Kandariya Mahadeva Temple
The Kandariya Mahadeva Temple is the largest and tallest structure in the temple district of Khajuraho , near the city of Khajuraho in the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh . The temple is dedicated to the god Shiva ; in the center of the cella ( garbhagriha ) is a lingam .
etymology
The current name of the temple is probably derived from the words kandara ("cave") and Mahadeva ("great god"), an epithet of Shiva. It is unlikely that this was the original name of the temple.
history
The temple, not dated by inscriptions or other documents, was built in the first half of the 11th century (probably from 1017 to 1029, according to another opinion from around 1025 to 1050). The most important forerunner is the Lakshmana Temple, built around 950, in the immediate vicinity, and the Vishvanatha Temple, completed around the year 1000 .
After the fall of the Chandella dynasty in the 12th century, the temples, like the rest of the formerly not insignificant city, were abandoned and left to the growth of the jungle. The temple buildings of Khajuraho survived - probably because of their remote location and the political and economic insignificance of the place - the period of Islamic expansion in northern India. In the 18th and 19th centuries, Khajuraho only had about 300 inhabitants. At the beginning of the 20th century, extensive excavation, security and restoration work was carried out under the - at that time still British - leadership of the Archaeological Survey of India .
architecture
The temple, built entirely from sandstone , is approx. 30.5 m high, also approx. 30.5 m long and approx. 20 m wide. It rises on a rectangular, approx. 3 m high walk-around platform ( jagati ) and is divided into four components that merge harmoniously into one another: portico ( mukhamandapa or ardhamandapa ), vestibule ( mandapa ), large vestibule ( mahamandapa ) and cella ( garbhagriha ) ; the sanctum of the temple is also surrounded by a pradakshinapatha . The three vestibules as well as the walk-around area of the cella are opened to the outside by balcony-like balustrades without blinds , in front of which there are often stone benches.
The different rooms have a slightly changing floor level and are covered by evenly rising pyramid-shaped roofs; the cella of the temple with the lingam has the highest floor level of all rooms and is raised by a shikhara tower with small accompanying turrets ( urushringas ). On the outside, this creates the image of a mountain or mountain stick towering over the surrounding landscape, an image that clearly refers to Mount Kailash , the residence of Shiva and his wife Parvati in the Himalayan mountains. But also inside the believers have to overcome some steps in order to reach the “highest”.
Inside and outside, every component of the temple is richly structured and covered with sculptures or abstract geometrical or vegetable ornaments; wall or stone vision is thus largely avoided.
Sculptures
In addition to the platform, the temple is decorated inside and outside with over a thousand figures, which are largely sculpted and are therefore only slightly connected to the rear relief ground. The prominently protruding components mostly show figures of gods ( Shiva , Vishnu, etc.), which are accompanied laterally in the slightly recessed parts by female figures of the same size - lightly dressed 'beautiful girls' ( surasundharis ) in different poses and always with their hair tied up. The somewhat broader, but most strongly downgraded, central registers of the three outer walls of the sanctum present erotic scenes of all kinds, for which the temples of Khajuraho are famous around the world, in several superimposed levels.
History of erotic sculptures
The ancient Indian religion is based to a not insignificant extent on love relationships; the mostly male main gods are always accompanied by female goddesses ( shaktis ), through whom their powers often become effective. An important ancient aniconical form of representation in this context is that of the Shiva- Lingam in the midst of the yoni . More specifically, the erotic representations can be traced back to Buddhist (cf. Karli , 4th century) and gupta-temporal (cf. Nachna , 5th century) depictions of so-called 'heavenly lovers' ( mithunas ) on portals, which in turn are highly likely had models made of wood, of which, however, nothing has survived. Despite their nudity, these early depictions of mithuna lack the clearly erotic-sexual component, which was only developed more strongly in the context of the developing tantrism, which was spread over large parts of northern India up to Konarak . One of the earliest (surviving) scenes of this type can be found on a relief pillar of the Kalika Mata Temple in Chittorgarh. Such sculptures were also associated with the assumed temple prostitution , about which, however, no reliable information is available.
Function of the erotic sculptures
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Erotic representations are an important part of Indian (temple) art and thus the subject of diverse considerations, interpretations and speculations. These range from images from the Kama Sutra , to disaster-warding (apotropaic) functions, to philosophical-esoteric attempts at interpretation.
- “In Hindu mythology, divine perfection is based on unity. The natural opposition between man and woman makes them strive for union and thus for the gods of equal perfection. In the sexual act, which is related to the creation of the world of the gods, man and woman merge into a unity ... Eroticism stands out from mere sexual act through its sensuality. The fantasy that determines the erotic act represents that 'more' that praises lust and gives love the cosmic dimension. Art transfigures nature; it gives it a mysticism that experiences sensual expression in ritual. The erotic scenes of Khajuraho illustrate the staging of the sexual act, they represent a ceremony that sacralizes the actions of the lovers ( mithuna ). "
- “Popular belief sees maithuna as a kind of magic to avert the evil eye and protect the temple from lightning strikes or as a means to test the spirituality of the believers who were not allowed to show any emotion in the face of such provocative scenes ... A better explanation provided perhaps the Indian scholar D. Desai, who considers the erotic scenes of Khajuraho to be a magical-shamanistic legacy, in which the representations promoted fertility and at the same time offered protection from evil and negative influences. "
Few commentators go into the fact that the clearly erotic-sexual representations appear exclusively on the outside walls of the temples; Such scenes cannot be seen inside the temple (i.e. in the world of the divine), although here, too, loving couples embracing each other ( mithunas ) or busty and half-naked 'beautiful girls' ( surasundharis ) are shown. Believers who want to worship the divine (i.e. the lingam in this case ) are thus not confronted with erotic-sexual issues at all when entering and inside the temple. It is also noticeable that there are no depictions of demons anywhere on the temple. The multitude and the dense arrangement of the life-affirming, beautiful, harmonious and also erotic representations simply leave no room for the development of negative and demonic forces.
meaning
The Kandariya Mahadeva Temple is considered the highlight of Chandella architecture, if not of (north) Indian temple architecture at all. The extremely rich, almost fully sculptural figure decoration is almost completely preserved and testifies to the technical and artistic mastery of the sculptors of the Indian High Middle Ages.
literature
- Krishna Deva: Temples of Khajuraho. (2 volumes) Archaeological Survey of India, New Delhi 1990, p. 146ff
- Henri Stierlin: Hindu India. Temples and sanctuaries from Khajuraho to Madurai. Taschen-Verlag, Cologne 1998, p. 129ff ISBN 3-8228-7298-9
- Marilia Albanese: Ancient India. From the origins to the 13th century. Karl Müller-Verlag, Cologne undated, p. 146ff ISBN 3-89893-009-2
- David Kinsley: Indian Goddesses. Female deities in Hinduism. Insel-Verlag, Frankfurt / M. 1990, ISBN 3-458-16118-X .
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ Henri Stierlin: Hindu India. Temples and sanctuaries from Khajuraho to Madurai. Taschen-Verlag, Cologne 1998, p. 146f ISBN 3-8228-7298-9
- ^ Marilia Albanese: Ancient India. From the origins to the 13th century. Karl Müller-Verlag, Cologne undated, p. 156ff ISBN 3-89893-009-2
Coordinates: 24 ° 51 '10.7 " N , 79 ° 55' 10.4" E