Ganapati's Vahana The Rat

Let us understand the origin/relevance of Ganesha’s vahana, the rat or the Mushika.

Ganapati is referred to as the Mushhak Vahan, or the rider of the rat. As we have seen that Ganesha is a harvest deity and the rat is one of the major problems of a farmer. Rats are known to devour the farmers produce and having a deity who rides a rat, is seen as someone who can control the menace that a rat is, for the farmers. Ganesha is known to have conquered the menace and riding the vanquished is a very common motif in our mythology (Krishna dancing on the serpent Kaliya, Shiva riding the bull, etc.). Riding the rat also depicts the control Ganesha exerts on the devastative power of the rats on crops.

Continuing with the same logic, Mushhak also means thief and the title Mushhak vahan also implies the lord who rides on the field rat, who is also the thief of the field.

The rat is also an animal that multiplies rather rapidly, is again symbolic of fertility and its productive power. The rat’s association with the harvest god, Ganesha could collectively symbolise the significance of a bumper crop brought in by the arrival of the god.

According to some scholars, a study of ancient India shows that there was the rule of Matanga (elephant) dynasty. There is a mention of a King of Kharvela of Kalinga who during the third quarter of the first century BC is supposed to have attacked the city of Musikas. Ancient India saw such dynasties with the totems of elephants and rats and there are records of the elephant dynasty being victorious over the rat dynasty. We can safely surmise that it is not entirely impossible to depict such aspects of history into mythological references of the conquered yielding to the conqueror.

Ganapati – Harvest god

Ganapati by many is considered to be a Harvest god. His association with harvest might not be too prevalent to us today, but if we trace the origins of the faith, we can see the association of Ganapati with vegetation and harvest.

Some scholars feel that the familiar sight of a farmer carrying bundles of corn with the lower ears of corn swinging to and fro resembled a lot with the head of an elephant and its long snout hanging. This led to the idea of a bumper crop overriding the menace of the rats might have taken the expression of a god with the head of an elephant riding a rat, with the god being pot-bellied – resembling a barn, surrounded by a snake, which is again the destroyer of the rats.

Ganesha is also referred to as the ‘Surpakarna’ and ‘Ekdanta’. The meaning of ‘surpa’ or the ‘supa’ is actually the ‘winnowing basket’. Also some references of ‘Ekdanta’ are with that of the ploughshare. Both the references are with harvest, and thus the association with a harvest deity.

The other reference of being a harvest deity is that of the rat. The rat is a menace for the farmers and Ganesha is seen riding the rat, implying that propitiating the god can lead to a control of the rat menace, which is a major source of problems for the farmers. We will discuss the significance of the rat in a later article. However, it is pertinent to mention a ritual followed in certain parts of Ratnagiri district of Maharashtra, India. There is a special day called the ‘Under Bi’, i.e. the second day of the rat. On this day, food is offered to an idol of a mouse which is worshipped along with Ganesha. The food offerings made to the idol on that day is the next day, thrown in the fields for the field mice to eat, and spare the standing crops.

Again the chief offerings the god is modak which is a sweet made out of sweet rice, sugar and coconut, again all things bearing a strong association with harvest.

The time of the celebrations and some of the rituals bear a very strong association with Harvest and thus Ganapati’s association with Harvest.

Ganapati - Birth Part 2

The Myth of Gajasura

A very interesting myth exists about Ganesha’s elephant head – the myth of the demon Gajasura.

As the myth goes, Gajasura – elephant headed demon was doing a very strict penance to seek blessing from Lord Shiva. Shiva granted him a boon as his satisfaction from the penance. Gajasura, asked that he be able to emanate fire from his body, so that nobody could dare come near him. Shiva granted the wish.

Gajasura continued his penance and Shiva would occasionally come and grant him his wishes. Finally Gajasura asked that Shiva inhabit his stomach and quite obviously Shiva granted the wish without thinking of the consequences. Soon Shiva was missing from his abode and Parvati was getting restless with the absence. Parvati then approached Lord Vishnu for help.

Lord Vishnu figured out soon regarding the whereabouts of Lord Shiva. He then devised a plan and took the form of a flautist and got Shiva’s Nandi bull to become a dancing bull. Together they performed in front of Gajasura who was so impressed by the performance that he granted a wish to the flautist – “anything you desire”. Lord Vishnu immediately asked for the release of Shiva.

Gajasura immediately saw thru the charade, but released Lord Shiva as promised. However, he asked for one last wish from Shiva. He said that he would want people to love him and his head should be remembered for ever after his death. Lord Shiva then got his son Ganesha there and substituted his head with that of Gajasura. This was one last gift by Shiva to Gajasura.

Ganesh – Marriage

There seem to be different versions of Lord Ganesha’s family. Was he married, and if so who were his wives? Let’s see the details of his wives and his family.

Popular myth says, that Lord Ganesha was married to two daughters of Prajapati, Siddhi (wealth) and Buddhi (wisdom). This could be symbolic of the fact that propitiating the Lord could help mortals attain both wisdom and wealth. Amongst the pantheon, goddess Lakshmi is associated with wealth and goddess Saraswati is associated with wisdom (learning), but then some myths say that both were Ganesha’s sisters! Coming back to Siddhi and Buddhi, his wives, both give birth to two sons – Shubh (auspiciousness) of Siddhi and Labh (merit) of Buddhi.

In some temples in North, his two wives are referred to as Riddhi (prosperity) and Siddhi, however, there are no significant textual references of Riddhi available.

Another popular myth says that Santoshi Ma (goddess of satisfaction), was Ganesha’s daughter. Again no textual references have been made available except the famous movie by the name of ‘Jai Santoshi Ma’.

A very famous representation by Raja Ravi Verma, shows Lord Ganesha with Ashtasiddhi, representing the eight spiritual attainments obtained by the practice of Yoga. According to Ganesha Purana, these Ashtasiddhis are personified to attack the demon Devantaka. Sometimes all of them are united as a single shakti of Ganesha.

In South a popular myth says that Ganesha was a celibate due to a curse by his mother Parvati. According to the myth, Ganesha was asked as to what kind of woman would he like to have for a wife. His response was a woman like his mother (like a true Indian son!). He is supposed to have said - "Bring me a woman as beautiful as she and I will marry her." This is supposed to have angered Parvati as she felt that he was seeing his mother in a manner inappropriate for a son (does this smack of a reference to the Greek Oedipus Complex?), and thus curses him to be a celibate for life. Some other references say that he was a celibate as he wanted to pursue the path of spiritual wisdom. He is thus also referred to as Abhiru, meaning “without a woman”.

In Bengal, during the Durga Puja, Ganesha is worshipped along with a banana tree (kala bou) as his consort. Not much is available in terms of details of the origin of the banana tree as a consort, except that it could be his association with vegetation as he is also seen as a harvest deity. But on a lighter note, one can also associate the banana tree with an elephants love for bananas!

Ganapati – Birth

The birth of Ganapati has its own myths. However there seem to be quite a few of them in the texts.

The most common one was that of Parvati giving birth to Ganesha all by herself, i.e. with the help of Shiva (thus also referred to as Vinayaka – ‘vina’ i.e. without; ‘nayaka’ i.e. male principle). Once Parvati wanted to go for a bath and so she created a child from her ‘ubtan’, i.e. turmeric paste (and thus Ganesha is also referred to as Dhûmravarna, "the Lord with a tawny colour") with instructions not to allow anybody inside the house. As luck would have it, Shiva returned from somewhere and Ganesha stopped him, unknown to him that Shiva was his father (though not biological). To cut short the whole story, a battle ensued between the two and Ganesh was beheaded by Shiva. Later, on realising the mistake, an elephant’s head was attached to the body of the child Ganesha. This is the most common and well-accepted myth from Shiva Purana.

Staying on with Parvati, another myth says that once the used bath-water of Parvati was thrown into the river Ganga, which in turn was drunk by the elephant-headed Goddess Malini. In due course of time, she gave birth to a baby with four hands and five elephant heads. Goddess Malini claimed the child to be hers, but Siva declared the child to be Parvati’s. Shiva then reduced the five heads to one and thus was born the elephant-headed god.

Still another myth says that once Shiva had slain Aditya, a son of Sage Kashyapa. Though Shiva restored the dead son, it did not pacify the sage who cursed him that his son would lose his head too. When this happened with Ganesha later, the head of Indra’s elephant was used to stick to the body of the child.

A lesser known myth says that a child was born to Parvati after a long tapa, penance. All the gods were invited by Shiva and Parvati to see and bless the child. All gods blessed the child except Shani dev. He did not want to look at the child as his gaze could harm the infant. But Parvati insisted that he see the child. But as is known, Shani’s gaze was so severe, that one look at the child and the child’s head gets severed. Lord Vishnu immediately mounted Garuda and flew to the Pushpa-Bhadra river and got the head of a young elephant and joined it with the body of the child Ganesha. This myth, though lesser known, is documented in Brahma Vaivarta Purana.