Browsing: Hindu Gods and Goddesses

The first thing I spotted was rows and rows of footwear lined up outside the door, neatly stacked. I dutifully shed my sandals too, and going inside found an Indian-style behthak in progress with silk cushions scattered on the woven carpet.
Arts lovers, some with babies in tow, were already sitting cross-legged, facing the empty expanse of a large wooden floor. Musicians were tuning up their instruments, in anticipation.

The space is the Anamika Navatman Studios, an innovative organization for South Asian Arts and the production was Bhinna Pravaaha: Memories of a Performing Artist – Maya Kulkarni. This is a first undertaking to record and pay tribute to the noted artists of the past.

I missed it. This beautiful festival of Indian dance in the middle of Manhattan’s bustling downtown business district. A pretty surreal event, I’m sure, looking at the pictures of bedecked dancers striking poses, surrounded by skyscrapers rising against the New York skyline. Yes, the temples of Khajuraho are very far away.

Want to make some spiritual gains and rub shoulders with Gods and Goddesses? The place to go for darshan is the Brooklyn Museum because here you get to meet not one, not two but all ten avatars of Vishnu, Hinduism’s Blue-Skinned Savior.

“Vishnu – one of Hinduism’s most important and powerful deities – is the Great Preserver, vanquishing those who seek to destroy the balance of the universe,” writes Joan Cummins in ‘Vishnu – Hinduism’s Blue-Skinned Savior.’ Indeed, the time looks ripe for Vishnu’s avatar to come to earth…

A chat with Joan Cummins, who is the Curator of South Asian art at Brooklyn Museum.

(Photo: Amal Biswas)

Ever wondered why Hindu Gods and Goddesses have multiple heads, limbs and eyes?

Word as a vehicle of expression of thought is a powerful instrument – but its adequacy is limited to the phenomenal world. That is why an individual’s personal spiritual realization is inexpressible in its totality.

Mythology is an offshoot of this inefficacy of word while dealing with celestial events. The saintly scholar in Hinduism is seized with the problem of adequately narrating a superhuman extraordinary event, and tends to exaggerate. He needs to respond to his inner clamor to bestow the highest glory to the Lord with love, respect and adoration.

This has inevitably resulted in the Hindu pantheon having Gods and Goddesses with multiple heads and hands, but then so do cosmic evil forces too. There is a deep philosophical significance in this.
– Guest blogger Tapas Mukherjee