Cow Protection-True and False

[Prof. Dr. Yogendra Yadav]

Prof. Dr. Yogendra Yadav

Gandhian Scholar

Gandhi Research Foundation, Jalgaon, Maharashtra, India

Contact No. – 09415777229, 094055338

E-mail- [e-mail];[e-mail]

 

 

Cow Protection-True and False

 

 

 The question of cow-protection is extremely complex. The fanatic, the humanitarian and the economist will of course view it differently. But the Hindu ideal of cow-protection has nothing in common with that of the first and transcends that of the other two. The camel and the horse occupy the same position in the economic life of the people of Arabia that the cow does in ours. Yet the ideal of camel-protection or horse-protection never arose in Arabia.... Even in the West the cow has more and more come to be regarded as the “mother of prosperity” and dairying has been developed into an elaborate science, but Westerners have not adopted the ideal of cow-protection in the sense in which we have. The cow-protection ideal set up by Hinduism is essentially different from and transcends the dairy ideal of the West.

The latter is based on economic values, the former, while duly recognizing the economic aspect of the case, lays stress on the spiritual aspect, viz., the idea of penance and self-sacrifice for the relief of martyred innocence which it embodies. The story in Kalidasa’s Raghuvamsa runs that King Dilip of the famous Raghu line finding himself in his declining years without issue went to seek the advice of sage Vasishtha his preceptor and was told that the attainment of his desire was prevented by a curse pronounced upon him by Surabhi, the Divine Cow, on account of an unintended insult that he had once offered to her and that the only way to remedy it was to propitiate her by personally serving her and by protecting her against all harm in her roaming in the forest. So dismissing all his servants, the King entered upon his penance  “offering her palatable mouthfuls of grass, rubbing her body, keeping off the gnats, following her as her shadow, halting where she halted, sitting down where she lay down, moving forth when she moved.” Such was the power of the King’s penance and so all-conquering his love that even wild Nature felt its spell. “When he entered the forest as its protector, forest conflagrations would become extinguished even without any shower of rain the stronger animals no longer oppressed the weaker ones.” Thus it went on for “thrice seven” days at the end of which, wishing to test the devotion of her protector, the cow entered a cave in the Himalayas and was suddenly seized upon by a lion unnoticed by the King who was lost in contemplating the beauty and grandeur of the surrounding mountain scenery. Startled from his reverie by the plaintive lowing of the cow, the King, ashamed of his absent-mindedness, fitted an arrow to his bow to shoot at the lion, but to his utter amazement and dismay feel himself hold as if by a spell and all his strength paralyzed.

The lion told him that his entire prowess was vain, since he was not an ordinary lion but Kumbhodara the servant of God Siva and was protected by the blessing of that God hi consequence of which no arms could prevail against him. “I know I am helpless,” replied the King but one thing still remains to me. I offer my body to thee as ransom for the cow and I beseech thee to appease thy hunger on my flesh and let the cow go.” The lion tries to move him from his resolve by a variety of arguments. “If compassion is your motive,” he expostulates, “then your decision is wrong, since by your death you will save only one cow, whereas if you live you will as their father ever protect your people against all troubles.” The King once more presses his request. “So be it,” replies the lion at last and the King laying down his arms throws himself before the wild beast “like a lump of flesh,” so that it might make a meal of him. But instead of the dreadful leap of the lion which he was expecting, flowers begin to shower from the heavens and he hears a gentle voice speak, “Rise up, my son.” He gets up and finds the cow standing before him like his own mother, with milk overflowing from her udders and “nowhere the lion!” And since the King has discharged his trust so nobly she grants him his wish. “Do not think I can produce milk alone,” she says to him, “if pleased I can grant any wish”.

Dilip is here depicted as love incarnate. Faced with the dilemma whether to lay down his life to save the cow or to gain the merit of giving crores of cows in charity he unhesitatingly chooses the former and finds that he has thereby propitiated an angel unawares. His relentless pursuit of truth leads him to the discovery of the true way of cow-protection the way of ahimsa, of perfect love and there through everything else is added unto him. The cow whose service and protection is enjoined by Hinduism as a sacred duty is not cow, the animal merely, but cow that in our sacred lore appears as the personification of the “agony of the Earth”, and that pleads for redress before the Great White Throne whenever the Earth grows weary under its load of iniquity. Its service includes the service of the entire afflicted humanity, of all those “who toil and suffer and are weary and need rest”, the service of Daridranarayana Dilip’s way is the way of perfect love self-suffering and self-purification. It is this spiritual ideal of cow-protection that is exalted by Hinduism as the highest dharma and with reference to which the promise is held out: “Do not think I can produce milk alone, if pleased I can grant any wish.”