Nine Lives(16)

I asked: “Is it that the theyyam stories provide inspiration?”

“Certainly,” replied Hari Das. “Many of the theyyam stories mock the Brahmins and the Nairs. They criticise them for the way they treat their fellow human beings, especially us Dalits. Let me tell you one story of the deity known as Pottan Devam. Our ancestors turned it into one of the most popular of all theyyams, the Pottan Theyyam, and used it to show the Brahmins that they couldn’t just treat us like dirt.”

By this stage, the entire well-building team had emerged from the hole in the ground, many carrying baskets of stone and mud, and were sitting around on the ground, axes and buckets to one side, listening to what Hari Das had to say.

“One day,” he continued, “according to the story of the Pottan Theyyam, the great god Shiva wanted to teach the Brahmins a lesson. He wanted them to stop being so proud and chose a very clever way to achieve this. He decided to humiliate the highest and cleverest of all the Brahmins of Kerala, the great saint and teacher Adi Shankacharya. This was a man who was very near to Enlightenment, a great saint, but who was held back from achieving Nirvana by his own arrogant pride, and his refusal to see the common humanity he shared with all men, whether high or low in rank.

“So one day, to teach him a lesson, to clear his mind of these notions and unseat him from his pedestal of pride, Lord Shiva and his wife Parvati played a joke on him and took the form of a poor landless Pullaya [Dalit] couple, and their son Nandikesan accompanied them. They were dressed like day labourers—rather like I am now—covered in dirt and mud from the fields. Worse still, Lord Shiva made himself smell of meat and drink, and swayed around as if he had spent the whole night drinking toddy. To complete the effect, he placed a great pitcher of toddy under his arm, and in his right hand he held a half coconut shell which he used to drink the spirit.

“In this state, they came across Adi Shankacharya just as the saint was crossing the narrow causeway that led across a paddy field. In Keralan society, it was always the rule that Pullaya and other low-caste persons should jump in the mud of the paddy rather than obstruct the path of a Brahmin, but in this case Lord Shiva and his family kept heading straight for Shankacharya, lurching drunkenly from side to side as he did so, and asking the old man who was coming towards them to move aside.

“Shankacharya of course was furious, and berated the three of them. How dare a family of polluted, stinking, drunken, meat-eating untouchables cross the path of a pure and unpolluted Brahmin? ‘You smell as if you have never taken a bath in your entire life,’ he shouted. Such a thing had never happened before. If they didn’t all step down off the causeway, immediately, Shankacharya said he would make sure that all three Pullayas were beheaded—this crime, he said, not even a god could forgive.

“Lord Shiva swayed around, and said, ‘All right, I admit I have had a drink or two. And it’s certainly been a while since I last had a bath. But your Honour, please: if I am to get down from this causeway maybe you could first explain to me what is the real difference between you—a fine, high Brahmin, as you say—and my family here, who you tell me are so unclean and filthy? You have asked me a question, now answer some questions of mine. Answer these questions satisfactorily and I promise you I will happily get down into the mud, and tell my wife and son to do likewise.

“‘This is my first question: if I cut my hand and you cut yours, we both have red blood. Maybe you would like to tell me what the difference is, if any? Secondly, we eat the same rice, do we not, and from the same fields? Thirdly, do you not use the bananas my caste grows to offer to your gods? Fourthly, do you not use the flower garlands our women make to dress your deities? And fifthly, does not the water you drink and use in your temple rituals come from the wells that we Pullayas toil to build?’

“Shankacharya could not reply to these questions, and seeing his stupefied silence, Lord Shiva asked him more questions, and continued to berate him. ‘Just because you use beautiful metal dishes to eat your food upon, and we use plantain leaves and cups of betel leaf, does this mean we are not the same species? You Namboodiris may ride on elephants while we ride on the backs of bullocks, but does that make us bullocks too?’

“This relentless questioning not only confounded Shankacharya, it also made him wonder how it could be that an illiterate, ill-educated Dalit could ask such sophisticated and penetrating philosophical questions. So Shankacharya began to meditate, even as he stood there on the causeway of the rice field. Then his sixth sense opened and instead of the Pullaya and his family, he dimly began to perceive Lord Shiva, the Devi Parvati and their son Nandikesan. Shankacharya was horrified at what he had done, and there and then he jumped into the mud of the rice paddy and prostrated himself before his lord, reciting a series of slokas in his praise: