Twitter
Advertisement

Faith, fervour and flagellation: The extreme lengths people go for piety

It's not just practitioners of Islam, but also Christians, Jains and others who go to extreme lengths for piety. Are they motivated by peer pressure or poor self-esteem?

Latest News
article-main
Shiite Muslims take part in a self-flagelation ritual during a religious procession
FacebookTwitterWhatsappLinkedin

Andheri resident Ahmed Ali Baig says the holy month of Muharram fills him with pious passion. From early childhood, this software engineer has joined those commemorating the martyrdom of the Prophet's family, flagellating themselves with chains to which sharp knives are attached (zanzeer zani) and cutting scalps (qama zani). "Such public mourning with self-injury is not merely a part of Shi'ism, it is for all practical purposes Shi'ism and defines who we are as a community," says the 32-year-old. Yet Baig doesn't really like the blood and gore involved. "I even buy packaged meat from malls to avoid the sight at a butcher's. So you can imagine how sick the bloodied faces and bodies leave me." Insisting there is no compulsion, he explains why he goes: "I feel it'll be morally wrong not to go when everyone goes."

Dr Rushaid Rizvi, a 64-year-old doctorate in Islamic Studies, too feels the flagellation in these gatherings is a matter of piety and devotion. "One wants to feel at least some of the pain that Hussain and his family felt at the Battle of Karbala," says the Bandra resident, a regular at the annual mourning. He tells us how injuries from the flagellation and scalp cutting are washed with rose water and covered with cloth moistened with the same.

Dr Rushaid Rizvi

In all these years, I've never come across anyone who developed any medical complications from such injuries."

Self-torture in other religions

Self-torture is not unique to Shi'ism (Shia beliefs) or Islam alone. Other Abrahamic precursor faiths like Judaism and Christianity too have a history of using torture for self-exploration and spiritual growth, self-sacrifice to Gods and the community or for atonement.

"While Judaism prescribed flagellation to 'cure people of offensive tendencies,' even making them believe this for their own good, Christianity has had a deeper association with flagellation because of what Jesus Christ endured before being crucified," says sociologist and cultural historian Dr Meghana Kashyap. "Such religious self-torture has been used by the Roman Catholic Church. There's enough evidence of this from the time the Eastern Orthodox and Catholic churches decided to go their own ways in 1054."

According to Dr Kashyap, many puritanical Christian monastic orders used a cattail whip of knotted cords called 'discipline' to flog themselves during private prayer.

Dr Meghana Kashyap , sociologist and cultural historian

Often this discipline was kept soaked in brine to increase its capacity to hurt.Forced into sexual abstinence as monks, many young ones undertook such extreme punishment to keep themselves from straying. In fact, Pope John Paul II kept such a disciplinary belt with his vestments in his closet for regular mortification. He also carried it with him when he travelled."

It is not as though ancient religions like Hinduism and Jainism don't have variations of such extreme self-torture, underlines Dr Kashyap. "Whether it's a young Shivaji cutting his finger to worship a shivlinga with blood or the Potraaj community whipping itself publicly to worship Goddess Kadaklakshmi while begging for alms or the walking/dancing on nails at Hindu shrines, these are all manifestations of the same process," she explains. "Jains follow such extremes as to self-tonsure, and other self-abnegations like Santhara or Sallekhana, in which a person forsakes food and drink, abstaining till death as was the case of 13-year-old Aradhana Samdariya, who died after fasting for 68 days during the period of Chaumasa."

Jain studies scholar Manish Yashodhar Modi rubbishes the equation of these practices with those of Abrahamic self-torture.

Manish Yashodhar Modi , Jain studies scholar

Despite outward similarity, Indian religions view self-control and penance as a means of transcending desire and achieving an elevated state of consciousness, free from anger, arrogance, artifice and avarice. There is no sorrow or anger involved and the precondition is to be in a state of calm and equanimity while practising penance," says Modi. "On the other hand, the Abrahamic religions see penance as a means of proving one's devotion and sometimes as an acceptance of the consequences of the sins committed by mankind. Penance and self-flagellation sometimes become expressions of boundless grief over past events."

Multiple motivations

Is there a psychological motivation to indulge in such acts? Yes, says Jamnagar-based senior psychiatrist Dr Bansilal Suwalka. "Generally people are motivated to maintain positive feelings and reduce negative ones, but sometimes there is an effort to maintain or increase the negative feelings," says Dr Suwalka. "This is often the case with individuals with poor self-esteem. Those with low self-esteem see feeling good as inconsistent with their negative self-views, since they don't feel they deserve to feel good."

He feels that people desiring suffering, who believe it will do them and the world around, good, can be driven not only by religion but even socio-political factors.  

Dr Bansilal Suwalka

The people who self-immolate to protest or the Mariamman worshippers who pierce themselves outside Apollo hospital for Tamil Nadu CM Jayalalitha's speedy recovery fall into this category."

Another psychiatrist, Dr Rajendra Barve, says the pressure of wanting to conform plays a very big role in participating in such acts. "It starts as peer pressure and before long descends into herd mentality and even mob frenzy where everyone's trying to externalise their pain and suffering to better the other."
Wonder if Ahmed Ali Baig will agree...

Find your daily dose of news & explainers in your WhatsApp. Stay updated, Stay informed-  Follow DNA on WhatsApp.
Advertisement

Live tv

Advertisement
Advertisement