Page 160 - Communication Processes Volume 3 Communication Culture and Confrontation

The Donkey 135

3. The universal dimension of the conflict appears in the fact that
all the gods in heaven feel furious and frightened by an attack
that directly targets only one of them. The jump to swallow or
bring down the sun is perceived by the party under attack as a
provocation meant to engineer a generalized conflict. The con-
flict is not restricted to a private quarrel between two individual
parties and their petty blows and kicks.
4. A similar universal dimension is clear in the nature of the blow,
which provokes the gods’ tremendous anxiety and disarray:
l all breath of life disappears, all beings suffocate and perish;
l all rains stop and drought is rampant for fourteen years; and
l all life is extinct on earth.
5. The providers of life on earth keep hiding, inactive,
l the wind at the top of a tree;
l the cloud at the bottom of a well; and
-
-
l Vayu in the body of Hanuman.
They are, naturally, the crucial personages of the drama. They
claim a control over the stakes of the conflict. Whether they act
on their own or at the request of another party, they stand as
the determinant ‘actants’ of the myth.
6. The reversal of situation happens quasi-unexpectedly when:
-
l the donkey and Vayu are outwitted by Śankar;
.
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l the cloud surrenders without a word to Surya; and
-
l Hanuman complies with the request of Śankar.
.
7. The gods manage to obtain the return to normalcy on earth
when, thanks to their initiative or decisive injunction:
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l Vayu obliges and blows again;
-
l Megharaj immediately pours rains; and
-
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l Vayu is released by Hanuman.
The disorderly agents and temporary retainers of life on earth
are brought to book and led to perform again as providers of
life—as their duty requires—by a direct intervention of the gods.
The decisive and final ascendancy of the gods is obvious in each
myth.
8. The brunt of the conflict is eventually borne by the donkey, an
outsider, an agent who is no party to the conflict, who by mere