The Development of Hindu Iconography c8.3

Language: English

c8.3.1

The above account of the nature of the subject will fully prove how it is intimately connected with religion. In fact, it is nothing but the interpretation of the religious art of man. It has been time and often shown by various scholars that the art of man in its very beginnings is mainly religious in character. Grünwedel observes, “The most important basis for the development of an independent art among any people lies in its religion.” Della Setta, in the work on Religion and Art has shown the intimate connection which exists between the art and religion of various nations of the world. This deep association is the more pronounced in the case of the early Indians. Grünwedel has rightly remarked, "The religious character, so deeply rooted in the national life of the Indian races, has also continued the guiding principle in their art."¹ Foucher has in a very striking manner endeavoured to show how the innate religious tendencies of the Buddhists have been mainly responsible for the beginnings and dissemination of the Buddhist art in India.² Thus, this intimate association between the religion and art being clearly demonstrable, it is hardly necessary to point out how the study of iconography helps one to understand the nature of religious practices indulged in by some races of mankind.

c8.3.2

In the very first instance, the discussion about the presence or absence of the practice of image worship among the early Indo-Aryan races in connection with the study of this subject will enable the student of Indian Iconography to get hold of positive data for the true evaluation and appraisement of their religion. An intensive and historical study of this subject will throw much valuable light on the gradual changes which were constantly being introduced in certain well-defined religious practices of the Hindus. The ever-increasing pantheon of a particular cult and the constant increase in mythological stories associated with it will find a ready illustration in the iconographic representations, which will throw very interesting sidelight on these transformations. Sometimes, a proper and scientific study of this subject will help us in correcting errors made by previous scholars in the understanding of the religious practices of different peoples. Thus, Fergusson, after a close observation of the reliefs of Bharhut, Sanchi and Amaravati, remarked that about one-half of the bas-reliefs of Sanchi. . . represented religious acts such as the worship of the dāgoba or of trees; once or twice the wheel was the object of adoration and once the serpent. Now, this explanation of the significance of many of the above reliefs has been proved to be erroneous by the patient researches of subsequent scholars. No student of iconography would interpret them in that way at present;

c8.3.3

but what he would find in them is that in most cases the trees within railings, with a rectangular seat underneath them, especially when they are adorned with garlands and parasols, are really the tangible emblems of the Master or his predecessors who are not iconically represented; other trees without these honorific adjuncts are really the *rukkha-cetiyas*, not usually objects of worship by themselves but so many objects of veneration because of their being residences of different Yakṣas. The dāgobas or *dhātugarbhas*, funerary structures, also symbolise the *Mahāparinirvāṇa* of Śākyamuni Buddha or that of the other Buddhas that preceded him. In the case of the Nāgas, Yakṣas, Yakṣiṇīs, etc., who can be recognised in the reliefs, it is to be observed that originally they were no doubt objects of worship, but they are depicted on these monuments in quite an opposite role, *viz.*, in that of so many worshippers of the Bhagavān Buddha. Fergusson, even in that early stage of the study of iconography, could partially hit the truth when he remarked in the same context, "There are also half a dozen scenes that can be identified with more or less certainty as representing events in the life of Śākyamuni"; but his statement that there is "a considerable number of representations of scenes in domestic life, regarding which it will probably be impossible ever to feel sure that we know who the actors in them are,"¹ has been modified to a great extent in the light of subsequent research.