Lord Shiva’s New Avatar: A Pumpkin!

Just this morning, I opened a news site and this is what I found.

A pumpkin wholesaler in Bokaro found an unusually large pumpkin in his stock, one unlike any he had ever seen before. What conclusion did he draw (as if there was a need for a conclusion)? Large pumpkin, oval shape.. what else is oval shaped? Shivalinga. That belongs to? Lord Shiva. Hence, the pumpkin is an avatar of Lord Shiva. See? It’s that simple. That is how you go from not knowing to knowing certainly. (Sherlock Holmes would be proud of that science of deduction).

Well, the man worshiped the pumpkin and offered it sweets, which I am positive the pumpkin refused to eat.

The news of the divine pumpkin spread like wildfire and people are flocking to the town to get a glimpse of it. Someone offered to buy the pumpkin for Rupees 5001, but the man refused to sell. After consulting with a priest, it has been decided that the pumpkin will be worshiped for a few days after which it will be cut open and distributed to devotees as prasad.

There is nothing new and noteworthy in this piece of news. It happens everyday in places where education and enlightenment has failed to reach. But what I really do want to point out in this blog is that never on such occasions has a priest or a religious group ever come forward to say that not everything that one suspects to be divine may be so. They always agree with each other! Whatever bullshit one may think up, the clergies will never ever deny it.

Why would a god come down as a pumpkin? Is it because he wants to mess with people’s minds? Or will people believe just about anything under the sun if anyone relates it to religion? Why no skepticism at all?

Is belief a blanket phenomenon that makes you believe “everything” unquestioningly? I mean, tomorrow if I start jumping up and down saying another Lord XYZ came in my dream and told me he is coming as a Pizza the next day, will the same people believe me and start ripping pizza joints all over the country?

I really would like to see at least one priest come out and say the pumpkin is not Lord Shiva because there is no reason why the god must come down as a pumpkin. A giant fruit is just that – a giant fruit.

Come on guys, have I overreacted? Don’t people take their beliefs so seriously as to make them look stupid? Isn’t unquestioning belief a double edged sword that undermines that which it claims to uphold?

Imagine, a dogmatic physicist claiming that since such a giant fruit has never been seen before, it must have come through a wormhole from another parallel universe?