Worship
Of God As Mother In The Indian Tradition
By Swami Satyasthananda,
OF the diverse forms of worship prevalent in India from time
immemorial, worship of the Divine Mother has occupied a place of singular
significance. This idea of worshipping the Divine as the Eternal Mother has not
been developed in any other religion of the world as it has been in the Hindu
tradition and therefore it represents a unique contribution of Hindu thought to
global religious culture.
According to Vedanta, when the formless and attributeless
supreme Brahman assumes form with the help of its inscrutable power, maya, it
is called Saguna Brahman or Ishvara. There are two aspects to the ultimate
Reality: the absolute and the relative. From the absolute standpoint Brahman is
impersonal and without attributes, nirguna; whereas from the relative
standpoint it is saguna, the personal God. Though these two aspects appear to
be mutually exclusive, they are in fact identical, much like fire and its power
to burn.
In India
the personal god is worshipped in various forms and is called by various names.
This has led to the formation of different sects. To Shaivas Shiva is the
Supreme Deity, to Vaishnavas, Vishnu; and to Shaktas, Shakti manifests as
Mother or Devi. Again, according to the different temperaments of aspirants,
the same deity is addressed as father, master, friend, beloved, or mother. Sri
Ramakrishna always referred to God as ‘my Mother’. The idea of addressing and
worshipping God as Mother is a very ancient tradition in India. This
idea finds expression in the Vedas and the Upanishads and was further developed
in the Purnas and the Tantras.
Origin and Development of
Mother-Worship
In India, where according to Manu ‘the daughter is the highest object of
tenderness’ and the mother is revered a thousand times more than the father’,
the adoration of the female principle in the Creation has been in evidence from
the very beginning of civilization. Not only has God been looked upon as the
feminine par excellence, the Divine Mother, but women have also been looked
upon as manifestations of the Divine Mother and have been offered worship at
every stage of life -- as virgins, as married women and as mothers. The Divine
Mother is not only the mother of the universe; she is also the Eternal Virgin.
From remote antiquity, through unrecorded centuries, right up to our own times,
the conception and adoration of the feminine principle as Divine has undergone
such evolutionary changes that it is difficult to exactly determine how and
when the different forms of goddesses originated and developed in India’s
religious history.
The following seem to be plausible reasons for the
development of Mother-worship in
India: (i) the position women enjoyed at home and in society in the days when
such the highest of all feminine types at home and in society; (ii) the
security the aspirant feels in the natural love and consideration of the mother
towards her child; and (iii) the concept that God creates sustains, and
destroys the universe by his Power or Shakti. Swami Vivekananda points out a
source in an old Vedic hymn to the Goddess: “I am the light. I am the light of
the sun and moon; I am the air which animates all beings.” This is the germ
which afterwards develops into Mother –worship. By Mother –worship is not meant
difference between father and mother. The first idea connoted by it is that of
energy----I am the power that is in all beings.’ Mother-worship is a distinct
philosophy in itself. Power is the first of our ideas. It impinges upon man at
every step; power felt within is the soul; without, nature. And the battle
between the two makes human life. All that we know or feel is but the resultant
of these two forces. Man saw that the sun shines on the good and evil alike.
Here was a new idea of god, as the Universal Power behind all---the Mother-idea
was born.
Activity, according to Sankhya, belongs to Prakriti, to
nature not to Purusha or soul. Of all feminine types in India, the
mother is pre-eminent. The mother stands by her child through everything. Wife
and children may desert a man, but his mother never! Mother, again is the
impartial energy of the universe, because of the colourless love that asks not,
desires not, cares not for the evil in her child but loves him the more. And
today Mother-worship is the worship of all the highest classes amongst the Hindus
We find traces of Mother-worship in the Indus civilization has been assigned to the third
millennium BCE, and is characterized by urban culture. The female figurines in
terracotta
found at Mohenjo-daro are comparable to similar
artifacts excavated from archaeological sites in Baluchistan,
Elam, Mesopotamia,
Transcaspia, Asia Minor, Syria, Palestine,
Cyprus, Crete, the Balkans
and Egypt.
It is probable that this devotion originated from a community of ideas shared
by the people of these regions. The generally accepted view is that these
figurines represent the Great Mother or Nature Goddess, whose worship, under
various names and forms is still prevalent in India.
The Vedic Period
There is a widespread misconception that the worship of god as Mother is a
post-Vedic or non-Vedic practice. But this idea has no basis. Before dealing
with the worship of God as Mother in the Vedic period however, it is necessary
to say a few words about the Vedic concept of the godhead.
The history of Hinduism can be traced back to the hymns
recorded in the Rig Veda. In these hymns we have the most astonishing record of
the march of the human mind from the worship of the half-personified forces of
nature like fire, wind, and rain to the realization of the absolute Spirit. We find
the religious poets of the Vedas groping their way towards the eternal---now
marching ahead, now receding, now triumphant, and now dissatisfied---leaving
behind them a trail of broken images, overthrown divinities, and abandoned
faiths. Nothing mattered to them except a resolute search for unity.
The gods of popular belief, being only half-personified
natural phenomena, gave them the clue. One god faded away into another. The
same epithets had been employed to describe more than one God. When these divinities
overlapped so much, it was inferred that they must all be one in essence. Hence
the Vedic poets could freely extol one god as supreme at any given time,
ignoring the claims of other gods. The myths of the Vedic Samhitas are unique
in attributing the idea of infinity to every one of these gods. These deities
or devas-----Indra, Varuna, Vayu, and so on--- are first worshipped as gods and
then are raised to the status of the Supreme Being in whom the whole universe
exists, who sees every heart, who is the ruler of the universe. Again with
Varuna, another idea is perceptible in germ form: evil and fear. On committing
evil deeds people become afraid and ask Varuna for pardon. These ideas of fear
and sin never really took deep roots in Indian soil but the germs were there.
Thus in the Vedas we see an early form of monotheism. This
invoking individual gods as the highest the elevation to supremacy of one god
at a time has been termed ‘henotheism’ by Max Muller. The gods are thus taken
up as it were, one after another raised and sublimated, till each has assumed
the proportions of the infinite personal God of the universe. The same is true
of the Vedic goddesses. But this monotheistic idea did not satisfy the Vedic
mind. There was an attempt to get behind these powerful gods and grasp the
‘power; of which they were the manifestations. A well known hymn says: ‘that
Being is one which the wise call by various names as Agni, Yama, and
Matarishvan’2.
It is difficult to pinpoint the origin of the mother
goddess idea in the Vedas, but the fact that deities like Aditi and Saraswati
are described by rishis as ‘motherly’ shows that the idea of the Mother
underlying such Puranic deities as Uma, Durga, Parvati, and Lakshmi is
undoubtedly of Vedic origin. The Vedic seer worships divinity in various
devotional moods, the most elementary being that of child towards its mother.
We find this manifest in such Rig Vedic phases as ‘Pita mata sadaminmanusanam; Agni is always father and
mother to humans’ (Rig Veda 6.I.5 ); ‘mateva yadbharase paprathano janam janam;
(Agni) sustains all beings like a mother’ (5.15.4) and ‘vayam syama maturna
sunavah; (O Usha!) let us be dear to you like sons to a mother (7.8i.4).
With the simplicity of a child Vedic seers look upon
heaven and earth as Father and Mother and pray to them for protection from sin
and guidance in the moral order. It is worth noting that when Mother Earth is
invoked or entreated, she is usually invoked with Dyaus, yet it has to be
admitted that the greatness and grandeur of Mother Earth commands reverential
praise from her children with whom the offering of songs is the real worship.
The Vedic conception of the Mother goddess is found best
represented in Aditi who is mentioned no less than eighty times in the Rig
Veda. She is the mother not only of the gods----deva—mata---but also of kings,
heroes, men, and women of the entire nature---the manifest as also that which
lies in the womb of the future. She is the mistress of the moral order that
governs the universe and also the giver of freedom. This tradition of Aditi
being the mother of the gods is found continued even in the Puranas.
The ‘Durga Sukta of the Taittiriya Aranyaka is one of the
most beautiful hymns in the Vedas. Therein Agni is conceived of as the Divine
Mother Durga, the resplendent goddess, blazing in her power:
Tamagnivarnam tapasa jvalantim vairocanim karmaphalesu
justam
Durgam devim saranamaham prapadye sutarasi tarase namah
I take refuge in the Goddess Durga, fiery in her luster and radiant with
ardency, who is the power of the Supreme manifest in diverse forms, residing in
actions and their results. O thou skilled in deliverance us, you steer us
expertly across difficulties; salutations to thee.3
In another Vedic hymn Rishi Kushika invokes Night as
Mother. She is the daughter of the heaven above pervades the worlds, protects
all beings from evils, and gives them peaceful shelter in her lap, mother as
she is. In later Puranic texts Night is described as originating from maya, the
creative power of Brahman, and is called Bhuvaneshwari the sovereign mistress
of the worlds. In the Durga Saptashati Mother Durga is given many epithets
ending with the word ratri or night----kalaratri, maharatri, and so on.
The most striking and comprehensive concept of the Divine
as Shakti in the Vedas is found in the ‘Devi Sukta’. The whole hymn is an
ecstatic outpouring of the realization of Brahman by Vak, the daughter of the
sage Ambhrina. Realizing her all pervasive identity she exclaims:
It is I (as identical with Brahman) who move in the form of the Rudras, the
Vasus, the Adityas and all other gods… I am the sovereign power (over all the
worlds ) bestower of all wealth, cognizant (of the Supreme Being) and the first
among those to whom sacrificial homage is to be offered; the gods in all places
worship but me, who am diverse in form and permeate everything… I give birth to
the infinite expanse overspreading the earth my birthplace is in waters deep in
the sea; there from do I permeate variously all the worlds, and touch the
heaven above with my body. It is I who blow like the wind creating all the
worlds; I transcend the heaven above, I transcend the earth below this is the
greatness I have attained.
In the Upanishads
The Mother Goddess makes her appearance in the Kena Upanishad as Uma Haimavati,
the power of Brahman. Having defeated the asuras, the devas led by Agni, Vayu,
and Indra----were puffed up with pride. They considered themselves all-powerful
without knowing where exactly their power came. Brahman appeared before them in
the form of a yaksa to remove their conceit-----to show them that they were not
only powerless but they also did not realize this fact. He asked Agni to burn a
straw and Vayu to lift it. Both failed. To Indra the yaksa did not even grant
an interview. When Indra felt humbled, Knowledge (of Brahman) made her
appearance in the form of Uma, in all her splendor. She told Indra that the
yaksa was none other than Brahman, the ultimate Reality, the source of all
powers. The Devi Bhagavata dwells elaborately on this legend and records
Indra’s adoration of the Supreme Mother through various hymns. According to
Shankaracharya and Sayanacharya, the Vedic commentator, Uma, who imparts the
knowledge of Brahman is vidya or ‘spiritual knowledge’ personified.
The Mundaka Upanishad also speaks of seven female
powers----kali, karali, and so on---personifications of the flames of the
sacrificial fire. The Shvetashvatara, a later theistic Upanishad, refers to the
‘innate power of the Supreme, concealed by its own nature. The sages realized
that this power, maya, is none other than Prakriti or primordial nature of
infinite variety, with knowledge and action as its natural forms’ (4.10;6.8)
In the Epics and Puranas
It is difficult to say with any degree of certainty if any of the ceremonials
and worship rituals of the Divine Mother in any of her currently popular
forms---Durga, Chandi, or Kali—were in vogue, as we know them today, during the
Epic age of the Ramayana and the Mahabharata. In the ‘Balakanda’ of the
Ramayana we do get the story of goddess Uma, the youngest daughter of Mount Himavan,
who was married to Rudra and was 'highly respected by all gods, including
Brahma. The Mahabharata also mentions Pradyumna’s worship of Goddess Katyayani
and Aniruddha’s hymn to Goddess Chandi. Of particular importance is King
Yudhish-thira’s hymn to Goddess Durga.6 This hymn contains some descriptions of
the Goddess which we are familiar with from Puranic times. In some recensions
of the text we find another hymn to Durga chanted by Arjuna at the instance of
Sri Krishna.7
Before we deal with the worship of the Divine Mother in
the Puranas and Tantras we need to briefly review the origin and development of
the idea of Shakti in India.
In the concept of Shakti we find a happy blending of two elements, one
empirical and the other speculative. On the empirical side is Shakti’s role in
Puranic cosmogony. It is a universal human experience that there can be no
creation without the union of two elements----the male and the female. By
analogy with this empirical fact the Rishis conceived of the role of the
primordial Father and primordial Mother in the origination of the universe. The
Mother held a very important position in many ancient communities; hence it was
natural that the cosmic Mother should become the most important deity. The
linga and yoni---representing the masculine and feminine respectively----have
been the traditional symbols of Shiva and Shakti since ancient times. In
virtually every Shiva temple the deity is depicted in the dual aniconic linga-yoni
form representing the eternal union of Shiva and Shakti.
Again, it was observed that all existent objects were
associated with intrinsic powers. So the Supreme Being, who is responsible for
the creation, preservation, and destruction of the universe, must posses
infinite powers to carry out these functions. The very fact of its existence
presupposes infinite powers. Though the belief in the powers of the Divine is
universal, it is lent a special color in India by the dominant Indian
tendency to view this power this universal energy as a female counterpart or
consort of the ‘possessor of that power’. Thus Shakti came to occupy an
important place in the religious consciousness of not only the Shaktas----for
whom Shakti is supreme---but also of virtually every other religious sect,
including the Shaivas, the Sauras, the Ganapatyas, and the Vaishnavas.
This strong belief in Shakti has fostered a popular
synthesis of such apparently contradictory philosophies as Sankhya, Vedanta,
Vaishnavism, and Tantra. The Sankhya speaks of Purusha and Prakriti as two
independent ultimate realities whose interaction is of the nature of an object
and its witness, the ‘accidental’ contact of Prakriti being a mere attribution
on the unattached Purusha. In the Puranas and related popular religious
literature Prakriti is plainly conceived of as Purusha’s female counterpart,
and the Prakriti and Purusha of the Sankhyas become identified with Shakti and
Shiva in the Tantras. Similarly, in Vedanta the principle of maya is viewed as
the Shakti of Brahman. In later popular religious traditions these pairs came
to be identified with such deities as Vishnu and Radha.
Though we have traced the origin of Mother worship to the Vedas as well as to
pre-Vedic cults, it is in the Puranas and the Tantras that the concept of
Shakti as Mother-Goddess attained remarkable development. We find many of the
feminine deities of the Vedas and the Upanishads gradually becoming the Supreme
Goddess in the Puranas and the Tantras. Such relations may be traced between
the Vedic Goddess Ratri and the Puranic deities Kali and Parvati. In the
Brihaddevata Devi Vak is addressed as Ratri, Saraswati, Aditi and Durga.8
In the vast and varied corpus of Puranic literature where
the abstract principles of the Vedas and the Upanishads are manifested in more
concrete forms, Shakti appears in the form of such deities as Chandi, Durga,
Jagaddhatri, and Annapurna. The voluminous
Devi Bhagavata is devoted to the celebration of various exploits of the Great
Goddess. Another important Shakta text is the Devi Mahatmya or Durga
Saptashati, also known popularly as Chandi. Comprising thirteen chapters from
the Markandeya Purana, this text elaborates upon the concept of Shakti as the
Great Mother and the highest Truth through allegory and is regarded as the most
sacred text of the mother-worshippers of India.
In the Chandi the goddess has been mainly styled Devi” but
she became well-known in later times as Durga. The epithet ‘Durga’ has been
variously interpreted in Puranic and Tantric literature, the central idea being
that of the Mother Goddess who saves us from every misery and affliction, from
all danger and difficulty. She is also called Chandi, the fierce goddess, in
which form she incarnates herself for the purpose of destroying the asuras
whenever they threaten the mental peace and heavenly dominion of the devas.
Durga is also worshipped as Annapurna or
Annada, the giver of food, and as Jagaddhatri, one who upholds the world. In
spring she is worshipped as Vasanti, the spring goddess.
In the ‘Devi Kavacha’ an auxiliary of the Chandi, the Devi
is conceived of in nine forms, Nava-durga: Shailaputri, daughter of the
mountains; Brahmacharini, dwelling in Brahman; Chandraghanta, who has the moon
for her bell; Kushmanda, the fertile,; Skandamata, mother of the war god
Skanda; Katyayani, the daughter of Rishi Katyayana; Kalaratri, the dark night
of dissolution; Mahagauri, the light of knowledge; and Siddhidatri, the
bestower of success. The Devi is also conceived of in three forms according to
the preponderance of each of the three gunas: of sattva, Maha-saraswati; of
rajas, Maha-lakshmi,and of tamas, Maha-Kali.
The ten Mahavidyas are another set of representations of
the Devi. Their origin is narrated in connection with the legend of Shiva and
his consort Sati. Sati’s father Daksha undertook a big sacrifice and invited
all the gods to attend it. But he deliberately chose to ignore his son-in-law
Shiva because of his rustic habits and disheveled appearance. Shiva, of course,
did not feel offended, but Sati did. She decided to visit the sacrifice and
disrupt it. Shiva was not willing to permit this. Sati’s anger increased and
she assumed the ten largely fearsome forms of the Mahavidyas: Kali, Tara, Shodashi, Bhuvaneshwari, Bhairavi, Matangi,
Chhinnamasta, Dhumavati, Bagala, and Kamala. Scholars are disposed to think of
the ten Mahavidyas as different local deities who were later associated with
and assimilated into the great Mother Goddess tradition through legend and
theology. The sadhakas, on the other hand, would take them as different aspects
of the same Great Mother Shakti suited to the tastes, temperaments, and mental
levels of spiritual aspirants.
It will not be out of place here to mention the denouement
of the story of Daksha’s sacrifice. Sati goes to the sacrifice and unable to
stand the insult heaped on her husband, ends her life by entering the
sacrificial fire. On getting the news of Sati’s demise Shiva is beside himself
with grief and starts roaming the universe with Sati’s corpse on his shoulder.
Fearing that Shiva’s grief and anger would ruin the worlds; the gods approach
Vishnu for help. Vishnu, the ever-merciful protector of the universe, quietly
approaches Shiva and with his discus dismembers Sati’s corpse into fifty-one pieces.
Relieved of the corpse, Shiva manages to overcome his grief while each of the
fifty-one places where parts of Sati’s body fall become sacred to the
worshippers of Devi.
The Durga Saptashati gives us a glimpse into the nature of
the Divine mother in the hymn addressed to her by Brahma, the Creator:
You are verily that which cannot be uttered specifically.
You are Savitri (the liberating mantra) and the Supreme mother of the gods.
By you this universe is borne, by you this world is created, by you it is
protected, O Mother Divine and you always consume it at the end. O you who are
( always ) of the form of the whole world, at the time of creation you are of
the form of the creative force, at the time if sustentation you are of the form
of protective power, and at the time of dissolution of the world, you are of
the form of destructive power. You are the supreme knowledge as well as the
great nescience, the great intellect and contemplation and also the great
delusion. The power of good is yours; the power of evil too is yours.
You are the primordial cause of everything, bringing into
force the three gunas---sattva, rajas and tamas---You are the dark night of
periodic dissolution. You are the great night of final dissolution and the
terrible night of delusion. You are the goddess of good fortune, the ruler, and
modesty, intelligence characterized by knowledge bashfulness, nourishment,
contentment, tranquility and forbearance. Armed with various weapons you are
terrible. Again you are pleasing, yea, more pleasing than all the pleasing
things and exceedingly beautiful. You are indeed the Supreme Empress, beyond
the high and low.
And whatever, or wherever a thing exists, conscient or
non-conscient, whatever power all that possess is yourself.9
This is the soul-enthralling
conception of the Divine Mother whom Hindus worship with great eclat in autumn.
This autumnal worship of Mother Durga is especially prominent in Bengal. In the image used for this worship she is usually
portrayed in the form of Mahisha-who took the form of a buffalo, as narrated in
the Chandi. The Devi has a lion for her vahana, vehicle, and is accompanied by
her daughters Lakshmi and Saraswati---or her companions Jaya and Vijaya---as
well as her sons Ganesha the giver of success, and Kartika the commander-in
chief of the gods. Kali is another popular goddess whose special annual worship
is performed on the new moon night after the autumnal Durga Puja.
References
1. The complete Works of Swami Vivekananda, 9 vols
(Calcutta:
Advaita Ashrama, i-8, i989, 9, I997)
2. Rig Veda ,
3. Taittiriya Aranyaka,
4. great women of India,
ed. Swami Madhavananda and Rameshchandra Majumdar ( Calcutta: Advaita Ashrama,
5. Shvetashvatara Upanishad
6. Mahabharata, ‘Virata Parva, chap.6
7. Mahabharata, Bhishma Parva, chap. 23
8. Brihaddevata, 2.74-9
9. See Swami Budhananda, ‘Worship of God as Mother, Vedanta Kesari,
Om Tat Sat
(Continued...)
(My
humble salutations to H H Sri Swami Satyasthananda ji and hindu samskrit dot com for the collection)
