Goddesses in the Hindu Tradition
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.17192/mjr.2016.18.3528Keywords:
Göttin, Goddness, Hinduismus, HinduismAbstract
This article provides an overview and analysis of the two primary Hindu goddess traditions—the formal tradition (often called the Aryan, Pan-Indian or great) and the gramadevata tradition (also known as village goddesses, Dravidian, non-Aryan, folk or little). A broad sketch of each tradition is followed by an in-depth description of a goddess from each tradition. The overview of the formal tradition looks at six major goddesses in the formal tradition: Kali, Durga, Parvati, Sarasvati, Radha, and Sita. The overview of the gramadevata tradition examines origin myths, typical functions, common forms, and characteristics of worship. For the in-depth description of a goddess from each tradition, Sri-Laksmi is examined from the formal tradition and Mathamma from the gramadevata tradtion. After examining the two traditions, I argue the two traditions are two separate traditions emerging from an ancient goddess tradition. Yet, these two traditions influence each other, resulting in significant similarities, with the gramadevata tradition exerting the most influence.
References
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Bailly, Constantina Rhodes. 2000. “Śrī-Lakṣmī: Majesty of the Hindu King.” In Goddesses Who Rule, 133–45. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Bean, Susan S. 1975. “Referential and Indexical Meanings of Amma in Kannada: Mother, Woman, Goddess, Pox and Help.” Journal of Anthropological Research 31: 313–30.
Bhattacharya, Tithi. 2007. “Tracking the Goddess: Religion, Community, and Identity in the Durga Puja Ceremonies of Nineteenth-Century Calcutta.” Journal of Asian Studies 66 (4): 44. doi:10.1017/S0021911807001258.
Bhattacharyya, N. N. 1973. History of the Śākta Religion. New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers.
———. 1977. The Indian Mother Goddess. New Delhi: Manohar Book Service.
Black, Maggie. 2009. “Women in Ritual Slavery: Devadasi, Jogini and Mathamma in Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh, Southern India.” Pakistan Journal of Women’s Studies 16 (1/2): 179–205.
Bose, Mandakranta. 2010. Women in the Hindu Tradition: Rules, Roles and Exceptions. New York: Routledge.
Brinkgreve, Francine. 1997. “Offerings to Durga and Pretiwi in Bali.” Asian Folklore Studies 56 (2): 227–51.
Brown, Cheever Macke. 1974. God as Mother: A Feminine Theology in India: An Historical and Theological Study of the Brahmavaivarta Purāna. Hartford, VT: C. Stark.
Brubaker, Richard L. 1983. “The Untamed Goddesses of Village India.” In The Book of the Goddess, Past and Present: An Introduction to Her Religion, edited by Carl Olson, 145–60. New York: Crossroad.
Brückner, Heidrun. 1996. “Divinity, Violence, Wedding and Gender.” In Wild Goddesses in India and Nepal: Proceedings of an International Symposium, Berne and Zurich, November 1994, edited by Axel Michaels, Cornelia Vogelsanger, and Annette Wilke, 437–48. New York: P. Lang.
Chongloi, H. 2002. “Interaction and Integration of Hindu Faith and Primal Faiths with Special Reference to Beliefs and Practices Adapted by Hinduism from Primal Traditions.” Indian Journal of Theology 44 (1-2): 31–37.
Coburn, Thomas B. 1985. Devī-Māhātmya: The Crystallization of the Goddess Tradition. Columbia, MO: South Asia Books.
Curran, Ronald T. 2005. “Kali, Individuation, and the Primordial Unconscious.” Psychological Perspectives 48 (2): 18. doi:10.1080/00332920500374903.
Dandekar, Deepra, and Abhijit Dandekar. 2011. “The Satvai and Settlement Pattern in Rural Western Maharashtra.” South Asian Studies 27 (2): 221–24. doi:10.1080/02666030.2011.614430.
Dhal, Upendra Nath. 1978. Goddess Laksmi: Origin and Development. New Delhi: Oriental Publishers & Distributors.
Elangovan, D. 2013. “Shifting Paradigam: Devadasi System--from a Social Evil to Cultural Eminence in Tamil Nadu.” Indian Streams Research Journal 3 (6): 1–4.
Elmore, W. T. 1915. Dravidian Gods in Modern Hinduism: A Study of the Local and Village Deities of Southern India. Lancaster, PA: New Era Printing Co.
Erndl, Kathleen M. 1997. “The Goddess and Women’s Power : A Hindu Case Study.” In Women and Goddess Traditions, 17–38. Minneapolis: Fortress Press.
Foulston, Lynn. 2002. At the Feet of the Goddess: The Divine Feminine in Local Hindu Religion. Portland, OR: Sussex Academic Press.
Foulston, Lynn, and Stuart Abbott. 2009. Hindu Goddesses: Beliefs and Practices. Portland, OR: Sussex Academic Press.
Gatwood, Lynne E. 1985. Devi and the Spouse Goddess : Women, Sexuality, and Marriages in India. Riverdale, MD: Riverdale Co.
Goudriaan, Teun. 1987. “On the Goddess’ ‘Phases of Life’ in Some Hinduistic Texts.” In Effigies Dei, 69–82. Leiden: Brill Academic Publishers.
Harper, Katherine Anne. 1989. The Iconography of the Saptamatrikas: Seven Hindu Goddesses of Spiritual Transformation. Lewiston, NY: E. Mellen Press.
Harvey, Andrew, and Anne Baring. 1996. The Divine Feminine: Exploring the Feminine Face of God Throughout the World. Berkeley, CA: Conari Press.
Hiltebeitel, Alf. 2011. When the Goddess Was a Woman: Mahābhārata Ethnographies: Essays by Alf Hiltebeitel, Volume 2. Edited by Vishwa Adluri and Joydeep Bagchee. Leiden: Brill Academic Publishers.
Jayakar, Pupul. 1990. The Earth Mother: Legends, Goddesses, and Ritual Arts of India. San Francisco, CA: Harper & Row.
Kinsley, David R. 1986. Hindu Goddesses : Visions of the Divine Feminine in the Hindu Religious Tradition. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Kumar, P. Pratap. 1997. The Goddess Lakṣmī: The Divine Consort in South Indian Vaiṣṇava Tradition. Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press.
Marglin, Frédérique Apffel. 1985. Wives of the God-King: The Rituals of the Devadasis of Puri. New York: Oxford University Press.
Markale, Jean. 1999. The Great Goddess: Reverence of the Divine Feminine from the Paleolithic to the Present. Rochester, VT: Inner Traditions.
Martin, Nancy M. 2007. “North Indian Hindi Devotional Literature.” In The Blackwell Companion to Hinduism, edited by Gavin Flood, 182–98. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing Ltd.
Merz, Brigitte. 2007. “When A Goddess Weeps—Ritual Failure Or Failed Performance? A Case Study From Nepal.” In When Rituals Go Wrong: Mistakes, Failure, and the Dynamics of Ritual, edited by U. Hüsken, 209–22. Boston: Brill Academic Publishers.
Misra, Kamal K., and K. Koteswara Rao. 2002. “Theogamy in Rural India: Socio-Cultural Dimensions of the ‘Jogini’ System in Andhra Pradesh.” Indian Anthropologist 32 (1/2): 1–24.
Mus, Paul. 1933. India Seen from the East: Indian and Indigenous Cults in Champa. Edited by I.W. Mabbett and D.P. Chandler. Translated by I.W. Mabbett. Cheltenham, Victoria: Standard Commercial Printers.
———. 1998. Barabudur: Sketch of a History of Buddhism Based on Archaeological Criticism of the Texts. Translated by Alexander W. Macdonald. New Delhi: Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts.
Olson, Carl. 1983. “Sri Lakshmi and Radha: The Obsequious Wife and The Lustful Lover.” In The Book of the Goddess, Past and Present: An Introduction to Her Religion, edited by Carl Olson, 124–44. New York: Crossroad.
Orr, Leslie C. 2005. “Identity and Divinity: Boundary-Crossing Goddesses in Medieval South India.” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 73 (1): 35. doi:10.1093/jaarel/lfi003.
Padma, Sree. 2013. Vicissitudes of the Goddess: Reconstructions of the Gramadevata in India’s Religious Traditions. New York: Oxford University Press.
Pintchman, Tracy. 1994. The Rise of the Goddess in the Hindu Tradition. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.
———. 2003. “The Month of Kartik and Women’s Ritual Devotions.” In The Blackwell Companion to Hinduism, edited by Gavin D. Flood, 327–42. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing Ltd.
Preston, James. 1985. Cult of the Goddess: Social and Religious Change in a Hindu Temple. Prospect Heights, IL: Waveland Press.
Rani, G. Sandhya, and B. Suguna. 2002. “Mathamma Cult.” In Patterns of Gender Violence, edited by Sushma Yadav and Anil Dutta Mishar, 160–69. New Delhi: Radha Publications.
Reddy, P. Munirathnam. 1982. “Study of a Harijan Caste Deity Festival: Mathamma Kolupa.” Journal of Social Research 25 (1): 52–55.
Rodrigues, Hillary. 2011. “Divine Times: Goddess Worship in Banaras.” In Studying Hinduism in Practice, edited by Hillary Rodrigues, 131–45. New York: Routledge.
Sandness, Adéla. 2010. “"In the Footprint of IIÄ’: An Early Image of Sacrificial Cosmology in Vedic Tradition.” Studies in Religion/Sciences Religieuses 39 (4): 509–21.
Santiko, Hariani. 1997. “The Goddess Durgā in the East-Javanese Period.” Asian Folklore Studies 56 (2): 209–26.
Schlemmer, Grégoire. 2012. “Rituals, Territories and Powers in the Sino-Indian Margins.” Moussons. Recherche En Sciences Humaines Sur l’Asie Du Sud-Est, no. 19 (August): 19–31.
Sinha, Amita. 2006. “Cultural Landscape of Pavagadh: The Abode of Mother Goddess Kalika.” Journal of Cultural Geography 23 (2): 15.
Vijaisri, Priyadarshini. 2005. “Contending Identities: Sacred Prostitution and Reform in Colonial South India.” Journal of South Asian Studies 28 (3): 387–411.
Wiebe, Paul C. 1975. “Religious Change in South India: Perspectives from a Small Town.” Religion and Society 22 (4): 27–46.
Bailly, Constantina Rhodes. 2000. “Śrī-Lakṣmī: Majesty of the Hindu King.” In Goddesses Who Rule, 133–45. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Bean, Susan S. 1975. “Referential and Indexical Meanings of Amma in Kannada: Mother, Woman, Goddess, Pox and Help.” Journal of Anthropological Research 31: 313–30.
Bhattacharya, Tithi. 2007. “Tracking the Goddess: Religion, Community, and Identity in the Durga Puja Ceremonies of Nineteenth-Century Calcutta.” Journal of Asian Studies 66 (4): 44. doi:10.1017/S0021911807001258.
Bhattacharyya, N. N. 1973. History of the Śākta Religion. New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers.
———. 1977. The Indian Mother Goddess. New Delhi: Manohar Book Service.
Black, Maggie. 2009. “Women in Ritual Slavery: Devadasi, Jogini and Mathamma in Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh, Southern India.” Pakistan Journal of Women’s Studies 16 (1/2): 179–205.
Bose, Mandakranta. 2010. Women in the Hindu Tradition: Rules, Roles and Exceptions. New York: Routledge.
Brinkgreve, Francine. 1997. “Offerings to Durga and Pretiwi in Bali.” Asian Folklore Studies 56 (2): 227–51.
Brown, Cheever Macke. 1974. God as Mother: A Feminine Theology in India: An Historical and Theological Study of the Brahmavaivarta Purāna. Hartford, VT: C. Stark.
Brubaker, Richard L. 1983. “The Untamed Goddesses of Village India.” In The Book of the Goddess, Past and Present: An Introduction to Her Religion, edited by Carl Olson, 145–60. New York: Crossroad.
Brückner, Heidrun. 1996. “Divinity, Violence, Wedding and Gender.” In Wild Goddesses in India and Nepal: Proceedings of an International Symposium, Berne and Zurich, November 1994, edited by Axel Michaels, Cornelia Vogelsanger, and Annette Wilke, 437–48. New York: P. Lang.
Chongloi, H. 2002. “Interaction and Integration of Hindu Faith and Primal Faiths with Special Reference to Beliefs and Practices Adapted by Hinduism from Primal Traditions.” Indian Journal of Theology 44 (1-2): 31–37.
Coburn, Thomas B. 1985. Devī-Māhātmya: The Crystallization of the Goddess Tradition. Columbia, MO: South Asia Books.
Curran, Ronald T. 2005. “Kali, Individuation, and the Primordial Unconscious.” Psychological Perspectives 48 (2): 18. doi:10.1080/00332920500374903.
Dandekar, Deepra, and Abhijit Dandekar. 2011. “The Satvai and Settlement Pattern in Rural Western Maharashtra.” South Asian Studies 27 (2): 221–24. doi:10.1080/02666030.2011.614430.
Dhal, Upendra Nath. 1978. Goddess Laksmi: Origin and Development. New Delhi: Oriental Publishers & Distributors.
Elangovan, D. 2013. “Shifting Paradigam: Devadasi System--from a Social Evil to Cultural Eminence in Tamil Nadu.” Indian Streams Research Journal 3 (6): 1–4.
Elmore, W. T. 1915. Dravidian Gods in Modern Hinduism: A Study of the Local and Village Deities of Southern India. Lancaster, PA: New Era Printing Co.
Erndl, Kathleen M. 1997. “The Goddess and Women’s Power : A Hindu Case Study.” In Women and Goddess Traditions, 17–38. Minneapolis: Fortress Press.
Foulston, Lynn. 2002. At the Feet of the Goddess: The Divine Feminine in Local Hindu Religion. Portland, OR: Sussex Academic Press.
Foulston, Lynn, and Stuart Abbott. 2009. Hindu Goddesses: Beliefs and Practices. Portland, OR: Sussex Academic Press.
Gatwood, Lynne E. 1985. Devi and the Spouse Goddess : Women, Sexuality, and Marriages in India. Riverdale, MD: Riverdale Co.
Goudriaan, Teun. 1987. “On the Goddess’ ‘Phases of Life’ in Some Hinduistic Texts.” In Effigies Dei, 69–82. Leiden: Brill Academic Publishers.
Harper, Katherine Anne. 1989. The Iconography of the Saptamatrikas: Seven Hindu Goddesses of Spiritual Transformation. Lewiston, NY: E. Mellen Press.
Harvey, Andrew, and Anne Baring. 1996. The Divine Feminine: Exploring the Feminine Face of God Throughout the World. Berkeley, CA: Conari Press.
Hiltebeitel, Alf. 2011. When the Goddess Was a Woman: Mahābhārata Ethnographies: Essays by Alf Hiltebeitel, Volume 2. Edited by Vishwa Adluri and Joydeep Bagchee. Leiden: Brill Academic Publishers.
Jayakar, Pupul. 1990. The Earth Mother: Legends, Goddesses, and Ritual Arts of India. San Francisco, CA: Harper & Row.
Kinsley, David R. 1986. Hindu Goddesses : Visions of the Divine Feminine in the Hindu Religious Tradition. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Kumar, P. Pratap. 1997. The Goddess Lakṣmī: The Divine Consort in South Indian Vaiṣṇava Tradition. Atlanta, GA: Scholars Press.
Marglin, Frédérique Apffel. 1985. Wives of the God-King: The Rituals of the Devadasis of Puri. New York: Oxford University Press.
Markale, Jean. 1999. The Great Goddess: Reverence of the Divine Feminine from the Paleolithic to the Present. Rochester, VT: Inner Traditions.
Martin, Nancy M. 2007. “North Indian Hindi Devotional Literature.” In The Blackwell Companion to Hinduism, edited by Gavin Flood, 182–98. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing Ltd.
Merz, Brigitte. 2007. “When A Goddess Weeps—Ritual Failure Or Failed Performance? A Case Study From Nepal.” In When Rituals Go Wrong: Mistakes, Failure, and the Dynamics of Ritual, edited by U. Hüsken, 209–22. Boston: Brill Academic Publishers.
Misra, Kamal K., and K. Koteswara Rao. 2002. “Theogamy in Rural India: Socio-Cultural Dimensions of the ‘Jogini’ System in Andhra Pradesh.” Indian Anthropologist 32 (1/2): 1–24.
Mus, Paul. 1933. India Seen from the East: Indian and Indigenous Cults in Champa. Edited by I.W. Mabbett and D.P. Chandler. Translated by I.W. Mabbett. Cheltenham, Victoria: Standard Commercial Printers.
———. 1998. Barabudur: Sketch of a History of Buddhism Based on Archaeological Criticism of the Texts. Translated by Alexander W. Macdonald. New Delhi: Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts.
Olson, Carl. 1983. “Sri Lakshmi and Radha: The Obsequious Wife and The Lustful Lover.” In The Book of the Goddess, Past and Present: An Introduction to Her Religion, edited by Carl Olson, 124–44. New York: Crossroad.
Orr, Leslie C. 2005. “Identity and Divinity: Boundary-Crossing Goddesses in Medieval South India.” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 73 (1): 35. doi:10.1093/jaarel/lfi003.
Padma, Sree. 2013. Vicissitudes of the Goddess: Reconstructions of the Gramadevata in India’s Religious Traditions. New York: Oxford University Press.
Pintchman, Tracy. 1994. The Rise of the Goddess in the Hindu Tradition. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.
———. 2003. “The Month of Kartik and Women’s Ritual Devotions.” In The Blackwell Companion to Hinduism, edited by Gavin D. Flood, 327–42. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing Ltd.
Preston, James. 1985. Cult of the Goddess: Social and Religious Change in a Hindu Temple. Prospect Heights, IL: Waveland Press.
Rani, G. Sandhya, and B. Suguna. 2002. “Mathamma Cult.” In Patterns of Gender Violence, edited by Sushma Yadav and Anil Dutta Mishar, 160–69. New Delhi: Radha Publications.
Reddy, P. Munirathnam. 1982. “Study of a Harijan Caste Deity Festival: Mathamma Kolupa.” Journal of Social Research 25 (1): 52–55.
Rodrigues, Hillary. 2011. “Divine Times: Goddess Worship in Banaras.” In Studying Hinduism in Practice, edited by Hillary Rodrigues, 131–45. New York: Routledge.
Sandness, Adéla. 2010. “"In the Footprint of IIÄ’: An Early Image of Sacrificial Cosmology in Vedic Tradition.” Studies in Religion/Sciences Religieuses 39 (4): 509–21.
Santiko, Hariani. 1997. “The Goddess Durgā in the East-Javanese Period.” Asian Folklore Studies 56 (2): 209–26.
Schlemmer, Grégoire. 2012. “Rituals, Territories and Powers in the Sino-Indian Margins.” Moussons. Recherche En Sciences Humaines Sur l’Asie Du Sud-Est, no. 19 (August): 19–31.
Sinha, Amita. 2006. “Cultural Landscape of Pavagadh: The Abode of Mother Goddess Kalika.” Journal of Cultural Geography 23 (2): 15.
Vijaisri, Priyadarshini. 2005. “Contending Identities: Sacred Prostitution and Reform in Colonial South India.” Journal of South Asian Studies 28 (3): 387–411.
Wiebe, Paul C. 1975. “Religious Change in South India: Perspectives from a Small Town.” Religion and Society 22 (4): 27–46.
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2016-06-02
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Lewis, S. (2016). Goddesses in the Hindu Tradition. Marburg Journal of Religion, 18(1). https://doi.org/10.17192/mjr.2016.18.3528
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