History of Mediaeval Hindu India (being a History of India from 600 to 1200 A.D.) v3.c33.s3.36

v3.c33.s3.36

It must be mentioned, further, that the idol in the Vajreśvarī temple is not fashioned by the hand but is a svayambhū idol viz. a natural stone coming out of the earth, having some appearance of a head, at least eyes. This is the only svayambhū idol of Devī which we have seen. The legend is that the deity was discovered by a cultivator who, while ploughing his field, accidently struck the deity with the iron-head of the plough and brought out blood. This is, of course, the usual story of the discovery of a swayambhū deity. It seems probable that as at Benares or at Ujjain (Mahākāla) the Mahomedans even under Mahomedan rule allowed the Hindus to have a temple of the same god in the vicinity of the old temple thrown down, so in Kangra the fort remaining in the possession of Mahomedans, the Hindus were allowed to have a temple of the same deity in Bhavan. Samsārachandra the first erected the Vajreśvarī temple in 1440, and the iconoclastic Shershah again threw it down a hundred years later. The tolerant Akbar allowed the temple to be rebuilt by king Dharamchand.