Everyone knows that Buddhism is one of the oldest and most popular religions in the world and today there are millions of followers of Buddhism around the world. Now if we talk about Gautam Buddha, his idols are always extremely impressive and you will find thousands and millions of his idols around the world, which look very beautiful and attractive to see. Some idols depicted him as doing sadhana and some as doing meditation. Well, there is one thing that is common in all these idols and that is Buddha's curly hair, but if you will know the real story behind it, you will be quite surprised.
The curly hair you see in every statue of Gautam Buddha is actually not hair at all. Now you must be wondering if these are not hair then what they really are? In fact, the curly hair that appears on the head of Gautam Buddha is a group of snails. You might not believe this, but it is true and there is a famous story prevalent among people regarding this. So not wasting much time, let's talk about this story in detail.
There are many guidelines written in the sacred texts of Buddhism, explaining that in order to attain enlightenment, both body and mind of man should be absolutely pure. Following these guidelines, Buddhist monks get their heads shaved for the purity of their bodies. This is what Siddhartha Gautama also did. When he had renounced his kingdom, he also got his head shaved during the same time.
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It is said that once Gautam Buddha was sitting under a tree and doing sadhana. While doing sadhana, he became so much absorbed in meditation that he did not remember anything about the outside, and forgetting the outside world, he got immersed in deep within. At that time the weather was having an intense degree of heat and the sun was right above the head of Buddha. Meanwhile, a snail started passing near him and its eyes fell on Buddha absorbed in meditation.
Seeing Gautam Buddha in this state, the snail stopped and started thinking that how he remains absorbed in meditation even in such scorching heat. The snail thought that he did not even have hair on his head, because of this he must be feeling the extreme heat. After contemplating all this, the snail crawled on Gautam Buddha's body and reached his head and after that, it thought in its mind that 'If I stay on Gautam Buddha's head, maybe it will reduce the effect of heat to some extent. Thinking this, the snail decided to stay there.
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After seeing the first snail, many other snails followed it on the head of Gautam Buddha. In this way, 108 snails sat on Buddha's head to save him from the heat and thus they all lost their life. It is said that these snails gave their lives to bring enlightenment to Buddha and that's why these 108 snails are always considered important for their crucial role.
In addition, there is another popular story in which some people believe that when Buddha was absorbed in meditation, his hair grew a little longer. During that time, when the fierce heat came, all the hair on the head of Buddha got burnt and became curly. Well, you must be aware that even today there are many such hot areas around the world where people's hair becomes curly due to burning. Taking this as the basis, today many people believe in this story.
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