Jagannath

• 1. Introduction

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  Jagannath is a Hindu deity whose face is a pair of enormous round eyes set in a painted wooden pillar, with no hands and no legs. Devotees across eastern India, from Odisha to West Bengal, Assam and Tripura, treat this unfinished-looking figure as their lord.

  His name has travelled much further than his image. Early British observers in India rendered it as the English word juggernaut, a term for a vast and unstoppable force. They took it from accounts of the great chariot processions in the town of Puri.

  Why would a god be shown without limbs? Why is he made of wood, when most Hindu images are stone or metal? Scholars have traced him to Buddhist, Jain, tribal and Vaishnava roots, so where did he really come from? And what did outsiders make of him when they first arrived?

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• 2. Face of Wood

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  Neem wood, brightly painted, is the substance of Jagannath in his temples. The image has a square, flat head and a pillar that blends the face into the chest. It has no neck, no ears and no limbs.

  The round face is read as a sign of someone with no beginning and no end, anadi and ananta. The two eyes have no eyelids. One is said to stand for the sun and the other for the moon, and paintings from the 17th century already show this. On his forehead sits the U-shaped Vaishnava mark called the Urdhva Pundra. The scholar Olgierd Starza reads his dark colour and abstract features as a stripped-down version of the cosmic form of Krishna. In some modern temples, two stumps pointing forward in an embrace stand in for his arms.

  Beside his brother Balabhadra and sister Subhadra, Jagannath is easy to pick out. His eyes are round, while theirs are oval or almond-shaped. He is dark, Balabhadra is white and Subhadra is yellow. His head is flat, while theirs are carved in a semicircle. A fourth figure, the Sudarshana Chakra, is red and about as tall as Balabhadra. It is carved from a wooden pillar and dressed in cloth, unlike the plain wheel found in other Vishnu temples. When Jagannath appears alone, only his face is shown, a form sometimes called Patita Pavana or Dadhi Vaman.

  Wood is the rare choice here. The Bhavishya Purana declares neem the most auspicious timber for images of Vishnu. In the temple at Puri, the images are repainted every week. Every 12 or 19 years, roughly, they are replaced by newly carved ones. The exact timing follows the luni-solar calendar, and it comes when the month of Asadha occurs twice in one year.

  The name itself is plain Sanskrit. It joins jagat, meaning universe, with nātha, meaning master, so Jagannath is the lord of the universe. In the Odia language he is also Jagabandhu, the friend of the universe. Other names describe his looks. Kāḷiā means the black-coloured Lord, though it can also mean the Timely One. Dārubrahma means the sacred wood-riddle, and Cakā Ākhi means the one with round eyes.

  He is not the only Hindu deity without a human shape. Shiva is often worshipped as a linga. Yet in some medieval and modern paintings kept in museums outside India, such as in Berlin, Jagannath appears with a full human body topped by the same abstract mask of a face.

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• 3. Contested Origins

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  Hymn 10.155.3 of the Rigveda mentions a wooden log floating in the ocean. The commentator Acharya Sayana read its key word, apurusham, as Purushottama, a title later given to Jagannath. On that reading the deity reaches back to the 2nd millennium BCE. Other scholars reject this, saying the hymn belongs to an Alakshmi Stava of Arayi.

  The Buddhist case rests on relics. Local legend says the Puri shrine holds a tooth of Gautama Buddha, and the town was once called Danta-Pura, the city where the sacred tooth was kept. The Chinese pilgrim Faxian wrote around 400 CE about a Buddhist procession that closely resembles the Jagannath festivities. Swami Vivekananda, in Lectures from Colombo to Almora, said the temple was once Buddhist.

  The oldest known direct mention of the deity comes from Indrabhuti, an ancient Buddhist king of Oddiyana, in a work called Jñānasiddhi. Abhinav Patra cautions that nobody has shown whether his Jagannath is the same god as today's. Later, a scripture of the Kabir panth, written by Kabir's disciple Dharamdas, has the god speak in his own voice. It says: "Kali Yuga has come. I am established as Buddha. Jagannath is my name." In Nepalese Buddhism, the Buddha is still called Jagannath. Yet Starza judges that the tooth, the festival, the lack of caste rules in the temple and the Buddha identification do not prove a Buddhist origin.

  Pandit Nilakantha Das proposed a Jain origin instead. Many Jain Tirthankaras carry the suffix Nath, and he derived Jagannath from Jinanath. The 22 steps leading to the temple, the Baisi Pahacha, have been read as honouring the first 22 of the 24 Tirthankaras. Annirudh Das identified the original deity with the Jina of Kalinga, carried to Magadha by Mahapadma Nanda, and pointed to the Hathigumpha inscription. Jain images have been found in and near the complex. They could be later additions or signs of friendly relations, and Starza calls the evidence too sketchy to decide.

  The tribal theories begin with the servitors known as Daitas, who are non-Brahmin. They are believed to descend from the Sabaras, also spelled Soras. They have the privilege of first viewing each new image, carved about every 12 years, and of serving the principal meals to the deities. Verrier Elwin suggested the original god was Kittung, a Sora deity made of wood, taken over by a Brahmin priest. Starza calls the parallel interesting but flawed, since Kittung is produced by burning a log and looks quite different.

  Stella Kramrisch pointed to the Anga pen, a log deity of central Indian tribes. Starza finds this weak because that figure carries a bird-like or snake-like head. Another proposal reads the flat head, curved mouth and large eyes as an abstract lion's head, from the cult of Lakshmi-Narasimha. Starza notes that this does not match the Narasimha images at nearby Konark. Meanwhile, many temples in present-day Odisha house a wooden pillar god called Dadhivaman, which may be the same deity.

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• 4. One Deity, Many Faiths

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  A copper plate inscription from Dasgoba, dated to 1198, names only Purushottama Jagannath. It says the Puri temple was built by the Ganga king Anantavarman Chodaganga, who ruled from 1078 to 1147, for Vishnu and Lakshmi. The Sanskrit play Anargharaghava by Murari likewise names Purushottama Jagannath and his consort Lakshmi, with no mention of a brother or sister.

  The earliest known mention of Balabhadra and Subhadra is the Pataleshwara inscription of 1237 CE, from the reign of Anangabhima III, who ruled from 1211 to 1239. The German Indologist Kulke credits this king with creating the triad, after Lakshmi turned into Subhadra. Vaishnava scholars offer another path. They say the goddess was first Ekanamsa, a form of Durga, and was later renamed Shubhadra to fit Vaishnava vocabulary.

  By the time the sources speak clearly, the deity belongs to many traditions at once. Gaudiya Vaishnavas see Balabhadra as the elder brother Balarama and Jagannath as the younger brother Krishna. Shaivas call Jagannath Bhairava, and the Shiva Purana lists Jagannatha among the 108 names of Shiva. Tantric texts link him to Mahabhairava, and his companion is the goddess Vimala. The offerings made to Jagannath become mahaprasad only after they are offered again to Vimala. The priests at Puri belong to the Shakta sect, though Vaishnava influence is strongest.

  The fourth figure, Sudarshana Chakra, is read as the wheel of the sun's chariot, a sign of the Saura tradition. All four worshipped together on one platform are called the Chaturdhamurti, the four-fold form. Shaktas see Jagannath as a blend of five gods: Vishnu, Shiva, Surya, Ganesh and Durga. In his elephant form, called Hathi Besha, devotees from Maharashtra revere him as Ganesha.

  The theology ties it together. In one reading, Jagannath is consciousness, Subhadra is energy and Balabhadra is knowledge. Medieval Odia scholars called him Shunya Brahma, the personified void. A 13th-century Kannada text by Rudrabhatta says Hari, Hara and Brahma are aspects of one supreme soul. In 1481 the Assamese scholar Shankaradeva became his devotee and wrote plays about Jagannatha-Krishna that remain popular in Assam and Manipur. The historian Jadunath Sarkar summed up the pattern this way: "The diverse religions of Orissa in all ages have tended to gravitate towards and finally merged into the Jagannath worship, at least in theory."

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• 5. Legends of the Log

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  A blindfold and a bag of mustard seeds drive the best known origin story, told in the Skanda Purana. King Indradyumna of Avanti longed to worship Nilamadhava, a deep blue image of sapphire. He sent a man named Vidyapati to find it. Vidyapati married Lalita, the daughter of the Savara chieftain Vishvavasu, who nightly visited the secret shrine.

  Vishvavasu agreed to take his son-in-law there, but only if he were blindfolded. Vidyapati scattered mustard seeds along the path. When the king arrived, following the plants that had sprouted, a storm had buried the image under sand. After three days and nights of prayer, a voice from the heavens told him that the god would appear as a wooden image floating by the sea.

  In the Puranic telling, a fragrant log of neem floated ashore, marked with the conch and disc of Vishnu. Vishnu himself came as an elderly master carver, traditionally identified with Vishwakarma. He asked to be left alone for 21 days inside the sealed pavilion. After 15 days of silence, the anxious king opened the doors. The carver vanished, leaving three figures without defined hands or feet. The god Brahma consoled the king, explaining that the Lord could see and bless the cosmos without physical organs.

  The 15th-century poet Sarala Dasa tells it differently in his Mahabharata. After the hunter Jara Savara killed Krishna with an arrow, Arjuna tried to cremate the body, but it would not burn. At a divine command, Jara cast it into the ocean, where it became the timber that Indradyumna found.

  The 16th-century Odia text Mahābhava Prakāśa, by Kanhei Khuntia, offers a third account. Krishna called out the names of the gopis of Vrindavan in his sleep, so his queens asked Mother Rohini to describe his childhood. Subhadra stood guard at the doorway, but she overheard the stories and her eyes widened while her limbs drew inward. Krishna and Balarama arrived and were overcome in the same way. The sage Narada prayed that they stay in that form forever.

  One more legend belongs to a king. The ruler of Kanchi refused to give his daughter to the Gajapati of Puri after seeing him sweep before the chariots, calling him a sweeper. Gajapati Purushottam Deva attacked and was defeated. He prayed to Jagannath, and the god and Balabhadra rode out on a white horse and a black horse. On the road, they took yogurt from a milkmaid named Manika, and Balabhadra left a gold ring as payment. At Adipur near Chilika lake, she showed the ring to the king, who knew it as Jagannath's and took it as a sign of divine support.

  The king won, brought home Princess Padmavati, and had her married to a sweeper, as revenge. His minister waited for the Ratha Yatra, when the king sweeps the chariot, and offered her to him as the bride of a royal sweeper of God. J. P. Das notes the historicity of the conquest is not certain. Purushottam Deva's expedition against the kingdom identified as Vijayanagar began in 1476. The scene is carved as a prominent relief in the prayer hall of the Puri temple. In 1880, Ramashankar Ray wrote the first Odia drama, titled Kanchi Kaveri.

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• 6. Wheels on the Bada Danda

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  The month of Asadha, usually June or July, is when three huge wooden chariots roll onto the Bada Danda, Puri's main street. The deities travel about 3 km to the Gundicha Temple so the public can see them, an act called darshan. They return on the ninth day, and hundreds of thousands of devotees come to watch.

  The chariots are rebuilt every year and pulled by devotees. Jagannath's chariot is about 45 ft high and takes roughly two months to construct. Artists in Puri paint flower petals on the wheels, along with the carved charioteer, the horses and inverted lotuses on the wall behind the throne.

  The festival also holds rituals that turn rank upside down. In the chhera pahara, the Gajapati king dresses as a sweeper and cleans the road before the chariots with a gold-handled broom. He sprinkles sandalwood water and powder as he goes. The custom says that under Jagannath's lordship the most powerful sovereign and the humblest devotee are no different. It is held twice, once on the way out and again on the last day.

  In another ritual, the pahandi vijay, devotees who feel aggrieved may kick, slap and insult the images as they are carried to the chariots. On the return journey, called the bahuda yatra, the chariots stop at the Mausi Maa Temple. There the deities are offered poda pitha, a baked cake generally eaten by poorer people.

  The festival is old. The Brahma Purana, Padma Purana and Skanda Purana all describe it, and the Kapila Samhita refers to it. Starza notes that the ruling Ganga dynasty is said to have instituted it around 1150, when the great temple was finished. Kings of Mayurbhanj and Parlakhemundi staged their own, and in the 18th century King Ramsingh of Jaipur is described as organizing one. In West Bengal, the day marks the start of preparations for Durga Puja, the region's biggest festival. At Mahesh in Serampore, a temple is famous for its own Rathayatra.

  The festival reached Europe early. The friar Odoric of Pordenone travelled in India in 1316-1318, some 20 years after Marco Polo dictated his own account. In his own account of 1321, Odoric reported people placing the images on chariots, while the king, the queen and everyone else drew them along with song and music.

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• 7. Temple and Pilgrims

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  The Puri temple rises over 215 ft, in the Kalinga style, and has drawn Hindu pilgrims since about 800 CE. It is one of the Char Dham pilgrimage sites. Its four main parts are the sanctum under a tall tower, a front porch, an audience hall and an offerings hall. The sanctum houses the deities on the ratnavedi, the Throne of Pearls.

  The Lion Gate is guarded by Jaya and Vijaya. Facing it stands the Aruna Stambha, a 16-sided granite pillar 11 m tall, brought from the Sun temple of Konark. The Madala Panji credits King Yayati of the Somavamsi dynasty with the original temple, but historians question that record. They date the sanctum and porch to the 12th century, under the Ganga king Anangabheemadeva, grandson of Chodaganga. The audience hall came in the reign of Gajapati Purushottama Deva, who ruled from 1462 to 1491. The offerings hall followed under Prataprudra Deva, who ruled from 1495 to 1532.

  The reformer Ramanuja visited Puri between 1107 and 1111, according to tradition, and converted Chodaganga from Shaivism to Vaishnavism. He founded the Ramanuja Math there. In 1268, the saint Nimbarkacharya set up the Radhavallav Matha. Jayadeva's Gita Govinda entered the liturgy at Puri for the first time, which spread its focus on Radha and Krishna.

  Chaitanya Mahaprabhu later made Jagannath beloved in Bengal. He stressed bhakti, spread the Sankirtan movement of chanting God's name, and won over the scholar Sarvabhauma Bhattacharya. King Prataprudra Deva was deeply influenced by him. Tradition says he merged with the idol after his death.

  A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, the founder of ISKCON, chose Jagannath as a form of Krishna to install in ISKCON temples worldwide. Its annual Ratha Yatra now draws crowds in many Western cities. Three more temples stand in Bangladesh and one in Nepal.

  Sikhs have their own link. Guru Nanak is recorded as visiting Puri in 1506 or 1508, on a journey east, and recited the aarti Gagan mai thaal there. Guru Teg Bahadur came later. Tradition says Maharaja Ranjit Singh, on his deathbed in 1839, willed his Koh-i-Noor diamond to Jagannath.

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• 8. Outsiders' Eyes

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  In 1633, the English traveller William Burton described the image as a serpent with seven heads. Avinash Patra says this contradicts every historical record. Burton called it the mirror of all wickedness and idolatry. Jean-Baptiste Tavernier never saw the icon and described its jewellery from hearsay. François Bernier mentioned the chariot festival in his 1667 memoir but did not describe the image, which leaves it unclear whether he saw it.

  The Delhi Sultanate and Mughal eras brought raids. Firuz Shah Tughlaq raided Odisha and desecrated the temple, according to his court historians. Under Akbar, the tradition flourished, but attacks grew serious after his death. Between 1509 and 1734, local Hindu rulers evacuated and hid the images many times. The temple complex itself was spared because the pilgrim tax paid by Hindu visitors brought in large revenue.

  The British took over management of the major temples at first, to collect fees and the Pilgrim Tax. Christian missionaries objected that this tied the government to idolatry. Between 1856 and 1863, the government handed the temples back to Hindus. Cassels and Mukherjee argue that rising Hindu anger at the tax, and corruption among collectors, mattered more than missionary pressure.

  The missionary Claudius Buchanan, who called the god Juggernaut, did the most to shape Western opinion. Through his letters, he was the first to introduce Hinduism to America, which he spelled "Hindoo". Michael J. Altman says Buchanan cast it as a bloody, superstitious religion needing replacement by the gospel. He called the deity Moloch and the shrine Golgotha, and he alleged child sacrifice. His book Christian Researches in Asia, published in 1811, called temple hymns obscene and temple art indecent. American magazines such as The Panoplist promoted it, and its influence on American views of Indian religions lasted some 50 years.

  Later writers pushed back. William Wilson Hunter and James Fergusson presented a more humane Jagannath to British and American readers. In the late 19th and 20th centuries, Hindu nationalists made him a unifying symbol of the self-rule movement. Even today only devotees of Dharmic religions may enter the Puri temple.

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