[Editor’s Note: This essay is from the same title, “Goddesses in Hinduism: “All the Mothers are One”‘ by Mary Ann Beavis with Scott Daniel Dunbar included in Goddesses in Myth, History and Culture (Mago Books, 2018).]
Goddesses with Male Partners: The Tridevi
As in other mythologies, Hindu Goddesses are often paired with male deities who are their husbands, and the male and female are understood as having complementary qualities. The three Goddesses who correspond to the Trimurti (trinity of principal male deities) of Brahma (the Creator) Vishnu (the Sustainer), Shiva (the Destroyer) are Lakshmi (Vishnu), Parvati (Shiva) and Sarasvati (Brahma), the Tridevi (Goddess trinity). In Hindu theology, these “trinities” may be interpreted as three aspects of the One, or as separate deities. In Hindu devotional theism, spiritual commitment to these great deities is seen as a path to salvation in the form of liberation (moksha) from the samsaric cycle of life, death and rebirth.
Lakshmi is also known as Sri, meaning “well-being, prosperity, luck and splendor,” with associations of “a complete lifetime, offspring, the life sap, honor, glory, and dignity.”[1] While in some texts she is associated with other gods (Soma, Dharma, Indra, Kubera),[2] in mainstream Hindu mythology she is the wife of Vishnu, in the context of a myth where the gods and demons churn the ocean like milk in order to obtain the nectar of immortality. Among the valuable essences churned up by the creative activity of the gods is Lakshmi, “the sap of existence that underlies or pervades all of plant and animal life.”[3] Vishnu is the overseer of this process, and when the Goddess emerges, she is immediately attracted to him, as he is to her. Since Vishnu is a kingly figure, Lakshmi bestows on him and his human agents—righteous kings—“her royal power, prosperity and fertility.”[4] As Vishnu’s consort, she represents the perfect wife, who is loyal and supportive to her husband, symbolizing the “orderliness of human society and human relations.”[5] Theologically, the divine consorts are seen as interdependent, and usually shown as a smiling, happy couple, sometimes touching each other intimately, sometimes, although rarely, even as one androgynous entity, with Vishnu on the right and Lakshmi on the left.[6] Kinsley explains:
The interdependence of the two is the subject of a long passage in the Vis͎n͎u-pūran͎a. There Vis͎n͎u is said to be speech and Laks͎mī meaning; he is understanding, she is intellect; he is the creator, she is the creation; she is the earth, he the support of the earth; she is a creeping vine, he is the tree to which she clings; he is one with all males, and she is one with all females; he is love, and she is pleasure (1.8.15 ff.).[7]
However, in the Pancaratra and Sri Vaisnava schools of Hindu thought and devotion, Lakshmi’s active role in creation eclipses that of her passive husband so that she takes on the role of the “supreme divine principle, the underlying reality upon which all rests, that which pervades all creation with vitality, will, and consciousness”,[8] to the extent that she takes over the functions of Creator, Sustainer, and Destroyer usually associated with Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva.[9]
When shown on her own, Lakshmi is often shown with the symbols of the lotus (fertility, life, purity, spiritual power) and the elephant (fertilizing rains, royal authority) (see Figure 2).[10] She is associated with Diwali (or Dipavali), the Festival of Light (Autumn), a five-day festival in which the Lakshmi Puja (worship of Lakshmi) is performed; this is extremely important, because it is the Goddess who provides the divine energy (Shakti) for the worship of the deities, which brings about happiness, wealth, prosperity and stability.[11]
Parvati is the wife of the high god Shiva. Her name means “she who dwells in the mountains,” and her myth describes her as a reincarnation of Shiva’s first wife, the Goddess Sati, who kills herself because her father snubs her husband, and whose body is dispersed all over the world, thus becoming the earth itself.[12] Parvati is born so that she can give birth to a child of Shiva—for only Shiva’s child can vanquish the otherwise invincible demon Taraka.[13] The Goddess originally sets out to win Shiva (the ultimate monastic) by inflaming his lust, but when that doesn’t work, she attracts his attention by devoting herself to ascetic austerities, outdoing all the great sages in her efforts.[14] After they are married, the intensity of their sexual relations shakes the universe, so much so that the gods are distressed, and prevent the god from impregnating the Goddess by causing him to spill his semen, which eventually ends up in the Ganges (herself a Goddess).[15] The river gives birth to the god Karttikeya, who finds his way back to his parents; he is suckled by Parvati, and eventually he slays the demon.[16] Their second child, Ganesha, is created by from the sweat and dirt of Parvati’s body to guard her from unwanted visitors. When the young god tries to prevent Shiva from approaching the Goddess, the god decapitates him in a rage. The Goddess brings Ganesha back to life and replaces his head with that of an elephant.[17]
One interpretation of the relationship between the divine couple is that it symbolizes the tension between the ascetic/monastic ideal (Shiva) and the householder ideal (Parvati).[18] Parvati civilizes and domesticates the extreme, anti-social Shiva, who is characterized by both ascetical and sexual excesses (see Figure 3). Parvati is the one who follows her husband in his wild cosmic dance, preserving and reconstructing the world in the wake of Shiva’s destructiveness. As Shakti (female principle of divine energy), Parvati is necessary for involving the divine in creation. The interdependence of the god and the Goddess is smbolized by the images of the yoni-lingam (female and male sex organs) and the androgynous Shakti-Shiva (Ardhanarishvara) (see Figures 4, 5).[19]
Sarasvati, the consort of Brahma, is the only Goddess of the Tridevi who figures in Vedic mythology. In later Hinduism, she is conflated with the Vedic Goddess of speech, Vac or Vagdevi.[20] In one version of her myth, she is born from the god Brahma, the creator of the world. In order to perform his work of creation, Brahma enters a meditative state, causing his body to divide into a male half and a female half (signifying that the divine is bisexual). Brahma is so enamoured with his female self, Sarasvati, that he mates with her, and their child, Manu, creates the world.[21] However, other myths associate her origin with Krishna or Vishnu.[22]
In addition to her Vedic origins as a river Goddess, Sarasvati is associated with many aspects of culture: speech, thought, intellect, science, learning, knowledge, the arts, music, dancing.[23] She also has certain titles that suggest a primordial, absolute nature: mother of the world, she whose form is power (Shakti), she who contains all forms within her.[24] She is usually depicted with four hands, holding a book (learning), a lute (the arts, especially music), a rosary and a water pot (spiritual sciences, religious rites).[25] She is often shown riding a swan (symbolizing transcendence) and accompanied by a peacock (symbolizing unpredictable behaviour, which is to be avoided). Like Lakshmi, she sometimes sits on a lotus, symbolizing perfection, even though it is rooted in mud (Figure 6). Her sexuality is not emphasized in Hindu mythology, and her motherhood is mostly metaphorical, in that she inspires creativity and wisdom.[26] In contrast to her husband Brahma, whose temples are rare and who is not a popular object of devotion, many temples are devoted to Sarasvati, and several festivals are devoted to her worship.[27]
(To be continued)
[1] Carl Olson, “Sri Lakshmi and Radha: The Obsequious Wife and the Lustful Lover,” in Carl Olson, ed., The Book of the Goddess, Past and Present (New York: Crossroad, 1986), 126. Olson asserts that Sri Lakshmi is a composite of two Goddesses who were merged in the time of the early Upanishads (ibid.).
[2] Kinsley, Hindu Goddesses, 23-26. See also Constantina Rhodes, “Lakshmi: Hindu Goddess of Abundance,” Goddesses in World Culture, Volume 1: Asia and Africa, ed. Patricia Monaghan (Santa Barbara: Praeger, 2011), 1-16.
[3] Kinsely, Hindu Goddesses, 27.
[4] Ibid., 28.
[5] Ibid., 28.
[6] Ibid., 29.
[7] Ibid., 20.
[8] Ibid., 30.
[9] Ibid., 30.
[10] Ibid., 21-22.
[11] Ibid., 33-34.
[12] Ibid., 37-41.
[13] Ibid., 42.
[14] Ibid., 42-43.
[15] Ibid., 42-43.
[16] Ibid., 43.
[17] Ibid., 44.
[18] Ibid., 46-49.
[19] Ibid., 50-51. See also Philip Lagace, “Ardhanārīśvara in Tiruchengode, Tamil Nadu: A Case Study,” M.A. Thesis, Department of Religion and Culture, University of Saskatchewan, 2016.
[20] Kinsley, Hindu Goddesses, 55-57.
[21] Ibid., 57.
[22] Ibid., 58.
[23] Ibid., 60-61.
[24] Ibid., 61.
[25] Ibid., 60-62.
[26] Ibid., 63.
[27] Ibid., 63-64.
(Meet Mago Contributor) Mary Ann Beavis, Ph.D.