7 SECRETS OF THE GODDESS
Devdutt Pattanaik
Westland Books
257 pages
Forty places to see before you die. Ten best beaches in the world. Fifty most powerful women …
If you visit the internet often enough, or even not that often, you can't miss these headlines that pop up whatever site you land on. Lists grab readers if search engine optimisation (SEO) experts (yes, in case you have been hiding behind a rock in a remote island somewhere, this is an important function in the digital economy and an area where many young engineers are cracking their IIT-sharpened brains) are to be believed. In the spirit of the times, therefore, 7 Secrets of the Goddess is no doubt a great title for a series (7 Secrets of Hindu Calendar Art, 7 Secrets of Shiva) of books. It will definitely draw in many more readers for a topic that is already widely read and may even make for a catchy television series title someday.
But surely, this could not have been the only reason for naming the books thus. Given that there are way more than seven goddesses in the pantheon and even more secrets to be uncovered, there must have been a more profound reasoning at work - perhaps because seven is a mystic number or it could be that this is the way boundless time was divided up by the first humans. To quote the author (albeit out of context): "Which is the correct reading? Who knows?"
Every book is more than its name, however. And this one is an interesting look at select goddesses and the way they have influenced society and vice versa. There's Gaia, Kali, Gauri, Durga, Lakshmi, Saraswati and Vitthai. Except for Gaia, the only Greek goddess, the rest belong to the Hindu-Indian pantheon. The author profiles them in detail bringing out facts and anecdotes that even if known have not been put together in this fashion.
The chapters carry the flourish of a good storyteller and are filled with many fascinating ideas. Durga, riding her lion, defies domestication, the author says. Her unbound hair shows that she is wild like Kali, but her nose ring says she is domesticated like Gauri. These are bound to bring him the rapt attention of the mythology-devouring public, but, if only, he had given us some insight into what led him to these conclusions it would have made for better reading. Also without a context or an understanding of what led to the formation of these myths, the analysis is not only incomplete but also flawed.
The author builds a fine argument with the goddesses and their stories to show how women were treated and their relationship with men. Certain myths perpetuated a feeling of disgust towards women, while others reflected a feeling that the earth mother was a trap. Escape, therefore, he says, meant rejection of all that symbolised the goddess. Thus, the serpent, messenger of the goddess, was rejected in favour of angels who could carry human beings to higher realms. Sure, but what about the rejection of the serpent because it was a sexual symbol, as many mythologists have said. Or what about the fact that the serpent-dragon was a revered and worshipped figure in the Orient even when it was being vilified in the Occident? There are no answers to be found here.
There are many such grand declarations made in the book that are insightful and entertaining, but unfortunately the reader can engage with these only at a superficial level. The author does not bring in the many layers that go into the making of the myth nor does he reveal the arguments that helped him with his analysis. For instance, while telling us the story of the goddess Yoga Nidra, also called Yoga Maya, who was created to destroy the demons born from Vishnu's earwax, he says the demons are our negative thoughts. Brahma who is witness to the destruction represents the partially awakened mind, while Narayana who creates the demons is our sleeping mind. And Vishnu is the awakened mind. The goddess is nature and Yoga Maya is "nature witnessed by an unenlightened mind". Sure, but the problem is that mythology is made up of so many strands of thoughts, ideas, memories and belief systems that it resists being put into a box. It is fully understood only when viewed through multiple lenses, which this book does not do. And that is unfortunate.
For instance, with respect to the goddess Kali, the book says: "By the fifteenth century, the Ramayanas and the Mahabharatas written in the regional languages start associating their wronged heroines, Sita and Draupadi, with Kali." Sita in the Adbhuta Ramayana kills a Ravana who has a 100 heads and Draupadi in the Tamil Mahabharata runs naked and eats cattle when she transforms into Kali at night. Kali, who is "indifferent to social conventions survived in the mind", he says. True, but there is a substantive body of work that shows epic heroines and village deities have been equated with the goddesses of the Hindu pantheon to give them legitimacy. As A K Ramanujan and several other scholars have pointed out, "a favourite way of integrating the village goddess into a Hindu system has been to see them as avataras of Kali or relatives of Siva" (Another Harmony: New Essays on the Folklore of India).
Still, the book follows a simple style and steers clear of the stodgy language and tiresome roundabout arguments that one finds in scholarly works on the subject. But the "devi" is a complex concept and has been layered with years and years of cultural and religious belief systems and taboos, and this book does not take us closer to understanding her.
Devdutt Pattanaik
Westland Books
257 pages
Forty places to see before you die. Ten best beaches in the world. Fifty most powerful women …
Also Read
If you visit the internet often enough, or even not that often, you can't miss these headlines that pop up whatever site you land on. Lists grab readers if search engine optimisation (SEO) experts (yes, in case you have been hiding behind a rock in a remote island somewhere, this is an important function in the digital economy and an area where many young engineers are cracking their IIT-sharpened brains) are to be believed. In the spirit of the times, therefore, 7 Secrets of the Goddess is no doubt a great title for a series (7 Secrets of Hindu Calendar Art, 7 Secrets of Shiva) of books. It will definitely draw in many more readers for a topic that is already widely read and may even make for a catchy television series title someday.
But surely, this could not have been the only reason for naming the books thus. Given that there are way more than seven goddesses in the pantheon and even more secrets to be uncovered, there must have been a more profound reasoning at work - perhaps because seven is a mystic number or it could be that this is the way boundless time was divided up by the first humans. To quote the author (albeit out of context): "Which is the correct reading? Who knows?"
Every book is more than its name, however. And this one is an interesting look at select goddesses and the way they have influenced society and vice versa. There's Gaia, Kali, Gauri, Durga, Lakshmi, Saraswati and Vitthai. Except for Gaia, the only Greek goddess, the rest belong to the Hindu-Indian pantheon. The author profiles them in detail bringing out facts and anecdotes that even if known have not been put together in this fashion.
The chapters carry the flourish of a good storyteller and are filled with many fascinating ideas. Durga, riding her lion, defies domestication, the author says. Her unbound hair shows that she is wild like Kali, but her nose ring says she is domesticated like Gauri. These are bound to bring him the rapt attention of the mythology-devouring public, but, if only, he had given us some insight into what led him to these conclusions it would have made for better reading. Also without a context or an understanding of what led to the formation of these myths, the analysis is not only incomplete but also flawed.
The author builds a fine argument with the goddesses and their stories to show how women were treated and their relationship with men. Certain myths perpetuated a feeling of disgust towards women, while others reflected a feeling that the earth mother was a trap. Escape, therefore, he says, meant rejection of all that symbolised the goddess. Thus, the serpent, messenger of the goddess, was rejected in favour of angels who could carry human beings to higher realms. Sure, but what about the rejection of the serpent because it was a sexual symbol, as many mythologists have said. Or what about the fact that the serpent-dragon was a revered and worshipped figure in the Orient even when it was being vilified in the Occident? There are no answers to be found here.
There are many such grand declarations made in the book that are insightful and entertaining, but unfortunately the reader can engage with these only at a superficial level. The author does not bring in the many layers that go into the making of the myth nor does he reveal the arguments that helped him with his analysis. For instance, while telling us the story of the goddess Yoga Nidra, also called Yoga Maya, who was created to destroy the demons born from Vishnu's earwax, he says the demons are our negative thoughts. Brahma who is witness to the destruction represents the partially awakened mind, while Narayana who creates the demons is our sleeping mind. And Vishnu is the awakened mind. The goddess is nature and Yoga Maya is "nature witnessed by an unenlightened mind". Sure, but the problem is that mythology is made up of so many strands of thoughts, ideas, memories and belief systems that it resists being put into a box. It is fully understood only when viewed through multiple lenses, which this book does not do. And that is unfortunate.
For instance, with respect to the goddess Kali, the book says: "By the fifteenth century, the Ramayanas and the Mahabharatas written in the regional languages start associating their wronged heroines, Sita and Draupadi, with Kali." Sita in the Adbhuta Ramayana kills a Ravana who has a 100 heads and Draupadi in the Tamil Mahabharata runs naked and eats cattle when she transforms into Kali at night. Kali, who is "indifferent to social conventions survived in the mind", he says. True, but there is a substantive body of work that shows epic heroines and village deities have been equated with the goddesses of the Hindu pantheon to give them legitimacy. As A K Ramanujan and several other scholars have pointed out, "a favourite way of integrating the village goddess into a Hindu system has been to see them as avataras of Kali or relatives of Siva" (Another Harmony: New Essays on the Folklore of India).
Still, the book follows a simple style and steers clear of the stodgy language and tiresome roundabout arguments that one finds in scholarly works on the subject. But the "devi" is a complex concept and has been layered with years and years of cultural and religious belief systems and taboos, and this book does not take us closer to understanding her.