Reading Notes: Seven Secrets from Hindu Calendar Art Part A

(Ganesha)

Ganesha’s secret

What I really like about this piece so far is that it’s structurally very different from the other pieces I’ve examined up to this point. While those generally have a focused storytelling agenda, this purpose of this piece is to educate people about the Hindu religion through stories about their Gods, Goddesses, gods, and goddesses.

Initially, the video discusses the multiplicity of divinity and the concept that Hindu deities are the most comprehensible embodiments of various aspects of divinity as a whole. It then goes on to explore the difference between Gods and gods. I find this an interesting distinction. It becomes even more interesting when one considers local gods and goddesses and their roles in the Hindu pantheon.

I didn’t know that Ganga was said to flow from the top of Shiva’s topknot. The really cool thing about that is that I’ve actually read an alternative source story regarding Ganga. In fact, I wrote in my storybook about a different relationship that Ganga and Shiva are said to share.

This discussion of local gods and goddesses is very interesting to me because it shows how culture impacts religion and people’s interactions with religion. For example, the fact that there are some earthly people who are considered to be the consorts of various deities.

It is particularly interesting to me that they are exploring the similarities between various historical pantheons and the Vedic pantheon. I also like the thread of subjective truth they are pulling through the video in conjunction with the initial story about Ganesha.

I had never considered greek mythology from the perspective of gods and goddesses fearing that the human race would eventually overthrow them. Vishwakarma is the one who creates. Bahuchara is the goddess of hijras who can turn a woman into a man. She is the embodiment of inclusive divinity.

Annapurna, the mother who feeds, becomes Lakshmi. Gayatri becomes Saryaswati. Ganesha is one of the most popular gods in modern Hinduism. Ganesha represents a balance between spiritual and physical desires.

Bibliography: Seven Secrets from Hindu Calendar Art

Storytelling: The Gander-Eater

 

(Cell Phone)

Lila never meant to raise a monster, but sometimes if you’re not careful enough, you reap weeds you never meant to sow. She had been careless, but Lila never dreamed that trying to give her son everything she could afford would end the way it had.

Our story, as so many stories before it, begins with an unforeseeable tragedy. Shortly after their son Lyle was born, Lila’s husband was killed in a mugging on his way home from work. The couple didn’t even have much money to speak of in the first place. After his death, Lila and her newborn son were left destitute, the former beyond desperate.

Finding a full time job and some kind of childcare for her infant was no easy task. Lila was forced to move to the city and take any position she could find, often working upwards of 70 hours a week. Between all her jobs and an intense sense of frugality, Lila managed to ferret away enough money to get a small one-bedroom apartment and send her son to a high-end private school in the area.

All that work exhausted her, but Lila would have done anything for her son. He was her pride and joy, and anything Lyle asked for he received, one way or another. Eventually, without meaning to, Lila spoiled her son, and he became a selfish, implacable nuisance. No matter how much he received, nothing was ever enough to satisfy him.

One day, some of Lyle’s school friends got to talking about the different gifts their parents had given them as a result of the performance in the last semester. Lyle listened for almost an hour to his friends discussing brand new cell phones, expensive computers, and imported gifts Lyle couldn’t even pronounce.

When he came home that night, Lyle walked straight up to his mother who was collapsed, exhausted on the couch. He began wailing at the top of his lungs, startling his mother awake.  Lyle bawled and squalled without end, demanding to know why she hated him so much that she wouldn’t give him a brand new phone like his friends had. Seeing her only son so distraught upset Lila, and she began to cry quietly, trying to assure her son that she would save up and get him a good cell phone as soon she could afford it.

Dissatisfied, Lyle only screamed louder. Lila offered him her cell phone, saying she would get herself a cheap one from the supermarket. Without warning, the screams ceased. Lyle glared at his mother and in a dark, soft tone warned her that he would have the phone he wanted or nothing.

Unfortunately, Lila knew she could do nothing and had to watch as her spoiled son locked himself in the only bedroom and refused to let her in or speak with her. Resolving to do what she could after work the next day, Lila laid down on the couch and fell asleep almost immediately.

When Lila woke up the next morning, she saw Lyle sitting at the foot of the couch playing with an expensive looking phone, the box and wrappings sitting beside him. Lila knew her son couldn’t have gotten the phone legally, but he wasn’t screaming anymore, and she was so tired. She simply didn’t have the energy to fight the boy she had created so she let him keep it. She said nothing.

Imgaine then, Lila’s guilt when the police showed up and took her son into custody based on fairly damning video security video. Lila spent the next week crying in the temple down the road from their apartment. Her son had been arrested and she was alone. Lost for options, she began to beg god for an answer to her son’s imprisonment.

Author’s Note: I chose to make this into a two-week story because I wanted to explore some of the later impacts of such a selfish and poorly behaved boy being given immense power, but I didn’t want to write an unreasonably long story. The source material is about a widowed woman who sends her son to school using what money she can beg and finds that he is dissatisfied when he discovers that his classmates can all afford to eat meat while he can have only vegetables. The boy steals a goose from the king’s aviary and eats it. When he’s caught and sent to prison his mother prays for his release. I’ll explore the end to this tale next week.

Bibliography: Neogi's Sacred Tales of India

Reading Notes: Neogi's Sacred Tales of India Part D

(Calf)

The Fatal Oath

The fatal oath is an interesting story that explores the junction of grief, piety, and desperation. Bijaya learns through her sufferings that there is great reward for those who face suffering with patience and continuous worship to a merciful god. I think it's fitting that this story centers around the mistake this woman made and the lengths she went to to remedy her mistake to the best of her ability. I like this mode of storytelling where the character is allowed to make a mistake then go out and find some way to begin reparations.

Sacrificed to Varuna

I love the way that so many of the tales I have read thus far tend to operate in a cyclical pattern where the beginning is closely related to the end and often the story's problem and resolution mirror or in some way bear resemblance to each other. In this story, the problem was created as a result of a necessary sacrifice to a god. The solution was the result of willing devotion to a goddess.

Joyabati - The Gift of Joya

Testing the gods seems to be a very dangerous but sometimes rewarding practice in these stories. When Joyadev tests Chandi, he is eventually rewarded with a message directly from Joya who teaches him great faith in Chandi. In other cases, though, testing the gods and goddesses can result in their divine wrath and punishment.

Saved from the Cat

I find many of the demands and requests made by the gods, especially those intended to be penances for past crimes, to be particularly strange. I don't understand how the penance the poorly behaved boy had to perform had anything to do with his mother's sins.

The Wife who Used to Eat the First Morsel

This story was barely 2 pages long. It was mainly about greed and  sacrilege. I don't plan on writing about this piece, but I will say that it reflects the theme of sin and atonement I've been noticing.

The Wife who Cooked Beef

This story harks back to the idea that one person's sin can damn another just as one person's atonement can save another. It was the servant girl who actually killed the calf, but it was the woman of the house who felt the need to atone for the sin committed. I like the woman's character, though. I understand her devotion and her resulting fear. It may not have been her fault, but she certainly feared punishment in case it was viewed as her doing since she didn't check carefully what kind of meat was brought to her.

The Banished Girls

One thing I really like about the stories that I've read in this storybook is the theme of punishment paired with that of forgiveness. Although many of the characters sin and are punished for their sin, it isn't hard for them to regain the favor of their patron god or goddess given they show sincere regret and shame in regards to their transgressions.

Bibliography: Archived Neogi's Sacred Tales of India

Reading Notes: Neogi's Sacred Tales of India Part C

(Gander)

The Gift of the Ascetic

I think it's interesting the way that the cycle of karma is focused in this story. If I was going to rewrite this story, I would probably write. the ascetic as some sort of con man. Alternatively, I could write the story from his perspective and explore a line of storytelling wherein he is actually praying for or in some way causing the infertility of the king.

The Sun's Twin Sons

I don't like that the mother seems to simply fall out of this story as if she were not the main cause of the boys' situation. It isn't fair to her sons. She seems to simply abandon them at the first possible time. I also want to know why the sun did not insist on Jokai keeping her promise. I don't want to rewrite this piece because I feel there are too many loose ends for me to tie up in a rewrite.

The Consequences of Generosity

This story seems to differ from some of the other stories I've read in that rather than someone suffering as a result of their selfishness or cruelty, the main characters in this story suffer as a result of the kindness they showed their good friend. I believe it was meant to teach a lesson about the fact that anyone can suffer the issues associated with poverty and destitution. It encourages compassion and understanding. All the people in the lives of this couple seemed to abandon them when the issue of their poverty arose.

A Brahman's Ban

The most interesting part of this story in my opinion is that it explores the idea that gods often require the aid of other gods and must perform supplications of their own in order to gain the favors they require. It shows how not only humans require divine intervention.

The Pir's Power

The capricious will and favor of gods seems to be a recurring theme throughout many of the stories I have read thus far. This one in particular reminds me of another from this same set of stories. In fact, I believe they were both about the god Satya Pir.

The Gander-Eater

I think the lessons to be gained from this particular story are that, firstly, sin can be ignored if due worship is made to a good-natured god or goddess. Secondly, the sins of one person can be atoned for by the worship and piety of another. One other noteworthy aspect of this story is the idea that this worship and love of the boy's mother created first a selfish, greedy boy then gifted him a kingdom to satiate his endless, insatiable desire. This would likely lead to a poorly led kingdom, but the woman loved her son so her actions make sense. Regardless, there is some moral ambiguity to her choices.

Bibliography: Archived Neogi's Sacred Tales of India

Storybook Planning: Chand, The Unbeliever and The Divine Brothers

(Snake Pit)

After reading the first two sets of stories from Neogi's Sacred Tales of India, I felt that it would be very interesting to combine the two stories involving the goddess Padma because I believe her to be a very interesting character. I think I would like to write the story in a somewhat similar way to the manner in which I am writing my Storybook project. I want Padma to tell her story to Lahana while Lahana is staying in her house. 

I chose to combine these two stories because I felt that they would simultaneously explain the closeness between Lahana and Padma and add to the depth of the characters in the story. I think that I will write it as an exchange that occurs between the two before Padma leaves Lahana alone.

It will be written from Padma’s perspective because I want to show why Padma seems so fond of Lahana. I’m going to use her past to help explain that fact by illustrating how Padma would be accustomed to not receiving the same honors and gifts as the people around her. Being an illegitimate child would have given Padma a set of burdens to bear that she would have been forced to bear on a daily basis that would have made her more inclined to note the burdens Lahana bore as a woman without a family.

I don’t think that Padma will explain all her feelings to Lahana, but I think that she will explain to the girl her background in explanation of why she’s willing to help her. I’m going to write Padma as answering Lahana as to why she accepted her sons’ requests to adopt her for a time. She will lead into a story telling Lahana about her origins.

After she explains where she comes from, Padma will explain to Lahana that this is why she is willing to take her in and ease her troubles. She will not however, explain how fond it makes her of the girl. That will be illustrated in the narrative as thoughts passing through Padma’s head. It will be written in a semi-omniscient third person in order to give me the flexibility I need to be successful in this endeavor.

Bibliography: Chand, the Unbeliever & The Divine Brothers

Reading Notes: Neogi's Sacred Tales of India Part B

(Vishnu)

The Bride of Yama

The thing I found most interesting about this story were its themes of redemption, sacrifice, and piety. It raises questions about whether or not the sinner is the sole bearer of the burden of their mistakes. This story specifically seems to propose that that need not be the case. It suggests that earnest sacrifice by anyone for the sake of another is sufficient to garner mercy.

The Goddess who Devoured Elephants

This story is also centered around worship. This one seems to focus on the rewards of continuous piety and the fickle nature of a god or goddess spurned. I don't think I'll write about this one.

The Slayer of Kangsa

The interesting thing about this story is that I actually read about it through one of my classmate's storybooks. It focuses on punishment for the wicked and the punitive role of the gods in the affairs of man.

Chand, The Unbeliever

I find it vaguely amusing that this entire story is centered around the illegitimate daughter of a god who wishes, herself, to be known as a goddess. I also think it's interesting to connect this with the other story I read involving Padma and her children. I may write this into the piece I read yesterday.

Bibliography: Neogi's Sacred Tales of India