Stories 43
Tradition: Shaiva · clear
Andhaka, the blind demon who wanted his mother
Parvati in play covers Shiva's eyes and the worlds go dark.
Brahma born from Shiva's right side
Shiva alone exists before the world.
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.
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.
How Shiva became half woman
Brahma makes a world of male beings that cannot multiply.
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.
Kama burnt by the third eye
Taraka can die only to a son of Shiva, and Shiva sits in grief and meditation after Sati.
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.
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.
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.
Rudra becomes the one Lord
A late Upanishad of the Black Yajurveda, in six chapters, takes up Rudra.
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 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 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 fifth head and the skull that would not fall
Brahma grows a fifth head, and with it pride or a false word.
The five faces and the five acts
Shiva's eternal form is pictured with five faces turned to the quarters and upward.
The ketaki lie and the curse of no worship
Brahma and Vishnu argue over which of them is greater.
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 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 twelve pillars of light
Brahma and Vishnu quarrel over who is supreme.
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.
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.
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 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.