Saturday, June 06, 2020

Goddess Kumari: the legends of its origin- ii

Myth about Legend of Nepal published in 2010 by writer Jnan Kaji Manandhar writes about two legends related to the origin of Kumari. One such story says, there used to be a Yantra, a mystical diagram endowed with miraculous spiritual powers of goddess Taleju. The legend says the first Kumari arrived at the valley of Kathmandu in the form of Yantra. In those days, the king could talk to the Kumari (Yantra), seek advice and directions regarding administration guidance. Once the lid of the mystical Yantra was let open, that made the royal girl disappear forever. The king was very sad; he could not talk with the Yantra. With days passing by the King was in his deep sorrow. One night in a dream, the goddess appeared and told him to install a virgin girl from the Sakya caste and she will immerse in her body. Then the king could talk to her as a Kumari.

The other version says that one Malla King used to play dice with the goddess Kumari. At one instance, the king was infatuated with the beauty of the goddess and he had winked at her. This proved to be a big insult to the goddess who immediately disappeared. Later on, the King regretted his gesture. A voice came to install a virgin Sakya girl as a Kumari where she would immerse herself. 
One such folklore says King Jaya Prakash Malla used to go to the Goddess Taleju place in the night in order to play dice with her. His queen was worried about the king's absence during the night. She decided to follow him and was surprised to see the king playing dice with the goddess. The goddess was annoyed and vanished away. Goddess's disappearance made the king very sad. One day goddess Taleju came to his dream and told, him he had to establish a Kumari Ghar and find a virgin girl from the Sakya clan. Taleju would incarnate in her. Hence it is believed that Jaya Prakash Malla started the worshipping of the Kumari girl as a living goddess.
An Advertised Secret:  The Goddess Taleju and the King of Kathmandu, in Tantra in Practice also provides a historical outlook towards the existence of Kumari. The book quotes a few lines from the Nepalese dynastic chronicles, Gopālarāja-Vaṃṣāvalī, in 1192 C.E., King Lakṣmīkāmadeva, “thinking that his grandfather had acquired so much wealth and conquered the four quarters of the world through the aid of the Kumārīs, resolved to do the same.  With this intention he went to the . . . [palace] of Lakshmī-barman, [where] he erected an image of Kumārī and established the Kumārī-pūjā.” as the earliest mention of the existence of Kumari or Kumari Puja that is still followed to this date.
After the reign of King Lakṣmīkāmadeva, we continue to find inscriptions mentioning Prithivi Narayan and other kings worshiping Kumārīs.  Both the Kaumārī-Pūjā (1280 C.E.) and the Kumārī-Pūjā-Vidhana (1285 C.E.) describe the worship of the Kumārī by the king and equate the Kumārī with the king’s personal deity (iṣṭa-devatā), highlighting her paradoxical role as both the king’s political servant and his revered deity, writes Brownen Bledsoe in his book.
An interesting anecdote published in Prithvinarayan Shah in the Light of the Dibya Upadesh (1989) translated by L. F. Stiller writes the great king Prithivi Narayan and his troops entered Kathmandu on the day of Indra Jatra, the occasion when the Kumari bestows her divine approval upon the king.  At the time of Prithivi Narayan Shah’s surprise attack, the then king of Kathmandu, Jaya Prakash Malla, was preparing to receive the Kumari’s blessing.  Swiftly, and unexpectedly, Prithivi Narayan rode into the royal courtyard and bowed before the Kumārī, who unhesitatingly blessed him.  At that moment, the popular legend goes; the king of Gorkha became king of Nepal in a swift act of power that was the result of both political strategy and divine grace won through years of arduous devotion to the Goddess.

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