Mahatma Gandhi on Snakes and worship of Serpent
Nonkilling of Snakes and Gandhi's belief in Unity and Oneness of all Creations
Young
Mohandas Gandhi was very much afraid of thieves, ghosts and serpents and
did not dare to move out of the house at night. On the other
hand we see his wife Kasturba was very courageous. In the course of
time, he could overcome these fears including serpent. There were
plenty of venomous snakes and reptiles in his community living
experiment premises in the Phoenix Settlement and the Tolstoy
Farm in South Africa. As a votary of ahimsa, his rule was not
to kill any one of them. With the help of Herman
Kallenbach, Gandhi could undertake study of snakes during his South
African days. He did not give up his interest in the study of
snakes even when he was busy with important works of national importance.
It is interesting to note that there is a chapter in a book viz.
Snake-Charmer . The title of the book is Bahuroope Gandhi written
by Anu Bandopadhyaya with a Foreword from Jawaharlal
Nehru. Gandhi himself admitted that he could not shed all
fear of snakes so as to befriend them. His ashrams in India whether
it is Sabarmati Ashram, Ahmedabad or Sevagram Ashram, Wardha all
were infested with snake those days.
In Sevagram
Ashram, Gandhi used to keep a snake cage and wooden scissors to catch
them. Govind Shende who was at Sevagram Ashram at a tender
age gives clues to who was catching the snakes at the Ashram.
Gandhi had assigned the responsibility for the same to Munnalal
Shah. In the words of Shende, “Munnalal ji used to catch
snakes and leave them in the nearby fields. The wife of Munnalalji viz.
Kanchenben was very much annoyed and unhappy for the said job. She had
feared that her husband may die one day while catching the snakes. It is a very
risky job. But she did not dare to argue or express her feelings to Bapuji”.The
snake cage and wooden scissors to catch snakes were preserved at Gandhi’s
office at Sevagram Ashram near Gandhi’s well known cottage Bapukuti . The
very design of snake cage with wire mesh and glass for sunlight shows
Gandhi's thoughtful thinking about all creations including venomous
snakes. Also the scissor was made of wood so that the snakes will not get
hurt.
Gandhi
believed in unity and oneness of all creations. He said "I believe in
advaita. I believe in the essential unity of man and for that matter of all
that lives." This unity and oneness of all
creations constitute the foundation of Gandhi's
relational world view.
His
very approach to nonkilling of snakes and philosophy of nonviolence
stems from this understanding. He even went to the extent of saying
that “I do not want to live at the cost of the life even of a snake.” It
was his implicit belief that snakes, tigers, etc., are God's answer to the
poisonous, wicked, evil thoughts we harbour and one should get rid of
such thoughts. He wrote in Young India “I believe that all life
is one. Thoughts take definite forms. Tigers and snakes have kinship with us.
They are a warning to us to avoid harbouring evil, wicked, lustful thoughts. If
I want to rid the earth of venomous beasts and reptiles, I must rid myself of
all venomous thoughts. I shall not do so if, in my impatient ignorance and in
my desire to prolong the existence of the body, I seek to kill the so-called
venomous beasts and reptiles. If in not seeking to defend myself against such
noxious animals I die, I should rise again a better and fuller man. With that
faith in me, how should I seek to kill a fellow-being in a snake? (YI, 14
- 4 -1927)
On the occasion of Nagpanchami on August 21, 2023 the residents and staff members assembled near agricultural field of the Ashram for a small meeting. Shri Jalandhar Nath, a resident of the ashram spoke on the occasion to remind all about the significance of snakes in the rural agrarian system. Smt . Ashben Bothra, President of Sevagram Ashram Pratishthan reminded the residents and staff that the snake cage in Sevagram Ashram is a reminder of Gandhi’s deep commitment to nonviolence. She stated that it is important to understand how Gandhi looked upon all these issues and the underlying philosophy. She suggested people should know about Gandhi’s thoughts on snakes and his scientific approach.
In his work A Guide to Health Gandhi wrote extensively about snakes while discussing about snake bites. The purpose of lengthy writing on snakes by Gandhi in this book was to get rid of foolish fears about it. Otherwise he would have limited it to merely prescribing cure for snake-bite. The following passage is culled out from the book to understand Gandhi's approach.
Gandhi wrote:
"There is no limit to the superstitions current among us in regard to snakes. From time immemorial we have cultivated a terrible fear of the snake; we even dread the very mention of its name. The Hindus worship the serpent, and have set apart a day in the year (Nagapanchami) for that purpose. They suppose that the earth is supported by the great serpent Sesha. God Vishnu is called Seshasayee, as he is supposed to sleep on the Serpent-God; and God Siva is supposed to have a garland of serpents round his neck! We say that such and such a thing cannot be described even by the thousand-tongued Adisesha, implying our belief in the snake’s knowledge and discretion. The serpent Karkotaka is said to have bitten King Nala and deformed him, so that he might not suffer any harm in the course of his wanderings. Such conceptions are also to be met with among the Christian nations of the West. In English a man is very often described to be as wise and cunning as a serpent. And in the Bible, Satan is said to have assumed the shape of a serpent in order to tempt Eve.
The real reason for the popular dread of snakes is obvious. If the snake’s poison should spread over the whole body, death must necessarily ensue; and since the idea of death is so dreadful to us, we dread the very name of a snake. Hence, our worship of the snake is really based on our fear. If the snake were a little creature, it would hardly be worshipped by us; but since it is a big creature, and a strangely fascinating one, it has come to be deified and worshipped.
The Western scientists of today hold that the snake is merely a creature of instinct, and it should be destroyed forthwith wherever found. From the official statistics, we gather that not less than 20,000 persons die every year in India of snake-bite alone. The destruction of every venomous snake is rewarded by the state, but it is really a question if the country has benefitted by it in any way. We find from experience that a snake never bites wantonly, but only as a retaliatory measure when it is molested in any way. Does this not bespeak its discretion, or at the least its innocence? The attempt to rid Hindustan, or any portion thereof, of snakes is as ridiculous and futile as trying to wrestle with the air. It may be possible to prevent snakes coming to a particular place by a systematic process of extermination, but this can never be done on a large scale. In a vast country like India, it would be an altogether foolish enterprise to try to avoid snake-bites by wholesale destruction of the snakes.
Let us never forget that the serpents have been created by the same God who created us and all other creatures. God’s ways are inscrutable, but we may rest assured that He did not create animals like the lion and the tiger, the serpent and the scorpion, in order to bring about the destruction of the human race. If the serpents were to meet in council and conclude that man has been created by God for their destruction, seeing that he generally destroys a snake wherever found, should we approve of their conclusion? Surely not. In the same way, we are wrong in regarding the serpent as a natural enemy of man.
The great St. Francis of Asissi, who used to roam about the forests, was not hurt by the serpents or the wild beasts, but they even lived on terms of intimacy with him. So too, thousands of Yogis and Fakirs live in the forests of Hindustan, amidst lions and tigers and serpents, but we never hear of their meeting death at the hands of these animals. It might, however, be contended that they must certainly be meeting their death in the forests, but that we do not hear of it, as we live so far away. Granted; but we cannot deny that the number of Yogis that live in the forests is nothing in comparison with that of the serpents and wild beasts, so that, if these animals were really the natural enemies of man, the whole race of Yogis and other dwellers in the forests should become very rapidly extinct, especially since they have no weapons with which to defend themselves against their attacks. But they have by no means become extinct, and we may conclude, therefore, that they have been allowed to live unmolested in the forests by the serpents and wild beasts. In fact, I have implicit faith in the doctrine that, so long as man is not inimical to the other creatures, they will not be inimical to him. Love is the greatest of the attributes of man. Without it the worship of God would be an empty nothing. It is, in short, the root of all religion whatsoever.
Besides, why should we not regard the cruelty of the serpents and the wild beasts as merely the product and reflection of man’s own nature? Are we any the less murderous than they? Are not our tongues as venomous as the serpent’s fangs? Do we not prey upon our innocent brethren much in the same way as lions and leopards? All scriptures proclaim that, when man becomes absolutely harmless, all the other animals will begin to live on terms of intimacy with him. When feuds and conflicts as fierce as that between the lion and the lamb are going on within our own breasts, is it any wonder that such things should go on in the external world? For, we are but the reflection of the world around us; all the features of the external world are found reflected in the inner world of our mind. When we change our nature, the world around should also inevitably change. Do we not find that the world assumes a totally different aspect to those individual men and women who change their own nature by strenuous self-discipline? This is the great mystery of God’s creation as well as the great secret of true happiness. Our happiness or otherwise rests entirely upon what we are; we have no need to depend on other people at all in this matter."
( Source : A Guide to Health by Mahatma Gandhi, Publisher:S. Ganesan, Madras,1921)
Gandhi's prescriptions for snake bite in this book is also significant even today. It shows the medical practitioner in Gandhi and his multifaceted personality. Sevagram Ashram availing the thoughts of Gandhi on the same on occasion of Nagpanchami.
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