Vector Art of Ancient Religious Devotion: Self-Torture Painful Poses Print Posters. I’m showing some very old and unusual engravings depicting early-1800’s extreme religious devotion in India – devotion of the self-torture type. One man had been standing eight years, day and night. The author described his feet and legs as “so swollen as to require bandages to prevent their bursting”… Yikes! Another devotee kept his arm elevated until it had become stiff, and the fingernails had grown six or eight inches. The third figure elevated both arms. A former soldier who lost his leg and was released by the army, he turned devotee. “He took a small idol in each hand, and elevated them above his head until his arms became perfectly stiff and immoveable”.