Shiva! For his devotees, he is the entire universe and the core of all beings. Who but a fool, be he ever so wise, would dare take on the task of writing about him? Has the writer not heard the old Indian tale of the goddess of learning who, despite having mountains of ink powder, the sea as an inkwell, the World Tree as her writing pen, and the surface of the earth as her paper, failed to describe the splendor of Mahadev, the Great God? Still, neither the writer nor the reader need despair, for Shiva is the devotee of his devotees, the lover of his lovers, and though he is all-encompassing and all-transcendent, he reveals him-self to his worshippers-for he is the very Self of each and every one.
In south India, when worshipping Shiva, one must first of all purify the body with water as one enters the temple, or holy site, where he customarily reveals his numinous presence. One brings him flowers, sweet smelling incense, and other beautiful things representing one's heart and soul, and dedicates them to Mahadev. One also offers a ripe coconut, which the attendant priest dashes against a hard stone surface, spilling the milk in front of the idol, or the lingam, which is Shiva's sign. The hard-shelled nut represents none other than our skull, this citadel of our hardened out little ego. Willingly one sacrifices this accursed limited ego-nature to the all-encompassing greater Self. The ego dwarf, reducing the universe to his own diminished dimensions by means of his clever, cutting intellect, is never capable of grasping the wider mystery. Shiva, therefore, in an act of mercy, seizes it, smashes it to bits, drinks out its life fluid, and lets us find at-one-ment with him, our true Self. It is no wonder that the ego-centered individual has always shunned and feared this seeming destroyer. And no wonder, then, that Shiva is often seen as the diabolos, or devil.
The stories told in this book are common Indian lore. Grand-mothers tell them to the children, peasant storytellers or wandering sadhus recite them in the evening to eager listeners. They are told, not just to entertain, but to teach, to make a point, or to illustrate some insight into the mysteries of life. My sources were mainly such oral tellings. There are however a number of good books, published in English that also address these tales and legends. Many are found in the various Puranas ("tales of ancient times"), such as the Shiva Purana. Helpful to the curious reader might be Cradle Tales of Hinduism by Sister Nivedita, Hindu Myths ("Penguin Classics" translated by Wendy O'Flaherty), Classical Hindu Mythology (Cornelia Dimmit and J. A. B. van Buitenen, eds.), Hindu Mythology, Vedic and Puranic by W. J. Wilkins, and A Classical Dictionary of Hindu Mythology and Religion by John Dowson. All of these source books will be listed in the bibliography.
I went to India in the role of an ethnologist, as a visiting scholar at Benaras Hindu University, where I planned to record various aspects of cultural and social phenomena. Faced with the heat, health problems, and most of all, the magic of this fascinating land, my cool scholarly detachment could not prevail. It was as if I myself were seized by Hara, the seizer, and sacrificed to my higher Self. My paradigms of reality vaporized, my coconut was smashed, and the grace of a wider vision (darshana) was accorded. When I left Bharata (as the Indians call India), this holiest of lands, where the veil covering the supernatural worlds is gossamer thin and the gods still reveal themselves to humankind, I had no photographs, no tape recordings, and few notes. These things seemed too profane, too limited. I myself was the page upon which He had written His name. And now that sufficient time has passed since I came back into the "world," I feel at last able to tell something about Mahadev-who is, dear reader, also your innermost Self.
**Contents and Sample Pages**
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