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Re: The third eye of Lord Shiva
Re: The third eye of Lord Shiva
In article <3eeu12$p8d@ucunix.san.uc.edu> Lokeswara Rao
lokes@selway.umt.edu wrote:
: There are stories of Lord Shiva burning a damsel (forgot the name) to
: ashes with the third eye. This I take to mean, with the spiritual
: knowledge we gain, anything desireable in material world fades and
: loses its desirability.
It wasn't a damsel, but Kamadeva, who had been sent by the gods to divert
Shiva from asceticism and arouse his passion for Parvati. The marriage of
Shiva and Parvati was necessary in order to give birth to Skanda, who
was to become the leader of the divine army and the rescuer of the gods
from the overbearing demons. Kama was eventually restored from
ashes by intercession of his wife Rati, but got from the incident his
appellation of "Ananga" = "the limbless".
The story is told in the _Ramayana_, _Balakanda_, 23 and in several
_Puranas_.
As for the meaning, the gods finally had their way and Shiva gave up
asceticism and married Parvati, engaging in love-making on mount Kailasa
for many thousand years! What the myth tries to express is the need to
strike a balance of some sort between the lofty ideal of asceticism or
"nivrtti", abstinence from action to pursue spiritual knowledge, and the
requirements of "pravrtti" or engagement in action to keep the mundane wheel
revolving according to the prescriptions of dharma. This ambivalence is
currently at play in all major Shiva myths, but the implications are far
more complex than is possible for me to discuss in a short article
like this; if you want to get a glimpse of the significance of Shiva's
dual nature you can peruse _Shiva. The erotic ascetic_ by W. Doniger
O'Flaherty.
Paolo Magnone
