Home My conception of hindu faith
 

Mythological selection

 

Those who expected to find in this text a summary of colourfull, exotic stories about the Hindu Pantheon, will have been disappointed. India is definitely a colourfull country and there are plenty of such stories in Puranas, as also in Bible. But there already exists many works on this subject, which I criticized in the introduction for their non relevance. I should add that they are also not "faithful" to the original texts. If you have spare time (you will not waste it), I can only advise you the reading of Raamayana and Mahaabhaarata. Admittedly, the reading is somwhat long, 24000 shloka and nearly 100000 respectively, but one is delighted even by the repetitions and the multitude of anecdotes, al with a moral, sometimes unsaid in the text. I will report only some of the legends told in these 2 principal works and the 18 Purana, for having the opportunity to comment about their meaning. Honor to the Ladies. They often appear unassuming , as good Hindu wives, but play a crucial role and are the subject of large a devotion (Diwali, festival of Lakshmi, Durga festival, without forgetting Holi, which beside being the festival of spring is also that of Radha). Sarasvati, better half of Lord Brahma, never invites to gossip, undoubtedly because she is the Goddess of Wisdom and that silence is gold. One knows about her that she materializes as a mythical river, which you will not even find on the map of Bhaarat varsha ( Indian continent). Invisible, she meets her cousins Yamuna and Ganga close to Allahabad: the exact place is Sangam meaning junction, communion. Ganga (Ganges in English) is more famous. After having irrigated the skies with its/her pure water, she flows down to the earth through the dense hair of Lord Shiva, to save earth and its inhabitants of her tumultuous floods. A Bollywood movy tells a beautiful parabola about this young girl, born in the Himalayas, whose fate finishes in a brothel of Calcutta after having washed the sins of million Hindustani (the title is "Ram Teri Ganga Maili"). Let us come to Lakshmi, the devoted wife of Vishnu, goddess of prosperity, light, fertility, beauty, and she will forgive me for forgetting some other attributes. As a mother, goddess of fertility, she is known under the name of Shakti. When the gods and evils get together to churn an ocean made of milk in their desire to manufacture the elixir of immortality (since they also are mortals), the result of their work was first of all the production of an unspeakable poison, which Lord Shiva considered as His duty to drink for saving the whole of living beings. Then, they obtained in addition to the elixir certain number of fabulous creatures. The first, of a very great beauty, was Lakshmi, whom Vishnu granted Himself, honor to whom honor is due. Lakshmi generally stays in Shrivatsa ( a holy knot of hair) on the chest of her Lord and Master. She never misses to incarnate at same time than Vishnu when He takes human form, as Sita partner of Lord Raama then as Radha in love with Lord Krishna. Parvati, the partner of Lord Shiva, plays a much more active role in cosmology and myths. She is Nature, the Mother (and the goddess Shakti, venerated at the origin in another part of the continent, is considered as one of her other names). She appears as wife of Shiva in the scriptures, a first time under the name of Uma, girl of Daksa (one of Brahma sons). Repudiated by her father for having married a morbid god who gets dressed with skins of animals, adorns himself with snakes and likes to be surrounded by phantoms and other odd creatures, she immolate herself. She does not sit on the funeral pyre of her husband, as it was of use during a decadent period in India (18-19th centuries) but jumps in the fire of the sacrifice offered by his father to the Almighty. Inconsolable, Shiva devotes Himself to meditation during some Kalpa. The gods decide to arrange a marriage for Him again, because (arranging marriages is a national occupation and) a prophecy says that only His son will be able to save the Universe of a catastrophe. But, when they beg Him to satisfy their wish, He does not want to hear about that. The attachment to a woman is the strongest dependency and even a god has no means to withdraw himself from this servitude. Rather ask me to defeat some other evils or drink again the poison which you manufactured from the milk ocean, does He say. However, Parvati, daughter of the Himalayas god, is created especially for seducing Him and she employs all the means well known to women to reach her goal, coming to disturb Him every morning during His meditation and swearing that she will keep quite. Shiva remains impassive. Then, as that takes too much time, the gods send Kaama, the god of love, to tease Shiva with his sweet-scented arrows, spring mirages, etc. Shiva, furious about this impudence, strikes down Kaama with the “laser” of His third eye, located in the middle of his forehead (the tika or tilaka drawn by Hindus on their forehead is a representation of this third eye). Finally, as it is due the story finishes by a marriage, but which does not give birth to a child. Shiva will conceive a son from the fall of His sperm on mother Earth, son named Kaartikeya, who will save indeed the Universe of the servitude imposed by a devil. On her side, Parvati conceives another son by brushing cells of her skin, whose name is Ganesha. One role of Ganesha is to be the eliminator of obstacles and his first very brave action will be to fight his "father", Shiva, when He tries to enter without permission in the gynaeceum. I leave you draw the moral of all this.
Lord Vishnu, whom I will qualify of the “medium” in the temporal trilogy beginning-medium-end often mentioned in the scriptures about the creation of the Almighty, has a sattvic essence. He ensures the survival of the Universe, maintains moral values, and is regarded by many Hindus as the tangible personalization of the Almighty, Bhagvan, whose impersonal form is Aatman. Other people worship more Shiva, but peace dwells in Heaven since both show respect to each other and know their link in Trimurti. By the way, in the mythology, Brahma is born in a lotus springing out of navel of Vishnu (see illustration) who is laying on His favorite snake (sesha naga, who accompany Him also during Vishnu incarnation as Krishna). Later Shiva is born from the forehead of Brahma when He is angry. Vishnu incarnates each time that His dharma outlined above requires that, under the form of demigods, various mythical animals and twice under human form (a third is to come). Raama, who is the object of a deep devotion, is the symbol itself of Uprightness, Truth and of the respect of rites. He materializes to liberate the earth from the evils who have multiplied and especially of their king, Ravana, who became so powerful that he terrorizes even the gods. The tangible proof is that the Ravana's son is called Indrajit, meaning "victorious of Indra. The character of Ravana requires a more detailed comment than to describe him as an ogre and a tyrant. He is so wise that Brahma granted him a boon, according to Brahma bad habit to propose to make wishes to people making long difficult penances, too often to shady individuals. What renders Ravana demonic, just as Satan, is his great pride, which of course will lose him. Raama has 3 brothers, all of divine essence, sons of three different mothers and of same official father, Dashratha, king of Ayodia. One of these brothers, being called Lakshman, plays a privileged role in the story by his constant demonstration of devotion to Raama. Briefly, following an unfortunate promise of Dashratha to his second wife, Raama must be exiled during 14 years and leave the throne during this time to his brother, Bhaarata. Raama wanders in the forest, accompanied by Sita, his wife, and by Lakhman during 13 years and they meeting many wise men meditating in the forest and some evils. Having mutilated the sister of Ravana and killed some other Ravana close relatives, Raama attracts on Himself the anger of this king of evils. Add to the source of conflict that Ravana is Sita appeals to Ravana for her great beauty. The affliction of Raama when Ravana succeeds in kidnapping Sita and carry her to Lanka (of same name in modern history), his kingdom, is the opportunity for Valmiky to write beautiful verses of a great lyricism. Raama follows their track and meets the tribe of monkeys, to which belongs the demigod Hanuman, son of Vayu the god of the winds. The fact that Raama chooses to ask the help of monkeys rather than to ask the support of his powerful brother Bharat and the many kings of Bharat varsha, who would have all granted to him their assistance, seems me very symbolic. Raama is sometimes somewhat contemptuous towards the monkeys, treating them of under-human, but He makes friends of their king Sudriva and of Hanuman. It is them whom He decides to put to the test because an undisclosed reason of Vishnu incarnation may be in fact of testing the devotion of His humblest creatures. Devoted they are indeed to whom they recognizes without doubt as an incarnation of God, as also the king of vultures and other creatures which I forget. Hanuman is especially a devoted servant, always on the breach to make himself useful. This comment should help you to understand better why a monkey has its effigy in many temples. Everything finishes well as in a fairy tale, except. that Sita is put to the test 2 times for having remained in the home of another that her husband. That appears cruel and quite machist to modern people like you and me. But, as a king, Raama must be exemplary, beyond criticism, even if He knows that nothing is founded, because any of His subjects is in right to require accounts to Him.
The objectives of Vishnu at the time of His incarnation as Lord Krishna are also complex. Mahaabhaarat and Bhaagvata Puraana (telling mainly the important deeds of Vishnu at the time of His 9 incarnations and especially as Krishna in Skandha 10) report to us that officially He has incarnated to release the human society from the kshatrya who forgot their dharma. They became greedy of power, twisted, lack of respect towards elders, for instance towards Bhisma their common great uncle, towards women also and especially Draupadi, wife of the 5 Pandava brothers (there is no typing error, Draupadi is married to Arjun and his 4 brothers). Krishna will follow His program up to programming the destruction of His own clan among the kshatrya and His own assassination. But Krishna is also an incarnation of the love of the life and His creatures. He often appears in the iconography in His infantile form, bluish cherub who plays in the meadows with the female guardians of cows (gopi) and, since very young, He flirts with them. Great mothers in India tell to small children how, very fond of sweet things, He stole butter from His mother. He likes to play flute, to dance with the gopis and to play Holi, the festival of spring. The number of His female conquests is incalculable. One pays to him in Bhagvata Purana 1600 women and 10 times more male children. Know why India is over-populated! My friends, somewhat prudish, deny these facts, saying that he liked only Radha. But why would God like only one woman? I will not tell all His miracles, the most touching being to lift a mountain (Govardhana) to make use of it as an umbrella to shelter His disciples from the lightning and flood sent by god Indra. Everyone likes Krishna. And yet He is sometimes deceptive, inventing a dreadful lie to despair Drona during the battle of Kurukshetra where all these kshatrya, heroes of a golden age (dvaapara yuga), must find death. It is worth to note for understanding this behavior what He says in Gitaa (Bh.G.10-36): I am also the best player and if you want to bet with me you have lost in advance.
A myth which is often narrated in Purana is about the power conferred by penance, which makes us suppose that certain pious people seek in fact only this power. One often hears about a devil or a wise ascetic (sannyasin) retiring in the forest to meditate there during thousands of years and nourishing only of grass and bays, then of water one day out of two and finally of air one day from time to time. Then the gods are alarmed at the power which the sannyasin will acquire by this long penance (except Vishnu and Shiva who are delighted) and the gods, fearing for their own power, generally ask to Lord Brahma to grant a wish to the sannyasin. They do not know what they are doing because when the penitent does not have a perfectly pure heart, catastrophe, he often ask to become immortal. That could not be, since even the gods are brought to die one day, so Brahma grants to him to become invincible except in quite precise circumstances, of which Lord Vishnu will have to take advantage, thanks to his great capacity of imagination (Maya). Lets note incidentally that the word Maya finds many translations: control of a cosmic nature, capacity of creation/miracles, His magic which makes us perceive our material existence as the only reality, hiding us our double nature. For instance, Ravana can be put to dead neither by a god nor by another mythical creature or forces nature, which requires that Vishnu incarnates as a man. The vanity of Ravana had not enabled him to conceive that he could be killed by one of these lower creatures and he laugh when one threaten him with the ire of Raama. It is reported that Indra became the chief of the gods because he would have offered 100 horse sacrifices (complicated sacrifice) to the Almighty. The scriptures always lets plane a doubt as for the authenticity of these famous sacrifices. Would he be a usurper? The character is little sympathetic. Full of himself, his emblem being the peacock, and I am not informed of only one circumstance where he showed altruism. He is however essential to everybody since he controls among other things the rain. When the penitent who deserved a wish is truly a wise man (Trishanku, Vishvaamitra…), he often ask the permission to prostrate at the feet of God, but often the gods grant to him only one stay within the paradise of Brahma or Vishnu. Shiva, more lenient, grants readily moksha to the soul. Why to be so strict? Krishna would answer in Gitaa that this devotee was not enough humble and did not simply surrender to Him. The self-scourging of certain penitent, even in certain cases their self-mutilation, has a back thought: that of the power. One finds similar examples in Christian mythology.
There does not exist frankly odious characters in Hindu mythology. Even Ravana or Hiranyashasipu (another demon) attract a little our pity. Certain devils with tyrannical powers were in former incarnations demi-gods who had been cursed by a wise man with lot of spiritual power. The most antipathetic character at my opinion is Narada, other son of Brahma, although he is very wise, because he takes pleasure to sow the discord by his gossips.