Indian Antiquary Vol 47

Author(s): Richard Carnac Temple, Devadatta Ramkrishna Bhandarkar
Publisher: Swati Publications

Page 234

218
THE INDIAN ANTIQUARY
(AUGUST, 1918
a tradition recorded in the Palm-Leaf Temple annals (Mâdlá Panji) which lend support to this. In the Sun Temple there is another partly mutilated image which the Pandas or the custodians of the temple declare to be that of Indra, the Hindu Jupiter Pluvius. Mr. Swarup declares this image to be that of Buddha (Konarka, p. 84), an identification which would naturally lend a strong support to his own theory. Mr. Swarup's opinion in this matter cannot, however, be accepted as final as we find that a very different view has been put forth by an independent scholar, after a minute and careful personal inspection. In an article in the Modern World, July 1913, Mr. Himangshu Sekhar Banerji, B.L., who took careful measurements of the altar at Konarak and the pedestal of the images in the Puri Sun-Temple, has described the similarity of the so-called Buddha, with that of the Moon-god, in the Navagraha frieze at Konarak and in view of the tradition that the Moon was also worshipped there along with the Sun, he is inclined to hold that the image in question is that of the Moon. If there had been anything peculiary Buddhistic about the image which was likely to lead to a satisfactory identification, the fact would hardly have escaped the attention of modern researchers. Mr. M. Ganguly, whose work on Orissa is probably the latest of its kind from the pen of an Indian scholar, has also been careful not not to hazard such a guess. Mr. Swarup's identification can therefore only be regarded as proven' under the circumstance.
Some of the Indian writers are so much obsessed with Buddhist' theories that we find in a vernacular work on Puri Shrines (Puri Tirtha) by Mr. Nagendra Nath Mitra, a statement to the effect that there are big images of Buddha on the pyramidal roof of the Konarak porch or Jagmohan. We had an opportunity of inspecting these images at close quarters, having risked a climb to the roof with the help of the local chowkidar. Being four-headed they are popularly believed to be representations of Brahman. Mr. Swarup with Mr. Longhurst of the Archæological Survey (Arch. Survey Report, E. Circle, 1906). so far differs from the popular identification as to take these images for representation of Śiva or Maheśvara, the matted locks being considered a fifth head on the strength of certain passages quoted from Hindu Texts. The author of "Konarka" monograph seems. to be under no illusion that these images were made to represent the founder of Buddhism in any of the varying attitudes (Mudra), but Mr. N. Mitra seems to go a step further even than other theorists of this school. Mr. Swarup, in view of his own peculiar views, seems to be anxious to relegate the Solar cult to a very subordinate position, and enunciates the view that it could never make a stand as a distinct or separate creed having subsequently become absorbed in the Saivite faith-the Sun God coming to be regarded as one of the eight forms of Siva or Rudra. To an unsophisticated person the obvious object of this assertion would appear to be that if Sun-worship were reduced to a mere subsidiary cult, it would be easier to attribute the building of this famous fane to a once flourishing and widely prevalent faith like Buddhism. Heliolatry seems to have once been fairly established in this land-from the temple of Martand 9 in Kashmir in the far north to that of Konarak in the southern shore. In Punjab, Multan (Mulasthn) on the Chenab (Chandrabhaga) was an ancient seat of Sun-worship. (Cunningham's The Ancient Geography of India, p. 232). Mr. N. N. Vasu quotes Vardha Purdia (178, 49-55) to show that Sun images were consecrated by Sambu, the Pauranic founder of the cult at Muttra, Multan, and Ujjain (Introd. to Vraja Parikrama), and in Vabishya Purana also there is mention of Multan and Chandrabhagâ in connection with heliolatrous rites (Viasllavism, Saivism, doc., by Sir R. G. Bhandarkar, p. 153). In Central India the shrines of the Sun God were not quite & negligible factor (Report Arch. Survey, W. India, Vol. IX, pp. 73-74, one of the interesting remains of early
Built by king Lalitāditya in the 8th century between A,D, 24 to 760.