The Bhakt Prahlad myth and the bogus Bhakti testimonial

  
Since the Indian festival Holi is just round the corner, one could not help turning the critical lens on some aspects of its association with Puranic myths about Prahlad and Holika.

That is Holika bursting into flames

Of course Holi has very little to do with Bhakti and if conducted with propriety and good sense, can be a source of great enjoyment, revelry and social interaction.

But Hindus have to spoil it all by harking back to its origins in the absurdities of the Puranas and making out a case for seeking devotion even in plain good old fun. Then surely they have to celebrate the triumph of good over evil even if that happened only the 'golden past' (once upon a time) and that too in the cooked up stories of the Puranas.

Oops! This is not even in the original script, but that is Prahlad in boiling water or is it milk?

The story of Prahlad has been attributed to the Vishnu Purana and the Bhagvata Purana. And who knows in how many more Puranas this broken record of a story has been copy-pasted into. But for now let us stay with Vishnu Purana and Bhagavata Purana as the originators of this cock-and-bull story.

But why should critics bother about this absurd fairy tale of a devotee of Vishnu? (Fairy tales are supposed to be absurd, but Puranic fairy tales test the extreme limits of absurdity).

Because there are elements in that tale whose belief in the stock Hindu and its abuse by the clerics and evangelical intelligentsia as a testimonial of devotional acme, that boggle the progressive mind and raise disturbing questions about the very idea of belief and its manipulations.

Whenever you find or see references to the Prahlad story, it is invariably qualified as a myth or a legend. But one is not really sure if majority of the Hindus take this tale to be only a myth or legend.

Also in the Indian cultural context, it is hard to determine what is the true connotation of a myth or legend. In the west, legend is taken to mean something of doubtful authenticity or historicity. 

But it seems like in the Indian cultural context this meaning somehow implies something of very ancient origin or anonymous authorship or indeterminate source or period or time. It appears to satisfy average Indian credulity to suppose or assume that events like the Ramayana episodes or the Mahabharata war may or could have happened in some remote past without the need for any specifics. 

The need to inquire into the specificity of these 'supposed' events is considered futile by or may not even occur to the average Indian believer.

The general cultural inability or rather lack of effort to make a conscious distinction between History and myth is a major problem that confronts any attempt to critically examine the details of myths such as these.

But still try we must. So mindful of these landmines of mass cultural cognitive dissonance, we will probe the chinks in the devotional armor of 'Bhakt Prahlad'. 

So the Hindu devotional cognoscenti holds up Prahlad as a paragon of devotion to Vishnu. In fact one could say the Prahlad is Bhakti Yoga's leading testimonial and role model.

Hindu theologians perhaps knew that devotional frenzy is no mean feat and is a thankless virtue. However credulous the religious lambs maybe, they still need sweeteners and bribes to be led towards the slaughter house of devotional mania. So imaginary assurances have to be provided to such sacrificial lambs that there is glory in the hallucinatory world of devotional piety and that a Vishnu or a Shiva or an Amba is their bodyguard and that these merchants of salvation will keep their word and listen to their prayers. What better way to rescue the rigmarole and futility of Bhakti than to cook up a story of a unlikely devotee like Prahlad being rescued and blessed by an even more mythical Vishnu donning the costume of the man-lion (Narasimha). That is a 2-minute avatar of a Dashavaratic Vishnu.

 Let us look at some other mind-boggling elements of the Prahlad myth:

• Prahlad was not just a Vishnu devotee but also a Vishnu devotion evangelist since devotion to Vishnu was tutored to him by the celestial mischief monger Narada while he was still a fetus in the womb of his mother who was kidnapped by Indra. (This is the pseudo-science of pre-natal or fetal intelligence for you. A similar example is found in the Mahabharata too where Abhimanyu learnt war-craft from Arjuna while he was in Subhadra's womb.)  

•  Prahlad was poisoned by his father, yet survived the poisoning without any problem

•  Weapons were thrown at Prahlad in order to kill him, yet he survived without even a scratch on his body 

•  Elephants were set after Prahlad to trample him to death, yet those elephants could not kill him

•  Prahlad was taken to the top of a mountain and pushed/thrown from there and still survived the fall

•  Prahlad's aunt called Holika who had the power of spontaneous combustibility (that is paranormality for you) tried to consume him in her fire, yet instead of killing him, ended up being consumed by her own fire. 

•  Last not least, Vishnu wearing a Narasimha clown costume hiding in a pillar closet breaks thru the suffocating barrier to make a mince-meat of Hiryankashipu ( For those who wish to know the finer details, Vishnu got over the smart-ass boon of Hiryankashipu with his own smart-ass technicalities of the twilight, lapping his adversary and of course the Narasimha (half man half lion) masterstoke of fright-night genius).

Can any sensible person believe any of this crazy stuff. One has to wonder whether Hiryankashipu was really serious in his intent to get rid of his son.  

Elephants that cannot trample a kid or a poison that is not fatal or venomous snakes that would not bite or constrict or a body that survives a fall from a mountain-top or fantasy creatures breaking out of pillars!!!. 

This cannot be our world and laws of physics and bodies that we observe and know. The Purana tells us that it was all due to Prahlad's devotion and the grace of Vishnu. Really!!! You have got to tell it to the birds. It is doubtful if even birds would believe this kind of utterly nonsensical fantasy. 

Common sense would term these as miracles that violate the known and observed laws of nature. It would take more than devotion to move mountains or alter the state of the world and the phenomenon of which we are a part. 

And what is the evidence for these extraordinary claims of devotional super naturalism and phenomenal rescues. Beyond the written or narrative word or legacy of the Purana itself, very little evidence exists to back up these tall claims. And the Hindus don't even know or care to know who wrote their Puranas and what basis and evidence they used when they made these incredible statements and claims. Anonymous claims and statements are glibly believed by the masses just because the Puranas sound holy and have a 'divine' cast of characters.

One cannot doubt that this Puranic fantasy could have some real world implications in a superstition-ridden  Indian society and culture. Evangelists and story-tellers glibly exhort the religious and the devout to be like a Prahlad or Gajendra or Markandeya, hardly caring that these are all fictions manufactured by the Puranas. And the devout do lap it up and waste their time and life in the useless rituals of devotion and prayers.

If Prahalad's 'adventure' that makes a mockery of common sense, the repetitive, known and observed patterns and mechanics of an operating world and universe and all known and emerging knowledge of phenomenon, is a testimony of devotion and its wonders, all one can say is that it is a completely bogus testimonial. 

One would have reluctantly given some benefit of doubt if these stories are narrated to children and confined to just that. But the saga of Prahalad (Prahalada Charitam) is the staple of devotional congregations of adults in many places and cities. 

I am really curious to know the stock Indian adult reaction to the recitation of fairy tales like these. How do they rationalize this and convince themselves that there is any sense or message in these trivialities?. 

What about the standard escape clause of the 'intellectual' types that these tales are allegorical!!

Now what are they allegorical of?. What is allegorical about a half-man and half-lion character? That we have the animal and the human in us??!! And what is so philosophical and deep about that?. 

Then what is so allegorical about a crocodile clutching the elephant Gajendra's feet and being rescued by Vishnu's flying discus?  That we all need divine grace and have to beg for and shed crocodile tears of devotion for it!!

This allegory wild-goose chase is endless and a trap in which the argument with the superstitious goes nowhere.

Evangelists like Murari Bapu and assorted Babas and Swamis address NRI crowds in Temples and event halls with the absurd tales of the Puranas and the epics including the Prahlad myth. Do these 'educated' and 'urbane' NRI's really believe these kinds of grandma's bedtime stories that they really go to listen to these at weekend prime-time donating top dollars to fund this nonsensical extravaganza. 

Today's children will laugh at these absurdities, but this is all high philosophy and esoteric spirituality to the 'learned' and 'certified' and 'credentialed' adults.

One is really at a loss for explanations and theories to account for this!!! Seems like a never ending puzzle!!