Hindus Idols Drinking Milk?

Rabbi Moshe Ben-Chaim

Reader:  Judaism's proof is 600,000 male witnesses at Mount Sinai…mass witnesses is 100% proof. [However] as 1 billion Hindus saw their god Ganesha drinking milk in 1995, isn't that more a valid proof than 600,000? Shouldn't you be a Hindu instead of being a Jew, if your desire is seeking God by objective means? How would you respond to this claim by Hindus?

Rabbi: No report says 1 billion Hindus witnessed a miracle, or even a stone idol “drinking.” The report is as follows:

On September 21, 1995 one worshipper offered a spoonful of milk to a statue of Ganesha, and the milk apparently disappeared, as if the statue was drinking it. News spread across the nation (and then the world), with Hindus flocking to temples and feeding milk to statues. The event was widespread in temples around the world. But, oddly enough, seemed to end within a matter of hours—in most places the report stopped the same day that it started. Media attention was intense, including coverage at the New York Times and the BBC. 

Scientists then tested the "miracle" by giving milk containing food coloring to statues in a New Delhi temple. They hypothesized that the milk was being pulled from spoons via capillary action, and in fact was running down the front of the statue rather than disappearing. Video of the "miracle" seems to support this hypothesis, with many clear examples of milk running down the front of statues, and pools of milk around statues. Prabir Ghosh was one of the people to demonstrate how the Hindus were coaxed into believing the miracle. Sitaram Kesri, labor minister in the Narasimha Rao government, quoted internal reports to say that a temple in Jhandewalan Park near the RSS headquarters in Delhi was the epi-centre of the miracle. He said it was a ploy by the Hindu nationalist BJP to gain votes in the ensuing Lok Sabha elections by spreading false rumors. The phenomenon reportedly spread by an organized barrage of late-night telephone calls to Hindu temples all over India and the world, telling them to feed their statues milk. The story was picked up, mostly as a novelty piece, by news services around the world, including CNN, the BBC, the New York Times and the Guardian. 

The facts: 1 Hindu claims milk vanished. While on May 2, 1312 BCE, 2.5 million Jewish eyewitnesses transmit that they were at Mt. Sinai hearing an intelligent voice emanating from the fiery mountain. It is the only history of the Jews from that era. Had it been a lie, it would never become the only history; the “true” alternative history should also have been transmitted. Furthermore, Torah states family names, tribes, census, locations traveled and dates. 

Facts vs. facts clearly unveil this Hindu careless discrepancy:

• 1 Hindu’s imagination vs. 2.5 million Jewish eyewitnesses

• Absorbing liquid vs. a supernatural voice emanating from inside fire and earthquakes

• An immediately rejected mystical Hindu claim vs. universally accepted world history for 3334 years 

These comparisons clearly expose the Hindu fallacy. But what prompts Hindus to even attempt offering a drink to stone elephant idols? The Hindu story was mass hysteria by mystics who already believe in statues as deities. “1 worshipper” interpreted milk absorption as a miracle and thousands elsewhere followed suit. That person was feeding a lifeless statue, that he created with his own hands. Why do gods need humans to create them? But, as he deceived himself the statue was alive, he can deceive himself that it drank the milk: 

Their idols are silver and gold, the work of men’s hands. They have mouths, but cannot speak, eyes, but cannot see; they have ears, but cannot hear, noses, but cannot smell; they have hands, but cannot touch, feet, but cannot walk; they can make no sound in their throats. Those who fashion them, all who trust in them, are like their statues.  (Psalms 115:4-8).

Instead of using observation and rational thought as the scientists did to explain the phenomenon, mystics don't use critical thinking…but accept sheer nonsense. That’s why Hindus everywhere tried to feed their idols milk…but the claims ended the same day. The scientists exposed the phenomenon as nothing more than absorption. The “widespread” belief of the claim does not equate with “mass witnesses” found only in connection with the Jews at Mount Sinai. The Hindu story itself claims “in most places it stopped the same day that it started.”  The story itself reveals it was false.