A Classical Dictionary of Hindu Mythology and Religion, Geography, History, and Literature c5.1693.3

c5.1693.3

the one, the pervading, the spiritual and blessed, the wonderful, the consort of Umā, the supreme lord, the three-eyed, the blue-throated, the tranquil. . . . He is Brahmā, he is Siva, he is Indra; he is undecaying, supreme, self-resplendent; he is Vishnu, he is breath, he is the spirit, the supreme lord; he is all that hath been or that shall be, eternal. Knowing him, a man overpasses death. There is no other way to liberation.” In the Rāmāyana Siva is a great god, but the references to him have more of the idea of a personal god than of a supreme divinity. He is represented as fighting with Vishnu, and as receiving worship with Brahmā, Vishnu, and Indra, but he acknowledges the divinity of Rāma, and holds a less exalted position than Vishnu. The Mahā-bhārata also gives Vishnu or Krishna the highest honour upon the whole. But it has many passages in which Siva occupies the supreme place, and receives the homage and worship of Vishnu and Krishna. “Mahā-deva,” it says, “is an all-pervading god yet is nowhere seen; he is the creator and the lord of Brahmā, Vishnu, and Indra, whom the gods, from Brahmā to the Pisāchas, worship.” The rival claims of Siva and Vishnu to supremacy are clearly displayed in this poem; and many of those powers and attributes are ascribed to them which were afterwards so widely developed in the Purānas.