Blind Men and an Elephant

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The story of the blind men and an elephant appears to have originated in India, but its original source is debated. It has been attributed to the Jainists, Buddhists, and sometimes to the Sufis or Hindus, and has been used by all those groups. The best-known version attributed to an individual in the modern day is the 19th Century poem by John Godfrey Saxe.

In various versions of the tale, a group of blind men (or men in the dark) touch an elephant to learn what it is like. Each one touches a different part, but only one part, such as the side or the tusk. They then compare notes on what they felt, and learn they are in complete disagreement. The story is used to indicate that reality may be viewed differently depending upon one's perspective.

Various versions are similar, and differ primarily in how the elephant's body parts are described, how violent the conflict becomes, and how (or if) the conflict among the men and their perspectives is resolved.

1 Jain
2 Buddhist
3 Sufi-Hindu
4 John Godfrey Saxe
5 Miscellany
6 References
7 See also
8 External links

[edit] Jain

A Jain version of the story says that six blind men were asked to determine what an elephant looked like by feeling different parts of the elephant's body.

The blind man who feels a leg says the elephant is like a pillar; the one who feels the tail says the elephant is like a rope; the one who feels the trunk says the elephant is liks a tree branch; the one who feels the ear says the elephant is like a hand fan; the one who feels the belly says the elephant is like a wall; and the one who feels the tusk says the elephant is like a solid pipe.

A wise man explains to them

All of you are right. The reason every one of you is telling it differently is because each one of you touched the different part of the elephant. So, actually the elephant has all the features you mentioned.^[1]

This resolves the conflict, and is used to illustrate the principle of living in harmony with people who have different belief systems, and that truth can be stated in different ways (in Jainist beliefs often said to be seven versions). This is known as the Syadvada, Anekantvad, or the theory of Manifold Predictions.^[1]

[edit] Buddhist

A Buddhist version is told in Jainism and Buddhism. Udana 68-69: Parable of the Blind Men and the Elephant. Buddha tells the story of a raja who had six blind men gathered together to examine the elephant.

"When the blind men had felt the elephant, the raja went to each of them and said to each, 'Well, blind man, have you seen the elephant? Tell me, what sort of thing is an elephant?'^[2]

They assert the elephant is like a pot (head), winnowing basket (ear), ploughshare (tusk), plough (trunk), grainery (body), pillar (foot), mortar (back), pestle (tail), or brush (tip of the tail).

The men come to blows, which delights the raja. The raja says:

O how they cling and wrangle, some who claim

For preacher and monk the honored name!

For, quarreling, each to his view they cling.

Such folk see only one side of a thing.^[2]

[edit] Sufi-Hindu

Mawlānā Jalāl ad-Dīn Muhammad Rūmī, popularly known in the English-speaking world as simply Rumi, was a 13th Century Persian poet, jurist, theologian and teacher of Sufism.

Rumi credits the tale to the Hindus in his telling of the story, "The Elephant in the Dark" from Tales from Masnavi. In this version, some Hindus bring an elephant to be exhibited in a dark room.

In a translation by A.J. Arberry, some men feel the elephant in the dark. Depending upon where they touch, 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 best.^[3]

Rumi doesn't 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: of 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.^[3]

[edit] John Godfrey Saxe

One of the most famous versions of the 19th Century was the poem "The Blind Men and the Elephant" by John Godfrey Saxe (1816-1887).

The poem begins

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^[4]

They conclude that the elephant is like a wall, snake, spear, tree, fan, or rope, depending upon where they touch. They have a heated debate that does not come to physical violence. But in Saxe's version, the conflict is never resolved.

Moral:

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!^[4]

[edit] Miscellany

American cartoonist Sam Gross published a book featuring the blind men and the elephant on the cover; however, one blind man was feeling a pile of elephant dung. The book was titled An Elephant is Soft and Mushy (ISBN 0-396-07823-0)