We often hear stories of dervishes who wore shabby clothes and endured strenuous practices such as cutting off water and food, hoping to receive God's revelation and true meaning and God's favor.
We respect this religious belief, but we are also filled with the curiosity of "**truth" about some of these "bizarre and outlandish" things, for example,
Chinese often joke about themselves, and their ancestors' beliefs were extremely pragmatic. If you pray to the gods and receive good results, you will mold a golden body and build a temple for them; If the gods do not manifest themselves, no one wants to go to worship.
However, our immediate neighbour India is very different from us, they are extremely religious, deeply believe in the gods, and even practice asceticism for the sake of the gods, who are often revered as ascetics.
In India, ascetics have existed for thousands of years seeking spiritual liberation by reducing material life to a minimum. According to statistics, there are still 4 million to 5 million ascetics in India, accounting for 0 percent of the country's population5%。
Most of them are poor, but some are middle-class or aristocratic. Regardless of their past status, after becoming ascetics, they would leave their hometowns and loved ones with simple luggage and enter deep mountains or temples for arduous spiritual practice.
The ascetic practice is to endure unimaginable suffering, they are unclothed, only the most intimate parts are covered, and most of them endure prolonged fasting and water cuts as a way to "exercise their bodies".
Dervishes develop their endurance and perseverance through a variety of unique practices. Some people choose to lie on a bed full of nails, and some people smear the ashes of the dead to increase the pain and improve their ability to endure the pain.
The Amal ascetic practice is to raise his arms high for more than 50 years, even if his arms are severely atrophied. In addition, many dervishes practice yoga, which they believe stimulates and mobilizes the potential in the body and improves concentration.
It is said that some dervishes can beat two drums at different rhythms at the same time, which is comparable to "drawing a square with the left hand and a circle with the right hand".
The reason they chose asceticism was to pursue a shortcut to heaven. Hinduism believes that one needs to go through many reincarnations to reach heaven, and through austerity, one can receive God's favor in this life.
Ascetics are highly revered among Hindus because they are believed to be able to communicate with the gods. However, if an ascetic's practice is too bizarre, people will also be suspicious.
For example, a 91-year-old dervishe's claim that he had not eaten for 78 years and drank only one glass of warm water a day naturally attracted widespread attention and controversy.
Piralad Jeni, a mystical dervish known to the world as the "Survivor of Spiritual Power". It is said that he was born in a small village in the Indian state of Gujarat, and unlike other dervishes who went out in middle age, Jeni began living in seclusion in the mountains of the western Indian state of Rajasthan at the age of eight.
And since the age of 13, he has never eaten any food. However, Jenny does not believe that he survives entirely on mental strength, believing that it is the blessing of the goddess that allows him to do so.
Jenny claimed that there was a mysterious hole in his palate that allowed the goddess to provide him with a constant supply of the elixir of life, so that he could spend decades without eating or drinking.
He was grateful for the help of an Indian doctor who specialized in supernatural powers and allowed him to live a normal life for many years. This human miracle that can survive normally without eating for more than 70 years has attracted widespread attention after the ** report.
Scientific research suggests that a normal person can survive for about 50 days without eating, but may not survive for more than 4 days if they don't even drink water. It is worth mentioning that India** pointed out that the previous record for the longest "hunger strike" of mankind was the "74-day hunger strike**" set by McSweeney during the Irish War of Independence.
Regardless of whether Jeni's act is a "bigu", there should be a clear limit, because according to domestic records, the longest practice of bigu was created by a Jain named Sri Mahajla, who insisted on drinking a glass of warm water every day for a year and did not feel hungry or thirsty.
This suggests that dedicating ourselves to one thing can help us overcome hunger and thirst. Therefore, while Bigu is a healthy behavior that deserves respect, we still need to do it within a safe and healthy environment.
Although "preoccupied" helps to temporarily relieve hunger and fatigue, not eating for more than 70 years has exceeded human imagination. Indians expressed curiosity about the authenticity of the matter, and many began to ask if Jenny could be imitated.
The incident quickly attracted widespread attention, and even Indian officials were involved. **According to the report, India's Ministry of Defense listed Jenny as a "key research object" in 2010, hoping to draw inspiration from it.
Under the authority of Jenny, the Indian Ministry of Defence intervened in the matter. On April 22, 2010, India's Ministry of Defence sent a car to pick up Jeni and take him to a hospital called Sterling in Ahmedabad district, Gujarat, where he was admitted to a hospital with no blind spots"Special care room"。
Cameras in this special care room operate 24 hours a day, monitoring all of Jenny's activities to make sure he really doesn't eat or drink. If Jenny needs to leave the care room, he will be accompanied and filmed on track.
Under the close supervision of more than 30 experts, Jenny did not eat a drop of water or rice for 6 days, but his physical function remained normal, he showed no signs of hunger or dehydration, and he was in good spirits.
On May 9, the Ministry of Defense concluded his quarantine observation of Jenny, and although no official report was issued, no adverse effects of muscle atrophy, severe dehydration, or organ failure were found in the actual observation.
Ilavazahagen, the researcher who participated in the observation, said that although he could not be sure whether Jenny's claims were true, he did not eat, drink or defecate during the observation period, making it more likely that Jenny's previous claims were true.
This is not the first time Jenny has been placed under quarantine observation. In 2003, he was quarantined for 10 days in the same hospital, where researchers provided him with only 100 milliliters of water to rinse his mouth and asked him to spit it out back into a measuring cup to detect whether he had drunk it secretly.
The study showed that despite a slight weight loss, Jenny did not experience other abnormalities during the quarantine. Doctors also found urine formed in Jenny's bladder during quarantine, but it was later reabsorbed, so he did not excrete it.
Despite the two quarantine observations, neither Indian doctors nor the Ministry of Defence seem to be reluctant to say much on the matter. They seem to confirm some facts, but do not give a definitive conclusion as to whether the legend of 70 years of not eating or drinking is true.
Some speculate that the Indian side may not have fully grasped the essence of the matter, fearing that the public's blind imitation will lead to chaos, but beyond that, there seems to be a hidden "deep intention" of Indian researchers.
Dr. Ravazagan, who heads a research institute, said that if Jenny's remarks are true, they hope to learn from the incident and find answers to how humans can sustain life in situations of extreme food scarcity or non-food.
This discovery will change our perception of human survivability, allowing us to be most protected from natural disasters or harsh environments, allowing soldiers to hold out longer in the absence of food, and possibly even solving food problems in space exploration, such as surviving on planets such as the moon and Mars.
It has always been questionable whether humanity will benefit from this. As time went on, there was a growing suspicion that Jenny might have used some tactics to evade surveillance and eat and drink privately.
There are even netizens who firmly believe that Jenny is there after the monitoring ** during Jenny's quarantine was made public"Wipe your nose"When he ate secretly, all this was just one of his parts"**", made for the sake of fame.
However, all of these speculations have not been confirmed, and we can't simply assume that Jenny is a **. After all, going without eating or drinking for more than 70 years is far beyond the imagination of ordinary people, so it is understandable to be questioned.
Until the evidence emerges, we can only see this as an anecdote and listen to it for the time being.
While asceticism is a manifestation of the devotion of Hindu believers, as society progresses, we may need to gradually abandon this overly extreme form of practice. Superstition over science is a step backwards in modern society, and if people use their will and endurance to build the nation and improve their lives, then India's national economy will surely be significantly improved.
Buddhism, another major religion in India, does not approve of this extreme form of asceticism. Although Buddhism also has asceticism, this "suffering" is relative to worldly happiness, and Buddhists give up material desires in order to practice diligently and realize selflessness.
In Buddhism, the ascetic practice of ascetics is not regarded as a "holy path", but as "self-grasping", "unbeneficial" and "lowly karma". While spiritual practice is worth advocating, extreme penance in modern society does not seem necessary.
According to some scholars, asceticism was originally done in opposition to the caste system and in pursuit of equality, but now "asceticism" for the sake of "asceticism" alone does not seem necessary.
Even in Hinduism, "asceticism" is considered a shortcut, but in reality, there are not so many shortcuts in life, many shortcuts can be crooked, and hoping for "shortcuts" to benefit humanity seems even more unlikely.