Thousands of people flocked to temples across India on Monday following reports that idols of Hindu gods were drinking milk given by devotees as sacred offerings.

Teenagers, adults and the aged stood in long lines with garlands and bowls of milk to feed the idols of Lord Shiva, Lord Krishna and the elephant-headed Lord Ganesha.

Hundreds chanted hymns in the northern city of Lucknow and the eastern city of Kolkata andwent into hystericswhen the milk held against the idols disappeared.

"It is amazing, Lord Ganesha drank milk from my hands. Now he will answer all my prayers," said Surama Dasgupta, a middle-aged woman in Kolkata.

The frenzy began late on Sunday in some northern cities and soon spread across the country, including the capital New Delhi, even as rationalists and non-believers called it mass hysteria.

A similar mania gripped the country in 1995 when thousands of Hindus fed milk in spoons to marble idols of Lord Ganesha.

That rumour spread across the globe and there were reports of Hindu deities drinking milk in London, New York and Italy.

"It is very natural for any stone idol to absorb any liquid and the older the stone the more it absorbs," M.P. Singh, a geology professor at Lucknow University, said.

The "milk miracle" came days after thousands of people in the financial hub of Mumbai drank water from a murky Arabian Sea creek as they thought it had miraculously turned sweet and could cure illnesses.

But police stepped in and stopped people after Mumbai's civic officials said the water could have temporarily lost itssalinitydue to pollution and inflow offreshwaterfrom a nearby source.

周一，數千名印度民眾涌向印度各大小寺廟，因為之前有消息稱寺廟里的神像喝下了信徒們所供奉的牛奶。

青少年、成年人以及老年人手持花環、端著牛奶，排著長隊給濕婆神、克利須那神和加內什象鼻神的神像喂奶。

喂給神像的牛奶消失之后，印度北部城市勒克瑙和東部城市加爾各答的數百名群眾唱起圣歌，陷入瘋狂狀態。

加爾各答一位名叫蘇拉瑪·達斯古普特的中年婦女說：“太神奇了，加內什神像喝了我手中的牛奶。所以，現在他一定會讓我所有的祈求都實現。”

上周日晚些時候這股狂熱在印度北部的一些城市開始，之后迅速席卷印度全國，其中包括首都新德里，其勢頭正如唯理論者和非信徒所形容的"大癲狂"。

1995年，印度也曾出現過一場類似的狂潮。當時，數千名印度人紛紛拿著勺子給加內什神大理石像喂奶。

這個傳聞當時傳遍全世界，在倫敦、紐約和意大利都出現了有關印度神像會喝牛奶的報道。

勒克瑙大學的地質學教授辛格議員說："其實，石頭神像吸收液體是個很自然的現象，而且，石頭的年齡越長，吸收的液體會越多。"

在“神像喝奶奇跡”發生數天之前，印度金融中心孟買有成千上萬人去喝阿拉伯海的一條支流里的渾水，他們認為這條支流的水奇跡般地變甜了，喝了可以治病。

之后，警方插手此事，阻止人們的這一舉動。因為孟買的市政官員解釋，是污染和附近水域淡水的注入導致海水的鹽分可能暫時流失。

Vocabulary:

go into hysterics : 陷入瘋狂狀態

salinity : 鹽分；鹽度

freshwater : 淡水