PilgrimTrips - India Pilgrimage

The Popular Conception

...Durga according to popular Hindu conception, is the divine daughter of Himalaya, and his wife, Menaka, a Manasputri of Brahma, the Creatot, It is said in the Markandeya purana that though she pervades the Universe, and is co- extensive with creation, yet she manifests and incarnates herself on special occasions with a view to help the Devas in the performance of their divine work. Though thus manifested and incarnated, she is neither limited nor conditioned but is Nithya or Eternal. In one incarnation, she became the daughter of Daksha Prajapati and was known as Sati; in another, she became the daughter of Himalaya and was known as Haimavati Uma. In both these incarnations, she became the consort of Siva to serve special purposes, resulting in the ultimate good of the Universe.

Having the creative, protective and destructive energies combined in herself, and being immanent and co- extensive with the Univers, she represents all these energies wherever they may be found to exist, is the special Sakti of every one of Devas and all created beings from lowest to the highest...

The Devas shouted for joy at this victory and expressed their gratitude to the Devi by singing her praises for her wonderful feat. Thet also prayed to the Devi that she might protect them in future, should they ever be similarly afficted. Saying "It shall be so," the Goddess vanished.

The Hindus of Bengal worship her in the form in which she revealed herself before the Devas for purpose of annihilating Mahisasura and his hosts.

The Devi manifested herself once again when her divine help was needed to kill the two Asuras, Sumbha and Nisumbha, who had become so powerful as to drive the Devas from their offices and authority. The latter, in their distress, repaired to the Himalayas and there offered a collective prayer to the Divine Mother in language which, for beauty, felicity, rhythm and inspiring thoughts, is unique in the entire range of Sankskrit literature.....

Hearing the news of this dire reverse, Sumbha ordered his whole army to march against the Devi. Footsolidiers and cavalry, elephants and chariots closed round her and Kali, in invincible array. The lion gave out deafening roars, Kali with her wide open mouth yelled, and the Devi twanged the sting of her bow and shook her huge bell which clanged in thundering peals. Just at the moment, the personified Sakthi of al the Devas poured in from all sides, and clistered round her, and stood by her side, ready to engage in fight and awaiting her command. From the Devi’s person also emanated countless Saktis, fierce in apperance, armed with deadly weapons, and the war fever burning, as it were, in their very blood. Before commencing the fight, how ever, the Devi sent Siva to the Asuras, asking them to depart to Patala or the dark regions below , and leave the Devas undisturbed in the possession of their authority, and in the performance of their offices. But they felt deeply insulted by this proposal, became all the more enraged and at once began the attack. The sangulnary nature of the conflict can better be imagined than described. One Asura, Raktaveeja by name, gave a lot of trouble, as from the drops of blood shed from his person thousands of fierce warrious sprang up instantly and continued the battle as furiously as ever. Whereupon Chandika (as the Devi is called) ordered Kali or Chamunda to suck up every drop of blood before it fell on the ground. And thus Raktaveeja was at last overwhelmed and killed. Sumbha also was killed after a bloody conflict. Nisumbha now stepped forward to fight the Devi. But his army had been annihilated and he was single handed. He therefore tauted the Devi, saying that she had no cause for boasting of her victory, as she had been fighting with the aid of others, which reflected no credit upon her. Whereupon the Devi smiled and said that there was none in the Universe excepting herself, and the hosts he saw were her emanations. In the twinkling of an eye, Chandika’s hosts were absorped in her person and were howher. A terrible duel now ensued between her and Nisubhs; but this lasted only for a while, ending in the death of the latter which caused great jubilation in Earth and Heaven; and the Devas offered her thankgivings in grateful andfelicitous language.

Chandika, the Divine Mother, hand some other manifestations in the past, and will it is said, have same more in the future which we need not dwell upon here.

Her Story In The Vedas

In the Kenopanishad Part III & IV, we find one of her manifestations thus described:
Brahma, the Supreme and Absolute, once caused the defeat ofd the Asuras who had transgressed the eternal laws that up hold the Universe. The Devas, in their ignorance, thought that it was they who and caused the defeat and prided themselves upon the victory. Brahmama, with a view to remove this false notion from their mind and teach them the Truth, appeared before them in all Hiss Glory. The Devas looked upon Him in wonder and amazement but could not make out who that Glorious Being was. They immediately held a consulation among themselves and deputed Agni to go to Mysterious Being and know Who He was. The Lord Says
"The whole world, lying under the spell cast over it by the working of the three gunas never truly knows me who am beyond and above the aforesaid gunas, and changeless. "This Divine Maya, emanating from me and comprised of the three gunas, is certainly difficult to transcend. Only those and who attain me can transcend her.

Surrounded as I am by yogamaya, I am not revealed to all. Hence the ignorant do not know me who am birhtless, and eternal." Futher on he says
"The Dawn seemed to them to open golden gates for the Sun to pass in triumph and while those gates were open, their eyes and their minds strove intheir childish way to pierce beyond the finite world. That silent aspect awakened in the human mind the conception of the Infinite, the Immortal, the Divine, and the name ofd Dawn became naturally the name of higher powers." (Vol II. Page 545).

Says Mr. Tilak, in the Artic Home in the Vedas (Page 81)
"The Goddess of Dawn is an important and favourite Vedic Deity, and is celebrated in about twenty hymns of the Rigveda, and mentioned more than three hundred times". These hymns, according to Muir, are among the most beautiful- if not the most beautiful- in the entire collection; and the deity to which they are addressed is considered by Macdonell to be the most graceful creation of Vedic poetry, there being to other charming figure in the descriptive religious lyrics of any other literature." Usha has been described in the Rigveda as "the first" "self- effulgent" "white- complexioned" though "sprung from darkness" (Rig. I. 123.); as "the Mother of the Gods and of the Sun," "Immortal" and "Undecaying" (Rig. I. 113); as "possessing perpetual youth," "whiterobed" "Doer of good" "bright- coloured" "the daughter of Night" and "the leader of the gods, advancing like a warrior armed with bright weapons" (Rig I. 93); "the wife of the Sun" and "the daughter of Agni" or Prajapati, as explained by Yaska (rig. I. 71); as "dark- complexioned at first, and white- Complexioned afterwards," "the leader of all living creatures" and "the sister of Night" (Rig. IV. 52); as "the daughter of heaven" (Rig. I. 71); as "the ancient" (Rig. IV. 51); as "deserving the homage of all" and "the ancient youthful damsel" (Rig. VI. 61); as "the destroyer of darkness (Rig. VI. 64 & 65); as "golden- coloured " (Rig. VII.78); "the lord of all" (Rig. VIII. 79); and as "the one who issued forth after breaking the strong gates or barriers of the Mountain" (Rig. VII. 79,4).

In the above descriptive epithets of Usha in the Rigveda we find all the attributes of the Pauranic Durga or Uma. She is Navayauvanasampanna (possessing perpetual youth); Sarvabharanabhushita (decked in gold): Puratani (ancient); Hiraumayi (golden- complexioned ); Shiva (doer of good); Kali (dark- complexioned); Asuranasini (destroyer of the powers of darkness); Vividhayudhadharini (like a warrior armed with bright weapons) : Devamata (mother of the Gods); Dakshakanya (the daughter of Prajapati) Giribala (issuing forth after breaking the strong barriers of the mountain) and so forth.

In the Taittiriya Samhita (Kanda IV, Prapathaka 3, Anuvak II) occurs the following passage
"This verily is She that dawned first’ She moves, entered into her. The bride, the new come mother, is born. The three great ones follow her." (Tilak’s translation)’ Sayana says that the three great ones are Surya, Vayu and Agni. The three typical deities or Devatas mentioned by Yaska are Agni, Vayu or Indra, and Surya. In Rig. VII. 78, 3, the Dawn is said to have created Surya, Yajna and Agni. These three great ones are identified in the Puranas with Brahma, (Agni), Vishnu (the Sun), and Rudra (the father of the Maruts or Vayu).

Then, in the same Samhita occurs the following passage
"The chief of the bright, the omniform, the brindied, the fire- bannered has come, with light in the sky. Working well towards a common goal, bearing (signs of ) old age, (yet) O unwasting ! O Dawn thou hast come." (Tilak’s translation).

It should be noted that in the above passage, the Dawn has been described as (omniform) which is one of the epithets of Durga also.

I think that we have now had sufficient evidence in the Vedas to identify Haimayati Uma with Hiranmayi Usha. The Pauranic Durga or Uma has been described as the Mother of Brahma, Vishnu and Siva, and yet she has been depicted as the consort of the last- named God of the trinity. In the Rigveda also, Usha has been described as the Mother of the Devas and of the Sun, and yet she has been depicted here and there as the wife of Surya. This discrepancy, and apparently absured and revolting account of both Uma and Usha require a little explanation.

The Sun, in the Rigveda, is identical with Agni (Rif. III, 55, 7 & 9), Rudra and Vishnu, who are only his different aspects in the three different parts of the day. Agni, or Brahma the Creator, is none other than the Morning Sun; Vishnu the Preserver, the Noon- day Sun; and Rudra or Siva, the Destroyer, the Afternoon Sun. The Earth has its Pralaya at night, when creation is plunged into darkness, and all living creatures are wrapped up in death like sleep".

From a superficical point of view, this appears to be the main idea of the manifestation of the Devi in the Vedas and the Puranas. But the Hindus believe that these heavenly phenomena, observed daily, are but the replica in a small compass, or the records in symbols, of great epochmaking events in the history of the creation and evolution of the world. The Vedas, they say, are Apaurusheya, i.e., not the production of any human being, but were inspired by Brahma, the Creatot, and their pages contain verities that never change nor perish. As in the past, so in the future; as without, so within. Their words are writ large in the heavens, and in the pages of Nature, and can be read and grasped only by seers, endowed with the faculty of divine vision. The Sun, for instance, though a heavenly body, is the emblem of the Saguna Brahma, and is worshipped as such thrice daily by every Dwija. The Golden Dawn represents Uma or the Primordial Energy, from which everything has evolved; and the Dark Night is Kali- ratri, the sister or the othr self of Usha or Uma, who fights with and routs the Asura army. These are mere symbols of great truths, physical as well as spiritual, which have to be ralised in life by every man before he attains Moksha. Says the Kenopanishad (Part II., 13):
Bhuteshu bhuteshu Vichintya dhirah,
Pretyasmallokadamirta bhavanti.
The Sun is also the emblem of Omkara which contains, as it were, the very key to spiritual knowledge and culture. Its very utterance gives one the grand vision of the Manifest Primordial Energy and a glimpse of the Absolute. The following prayer in the Ishopanishad is significant:

"O Protector of the world, the door to Brahma (the Absolute) has been shut up by the golden, cup i.e., the Sun Dost thou remove it to enable me, a follower of the Truth, to obtain His vision."

Durga, then, as worshipped by the Hindus, is the Primordial Energy of the Universe that creates, upholds and destroys. It is through Her that a vision or glimpse of the Absolute and Infinite is possible. She is neither the Dawn, nor the Night, nor the Sun, nor any beautiful and wonderful phenomenon of Nature; but she is the very essence on which everything that is subsists. She is the Brahmamaya through which the Universe has been manifested:
The Hindus try to realise this grand conception of Her in their life by symbolising Her in a figure of clay, and worshiping Her as the Primordial Energy of the Universe- the Mother of the Gods and of all Creation,- the Haimavati Uma that surrounds in a golden haze, as it were, Brahma, the Supreme and Absolute, and has in her power the divine gift of revealing Him to those who are the real and earnest seekers after the Truth.

Notes on the Illustrations

Satre, wife of Shiva in a former birth, after leaving her body was born as Parvati or Uma the daughter of King Himavat. In this new life too her heart yearned for the Great God and she went through severe austerities to get reunited to Shiva, her husband in her previous birth. Day after day Uma worshipped Shiva and the constancy of her devotion was so great that even Siva’s dhyan was interrupted and he opened his eyes to meet those of Parvati. Madan Deva, the God of Love, took advantage of this opportunity and he let off his arrow of flowers phulasar and struck the Great God. Shiva frowned at the audacity of Madan and poor Madan was reduced to ashes.

The little floral arrow however did its work all the same. Through the intercession of the sage Narada marriage was arranged between shiva and Parvati. The Great God arrived; but when Menaka, the mother of parvati, saw the bridgroom her heart cried out in utter grief. For behold. Shiva was but an old beggar, addicted to intoxicating drugs! Oh! how could Parvati have wished him for her husband? Oh! how can she marry her Uma- the image of gold- to that ash- besmerared old beggar? Oh! how?