Copyright © 2001 by Michael Segers, All rights reserved
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The
Largest Number of Human Beings
Pardon the pushing and
shoving, but this week, we’re looking at what The Guinness Book of Records
calls "the largest number of human beings to ever assemble with a common
purpose, in the entire history of mankind." Nope, it’s not a meeting of
the Rovin’ and Ravin’ Fan Club but instead the Kumbh Mela (or Kumha Mela—the
different spellings can short circuit the search engines), a Hindu religious
festival occurring every year, but with a special commemoration, the Maha (or
great) Kumbh Mela, every twelve years. This year, the great festival runs in
Allahabad, India, from January 9th through February 21st,
dates selected by astrologers as being especially auspicious.
Over 5000 ashrams (Hindu
religious communities) are represented, as thousands of teachers, monks and
other holy men join millions of pilgrims (this year, it is predicted, some
thirty million) to wash away their sins in the Ganges River. The festival
commemorates the time the god Vishnu saved the elixer of life in a pot which
some lesser gods carried, resting at Allahabad and three other holy cities, at
each of which a drop of the elixer was spilled. It is only at those cities that
the festival is held, and only at Allahabad that the great festival is held, of
which a written account from the seventh century, A.D., survives.
The festival once attracted
Mark Twain. Today, it attracts various jet-set curiosity seekers, as well as
devout Hindus, especially attracting teachers and leaders from the forests, the
mountains, the small towns, and the large cities, from throughout the fabric of
life in India. Some come with absolutely nothing, not even clothes, the
"sky-clad." Others come with chauffeurs and security guards. Vendors
and reporters are everywhere.
Hindus of all varieties of
sects and beliefs attend to participate in various rituals and to observe the
extreme practices of some of the sadhus (holy men). This year, the festival also
attracted two foreign women who stripped to join the ritual bathing... and were
arrested. It is said that miracles occur, and even devout Hindus agree that it
is quite a miracle to bathe in the heavily polluted sacred rivers without
getting sick.
So, what does this have to
do with life in Sylvester? It just shows, once again, how lucky we are to have
our free-net, which opens up such exotic corners of the world to us. By visiting
the official website Kumbh
Mela 2001, we can
join the millions of participants, without having to worry about finding a hotel
room. The Kumbh Mela Project offers an experience of the festival ranging from Mark
Twain to multimedia.
My favorite Kumbh Mela site
is the Zenzibar Special Report: Kumbha Mela 2001 Zenzibar
Special Report: Kumbh Mela 2001.
There is a correspondent who uploads photos and reports from the Allahabad
internet infrastructure—one server for the whole town and, at the internet
cafe he is posting from, one 33k modem hooked to several computers. You can also
go back in time to experience in video and images the 1989 Kumbh Mela, the last one, which had only some fifteen million
participants.
As exotic as Hinduism
seems, it has had an ongoing fascination for Americans, from Henry David Thoreau
to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., to the recent film,
The Legend of Bagger
Vance, which set the story of the Bhagavad
Gita on a golf
course in Savannah. For many years, the Vedanta
Society has
provided an outpost of Hindu philosophy, pretty much stripped of its cultural
aspects, in southern California. Christopher Isherwood (best known for his
autobiography, upon which the musical Cabaret was based) and Aldous
Huxley (Brave New World) were among its early supporters. Of course,
faithful readers know that my motto is, "When in doubt, ask About."
And, once again, the About.com network comes through, with a rich site About Hinduism.
Our great Georgia author, Flannery O’Connor, a devout Roman Catholic who suffered from lupus for many years, was once offered a round trip to Lourdes, to bathe in its waters, sacred to Roman Catholics, in hopes of receiving a miraculous cure. She declined, saying that she was the kind of Catholic who would do anything for her faith... except take a bath. Water and bathing figure in the rituals of many world religions. In the mysterious nature of water, people from many times and cultures have seen images of mysterious aspects of our nature. So, my frequent admonitions that you keep your feet dry and year heart full of noble thoughts are tempered by the realization that sometimes, we all must wash our feet... and our hearts.
Religiously Rovin': Internet Pilgrimages