Shiva - the Mahadev!

I do not call my self a highly spiritual person - but do hold strong views on Hindu spirituality thoughts. I worship all forms of gods, but is internally aware of the Advaita concept of god in one self. Having said this, I need to admit my bias towards Shiva - a formless yet the God who is Mahadev! I realised my bias towards worshiping Shiva only in the my early 50.  Ever since, I have been seeking comfort when I visit any Shiva temple.

Since then I have been looking forward to thoughts and ideas that propagate the virtues of Lord Shiva.   I have read the Shiva Triology by Amish Trivedi  which grew my passion for Shiva.

Two recent ideas attracted me. In one of the Tamil classical dance serials in Jaya TV - entitled 'thakathimitha' last week, a famous Bharatanatyam dancer - I tried to recall her name but in vain - presented Lord Nataraja in an interesting fashion.  She drew two triangles one upside intersecting the other in normal form to form a star - Shatkonam.  then she captured the classical nataraja dance posture within the the triangles and then drew a circle around the triangles.  Then she went on to explain how this figure explains the five elements of nature - Fire, Air, Earth, Water and sky.  She also  stated that one needs to be grounded in reality - like Lord Shiva even while dancing with joy and fervour.

The second article which appeared today in Economic Times.  I give selected extracts from this article:

Quote:

Every major Indian band has a song that celebrates him, qualifying him as a bonafide rock hero. And why not? He was into hallucinogens and danced the universe to its destruction (ahead of its subsequent rebirth), dreadlocks and all.

Then there’s the snake draped around the neck. He’s the subject of a hip new popular TV serial, besides being the basis for the central figure in a best-selling series of books. He’s like, seriously cool.

......

The Mahabharata is a spectacle, to be enjoyed in full, but it’s hard to focus on individual characters and stories. The Ramayana offers a single focus, but Lord Ram is too perfect and divine for people to identify with directly — and even his apparent flaws, like the abandonment of Sita, don’t make him a sympathetic character.

Krishna’s stories are personal and likeable, but there is a basic divergence between two very different Krishnas, the lover of the Geeta-Govinda and the shrewd strategist of the Mahabharata, that complicates the narratives.

By contrast, Shiva’s story offers simple parallels to people’s lives.

“His conflict with Daksha is classic son-in-law versus father-in-law, the sort of story that TV tells all the time,” says Pattanaik. All gods in Indian mythology have families, but Shiva is one of the few whose family story is so central to his legends: conflicts with his wife, problems with his sons, the basic themes are familiar, even if the central character has supernatural powers and wears a snake around his neck. “He is the alpha male who is on your side,” he says. “He allowed us to make a mythological serial in a different way,” Pattanaik adds.

Writer Amish Tripathi’s works build on this outsider appeal of Shiva. He has written the hugely best-selling Shiva trilogy of novels, which offer an imaginative retelling of Indian mythology centering on a Shiva-like character, a Tibetan tribal warrior who becomes both saviour and destroyer of the ancient civilisation of Meluha, a possible stand-in for the Indus Valley Civilisation. Tripathi explains that there are two types of heroic archetypes — those who build and maintain society and those who live outside society, but come in to rescue it at times of peril.

Shiva is the second kind of hero. Tripathi is careful to emphasise that all gods and choices of those who worship them should be respected, but the youth connect with the heroic outsider is easy to understand. Being young is all about questioning and even attacking social norms as you figure out your place in society and “Shivji is the god of rebels,” he says.

“He is the god with matted hair, the god who takes drugs, he is the god who is a brilliant dancer and musician.

He is said to have invented the rudra-veena.”

These physical symbols count, and it is not surprising that Shiva shows up on so many tattoos.

It isn’t all rebellion though. Tripathi points out that Shiva embodies many modern virtues. Unlike other gods who are shown in more traditionally patriarchal terms, Shiva treats his wife as an equal. “Many traditional images show them seated side by side, on the same level,” says Tripathi. “And Shivji will have his children on his lap.” He also points out that Shiva doesn’t differentiate among his devotees, who include both devas and asuras, like Ravana: “There is a saying that ‘Shivji apne bhakton ka bhakt hai’,” and this humility emerges as another attractive aspect today.

Unquote

In other words, Shiva embodies modern virtues and can connect with any one - belonging to older generation or with the current one.  To me any one who adopts the qualities of Lord Shiva and that of his beloved son Lord Ganesha, would be on a sure road to become Mahadev!

Har Har Mahadev

Sivoham! Sivoham! 

Sekar

My first blog! Capturing thoughts, ideas or musings for posterity.

 Dear all

For a while, I have been contemplating capturing my fleeting ideas or my musings in some form or other for posterity.  While I was toying with the idea of writing them down, when my daughter mentioned day before yester day that she created a blog of her own using gmail account, I instantly thought that this is the way - I can effectively do what I wanted to do.

So here is my first test blog.  My thoughts and musings would be captures in my musings@blogspot.com.

As and when I get time or become contemplative, I intend to put down the thoughts, ideas or views through this format.

Any one viewing this - is free to comment on the thoughts,etc.,

Best regards

Sekar