A white elephant, the fourth to be found in military-junta-ruled Burma in the past decade, was transported today into Naypyitaw, the state’s capital. The rare elephant’s arrival was accompanied by a ceremony attended by country’s top military leaders, according to an Associated Press report.
They greeted the 7-foot, 4-inch (2.2-meter) elephant at Uppatasanti Pagoda, modeled after Yangon’s Shwedagon Pagoda, the most holy site for Burmese Buddhists.
“Since independence, successive governments, civilian and military, have supported and associated themselves conspicuously with Buddhism,” reads the 2005 US State Department report on religious freedom in Burma. The state regularly ranks among the least free nations in the world in terms of civil and political rights, based on Freedom House annual reports.
Despite this associating itself with Buddhism, Burma’s military dictatorship routinely has acted to suppress protesting Buddhist monks, in addition to democratic and other activists.
The special elephant, said to be a 38 year old female, was paraded around the Pagoda, along with accompanying elephants, while numerous ostensibly religious sermons were being broadcast, reported Thaindian News.
White elephants, actually albinos, have for centuries been revered in Myanmar, Thailand, Laos and other Asian nations. They were typically kept by monarchs and considered symbols of royal power and prosperity. They are also found in Hindu mythology.
In Burma a legend recounts that invasion of present-day Thailand in the 16th century followed a refusal by the then-King of Siam to bestow Burma’s king, Bayin Naung, with a white elephant.
The subsequent invasion in 1563 has come to be known as the War of the White Elephant. Some forms of Buddhism also associate white elephants with the birth of the Buddha.
They greeted the 7-foot, 4-inch (2.2-meter) elephant at Uppatasanti Pagoda, modeled after Yangon’s Shwedagon Pagoda, the most holy site for Burmese Buddhists.
“Since independence, successive governments, civilian and military, have supported and associated themselves conspicuously with Buddhism,” reads the 2005 US State Department report on religious freedom in Burma. The state regularly ranks among the least free nations in the world in terms of civil and political rights, based on Freedom House annual reports.
Despite this associating itself with Buddhism, Burma’s military dictatorship routinely has acted to suppress protesting Buddhist monks, in addition to democratic and other activists.
The special elephant, said to be a 38 year old female, was paraded around the Pagoda, along with accompanying elephants, while numerous ostensibly religious sermons were being broadcast, reported Thaindian News.
White elephants, actually albinos, have for centuries been revered in Myanmar, Thailand, Laos and other Asian nations. They were typically kept by monarchs and considered symbols of royal power and prosperity. They are also found in Hindu mythology.
In Burma a legend recounts that invasion of present-day Thailand in the 16th century followed a refusal by the then-King of Siam to bestow Burma’s king, Bayin Naung, with a white elephant.
The subsequent invasion in 1563 has come to be known as the War of the White Elephant. Some forms of Buddhism also associate white elephants with the birth of the Buddha.
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