Shitala Satam - Religious fevour

Thinking activity

Religious fervor and "A tale of tub"

This blog is a thinking activity given by kavisha ma'am, Department of English, mkbu. In this blog i am going to discuss the festival "shitala satam" and describe what is science and myth behind this festival.

Here is blog of  Dilip Barad sir on the topic- Shitala satam- Religion vs Science , inclulation vs vaccination, non acceptance of intellectuals.

Dr.Dilip barad sir's blog

and here is blog of Kavish ma'am on the topic-

"Shitala satam blind faith vs Reasonable daubts.

Click here

Shitala satam

In India people celebrate many festivals. Each and every month, year. In India there are many religions and we all live together. Many people blindly believe in religion and follow their rituals without knowing the science behind it. One of the festivals is shitala satam.

Shitala satam is also known as shitala saptami, and this festival is dedicated to goddess shitala sheetala which is also spelt as sheetala.

Devotees of goddess shitala in gujarat state celebrate shitala satam on the saptami tithi, shravan krishna paksha. This is the seventh day in the month of shravan during the warning phase of the lunar cycle. This festival falls one day before janmashtami, this festival is the birth anniversary of shree krishna.

 

On this festival devotees observe a vrat and follow certain rituals. By fasting, devotees pray tribute to shitala mata. 

When we see her pictorial, she was mounted on a donkey. Wearing a garland of neem leaves ,also holding a bunch of neem leaves and carrying a broom in one of her hands. A dustpan and a pot of water on the other hand. Broom and dustpan are symbols of cleanliness, and neem represents healing and last water signifies coolings or life nurturing quality.

Women devotees worship her for the health and long life of their children. This festival occurs in the monsoon season in the western and northern parts of india. Most people avoid cooking fresh food on this day. People prefer consuming simple, non  spicy, cold food prepared on the previous day. This practice guards the digestive system against health troubles.

Here is picture of food plate, there is many food items in this plate which woman makes on shitala satam-

Basically sheetala means cool or cold. Therefore, this vrat is intended for relieving the stomach of all its elements, and people avoid lighting fire on this day to shield themselves from heat. Local belief suggests that goddess sheetla cures heat borne illnesses. Devotees worship this deity to cure diseases like chickenpox, measles and other heat borne diseases.

And now we are going to discuss the perspective of religion vs science.

According to sigmund freud:

"God was an illusion and worshippers were reverting to childhood needs of security and forgiveness."

So, religion played a vital role in shaping human thinking. If there is a question and people can not find an answer then they start connecting it with god. Religion and science are totaly opposite to each other. If there is science there is no religion and if there is religion there isn't science.

Shitala satam vs science-

There is one story behind this festival that, many years ago there is a terrible disease called shitala, and there is no medicine for it so people became restless from the death of this illness and they started to worship this devi named shitala and in the whole year at least one day they eat cold food.

In this festival there is one science behind eating cold food to overcome the deficiency of B12. But that time there is no practice to eat cold food to overcome the deficiency of B12. People do this because of fear of Devi sheetala and after this all there is one research paper done by great scientist Homi k Bhabha that says shitala is the festival to overcome deficiency of B12.

When Edward jenner tried to tell the people that he found a vaccination for this illness he became hatred.. Because he ultimately tried to tell the people that there is nothing like a goddess to cure your disease. So this is how science and religion always stand opposite. But we can say that…

"if there is no religion than there is no science and if there is no science than there is no religion."

Here is one picture which discribes some principles of religion and science  in science we could doubt about things and could ask question, and can search for answer, if we don't know about things than we study about it, look for alternative explanation. This are some science principles and now we look at some  religion's principles religion said that don't doubt things, god is answer of all things and there is no alternative explanation about things. Religion pretand that it knows everything, but that is not entirely true.

This festival has three aspects, here they are-

Religion:

The worshipers observe the customs and practices in the honour of shitala maa, the deity who is known to be the cure of diseases in children and protector of offsprings and childbirth.

Science

The scientific rationale being that the fermented food acts as a probiotic meal which brings about a balance on digestion and strengthens and improves the body's immunity by boosting the gut flora.

And finally palate : who are we kidding, some foods just taste better on the following day..! 

We can connect this festival with the book " The myth of Sisyphus " which is an essay written by Albert Camus in 1942.

The myth of sisyphus

This essay is influenced by philosophers such as Soren Kierkegaard,Arthur Schopenhauer and Friedrich Nietzsche, Camus introduces his philosophy of the absurd here.

This Absurd lies in the juxtaposition between the fundamental human need to attribute meaning to life and the "unreasonable silence" of the universe in response.

In the last chapter of this essay, Camus compares the absurdity of man's life with the situation of Sisyphus, a figure of Greek mythology who was condemned to repeat forever the same meaningless task of pushing a boulder up a mountain, only to see it roll down again. The essay concludes " The struggle itself.. Is enough to fill a man's heart, one must imagine sisyphus happy."

Jonathan swift - A tale of tub

There is one satirist Jonathan swift who written many religion works and his novel represent society. Acvording to his writting time sequence, the targets of his ridicule of his became larger and larger, from Roman catholic and Puritans, to the declining christianity, and to all religions in general, which reflects his uncompromising stance as an Enlightener.

"A tale of tub" one of swift's earlist satire works, is a religions allegory. This book exposes the quarreles of the churches in the famoua story of three brothers, peter, martin, and jack.

To conclud, we can say that in india we were celebrates many festivals, "Shitala Satam" is one of it. Many people follow rituals bliendly without knowing anything about it without knowing science behind it. Because of fear of god they follow certain kinds of rituals. In this modern time scientist finds most of solutions of many kind of disease, but many people coundn't trust them they only trust on religion.

Here is youtube video of  "Shitala Satam" story-