Iconography of Vaishnavi Images

3. B. (i). VAISNAVI IMAGES. a. Sarasvati. more Sarasvati, the goddess of learning and culture, is a very well-known deity. She has various other names, such as Vak, Vagdevi, Vagisvari, Bharati, Vani, etc., etc. among As the goddess of culture and learning, she was popular the followers of the Brahmanical religion, as well as among the Buddhists and the Jainas.* The Buddhists conceived her as the consort of Manjusri, while in Brahmanical mythology, she is sometimes consorted with Brahma and sometimes with Visnu. She is ordinarily represented sitting on a lotus seat with one leg pendant, playing on a Vina. Her vehicle swan is represented near her feet. This milk-white goddess of culture has a curious record. † She appears in the Rg-Veda as a manifestation of a sacred river called Sarasvati. She is said to have refreshed Indra in his labours, while the Asvins helped him. (R. V. 1315). The Vajasaneyi Samhita expands this into a narrative of *V. A. Smith's Jaina Stupas of Mathura. Page 56. Plate XCIX, b. † Prof. Macdonell's Vedic Mythology. Page 87.

how when Indra with the other gods was engaged in a healing sacrifice, Asvins as physicians and Sarasvati by her speech communicated vigour to Indra. Gradually she came to be identified with the Vedic goddess Vak, the personified speech, (Vedic Mythology, P. 124) and the identification is unhesitating in the Satapatha Brahmana, 3-9-17 and in the Aitareya Brahmana, where it is reiterated several times.* Sarasvati as an individual goddess seems at first to have been consorted with Brahma. The story will be found in the 3 rd chapter of the Matsya-Purana. Brahma performed austere meditations in order to create, and from his mind sprang his ten mind-born sons. From his body, on the other hand, sprang ten other issues, the last of whom was a daughter, variously called Satarupa, Angaja, Atmaja, Savitri, Gayatri, Sarasvati and Brahmani. Brahma became enamoured of her and began to mutter in ecstacy,-"What beauty, what extraordinary beauty!" He began to feel shame to look at her in the presence of his sons, when this daughter prostrated herself before him and then began to walk round him in devotion. Brahma kept his seat, but his keen desire of never ceasing to look at her caused a face to spring in each direction, (north, east, south, west and up) and thus gave him five faces.t This myth of the incest of Brahma has its origin in the Rg-Veda, X-61/5-7, and is developed through Maitrayani Samhita (4-22; vide Vedic Mythology, p. 119), Satapatha Brahmana, (6 th Prapathaka, 2 nd Brahmana, Vangiya Sahitya Parisat Edition, vol. I. p. 212) and Aitareya Brahmana (3-9, Ditto Edition, p. 287). In these, Prajapati is Said to * Aitareya Brahmana, Vangiya Sahitya Parisat Edition. Pages 132, 186, 227, 296. † Brahma subsequently lost one of his faces in a contest with the five-faced Rudra and thus came to be known as the Chaturmukha or the four-faced one.

have coupled with his daughter, called either Dyayus or Usas. The place of Dyayus or Usas is taken in the Puranas by Sarasvati, or Savitri, the Vedic learning personified.* The story of the connection of Sarasvati with Visnu is of more recent origin and is indeed found in fully developed form only in the Brahmavaivarta Purana, (chapters 1-7, Prakrti-khandam) a work avowedly devoted to the cult of Krsna. Here, the older traditions regarding the origin of Sarasvati and her relationship with Brahma are altogether passed over and a novel origin is fabricated for her. Krsna is, according to this Purana, the One Lord of the Universe. Once, He felt an inclination to create and thus sprang from him Radha, his female counterpart. Their union produced the Mundane Egg, which Radha threw into the Mundane Waters. Krsna was incensed at this unmotherly conduct of Radha and cursed her, as well as the other goddesses who would be her parts and would proceed from her, with ever-lasting youth and barrenness. At this stage, "suddenly, from the tip of Radha's tongue sprang forth a lovely girl of white colour wearing yellow dresses, heavily bedecked with jewels and holding a vina and a book in her hands, the presiding deity * Muir, in his 'Original Sanskrit Texts' (vol. iv, Pages 38-41), has gathered together some texts on the subject, and he remarks:-"This legend of Brahma and his daughter, though, as appears from a passage in the Satapatha Brahmana, it has occasioned scandal among the Indian writers from an early period, is not to be regarded in the same light as many other stories regarding the licentious actions of some of the other gods. The production of a female and her conjunction with the Imale out of whom she was formed, is regarded in Manu, 1-82, as one of the necessary stages in the cosmogonic process (and finds its near parallel in the book of Genesis)." 24

of all the Sastras." Radha again parted herself into two and her left half was transformed into Kamala or Laksmi. At this, Krshna also parted himself into two and produced the four-armed Visnu from the left half of his body. Krsna gave Sarasvati and Kamala to Visnu as his wives, with whom he went to Faikuntha and lived there in happiness. From chapter vi, it appears, however, that Visnu had obtained another wife, Ganga by name, in the meantime. One day Ganga was looking wistfully at her Lord and Visnu was reciprocating the tender glances. This was too much for the short-tempered Sarasvati who vehemently began to accuse Visnu of partiality. Visnu, in order to give Sarasvati time to recover her temper, left the place; but this only served to incense Sarasvati the more. She advanced threateningly towards Ganga, when Laksmi intervened. Exasperated at the intervention, Sarasvati cursed Laksmi with transformation into both a tree and a river. Laksmi was holding Sarasvati by force. The curse made her full of grief but she neither cursed in return nor let Sarasvati go. At this goodness of Laksmi, Ganga fired up and cursed Sarasvati with transformation into a river. Sarasvati, who had not yet cooled down, returned the same curse to Ganga. descending to the earth to At this stage Visnu returned and learnt what had happened. He forthwith divorced Sarasvati and Ganga and decreed that only Laksmi should remain with him, part of her energy fulfil the curses of Sarasvati. She would thus be born as the daughter of a king, obtain Visnu as her lover and then be transformed into the sacred Tulasi plant. As a river, she would be known as the Padmavati or the Padma and would be as sacred as the Ganges. Sarasvati was given over to Brahma and Ganga to Siva. At the intervention of Laksmi, however, Visnu relented so far as to permit Sarasvati and Ganga to remain

near him in part, while the rest of their energy would go to fulfil the curses and to attend on their new husbands. These confused legends are, on the very face of them, of modern manufacture, and the manufacturer,-a fervent devotee of Krsna, does not appear to have been a masterhand in his art. The complete severance with the older legends, and the patch-work towards the close, resulting in a half-hearted alliance of Brahma with Sarasvati, bespeak a rather weak and an individual hand. But no serious doubt need be entertained that even these novel legends are considerably old, as we find Sarasvati unquestionably, though not universally, accepted as the wife of Visnu by the side of Laksmi, in almost all the images of Visnu hitherto found in Bengal. The rise of a separate school of sculpture in Bengal is synchronistic with the rise of a dynasty of its own kings, viz the Palas, about the beginning of the 9 th century A. D., and hardly one of the innumerable sculptures found in Bengal can be assigned to an earlier period. The only exception is the unique image of Visnu worshipped at Laksmankati in the Bakarganj District noticed supra on pages 86-87. Even on this sculpture, Sarasvati appears seated on a lotus and playing on a lyre of antique pattern. Only the discovery of dated images of Visnu belonging to an even earlier period can enable us in future to find out the true date of the ascription of Sarasvati to Visnu's wifehood. Visnu's other wife Kamala or Laksmi has also a very interesting record in the history of image worship in India. The Puranas (Kurma, I. Chap. xiii. Visnu, I. Chap. ix) state that she was born of Khyati and her father was Bhrgu. Subsequently she disappeared and was recovered by churning the This legend of the churning of the ocean has not yet been thoroughly investigated; but as far as is known, it ocean. appears the Vedic literature. to have hardly any root in

Probably it is reminiscent of some joint undertaking by the Assyrians and the Indians, and the story seems to have been directly taken up and embedded in the Pauranic literature. Laksmi, recovered by churning the ocean and identified with the daughter of Khyati and Bhrgu, thus appears to have had a foreign accretion to her personality, which already, in the Satapatha Brahmana, was an embodiment of beauty and riches. This much is certain that Vedic Visnu had no wife united to him and whatever may be the origin of Laksmi, she was united to Visnu in a much later period and has kept her position ever since. Even in the apocryphal Sri Sukta, (MaxMuller. Rg-Veda, 2 nd Ed. Vol. IV. P. 523.) the genuine first fifteen verses are silent regarding her wifehood of Visnu, and it is only in the manifestly later fourteen verses that she is invoked in that capacity. Such was, however, not the case with Sarasvati. Originally the wife of Brahma, she was fictitiously united to Visnu. The looseness of the bond is apparent from the fact that several Puranas, in their directions for the making of an image of Visnu, direct the substitution of the goddess Prthivi in the place of Sarasvati.* The swan, which is the vehicle of Brahma, is found as the vehicle of Sarasvati in many of her images, a fact that unmistakably points to her original place in the Indian mythology as Brahmani or the wife of Brahma. Sarasvati has many different Dhyanas or invocations and in some of them, her vehicle Swan does not appear. The museum of the Varendra Research Society at Rajsahi has in its collections images of Sarasvati which show a ram as the vehicle of the goddess in the place of the swan. In the Dhyanas of the 3 A(i) c 5 * Vide the description of above, in which Prthivi occupies the position ordinarily occupied by Sarasvatt.

goddess that have come to my notice, I have not met with the mention of ram as the vehicle of the goddess in any of them. But that the sculptors of Varendri did not put in ram without proper authority, is evident from some passages in the Satapatha Brahmana. There, in the first Brahmana of the 7 th Adhyaya, Kanda XII, it is related how once Indra became enervated because he had desecrated the Sacrifice and his vital energy began to flow off from all parts of his body. "From his nostrils his vital powers flowed off and became that animal, the ram." (Eggeling's translation, vol. v. S. B. E., vol. XLIV, page 215). The gods, on this, called upon the Asvins and Sarasvati to heal Indra. Sarasvati healed Indra and received the ram as her reward. From that day, the ram has been sacred to Sarasvati. Rams or ewes used to be sacrified to Sarasvati, as is evident from the 7 th section of the 2 nd Brahmana :-"Hegoats are sacred to the Asvins, ewes to Sarasvati, and cows (and bulls) to Indra, they say: if these animals are sacrificed, he (the sacrificer) by means of those deities gains those. animals." 35 It is interesting to note that the custom of sacrificing ram to Sarasvati still pesists in some parts of the Dacca district, and one of the principal diversions of young people in some villages on the festive day of the worship of Sarasvati is ram-fight. The earliest image of Sarasvati hitherto discovered in India appears to be the inscribed one installed by a Jaina devotee at Mathura, towards the beginning of the Christian Era. The goddess squats on a rectangular seat in an inelegant fashion and is clothed in a loose drapery. She holds a book in her left hand. The upper portion of the image is lost together with the right hand, which is raised and probably had either the Vyakhyana Mudra, or a pen. On the right side is a male

attendant with a pitcher (Sudhadhya-Kalasa,-the pitcher of nectar ?). On the left is also another male attendant with hands folded in adoration. The number of the images of Sarasvati found in Bengal is not large. I cannot find any individual image of Sarasvati catalogued in the two catalogues of the Indian Museum of Calcutta. In the catalogue of the Rajsahi Museum, three images of Sarasvati, found in the districts of Bogra and Rajsahi, are described. Only one of them is entire. The Dacca Museum has an excellent image of Sarasvati. From the last two images, it is seen that the goddess plays on a vina by her two normal hands, while the other right hand and the other left hand hold a rosary and a book respectively. It is rather curious that not one of her several Dhyanas to be found in the different Tantras, corresponds exactly to these images; the only description that corresponds to the images found in Bengal is contained in the 1 st half of verse 16, chapter 50, of the Agnipurana. Here she is described as Pustaksa-malika-hasta vina-hasta Sarasvati. (i. e. Sarasvati should have the Lyre, the Book and the Rosary in her hands). The Chart on the next page summarises the attributes of Sarasvati according to the different Dhyanas. The eighth variety is distinguished as Parijata-Sarasvati. 3 b (1) Image of Sarasvati in black stone, 1'11"x 11". It is a beautifully carved image of Sarasvati. The goddess has four hands. Her normal hands play on the lyre. The other right hand holds the Rosary and in the other left hand is a Book.

Plate LXIII. To face page 188. Sarasvati: 3. B. (1) a

No. I SARASVATI Attributes in different hands. 3 4 189 Additional characteris-Reference. tics. Book (learnBody formI. Boon Rosary Skull ed of the ing) alphabet, 2. Pen * Sarada Tilak Tantra, 7 th Patala Book Appears to be only twoarmed. Ditto. Attitude of expounding (VyakhyaRosary Pitcher of nectar. Book mudra) Ditto. Vina Rosary Pitcher of nectar. Vehicle, Book Ditto. the swan 5. Lotus Rosary Lotus Book 6. Expounding Rosary attitude. Pitcher full of gems Book Ditto. Ditto. Abstraction Rosary Pitcher Book alphabet. Body com- Prapanchaposed of the sara Tantra ch. 7-3 8 Vina Rosary Pitcher of nectar. Book Vehicle, the swan Do. ch. 8. a Boon Rosary Protection Book IO. Playing on vina Rosary Playing on vina Book Chart of the attributes of Sarasvati. Agnipurana. chap. 319. Agnipurana. ch. 50.

The goddess sits on a lotus with her right leg pendant, the foot resting on a lotus. Below are carved some elaborate coils of lotus stalks. Swan, the vehicle of the goddess, appears inside the extreme right coil. A devotee with folded hands, is depicted in the left extreme coil. Masses of tangled locks of the goddess are done into a braid, nicely carved and shown on the left side of her head. The goddess sits under a tri-folio arch and the Krttimukha is depicted at the top of the piece. The find-place of the image is note-worthy. Vajrayogini is at present a big village in the southern part of the tract which anciently was the site of the city of Vikramapura. This village, which comprises 27 hamlets, each known by a different name, has yielded a number of Buddhist images. This fact, together with the name of the village, which is identical with that of that of a well-known Vajrayana goddess, marks this village out as an ancient seat of the Buddhists. Some ancient mounds in the centre of the village are known as the Nastik Panditer Bhita or the atheist scholar's home-stead, attached to which is another mound called Tolbadir Bhila (the school-gi It was from a tank below this school-site that this image of the goddess of learning was found. Atisa Dipankara, who went to Tibet from the Vikramasila monastery in 1040 A. D. and reformed Buddhism there, is said to have had his home in Vikramanipur in the country of Bangala. Vikramanipur appears to be no other than Vikrampur, and popular imagination has associated Atisa with the atheist scholar who had his home in Vajrayogini, and near the site of whose school this image was found.