Compiled by London Swaminathan
Post No. 907 Dated 14th March 2014.
It is a popular story known to most of the Asians because Hindu, Buddhist, Jain and Sufi poets sang about it. But not many people knew that is a story from Tirumantiram sung by the Tamil Siddha Tirumular. Even an English poem is written by an English poet about this anecdote.
A king sends six blind men to examine an elephant. Each one touches and feels only one part of the elephant’s body and jumps to a conclusion which is partly right and not the whole truth. One who felt
The leg thought it was a pillar
The belly thought it was a wall
The ear thought it was a fan/ winnowing pan
The tusk thought it was a snake or tree branch
The tail thought it was a rope
The tusk thought it was a solid pipe
The story changes slightly in each version. Tirumular was a North Indian who came to Tamil Nadu, probably from Kashmir, learnt Tamil and composed 3000 verses. It is included in the Saivite canon as Tenth Tirumurai. His poems are full of symbolism. Tirumandiram has lot of secrets about Yoga and Mantra Sastra. In one of his verses he also sang about six blind men feeling an elephant. He compared it to six sects outside the pale of Saivism.
According to him the blind man who felt the back thought it was a hill, tail a broom stick, tusk a tree stem, ear a winnowing pan trunk a pestle and leg a mortar. They quarrelled among themselves about what they thought it was. Six sects are fighting like this.
English poet John Godfrey Saxe (1816-1887) composed the following poem about this story:
It was six men of Indostan, to learning much inclined,
who went to see the elephant (Though all of them were blind),
that each by observation, might satisfy his mind.
The first approached the elephant, and, happening to fall,
against his broad and sturdy side, at once began to bawl:
‘God bless me! but the elephant, is nothing but a wall!’
The second feeling of the tusk, cried: ‘Ho! what have we here,
so very round and smooth and sharp? To me tis mighty clear,
this wonder of an elephant, is very like a spear!’
The third approached the animal, and, happening to take,
the squirming trunk within his hands, ‘I see,’ quoth he,
the elephant is very like a snake!’
The fourth reached out his eager hand, and felt about the knee:
‘What most this wondrous beast is like, is mighty plain,’ quoth he;
‘Tis clear enough the elephant is very like a tree.’
The fifth, who chanced to touch the ear, Said; ‘E’en the blindest man
can tell what this resembles most; Deny the fact who can,
This marvel of an elephant, is very like a fan!’
The sixth no sooner had begun, about the beast to grope,
than, seizing on the swinging tail, that fell within his scope,
‘I see,’ quothe he, ‘the elephant is very like a rope!’
And so these men of Indostan, disputed loud and long,
each in his own opinion, exceeding stiff and strong,
Though each was partly in the right, and all were in the wrong!
So, oft in theologic wars, the disputants, I ween,
tread on in utter ignorance, of what each other mean,
and prate about the elephant, not one of them has seen!
Sri Ramakrishna’s Chameleon Story
Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa, Guru of Swami Vivekananda, related another story to show the fallacy in such superficial differences through another example:
Two persons were hotly disputing over the colour of a chameleon. One said, “The chameleon on that palm tree is of a beautiful red colour”. The other contradicted him saying, “You are mistaken, the chameleon is not red, but blue.” Being unable to settle the matter through argument both went to a man who always lived under the tree and had watched the chameleon in all its phases. One of the disputants asked ,”Sir, is not the chameleon, on the tree, of a red colour?” the man replied ,”Yes,sir”. The other disputant said, “What do you say? How is that possible, Surely it is not red, but blue.” The man again humbly replied, “Yes, sir”. He man knew that the chameleon constantly changed its colour. So he said “Yes” to both the conflicting views. God who is Sat Chit Ananda- ( Existence-Knowledge-Bliss Absolute), has likewise various forms. The devotee who has seen God in only one aspect knows that and that aspect alone. None but who has seen him in manifold aspects can say .“ All these forms are of the one God, for God is multiform”. God is formless and with form, and many are his forms which no one knows about.
Why We Disagree: Swami Vivekananda
Swami Vivekananda expressed the somewhat a similar theme through his story Frog in the Well in the very second lecture in Chicago about 125 years ago:
I will tell you a little story. You have heard the eloquent speaker who has just finished say, “Let us cease from abusing each other,” and he was very sorry that there should be always so much variance.
But I think I should tell you a story that would illustrate the cause of this variance. A frog lived in a well. It had lived there for a long time. It was born there and brought up there, and yet was a little, small frog. Of course the evolutionists were not there then to tell us whether the frog lost its eyes or not but, for our story’s sake, we must take it for granted that it had its eyes, and that it every day cleansed the water of all the worms and bacilli that lived in it with an energy that would do credit to our modern bacteriologists. In this way it went on and became a little sleek and fat. Well, one day another frog that lived in the sea came and fell into the well.
“Where are you from?”
“I am from the sea.”
“The sea! How big is that? Is it as big as my well?” and he took a leap from one side of the well to the other.
“My friend,” said the frog of the sea, “how do you compare the sea with your little well?”
Then the frog took another leap and asked, “Is your sea so big?”
“What nonsense you speak, to compare the sea with your well!”
“Well, then,” said the frog of the well, “nothing can be bigger than my well. There can be nothing bigger than this. This fellow is a liar, so turn him out.”
That has been the difficulty all the while.
I am a Hindu. I am sitting in my own little well and thinking that the whole world is my little well. The Christians sit in their little well and think the whole world is their well. The Muslims sit in their little well and think that is the whole world. I have to thank you of America for the great attempt you are making to break down the barriers of this little world of ours, and hope that, in the future, the Lord will help you to accomplish your purpose.
Bharati on Cats
The greatest of the modern Tamil poets Subramanya Bharati gave the same message through his beautiful poem Tom Tom:
We have in our home
A pet, a white cat,
She gave birth to kittens
Each of a different hue.
Ash coloured was one kitty,
Jet black was another;
A third vivid like a viper;
Milky-white was a fourth.
Skin colours do vary
But they are of the same stock.
Can you call one colour superior
And another inferior?
Complexions may vary
But all men are one.
We are all uniformly human
In our thoughts and deeds.
Tamil References:
முதலொன்றாமான் ஆனை முதுகுடன் வாலும்
இதமுறு கொம்பு செவி துதிக்கை கான்
மதியுடன் அந்தகர் வகை வகை பார்த்தே
அதுகூறல் ஒக்கும் ஆறு சமயமே (திருமந்திரம்– 1507)
Bharati Poem
வெள்ளை நிறத்தொரு பூனை
எங்கள் வீட்டில் வளருது கண்டீர்
பிள்ளைகள் பெற்றதப் பூனை
அவை பேருக்கொரு நிறம் ஆகும்
சாம்பல் நிறத்தொரு குட்டி,
கரும் சாந்தின் நிறம் ஓரு குட்டி
பாம்பின் நிறமொரு குட்டி
வெள்ளை பாலின் நிறம் ஓரு குட்டி
எந்த நிறமிருந்தாலும்
அவை யாவும் ஓரே தரம் அன்றோ
இந்த நிறம் சிறிதென்றும்
இஃது ஏற்றம் என்றும் சொல்லலாமோ
வண்ணங்கள் வேற்றுமை பட்டால்
அதில் மானுடர் வேற்றுமை இல்லை
எண்ணங்கள் செய்கைகள் யாவும்
இங்கு யாவர்க்கும் ஒன்றென காணீர்!
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Tamil and Vedas 
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