Stories 95
A day of Brahma
One day of Brahma is a kalpa of 4.32 billion human years, and his night is as long.
Aiyanar, the horseman at the village edge
The Tamil village guardian on horseback was absorbed over the medieval centuries into Shasta, the son of Shiva and Mohini, and the Sanskritising continues today.
All as one: the Smarta Panchayatana
The Smarta school worships five deities — Ganesha, Shiva, Shakti, Vishnu and Surya, with Kartikeya added in the south — set in a quincunx around the worshipper's chosen one, as equal forms of the one Brahman; tradition credits Adi Shankara, though the practice is older.
Anasuya tests the three gods
Narada provokes the three consorts into sending their husbands to test Anasuya's virtue; she turns them into infants and nurses them; the consorts beg for their husbands and she asks for sons — one three-headed Dattatreya, or three sons.
Andhaka, the blind demon who wanted his mother
Parvati in play covers Shiva's eyes and the worlds go dark.
Ayyappa and his companion Vavar
Kerala's Ayyappa, born of Shiva and Mohini, grows up in Pandalam, defeats the demoness Mahishi and keeps a Muslim companion whose mosque still faces his temple at Erumely.
Baka Brahma's error and Sahampati's plea
In the Pali canon Brahma is a class of deities, not a creator: Baka Brahma is shown his delusion, and Brahma Sahampati begs the Buddha to teach.
Bhrigu tests the three gods
Sages on the Saraswati bank ask Bhrigu to find which god is greatest.
Bhrigu tests the three gods
Sages send Bhrigu to find out which god is greatest. Brahma swallows his anger, Shiva raises his trident until his consort calms him, and Vishnu apologises after being kicked; the sages choose Vishnu. Temple and popular tellings add Lakshmi's departure, the Tirumala descent and curses on Brahma and Shiva.
Bhrigu's kick and the coming of Srinivasa
The sage Bhrigu tests the three gods and kicks the reclining Vishnu; in the Bhagavata Vishnu's humility settles the matter, while the Tirumala tradition adds Lakshmi's departure to Kolhapur and Vishnu's descent as Srinivasa, who marries Padmavati on borrowed money.
Brahma born from Shiva's right side
Shiva alone exists before the world.
Brahma is born in the golden egg
A golden egg forms in the waters and glows like the sun.
Brahma's fifth head and the skull that would not fall
Bhairava, born from Shiva's brow, cuts off Brahma's fifth head; the skull sticks to his hand and the sin of brahmin-killing follows him; he wanders as a beggar, kills Vishnu's gatekeeper, is fed blood from Vishnu's forehead, and is freed when the skull falls at Kashi.
Brahma, Sandhya and the curse on Kama
Brahma's mind-born daughter Sandhya is so beautiful that Kama tests his new arrows on the gathering.
Daksha's sacrifice and the death of Sati
At a gathering Shiva stays seated when Daksha enters; Daksha reads it as contempt.
Five ways the Shaivas see him
The early Pashupatas, the first sectarian Shaivas, appear in the first centuries CE.
Four Vishnu stories behind Diwali
Rama's return in the north, Narakasura's death in the south and west, Lakshmi's wedding night in Puranic lore, and Bali's return in the Deccan and Gujarat.
Ganga comes down through Shiva's hair
King Sagara's sixty thousand sons, hunting his stolen sacrificial horse, accuse the sage Kapila and are burnt to ash by his glance.
Hanuman as Shiva's own avatar
Shaiva texts and popular tellings say that when Vishnu chose to be born as Rama, Shiva chose to be born as Hanuman — his eleventh Rudra — to serve him; Vaishnava schools call Hanuman the son and incarnation of Vayu.
Harihara: Vishnu and Shiva in one body
Vishnu and Shiva are shown as one figure divided down the middle.
How Shiva became half woman
Brahma makes a world of male beings that cannot multiply.
How Shri became Vishnu's inseparable consort
The Vedic Shri of prosperity rises from the churned ocean as Lakshmi, surveys every being and chooses Vishnu as her husband.
How Vishnu and Shiva became one body
Vishnu and Shiva merge into a single form — to end a dispute among devotees, to kill Guhasura whom neither could kill alone, or at Parvati's prayer to reconcile two serpent kings. Shiva is the right half, Vishnu the left, in every telling.
How scholars explain Shiva's rise
Scholars treat the Shiva of today as a figure merged from several older gods rather than one continuous cult.
Kama burnt by the third eye
Taraka can die only to a son of Shiva, and Shiva sits in grief and meditation after Sati.
Kamban's Rama stands above the three
In the Tamil Ramavataram Rama is divine from the start, yet the poem sets him above Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva rather than inside the triad as an avatar.
Kanakadasa's window at Udupi
Turned away from the Udupi temple, the shepherd-saint Kanakadasa sang outside until the image turned to face him through a gap in the wall.
Krishna alone: Sankardev's Assam
Sankardev's Ekasarana keeps only Krishna as an object of worship and drops Shiva and Brahma from the cult, sung through the Kirtan Ghosha.
Krishna's penance for a son
Jambavati asks Krishna for a son like Pradyumna; Krishna spends six months in austerities under the sage Upamanyu, and Shiva appears as Ardhanarishvara to grant the boy Samba, named after that form.
Madhu and Kaitabha
Two demons born from Vishnu's ear-wax threaten Brahma and steal the Vedas; who saves the day depends on the sect — Vishnu as Hayagriva in the epic line, or the Goddess who must first leave Vishnu's body in the Devi Mahatmya.
Mahabali comes home for Onam
Kerala remembers Bali as the just king pushed under the earth by Vishnu's dwarf, who returns each year at harvest to see his people.
Mahishasura's boon: no man shall kill him
The buffalo demon Mahishasura wins a boon that no man can kill him.
Markandeya and the noose of death
The childless sage Mrikandu is offered by Shiva a choice: a good son who dies at sixteen or a fool who lives long.
Mohini and the demon who burned himself
A demon wins from Shiva the power to destroy whoever he touches on the head and turns on the giver; Vishnu, as Mohini or as a young brahmachari, tricks him into testing the boon on himself.
Nanda goes to Kailash as a bride
Every twelve years Garhwal and Kumaon walk the mountain goddess Nanda three weeks from her mother's home to Shiva's Kailash as a young bride.
One being, three functions: the Trimurti idea
The Maitri Upanishad names Brahma, Rudra and Vishnu together as portions of one being, matched to the three gunas.
Parvati wins Shiva
Sati is reborn as the daughter of Himavat and Mena and grows up loving Shiva.
Prahlada and the man-lion
The asura boy Prahlada survives his father's every attempt to kill him; Vishnu bursts from a pillar as Narasimha and kills Hiranyakashipu in a way that slips past every clause of his boon.
Purusha and Narayana on the waters
The cosmic person of the Purusha Sukta and the Narayana who rests on the waters are fused into Vishnu's cosmic identity, pictured as Anantashayana.
Rama the monk and Krishna the cousin
Jain tellings keep Rama and Krishna as great men in a fixed roster of sixty-three: Lakshmana kills Ravana, Rama becomes a monk, and Krishna is Neminatha's cousin.
Rama's linga at Rameswaram
Rama wishes to worship Shiva on the island before crossing to Lanka, or after killing Ravana, to be cleansed of killing a brahmin.
Ravana lifts Kailash
Flying home in the Pushpaka after beating Kubera, Ravana is halted by Kailash.
Ravana's boon at Gokarna
Ravana and his brothers Kumbhakarna and Vibhishana perform austerities at Gokarna for ten thousand years.
Rudra becomes the one Lord
A late Upanishad of the Black Yajurveda, in six chapters, takes up Rudra.
Rudra, the howling archer of the Rigveda
The Rigveda addresses Rudra in three whole hymns and mentions him about seventy-five times.
Saraswati: daughter, consort, or both
Brahma's body splits into a male and a female half.
Shiva drinks the poison
Gods and demons churn the ocean of milk for the nectar.
Shiva takes up the plough
Rameswar Bhattacharya's 18th-century Bengali poem makes Shiva an illiterate, penniless villager who has to farm to feed his family.
Shiva the begging farmer of the Gajan
At Bengal's Chaitra Gajan devotees become Shiva and his ganas, act out his marriage and beg from house to house; the god is a poor householder scolded by his wife.
Shiva's sixty-four games in Madurai
The Tamil Thiruvilaiyadal Puranam turns Shiva into Madurai's own god, who walks into the city in disguise across the reigns of fifty-two Pandya kings.
The Rama found in an anthill
A tribal woman finds Rama's images in an anthill on the Godavari; a tax official builds the temple with state money and is jailed for it.
The Sharanas' Shiva of the meeting rivers
Basavanna and the Kannada vachana poets addressed Shiva as their own personal lord, rejecting temple, caste and ritual, with the body itself as the shrine.
The birth of Ayyappa
Brahma's boon to Mahishi — that only a child of Vishnu and Shiva can kill her — forces Vishnu to take the Mohini form; Shiva's desire for Mohini yields a son, found and raised by the king of Pandalam, who kills Mahishi and takes his seat at Sabarimala.
The birth of Ganesha
Parvati wants a guard of her own and shapes a boy from the paste on her body.
The birth of Kartikeya
Taraka can be killed only by a son of Shiva.
The boon that had a loophole: Hiranyakashipu
Hiranyakashipu performs long austerities to win power over the gods.
The burning of the three cities
The gods build Shiva a cosmic chariot with Brahma as charioteer and Vishnu as the arrow to destroy the three cities of Taraka's sons; the Shaiva prelude has Vishnu send a heretical teacher to strip the cities of merit, while the Bhagavata has Vishnu as a cow and Brahma as a calf drink the demons' reviving well dry.
The churning of the ocean of milk
Gods and demons churn the milk ocean with Mount Mandara on the tortoise's back; poison, treasures, Lakshmi and the nectar emerge, and Vishnu as Mohini keeps the nectar for the gods.
The dance at Tillai and the contest with Kali
Two sages, the serpent Patanjali and the tiger-footed Vyaghrapada, ask to see Shiva's dance.
The demon who could burn with a touch
A demon worships Shiva with terrible austerities, offering pieces of his own body.
The fifth head and the skull that would not fall
Brahma grows a fifth head, and with it pride or a false word.
The fish that warned the Bhils
A fish warns a brother and sister of a flood; afterwards Bhagwan, or in one telling Rama, sends them to repeople the world.
The five faces and the five acts
Shiva's eternal form is pictured with five faces turned to the quarters and upward.
The gatekeepers who chose three hostile births
Vaikuntha's doorkeepers bar the Kumaras, are cursed to be born away from Vishnu, and choose three lives as his enemies over seven as his devotees.
The god who waited on a brick
Krishna came to Pundalik's door, was told to wait on a brick while the son served his parents, and stayed; the Varkari saints sang to him as Vitthal.
The golden womb and Prajapati
Before the gods there are only the primordial waters.
The horned figure on the Indus seal
Ernest Mackay finds a steatite seal at Mohenjo-daro in 1928–29, dated about 2350–2000 BCE.
The hunter and Arjuna
In exile Arjuna does austerities in the Himalaya to win weapons for the coming war.
The ketaki lie and the curse of no worship
Brahma and Vishnu argue over which of them is greater.
The lotus from Vishnu's navel
During the dissolution Vishnu lies on the serpent Ananta in the cosmic waters.
The lotus from Vishnu's navel
Vishnu enters the cosmic egg on the causal ocean and a lotus grows from his navel bearing Brahma, who will create the worlds.
The mind-born sons, Narada and Daksha
Brahma wishes for children and brings them out of his own mind.
The pillar of light
Brahma and Vishnu quarrel over who is greater; Shiva appears as a column of fire without end; Brahma flies up as a gander and Vishnu digs down as a boar; Vishnu admits failure, Brahma lies with the ketaki as witness and is cursed. Tamil tradition roots the pillar at Tiruvannamalai.
The race around the world
Shiva and Parvati must choose between their two sons.
The release of the elephant king
An elephant seized by a crocodile lifts a lotus and calls on Vishnu, who arrives on Garuda and frees both animal and captor with the discus.
The sacrifice in dwarf form wins the earth
In the Shatapatha Brahmana Vishnu, as the sacrifice itself, takes dwarf form and strides the earth back from the asuras for the gods.
The silent teacher under the banyan
Shiva sits under a banyan tree facing south, one foot on the dwarf of ignorance.
The three cities burnt with one arrow
Taraka's three sons win from Brahma three flying cities of iron, silver and gold, built by Maya.
The three strides of the Vedic Vishnu
In the Rigveda Vishnu is a minor companion of Indra whose one great act is to pace out the cosmos in three steps.
The twelve pillars of light
Brahma and Vishnu quarrel over who is supreme.
Three faces of one Widhi
Balinese Hinduism reveres Brahma, Wisnu and Siwa as manifestations of the one ineffable Sang Hyang Widhi Wasa, a formulation sharpened for state recognition.
Three gods in one guru
Maharashtra folds Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva into the single three-headed guru Dattatreya, whose cult grows from the Guru Charitra and is claimed by Nath and Mahanubhava lines.
Two origins of the discus
The Sudarshana is either Shiva's gift at Kashi after Vishnu offers his own eye in place of a missing lotus, or Vishvakarma's work from the radiance shaved off the sun.
Vaikuntha, the abode without care
Vishnu's heavenly abode, its gatekeepers and general, and the two answers to where it lies.
Vamana and King Bali
The generous asura king Bali grants a dwarf brahmin three paces of land; two strides cover heaven and earth, Bali offers his own head for the third and is sent to rule Sutala with Vishnu as his doorkeeper.
Vishnu cannot wake until the Goddess withdraws
In the Devi Mahatmya Vishnu lies in yogic sleep on the waters while Madhu and Kaitabha threaten Brahma; only when Brahma praises Mahamaya and she leaves Vishnu's body can he rise and fight.
Vishnu created from Shiva's left side
The Shiva Purana has Shiva bring Vishnu forth from the left of his body as the embodiment of sattva and assign him the work of preservation.
Vishnu's thousand lotuses and his eye
Vishnu pledges a thousand lotuses to Shiva at Kashi; finding one missing, he offers his own lotus-eye; Shiva restores the eye and gives him the Sudarshana discus. The day is kept as Vaikuntha Chaturdashi; a related Kashi charter has Vishnu's penance create Manikarnika.
Vishnumoorthi comes down in the Theyyam
In north Malabar the man-lion's killing of Hiranyakashipu is not read but danced, by a performer who is believed to become the god.
Vrinda's curse and the wedding of Tulsi
Vrinda, deceived by Vishnu in her husband Jalandhara's form, curses him and is reborn as the tulsi plant, whom Vishnu marries every year.
Who made whom: the Bhagavata's creation frame
Brahma, himself born from Vishnu's navel lotus, grows angry when his mind-born sons refuse to procreate; from between his brows a crying child is born and named Rudra, given eleven places, names and consorts, and told to stop creating and practise austerity.
Who made whom: the Devi Bhagavata's frame
The Goddess creates the three gods to do the work of creation, preservation and destruction, carries them to her island Manidvipa, turns them into women for a hundred years, and returns them with their consorts to their tasks.
Who made whom: the Shiva Purana's creation frame
Shiva creates Vishnu from the left of his body and Brahma from the right (through the lotus from Vishnu's navel), assigns creation, preservation and destruction, and stands beyond all three.
Why Brahma has four heads
Brahma's four heads face the four directions and stand for the four Vedas.
Why the night of Shiva is kept
A hunter named Gurudruha, or Lubdhaka, is caught in the forest by night and climbs a bilva tree to wait for game.