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the first book of

The God of War – 1
The Chinnamasta Devi

Nothing can stand between a woman and her way – this all men, who are
experienced, do know.  An enraged woman is more fierce than an angry
tigress; if diversion is not possible, it is wisest to move away - be
elsewhere, if submission is too expensive.

The Great Goddess, the Mahadevi, is the most womanly of women. Her rages,
when Her way gets thwarted by Her husband, the Good Lord, the Mahadeva,
are the most terrible.

“Run, Shiva, run!” Had He done so, a lot of trouble could have been
avoided. But our dear Lord Shiva, He has no guile, nor is He a coward. He
is simple and straightforward. He simply repeated to his wife, Sati,
“You must not go to your father’s house”.

Must not, indeed!  How dare He! What did He think he was?  Her master?
Was She His slave, to have to obey His wish? Did He think that She would
be restricted anyhow?  She was His equal, His partner, and this He had
better know, in no uncertain terms.

And yet, She knew, She was bound to Him. She could not just leave Him, and
do as She wished, as if the marriage bond meant nothing much. He had to
agree to Her leaving Him to go to Her father’s house.

But She could go into terrible rages, and that She did.  Our dear lord,
Shiva, stood His ground. He was not finding any chance to explain.

In Her rage, and in efforts to frighten Shiva into submission, the
Mahadevi took on the most horrible postures – far beyond the scope of
any mortal woman.  Finally She cut off Her own head, held it in one of Her
hands, and directed the blood flowing out of Her neck into the mouth of
Her severed head.

This form of the Mahadevi, Her most violent and terrible form, is known
and worshipped to this day as the Chinnamasta Devi.

As we know, upon seeing this form of the Goddess, Shiva relented and gave
Sati the permission She wanted. The consequences for that, He knew in
advance, for Shiva is all-knowing, cutting through the barriers of Time.

Yes, the consequences would be terrible, as Shiva knew full well.  Why did
he then stop remaining unmoved? Was it because in the Chinnamasta, with
His Divine Vision He could see, resulting inevitably from that terrible
form, the creation of his wonderful son, the Kumara?  He, the most
brilliant, the bravest, the invincible, the kindest, the most beautiful
and the most charming of Gods – the Shuvramaniyam? How could He stop the
birth of such a God!

The God of War – 2
The Marriage of Shiva

Other Gods may love finery and pleasure, but not Shiva, the Good.  Lonely
he existed, in the most remote haunts, meditating most deeply into the
core of all things, to find sec rets unknown. In such search, there is no
scope for any show-off. There is no competition! Practically all are
incurious, self-satisfied, absorbed in their own immediate matters. “Let
him be – he is mad, or in the grip of drugs.”

Only those blessed by Shiva may understand -  little though it be -  about
the ways of the Great God, the Mahadev.

To be single, alone, to roam for ever and ever the vast expanses of time
and space, to probe into the deepest with the most minute detail;  gaining
ever increasing knowledge, strength, wisdom, insight, compassion… and
not to be able to share!  Is that a blessing or a curse, the grandeur of
loneliness?  Not to find, nor even to know, in the fleeting moments of
conjugal intimacy, the reflection; and yet, what is not the reflection, of
one’s innermost feelings and longings! Of what purpose the grand
beauties and challenges of the universe, if all that remain confined to
just the self’s experience - never to be shared, never to be continued?
But where, where was the significant other? The One, who with Her  magic,
would transform His life, make new life?

Thus desire rose deeply in the Mahadev.  It radiated from His being,
spread through the aether, making all that was sensitive and desirable
tremble with anticipation. All those who could feel, felt; no one felt
more deeply than Sati, the daughter of the King Daksha, the king of the
Gods, and men.

Sati had adored Shiva from the moment She had heard of Him.  There could
be no one else for Her. Her strength of character, Her immense beauty and
charm, Her grace and kindness – had no other source; and grew from day
to day. The glow from all that matched the desire in the Mahadev – they
were destined to meet, and marry.

Daksha had many daughters; the youngest of them was Sati; she was the only
one yet unmarried. For Sati, he organised a grand sway-am-var, the
ceremony where the bride freely chooses for her husband whoever she
wanted. Gods and kings came to attend the sway-am-var,  to win the hand of
the matchless Sati.

It all happened so long ago, that it may appear unbelievable to us now
what the Gods looked like, in the time of Sati. We are informed by Sister
Nivedita, who faithfully followed the popular  Indian traditional
thinking, that They cast no shadow, for They were illumined from within,
and that They were unblinking! When she wrote her book “Cradle Stories
of Hinduism” there was no notion of computers, let alone androids or
cyborgs!  Strange, how the sounds from the distant past may provide some
understanding for the realisations in the near future! Cyclic, then, is
the nature of the universe, with time and space forever jostling; and at
time, splashing.

As our knowledge about the Gods are far from perfect, we can but humbly
try to understand Them as best our wits and knowledge can manage. Where do
They exist? In our stories, They come to Earth from time to time.
Otherwise, They inhabit a region we can know nothing about – it is
Heaven, which we may reach, with our spiritual form, after we die.  So
what are we? If we believe in the Gods and Heaven, then we are Gods in
mortal form, if we are good; if we are bad, we are devils destined for
Hell. If we do not believe in the Gods and Heaven, then there is no
question nor notion of any intrinsic good or evil; consideration exists
only for convenience and profit. Those unsure are clouded by the veil of
ignorance; when that veil is removed, one finds one’s true status, as
fundamentally divine, albeit flawed maybe!

At the time of Sati, and right up to the legends in the Mahabharata, the
Gods and Goddesses roamed the Earth, and mingled with humans, often
exhibiting Their superior powers. We worship Them to this day, even though
They do not exist in physical form as they once did. We additionally
associate Them with physical and abstract aspects of Nature: thus the God
of Absolute Truth, Agni, manifests as sacred fire; Surya, the most giving
of Gods, manifests as the Sun. Goddesses manifest as rivers; in
manifestations of knowledge and music as Sarasvati; in the show of grace
and wealth as Lakshmi. To the rational mind this seems romantic; to the
“romantics” this is the height of ecstatic experience! To be
perennially enveloped, most directly, and all the time, by the Gods and
Goddesses! Reliable and constant sources of joy and inspiration! Unfailing
guides for the avoidance of perils and evils!

To repeat, the Gods Who came to Earth hoping to wed Sati were, as Sister
Nivedita informs us, unblinking and illuminated from within. Did They
originate from some planet orbiting a distant star? Were They very
advanced beings who had changed their bodies with high technology to be
immortal? Were They responsible for the genetic manipulation of Earthly
hominids to make them in their own image? Did They create, over billions
of years, the non-human species? Who knows!

Shiva had not been invited by Daksha for the sway-am-vara. Daksha hated
Shiva, for Shiva had not bowed down and touched his feet, at the banquet
for the ceremony that made Daksha the Overlord. Yes, Daksha was the King
of the Gods, everyone else bowed down and touched his feet; but Shiva,
being the greatest God, did not do that, out of sheer kindness. Had He
touched Daksha’s feet, Daksha’s head would have rolled off instantly,
for that is what happens when the superior genuflects to the inferior!
What was equally galling was that Shiva, unlike Daksha and the other Gods,
had no use for pomp and finery.  Instead of fine silks and jewels, Shiva
wore ashes and a pink loin-cloth, and had only a staff and a bowl for
further material possessions. Like any beggar! Daksha’s pride made his
anger and hatred for Shiva grow more and more; while Shiva on the other
hand quite forgot the incident.

In a great circle in the splendid court of Daksha, the Kings and Gods sat
on magnificent thrones, awaiting the decision of Sati. What could she do?
The One she wanted to marry would not be there!

Sati entered the circle with trepidation. Any of the great personages
there, seeking her hand, would provide a luxurious life for her. Her
father would be happy and proud, with the new alliance. She would be
hailed a dutiful daughter. All would be smooth sailing!

But, no! There was nothing in the circle of suitors but despair for Sati.
She threw up her garland of flowers in the air, in desperation, saying out
loud, that if Shiva considered her worthy, may He receive her garland!

The very next moment Shiva was standing next to Sati, with her garland
around His neck.

The entire circle of guests rose up as one. They had never seen such a
wonderful sight as this – the beautiful, blushing,rapturous Sati with
her chosen, the greatest God, Shiva, Who overwhelmed them all with His
sheer presence.

Daksha was beside himself with rage and frustration.  The wishes of the
bride had to be honoured, so the marriage ceremony was performed. After it
was over, Daksha had nothing to offer his daughter but curses.
“Undutiful child!  You have married a beggar! He has nothing!  You have
spurned all my honoured guests!  Be off with you! Live as a beggar’s
wife!  Never come back here, and never look at my face again!”

All Sati knew was that she was married to Shiva, and nothing else
mattered. Daksha’s  harsh words thus made no impact upon her. Shiva took
her away to Mount Kailas. All her dreams and prayers were answered in
full.

The God of War – 3
The death of Sati
Narada – the sage and creator of disaster – visited the happy couple.
He informed Parvati that a great festival, or yagya, was taking place in
Her father’s palace. All were invited, except Shiva and Sati.

Sati became curious.  She wanted to know more and more about what was
happening. Narada fed Her all the information, while Shiva started looking
more and more uncomfortable.

Memories of Her happy unmarried life came back to Sati.  She overlooked
the slights and insults She had received by Her father and other
relatives. Drowsy as She had become in Her love for Shiva, She had
unconsciously forgiven and even forgotten.  They all should know how happy
She was!  So, She must go to her family, take part in all the fun and
festivities!  O what joy!

Narada left the couple, went on His way. Troublesome God, Narada, but
without Narada there would be no story of any kind. Things would be just
perfect, as the motion of the stars and planets, with time stopped so to
say, for there would be no noteworthy events for record.

We mortals pray that please, please, Narada, do not enter our lives!  Let
us live in peace!   But peace is for the ordinary, not the greatest God,
Shiva.  Shiva has to face the greatest of discords, because that is His
lot.

Had our dear sweet Shiva more tact, He could have managed His wife more
discreetly.  But Shiva could look into the future, and knew what would
happen if Sati went to meet her family. He gave a direct refusal. Shiva
has no guile, He is too simple and direct.

The consequences of that refusal, has been described in the very beginning
of this tale. Even the greatest God cannot stop a passionate woman from
having her way. As Sati left, Shiva looked after her longingly, but even
the power of His eyes could not draw Her back. Such is the power of
stubbornness! From which depths does that come, to overwhelm reason? The
answer to such a question eluded even the greatest God. How to replace
stubbornness with foresight for a smooth, calm future?

So Sati, accompanied by Nandi, Shiva’s bull, left Her husband, and made
Her way to Daksha’s palace. Indeed there was a great deal of hustle and
bustle, comings and goings of the lords and ladies, fineries and
decoration…  Sati had no doubt that She would be well received.

Sati was mistaken.  The servants and lackeys, seeing Her, scurried off.
All those who had known Her in the past, ignored Her, looked past Her, as
if She had never belonged there. Sati, Who was so good, so pure, so free
from petty matters, simply did not understand – She was just puzzled.
She sought out and met Her father, Dakshya.

Dakshya treated Sati mercilessly. How dare Sati come uninvited, dressed
like a beggar’s wife, unescorted by anyone! Had She not been told never
to return? Had She no shame? Was it not bad enough that She married a
useless vagrant? Made a mockery of all the great, fine Gods, any of Whom
would have been more than happy to marry her, with Her choice? What had
She come here for, anyway – to show off what exactly!

Sati made meek remonstrances. A father’s curses were like blessings, for
indeed the father could only love his children. Whatever She had done, had
to be forgiven.  She was, after all, so happy with Her choice!

Dakshya became dark with anger. If Sati had come crawling back, leaving
Her wretched husband for good, She would have been welcome. But, this
impudence!  To pretend She was actually happy to live with that vagabond,
that beggar, that fool, that pretender, that associate of all the
miserable and hopeless, Who had absolutely nothing worth showing off, was
insulting to the intelligence, completely unbearable.
Hearing such bad things being said about Her husband, Sati was full of
anguish.  She beseeched Her father to stop saying such things.  A faithful
wife simply could not tolerate such insults to her husband.
But Dakshya did not stop. He kept on abusing Shiva with all the venom in
his heart.
In extraordinary pain and sorrow, with Her final thought on Shiva; in
helplessness - for She could not in duty defy Her father, nor in disgrace
return to Her husband - Sati had to give up Her life. She could do nothing
else!
“Take back the life you gave me! My ears are burning with all the nasty
things you have said about my dear husband! I cannot live in this body any
more – it has been subjected to your abuse and can never recover.”
Saying that Sati fell dead at Her father’s feet.
Dakshya, in his pride, barely noticed that his daughter was dead.  He
ordered his servants to keep Her body away from sight, and then continued
with the festivities, as if nothing that mattered had happened.
Nandi was horrified. He called after Dakshya – “Be not so proud,
Dakshya. I see your head replaced with that of a goat.”
“And that suits you better.”

The God of War – 4
The Wrath of Shiva

With the death of Sati, came a strange coldness in the place where She
gave up Her life. With the ebullience of the revellers in Dakshya’s
palace, that coldness intensified, and spread all over the land. All
Nature shivered. Finally this coldness reached Shiva.  Shiva became
frozen, with cold sorrow. That He knew this would happen did not make his
pain any less. In that cold, stone-like state Shiva would have remained
for ever; but then He also heard the expressions of mirth and laughter
from the guests of Dakshya.

Shiva looked around, with His terrible third eye. He saw all Nature
similarly cold, frozen, lifeless and yet looking up to Him for direction.
Nandi, returning to Shiva, gave His account of the death of Sati.
The cold that frozen all, even the earth, intensified. Shiva knew about
the death of His beloved; indeed He knew what would happen long in
advance, which is why He wanted to stop Sati from visiting Her family. But
He had not known the exact circumstances of Her dying. The pure, sheer
heartlessness of these Gods! What indifference to all that was sweet and
charming, loving and playful! What arrogance they Had! What total lack of
feeling, with no thought of forgiveness, not a single trace of compassion!
 Far worse than the asuras, they had become. The asuras would never treat
one of their own so badly.
The coldness within Shiva intensified; it compressed His being, shrinking
and hardening it ; till Shiva heard even more loud mirth and laughter from
Dakshya’s  guests – then, as the most compressed strings when released
become immensely active, the coldness within Shiva turned into white heat.
As the greatest of volcanoes may burst out from under the permafrost of
Siberia, so did the extraordinary stillness of Shiva turn into the most
violent of action.

The God of War -  5
The killing of Dakshya
Shiva, from His matted locks, tore out a single hair and flung it on the
ground.
Immediately there formed, a giant of gargantuan proportions, incredibly
strong and fierce.
Shiva’s third eye blazed, and He looked all around, shaking His matted
locks.
Immediately all that was natural – the grass, the trees, the waters and
even the rocks – turned into a vast army of mighty warriors.  It was as
if Nature rose to avenge the loss of its best and sweetest.
Like a mighty forest fire, or like an unstoppable tsunami, with Shiva and
His giant general at its head, the army marched towards the palace of
Dakshya.
The Gods panicked in pure fright. Their mirth turned to horror in a trice.
They ran away from the rampaging hordes of Shiva, as fast as they could.
Dakshya tried to rally them, but to no avail. Shiva’s general cut off
his head. The entire palace was ransacked and ruined. Of all that showed
the pride of the Gods, and the esteemed mortals, nothing remained.
Heeding not this chaos, Shiva went straight to where the body of Sati lay.
He lifted Her body, and placed it reverentially across His shoulders.
Shiva would then have left, but a woman threw herself at His feet, sobbing
uncontrollably.
Always, always, even in His darkest moments of grief, the Greatest God is
polite.
“Who are you?” asked Shiva.  “Why are you worshipping Me?”
“I am the mother of Sati and  Your mother-in-law.”
Shiva softened. “What can I do for you, mother?”
“Out of pure mercy, please give back the life of my husband, Dakshya.”
“Let him live!” said Shiva, immediately. The headless corpse of
Dakshya came alive, and stood up!
However Dakshya’s head could not be found. The best Shiva’s general
could do was to install the head of a sacrificed goat, in its stead.
Thus did Nandi’s prophecy come true. Dakshya soon found that he could
not pose with dignity to his subjects with a goat’s head. He invented
the first mask, to cover his goat-head, but it was not often easy to hide
the ears. His invention was and is found to be useful to those with his
qualities, occupying superior positions.
In the lowest depths of sorrow and despair, burning from within, and yet
cold all over, Shiva left Dakshya’s palace with the body of Sati
lovingly draped over His shoulders.


The God of War – 6
The dance of Shiva

Full of anger and sorrow, Shiva strode out with Sati over his shoulders.
He was very upset, and gave Himself relief by motion. Why was He suffering
so much? Why?
What was the point of it all, this consciousness? What caused so much
meanness? What? How could matters be rectified? How? Why this unexpected
pettiness from those supposed to be kindly and wise? How could they
descend from their high ideals? What was the point of striving for
glorious elevation, when descent to callousness was inevitable?
With every question there was a stamp by His foot upon the Earth, which
now to Him appeared to be but a vehicle for ignorance - an insidious
giggling demon that had to be stamped out.

Thus in complete anger and grief caused as much by His incomprehension as
His personal loss, Shiva stamped and stamped, and as He did, He whirled
with incredible beauty and the utmost grace in the most awesome dance that
could ever be comprehended.  It is known now as the Tandava Dance, the
dance of destruction.
Shiva, the embodiment of complete goodness, is normally still, and silent
in apparently eternal meditation. The complete opposite happens when Shiva
gets into rage, the rage of a good man wronged. Not that He intends to,
but His movements cause immense destruction.
In His anger and grief, He moved , as if in dance, most wonderfully and
gracefully; but as He stamped, the Earth shook, the waters got troubled,
the air went into turmoil – volcanoes erupted; earthquakes shook the
Earths; tsunamis huge raced up the shores; cyclones of devastating power
ruined everything…
All the Gods looked on in awe and dismay. If Shiva carried with His dance
all existence would be destroyed.
Powerful as Shiva was, He could not be stopped.  So long as He continued
in His anger fuelled by grief the destruction would continue.
The Gods looked at Vishnu, the Preserver, the most clever and
well-intentioned among Them.  Only He could do something!
Following Shiva, Vishnu launched His discus at Sati’s body fifty-two
times, cutting off Her body parts with each strike, till nothing of Sati
remained upon Shiva. Wherever Her body parts fell upon the sacred soil of
Bharata, those places became the most holy, and centres for pilgrimage to
this day.
Finally Shiva understood that His beloved Sati was no longer with Him. His
anger abated, but the grief remained. And along with that grief, there was
confusion. What was wrong with Him? Why could He not have stopped the
death of His wife? What did He not know? How could He have done better?
Ignorance then, was not only outside Shiva, but also within Him. And
indeed, how could the greatest God, Who was completely good, have any idea
about wickedness and deceit, meanness and the need to show off grandeur?
How could He be completely good if indeed He could know of evils and
vices, snobberies and cunning, and practice them, when the opportunity so
presented? Was it good to be so good?
Such were the issues that vexed the greatest God, Shiva. He stopped His
dancing. The consequent destruction also stopped.  The Gods sighed with
relief.
Loneliness struck Shiva. He deeply felt that He needed a son. But how
could He get a son, having lost His beloved wife? There was no other woman
He could even look at.
Shiva knew He had much to learn. Once again He went into the deep, silent,
still state of meditation, more intensely than ever, to gain even greater
powers from the Higher Regions.