Lord Shiva as Nataraja : Aesthetics of Dance and Destruction

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Lord Shiva as Nataraja : Aesthetics of Dance and Destruction

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Shiva the Hindu god of destruction is also known as Nataraja, the

Lord of Dancers (In Sanskrit Nata means dance and raja means

Lord). The visual image of Nataraja achieved canonical form in

the bronzes cast under the Chola dynasty in the tenth century AD,

and then continued to be reproduced in metal, stone and other

substances right up to the present times. The Chola Nataraja is

often said to be the supreme statement of Hindu art.

 

There is an interesting legend behind the conception of Shiva as

Nataraja: In a dense forest in South India, there dwelt

multitudes of heretical sages. Thither proceeded Shiva to confute

them, accompanied by Vishnu disguised as a beautiful woman. The

sages were at first led to violent dispute amongst themselves,

but their anger was soon directed against Shiva, and they

endeavored to destroy him by means of incantations. A fierce

tiger was created in sacrificial fires, and rushed upon him; but

smiling gently, he seized it and, with the nail of his little

finger, stripped off its skin, and wrapped it about himself like

a silken cloth. Undiscouraged by failure, the sages renewed their

offerings, and produced a monstrous serpent, which however Shiva

seized and wreathed about his neck like a garland. Then he began

to dance; but there rushed upon him a last monster in the shape

of a malignant dwarf. Upon him the god pressed the tip of his

foot, and broke the creature's back,so that it writhed upon the

ground; and so, his last foe prostrate, Shiva resumed the dance.

 

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To understand the concept of Nataraja we have to understand the

idea of dance itself. Like yoga, dance induces trance, ecstasy

and the experience of the divine. In India consequently, dance

has flourished side by side with the terrific austerities of the

meditation grove (fasting, absolute introversion etc.). Shiva,

therefore, the arch-yogi of the gods, is necessarily also the

master of the dance.

 

Shiva Nataraja was first represented thus in a beautiful series

of South Indian bronzes dating from the tenth and twelfth

centuries A.D. In these images, Nataraja dances with his right

foot supported by a crouching figure and his left foot elegantly

raised. A cobra uncoils from his lower right forearm, and the

crescent moon and a skull are on his crest. He dances within an

arch of flames. This dance is called the Dance of Bliss

(anandatandava).

 

Illustration : http://www.exoticindiaart.com/brass/zh70.jpg (Size

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These iconographic details of Nataraja are to be read, according

to the Hindu tradition, in terms of a complex pictorial allegory:

 

The most common figures depict a four-armed Shiva. These multiple

arms represent the four cardinal directions. Each hand either

holds an object or makes a specific mudra (gesture).

 

The upper right hand holds a hour-glass drum which is a symbol of

creation. It is beating the pulse of the universe. The drum also

provides the music that accompanies Shiva's dance. It represents

sound as the first element in an unfolding universe, for sound is

the first and most pervasive of the elements. The story goes that

when Shiva granted the boon of wisdom to the ignorant Panini (the

great Sanskrit grammarian), the sound of the drum encapsulated

the whole of Sanskrit grammar. The first verse of Panini's

grammar is in fact called Shiva sutra.

 

The hour-glass drum also represents the male and female vital

principles; two triangles penetrate each other to form a hexagon.

When they part, the universe also dissolves.

 

The opposite hand, the upper left, bears on its palm a tongue of

flames. Fire is the element of destruction of the world.

According to Hindu mythology at the end of the world, it will be

fire that will be the instrument of annihilation. Thus in the

balance of these two hands is illustrated a counterpoise of

creation and destruction. Sound against flames, ceaselessness of

production against an insatiate appetite of extermination.

 

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The second right hand is held in the abhaya pose (literally

without fear) and so a gesture of protection, as an open palm is

most likely to be interpreted. It depicts the god as a protector.

 

The left leg is raised towards the right leg and reaches across

it; the lower left hand is stretched across the body and points

to the upraised left foot which represents release from the cycle

of birth and death. Interestingly, the hand pointing to the

uplifted foot is held in a pose imitative of the outstretched

trunk of an elephant. In Sanskrit this is known as the

'gaja-hasta-mudra' (the posture of the elephant trunk), and is

symbolic of Ganesha, Shiva's son, the Remover of obstacles.

 

Illustration : http://www.exoticindiaart.com/brass/zh77.jpg (Size

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Shiva dances on the body of a dwarf apasmara-purusha (the man of

forgetfulness) who embodies indifference, ignorance and laziness.

Creation, indeed all creative energy is possible only when the

weight of inertia (the tamasic darkness of the universe) is

overcome and suppressed. The Nataraja image thus addresses each

individual to overcome complacency and get his or her own act

together.

 

The ring of fire and light, which circumscribes the entire image,

identifies the field of the dance with the entire universe. The

lotus pedestal on which the image rests locates this universe in

the heart or consciousness of each person.

 

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The Nataraja image is also eloquent of the paradox of Eternity

and Time. It shows us that the reposeful ocean and the racing

stream are not finally distinct. This wonderful lesson can be

read in the significant contrast of the incessant, triumphant

motion of the swaying limbs to the balance of the and the

immobility of the mask-like countenance. Shiva is Kala, meaning

time, but he is also Maha Kala, meaning "Great Time" or eternity.

As Nataraja, King of dancers, his gestures, wild and full of

grace, precipitate the cosmic illusion; his flying arms and legs

and the swaying of his torso produce the continuous

creation-destruction of the universe, death exactly balancing

birth. The choreography is the whirligig of time. History and its

ruins, the explosion of suns, are flashes from the tireless

swinging sequence of the gestures. In the beautiful cast metal

figurines, not merely a single phase or movement, but the

entirety of this cosmic dance is miraculously rendered. The

cyclic

rhythm, flowing on and on in the unstayable, irreversible round

of the Mahayugas, or Great Eons, is marked by the beating and

stamping of the Master's heels. But the face remains, meanwhile

in sovereign calm.

 

Steeped in quietude, the enigmatic mask resides above the whirl

of the four resilient arms and cares nothing for the superb legs

as they beat out the tempo of the world ages. Aloof, in sovereign

silence, the mask of god's eternal essence remains unaffected by

the tremendous display of his own energy, the world and its

progress, the flow and the changes of time. This head, this face,

this mask, abides in transcendental isolation, as a spectator

unconcerned. Its smile, bent inward, filled with the bliss of

self-absorption, subtly refutes, with a scarcely hidden irony,

the meaningful gestures of the feet and hands. A tension exists

between the marvel of the dance and the serene tranquillity of

this expressively inexpressive countenance, the tension, that is

to say, of Eternity and Time. The two, invisible and visible, are

quintessentially the same. Man with all the fibers of his native

personality clings to the duality; nevertheless, actually and

finally, there is no duality.

 

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Another aspect of Nataraja rich in a similar symbolism is his

lengthy and sensuous hair. The long tresses of his matted hair,

usually piled up in a kind of pyramid, loosen during the

triumphant, violent frenzy of his untiring dance. Expanding, they

form two wings, to the right and left, a kind of halo,

broadcasting, as it were, on their magic waves, the exuberance

and sanctity of vegetative, sensuous life.

 

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Supra-normal life-energy, amounting to the power of magic,

resides in such a wildness of hair untouched by the scissors. The

conceptualization here is similar to the legend of Samson who

with naked hands tore asunder the jaws of a lion. His strength

was said to reside in his hair.

 

Also central to understanding the symbolism behind Nataraja's

hair is the realization that much of womanly charm, the sensual

appeal of the Eternal Feminine, is in the fragrance, the flow and

luster of beautiful hair. On the other hand, anyone renouncing

the generative forces of the vegetable-animal realm, revolting

against the procreative principle of life, sex, earth, and

nature, and entering upon the spiritual path of absolute

asceticism, has first to be shaved. He must simulate the

sterility of an old man whose hairs have fallen and who no longer

constitutes a link in the chain of generation. He must coldly

sacrifice the foliage of the head.

 

The tonsure of the Christian priest and monk is a sign of this

renunciation of the flesh. (Clergymen of denominations in which

marriage is not considered incompatible with the saintly office

do not wear a tonsure.) These "Worthy Ones", representing the

victory of yoga-spirituality, have overcome all seduction by

their taking of the monastic vows and following of the ascetic

formula. With their voluntary baldness they have broken through

to the peace beyond the seasons of growth and change.

 

Thus by donning long, luxurious hair, Shiva dispels the notion of

the conventional ascetic and reiterates that the image of

Nataraja assimilates and harmonizes within itself apparently

contradictory and conflicting aspects.

 

Shiva is thus two opposite things: archetypal ascetic and

archetypal dancer. On the one hand he is total

tranquillity-inward calm absorbed in itself, absorbed in the void

of the Absolute, where all distinctions merge and dissolve, and

all tensions are at rest. But on the other hand he is total

activity- life's energy, frantic, aimless and playful.

 

The Nataraja image represents not simply some event in the mythic

life of a local deity but a universal view in which the forces of

nature and the aspirations and limitation of man confront each

other and are blended together. The curator of the Indian

collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art has rightly written

that: " If one had to select a single icon to represent the

extraordinarily rich and complex cultural heritage of India, the

Shiva Nataraja might well be the most remunerative candidate."

 

( This article was sent as a newsletter from the website

http://www.exoticindiaart.com )

 

Nitin G.