Shuka Deva was a born hermit. Son of Rishi Veda Vyasa, he discarded the comforts of home at a very early age. When Veda Vyasa tried to talk him out of living the life of a sanyasi, Shuka Deva silenced his old father, saying that the longer he stayed at home, the more tightly he would be caught in the web of maya. In time, Shuka Deva acquired the knowledge of all that was worth knowing and his fame spread far and wide. It was he, who at the head of
Ancients Speak
Suman K Sharma
thousands of rishi-munis, comforted and morally uplifted the accursed King Prikshitas the latter sat waiting for the Takshak serpent to bite him to death.
Even so, in his conduct and bearing, the great sage remained as innocent as a new-born baby.Once, he was walking through a jungle along with his father. Passing through a thicket, the father and son heard voices of several divine women bathing sportingly in a natural fountain. Shuka Deva walked on as before. But Veda Vyasa, who was a few steps behind him, noticed that women had cried out in shame on seeing him and ran for their clothes. That puzzled the old man. The bathing women had not felt shame before his youthful son. How then they had become so bashful on seeing an aged man like him?
Ved Vyasa sought out the answer from one of the women who had by then covered up her nudity. “Venerable sir,” said the woman courteously, “it is very simple. For your son, we all are creatures of God. He does not make difference between man and woman. You, sir, with your worldly knowledge, do. That is why we in our nakedness felt shy of you and not of your young son.”
There is nothing shameful about any organ of the human body. It follows, therefore, that nakedness is not indecent in itself. Had it been so, the ancient sculptors would not have carved out our deities in explicit detail. Shame comes only when the element of lust is attached with it. The generative organs, for instance, perform the vital role of keeping a race alive beyond the normal span of life. But name them obscenely and they become terms of abuse. Young and innocent Shuka Deva saw the women washing their bodies. To him, the scene did not mean anything more than what it was. But old Veda Vyasa knew by experience what an unclothed woman body could mean to a lustful man – his view was coloured by unwelcome desire. The bathing women had naturally to cover themselves up before him.
The little story leaves a big message for the self-professed reformers who hector young women and girls to dress ‘properly’ so as not to put their bodies on display. It is men and boys who have to unlearn the wrongful ‘knowledge’ about the feminine gender rather than lay blame on the inanimate clothes. Woman is not an object of male desire but as much a person in herself as man is.
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