Simple Acts of Reverence, Durga and Her Festival

Durga Puja, the harvest festival in celebration of Goddess Durga begins the day after the new moon this week. Here is a piece from my book about my experience during Durga Puja in Kathmandu in 2000.

At the autumn equinox, the annual worship of Goddess Durga begins on the dark moon. For nine days and nights daily recitation of the Sri Sri Chandi text invokes Durga’s victory over demons that are destroying the precious equilibrium of the earth. The Chandi serves as a mythological guide demonstrating the immeasurable powers Durga embodies, which, from a tantric perspective, are inherent in each of us. The ritual re-enactment of this epic myth expresses a deep reverence for earth as Mother and honors the inseparable connection between divine and human existence.

On each morning of the nine day festival, Durga’s devotees go to one of the hundreds of Goddess temples in the Valley. They bathe in the river at a tirtha or sacred place of the Goddess to cleanse themselves of negative thoughts and emotions. Then, they collect sand from the river bank to place on their home shrine. On the first morning of the ritual, after the sand has been added to the family altar, a priest invokes the Goddess Durga into the seeds of the barley plant. The sprouts that will appear over the next nine days become symbolic of the sword Durga uses to cut away destructive forces.

On the first morning of the Durga festival in 2000, I dressed in red and went down to the river with several other women from the pilgrimage I was co-leading. We bought an offering plate of woven leaves filled with rice, red and yellow powder, oiled-wicks in ceramic cups, coconuts, flowers, especially marigolds; a favorite of Durga, rice, and ropes of incense. I soon became lost within this world. Beyond the bounds of time and space, immersed in the sacredness of every act, I found myself going from shrine to shrine as if I had done it hundreds of times before. All my senses were utilized: the act of darśan— seeing and being seen by the deity, touching their feet or foreheads, listening to chanting and bells ringing, the smell of incense and flowers floating through the air, and the taste of consecrated food.

Our small group followed the procession that wound throughout the temple complex. Inside the central gates there is an elaborate medieval pagoda style temple that houses an image of Durgā as Bhagawati. In this manifestation Her name refers to the creative power of women’s yonis or wombs/vulvas. This power does not necessarily manifest in a physical child for goddesses like Durga and many of her counterparts are, in fact, not biological mothers. Her power is the force of creativity in all its forms, but especially art, music, dance and literature.

To the right of Bhagawati’s temple, fifteen people were playing instruments and chanting to Devī under a roofed, but open-walled pavilion. The sounds of devotional music reverberated throughout the compound. We went down to the end of the line, which reached the riverbank. Women and men must wait in separate lines, and as is common in most religious rituals I have attended, the women outnumber the men two to one. A long line of vibrant red saris flowed through the temple. I entered the blood red stream and awaited my turn with Bhagawati.

In the main courtyard a group of Goddesses, the Nava Durgās, nine fierce manifestations of the Goddess Durga are carved into niches along the walls. Flowers and rice coated in blood and red vermillion paste carpeted the temple grounds. Sweet mystifying whiffs of incense filled the air. Red, orange, and yellow powder stained my fingers and was smeared on my face from brushing my hair back every time I knelt down to rest my head on a deity's smeared crimson feet. A vibrant array of colors and offerings were all over the ground and covered every deity and divine icon along the way.

Even though I am not Hindu, I was allowed inside the temple. The inner sanctum is dark, moist, and pungent with smells of the many offerings to Goddess. After placing my head on Bhagawati’s sticky red feet and giving Her my offerings and prayers, I went outside to light a butter lamp, burn incense, and ring a bell as a means of communicating with the Divine. Such gestures signal our devotion and reverence, as well as our acknowledgement of being in sacred space. I stood there in prayer for a few moments, then turned to see a middle-aged Nepalese woman warmly smiling at me. Her eyes met mine, “Jaya Mata, Victory to the Mother" she whispered to me as she touched my hand. Two women from different continents, worlds and languages apart from each other, and yet despite the superficial unfamiliarities we share, there is a deeper bond of love and devotion to Goddess. I have found unity, if even for a brief moment.
Jai Bhagawati Ma.