Obscure Religious Cults as Background of Bengali Literature c22.2

c22.2

Lord Dharma has five *Paṇḍitas* in the five ages, Setāi in the golden age (*Satya-yuga*), Nilāi in the silver age (*Tretā-yuga*), Kaṃsāi in the copper age (*Dvāpara-yuga*), Rāmāi in the iron age (*Kali-yuga*) and Goṃsāi in the void-age or the age to come (*Śūnya-yuga* or *Anāgata-yuga*). Setāi is white in colour, Nilāi is blue, Kaṃsāi yellow, Rāmāi red and Goṃsāi green. The five *Paṇḍitas* are really the five priests of Dharma in the five ages including the age to come.¹ But at the time of the worship of Dharma all the five ages meet together with all the five *Paṇḍitas*, whom we find placed in the five quarters, and these five quarters are again represented by the five gates of the temple of Dharma facing the five quarters. This theory of the gates in the different directions with respective presiding deities over them is also found in the *Gājana* songs of Śiva still now current in West Bengal as well as in East Bengal. In the versions of West Bengal the presiding deities over the southern, western, northern and eastern gates are Jagannātha, Ekādaśa Bhīma, the Sun (*Bhānu-bhāskara-rāya*) and Kāmākhyā of Kāma-rūpa respectively.² In the versions of East Bengal the deities in the west, south, east and north are Jagannātha, Vaidyanātha, Śrī-muṇḍa-cakra-vāhinī and Śrī-sabhā-liṅga-vāhinī respectively.³ Sometimes Jagannātha, Kṣira-nadī-sāgara, Sūrya-divākara (the sun) and the Himalayas are also saluted in the four directions.⁴