The Challenge with the Completely Predictable Ending
Early last month there was a controversial challenge in India, the two sides basically being Reason and Superstition.
On 3 March 2008, in a popular TV show, Sanal Edamaruku, the president of Rationalist International, challenged India’s most “powerful” tantrik (black magician) to demonstrate his powers on him. That was the beginning of an unprecedented experiment. After all his chanting of mantra (magic words) and ceremonies of tantra failed, the tantrik decided to kill Sanal Edamaruku with the “ultimate destruction ceremony” on live TV. Sanal Edamaruku agreed and sat in the altar of the black magic ritual.
Obviously, the “ultimate destruction” magic also failed in front of cameras. I highly recommend reading the entire article; it’s tough to reproduce an appropriate summary of snippets here, since every line is worth reading. It’s an incredible story of reason triumphing over stupidity - in that it is incredible that such a challenge was neccesary at all.
Millions of people must have uttered a sigh of relief in front their TVs. Sanal was very much alive. Tantra power had miserably failed. Tantriks are creating such a scaring atmosphere that even people, who know that black magic has no base, can just break down out of fear, commented a scientist during the program. It needs enormous courage and confidence to challenge them by actually putting one’s life at risk, he said. By doing so, Sanal Edamaruku has broken the spell, and has taken away much of the fear of those who witnessed his triumph.
If only we could do similar challenges with Christianity and other religions in order to have a similarly profound effect.