Pashupati

Pashupati ( Sanskrit पशुपति paśupati m. "Lord of the cattle") is a form of the Hindu god Shiva , which was worshiped in Vedic times.

Essence

In the Veda Pashupati is a name of Rudra and is later, like Rudra, also understood as a form of Shiva . In the Atharvaveda he is invoked as the protector of cows, horses, humans, goats and sheep and in the Atharvashiras Upanishad he is glorified as the principle of all things.

Pashupati is the national god of Nepal . He is venerated in Pashupatinath , a temple complex in Deopata near Kathmandu in Nepal, where his cult has been attested since the 8th century. During the Shivaratri festival, the Nepalese king appears in the temple with his entourage and worships the Pashupati.

The Shaivistic ascetic sect of the Pashupatas is named after the god . This interprets the word pashu "cattle" also as "soul", which is why the divine name as "lord of life" and the like. is reinterpreted, as it were, as Pashupati frees the soul from its fetters, like the cattle tied to the stake.

Origins

Mohenjo-Daro seal 420 , 3rd millennium BC.

A seal of the Indus culture from the archaeological site Mohenjo-Daro shows a seated figure surrounded by animals, which the excavator John Marshall interpreted as Proto-Shiva, with the animals reminding of Pashupati, the "lord of the animals". This interpretation is no longer upheld today, partly because Pashupati is the protector of domestic animals, while wild animals - buffalo, elephant, rhinoceros, tiger and antelope - are depicted on the seal.

literature

• Hans Wilhelm Haussig (Ed.) Gods and Myths of the Indian Subcontinent (= Dictionary of Mythology . Department 1: The ancient civilized peoples. Volume 5). Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart 1984, ISBN 3-12-909850-X , p. 143 f.
• Pasupati . In: John Dowson : A classical dictionary of Hindu mythology and religion, geography, history, and literature. Trübner & co., London 1879, p. 233 ( Textarchiv - Internet Archive ).

Individual evidence

1. ↑ paśupati . In: Monier Monier-Williams : Sanskrit-English Dictionary . Clarendon Press, Oxford 1899, p. 611, col. 3 .
2. ↑ Hans Wilhelm Haussig (Ed.): Gods and Myths of the Indian Subcontinent (= Dictionary of Mythology . Department 1: The ancient civilized peoples. Volume 5). Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart 1984, ISBN 3-12-909850-X .
3. ↑ Axel Michaels: The Hinduism . CH Beck, Munich 1998, ISBN 3-406-44103-3 , p. 344.
4. ↑ Jan Gonda: The Younger Hinduism . Kohlhammer, Stuttgart 1963, p. 215.
5. ↑ Sir John Marshall: Mohenjodaro and the Indus Civilization. Volume I, London 1931, pp. 52-56.
6. ↑ Doris Srinivasan: unhinging Siva from the Indus Civilization. In: Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland , Volume 1, 1984, p. 82.