"There are four blind men who discover an elephant. Since the men have never encountered an elephant, they grope about, seeking to understand and describe this new phenomenon. One grasps the trunk and concludes it is a snake. Another explores one of the elephant's legs and describes it as a tree. A third finds the elephant's tail and announces that it is a rope. And the fourth blind man, after discovering the elephant's side, concludes that it is, after all, a wall." This is analogy to the religions of the world, if you could not already tell. What is missing from this is the fifth man to which the elephant shit upon. He determined that religion is full of shit and killed the elephant. More seriously, though, this analogy is one that a lot of professors of religion like to use to express that all religions have equal authority in the understanding of God. It is easy to see this analogy like that because each blind man is just doing his best to understand what he can based on what he has found. As I see it, however, each man may have an equally valid claim about what they have found, but they are all also equally wrong. It's not a snake, it's not a tree, it's not a rope, and it's not a wall. Its a fucking elephant. To me, the analogy says that all religions can't explain the truth so they jump to the conclusion that the first idea that hits them must be correct. Not to mention that, if the elephant is supposed to represent God, it pressupposes that God exists by there, in fact, being something there for the blind men to feel upon. I just found this analogy and thought it was kind of interesting. Take it as you will.