Pages

Monday, September 24, 2012

Offerings made to Lord shiva- part4


Offerings to Lord Shiva:  Shiva accepts all, he is the best of best, we may at first be startled to see people offer flowers and fruits of Dhatura Plant which is highly poisonous, the touch of it may cause allergic reactions or even be fatal, he loves to be smeared with ash of a corpse, not much but an ounce of clear water and manasika pooja( to pray, worship and perform rituals in mere imagination) as he expects simplicity and kind enough to “shelter the forbidden”. Eventually grades “the best and worst” equally, to those who seek refuge. A few aggressive methods are followed too, like offerings such as drugs, wine, chillum- a smoking instrument, narcotics and liquor called “Bhaang”, which shiva himself prepares to get bibulous. 


 










The story behind this: Lord Vishnu was in Yoga nidra or the divine sleep, was under water or the celestial ocean of the universe, sleeping on the breast of Goddess        Yoga-maya, during this period a lot of dirt got collected in his navel, due to which a thick a muddy puddle was formed from which a lotus raises above the sea in which Lord Bramha is born. He gazes the (universe) nature around and gets scared of its malicious phase( the darkness, the dust, the process of matter forming in space on its own, there’s no roof or container which contains the whole universe but, is just floating with no support). He then decides to create his own territory, which was a behavior of an animal (as an animal in a forest creates its own territory by urinating around) as Bramha created his terrain he called it the “Bramhanda”, his ignorance fetched him the price. 
 
As Bramha was alone his mind rattled with thoughts new, he thought if he moved out of his terrain he might die- this very thought of his gave birth to “death” enraged by this Shiva curses him, because being a god he couldn’t control his mind and thoughts which gave birth to death, the cost of which was borne by people who once took birth had to meet death and that’s one reason Bramha is not been prayed.


He then thinks of taming the nature around him, but when he fails, imagines nature as a beautiful woman and called her “Maya” or “Bramh-maya” –illusion, who was nothing but nature herself, she becomes his daughter  Manasika Putri(as she is born due to his thought), he enjoys thinking about her, lives with her in his thoughts, loves her, tames her according to his whims, he then feels scared of losing her, gets scared if she might leave him for someone better, due to these thoughts – fear, love , jealousy, possessiveness, lust, anger are born. when he proposes to her for sex she declines, but due to lust he follows her everywhere, she then takes myriad forms of animals and birds, he then replicates her forms and mates with her in every form and produce offsprings and that’s how the world gets populated with several species. Later when she turns human he tries to copulate with her as a human, but before he could do that Lord Shiva and Vishnu stops him by attacking him with a spear. To tease his schizophrenic act of hallucination, as if he was on drugs or was bibulous, which got him out of control not knowing what he was doing, Shiva appears in front of him ubiquitously and teases him by impersonating a person who smokes narcotics and intoxicated, thus reminds him of his lost senses and chuckles to annoy him.


shiva smears ash - part3

Shiva gives more importance to feelings and emotions than materialistic offerings, he does odium the act of littering matters of nature, like, cremating corpses, because on seeing humans fritter away things granted by nature, felt nature or prakriti his wife, was disregarded, so advised and insisted his disciples to consume the littered substances, which include flesh of a dead person, excreta and skeletals for their other uses. His disciples the Nagas, Aghoras, Sidhhas and many others do not waste anything being littered including corpses and excretes of animals and humans, which till date they follow as an order passed by Shiva himself, as according to them one should be able to visualize divinity in everything, as god exists everywhere. 
Intresting… This was the first attempt to recycle the waste LOL. There’s another folklore which say, that when Shiva was wondering “why the wars and conflicts were for?”, he saw people carrying a carcass for cremation, waited there until the corpse was completely burnt, saw people returning back home, saw the Athman or spirit  of the dead person sitting beside and crying, he still didn’t get his answer when he tried questioning the Athaman, he understood that that the reason for it being sorrow, was not death but, repentance and understanding the truth that all his obsessions for women, money and land didn’t accompany him in the end, neither did he possess them eternally. Enlightened by this Shiva felt it was his duty to remind those who were existing with such obsessions, what’s worth doing and what remains in the end. So smeared the ash of the corpse in front of him, all over his body, startled by this behavior of Shiva the Athman asks him, being a Lord of Lords why did he have to apply the ash of such a normal and despicable person, he then answers being down toward, that though he was God, the Athman was an “indirect-Guru” who fetched him answers, so then grants him salvation.