Porky: Ever’body got their own way of lookin’ at anything... Din’t you ever hear the story of the blind men an’ the elephant? ... Each one was partly right. Pogo: Yeah... an’ each was mostly wrong ... But you gotta remember each was all blind.
Instant Pogo by Walt Kelly
included in Walt Kelly’s Pogo Revisited
I don’t have to explain how this parable expounds self, do I?
Tittha Sutta
The scripture is about some monks (Bhikkhus) who hear some ascetic Hindus in lively argumentation about whether the world is eternal or not, infinite or not, whether the soul is separate from the body or not. They then consulted the The Buddha who taught them the parable of the blind men and the elephant:[5]
A king has taken an elephant to his palace and asks the city's blind men to examine it. When the men felt each part of the elephant, the king asked them, each one, to describe what an elephant is. One man has felt the elephant's head and describes it as a pot, another has felt it on the ear and describes it as a basket or a sieve. Someone has felt the pastures and describes a plow beetle and someone has felt the legs and talks about tree trunks.
They have all experienced the elephant in different ways and can not agree on what an elephant is. Their conclusions are completely different and they end up in a heated dispute. The moral of the matter is that it is a waste of time and energy to determine what it is you are experiencing, as this will necessarily be different.
There are many versions of this parable, which has been taken into Hinduism, Buddhism, and Jainism.
The wise man calmly explained to them, "All of you are right. The reason every one of you is telling it differently because each one of you touched the different part of the elephant. So, actually the elephant has all those features what you all said."
"Oh!" everyone said. There was no more fight. They felt happy that they were all right.
The moral of the story is that there may be some truth to what someone says. Sometimes we can see that truth and sometimes not because they may have different perspective which we may not agree too. So, rather than arguing like the blind men, we should say, "Maybe you have your reasons." This way we don’t get in arguments. In Jainism, it is explained that truth can be stated in seven different ways. So, you can see how broad our religion is. It teaches us to be tolerant towards others for their viewpoints. This allows us to live in harmony with the people of different thinking. This is known as the Syadvada, Anekantvad, or the theory of Manifold Predictions.
There is also a Sufi version.
Rumi, the 13th Century Persian poet and teacher of Sufism, included it in his Masnavi. In his retelling, "The Elephant in the Dark", some Hindus bring an elephant to be exhibited in a dark room. A number of men touch and feel the elephant in the dark and, depending upon where they touch it, they believe the elephant to be like a water spout (trunk), a fan (ear), a pillar (leg) and a throne (back). Rumi uses this story as an example of the limits of individual perception:
The sensual eye is just like the palm of the hand. The palm has not the means of covering the whole of the beast.[16]
Rumi does not present a resolution to the conflict in his version, but states:
The eye of the Sea is one thing and the foam another. Let the foam go, and gaze with the eye of the Sea. Day and night foam-flecks are flung from the sea: oh amazing! You behold the foam but not the Sea. We are like boats dashing together; our eyes are darkened, yet we are in clear water.[16]
Rumi ends his poem by stating "If each had a candle and they went in together the differences would disappear."
It is also applied in such disparate realms as politics and physics.
The best that most physicists can hope for is to misunderstand at a deeper level.
Wolfgang Pauli
Newton, for example, explained that gravitation is very like a force, but then Einstein explained that it isn’t. General Relativity is one of the most accurate physical theories ever, but at some point it and Quantum Mechanics will have to be replaced by some sort of Quantum Gravity, which is expected to be very like nothing anyone has ever thought of.
Your Koans
- Can you say, “I could be wrong”?
- Can you refrain from arguing with people who think you are stupid and evil for not believing in their elephant?
- Can you wish them maximum good?
- Can you befriend them?
Poem
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
- Side—Wall!
- Tusk—Spear
- Trunk—Snake
- Knee—Tree
- Ear—Fan
- Tail—"I see," quoth he, "the Elephant Is very like a rope!"
So oft in theologic wars, The disputants, I ween, Rail on in utter ignorance Of what each other mean, And prate about an Elephant Not one of them has seen!
John Godfrey Saxe
The Blind Men and the Elephant
The Bible is one of the greatest elephants known to humanity.
This is not a hoax
Religion is, of course, one of the seven mountains of culture that NAR [New Apostolic Reformation] seeks to conquer to achieve Christian dominion (the other six being government, family, education, business, media, and arts & entertainment).
Do you see what parts of culture they missed, and what parts of each of their mountains?