We have worked our way up to the biggest in terms of Indian religion. Hinduism is the religion of over 80% of the Indian population, according to the 2006 edition of the The World Factbook. On this page you will find some images of important Hindu sights and sites taken in a trip to India in 1999.
This young man in Varanasi is preparing offerings, a common ritual of devotion when visiting the Ganges. Visitors to the river can purchase, for a very small price, these paper dishes containing flower petals and a small candle. The dishes are then floated on the river. I accidentally sunk mine; I pushed it slightly to get it floating and ended up knocking it on its side. No blessings for me I guess! I did not get to the Ganges at night to see this ritual; it certainly must be a lovely sight, with the river coming alive from the glow of the candles.
Hinduism is a highly visible presence, from statues of Ganesha or Laxmi in shops to "open air" altars like the one above, dedicated to the monkey god Hanuman, or the one below dedicated to the goddess Kali. These pictures were taken in the city of Agra. They aren't as clear as they might be because I took them from an overpass and couldn't get a straight on shot. You can see that people have left offerings of various kinds at the base of the statues, including some bananas for Hanuman! Hanuman is the original flying monkey, a much-loved god who is himself particularly devoted to the god Rama and his consort Sita. When Sita was kidnapped by the demon king Ravanna, it was Hanuman who went and rescued her. He is often portrayed as literally ripping his own chest open to reveal images of Rama and Sita inside, showing that he carries them in his heart. He is also sometimes portrayed holding a mountain in one hand, a reference to a story about his attempts to help the goddess Lakhsmana who was badly ill and needed a special medicinal herb that was only grown on one mountaintop. Hanuman flew to the mountain and, unable to immediately identify the herb, simply uprooted the whole mountain and raced back with it.
Kali (above) is both the divine mother and the goddess of destruction. Legendary Indian film director, Satyajit Ray, directed a 1960 film called "Devi, the Goddess" about a devotee of Kali and his belief that his daughter-in-law was her incarnation. It is an excellent film for helping you examine the dual mother/destroyer role this goddess plays.
When visiting temples or altars, many individuals bring or purchase flowers, special necklaces and other items to adorn the religious statuary. Below is a picture of a set of stalls leading up to a Hindu temple in Jaipur. To the right you can see rows of necklaces hanging on the wall. You can also purchase postcards of Hindu deities, incense and other devotional items.
Below is an example of a more modern Hindu temple, the Birla Mandir in Jaipur, built in 1985. As an institution, it demonstrates the concept embraced by Hinduism that all religions are simply different paths to the same goal and the same God. There are statues at the temple of various important religious figures or deities. Besides the Hindu deities, one can find statues of Jesus, Mary and St. Francis.
Below are two examples of statuary from
this modern temple, the first of the Hindu god, Shiva, and the second
of Jesus Christ.
Some temples are very ornate inside as well as outside. The following pictures show you just a few of the large-scale dioramas available in one Hindu temple in Varanasi. These dioramas illustrate for the viewer some of the stories of the gods and goddesses.
This diorama appears to be about the
monkey god Hanuman. Why there are two of him, I don't know; this
is a legend that I must research. Maybe he is seeing himself in
the mirror!
Khajuraho
Now we turn to a much older temple architecture. Certainly one of the most impressive sites for Hindu and Jain temple architecture is the town of Khajuraho, with its ornate temple complexes. The temples have been attributed to a group called the Chandellas/Chandelas, who arose to political prominence in the area. Many of the temples are very elaborately carved - in fact, mind-bogglingly so! While they represent only a small percentage of the carvings, it is not surprising that the erotic carvings are what people remember most. Many of them are very explicit. I took some photos of those but gave them to an artist friend, and am too embarrassed to take the negatives to Walgreens and have new copies made.
This photo above, of the Lakshmana temple (built about 950 AD) in the Western Group of temples, gives you some idea of the sheer intricacy of the carvings. If you look at the lower portion of the temple, you can just make out some of the many statues of human figures that adorn the facade. The photo below gives you a more close-up look at the carvings on one of the temples, enabling you to make out individual figures more clearly.
I think I was lying flat on the ground to take this one. It is difficult to comprehend how very time-consuming the construction and ornamentation must have been, especially for the time period and the tools that would have been available.
Here is a closeup of a scene from daily life carved into the facade of one of the temples. Below is a tribute to the "unknown sculptor" (surely that should be plural) of the Khajuraho temples. It is complete with corporate endorsement of the spirit of the area. As Shyam S. Poddar, founder of the Orient Express Co. and Hotel Chandela states on the side of the statue, "Khajuraho certainly will stage a comeback after 1,000 years, like no other place in the world has done."
