Book Review: The Limits of Reason Against the Seductive Power of Religion

In India’s present political climate, any book with references to Hinduism will be under pressure to comment on religion in contemporary India. Taking a hortatory position in support or in rejection of religious violence in India is just one way of engaging with the issue. But, there are other ways as well.

Saikat Majumdar’s The Scent of God, a Bildungsroman about a boy’s spiritual and sexual awakening in an exclusively male boarding school of a Hindu monastic order, adopts a different approach to this loaded question. Through the protagonist Anirban’s journey to adulthood, the novel explores, in evocative, lyrical prose, the hold of religion on India: a modern secular democracy, obsessed with science and economic development.

The school where monks nurture the spiritual and intellectual side of young boys, amidst acres and acres of verdant surrounding, embodies the ancient principles of brahmacharya. At the same time, it is a remarkably contemporary school. It is a breeding ground for future engineers and doctors. In that sense, the fictional school embodies contemporary India, where secular democracy exists alongside deep seated religious ties.

Within the school, two modes of religious existence is enacted. The monks present a narrow and stultifying vision of Hinduism, based on strict adherence to rules. The focus on spiritual and intellectual life encourages mortification of the flesh. The dorms have no fan, even in scorching summers. The spare diet is inadequate for growing boys leading an active life of daily football practice for two hours and yoga. Even punishments were designed to train young boys to “be beyond touch, while the body was in pain”. For missing morning PT, boys have to silently hold an arch while being caned. Screaming, or losing balance led to a repeat of the whole process.

The result of such continuous denial of body is outbursts of violence. In desperation, the hungry boys secretly kill, roast, and eat a pigeon. Premen Swami, under insane fits of rage, thrashes students with his metal-studded whip for minor infractions.

Deeper structural violence

In addition, there is deeper structural violence in the system. The school and its huge grounds are on lands appropriated from the Muslim villagers of the neighboring Mosulgaon. The book opens with the boys huddled together, excitedly watching an India-Pakistan match on television, under the eagle eye of Kamal Swami, the Lotus Lord. This rare indulgence – generally, students are not allowed to watch television – is cut short when one of the excited boys utters a sexual slur against the Pakistanis. Yet, the rampant anti-Muslim sentiment during the match or in their attitude to the Muslim villagers outside the campus goes without a reprimand.   

Unlike the dramatic horrors of Majumdar’s earlier novel Firebird, the violence and abuses of this world speak in hushed, sibilant whispers. This is because life inside the school is presented through Anirban, a naïve, yet observant, and sensitive soul. He notices things such as the fact that some of his peers were “good-looking and fair complexioned and so the monks liked them. They also got the rooms right next to that of the hostel warden”.  But, like most teenagers, he does not understand the significance of what he has seen. The adult readers can, of course, but Anirban cannot.

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The clear voice of criticism against this world is Anirban’s endearing curmudgeon of an English teacher, Sushant Kane. An orphan raised by the monks, Kane and his brothers now teach in the school. A believer in activism, and political action, he sees through the hypocrisy of the monks. Kane comments on Premen Swami’s savage outburst: “They beat them up because they want to do something else they can’t”. He warns Anirban of the “flowers, incense, music, the nasha” and the need to “stay sharp” because, “They can kill you. You won’t know you’re dead”. He nurtures Anirban’s skill with language and oration, introducing him to life outside the school, in an effort to keep him sharp.

Intimate and aesthetic response to religious life

Against the monks’ stifling version of Hinduism, the novel posits Anirban’s intimate and aesthetic response to religious life. He is attached to monastic life not because of a desire for nirvana, but because of the sensory beauty of prayer rituals: the sound of conch shell, the poetry of prayers, the fragrance of incense, the silence during meditation, and the grace and charisma of saffron-clad monks. It is through sensory pleasure in rituals that he finds himself growing enamored of monastic life.

Anirban’s attachment to the sensory aspects of prayer and meditation reminds us of the mystic strand of Hinduism that allows for an intimate and personal relation to God. Meera Bai and Shree Ramakrishna Paramhansa of Bengal are historical representatives of this tradition. Through Anirban’s journey, the novel’s vision of Hinduism challenges the current doctrinaire version in circulation.

The novel links the sensory world of religious worship to the sensory nature of erotic desire. According to Majumdar, “If senses are the way one communicates with an intangible God, then it is through those very senses that one falls in love.” These two aspects of Anirban’s life come together during the morning prayers, where his mind remains stubbornly tethered to his body “around his left knee which touched Kajol’s bony right knee. Throughout prayer, their knees were glued, afraid to breathe and stir, lest they lose each other”.

Through such surreptitious encounters, during prayers, while watching nail-biting Indo-Pak matches, while studying for exams, or in classrooms, Anirban and Kajol fall in love. The tender depiction of the boys’ growing love for each other contrasts with the whispered paedophilia in a world where celibacy is defined as abstinence from heterosexual sex, and women are seen as pollutants.

Anirban’s choice

Anirban ultimately has to choose between the sensory joys of celibate monastic life, and the activism of secular life. His final choice is determined by his attachment to the aesthetics of religion. His choice baffles Kane. In the secular world, the rational choice is to utilise one’s talents. If one is a gifted orator and writer, one uses it to benefit of society. If one is skilled in the sciences one trains to become an engineer and gains wealth. A choice based on the sensory defies all logic. Yet, it is also a choice that defies the principles of monastic life, where detachment from the body and its desires is mandatory. If anything, the novel reminds us of the diverse traditions within Hinduism.

The novel does not record the spectacular religious atrocities of the present times with the directness of a political pamphlet, nor does it offer an instruction manual on how to tackle religious violence. As a result, it may seem to have failed to deliver what it promised. Yet, Anirban’s story highlights the limits of reason against the seductive power of religion.

In the end, the novel offers a way to understand why dismissing religion as backward has not prevented it from intruding on and usurping our secular existence. It also presents a counter to prescriptive visions of religion. These are forms of resistance, even if they are not easily identifiable as such.

Sohinee Roy is an associate professor of English at North Central College.

Note: A previous version of this article did not attribute the sentence, “If senses are the way one communicates with an intangible God, then it is through those very senses that one falls in love” to Majumdar. The author regrets the error.