- 6 months ago
Documentary, Treasures of the Indus - Part 3 - Of Gods and Men
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00:00The Indus River gave its name to India and along its banks are the sites of some of the earliest urban settlements on earth.
00:15Though the subcontinent was the birthplace of many of the world's great religions,
00:19excavations of these cities have uncovered no evidence of any organized religious practices.
00:25But in the last 2,000 years a culture of religious tolerance developed amongst the many faiths of these lands.
00:36Buddhism, Jainism, Sikhism all originated here and the Mughal conquerors built their Islamic mosques alongside Hindu temples.
00:46In 1582 when Europe was in the grip of almost continuous religious conflict between Christian sects,
00:52the Mughal emperor Akbar the Great exhorted his philosophers to seek a way for all religions in his empire to co-exist.
01:01To some extent this is still a society that is tolerant of religious difference.
01:06But the balance has shifted and today Hinduism is the majority faith in India
01:11and consequently the third most popular religion in the world.
01:17Hinduism has been evolving for thousands of years and its current dominant status has been achieved by its willingness to change.
01:25Its genius for adapting to the changing circumstances of its followers, absorbing the customs and beliefs of different faiths as it grew.
01:34The temples constructed to nurture this faith are some of the greatest architectural treasures in India.
01:40And in this last programme of the series we are in the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu.
01:46This is where Hindu temple culture reached its zenith
01:49and there is no better place to understand the story of these remarkable buildings.
01:54India is a country of over a billion people and the Hindu majority understand and interpret their existence in terms of their relationship with the divine.
02:22Their faith, a complex synthesis of many ancient beliefs, is inseparable from their everyday lives.
02:29The sacred and the profane are inextricably entwined.
02:35Even some of its most ardent followers will tell you that Hinduism is not a religion but a cultural phenomenon.
02:45The word Hindu is also derived from the mighty Indus River.
02:58And for those who have not grown up in its homeland, this most Indian of faiths can be difficult to understand.
03:04The myriad Hindu deities inhabit another dimension.
03:09But its followers believe that the world in which we live is illusory.
03:14And the goal is to break through this illusion and discover reality beyond.
03:22The locus for this quest is the temple.
03:25The Hindu temple is where the divide between illusion and reality is at its most porous.
03:35Where the opportunity to achieve darshan, a vision of the divine, is most possible.
03:40Every community in India, great or small, will have its own temple.
03:45The centre of its social and spiritual life.
03:48And these places have fostered the greatest flowering of Hindu artistic expression.
03:54I've been studying these buildings for over 20 years.
03:59They're remarkable works of art in their own right.
04:01But they're also the cradle of creativity for sculpture, poetry, music and dance.
04:06The very heart of a vibrant culture that's beating as strongly as ever.
04:11My fascination began as a student when I set out across this landscape on a scooter
04:16and discovered a way of life that stretches back over millennia.
04:24Descending from the arid Deccan Plateau, the flat and forested landscape of southern India
04:40is very different to the north.
04:43This is a land apart, ethnically and culturally distinct, and with a separate history.
04:49Even the Mughal conquest did not reach this far south.
04:53In the 6th century, a dynasty known as the Pallavas came to power in southern India.
04:58Their empire thrived on trade.
05:01And the town of Mahapalipuram on the Coromandel coast was their principal port.
05:06Fishing is now the mainstay of this coast, part of the modern state of Tamil Nadu.
05:21But in a golden age in the 7th and 8th centuries, the Pallava kings turned Mahapalipuram into an artisan laboratory for the craft of stone carving.
05:31And it now has world heritage status.
05:34Beached like a petrified ship to the south of the town is one of the earliest freestanding stone temples in India.
05:45The Shaw Temple.
05:47When this temple was built, many of the elements of temple design had already become standardised.
05:56But the origins of this architectural form are not buildings at all.
06:03A few hundred yards inland from the Shaw Temple is a shrine from the start of the Pallava period
06:09that helps us appreciate why these buildings evolved in the way they did.
06:14Like many caves and natural rock formations in India,
06:18an opening in this granite overhang has been enlarged and shaped over many generations
06:23to provide a site to worship local gods.
06:27The earliest temples were built at potent natural sites
06:30where it was believed that these unfathomable beings were most likely to reveal themselves.
06:36These shrines could have been as simple as a clearing in the forest,
06:41a source of spring water, or as in this case, a cave.
06:46What they all shared was a setting where the natural energy of the earth seemed to manifest itself.
06:53This remarkable rock architecture is 1400 years old
06:57and the men who carved it were trying to harness the spirit of the stone from which it is formed.
07:03These beams mimic timber cross members and the whole structure was formed in imitation of wooden temples.
07:12The columns appear to be holding the roof up, but it is all made from the living rock.
07:19Inside is a small, dark, womb-like chamber where very little natural light penetrates
07:25and this is regarded as the most sacred part of the temple, the sanctum.
07:30On the back wall is a carved panel which tells us that this temple is dedicated to Shiva,
07:35shown here with his consort Parvati.
07:40On the side wall is a panel showing Vishnu reclining on the primordial waters.
07:46Shiva and Vishnu are two of the principal gods of Hinduism.
07:50Here in this early temple you see both Vishnu and Shiva co-exist, but that won't last.
07:59As Hinduism evolved, here in southern India Shiva became the more popular deity,
08:04while in the north Vishnu is more common, but both are aspects of the divine.
08:09At the time these cave temples were made, by far the most popular faith in India was Buddhism,
08:16and the people who worshipped here would have been most surprised to discover
08:20that they would one day be regarded as part of an organized religion called Hinduism.
08:25The earliest animist practices saw the spirit of the earth and its power manifest in all natural things.
08:40Despite its selection of recognizable Hindu deities,
08:44this isolated rural shrine in a forest clearing has a powerful sense of mystery.
08:49When it was first venerated by the local villagers, it would have had little to do with Shiva.
08:56The many hundreds of clay horses gently decaying in the undergrowth tell us that this shrine is dedicated to Ayana,
09:04a deity who protects rural villages and is almost exclusively found in Tamil Nadu.
09:09He rides around on horseback fighting the demons of the forest.
09:16The inspiration for this holy place was spiritual rather than religious,
09:21a potent nexus for the essence of the forest.
09:30A similar sense of the power of natural forces is evident by the shore at Mahabalipuram.
09:36Set back from the sea, we find the next phase in the development of the Pallava stone carvers.
09:43A row of rocky outcrops and boulders allowed them to work on a relatively modest scale
09:49to try out some of their ideas for rock-cut temples.
09:52These are the ratas, a word which means chariot, and they're the first freestanding rock-cut temples in Indian architecture.
10:04And they are completely without precedent.
10:09The ratas are not strictly temples because they were never finished,
10:12but they functioned as an aesthetic playground for the Pallava kings.
10:17They're extremely architecturally diverse for the 7th century,
10:22each one trying out different shapes and layouts and with a rich variety of ornamentation.
10:28The smaller outcrops were used to create animals and other mythical figures.
10:32However, there were occasionally botched jobs.
10:36Imagine the sorry group of stone cutters who stood around this magnificent carving of Shiva's bull Nandi
10:42and watched as a natural fault in the granite caused his rear end to fall off.
10:47But this challenge seemed to be one the Pallava craftsmen relished.
10:57And it was in stone that Hindu architecture came to life.
11:02At the four corners of this last rata are figures of Shiva and other gods
11:07with scripts in ancient Tamil carved in the masonry above.
11:11One is thought to be the king, Narasimha Varman I,
11:14with an inscription that proclaims his patronage of the site.
11:19Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair.
11:30Skills developed in the Pallava times have not been lost.
11:33In the back alleys of the town today, there are hundreds of stone artisans
11:37chiseling away in ramshackle street studios,
11:40meticulously turning stone into devotional art.
11:44The granite that these stonemasons are carving is not found locally
11:48and has to be transported from a quarry 50 kilometres away.
11:54But what Mahabalupuram does have, which makes it the undisputed centre of stone carving along this coast, are the craftsmen.
12:05Artists are available here.
12:07Right, so the skill is here.
12:09Yes, that's why.
12:11Do you take the craftsmen to see the ancient temples?
12:13Ah, yes. Then we are showing the photographs also.
12:16And we are teaching the people how to follow the tradition.
12:18And on the basis of the training only they make.
12:21The apprenticeship to become a master mason here takes a minimum of seven years.
12:26And in that time, every aspect of the process is covered.
12:30The workshop even manufacture their own chisels.
12:33Do you see the production of sculpture as an act of devotion?
12:39Ah, yes. Normally. Even the stone itself is as a soul.
12:44Yeah.
12:45We are touching the soul. We are making the statue.
12:48There is no doubt that the modern carvers have developed their own style.
12:52Though they are depicting the same deities, these figures are subtly different from those that we see from a thousand years ago.
13:00There is some mechanisation to relieve the more laborious work.
13:04And there are other welcome innovations, like hot chai at three o'clock.
13:08As well as doing a brisk business with passing tourists, the masons working in these yards are kept busy, supplying sculptures to temples all over the world, from Neasden to Nairobi.
13:34These stone images would be used in temple shrines, like this small rock-cut building nearby, which takes its inspiration straight from the ratas on the beach.
13:47It consists of nothing more than the shrine chamber itself, and a narrow veranda for worshippers.
13:54So this temple has actually been consecrated with an image of Garnish, and people are clearly leaving prayers and lighting lamps.
14:02Garnish is Shiva's oldest son, and as ever, there are many versions of his story.
14:10The most common tells how Parvati gave birth to a boy while Shiva was on his travels.
14:17She went to wash herself and told her son not to admit any man to the house while she did so.
14:22Shiva returned and found his way barred by the youth and in a rage beheaded him.
14:27Parvati emerged and revealed the identity of the boy, and a remorseful Shiva brought him back to life, replacing his head with one from a passing elephant.
14:39Family fidelity was restored.
14:41As any Bollywood film-goer will tell you, the Indians love a good yarn.
14:49This passion for storytelling is extravagantly indulged at Mahabalipuram's greatest treasure, the low-relief carving known as the Descent of the Ganges.
14:59Carved in the early 7th century at the same time as the Rathas, this exuberant panorama is packed with life, spilling down the faces of two monolithic boulders some 43 feet high.
15:11As far as storytelling in stone goes, this is pretty hard to beat, but it's also an example of inspired planning.
15:20The sculptors have adapted a natural cleft in the rock to represent the story of the Ganges, whose life-giving waters are so central to the Hindu worldview.
15:29So what are we being shown?
15:33Well, the simple version is that the mythical sage Bhagiratha is entreating Shiva to bring the celestial river Ganga to earth.
15:41The gods are rushing to the banks to see this miracle, and all the creatures of creation are watching in admiration, including a family of life-sized elephants.
15:49It's full of beautifully observed details and comic illusion. Bhagiratha is shown as a sadhu, a holy man, balanced on one leg, but his holiness is somewhat undermined when we see his pose imitated lower down by a cat.
16:06For Hindus, Ganga is personified as a goddess, flowing down from a far away source high in the Himalayas to water the plains of India.
16:15So powerful was her force that Shiva had to break her descent by extending his matted locks, lest she flood the earth, and thus you see the union of male and female forces.
16:29A more complex alternative is that this is an episode from the early Hindu epic tale, the Mahaparatha.
16:35The holy man is in fact a character called Arjuna, standing on one leg as a penance in the hope that Shiva will grant him an invincible weapon to destroy his enemies.
16:47We don't know which of these two narratives the original artists had in mind, but both resist complete explanation with equal stubbornness.
16:55What we are seeing here is an early example of the taste for complex ornament, and this seething mass of deities will eventually become a staple of temple decoration.
17:05Lots of people find Hinduism confusing because of the multiplicity of gods and goddesses, but amid this profusion of deities lies a very simple idea.
17:17These characters are all different aspects of one ultimate energy, which is beyond name and form.
17:23So at its core, Hinduism is actually a monotheistic religion.
17:30For the Palafas, their greatest moment was the construction of the Shaw Temple, a landmark not just for their own progress as masons, but for the development of the nascent Hindu faith.
17:42The Shaw Temple marked a significant move towards building on a monumental scale.
17:47Whether it was an architectural masterpiece or a simple carving on the back wall of a cave, at the heart of any Hindu devotional building is the shrine.
17:59The small sacred space where the devotee experiences Garshan, the presence of the divine.
18:07As these buildings grew in size, it became common to mark the presence of the central shrine with an elaborately carved tower known as the Vimana,
18:15which stands as a marker very visibly proclaiming the temple's location to the faithful.
18:24Though this building is a freestanding structure, the way the rock is carved harks back to the Rathas.
18:30It is not made of regular stone blocks and mortar, but huge sections of precisely shaped granite.
18:36This temple, which has stood here for twelve centuries, is only held together by the weight of its component parts and a complex system of load distribution.
18:48Time has proved this to be perfectly sufficient to withstand the elements.
18:54The 2004 tsunami hit this coast with considerable force, but the building survived.
18:59The Shaw temple shows just how far early Hinduism had come by the eighth century.
19:07But there was plenty of opposition for the hearts and minds of the people.
19:10What was needed was a big marketing push to advertise its advantages, and that is exactly what it got.
19:22It's too simplistic to suggest that Hinduism was just a more attractive religious experience than the Buddhist or Jain alternatives.
19:29But both these faiths demanded rather a lot from their adherence.
19:35This is the sculpture of the Buddha during the six years he spent fasting.
19:40After this extensive road test, even he acknowledged that this was not the way to attain enlightenment.
19:46But here in Tamil Nadu there was a group of characters who found just the right sales pitch for Hinduism.
19:54A set of holy men called the Nyanmas, or the Hounds of Shiva.
19:59Between the seventh and the ninth centuries, this pantheon of 63 mystics and philosophers, also known as the Tamil saints, promoted a new kind of devotional Hinduism.
20:11They're renowned because they travelled through the Tamil country singing the praises of the god Shiva in the most extravagant and wonderful way.
20:23Their poetry today is still, even in translation, is intoxicating.
20:28Yes, it's quite wonderful.
20:30And why are they so keen on Shiva?
20:32Well, it's obvious, isn't it?
20:34He is about power, he is both the creator of life and of the cosmos, and he is also the destroyer.
20:43And he is totally different in that respect from Vishnu, who sits in the middle, who is the ideal husband, the ideal king, the lord of settled society.
20:57Shiva is very often dynamic and at the extremes.
21:01So he was very seductive?
21:04Yes, if you're interested in an exciting life.
21:07Yes.
21:09Life was getting exciting for these Hindu revolutionaries.
21:13Their teaching was beginning to win a sizeable following.
21:16While Europe was groping through the dark ages, in India, Hinduism was moving slowly towards the light.
21:23The hymns written by the saints were central to their success.
21:34The Nyanmas are said to have sung the Buddhists out of India, and their songs are still sung in the temples today.
21:40The Nyanmas offered a path to salvation that was open to all.
21:51Their great attraction that they shared with Islamic Sufism, which was developing around the same time in northern India, was that a personal expression of devotion was a way to become one with the divine.
22:03Many of the rituals associated with Hinduism today, such as the chanting of the names of the deities and pilgrimages to holy sites, were established by the Nyanmas.
22:16But in a practical sense, the goal was also to give Hinduism a popular face.
22:23The fantastic array of gods meant that everyone could find their own personal deity and set them to work on behalf of their soul.
22:31What they were striving for was a structure for Hinduism, a way to formalize and codify its disparate rituals, to give it order and therefore authority.
22:43And to do that, they needed to write it all down.
22:49Hinduism is not a religion of the book.
22:52There is no central source of authority, like the Bible or the Koran, to refer to, to promulgate the absolute word of God.
23:00But that doesn't mean there is any shortage of scripture.
23:04The whole canon of Hindu philosophy thrives on debate and spiritual inquiry, much of it delightfully contradictory.
23:11If you try to collect it all together, it would fill a myriad libraries.
23:16What was added to this at the time of the Tamil saints was a far more rigorous set of instructions for the devotee, the Agamas.
23:25The Agamas are a set of rules to guide the Hindu devotee.
23:37They are incredibly wide ranging, offering advice on temple construction, on the intricacies of the guru-disciple relationship, on meditations on the nature of Lord Shiva, covering every moment of life, from waking to sleeping.
23:51How he should get up from bed, what he should see, what he should think, immediately waking up.
24:01From that onwards till he goes to sleep in the night, midnight, all are codified.
24:06This is the library of the French Institute in Puducherry, where 8,000 bundles of palm leaves have been collected, on which the Agamas are inscribed.
24:17And how did they do the writing?
24:20Writing, this is one of the most widely used stylus, sharp-edged iron one. It is held in this fashion.
24:31The palm leaf is scratched by the stylus, and then soot is rubbed onto the surface where it bonds with the sap, to leave the finely intricate script.
24:41Once state-of-the-art technology, the palm leaf manuscripts were painstakingly recopied every hundred years or so to preserve them.
24:51But these copies lead a pampered life, stored in an air-conditioned library, and are regularly painted with lemongrass oil to maintain their subtleness and prevent them being eaten by insects.
25:03The Agamas originated in Tamil Nadu, and are written in the ancient Tamil language.
25:17Gata, Gata Gray, Gata Gray.
25:23All 8,000 bundles are now being translated, before being photographed and digitised, allowing them to be accessed online.
25:31The Agamas now gave Hinduism a formal structure that is still a keystone of its practice today.
25:49In the wake of this change, we begin to see a significant decline in the Buddhist presence in India.
25:55Buddhism, a faith that had once counted itself as the main religion of India, and had been successfully exported to China and across Asia, was now destined to disappear from the land where the Buddha had sat under a tree and attained enlightenment.
26:13Why this happened is still a matter of fierce debate.
26:18The two religions share many central beliefs, and there is some evidence to suggest that Hinduism simply absorbed many adherents of Buddhism by borrowing their ideas.
26:27There may have been some persecution, but there was no major conflict, just an increasingly rapid acceptance of the newly invigorated Hindu teaching.
26:37Towards the end of the 9th century, a new dynasty established itself in Tamil Nadu.
26:51From their origins on the banks of the Kaveri River, the Cholas quickly gained control of peninsular India and spread their influence into Sri Lanka,
27:02ultimately becoming the principal military, economic and cultural force in Southern Asia.
27:07Once established, they turned their attention to the glorification of their new capital, here at Tanjavur, and they certainly left an incredible legacy.
27:23The Chola dynasty produced many notable kings, but perhaps the greatest came to the throne at the end of the 11th century.
27:30Raja Raja Raja Chola was a rare combination of both empire builder and patron of the art, but perhaps his greatest legacy is as a builder, and this is his greatest triumph.
27:48This building was completed in 1010, so has not long since celebrated its thousandth birthday.
27:54It was started and completed in one continuous push during the lifetime of Raja Raja Chola, and in the immediate aftermath of the Hindu revolution sparked by the Tamil saints.
28:06It's 300 years since the shore temple at Mahabalipuram was built, but we can clearly see that a great leap forward has occurred.
28:14Its sheer size speaks of a building created for a dominant faith.
28:17Inscriptions in ancient Tamil tell us that Raja Raja Chola was instructed to build the temple in a dream, but the real inspiration was surely the architecture of power.
28:32It is of course dedicated to Shiva, and the message is clear.
28:37Raja Raja and Lord Shiva were two sides of the same coin.
28:41As a work of art, it established a distinctive Chola style, both in design and ornamentation, which was to last for the next few centuries.
28:51The multifaceted columns and their projecting square capitals were widely copied, but it was the height of the central tower over the shrine, the Vimana, and its monumental gateways, the Gopurans, that were its greatest innovations.
29:07The temple Gopurans that Raja Raja built were more opulently embellished and on a far grander scale than had been attempted before.
29:18In the flat Tamil landscape, these mighty stone doorways came to dominate the view, announcing the presence of this colossal building.
29:27So we're entering through the great stone Gopurans of Raja Raja.
29:32Dr. Nagaswami was formerly the director of the Archaeological Survey of India, and took a particular interest in this building.
29:41He probably knows more about its construction than Raja Raja Chola ever did, starting with the very first mark-a-peg the builders set in the earth.
29:49When the sun rises, the shadow will be thrown on the western side, that will be marked. And then, on the same day, when the sun sets, they draw the central line, exact central line.
30:05This central axis is the basis of the sacred geometry of the temple. Along this line, the location of the main shrine is determined. And this point, directly below the finial on the central tower, the Vimana, becomes the focus from which the entire complex is plotted.
30:22Now, in this plan, you see the central Vimana, or the main tower, and the inner sanctum. Now, this is exactly in the centre of this outer square.
30:41Sure.
30:42This outer square, which we call the back square, is the original cosmic diagram on which it is laid out, and then that is doubled.
30:55In many ways, Raja Raja Chola was only doing what had been done before, on a monumental scale. The Vimana is only a few feet shorter than Westminster Abbey. But Raja Raja couldn't just do as he pleased here. He was bound by the rules laid down in the Arganas.
31:14They prescribe that you must first prepare the measuring scale.
31:19So what are the measurements of this based on?
31:22The central finger of the builder, Raja Raja Chola.
31:27I imagine it would take quite a few multiples of Raja Raja's middle finger to reach 216 feet to the top of the Vimana here. But he seemed to have had his finger in every aspect of the temple.
31:39This inscription which says that the King Raja Raja covered the entire tall Vimana at the back with gold. Tower is called Mahamiru.
31:53Mahamiru means the golden mountain beyond Himalaya, which is a mythical mountain.
31:59Sure.
32:00And, but that was the place where Shiva used to reside.
32:04Yeah, Shiva's mountain abode.
32:07The inscriptions are extraordinarily comprehensive. Just like the Tamil saints who preceded him, Raja Raja was codifying Hinduism, recording the operational practices of his temple.
32:19Every detail, who is responsible, how much money was given, for what purpose, and then he says at the end, that so long as the sun and the moon last, this gift must be protected.
32:37The rules of temple architecture, which are laid down in the Agamas, were followed by Raja Raja Chola when he came to build this temple.
32:45But though he was a man of refined aesthetic taste, he was also an able administrator.
32:49Raja Raja created a multi-layered system of government in which the temple was the central authority and the largest employer, with a vast permanent workforce that included priests, ceremonial officers, financiers, maintenance teams, cooks and kitchen staff, but also the most talented youngsters in the arts of poetry, singing and dance.
33:15The temple dancers were apprenticed at an early age, and usually for life. The disciplines of classical Hindu dance came from a 2,000-year-old work called the Natya Shastra, and remarkably, it is still being taught today.
33:38Classical dance is a comprehensive study. It is not only the movement of your body, it is a total union of all your senses, your body, mind and soul.
33:52One obvious way in which these skills are still evident in modern Indian culture is in the dance routines of Bollywood films.
34:08But the complex vocabulary of gestures that these students are learning has been refined over centuries.
34:13It kind of triggers your subtle emotions. In today's other art forms, which is more popular, like commercial art forms, there is no place for subtle emotions. Like, it is all very blatant and very strong. But here, you can see how subtle can be strong.
34:34We also need to have that divine connection for people who really believe in it. There are dancers who really believe in, you know, connecting it with the temple.
34:54It is very important that it goes beyond caste, creed, nationality, because ultimately, it's a language. Yeah, it has come out of the temples, but now it's a totally different scenario.
35:07We have festivals organized by the temple authorities, where dancers are invited to dance in the temple pressings.
35:14Classical dance is one aspect of temple culture that has found its way into mainstream Indian life, and is now invited back inside the temples to participate.
35:24Again, in the sacred rituals that originally inspired it.
35:29Beyond its function as a community center, workplace and school, the primary purpose of a temple is spiritual.
35:37And right at its center is the shrine of the main deity, where the devotees come to receive darshan.
35:47This is the root of circumambulation, and it leads us to a powerful image at the heart of Hinduism.
35:55We move from profane to sacred space as we approach the central shrine.
36:00In this most potent place is kept a phallic symbol, the lingam.
36:06The lingam is a smooth column of stone rising out of a circular base that represents the female.
36:12Here we have one in one of the side shrines, which shows the yoni, the female yoni, with Shiva rising as progenitor of the universe from the center of it.
36:23The lingam represents the presence of Shiva, and to gaze on it is to receive darshan.
36:28The room where it is kept is the direct descendant of the recess in the back of the cave that we saw back in Mahabalipuram.
36:37The surprise is that inside there is no embellishment, no grand design, no incredible ornamentation that you see on the exterior of the temple.
36:48Just a simple, potent space where the devotee can be one with the divine.
36:53Unlike a church, there's no congregation, there's no liturgy.
36:59Every temple has its own tradition, and everyone is on their own journey.
37:03The 9 miles concept of supreme personal devotion to a god like Shiva meant that you travel together on your journey through life.
37:15But even with Shiva's guidance, where your journey led you was largely up to you.
37:20Reincarnation is a central tenet of all the religions that originate in India,
37:26and your behavior during this life will determine how you return in the next.
37:30The intensely personal nature of Hinduism made it very attractive to people of different needs and aspirations.
37:40Each chose their own journey and selected the gods from whom they would seek guidance.
37:45The object of the journey was to accrue good karma, behavioral brownie points,
37:51and to ultimately obtain release from the endless cycle of birth and rebirth.
37:56In pursuit of that supreme challenge, we can see how the form of this remarkable building evolved,
38:04channeling worshippers towards the central shrine and the presence of the divine.
38:10It's a long way from a forest clearing.
38:13By the time it was finished, the basic precepts of Hindu worship were set in stone.
38:17But though this building was the peak of Chola artistic achievement, their lasting legacy was not in granite at all.
38:25More than a thousand years ago, it was discovered that the sand in this particular bend of the Calvary River had a purity that was supremely good for bronze casting.
38:45It was in bronze that the Chola craftsmen established their artistic heritage, creating beautiful works of sculpture that are still being replicated today.
38:57Just like the stone masons in Mahabalipuram, the main subjects for the bronze sculptures made here are likenesses of the Hindu deities.
39:05Today the furnace is powered by this venerable old motor, which began its working life under the bonnet of an ambassador taxi.
39:17But in most other respects, nothing has changed here for a thousand years.
39:22The figures are made using an ingenious process called lost wax casting.
39:26And the first step is to make a wax version of the sculpture.
39:32The material in this heated basin is actually a mixture of beeswax and resin.
39:37And part of the skill is the constant warming of the wax while it is being worked.
39:42The team all have their own specialities and they develop extraordinary speed and dexterity.
39:48In fact, they make it look so simple, I thought I'd have a go.
39:52OK, let's go.
39:56Mine doesn't look like yours.
40:13Ah, then you get the fun.
40:16I have to admit I had a little bit of help.
40:21Now this is where the all-important mud comes in.
40:24The wax sculpture is encased in a mould made from Calvary River Sand, making sure all the details are retained.
40:33This is then allowed to dry out.
40:36Then for every mould we make two holes.
40:38Then after we put in the slanting portion and we cover it with the iron strings to become mould more strong.
40:45Then after we heat the mould, the wax should be lost here.
40:48Yeah.
40:49So we get the negative hollow inside the mould.
40:51Sure.
40:53In the furnace area, the moulds are gently cooking on a fire on one side of the room to drain away the wax,
41:00while the bronze is being brought up to temperature in the fire pit.
41:03Trusting only in the protection of their cotton lungis, the team begin to pour the metal.
41:08There's something incredibly captivating and primordial about this fire and also the way all these men work together.
41:18Even after the moulds have cooled and are broken open, there's still plenty to do cleaning up the figure's rough edges.
41:31But the end result makes it all worthwhile.
41:33This is magnificent. Look at this.
41:38And this is also make out of one mould.
41:41Yeah, this is about 800 kilos.
41:43Like the stone Shiva Lingam in the temple shrine, this is another manifestation of Shiva.
41:50Known as the Nataraja, this is an avatar.
41:53Originally a Hindu word for an incarnation of the deity when they descend to the earth.
41:58In this form, Shiva is the cosmic dancer creating the universe while stamping down the dwarf of ignorance.
42:07This is the cycle of time.
42:09Exactly. We call universe.
42:11Yeah.
42:12And this is the fire circle we call also, and this is dancing in the fire circle.
42:15So how do you achieve this kind of balance?
42:18In the wax itself, we make the measurement.
42:20Even though the circle is also come and die, everything is making a single mould.
42:23So you create the whole figure in wax?
42:24In wax, exactly.
42:25So part of preserving the tradition is not just preserving the product but also the process.
42:33Exactly, exactly.
42:35These bronze deities are made in every size, from the largest temple figures to the smallest domestic gods for a bedroom shrine.
42:44The material allows for a fluidity of movement, softer expressions and gestures, communicating messages of benevolence and forgiveness.
42:53And the more beautiful and refined the bronze god is, the more likely the spirit of the real deity is to inhabit the sculpture.
43:01The other great advantage to a sculpture cast in bronze, as opposed to stone, was that it was portable.
43:14For centuries, the stone gods in the temple shrines were a fixed and immovable presence, drawing the faithful to Darsha.
43:21But the advent of portable bronze figures meant that the deities could leave their shrines.
43:27This is Madurai, one of the great temple cities of South India, and the figure on the palanquin is once again Shiva.
43:37He's been taking on a nightly excursion around the temple, and this ceremony shows how devotional practices changed in the period after the Tamil saints.
43:45The bronze statue of Shiva is hidden from our view, behind the curtains, but for the priests carrying him, he is very real.
44:00He's been taken to spend the night with his consort, Parvati, known here by the name of one of her avatars, Minakshi, and the tryst will take place in her shrine.
44:12These golden footprints represent Shiva descending from his palanquin to enter Minakshi's shrine.
44:20The local legend tells us that Shiva and Minakshi were married in Madurai in a ceremony performed by Vishnu.
44:27And after a long and happy life together as rulers of the town, they assumed divine form and she became the deity of this temple.
44:34There may seem to be an element of mystical pantomime here, an elaborate mask in which the divine couple make out behind closed doors.
44:46But their mortal followers are being shown an activity that they can relate to their own lives.
44:51The veil of illusion becomes translucent.
44:55The marriage of Shiva and Minakshi is consummated anew every night, and at dawn, Shiva slips away back to his own shrine.
45:05Madurai is in the deep south of Tamil Nadu.
45:10It's over 2,500 years old and was mentioned by Greek travelers when the paint was still wet on the Parthenon.
45:18The sprawling complex of halls and courtyards that make up its labyrinthine temple cover an area the size of 25 football pitches, and it has no less than 14 Gopurans.
45:29The Gopura came into its own at the great temple of Madurai, and it was here that it became a defining feature of temple architecture of the south.
45:42The Vimana underwent a corresponding shrinking process and was now barely visible from the ground level.
45:48The other very visible feature is the colorful riot of sculpture on the towers.
45:54These plaster figures proclaim to the faithful just what an army of deities are working away on behalf of their soul.
46:00But the lurid choice of colors is a fairly recent addition.
46:07The custodians of the temple, the priestly class who manage the building and its day-to-day affairs, are Brahmins, the top rung of the Indian caste system.
46:15At the opposite end of the spectrum are untouchables, not considered worthy to enter the temple shrine, but they too need an opportunity to experience darshan.
46:26The city of Madurai developed according to a division of labor, and the model on which it's based is said to be like the unfurling petals of a lotus flower, and at its center is the temple where the Brahmins officiate.
46:41In the surrounding streets, the warrior caste, or the Kshatriya, are found, and the next layer is for merchants or landowners, known as the Vaishya.
46:51In the outlying districts live the Sudra, commoners or peasants, and on the fringes of the city are those without a caste.
46:59There are 160 Brahmin priests working at this temple, and it is through their good offices that access to the main shrine is regulated.
47:07In theory, they minister to all without fear or favor.
47:12Rich, poor, able, disabled, there is no discrimination among the people to worship those who are coming as a duty.
47:28Things get slightly uncomfortable when it comes to equal access to all areas.
47:32How about people who want to go to the inner sanctum? Can anybody go?
47:37Not anybody, because we are the medium for them, you know.
47:41So you're saying there's a system here?
47:42There's a system, the principle. All cannot easily go, you know.
47:46For the untouchables who are not permitted to enter the shrine, and for those who simply feel they can navigate life without the guiding hand of a Brahmin priest, there are alternatives.
47:58In a corner of the main temple courtyard, genuinely accessible to all, there is a small shrine to Garnish, the remover of obstacles, which is extremely busy.
48:11These worshippers are allowed to touch the deity, to make their own offerings, and to conduct their own personal rituals.
48:17But by doing so, they remain very much part of Hindu practices.
48:29Familiar religious images are now emerging from the temples and becoming part of mainstream Indian life.
48:36A process that began with the advent of cheap colour printing in the late 19th century.
48:40The painter, Raja Ravi Varma, became hugely popular by portraying the deities in a contemporary Western style using oil paint.
48:52The performance artist Pushpa Mala has recreated his familiar image of the goddess Lakshmi, casting herself as the deity.
49:01Lakshmi, of course, is the goddess of wealth.
49:03But Ravi Varma also created this kind of fair-skinned, aristocratic, ideal Indian woman.
49:11Pushpa Mala has also made work based on a series of photographs taken by British ethnographers in the 19th century,
49:19that sought to categorise the races of India.
49:22These images, being regarded as scientific, are not concerned to disguise the darker skin of their subjects.
49:28In fact, the Andamanese Islander picture comes from a very famous study, and they were doing it in all the colonies.
49:35And that was in a sense to, you know, control and understand.
49:39So that was to kind of really, you know, get a grasp on the world, which was rapidly sort of expanding.
49:45In fact, the term Hindu only came into widespread use during the British Raj,
49:51and these religious and ethnic classifications certainly contributed to the rigidity of the Indian caste system.
49:59But once these religious stratifications had been formulated, they became a welcome badge for those they labelled.
50:07The temple is still the focus for the religious life of Hindu communities.
50:11But the younger generation are growing up in a country where their government now wears this religious badge,
50:18and religion is more present in everyday culture than ever.
50:22The intensely expressive sculptures that adorn the temple Gokurams have now appeared in a new guise.
50:28Hindu legends are retold in comic book form, and these graphic novels have become immensely popular.
50:34But for a group of young comic book enthusiasts working in a small apartment,
50:41these homegrown efforts retelling the familiar stories of Shiva need a bit of updating.
50:47Here's their take on the marriage of Shiva and Manakshi that inspired the night ceremony in Madurai.
50:54But the scene has now become a mashup of Gotham City and Middle-earth.
50:59I used to read comics, you know, Superman, Batman.
51:03I loved the graphics in those comics.
51:06Then I read a few comics from Indian publishing houses.
51:09The stories were good, but the graphics were a little bit obsolete, basically.
51:13I mean, I used to see Marvel and I used to see the difference.
51:17So I said, why not bring these three together,
51:21that I have graphics which are universal,
51:23and bring in stories which touch our Hindu legends,
51:28and bring in the art of narration from Tolkien,
51:32and make graphic novels with these three elements.
51:36Although the style of the graphics and the narration are new,
51:39for a true Hindu there is very little room for innovation when it comes to the stories.
51:43It doesn't make any sense to deviate, because if the story is there, existed,
51:49a lot of people, especially the young ones, or the youth of today,
51:53or the Y generation, whatever you may call it, in our country and abroad,
51:56don't know much about the story.
51:58And the story itself is so interesting.
52:02Why do you want to deviate and rock the boat?
52:03As keen as these guys are on sticking to the authentic stories,
52:08they have some interesting ideas about Hinduism.
52:11Hindu was never a religion, I believe.
52:14This is my personal view. It is a culture.
52:16It was a way of living.
52:18All of the answers are there in the past.
52:21You know, children from all ages look at the graphic novel and get attracted.
52:25Wow, this is such appealing art, I love it, it's so awesome, it's so cool.
52:29Okay, then he starts to read and in that whole process he understands the story.
52:35That's where we come in.
52:41However adroit Hinduism is at adapting itself to the modern world,
52:46Hindu philosophy is still difficult to reconcile with Western notions of religious experience.
52:52One of the most fundamental disconnects between Eastern and Western thought
52:56is represented by Shiva Nataraja and his Ring of Fire.
53:01Time is cyclical and all opposites are reconciled in Shiva.
53:06Today, in many fields, India is leading global technological progress.
53:12So how does it reconcile scientific advances with ancient myths and legends?
53:18Victorian Christianity was severely tested by the theories of scientists like Charles Darwin.
53:23And many evangelical Christians still cannot accept the scientific truth of evolution.
53:29Hinduism, it seems, has no such issues.
53:33Outside the CERN Particle Research Centre in Geneva, Shiva Nataraja,
53:39donated by the Indian government, celebrates the involvement of many Indian tech companies in the project.
53:44Whether you call it the Large Hadron Collider or Shiva Nataraja,
53:50the fact that the origins of the universe lie in a ring of cosmic energy
53:54is just confirmation of something Hindus already knew.
53:58What took science so long to catch up?
54:01Does being a Hindu allow a certain freedom of inquiry?
54:05It does, because I can be a Hindu without having to subscribe to a particular God,
54:15to a particular book, or to a particular religious practice.
54:19Which means that I can be completely independent, I can have my own view of the world,
54:25I can have my own view of the universe, and I can accommodate different views from different systems,
54:34and synthesize them in my mind.
54:36For a Hindu, the Black Water, the Indus River, or the Indian Ocean,
54:44mark the boundaries of their homeland.
54:47In the days before mass travel to cross the Black Water and leave India,
54:52was to cease to be a Hindu, and the rise of Hindu nationalism has reinforced the idea
54:58that to be Indian is to be Hindu, and vice versa.
55:01But Hindu nationalism is directly at odds with its inclusive tradition,
55:07and as India emerges as a major economic force at the forefront of globalization,
55:12the role of Hinduism in its society is becoming incendiary.
55:21It's total chaos here, and this is the festival of Gartigai Deepan,
55:25and since we're in the Tamil heartland of southern India,
55:27we have yet another festival which celebrates the multifaceted Shiva.
55:32The central story tells how in a moment of celestial competitiveness,
55:37Shiva appeared to Vishnu and Brahma as an endless flame of light,
55:42and challenged them to find his head and his feet.
55:46To cut a long story short, and it is a long story,
55:49they fail, and Shiva remains supreme.
55:52Like so many other elements of Hinduism, this festival offers the devotee a bewildering array of choices.
55:59The basic tale has become freighted with other cargo,
56:02competing traditions that obscure the central meaning with excess baggage.
56:07In one tradition, the oil lamps ward off evil forces and bring prosperity and joy.
56:13In another, the relationship of brothers and sisters is remembered,
56:17and siblings exchange gifts.
56:18Yet another tale is the alignment of six stars at this point in the year,
56:24said to represent the six faces of Murugan, the Hindu god of war.
56:29The complexity that results from this amalgamation of myth and celebration,
56:36makes it impossible to give a simple answer to the question,
56:40what is this festival for?
56:41Perhaps there is no answer, and perhaps there doesn't need to be one.
56:47It means something different to each person.
56:50Everyone can enjoy it together.
56:52And in this simple fact lies the secret to hindurs in success.
56:55The temples are as busy as they have ever been, and as their traditions spill out into mainstream Indian life once more,
57:08their devotees are still seeking answers to questions that are eternal.
57:11The many different religions that have vied for the souls of the faithful over the centuries have left a rich legacy in these lands.
57:23The haunting relics of the Buddhist culture are now just ruins,
57:27but their beautiful devotional art reminds us of their remarkable achievements.
57:32The great mosques and mausoleums of the Mughal conquests are architectural masterpieces venerated around the world,
57:42and the skill of their painters and their musical heritage are as cherished today as they have always been.
57:485,000 years ago, when the first great urban settlements grew up on the banks of the Indus River,
57:55the citizens had to devise ways of living together in some of the world's first cities,
58:01and they face similar problems now.
58:03But as we know, in the Hindu worldview, time is cyclical, not linear.
58:08The cities of these lands today had to find new strategies to support vast populations,
58:15but they have a genius for coping with immense challenges.
58:20And as they strive towards solutions, it's perhaps some comfort to know that they've been here before.
58:26In the West, time marches on, but here, what goes around, comes around.
58:38A documentary musical tells the story of India herself, here on BBC4,
58:43from the heart of one of her most deprived areas.
58:46We spend a year at Mumbai High, next.
58:48It's about Roberto, 건ami fridge.
58:49Good night.
58:50Beyond in Mac.
58:51Anyway.
58:56You can find a way in that case that you onu watch any old times.
58:59You can participate all the cons to the world and behind me
59:01in the backyard.
59:02It is nice telling you.
59:07There won't�� us down at any of the worlds,
59:09but there is nothing like when it's demonstrated.
59:13Whatever day is, we have one degree paddle over you,
59:14and you can freely tap your totalement prey next to one of the forecasts.
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