_India conspicuous in the history of Serpent Worship--Nagpur--
Confessions of a Snake Worshipper--The gardeners of Guzerat--Cottages
for Snakes at Calicut--The Feast of Serpents--The Deity
Hari--Garuda--The Snake as an emblem of immortality._
In the course of this work we have had occasion frequently to allude to
India as the home of the peculiar worship before us, and perhaps that
country may fairly be placed side by side with Egypt for the multitude of
illustrations it affords of what we are seeking to elucidate.
Mr. Rivett-Carnac from whose paper in the journal of the Bengal Asiatic
Society we have already quoted, says:--"The palace of the Bhonslahs at
Benares brings me to Nagpur, where, many years ago, I commenced to make,
with but small success, some rough notes on Serpent Worship. Looking up
some old sketches, I find that the Mahadeo in the oldest temples at Nagpur
is surmounted by the Nag as at Benares. And in the old temple near the
palace of the Nagpur, or city of the Nag or cobra, is a five-headed snake,
elaborately coiled. The Bhonslahs apparently took the many-coiled Nag with
them to Benares. A similar representation of the Nag is found in the
temple near the Itwarah gate at Nagpur. Here again the Nag or cobra is
certainly worshipped as Mahadeo or the phallus, and there are certain
obvious points connected with the position assumed by the cobra when
excited and the expansion of the hood, which suggest the reason for this
snake in particular being adopted as a representation of the phallus and
an emblem of Siva.
"The worship of the snake is very common in the old Nagpur Province where,
especially among the lower class, the votaries of Siva or Nag Bhushan, 'he
who wears snakes as his ornaments,' are numerous. It is likely enough that
the city took its name from the Nag temple, still to be seen there, and
that the river Nag, perhaps, took its name from the city or temple, and
not the city from the river, as some think. Certain it is that many of the
Kunbi or cultivating class worship the snake and the snake only, and that
this worship is something more than the ordinary superstitious awe with
which all Hindus regard the snake. I find from my notes that one Kunbi
whom I questioned in old days, when I was a Settlement Officer in camp in
the Nagpur Division, stated that he worshipped the Nag and nothing else;
that he worshipped clay images of the snake, and when he could afford to
pay snake-catchers for a look at a live one, he worshipped the living
snake; that if he saw a Nag on the road he would worship it, and that he
believed no Hindu would kill a Nag or cobra if he knew it were a Nag. He
then gave me the following list of articles he would use in worshipping
the snake, when he could afford it; and I take it, the list is similar to
what would be used in ordinary Siva Worship. 1--Water. 2--Gandh, pigment
of sandal-wood for the forehead or body. 3--Cleaned rice. 4--Flowers.
5--Leaves of the Bail tree. 6--Milk. 7--Curds. 8--A thread or piece of
cloth. 9--Red powder. 10--Saffron. 11--Abir, a powder composed of fragrant
substances. 12--Garlands of flowers. 13--Buttemah or grain soaked and
parched. 14--Jowarri. 15--Five lights. 16--Sweetmeats. 17--Betel leaves.
18--Cocoa nut. 19--A sum of money (according to means). 20--Flowers
offered by the suppliant, the palms of the hands being joined.
"All these articles, my informant assured me, were offered to the snake in
regular succession, one after the other, the worshipper repeating the
while certain _mantras_ or incantations. Having offered all these gifts,
the worshipper prostrates himself before the snake, and, begging for
pardon if he has ever offended against him, craves that the snake will
continue his favour upon him and protect him from every danger."
In the _Oriental Memoirs_ by Forbes, we are told of the gardeners of
Guzerat who would never allow the snakes to be disturbed, calling them
"father," "brother," and other familiar and endearing names. The head
gardener paid them religious honours. As Deane says, "here we observe a
mixture of the original Serpent Worship, with the more modern doctrine of
transmigration."
Still more striking is the information in Purchas's _Pilgrims_, that a
king of Calicut built cottages for live serpents, whom he tended with
peculiar care, and made it a capital crime for any person in his dominions
to destroy a snake. "The natives," he says, "looked upon serpents as
endued with divine spirits."
Then there is the festival called "The Feast of the Serpents," at which
every worshipper, in the hope of propitiating the reptiles during the
ensuing year, sets by a portion of his rice for the hooded snake on the
outside of his house.
The deities of India and the wonderful temples and caves, as those at
Salsette and Elephanta, as may be seen in Maurice's _Indian Antiquities_,
Moor's _Hindu Pantheon_, _The Asiatic Researches_, Faber's _Pagan
Idolatry_ and numerous other works, are universally adorned with, or
represented by this great symbol. Thus we have the statue of Jeyne, the
Indian AEsculapius, turbaned by a seven-headed snake; that of Vishnu on a
rock in the Ganges, reposing on a coiled serpent whose numerous folds form
a canopy over the sleeping god; Parus Nauth symbolized by a serpent;
Jagan-Nath worshipped under the form of a seven-headed dragon.
Hari, appears to be one of the titles of Vishnu--that of the deity in his
preserving quality--and his appearance on the rock, as just mentioned, is
thus noticed in Wilkins' _Hitopadesa_: "Nearly opposite Sultan Ganj, a
considerable town in the province of Bahar, there stands a rock of
granite, forming a small island in the Ganges, known to Europeans by the
name of 'the rock of Ichangiri,' which is highly worthy of the traveller's
notice for the vast number of images carved upon every part of its
surface. Among the rest there is Hari, of a gigantic size, recumbent upon
a coiled serpent, whose heads (which are numerous) the artist has
contrived to spread into a kind of canopy over the sleeping god; and from
each of its mouths issues a forked tongue, seeming to threaten instant
death to any whom rashness might prompt to disturb him. The whole lies
almost clear of the block on which it is hewn. It is finely imagined and
is executed with great skill. The Hindus are taught to believe that at the
end of every _Calpa_ (creation or formation) all things are absorbed in
the Deity, and that in the interval of another creation, he reposeth
himself upon the serpent Sesha (duration) who is also called Ananta
(endlessness)."
Moor says Garuda was an animal--half bird, half man--and was the _vahan_
or vehicle of Vishnu, also Arun's younger brother. He is sometimes
described in the manner that our poets and painters describe a griffin or
a cherub; and he is placed at the entrance of the passes leading to the
Hindu garden of Eden, and there appears in the character of a destroying
angel in as far as he resists the approach of serpents, which in most
systems of poetical mythology appears to have been the beautiful,
deceiving, insinuating form that sin originally assumed. Garuda espoused a
beautiful woman; the tribes of serpents, alarmed thereat, lest his progeny
should, inheriting his propensities, overpower them, waged fierce war
against him; but he destroyed them all, save one, which he placed as an
ornament about his neck. In the Elephanta cave Garuda is often seen with
this appendage; and some very old gold coins are in existence depicting
him with snakes or elephants in his talons and beaks. Destroyer of
serpents, Naganteka, is one of his names.
He was of great use to Krishna in clearing the country round Dwarka
(otherwise Dravira) from savage ferocious animals and noxious reptiles.
Vishnu had granted to Garuda the power of destroying his as well as Siva's
enemies; also generally those guilty of constant uncleanness, unbelievers,
dealers in iniquity, ungrateful persons, those who slander their spiritual
guides, or defiled their beds; but forebade him to touch a Brahman,
whatever was his guilt, as the pain of disobedience would be a scorching
pain in his throat, and any attack on a holy or pious person would be
followed by a great diminution of strength. By mistake, however, Garuda
sometimes seized a priest or a religious man, but was admonished and
punished in the first case by the scorching flame, and was unable, even
when he had bound him in his den, to hurt the man of piety.[20] To Rama
also, in the war of Lauka, Garuda was eminently useful: in Rama's last
conflict with Ravana the latter was not overcome without the aid of
Garuda, sent by Vishnu to destroy the serpent-arrows of Ravana. These
arrows are called "Sharpa-vana" (in the current dialect _Sarpa_ a snake,
is corrupted into _Saap_ or _Samp_, and _vana_, an arrow, into _ban_)
and had the faculty of separating, between the bow and the object, into
many parts, each becoming a serpent. Viswamitra conferred upon Rama the
power of transforming his arrows into "Garuda-vanas," they similarly
separating themselves into "Garuda's," the terror and destroyer of the
_Sarpa_.
Some legends make Garuda the offspring of Kasyapa and Diti. This
all-prolific dame laid an egg, which, it was predicted, would preserve her
deliverer from some great affliction. After a lapse of five hundred years
Garuda sprung from the egg, flew to the abode of Indra, extinguished the
fire that surrounded it, conquered its guards, the _devatas_, and bore off
the _amrita_ (ambrosia), which enabled him to liberate his captive mother.
A few drops of this immortal beverage falling on the species of grass
called "Kusa," it became eternally consecrated; and the serpents greedily
licking it up so lacerated their tongues with the sharp grass that they
have ever since remained forked; but the boon of eternity was ensured to
them by their thus partaking of the immortal fluid. This cause of snakes
having forked tongues is still popularly in the tales of India attributed
to the above greediness; and their supposed immortality may have
originated in some such stories as these; a small portion of _amrita_, as
in the case of Rahu, would ensure them this boon.
In all mythological language the snake is an emblem of immortality: its
endless figure when its tail is inserted in its mouth, and the annual
renewal of its skin and vigour, afford symbols of continued youth and
eternity; and its supposed medicinal or life-preserving qualities may also
have contributed to the fabled honours of the serpent tribe. In Hindu
mythology serpents are of universal occurence and importance; in some
shape or other they abound in all directions; a similar state of things
prevails in Greece and Egypt. Ingenious and learned authors attribute this
universality of serpent forms to the early and all pervading prevalence of
sin, which, in this identical shape, they tell us, and as indeed we all
know, is as old as the days of our greatest grandmother: thus much as to
its age, when there was but one woman; its prevalence, now there are so
many, this is no place to discuss.
If such writers were to trace the allegories of Sin and Death, and the end
of their empire, they might discover further allusions to the Christian
dispensation in the traditions of the Hindus than have hitherto been
published--Krishna crushing, but not destroying, the type of Sive, has
often been largely discussed. Garuda is also the proverbial, but not the
utter destroyer of serpents, for he spared one, they and their archetype
being, in reference to created beings, eternal. His continual and destined
state of warfare with serpent, a shape mostly assumed by the enemies of
the virtuous incarnations or deified heroes of the Hindus, is a continued
allegory of the conflicts between Vice and Virtue so infinitely
personified. Garuda, at length, appears the coadjutor of all virtuous
sin-subduing efforts, as the vehicle of the chastening and triumphant
party, and conveys him on the wings of the winds to the regions of eternal
day.