Abstract
COVID-19 has made its imprint in human history once again providing us the opportunity to reflect and interpret the pandemic from several dimensions. It has disturbed lives of people leading to cognitive reactions apart from its physical impacts. Given the historical backdrop of pandemics, this article attempts to explore the diverse perspectives of people regarding the COVID-19 pandemic through in-depth interviews of people belonging to different strata of the society. The narratives were interpreted into themes which fall into the areas that cover popular perceptions regarding the pandemic. The responses were found to be surprisingly very complex and syncretic, from theological–spiritual rationalisations to natural or political explanations and scientific and clinical causes. Despite all scientific and technological advancements till date, the belief system has not drastically changed from what has been gleaned from the ancient theological literature.
Introduction
Impacts of COVID-19 pandemic on the society have been diverse and it is important to highlight the human dimension as well when it is dissected from several aspects. Evidently, it has disturbed lives of people leading to cognitive reactions apart from its physical impacts. We have evidences of earlier pandemics affecting human lives negatively. For instance, Liberian case studies of Ebola epidemic show how the epidemic and especially quarantine practices increased stigmatisation and divisive tendencies which point out the need for providing accurate and consistent information to local communities about the transmission of the virus (Pellecchia, 2017; Venables, 2017). Apart from such trends, it would also be interesting to examine popular discourses and responses of the people in relation to the pandemic which would help in strengthening the official policies regarding knowledge strategies.
Review of Literature
The word ‘pandemic’ comes from Greek word, pandemos which can be broken down to pan (all) and demos (people) and refers to plague among people across the globe. The word ‘plague’ is derived from Latin word pestis which means curse. It was coined by physician Galen and referred to a lethal epidemic caused by bacteria, Yersinia pestis. Plague was believed to be caused by supernatural power as a punishment to people/population for their sin and hence a divine curse as recognised by an apocalypse where God used diseases on man to accomplish divine and sovereign purpose (Naphy & Spicer, 2000; Rosenberg, 2020). Bible has used the term pestilence and plague repeatedly instead of pandemic which is a modern term. The world witnessed several plagues/pandemics like— Plague of Athens, Antonine plague, Plague of Cyprian, Plague of Justinian, Roman Plague and Black Death (Signoli, 2012); and epidemic outbreaks like— smallpox, cholera and Ebola in West Africa. In all pandemics, religion and the associated paradigms like social, cultural and political factors played a major role in shaping the worldview which suggests that every 100 years; the world has to undergo massive threat of pandemic. The notion of curse is certainly part of this worldview, although the dominant version of such a notion is part of the oral culture as so far only a few literatures are available on pandemics and the attached belief system.
Campbell (1931) observed that many parts of Europe and Eastern Mediterranean regions during medieval times suffered repeated episodes of major epidemic outbreaks that did not spare any sections of the population and were devastating. These were the deadliest epidemic diseases, especially plague that ravaged the population with high mortality figures. To add further, this manifested itself in cyclic order every 100 years and known as ‘The Black Death of 749/1348 of Europe’ which devastated and dislocated the population and turned the world into ‘silence’, giving way to re-emergence of Islam and Christianity (Conrad, 1982; Campbell, 1931). However, most of the Arabic scholars failed to identify these calamities as epidemics; they considered all of them as natural disasters which also included: flood, famine and droughts in the list of ‘plague’. Medieval Islamic tradition viewed that these catastrophes occur due to ‘corruption happening in air, water and earth ’, and noted that God created venomous insects and contemptible rotten materials that help in purifying and checking the spread of contagious air (Lane, 1863). According to this view, only God lovers could survive the surging of epidemic/plague and the anti-God would die, thus cleaning the human race.
Pestilence/plague/pandemic have been mentioned in ancient religious literature as well in the form of metaphors which blame materialistic possessions and sins as the causes of such devastation. People at every corner of the world opted to react to such situation in different ways; especially some sections of the population had a communal response and considered it as a curse sent by God to teach a lesson. Kelkar (1944) in his analysis on various curses observed that even curses have their own destiny or kismet. Some of them impact intensely on the victim and others disappear with time, and hence the victims could save themselves from the curse being fructified. There are instances of curses which were transferred to generations of women as in the case of Yudhisthir to his mother Kunti in the epic Mahabharata.
Curses have also been viewed as a blend of immense faith on ethics and moral conduct with a dimension of religious/animist/witch-crafting/spiritual approach (Kelkar, 1944). Violation of such ethics and moral conduct is considered as the reason which may trigger curses or blessings that would affect the present and future of people negatively. This was overt in every religion, as Sanatan (present day Hinduism), Zoroastrian, Islam, or Christianity. Theology indicates that good and virtuous are blessed and protected by the supreme and untouched by the evil, while the wicked are cursed. As per the Old Testament, curses are also of two kinds: one which has specific punishment and the other in which punishment is not specified but includes curses that are part of punishments like— pestilence which had the capacity to change the courses of civilisation or bring far-reaching changes in social-political-religious and cultural history of mankind. Such curses needed a stronger power to change them as otherwise they get carried over from one generation to another. Certainly, for such curses to be effective and influential, it is held that the author of such curses should be a spiritual master as cited in Mahabharata.
Epidemic diseases such as smallpox, cholera and plague were considered as curses in the history of humanity. All major outbreaks of diseases in human history as we have seen had such a dimension which also shaped human responses to the disease. Despite clinical manifestations, many outbreaks of diseases are still attributed to Gods and Goddesses in India, Bangladesh, China, Japan, South Africa and many other countries. Religious authorities have time and again organised spiritual remedies, collective confessions and prayers to appease the God to put an end to epidemic situations as they have been considered as the sign of divine wrath rising due to innumerable human sins. In the present context, the COVID-19 pandemic has kept the entire world population stranded and quarantined with series of lockdowns leading to numerous public health strategy debates as well as responses among the people. The aim of this article is to explore the popular belief system and perceptions among people in relation to the pandemic in order to evolve appropriate knowledge strategies.
Methodology
This study is based on month-long fieldwork conducted in Jharkhand, India during the COVID-19 phase in 2020. Given the conceptual background and prevailing role of religious convictions in shaping the responses to the pandemic especially in relation to curses, this study tried to explore responses of the people in the context of their belief system and perceptions. By following the protocol of safe distancing, in-depth interviews were carried out with people of different representations including various occupations and devotions. The fieldwork followed a data saturation approach and included 20 respondents from various sections such as teachers, government staff, home makers, daily wage workers and a few politicians from Jharkhand which is one of the economically backward states in India. Since the research involved mapping people’ s perception about COVID-19, personal face- to- face interviews as well as telephonic interviews were conducted using open ended questions in the local language taking verbal consent of the respondents. The responses were transcribed and carefully coded to identify major themes which fall into the areas that cover belief system and popular perceptions regarding the pandemic. The thematic analysis helped in identifying a number of themes which are presented under various subtitles later in the article.
Findings
Social Isolation and Stigmatisation of COVID Patients
It is important to highlight the importance of human thought processes which get heightened during isolation and desperation. In every epidemic/pandemic, people went through isolation and experienced hopelessness even to the extent of their own deceased family member causing mutual enmity and bitterness within the family and with neighbours. During these interviews people narrated their experiences and reactions while talking about funeral and burial rituals that became an uncertainty in this situation.
My uncle died of Corona and nobody was ready to take his body for funeral. Even the doctor was not ready to come near him. My brother and I gave shoulder to his dead body, though even he was wearing several things for protection, I was not wearing even that. I depended only on my strong immune power always which also helped me traveling during this period.
The community was tensed due to inadequate knowledge and rumours about the disease that stigmatised people. People feared coming near those who were diagnosed with COVID or even health workers naming them as ‘corona carrier ’. There was anger among people wrapped with fear which was directed to community health workers who were visiting door to door as part of the surveillance activity of COVID. At times, the blames and frustrations from series of lockdowns and curfews were put on ASHA workers who tells her own experiences during this period:
‘People used to run away, pass comments saying: Corona wali aa gae! (corona woman has come). They covered their faces and closed eyes seeing us coming passing the road’.
Evidently, the pandemic created several ways of self-perceptions based on a spectrum of views and perspectives which people gather from one another.
The Concept of Curses and Human Perceptions
Many people consider curses as real. There are cases in history in which whole empires have collapsed supposedly based on curses. It is believed that they do impact depending on the matter of aggrieve. A large number of such instances, as mentioned earlier, are biblical which are linked to black plagues, a recurrent phenomenon at that point of time. In the Indian society too, apart from epic instances such responses are not uncommon including as reactions to several cases of epidemics which happened at various points of time. This is also noticeable in the present pandemic, mainly raised as ‘popular intellectual expressions’ and rationalisations.
Curse involves people, compared to impersonal ‘bad luck ’. While superficially, curse can be defined as swearing with intense anger, often loudly and by bad habit, mostly against a person with intent to threaten. They are sometimes expressed as a reaction to a painful situation. More seriously, adding hate to anger, it is like making a personal deep declaration of wish of bad luck or pain or damage to a person. Even more maliciously, it also involves invoking the help of bad spirits to cause damage to a situation and harm a person.
Some describe it as an awful karma mostly done with intent to harm someone.
Since we are children of one Almighty, none of our activities are hidden from his sight and therefore it is only our evil karma that acts as a punishment for us. At the same time, curses of not everyone attain fruition; it is only those having 32 teeth and among parents only the curse of a father will show the effect of curses. These curses are never given by God rather everything it is just a conditioning of our mind and incidentally. Not all angry words although uttered in the style of a curse become a curse because often people express their anger, anxieties and frustrations on one another. Curses are also given that as post-hoc expressions when some accidents happen in life and people usually connect them to the words of damnation. However, if any statement is uttered with an intention usually in despair against someone, it becomes a curse.
For some, curses are defined as an energy which has not yet assumed the state of particle. People think that it stays on and on and sometimes may take some years to take effect. It goes in and around an institution–individual loop and may impact the whole or part and in stages.
A few related the outcomes in relation to curses to our deeds and the way in which we treat the nature and other living forms.
Curses are verbal affirmations that get passed on from one generation to another. Not only just our own karma (deeds) but even karma of others also shows its impact on our lives directly or indirectly. Like for example, if someone makes our Gou Mata (cattle) to eat plastic or slaughter them, then not just that person who has to suffer but the entire generation will face the wrath. We are silently accepting such wrong-doings and therefore Nature will try to balance itself in all ways. Curse/blessings, all are spinning energy forms or vibrations and hence it is not necessary to be orally expressed but intentions are also equally potent. These are energies, similar to the touch of a mother. So, these are all experiences to be felt and even if you do not utter a word but feel from your heart, they get activated.
In this context, many people attributed the present situation as a punishment due to the sins and the harms perpetrated by humans against the nature.
Corona is definitely a form of curse of God of this janma (lifetime) and it will keep circling around, no matter how many vaccines and precautions we take to prevent it, Nature is taking a turn and our air is poisoned. Today’s yug (era) is a bhathjug (Kalyug). God and our ancient saints have already written in our scriptures that such a day will come one day and such instances will keep repeating again and again as and when, earth has to suffer limitless sins of Mankind. Whatever, we are doing today will return back to us. Only God has the power to curse and bring such calamity.
For some, the pandemic is so big and so coordinated that it is above human will to make such damage to so many people and curse by bad spirits could be one of the reasons. Science will not be able alone to explain and fight against the pandemic.
Pandemic as a Divine Intervention to Balance Life and Nature
The nature lovers blamed the pandemic as the curse of unvoiced fauna and the divinity followers considered it as a curse of God. The divinity followers underlined the need to instil the need of togetherness in family, humble living and accept the significance of prayers in our lives. It was considered as a divine intervention to rejuvenate the imbalance brought by unsystematic behaviour of humans. A few considered it as a time for mankind to introspect their own materialistic expectations, worldly ways of living and our dependency on machines. They thought that the virus has compelled to question the direction in which we are moving, from real to virtual world and hence made it necessary to recall the need to return back to roots once again.
Corona is not created by God rather it is the fruit of our own kartawya (deeds). The disease came from people who slaughtered and ate all kinds of animals. God did not ask us to eat them nor those animals, instead we killed and ate them. It is all their dushkarm (evil deeds) that the entire world suffered. So this was created by mankind and not a curse by God. Possibly, it was our own karma accumulated over several births which result in calamities like Corona. Corona was just a way to remind people of their bad karma to understand the reality that only God is Supreme. Corona came for all equally but those who had done good karma were saved and the evil had to die. Diseases like Corona have appeared time and again in the history of mankind. No other creature breaks the rule of Nature as human beings does. If man has broken rules then he has to suffer. It is all due to the increasing numbers of abortions, different forms of rising violence against women, killing own brother for selfish interests, indiscriminate use of latest technology, urbanisation, airplanes, petrol, vehicles and God knows what else! Pushing whole mankind towards its ending. Right now, it is just the beginning. This is in a way curse and the Nature balances itself in this way only. If man is trying to win over death, then Nature God will bring the kinds of diseases which will burn the entire human race (swaha). Nature is warning us to be careful and know our limits. Everyone knows that the countries that are affected are mostly more advanced and materialistic. God intends to tell us through Corona— if you can make big ammunitions then I will create jiwaanu (microbes) that are good enough to destroy the whole human race.
For the others who are philanthropists and belonging to certain religious sections find that,
the Pandemic will be, in the end, a disguised blessing for mankind, like in the case of all hard lessons taken from a good father guiding his son, in order to correct his son’s mistakes. If humans were proudly thinking they were invincible, know it all, with unlimited life on earth, and forgetful of others, with no regard to elders or smallest or poorest then such an attitude needed urgent correction.
Pandemic from a Scientific Outlook
Despite varied views and streams of perceptions, COVID-19 has raised a scientific temperament among people in the form of hand hygiene, vaccination, social distancing, use of mask, and so on. One could observe a stream of prevailing irrationality, but such a scientific approach has been successful to combat the disease. This indicated the increasing positive inclination towards medical science and social health care initiatives for combating the pandemic.
It may not be appropriate to see it as a Curse rather I look at the Pandemic as a medical phenomenon, impersonally, as a worldwide flu as just another annual flu, inevitable. It will be slowly and scientifically conquered like other past worldwide diseases. Just be patient, put money in research… Since ages, Corona virus has existed and infected us. The only difference is that now we have given its name. However, earlier our environment was much cleaner and we had the power to fight against such diseases without any medicine. Today, our body strength has gone down to resist them and the disease has become violent and fatal. Otherwise, it is no curse! Corona has only hit people who were vulnerable in terms of their immunity. So, it cannot be called a curse. Instead, our callousness became one of the reasons for this curse kind of epidemic. Again, there is so much of food adulteration, imbalanced lifestyle with no room for yoga in our daily life. We have forgotten to bring balance between the physical, mental and emotional well-being and somehow we are enslaved by the growing stressful situation of life. Had it been a curse then not less than 50–60% people might have died and it would have reoccurred generation after generation. Paap (sin) aur punya (and virtues) is a religious propaganda and it has no correlation with newly developing bacteria and viruses of Corona. We are somewhere going against the rule of nature and exploiting it limitlessly that has brought pollution of air, water and giving way to reproduction of various deadly bacteria and viruses. Whenever there are a new bacteria or virus in air which at times becomes more poisonous it takes the form of a pandemic.
There was one view which considered the pandemic as a mechanism to control population.
When there is an uncontrolled population growth to the extent that it imbalances nature, then by some divine intervention similar such incidences happens that cleans up a large chunk of population across the world irrespective of any differences.
Pandemic as Political Fallout
The response from government and health authorities had been prompt with forceful establishment of quarantine, isolation zone and series of lockdowns after increasing number of cases and mortality due to COVID-19. However, misinformation circulated mainly through the social media led to distrust in the government during the preliminary phase of COVID. Responses also reveal that people have been influenced by suggestions of fake remedies using natural extracts and misinformation regarding potential side effects of the vaccine developed in the country. Some respondents also mentioned that health workers could not explain the various aspects of the disease which probably indicate deficits in training.
Apart from such limitations regarding control strategies, there were views from the people which considered the pandemic as an International Political agenda,
It is international politics where each wants to overpower the other. It is a well-planned and managed intervention to distract the attention of common people and government of all nations of the world and to evolve as a superpower. This is just another kind of flu which first appeared during world wars. There is no point of Curse and blessings here; it is all a high level conspiracy and dirty political game of minds. This is all about conspiracy of one country to become superpower of the world. It was a well thought plan to spread a new viral disease that would paralyse the entire world and developing a vaccine against the same would control all the Nations. However, this plan remained unsuccessful as they could not develop any antidote for that.
The responses which consider the pandemic as conspiratorial were significant which could be due to the influence of social media and internet. Given such a route, these responses are also important to the process of developing appropriate communication strategies.
Conclusions
Existing literature in the recent pandemic discourse has focused on social media and its influence on developing responses and reactions of the people especially fear and other emotions (Arao, 2021; Xue et al., 2020). Therefore, as an addition to the existing knowledge, the present article could help in especially understanding the dimension of attributions in relation to the pandemic. The popular discourse based on thematic analysis of people’s responses was found to be surprisingly very complex and synergetic, from theological–spiritual rationalisations to natural or political explanations and scientific and medical causes.
The view that places the pandemic as beyond the purview of human wisdom with a divine component is still strong. The attributions of Godly or other forms of curses in order to make mankind learn the lessons of morality, limits in exploitation nature and its attributes are dominant in the popular discourse but despite such a worldview, there exists a scientific worldview along with such attributions. Recognition of such complexity is important from a pragmatic angle especially for pandemic control. The belief system and the worldviews also need to be appreciated for evolving appropriate knowledge strategies in relation to disease programs in general and pandemics in particular.
