Bharatanatyam

Recently I was invited to an Arangetram where a friend’s daughter performed Bharatanatyam for nearly three hours. Needless to say that it was a visual treat and near sublime. During the performance there were instances when the dancer was enacting different emotions and all the references were that of gods and goddesses from Hindu mythology. This set me thinking on the origins of this beautiful and divine dance form.

To begin with – Arangetram is a Tamil word where ‘aranga’ means a raised floor and ‘etram’ means to ascend. In short an arangetram is the first public performance of a disciple who has undergone years of arduous training in the dance form. The first performance is that much a test for the disciple as it is for the guru or the teacher who feels proud to showcase his own skills as he prides over the achievement of his disciple.

As always with Indian aspects, there is mythology behind this too!

According to Hindu Mythology, the gods and goddesses requested Lord Brahma, who was the Creator of all, to create a text which was accessible and understandable to common man – a fifth veda. Considering the request, Lord Brahma created the Pancham-veda also known as Natyaveda, which was the embodiment of all the four vedas, i.e. Rig, Yajur, Sama and Atharva Vedas.

It is said that Lord Brahma took aspects of words (pathya) from the Rig Veda, aspects of the gesture (abhinaya) from Yajur Veda, song and music (geet) from Sama Veda and emotions (rasa) from the Atharva Veda to create his final Pancham-veda. Lord Brahma then gave this to sage Bharata for him to spread it amongst mankind. With the help of this text, Bharata muni wrote what is better known as the Natyashastra or the science of drama, a complete text on Indian dance, drama and music. Bharatanatyam got its name from sage Bharata.

Another version says that this is the dance form which was taught by Parvati to Usha, who was the daughter of a demon by the name of Banasura and Usha in return taught the same to the gopikas of Dwarka. This is how the dance form reached mankind.

The modern format of the Bharatanatyam is credited to the efforts of four brothers, who were collectively known as the Tanjore Quartet, in the 19^th century. Together, they organized the dance form into progressive lessons to enable teaching of the art form. They also composed additional music for performances which combined with graceful movements added to the sheer divinity of the performance.

Bharatanatyam has mythological association and has a direct ‘involvement’ of the gods. This lends it the divine credence and also the much needed dedication and discipline for such tough and long-drawn learning, which is no less than worship and on achievement, the performers feel nothing short of heavenly bliss. Ask my friends daughter and she would vouch for this!

Next we will read about another important dance form with mythological explanations. Keep reading!

Two of my articles on Lord Shiva which were written on the occassion of Shivratri have been published in the following Website -

http://espiritokashi.wordpress.com/category/journal/

Holi & Women's Day

Today is Holi and also International Women’s Day, so happy holi to all and a very happy women’s day to all the women I know and the rest, whom I would love to know!

Having said that, there is a hidden irony in today’s Holi. On one hand we are celebrating Women’s day, and on the other hand this day is a day when the image of the women has to take a beating! Let’s go thru some of the myths of Holi and it will be apparent.

First and the most common name associated with Holi is that of Holika. Holika was the aunt of Prahlad, who was the son of Hiranyakashyap. Hiranyakashyap was an egoistic ruler who had commanded that only he should be worshipped and none else. However, his son Prahlad used to worship Lord Vishnu and no orders or threats would deter him from doing so. Hiranyakashyap had made many attempts of eliminate his son, but each time Lord Vishnu would save him. Holika had a boon, whereby fire could not touch her or harm her, so on this day, she managed to coax Prahlad to sit on her lap and enter the fire. But due to her evil intentions of killing a pious boy, it was she who got burnt and Prahlad came out unscathed. Holi gets its name from the evil aunt, Holika.

Mathura celebrates Holi by burning the effigy of a demoness (female demon – if I may!!), Putana. According to a legend, the King of Mathura, Kamsa (also Lord Krishna’s uncle) had sent Putana to kill the baby Krishna. She tried to suckle baby Krishna by oozing poison from her breasts. But the Lord knew about her evil designs and sucked her life out leaving her lifeless. Till this day, the Yadava community in Mathura, burn the effigy of Putana who is sometimes also referred to as Holi.

Finally a lesser known myth – the myth of Dhundhi. In the kingdom of Prithu there lived a terrible ogress (a female giant or monster in myths and fairy tales) by the name of Dhundhi. Dhundhi was invincible as she had received a boon that she would not be killed by men or gods; could not be harmed by arms or heat or cold or rain. This had made her a menace and she was known for devouring young children. Prithu was worried about this and so one day he called his priest to see if there was a solution to this menace. The priest said that besides the boons, she also had a curse from Lord Shiva. According to the curse, she was not immune to pranks and abuses from boys. So it was decided that on this day – when it is neither cold nor hot and definitely no rain, the young boys (who are not men as yet and definitely not gods) would consume bhang (to get them delirious), and make a lot of noise and abuse her out of the kingdom, which Dhundhi could not resist. Till date this behavior of young boys can be seen and no offence is taken on this day!

As we have seen, that the festival celebrates the elimination of a female form, be it an aunt or a demoness or an ogress. To add fuel to fire, the day is also known as the day to celebrate the victory of good over evil!

Heavens!! Where do I hide today?

Happy Holi and a great Women’s Day to all the lovely women of the world!!!!

What would the world be without each one of you!! Phew!!!

Read last year’s article on Holi – “Holi – Festival of Colours”

http://utkarshspeak.blogspot.in/2011/03/holi-festival-of-colours.html

Iravan – the South Indian Barbareek

In the last two articles, we read about Barbareek, aka Khatu Shyam Baba, a North Indian deity prevalent in parts of Rajasthan and adjacent areas. Today we will read about a similar myth from the South India. Please note the striking similarities.

This is the myth of Iravan which is prevalent in Tamil Nadu and the nearby areas.

Iravan was the son of Arjuna and Uloopi, the Naga princess. During the 13 year exile for the Pandavas, one year was spent by Arjuna as a penance and during this year he is supposed to have travelled far and wide. This was actually done for him to forge alliances and acquire weapons and powers. It was during this one year that, he visited what is present day North-East of India. There he came across Uloopi and they get married. However, the relationship was a very brief one as Arjuna had to move on soon after his marriage. Iravan was born out of this brief relationship. However, Arjuna gets to see his son only prior to the war of Kurukshetra and asks him to join the war, which the brave Iravan agrees to.

There are no major reasons or events leading to his sacrifice, except for the fact that he was a brave warrior and the principle of offering sacrifice prior to the war. There are different versions of the sacrifice in the case of Iravan. Some say that he offered to be sacrificed on the 18^th day of the battle to Ma Kali. The more prevalent belief is that he was sacrificed at the beginning of the war. However he was rewarded by a couple of boons for the heroic deed. One was that his head would witness the entire battle from a hilltop. The other boon was that since he wanted to die a heroic death, he wanted to be mourned by a widow after his death.

Ritual enactment of lamenting the
death of Iravan by eunuchs

Having agreed to the boon, there was one problem. No woman wanted to marry him and be his wife for a night as he was to die the very next day. Seeing this Krishna decides to take his previous form of Mohini, the enchantress, gets married to Iravan and spends the night with him. Later in the morning, after his death, Mohini mourns the death of Iravan like a widow. There are different versions to this aspect, in different parts of the state and its neighbourhood with some eliminating the episode of Mohini’s mourning completely. Even to this day, in a ritual enactment of the mourning, many transvestites and eunuchs enact the ritual mourning by crying, beating their chests and breaking bangles on the day of the said sacrifice of Iravan. In some Krishna temples, he is decked in a white saree for a day, to mark the day as the day of widowhood.

What is interesting to note is that more than worship or a religious following, Iravan is a very popular folklore and a common theme or subject of folk theaters and plays. This myth could just have been woven to lend divinity to Iravan the folk hero by associating him with Arjuna and Lord Krishna of the epic Mahabharata. His face makes for very colourful masks and is a great hit with the locals in the rural areas. He is also referred to as the god of the transvestites and the eunuchs who are locally referred to as Ali’s also referred to as Aravani (that of Iravan).

In some of the plays which dramatizes the whole episode of Iravan, he is compared with the likes of Puru and Bhishma who are known to have sacrificed for their fathers, Yayati and Shantanu respectively. Iravan’s sacrifice of his life for the victory of his father is seen as bigger than that of Puru who gave up his youth for his father Yayati and Bhishma who gave up the throne and matrimony for his father, Shantanu.

Though there are similarities with that of Barbareek, there are some prominent differences, besides the parentage of the two.

First and foremost, the heroic allusions are missing in the case of Iravan, though the same does find mention in the dramatic enactments of Iravan. Nowhere is there reference of his infallible arrows and his participation in the war having a pre-condition.

Second, Lord Krishna does not have the role of testing Iravan; rather here he is central to being part of the sacrifice. He does suggest the sacrifice, but he does not make it obligatory as a word given for charity as done in the case of Barbareek. Thus in this myth, Krishna actually comes out as a savior who bails out Iravan with his last wish.

Third, the association with the transgender and transvestites is a bit of an enigma. How this practice of Iravan being a god for the community and the ritual enactment of mourning by them came about is unknown. However, one can theory could be that the marriage could not be said to be consummated as ultimately Mohini was a male and the relationship was thus not normal. Also, except for the mourning by the widow of Iravan, there wasn’t anything of a marriage as he was still deprived of a coital bliss, something that the community is deprived of too. The identification of the Ali’s state with that of Iravan and thus the lament is quite understandable. (If there are any other theories, then please feel free to forward the same to the Blog..).

During this period a number of fertility rites are also performed. One of them is that prior to the ceremony, a goat is killed and the blood of the goat is smeared with cooked rice and the same is offered to idols of Iravan. It is believed that this rice eaten by women can help them conceive. The presence of such rituals actually bears testimony to some ancient practice (even tribal practive) which has got assimilated with the popular epic. The strong folk-connotation also refers to some folklore associated with a popular folktale.

An interesting myth, but localized as per the region.

It is said that there are similar characters in other parts of India like Bundelkhand, Orissa and Himachal Pradesh. There is a popular version of Iravan in Java too, but that’s for another day!

Barbareek aka Khatu Shyam Baba - Part 2

Yesterday we discussed the myth of Barbareek aka Khatu Shyam Baba. There are some small aspects of the same which are also quite interesting. Let us go through them.

One small aspect of the myth is that post the battle of Kurukshetra, the Pandavas started arguing amongst them as to who was responsible for the victory. After much argument, Krishna, suggested that they ask the head of Barbareek as he had had a ring-side view of the entire battle. On asking, Barbareek said that it was Lord Krishna who was responsible for the victory as during the entire battle his game-plan and his suggestions were crucial to the outcome of the whole battle. From the height of the hilltop, all he could see was Lord Krishna’s sudarshan-chakra simply killing all the enemies and Draupadi in the form of Ma Kali simply lapping up the blood of all the enemies, not allowing a single drop to fall on the ground. To dig deeper in this aspect, one can see two very strong suggestions. One is the supremacy of Lord Krishna and the other is the prevalence of the cult of Mother Goddess. It is said that the practice of offering a sacrifice before the battle was to appease Ma Kali, who has always been associated with sacrifices and such aspects. Finally, this also has traces of the myth of Raktabija (http://utkarshspeak.blogspot.in/2011/11/raktabija-demon.html ) where Goddess Kali does not allow the drop of the demon to fall on the ground to avoid the multiplication of the demon from the drops of his blood. In oral tradition of mythology, such mixing up of myths is only human, is one guess. The other could be a harmonious co-existence of different cults at a given time.

We have read earlier that when Krishna disguised as a Brahmin tested Barbareek’s power of the arrows, the arrow hovered around his foot, which had hidden a leaf. Another version says that the arrow actually pierced his foot and had made it a vulnerable zone. Another version says that Lord Krishna had got a boon from Sage Durvasa (the sage known more for his curses than boons!) that his entire body would be immune to weapons except his foot. Later we have read about the death of Lord Krishna by being struck by an arrow of a hunter in his foot which he had mistaken to be the face of a deer. This aspect of the myth is similar to the famous Greek myth of Achilles and his vulnerable spot, his heel. Achilles was a brave hero in the Greek mythology who was invincible except for his vulnerable spot, his heel. He meets his end, by being struck by a poisonous arrow in his heel. Quite a few similarities, I guess!

A Painting depicting the sacrifice of
Barbareek

Finally the justification of Lord Krishna asking for the sacrifice! According to one version, once Lord Brahma and other gods approached Lord Vishnu to complain to him about the evil on earth and how wickedness was all over and innocent people were not being allowed to live in peace. They urged Lord Vishnu to do something to eradicate this evil. Hearing this, a Yaksha spoke out of turn and said that for these kind of acts, he himself was enough and it did not quite require the help of Lord Vishnu. Lord Brahma was insulted at his impudence and cursed him that whenever he reached a stage of eliminating all evil on earth, Lord Vishnu would end up killing him first. Barbareek was the same Yaksha in the later birth and Krishna was only doing what was pre-destined! This is an interesting aspect of myth-making. On the face of it, it seemed that Lord Krishna had been unfair to a brave hero and got him eliminated. He would have supported the Pandavas and would ensure the victory of the Pandavas. Some skeptics would say that Krishna did so to avoid all credit going to Barbareek if it so happened and thus got him eliminated, even when he was related to the Pandavas and was going to fight from their right side. Some of these thoughts are of modern-day thinking.

Epics are never like a once-written novel, where all instances are sequential. In the oral tradition, many aspects get inserted based on the orator, his preference and his biases as well as that of his audience. It is highly probable that this aspect of the Yaksha has been an afterthought when the hero of the story (Lord Krishna) begins to be misunderstood especially for his seeking the head of Barbareek. This could be an individual’s perception or a common notion. This aspect also highlights the process or the rationale of myth-making.

Next time we will read about a similar myth, prevalent in South India.

Keep reading....