Evening Republican, Volume 23, Number 132, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 June 1920 — “Holy Men" of India. [ARTICLE]

“Holy Men" of India.

In India there are no less than 5,000,000 sadhus or holy men, usually ash. besmeared and almost naked. Frequently these have chelas or disciples—boys who accompany them,

begging for their master, being trained for this same life. To go about begging one’s food from door to. door, with saffron-colored robe, a begging bowl, an antelope skin on which to ait, a chain of beads with which to count one’s prayers, and a blanket tn cold weather —such are the old Ideals of India as to the highest life to which a man Some believe that by unnecessary suffering, such as sitting on beds of spikes or swinging the heyi downward over a fire, they can attain deliverance.