If your God was going to drop down from the heavens for a stroll around your town, what form do you think he or she would choose? A turtle, perhaps?
According to Reuters:
Hundreds of poor Hindu villagers in eastern India have refused to hand over a rare turtle to authorities, saying it is an incarnation of God, officials said on Tuesday. Villagers chanting hymns and carrying garlands, bowls of rice and fruits are pouring in from remote villages to a temple in Kendrapara, a coastal district in eastern Orissa state.
Police have been trying to take the animal from the villagers since it’s actually illegal to harbor this rare turtle. (Note: That’s not a picture of the turtle to the left. The exact species isn’t clear from news reports.) The villagers are saying the turtle has holy symbols on its shell and is really an incarnation of Lord Jagannath, a popular Hindu deity.
Let us all pray to Jagannath that this doesn’t devolve into an Elian Gonzalez-type situation, with Indian authorities barging in to grab a confused reptile…
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Image: flickr / Rennett Stowe
November 12th, 2009 at 1:18 pm
Though Discover has made this story another act of weirdness of Hinduism, it is this type of tolerance and more importantly the respect of all life that has saved the Asian lion from extinction as it only resides in India. Once this cat roamed from Iran to China and now exists in the Gir forest of India.
Such respect for life at this level is not found in other so called “civilized socities” who would have made a soup out of this turtle. Congrajulations to the deep respect Hinduism embodies towards other forms of life.
November 12th, 2009 at 5:54 pm
There’s a picture of the turtle at the Reuters link. It’s not a sea turtle of any kind, it’s a (freshwater) trionychid (softshell), almost certainly Aspideretes gangeticus.
November 13th, 2009 at 10:34 am
Thanks for sharing your expertise, Sven! I’ll edit the post accordingly.