Deliberations With Devdutt

Never-Complete and Ever-Changing Truths

- Devdutt Pattanaik

All our lives we have been told the story of six blind men and the elephant. We are told how these men felt different parts of the elephant and assumed what they were holding was a rope (tail of the elephant), winnowing basket (ear), the pillar (foot), a branch of a tree (trunk), wall (body), and plough (tusk).

The question to be asked is: who sees the reality of the elephant? Who is this Mr. Know-itAll? Is it the Guru, the prophet, the holy man in saffron robes, the man in the pulpit, the evangelist, the teacher, the leader, the king, the priest, the father, the mother? How can we be sure we are not being lied to? Or are being asked to abandon our own experiences in favor of someone else’s knowledge? This can only lead to exploitation.

This story originated to explain the Jain concepts of Anekanta-Vada (doctrine of multiple realities) and