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Shiva
also spelled Śiwa or Śiva
One of the main deities of Hinduism, whom Shaivas worship as
the supreme god (see Shaivism). Among his common epithets
are Shambhu (“Benign”), Shankara (“Beneficent”), Mahesha
(“Great Lord”), and Mahadeva (“Great God”).
Shiva is represented in a variety of forms: in a pacific
mood with his consort Parvati and son Skanda, as the cosmic
dancer (Nataraja), as a naked ascetic, as a mendicant
beggar, as a yogi, and as the androgynous union of Shiva and
his consort in one body, half-male and half-female (Ardhanarishvara).
As Bhairava, he is often depicted as a Dalit (formerly
called an untouchable) and accompanied by a dog. He is both
the great ascetic and the master of fertility, and he is the
master of both poison and medicine, through his ambivalent
power over snakes. As Lord of Beasts (Pashupati), he is the
benevolent herdsman—or, at times, the merciless slaughterer
of the “beasts” that are the human souls in his care.
Although some of the combinations of roles may be explained
by Shiva’s identification with earlier mythological figures,
they arise primarily from a tendency in Hinduism to see
complementary qualities in a single ambiguous figure.
Shiva’s female consort is known under various
manifestations as Uma, Sati, Parvati, Durga, and Kali; Shiva
is also sometimes paired with Shakti, the embodiment of
power. The divine couple, together with their sons—Skanda
and the elephant-headed Ganesha—are said to dwell on Mount
Kailasa in the Himalayas. The six-headed Skanda is said to
have been born of Shiva’s seed, which was shed in the mouth
of the god of fire, Agni, and transferred first to the river
Ganges and then to six of the stars in the constellation of
the Pleiades. According to another well-known myth, Ganesha
was born when Parvati created him out of the dirt she rubbed
off during a bath, and he received his elephant head from
Shiva, who was responsible for beheading him. Shiva’s
vehicle in the world, his vahana, is the bull Nandi; a
sculpture of Nandi sits opposite the main sanctuary of many
Shiva temples. In temples and in private shrines, Shiva is
also worshipped in the form of the lingam, a cylindrical
votary object that is often embedded in a yoni, or spouted
dish. Together they symbolize the eternal process of
creation and regeneration. Since the late 19th century some
scholars have interpreted the lingam and yoni as being
aniconic representations of the male and female sexual
organs, respectively.
Shiva is usually depicted in painting and sculpture as
white (from the ashes of corpses that are smeared on his
body) with a blue neck (from holding in his throat the
poison that emerged at the churning of the cosmic ocean,
which threatened to destroy the world), his hair arranged in
a coil of matted locks (jatamakuta) and adorned with the
crescent moon and the Ganges (according to legend, he
brought the Ganges River to earth from the sky, where she is
the Milky Way, by allowing the river to trickle through his
hair, thus breaking her fall). Shiva has three eyes, the
third eye bestowing inward vision but capable of burning
destruction when focused outward. He wears a garland of
skulls and a serpent around his neck and carries in his two
(sometimes four) hands a deerskin, a trident, a small hand
drum, or a club with a skull at the end. This skull
identifies Shiva as a Kapalika (“Skull-Bearer”) and refers
to a time when he cut off the fifth head of Brahma. The head
stuck to his hand until he reached Varanasi (now in Uttar
Pradesh, India), a city sacred to Shiva. It then fell away,
and a shrine for the cleansing of all sins was later
established in the place where it landed.
Wendy Doniger
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"Great
god, supreme lord, what
are you doing inside there? All of
us, the gods, have come to you for
refuge, for we are tortured by
Taraka; protect us. "
Shiva Purana
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Shiva and His Family
Tне god Shiva lived on Mount Kailasa with his
wife, the gentle goddess Parvati, and his two sons
Skanda (or Kartikeya) and Ganesh. Skanda, his oldest
son, was originally six children created by Shiva
alone, but one day, Parvati cuddled the children
together too much and they merged into a single body
with six heads. Skanda, who was the Hindu god of
war, grew into a handsome young man, quite the
opposite of his fat little brother, the
elephant-headed Ganesh. As soon as he was old
enough, he killed the demon Taraka who had been
oppressing the gods. Ganesh, on the other hand, was
born from the dirt Parvati had washed off in her
bath. Stories vary as to how he acquired his
elephant head: in one Parvati tells him to stop
anyone from disturbing her in her bath, and when he
refuses to let Shiva in, Shiva burns off his head
with his third eye; in another, Shiva, who has been
away, does not recognize his son and sears off his
head thinking he is paying court to Parvati; yet
another tells how the planet Saturn, while
babysitting Ganesh, forgets the power of his glance,
and burns off his head by accident. In each story,
Ganesh's human head is replaced with that of an
elephant.
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SHIVA AND HIS FAMILY ON MOUNT
KAILASA
Shiva and his family are shown here on Mount
Kailasa with a deputation of gods and holy men at
the base of the mountain. They may be worshipping
the holy family or, despite the presence of Skanda,
they
may be asking Shiva to help them destroy the demon
Taraka - for which purpose Skanda was born.
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Dangerous Child
Parvati cradles Skanda, the god of
war, who later restored peace to heaven and
earth after he defeated the demon Taraka. He is
identified
with the planet Mars.
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Hanuman, the Monkey God
Standing aside from the other gods is
Hanuman, the monkey god, the general of Rama in
the Ramayana. He was the son of the wind god
Vayu, was capable of changing shape, and was
immensely strong. He is regarded as the epitome
of loyalty.
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"The brahmins saw Rudra
(Shiva) dancing in the sky,
that
supreme liberator who
instantly
releases people fro?» their
ignorance, who is kind and
benevolent to his devotees.
"
KURMA PURANA
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This 11th-centuiy bronze shows Shiva as
Lord of the Dance
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Lord of the Dance
Shiva, called "the destroyer", is shown as a
family man; as a holy man with matted hair and
an ash-smeared body; as Bhuteswara, lord of the
ghosts, wearing a skull necklace; and as here,
as lord of the Tandava, the universal dance in
which he dances the creation and destruction of
the world, trampling the dwarf of human
ignorance. By the ferocious concentration of
this dance, Shiva reveals the cosmic truth. He
dances in a circle of flames, cupping in one
hand the flame of destruction, and in another
the drum of creation. The holy men who saw him
dancing hailed him thus: "We behold you dancing,
source of the world, lodged in our own hearts!
By you does this wheel of Brahma turn. You, sole
guardian of the world, are filled with Maya. We
take refuge in you! We adore you! You are the
soul of Yoga, the master of consciousness who
dances the divine dance!"
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Agni, God of Fire
The fire god Agni, a god of sacrifice, is
born anew whenever a fire is lit. One of the
chief Vedic (early Indian) gods, his role
gradually diminished, as many of his attributes
were taken over by either Shiva or Skanda (with
whom Agni was briefly and agonizingly pregnant
during Skanda's highly complicated conception
and gestation). While Shiva's fire will devour
the world at doomsday, Agni's both consumes and
purifies the dirt and sin of this world; for
this reason Hindus burn the bodies of their
dead. The purifying power of Agni's fire was
granted him by the sage Bhrigu. Bhrigu abducted
another man's wife, and the injured husband
asked Agni, who knew all homes, where she was to
be found. Agni told him, and Bhrigu was so angry
that he cursed Agni to eat everything in his
path, whether pure or impure. Agni argued that
as a god he had to tell the truth, so Bhrigu
granted him the power to purify everything he
burnt. Agni has two heads, a fire-red body, and
seven tongues that greedily lick up the butter
used in sacrifices.
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