The first time I saw him on video, I heard him speak on the Mahabharata, connecting it with the Upanishads

Saffron costumes

But for the costume, this sex scandal would not have generated such uproar. The fact is, despite the second video, the articulation of the first video is still brilliant, but now when I see it, I am prejudiced by the second video. The words ring hollow. The costume he wore added weight to the words in the first video. And it is that very costume that gave more publicity and meaning to the second video than it deserves.u00a0

We need our teachers to wear costumes. We will not accept a guru wearing jeans and T-shirt or a business suit. It must be orange or ochre or white. They must have long hair and a long beard. They must give themselves fancy titles and insist they are hermits, never mind that they travel only in foreign cars, and in business class on airplanes and eat only the choicest fruits served in the most expensive china. So part of being a spiritual teacher is also about performance. One has to look the part and act the part. The students demand it and the teacher succumbs to it.

In imagery, clothes and colours are used as symbols. In Vedic times, the hermit was called Digambara, the sky-clad one, meaning naked. Clothes indicated being part of society. Exceptions were made. Some hermits wore clothes that nature provided them -- bark, leaves, animal hide. Use of woven fabrics by hermits was forbidden.

Woven fabrics was for householders. As hermits interacted with villagers, some hermits, so as not to discomfort villagers, started wearing kaupina or loin cloth. Otherwise, all hermits, even women, were naked. The idea was to express a thought -- that they possessed nothing. The story from the Jain chronicles informs us that when Mahavira renounced the world, he did have a small piece of cloth around his waist. One day, this cloth got stuck on a bramble bush. He wondered whether he should release the cloth from the bush. If he did so, it would mean he was attached to the cloth. So he did not and from that day went about naked. But mere nakedness does not indicate renunciation. Otherwise everyone who patronises nude beaches would claim to be a hermit.

Following Buddhist times, when monks began interacting more and more with people, hermits adopted clothes, usually undyed cloth, usually white. Colour was associated with materialism. Over time, one colour became increasingly associated with ascetics. It was 'bhagwa' which is a light saffron that has over time turned bright.

Ideally, thought should express itself in form. But today, through form we are expressing thought. Thus when we see a man dressed in saffron robes, we assume he is a holy man. We are becoming a culture where 'packaging matters'. And so we end up with performers pandering to our spiritual needs.u00a0

Devdutt Pattanaik is a Mumbai-based mythologist who makes sacred stories, symbols and rituals relevant to modern times.u00a0

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