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The Hindu Temple v2.c11.s7: Symbols of Reintegration

The Hindu Temple v2.c11.s7

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Symbols of Reintegration

The Images of Immanent Breath

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The celestial dancers, the Apsarās, have their bodies built not of the gross substance of earth, such as flesh and bones, but of the attributes of air consisting of movement, "bending, stretching, jumping and running".¹⁴⁶ Thus she dances at the festival of the gods in Indra's heaven (Pl. LXVIII; 'Mahābhārata'. III. 43. 28-32). Gandharvas make the music and join in the dance in Indra's city Amarāvatī. That he enters Amarāvatī is said of a dying person;¹⁴⁷ he is released of the earthly sheath of his body as is the initiate, who enters the inner temple.

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¹⁴⁶ 'Garuḍa Purāṇa' XV. 25. The body consists of the five elements: earth, water, fire, air and ether. Skin, bones, nerves, hair and flesh are the five attributes of earth; bending, running, jumping, etc., are the five attributes of the air.

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¹⁴⁷ This meaning is implied in Mbh. VII. 7. 20.

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In full worship there is always dancing and singing before the Devatā for his entertainment. This is Rājasika Pūjā, expansive worship of God. In Sāttvika Pūjā, in which is worshipped the Essence (Sat), the Supreme Spirit, the dance is that of the mind and the senses. It is the dance of Śakti in her various forms. These are carved on the walls of the temple (Pls. XXI, XXII, LXIV) and show their "body of movement" which belongs to the air and is supported by immanent breath. For the air, when inhaled, is changed; it is believed to increase in volume by the heat of the body; not all of it is exhaled, the major part of its increase remaining. Thus the vital forces are increased and also the lightness of the body; the more the air (prāṇa) is kept in, the lighter becomes the body.¹⁴⁸ This is the object of the control of breath (prāṇayāma) which is a prerequisite in the training of a Yogī. The lightness of the body (laghutva; 'Śvet. Up.' II. 13) is felt in its effect as a soaring, a staying in the air. The power of levitation, inwardly experienced through breath, releases the images of the dancing, flying hosts of gods, of Apsarās and Gandharvas, of the Vidyādharas, the wizards and of numberless Gaṇas and other celestials (Pls. XXIII, LIII, LXIX, LXXIV, LXV, XXIV, LV).

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¹⁴⁸ The air inhaled (pūraka) increases in volume by the heat of the body 5 times while it is restrained or the breath is held (kumbhaka) and when exhaled (recaka) two-fifths only pass out and the remaining three-fifths are retained.

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Prāṇayāma is part of the knowledge of the sculptor by actual practice or by his awareness of it. Another means of concrete realisation, similarly at his command is by touch, as practised in Nyāsa, the ritual act of assigning or locating divinity at its proper place in his own living body and in the form of the image. Such a constantly repeated concrete experience by touch of shape three dimensional, rounded and also breathing, is part of the equipment of the craftsman, as a Sādhaka and Yogī. He applies it creatively on the image which he carves. Prāṇayāma and Nyāsa develop in him a subtle sense of the living form, not only sustained, but also shaped, as it were, by breath. In his carvings he makes palpable the ‘body of breath’ by a modelling in which the shape of man, free from the gross weight of the earth, the bones and muscles which belong to it, is given transubstantiated form as the breathing body of the gods.

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With breath restrained the vaulted chest (Pl. LXXIX) lifts the sentient face into regions where pain is no more but a memory (Pl. XXV), and offerings are made of sound from many instruments (Pls. XXVII, XXVIII, LV), or full of detachment, the flight is across clouds of ignorance. They are cut by the sword of knowledge in the hand of the Vidyādhara. Gaṇas are often seen flying in crowds and Vidyādharas are accompanied by Apsarās or they fly singly. Trenchant, their backs arched like scimitars, with sword drawn and mace swung across their heaving shapes, the Devas soar fighting (Pl. XXIII); in another relief they are composed into a pattern of the cosmic wheel (Pl. LXIX) which keeps rolling through the cycles of time, they urge it on wielding their swords and driven themselves in its rotation; knowledge is ground by the wheel of time and its swish is the rhythm of a ceiling panel.

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Breath, the vital manifestation of the Spirit, is the support and prime mover of all action; it is shown having formed a body of its own which is particularly that of the Gaṇas (Pls. LXV, XXIV, etc.). They are mere quantities (gaṇa = quantity), look like windbags (Pl. LXV), hosts of them. Their bodies inflated by air race in gusts across the atmosphere, support the Vimānas, the chariots of the gods (Pl. XXIV), and produce the music out of the sound which is immanent in the ether and in the air. Full of it, they play it on different instruments and make it as articulate as their air-borne, air-filled bodies are made by the sculptor. They—and not caryatids—carry the superstructure and walls of the temple (Pls. LIII, LXVI, XXXIX).

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The inward realisation of lightness, weightlessness, non-existence of the physical body in a state of concentration on the Supreme Spirit and on His manifestation, the Word, and the hearing of its music are shown in the images of the Gaṇas who, while resembling the shape of man, are unlike it. Their bodies made of breath move in the air.

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“Breath goes out with the sound HA and enters again with the sound SA; the living being is indeed always repeating the mantra Ham-Sa. Ham-Sa” (‘Garuda-Purāṇa’, XV. 78). Breathing is the rhythmic formula which is constantly said of itself. The Hamsa mantra is the “seed of the Universe”, the breath of life (prāṇa-bīja). Its visual symbol is the Hamsa, the royal mallard, celestial swan (Pls. XLII, LXXV) who is the vāhana of Brahman. “The Hamsa dwelling in the Light . . .¹⁴⁹ signifies the unity of Paramātman, the Lord beyond and without qualities, and all that has proceeded from him. It is thus also His symbol as Antarātman, the immanent Spirit (‘Śāradātilaka’, XXI. 64 f) which is consciousness as the manifestation of Supreme Consciousness (Cit).

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¹⁴⁹ Haṃsavatī Ṛk. RV. IV. 40.5 ; ‘Vāj. S.’ XII. 14 ; Ś.B. VI. 7.3.11 ; ‘Kathopaniṣad’, V. 2.

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In the shape of the celestial swan it is carved anywhere on the base of the Prāsāda or on the ceiling of the Maṇḍapa, flocks of birds in shapes ever renewed in

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SYMBOLS OF REINTEGRATION

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the course of thousands of years,¹⁵⁰ in procession, or in couples confronting each other. Where, as in Pl. LXXV, a lotus in flower is shown between two swans, the words addressed to the Goddess have found a visible equivalent: "I worship that pair of swans who are Ham and Sa, dwelling in the mind of the Great, who subsist entirely on the honey of the blooming lotus of Knowledge" ('Saundarya Laharī', 38).

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¹⁵⁰ From Mauryan capitals (3rd Century B.C. ; Rampurva) to contemporary South Indian temple reliefs and metal lamps. The Sasanian shape of the bird proved to be the most enduring (Pl. XLII). The Haṃsa, except in the classical, "illusionistic" representation of the Kaniṣka casket is but rarely shown flying (Pl. LXVII) ; even though they surround flying Vidyādharas, the birds are not represented in flight.

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As form (rūpaṃ) and figure (ākṛti) of a verbal symbol, the Haṃsa bird carved on the temples means that union towards which fly the hosts of celestials, the Gaṇas, Vidyādharas and Gandharvas and whose dancers are the Apsarās. They are given form, are bodied forth by art as images of the power and the movement of the Breath and the Spirit.

Mithuna, the State of Being a Couple

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“Just as a man closely embraced by a beloved woman knows nothing more of a without or a within, so also does the Person (the spiritual person of man) embraced by the ‘prognostic’ (prajñātmanā) Spirit know nothing more of a without or a within. This is his true form in which his desire is satisfied, the Spirit and the whole of his desire. He has no desire any more, nor any pain.” (‘Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad’, IV. 3.21).¹⁵¹

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¹⁵¹ Translated by Coomaraswamy in ‘La Doctrine de la “Biunité” Divine’, É.T., 1937, pp. 289-301.

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This state which is “like a man and a woman in close embrace” is a symbol of Mokṣa, final release or re-union of the two Principles, the Essence (Puruṣa) and Nature (Prakṛti). This symbol is carved, on the door jambs of the Garbhagṛha and on the walls of the temple, repeatedly, in the many forms in which limbs are conjoined in close embrace (Pls. XXX-XXXIV).¹⁵² The name of this conjoint symbol of Puruṣa and Prakṛti, as Mokṣa, is Mithuna, ‘the state of being a couple’.¹⁵³

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¹⁵² The ‘Tantrarāja Tantra’, XXI. 88-96 treats of the offerings made to the 50 Mithunas.

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¹⁵³ Mithuna as an enrichment on the door-jambs (śākhā) of the Garbhagṛha is enjoined to be carved in the ‘Bṛhat Saṃhitā’ LV, ‘Hayaśīrṣapañcarātra’, ‘Agnipurāṇa’ CIV. 30 ; ‘Samarāṅgaṇasūtradhāra’, XL. 30-34 ; etc. The earliest Mithuna yet known is carved on one of the earliest historical monuments yet known, i.e., of about the 2nd century B.C. in Sāñcī, Stūpa II. Marshall-Foucher, ‘The Monuments of Sanchi’, Pl. LXXVII. 20a. Mithuna is one of the permanently recurrent themes of Indian sculpture. A ‘classical’ Mithuna, on a gold ornament, is reproduced in the ‘Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bengal’, 1912, p. 283. The Buddhist connotation of Mithuna is the union of Buddha and Prajñā.

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Mithuna as symbol of Mokṣa, ultimate release, means a union, like that of the Fire and its burning power, which is inseparable from, and in, the Fire from the beginning. Mithuna as practised and beheld by the Sādhaka is a re-union, for in the beginning the Puruṣa, the Essence, was “like a man and a woman in close embrace. It desired a second. Himself the Puruṣa divided into two. So were born man and wife. He united himself to her” (‘Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣad’, I. 4. 1-4).¹⁵⁴

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¹⁵⁴ See note 151.

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Prakṛti as Supreme Śakti is within God, hidden in His own qualities (‘Śvetāśvatara Upaniṣad’, IV. 10). Within Him, by means of his mind (manas), he entered into union (Mithuna) with the unspoken Word (Vāk) (Ś.B. VI. 1. 2. 6). The divine ‘bi-unity’ comes about by “Śiva’s need of Śakti for accomplishing the enjoyment of unredeemed man (paśu, lit. the animal) and his final release” (Śrikumāra in ‘Tātparyapradīpikā’, the commentary on ‘Tattvaprakāśa’ I. 3).

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Man’s separation from God and the world of dichotomy in which he lives result from the bi-sexual polarity in divinity, and from the subsequent externalisation of the Conscious Śiva as the object of his own Self-enjoyment. In order to regain the primordial wholeness (Brahmajñāna) the yogin practises bodily, mental and intellectual exercises and the devotee (sādhaka) observes the rites as his means of accomplishing (sādhana) final release. In such exercise (yoga) there is a coupling (maithuna) of the active and the changeless Principles.

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The symbolic union (yoga) in the flesh with the assistance of a Śakti may be practised only by Sannyāsins who are far advanced on the road to metaphysical realisation, while the highest class of Avadhūta¹⁵⁵ does not require this sacrament and may not unite with a woman. The Sādhana in which the Sādhaka is assisted by his Śakti is called Latā-sādhana.¹⁵⁶ In its performance the Śakti is as much woman (latā) as she is a vine or creeper (latā). "As the creeper embraces the tree on all sides, so do thou embrace me" ('Atharva Veda', VI. 8.4.). "For when one is with a mate, he is whole and complete" ('Śatapatha Brāhmaṇa', X. 5. 2. 8.).¹⁵⁷ Thus Gaurī is described as Ardhāngī, the half of Śiva's body, "embracing Śiva as the Mādhava creeper clasps the young Āmra tree with her bosom like a cluster of blossoms". ('Yogavāsiṣṭha, Nirvāṇaprakaraṇa', XVIII. 3).

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¹⁵⁵ Avadhūta is a man who is above caste and the ordered life (āśrama; i.e., its four successive stages as celibate student, householder, recluse and Sannyāsin) and ever contemplates the Supreme Spirit only. The lowest type of these Sannyāsins live in the family. In the third class, conforming with the rules of Yoga and Bhoga, the Sannyāsin may satisfy the desire of a woman who approaches him. In the next two classes he is competent to practise Yoga with the assistance of a Śakti. In the highest, the sixth class, he may not unite with a woman.

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¹⁵⁶ The rules relating to Latā-sādhana are given in the following Tantras: Śiva Saṃhitā, p. 45; Prāṇatoṣinī, p. 618; Gandharva Tantra, p. 60; Kaulāvalī, p. 29, etc.

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¹⁵⁷ In Orissa, (cf. 'Utkalakhaṇḍa', XI. 'Ind. Ant.' XLVII. p. 217) it is said that Mithuna figures on a building prevent the building being struck by lightning. In the lightning is seen the union and identity of the immanent spirit of man and the transcendent Spirit. "The Person seen in the lightning—I am He; I indeed am He ('Chānd. Up.'. IV.13.1. 'Kena Up.' 29-30). No lightning will strike the building where this union is imaged.

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Gods and ascetics therefore should be represented in their love sport (krīḍā, līlā) on the walls of temples¹⁵⁸ but ascetics practising the game of love should not figure on the habitations of men¹⁵⁹ for their game is none of the three purposes of life.¹⁶⁰ It is a symbol of final release, its fourth and ultimate purpose.

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¹⁵⁸ T. Bhattacharya, 'Some Notes on Mithuna in Indian Art.' Rūpam, 1926, p. 22f, quotes 'Suprabedhāgama', XXX. saying that "Śivakrīḍā, Harikrīḍā and Tapakrīḍā should particularly [be made]"—a reference which could not be verified from the Tanjore Ms. of the 'Suprabedhāgama'. Mithuna carvings showing shaven headed and other ascetics occur on the temples of Orissa; also in Khajuraho, etc.

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¹⁵⁹ 'Mayamata', XVIII. 111.

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¹⁶⁰ Kāma, Lust, with the discipline of its satisfaction, is the third of the 4 purposes of life which are lawfulness (dharma), the acquisition of wealth (artha), the satisfaction of lust (kāma) and the attainment of final release (mokṣa).

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