Six Blind Men & the Elephant - By John Godfrey Saxe

You see to believe. We believe what we see. Others believe what they see. There comes the conflict. When conflict arises we have 2 options. We can choose to continue the conflict or to problem solve.

In this poem 6 blind men encounter an elephant and listen for how they perceive an elephant looks like.

Six Blind Men & the Elephant - By John Godfrey Saxe (1816-1887), John Godfrey is an American poet, who is well-known for his poem six blind men and the elephant.

It was six men of Indostan

To learning much inclined,

Who went to see the Elephant

(Though all of them were blind),

That each by observation

Might satisfy his mind.

The First approached the Elephant,

And happening to fall

Against his broad and sturdy side,

At once began to bawl:

"God bless me!

but the Elephant Is very like a wall!"

The Second, feeling of the tusk Cried,

"Ho! what have we here,

So very round and smooth and sharp?

To me 'tis mighty clear

This wonder of an Elephant

Is very like a spear!"

The Third approached the animal,

And happening to take

The squirming trunk within his hands,

Thus boldly up he spoke:

"I see," quoth he,

"the Elephant Is very like a snake!"

The Fourth reached out an eager hand,

And felt about the knee:

"What most this wondrous beast is like

Is mighty plain," quoth he;

"'Tis clear enough the Elephant

Is very like a tree!"

The Fifth, who chanced to touch the ear,

Said: "E'en the blindest man Can

tell what this resembles most;

Deny the fact who can,

This marvel of an Elephant

Is very like a fan!"

The Sixth no sooner had begun

About the beast to grope,

Than,seizing on the swinging tail

That fell within his scope.

"I see," quoth he,

"the Elephant Is very like a rope!"

And so these men of Indostan

Disputed loud and long,

Each in his own opinion

Exceeding stiff and strong,

Though each was partly in the right,

And all were in the wrong!

Moral:

So often in theological wars,

The disputants, I wean,

Rail on in utter ignorance

Of what each other mean,

And prate about an Elephant

Not one of them has seen.

The poem is about people mis-interpreting what’s really going on and vexing about it and jumping into the wrong conclusions. Each blind man was totally convinced that he had made the true discovery and argued his case valiantly. Each felt that he was telling the truth and the others were telling the lie. Can you tell- who was telling truth and who was telling the lie?

The poem illustrates the range of truths and fallacies. One's subjective experience can be true, but such experience is inherently limited by its failure to account for other truths or a totality of truth. The poem throws an insight into the relativism, opaqueness or overwhelming nature of truth. It shows the behavior of the experts in fields where there is a deficit or isolation of information, the need for communication, and respect for different perception.

Each one of us knows only a part. Each one of us perceives the conflict in totally different ways as per our background, experience, training, personality. We might perceive only a portion of truth. To find out the whole truth we must put all the parts together. Success lies in unity and appreciating diversity.