30 November, Jaipur.
Before leaving for India, several seasoned travelers in Asia gave me advice. Perhaps the strongest words addressed the need not to do too much. Today I took that advice and did very little. There was a morning visit to one of many forts/palaces in the area, this particular one the Amber Fort, which housed royalty back in the days when Mughals were gaining control over the Indian Rajputs. This fort was built in the late 1500s and early 1600s. Its major feature, to my interests, is a fascinating Kali temple, nestled neatly along the lower side of a second courtyard gateway. Kali is one of the forms of Durga, the mother and destroyer of evil. Kali is often pictured as bloodthirsty in an image where she holds a sword in one hand and a decapitated head in another, fighting evil as fiercely as imaginable. The temple is an open rectangle with tall white marble floor and walls, ornately carved with geometric design. Only three images of Kali are there, the main one at the front where the priest and devotees gather.
Lonely Planet says that a goat was sacrificed in the Kali temple daily, from the 16th century until 1980. I suppose that would have been interesting to watch, but I’m glad that I missed it. Instead, I saw more puja worship and priestly blessings. Everything was very similar to the earlier descriptions (see below), except for a couple of additions. First, serious Hindus purchase a small coconut, break it with a supplied strong tool, and bring it to the altar along with the other bits of sugar and flowers. The priest takes the juice, and keeps one half, giving the other back. Then, after prayers, priestly blessing and the marking on the forehead, and then, he pours a bit of the juice into the cupped hands of worshippers, who sip a bit of it. Kali, I am told, is associated with coconuts, which are a sign of blessing. The other “addition” was the spontaneous song, with a burning candle held high, which was apparently a hymn to Kali.
Later, I visited the royal cenotaphs for the palace, where monuments mark the ashes of Rajput leaders. High in the ceilings of the cupola-style “porches” were carved scenes from the Ramayana stories of Hinduism. Even in death, it seems, Hindus are remembered in light of their religious identities.
There is much about india that is difficult for Westerners. Paradoxes abound. Trash is everywhere, but it provides food for wandering cows, pigs, dogs, and other critters. God is whatever image or idea one can imagine, which even means god can be poverty. Homelessness is widespread. Temples and shrines are on every block, while public latrines are around the corners. Smells of incense mix with dust and soiled clothing. Prayers are offered, yet a kind of fateful acceptance of things persists. I wonder if basic philosophical underpinnings in Hindu thought – regarding caste and karma, rebirth and moksha (liberation) – work to placate aggressive attempts to improve society, alleviate poverty, stop evil. I wonder how much acceptance plays a role.
Diana Eck, Harvard specialist in North Indian Hinduism, talks in her book, Darsan, about this visual presence of the good and the bad, and I find her commentary helpful. “Much that is removed from public view in the modern West and taken into the privacy of rest homes, asylums, and institutions is open and visible in the life of an Indian city or village. The elderly, the affirm, the dead awaiting cremation – these sights, while they may have been expunged from the childhood palace of the Buddha, are not isolated from the public eye in India. Rather, they are present daily in the visible world in which Hindus, and those who visit India, move in the course of ordinary activities. In India, one sees everything. . . . Whatever Hindus affirm of the meaning of life, death, and suffering, they affirm with their eyes wide open” (11).
Perhaps we in the West hide, or deny, too much, neatly segmenting entire populations away from the proper public view. Perhaps Indians are too resigned to the roles of life, the karmic rule of life and death. Surely we all need to see God in all of life, not just Sundays or shrines.
1 December, Jaipur, 5:30 a.m. I awoke to sounds of the Muslim call to prayer, here in this town of Hindus and Muslims. I’ve been hearing more Hindu chants in the morning and evening, forming a cacophony of invocation across the faiths. The sounds of cathedral bells, marking the day by reminders of God, could be heard in the West in times past. I wonder…..
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