Indian Art: A History of Indian Art from the Earliest Times up to the Third Century A.D. c13.s7.22

c13.s7.22

BRAHMĀ : Depicted for the first time in stone. Amongst Pañchāla coins those of Prajāpatimitra show the figure of Prajāpati or Brahmā on one side. It is a miniature human figure with one head and probably four arms. At Mathura, Brahmā is depicted with four faces (sometimes three faces only in a front view), holding his right hand in abhayamudrā. He is a four-armed pot-bellied figure, having a beard and also matted looks on the head. The beard, the jaṭā and the potbelly become distinctive features of those gods who were considered to be of the Brāhmaṇa class. For example, Brahmā and Agni. The earliest image (382) shows the god with three faces and a haloed bust superimposed at the back of the central head to complete the number of four. On the reverse is carved an Aśoka tree similar to that in Nāgarājñī and Indra images (392) which also belong to the Kushāṇa period. The right hand of the projecting figure is held in abhayamudrā and the left sholder is covered with drapery like in Buddha images of this period. Images of Brahmā were also worshipped in the Gupta period and several good specimens have been preserved. [Figs. 169-9]. The worship of Brahmā continued in the medieval period when his images with Sarasvatī became popular and have been actually found at many centres throughout the country. Later on during the Muslim period the worship of Brahmā gradually went out of fashion and the belief developed that he had been ousted from the religious orbit due to an alleged utterance of a lie; only a fiction. The main reason was the emergence of Vishnu and Śiva as two great religious symbols which inculcated the worship of only their respective divinities. Consequently Brahmā went into the background and fell into neglect. But at one time his worship extended from the Himālaya to the far South where his images have been found. At present the one living temple of Brahmā is the one at Pushkara near Ajmer.