Mariamman

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Pranam. Here is an interesting article on Mariamman that I found on the net.

Devotion to Mariamman

Doctrines India has always been a land of villages and in the context of

village life the most important and powerful divine presence is the gramadevata,

a deity identified with the village. A village may have several gramadevatas,

each with its own function. Village deities are more numerous than Indian

villages, though some are known throughout a region and one of these is the

goddess Mariamman (Also called Mari, Mariamma, Maryamman. In the Puranas she is

known as Marika.) who has devotees all over South India.

The village belongs to the goddess. Theologically she was there before the

village and in fact she created it. Sometimes she is represented only by a head

on the soil, indicating her body is the village and she is rooted in the soil of

the village. The villagers live inside or upon the body of the goddess. The

goddess protects the village and is the guardian of the village boundaries.

Outside the village there is no protection from the goddess. The village is a

complete cosmos and the central divine power of the village is the goddess. The

relationship between the village and the goddess is primarily for the village as

a whole and not for individuals. Mari can mean sakti, power, and amman is

mother, so she is the mother-power of the village.

However, this relationship is not a simple one. In some places, Mariamman is

invoked three times a year to regenerate village soil and protect the community

against disease and death. Other places may have an important Mariamman

festival. Mariamman is not a peaceful and benign goddess. She can be vindictive,

inexorable, and difficult to propitiate. Essentially she is a personification of

the world's natural forces, but specifically she is a goddess of smallpox,

chickenpox, and other diseases. Her role is ambivalent for she both inflicts the

diseases and protects the village from them. The onset of disease or disaster

causes special worship or a festival of the goddess, for they are caused by

demons let in because the goddess's defences have broken down or because the

goddess is angry at being neglected. Mariamman reminds people that their ordered

world can be shattered at any time and worshipping her makes one's view of

reality less fragile. When the villagers are afflicted, so is the goddess

invaded by demons. The villagers and the goddess are suffering the invasion of

the village together and that is why one can say that the goddess causes the

epidemic. The goddess suffers most but cannot contain it all and spreads it to

the villagers, who help her deal with it. Mariamman is especially favourable at

this time to those suffering from the disease, for they are helping her bear the

burden of the demonic attack.

Blood offerings of animals are commonly sacrificed at festivals of Mariamman,

but this is not invariably the case. Whitehead in his classic study The Village

Gods of South India (1921) found at the village of Vandipaliam in Cuddalore

district that at an annual festival of ten days to Mariamman no animal

sacrifices were ever offered or on any other occasion at the shrine. At Shiyali

in Tanjore district during the sacrifices of animals to other gods at the

festival (of all the village gods) a curtain is drawn in front of Mariamman.

 

History One story about the origin of Mariamman is she was the wife of

Tirunalluvar, the Tamil poet, who was a pariah, outcaste. She caught smallpox

and begged from house to house for food, fanning herself with leaves of the nim

or margosa tree to keep the flies off her sores. She recovered and people

worshipped her as the goddess of smallpox. To keep smallpox away they hang nim

leaves above the doors of their houses.

Another story involves the beautiful virtuous Nagavali, wife of Piruhu, one of

the Nine Rishis. One day the Rishi was away and the Trimurti (an image with

three heads representing Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva) came to see if her famed

beauty and virtue was true. Nagavali did not know them and, resenting their

intrusion, turned them into little children. The gods were offended and cursed

her, so her beauty faded and her face became marked like smallpox. The Rishi

returned, found her disfigured, and drove her away, declaring she would be born

a demon in the next world and cause the spread of a disease which would make

people like herself. She was called Mari, meaning 'changed.' Both stories are

reported by Whitehead and he remarks that in Mysore he was told that Mari meant

sakti, power.

Mariamman is an ancient goddess, whose worship probably originated in the tribal

religion of Dravidian India before the arrival of the Aryans and the brahman

religion. According to tradition, among the Dravidian mountain tribes as in

Coorg in southern Karnataka, human sacrifices were offered to Mariamman. These

were replaced with animals and as we have seen, in some villages no animal

sacrifices are offered. Here we can see a historical gradation.

Local goddesses such as Mariamman who protect villages and their lands and

represent the different castes of their worshippers have always been an

important part of the religious landscape of South India. However, we can note

periods of special significance. The eclecticism of the Vijayanagar period

(1336-1565) encouraged folk religion, which became more important and influenced

the more literate forms of religion. In the last century and a half there has

been a rebirth of Tamil self-consciousness (see Devotion to Murukan). In the

middle of the present century deities such as Mariamman have become linked to

the "great tradition" as the strata of society which worship the goddess has

become integrated into the larger social order.

 

Symbols At the centre and source of the village is a boddhu-rayee, navel

stone, with which the goddess is associated. As mentioned in doctrines, the

goddess may be represented by only a head on the ground, as her body is the

village. To protect the village, shrines and symbols of the goddess are often

placed at the boundaries of the village. These symbols are usually simple,

rough, unhewn stones, five or six inches high and blackened with anointing oil,

or there may be a stone pillar. If there are shrines these will often be crude

simple structures.

Mariamman's colour is yellow and sometimes a stone is adorned with a yellow

dress, only a small part of bare stone emerging at the top. Sometimes there is

only a spear or trident thrust in the ground in place of the goddess-stones. In

larger villages a slab of stone may be carved with a rough figure of a woman,

who may have four, six, or eight arms, or none at all, and the arms hold various

implements such as a knife, a shield, a drum, a bell, a devil's head, and a

three-pronged fork. It is common to have a fixed stone image in the shrine and

to use a small portable metal image in processions. Mariamman can be represented

as riding naked on an ass with a winnow on her head and a broom and water-pot in

her hands. Sometimes there is no image and the goddess is represented by a brass

pot of water decorated with nim leaves. The nim tree is sacred to Mariamman. In

poor villages an earthenware pot is used.

During the ceremonies of the goddess there is a symbolic marriage. Although the

goddess is sometimes said to have a consort, she is really married to the

village, so the goddess and village can nourish each other.

A blood sacrifice at her festival can appease the goddess to withdraw her anger

symbolised as the heat of disease or it can symbolise the defeat of the invading

demon. Traditionally a buffalo was offered. After it was beheaded, its leg was

thrust into its mouth, fat from the stomach was smeared in its eyes, and a

candle was lit on its head. It was then presented to the goddess. This

humiliation of the victim symbolises the defeat of an enemy, the demon who

causes the epidemic or disaster.

Village festivals are filled with symbolism. At a festival in Karnataka, the

Mariamman image is first painted in bright colours and put in a shelter of nim

leaves and a sheep sacrificed to placate the goddess. Then a he-buffalo is

sacrificed by untouchables and the head put in a pit before Mariamman. The blood

and parts of the buffalo are mixed with rice and put in a large basket. This is

caraga and it is carried in procession by untouchables followed by other

villagers carrying sickles and weapons to guard it. At other shrines sheep are

sacrificed and mixed with the caraga, which is then sprinkled on the fields and

along the boundaries of the village, thus regenerating the soil and protecting

the village. Even vegetarian farmers believe that the soil needs blood and if it

is not given then human lives will be taken.

Festivals without animal sacrifice may offer boiled rice, fruit, flowers, cakes

and sugar, and incense and camphor are burnt. There is Abishegam, ceremonial

washing of the image twice a day, with water, oil, milk, coconut milk, turmeric,

rose water, sandalwood, honey, sugar, limes, and a solution of the bark of

certain trees, separately in a regular order. The image of the goddess is

carried twice a day on the shoulders of devotees around the village and there

may be a car procession one day. Under brahmanical influence, the image can be

towed around a tank.

At many festivals an important role is played by a Matangi, a low caste woman

who is unmarried and holds the office for life. She is a living symbol of the

goddess and becomes possessed by the goddess, dancing wildly, using obscene

language, spitting at devotees, and pushing people around with her backside. The

festival reverses social norms and the Matangi's behaviour, which would

ordinarily be highly polluting, is purifying and people seek out her spit and

insults.

 

Adherents Millions of villagers across South India worship Mariamman,

especially in Tamil Nadu and Karnataka. Mariamman is one of the deities

worshipped in almost every Tamil village. Nearly all members of a village

participate in the goddess's festival, even brahmans and Muslims. The different

castes to some extent mix freely. This is not the case in daily life. The ritual

topography of a village in Karnataka, for example, has an inner village

inhabited by the purest castes and the rest live outside this. The shrines of

the goddess would be in the outside part of the village. The oldest, largest,

and most important Hindu temple in Singapore is the Mariamman Temple, which was

established early in the nineteenth century.

Pilgrims at a Mariamman festival wear mostly yellow, the colour of the goddess.

Some men dress as tigers and other animals. Pilgrims may come because of a

specific fear or debt or because one of their family has a disease associated

with the goddess or they themselves have recovered from the disease. Particular

castes are associated with Mariamman, such as fishermen and builders on the

coast of Tamil Nadu. Pilgrims fast before the festival and bring offerings, such

as money in a propitious amount, say one hundred and one rupees. Some pilgrims

have made vows to Mariamman to walk on fire, carry burning pots on their heads,

or perform covadi, when they swing suspended on hooks through their flesh.

 

Headquarters/

Main Centre There is no one main centre for Mariamman.

 

With Love

 

Shankaree

 

 

 

 

 

Health - Feel better, live better