Namaste, Shivatar and All.
With this post, you all shall gain an insight deep into my heart - my very core.
Lord Shiva is not only everything I could ever want and hope for in a God, but also, in a
man. A being full of incredible love and light, but also formidable darkness, infinite mystery, incalculable wisdom and unbridled passion.
To be totally in love and enamoured by a Hindu Deva is a wild ride - of mind, heart, body and soul. He deeply touches me on
all these levels! One moment, He can appear as Rishabh Deva, being the most handsome, courageous, powerful and potent thing I have ever experienced and the next, He takes the form of Mahakaal - to overcome the fear and terror of death and the unknown with His unending love.
Yes, He is the 'perfect man' for me. He can be anything that my heart desires (when He isn't teaching me a lesson). He can also be so incredibly cute that it boils the blood of this 'hot-blooded' woman. He invented Yoga (Aadi Yogi), He is an amazing dancer, dancing the whole cosmos into existence, He can play any musical instrument given to Him, but He prefers the veena and damru, and to hear Him sing just creates waves of ecstatic bliss.
Lord Shiva is also very passionate, extremely sensual (
not sexual), is the master physician and healer, demonstrated by the crescent moon He keeps in His wild, untamed locks and is the epitome of masculine potency, virility and unending powerful energy (Shakti) as represented by the Jyotir Lingam. His knowledge and awareness of everything is total and complete within itself - the only entity which can stop my limited, human intellect dead in its tracks.
I've come to 'know' Lord Shiva on a very personal and intimate level. Even though He is the 'Destroyer' and the 'God of Death', what really gets 'destroyed'? and what really 'dies' if everything is Brahman Absolute? if everything is only what this 'form' of Lord Shiva merely represents? and I don't mind so much if there's 'not much love for Shiva' because I realise that I love Him deeply and this just means there's more of His attention and affections left for me to enjoy. I often think that Kali is going to get jealous one of these days and I, for one, wouldn't like to get on Kali's 'bad side'.
Lord Shiva's "Yakshaswaroopa" (Demonic form) is a glorious sight to behold! It's when He goes dancing throughout the Universe totally naked (Sky Clad) and using all forms of visible matter as His adornments. This is what is meant when we say "Digambaraya". It is the form of the Formless, which cannot be perceived through and via any senses and yet, everything in existence IS that! - a powerful, entropic display of cyclic fractals. This is also Sadashiva - the being who strings galaxies on quantum threads and makes His garlands from them.
Lord Shiva may be the "God of Death/Destruction" but usually, Lord Yama has that role and of course, Lord Yama (Yamaraj) is just another aspect of Lord Shiva, but devotion to Lord Shiva can also mitigate the eventuality of being visited by the "Grim Reaper". This is beautifully illustrated by the tale of Markandeya.
I forget all the details of the story, but once upon a time there was a very pious saint, a devotee of Lord Shiva (forget his name) and both he, and his wife had been trying for about 40 years to conceive a child, but his wife was barren - or he was infertile - or something, but for some reason, it just wasn't meant to be...but he wasn't about to give up, so he prayed to and beseeched Lord Shiva for a boon - that his wife give birth to a son - even though they were both in their 60's by this stage.
After years of worship, ritual and loving service, Lord Shiva appeared and granted the sage the boon that his wife would give birth to a son, but there was also a huge catch (there usually
is with boons that Lord Shiva grants). The child would reach the age of 16 and then contract a mysterious illness and die and there was nothing that could be done about it; and so it was that 9 months later, his wife gave birth to a son and they named him Markandeya.
Now, the truth of his fate was hidden from Markandeya, but ever since birth, he showed an incredible love and devotion towards Lord Shiva. He was in ecstatic bliss worshiping Lord Shiva almost always and his parents couldn't be happier. Then, when Markandeya was 16, he contracted a fatal illness and was told about the events of his birth and the prophecy which was foretold by Lord Shiva. Markandeya didn't want to leave the world. He wanted to spend a very long life worshiping the Lord, teaching others and helping people. He felt that this was his destiny which he was being 'robbed of' by the selfish needs of his parents.
So, Markandeya went into full-on concentrated worship of Lord Shiva - praying for a 'boon' of his own, but day after day, he became sicker and sicker until he was no longer able to focus, concentrate or worship - just hugging the Shiva Lingam. Then, with his dying breath, Lord Yama appeared to claim his soul and take it to the "Underworld" but as soon as Lord Yama appeared, so did Lord Shiva and the two began to fight it out for the custody of Markandeya's immortal Soul. To cut a long story much shorter, in the end, Lord Yama was sent packing by Lord Shiva and Markandeya ended up living a very long and fruitful existence in the service of the Lord.
Lord Shiva is not only the source of death and destruction, but also the source of infinite Love, Mercy and Grace. It is shown in the Puranas (and it has also been quite a while since I studied them) and it is the Puranic 'form' of Lord Shiva that I most closely identify with, even though I fully realise that this is only a front for the boundless and infinite representation of Pure Consciousness known as Brahman. Brahman is the glorious Truth, Consciousness and Bliss (Satchidananda) which this Saguna (attributed) form merely represents on
all levels and with every glorious
leela (Divine passtime) He enacts within this World. This is why He is also called "Mrityunjayaya" or the Supreme Conqueror OF Death! To know Lord Shiva is not to 'die' and to know Lord Shiva is to be free from the Kalachakra - the wheel of time, death and causality (Karma).
Oh Glorious Lord with the 'Third Eye' whose celestial fragrance pervades the Universe. May I be liberated from the bondage of false concepts, of fear, and even death itself, just as the ripe melon is liberated from the vine.
Om Tryambakam Yaja Mahe Sughandim Pushthi Vardhanam. Urvarukhamiva Bandhanaan Mrityor Mukshiye Mamritaat.
This is called the "Mahamrityunjaya Mantra" or 'The Great Death-Conquering Mantra" and it doesn't negate the eventuality of physical death, but the whole attachment to the body and mind; to the whole material world at the time of physical dissolution so that spiritual immortality (Moksha) is attained.
So, knowing what Lord Shiva truly IS (when not Myself), I still worship Him as a beautiful and potent masculine Deity because He has found that way to enter into my heart, being everything that I could ever want in a 'relationship' (until the relative ceases to exist) Divine or otherwise and I recall all of the Puranic Leelas with much delight and glee, as they are all a moral lesson and give instructions about how to love and worship Him unselfishly and unconditionally - and woe befall those who worship Him out of egotistical, selfish needs and desires. Bhasmasura, the 'Ash Demon' being the prime example (Ravana was another) and I shall relate the story of Bhasmasura in a later post, as it goes to illustrate the loving bond between Lord Shiva and Lord Vishnu in regards to who should live and who should die.
Also, one day I will make a thread on the whole Shiva Maha Purana and tell you all about the many wonderful passtimes of Lord Shiva, which reads like a cross between the Art of War and a Mills and Boon romance novel - very entertaining nonetheless. A while ago, I read "The Shiva Trilogy - The Immortals of Meluha" by Amish Tripari and it portrayed Lord Shiva as a man who
became a God - and while it was a pretty far-fetched work of fiction that bored me to death, I still read it. I like to subscribe to the whole idea that Lord Shiva is a shape-shifting "Alien" or a cosmic entity from the Pleiades Star System and there's tons of evidence which bears this whole theory out. They also say that Mt. Kailash is a "man-made pyramid" which is hollow inside or it could also be an "Earth Portal" directly to the Pleiades itself and they have also found many deep tunnels under the Ellora Caves in India which once housed a splendid underground city around the same time as the Indus Valley Empire.
Originally and in the beginning, Lord Shiva was only a minor Deity, taking a 'back-seat' to the Sun Deity (Hiranyagarbhaya) and He was worshiped as Pashupati - the Lord of Beasts and also the Lord of hedonism, abundance, ritual, trance states, music, the Arts and basically everything "Shamanic". The correlation was made to Bacchus and Dionysis and yet, Pashupati also refers to and represents the Human condition of a Soul being in either the 'bound' or 'liberated' state - either being tethered to existence and conditioned in the ways of the world, or free and unfettered to experience the bliisful state of total immersion within the Pure Consciousness of a Universal, Transcendent, "Being". It is akin to a wild animal which after being domesticated, is returned to the wilderness and must learn to adapt to the ways of its unlimited environment.
So, it all goes back to Lord Yama - Yamaraj - the "Grim Reaper" who is but an emanation of the 'energies' of Lord Shiva. There are two nice tales about Lord Yama to be had. The first is found in the Katha Upanishad, where a young boy, Nachiketas committed suicide (by fire) due to the selfish acts of his own father, but Nachiketas was kept waiting at the gates of Patala (Hell) for three days and three nights whilst Lord Yama was absent doing his 'grim duties'. Upon returning, Lord Yama said to Nachiketas "Sorry for keeping you waiting for three days, so you may ask three boons from me now". The first boon that Nachiketas asked for, was for the forgiveness of his father. I forget the second one, but the third boon was that Lord Yama, himself become the boy's "Guru" and instruct him as to what happens to the Human Soul upon death and after it. Of course, Lord Yama didn't want to answer that one, offering instead wealth, notoriety, riches, fame etc but Nachiketas was resolute and thus, Lord Yama instructed him as to the nature of Brahman Absolute and taught him all the secrets of the Universe.
The second discourse is found in the Mahabharata, as King Duryodhana lay dying due to a fatal wound to his groin, inflicted by Bhima for acting lustfully towards Draupadi (wife of the Pandavas). As Duryodhana suffered a long and painful drawn-out death, a similar conversation was had with Lord Yama about the nature of life, death, the Universe and Everything. Ultimately, Nachiketas returned to Earth (it wasn't his time) to teach his father and others about the Vedas and Duryodhana was bade entrance to Heaven (Swarga) due to the intercession of Yudhisthira. There are so many great examples of these stories - but that's all they are, just
stories (of which I know many).
Being a Hindu and worshiping Lord Shiva is in my blood, bones and marrow. It is a part of my Soul and who I am as a sentient being and it has gone on this way for many lifetimes. Whenever I hear something relating to the Epics, it's like "yeah, I knew that"; like a previous existence which has come to fruition and full-circle within
this lifetime! It's like I have been with Lord Shiva in another place and in another time and I'm just remembering all of it now and it feels like I was one of the Devas myself, but maybe I'm just a 'Star-Seed' from the Pleiades.
Anyway, that's enough for now...
more than enough to keep you all going and I may elaborate more in a subsequent post over the next week or so, but for now, so long, take care and the Shiva within me loves the Shiva within you all. Namaste.
Om Namah Shivaya