In the Court of the Love-Eyed Goddess

[Guest guest]

In an enlightening essay published yesterday in the Indian Express,

Renuka Narayanan visited an ancient Devi temple, where she

was surprised by many "fascinating examples of Hindu orthodoxy's

positive potential for change."

 

IN THE COURT OF THE LOVE-EYED GODDESS

 

"You're biased about Lord Ram. How can I make you understand?" asks

the old gentleman with a Vaishnava tilak. We've met five minutes ago

and are chatting away like uncle and pet niece, in a shaded corner of

the Sri Kamakoti Matt (Srimatam) in the exceedingly ancient temple

town of Kanchipuram.

 

"Ramayanam Mama" is the old gentleman's nickname, he proudly tells

me -- bestowed for his epic expertise by none other than the late

venerated Paramacharya of Kanchipuram. A retired civil servant, he's

reading Tom Clancy and carries the book everywhere he goes, even

intothe darshan room of Srisri Balaperiyawal, the junior

Shankaracharya.

 

Ramayanam Mama, supposedly orthodox to the core, seems least bothered

by my short, loose, highlighted hair or my obvious modern

cynicism. "Why do you dislike Lord Ram so much? Don't you realise He

suffered as much as Sita did?" he asks gently.

 

"It's wounded love," I explain (presumptuously?) on behalf of Modern

Indian Womanhood. "I can't endure the thought of how he treated

Sita!" [see http://www.shaktisadhana.org/sita.html -- Ed.]

 

"Love itself is a wound!" says Ramayanam Mama. "It makes you

vulnerable to every kind of hurt. But isn't that what life is all

about? Isn't that why this incredible story still matters so much to

us?"

 

A bizarre exchange with a perfect stranger, deep in the bastion of

sternest Hindu orthodoxy? Not really, come to think of it. Isn't this

the court of the 'love-eyed' goddess, Kamakshi, presiding deity of

Kanchipuram?

 

Anything could happen in this forcefield of raw energy. Masks fall

away, feelings seem out on toast even while one behaves with utmost

politeness.

 

The Srimatam is a fascinating example of Hindu orthodoxy's positive

potential for change. It's an unmistakably strong vibe, coming at you

from all kinds of situations and from the people living and working

behind its high, cloistered walls.

 

For one, access to the heart of the Matt doesn't seem to be on caste

or gender lines any more. My taxi driver from Chennai, a proud, true

Tamizhan, follows me right in with my little basket of fruit and is

spoken to most politely by the priests who conduct me into the

darshan area.

 

My eyes fill seeing a mottai paati (shorn widow), the saddest,

cruellest creation of Hindu patriarchy, seated right upfront while

His Holiness the Junior Shankaracharya performs the important morning

puja to Lord Shiva in his form as Sri Chandramouliswara (the Moon-

bearer). Paati (granny) is adding to the auspicious vibes by loudly

chanting the Lalita Sahasranamam with a group of satsangis. Just ten

years ago, the very sight of her would have been condemned as

horribly inauspicious for such 'pure' and 'exalted' sanyasis. I just

love it when paati sees me at a loss and hands me her prayer book

with a sweet, confident smile. It's her right to be here as a

believing woman — belonging, at last?

 

Crosslegged on the ground nearby is pale, handsome Thyagu, a slender

young man who plays the mridangam during worship and gently guides

two little boys, each with his own mridangam. One of them, a stout,

naughty-eyed fellow muffs a cue but a glance from Thyagu brings his

chubby fingers back in rhythm. Cultural transmission? Yet [this is a

man] who works the e-mail and supervises the ultra-modern Anna

Daanam. This designer building serves free food to groups of

devotees — it's the Hindu langar. The kitchen is unbelievably

hygienic and state-of-the-art. "I'm in a gurdwara!" I joke.

 

A 50-strong group of simply dressed pilgrims from Ernakulam suddenly

flood the courtyard. They wash up in neat lines at a sparkling row of

steel sinks. I catch — but only just! — the gleam of quiet fun in

Thyagu's eye as he blows a whistle and they all troop in and sit in

orderly rows to be served a delicious meal of nolkol sambhar, rice,

beetroot sabzi and spiced buttermilk.

 

While I tuck in, Vilwam, a 22-year-old Telugu priestlet refrains

heroically from eating. He's trying to be a Perfect Ascetic, having

shaved his head and undertaken vows of restraint. The other

priestlets rag him goodnaturedly about being a "Madi Mama" (person

undergoing austerities).

 

"Well, I'm trying!" retorts Vilwam. "What I really want is to improve

my Hindi. But I need to be in a Hindi-speaking atmosphere to do

that."

 

Vilwam and I have been around four temples together that morning and

have just had a huge argument about the last one, which I detested

because of the disco bhajans played aloud and its rather casual

priest, a moody, restless-looking young fellow.

 

"You can't say you dislike the temple," insists Vilwam, not unfairly.

 

"But it's people who make a place. So many Hindus get put off temples

because of rude or sloppy priests," is my view. But Vilwam and I are

in perfect accord over the lyrical beauty of the ancient

Kailasanathar Temple.

 

Kailasanathar is a dream. None of those elegant formalised lines of

later Chola architecture, this is pure Pallava exuberance, energy and

beauty (like at Mahabalipuram). A touch of whimsy, a divine

confidence in making a House of God is pretty evident. The elderly

archak, Subramanya Aiyer, speaks Oxbridge English and is a fount of

learned lore. The Shivling here is a massive, brooding monolith with

a subterranean passage that only the utterly devout have the courage

to tackle.

 

Under the bright blue sky, the priest's stories take you back in time

through corridor after corridor of tiny cloistered spaces for

meditation, their frescoes still bright and beautiful in places.

 

Imagine, Pulakesi the valourous Chalukya, walked here! (He's the guy

who pushed Harshavardhana of Thaneswar back across the Narmada). The

Pallavas of Kanchi had attacked Badami (Vatapi) the Chalukya capital

and laid it waste so that it could not rise for fourteen years. It

wasn't just Muslims who broke Hindu temples, you know!

 

Biding his time, young Pulakesi put together a huge army and laid

siege to Kanchi. But when he inspected Kailasanathar he exclaimed

that the world would condemn him as a barbarian if he destroyed

anything so brilliant. His queen came up with idea that they should

take the Kanchi artisans back with them and that's how the fabulous

temples at Pattadakkal were created, "But in granite, not pressed

sand. This technique is a secret and unique to Kanchi," reveals

Subrahmanya Aiyar.

 

I can't help noticing though that both he and the splendid temple in

his loving care are desperately poor. "How many temples can our

society support?" asks Vilwam sadly. But Kailsanathar is so amazingly

beautiful, with so much real history!

 

Anyway, what with spick-and-span hostels for destitute girls,

hospitals and perinatal projects in Chennai and an impressive

international library near Kanchi — HH wants heaps of books, so if

you're dumping your library, you know where it'll be welcome — I'm

treated to an impressive whirlwind tour of Progressive Hinduism. It's

devotion to Devi Kamakshi and the Srimatam that makes these people

run. They say so, loud and clear.

 

The magic realism of Kamakshi's kingdom seems best personified by two

people. One is Kameswara Sivacharya, a big, burly, sarcastic priest

who's a storehouse of myth and legend. An MA, he lives in a tiny

traditional home with his mother and wife, downroad from Kamakshi

Amman. He officiates as the archak at a lovely old Kartikeya temple.

Trad to the core, but I like the casual, new modern ease to the way

he leads me around Shiva Ekambareswarar's great temple, a sense of

once-autocratic ownership that's now open to sharing without tiresome

old gender hassles. Way to go! This relaxed and friendly interaction

could be happening in London, Paris or New York; this could be one of

the curators at the Metropolitan Museum, NY, showing me around the

Magritte retrospective like it happened back in 1992.

 

"Kamakshi Amman," I think impertinently, "You're really something if

you managed to swing this atmosphere. What took you so long, Mother?"

 

I get my answer early at 5.00 am when I rush across to Kamakshi

Amman's great temple to rendezvous with Rukmini Raman, a/k/a 'Tiruchi

Mami'. A chatty, knowledgeable little lady who spent decades in

Porbander with her now-retired husband, Rukmini Mami wears a nine-

yard madisar sari and most kindly carries a thermos of coffee for

yawning me. My eyes open wide when she hands me a smart card with her

e-mail id. A cyber-mami in a nine-yard sari!

 

"You're blowing my socks off!" I tell Kamakshi Amman severely in my

head. "Do you want to kill your devotee with shock?" For it is I, the

so-called city slicker that feels like a rustic fool with narrow

notions.

 

Our society is capable of much more complexity than we realise, an

individual can "contain multitudes" as Walt Whitman put it and

reconcile many aspects of life comfortably in one skin. But before I

shout huzzas for Hinduism, I need to check Devi out.

 

Waiting inside that dark, ancient precinct after inspecting the

temple cow and baby elephant, I feel the centuries pulling me

in. "Spare me this 'womb of time' stuff," I mutter, resisting in my

thoughts. The bells ring, the oil lamps are swung to light up Her

dark, beautiful face, the perfect amrit kalashas of her red-draped

bosom, the crescent moon on her crown, her elegant eyebrows arched in

sandalwood paste. The stone srichakra at her feet is the mystic

yantra, the 'wish-giving' throne placed by Adi Shankara himself.

 

Serene and triumphantly beautiful, the Love-Eyed Goddess reveals

Herself to us. There are no words. She simply is.

 

Source (with pics and additional info):

http://www.indianexpress.com/full_story.php?content_id=23645