Mesmerizing symbolism of Hinduism in two legends
I just couldn’t help posting this here. I read it and was so mesmerized by the extremely logical interpretation of the symbolism of the Shiva-Ganesha-Parvati story.
You have to read it again and again to understand and admire the beauty of Sanatana Dharma! All praise to our scholarly ancestors who saw so much wisdom in symbolism, as they knew that the common man without extreme visual and auditory stimulation would not easily realize.
Read the wonderful explication below.
In India, we have the same thing, under an infinite number of symbols. Let us take two of them. The first is from the Shiva Purana. We have on one side Shiva, the Consciousness, and Parvati, the Nature, on the other side. It’s Parvati, by Maya, the illusion that is Herself, who creates a child, from the exudation of her own body, (who later becomes Ganesha), who is no other that the mind, her own creation. The child is not created by the Consciousness, by Shiva, but by Parvati, the Nature. This child, the mind, prevents Shiva from meeting Parvati; he prevents the cosmic wedding, the reunification of the two, Consciousness and Nature. The Shiva Purana says more, giving details: when Shiva wants to put this child away, it’s not possible for Him, He has to ask his “ganas” to come for helping him, but the little guy overcomes theses ganas. The ganas are the symbols of the virtues, of the good tendencies in us. That means that, for having his desires fulfilled, the mind will even kill the good tendencies in us. When Shiva wants to meet Parvati and when he cannot, even with the help of the Ganas, the only mean to succeed is to chop off the head of the boy with his trishul. The meaning is that the Consciousness kills the mind). That being done, He replaces the head of the child by the head of an elephant. The elephant head is constituted of senses all increased to the maximum: large ears, piercing eyes, very big nose. He replaces the head of the boy, the mind, by the intelligence, by “buddhi”: the faculty to discriminate, to distinguish the true from the false, the only means for Shiva to be able to be united with Parvati. The boy was a creation of Parvati; Ganesha is the creation of Shiva. Le sense of ego has been cut and replaced by the buddhi, the discrimination. From then, instead of killing the ganas, he becomes gana-isha, Ganesh, or Ganapati, the Lord of Ganas. And it’s why in temples of Shiva you must first honour Ganesha before reaching Shiva. You must first give up your mind, your ego. Without doing that, you will never reach the Consciousness, Your Self.
I’ve picked it up from this site by Gaura Krishna. He also has this to say on the Ramayana -
…in the Ramayana where we see the separation of Rama (Consciousness) and Sita (Nature) with the kidnapping of Sita by Ravana. Ravana, the mind, the ego, is unable to seize Sita, Nature, and so separates her from Rama (the Consciousness) by a play of Maya (illusion). Le line not to be passed is the Lakshmanrekha. Once this line passed, it is the fall. And so, it’s the beginning of the manifestation and Rama needs a life journey in order to meet Sita, killing all the rakshasas, the demons and finally Ravana the ego…..To come back to the primitive state, to be conscious again that the Consciousness and Nature are one and the same thing, one must do away with the mind, one must kill the ego. This is the meaning of life, like Rama going to Lanka to join Sita must kill all the demons that are on his way. In fact it’s man who is evolving towards his source by killing all the karma, all the demons and ends by killing the mind itself, the ego itself: Ravana. Only then will he be able to unite with Sita. We have given here only the general sense without entering into the details, namely the intervention of Hanuman, the complete surrender, who alone has made the successful union possible.
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