Ganesha and the 7 Unanswered Questions

 

Devi Parvati wanted to have someone very powerful who could guard the gates of private place where she used to have bath so that Shiva could not barge inside.

For this she created a being from the dirt of her body, instills life in him and the boy named Ganesha was born.

Ganesha like an obedient child follows his mothers order to not allow Shiva from entering her place unless she asks him to do so. When Shiva arrives from kailasha to see his wife, Ganesha successfully prevented Shiva from crossing the gates. This angers Shiva so much that he beheads his own son. It infuriates Parvati to an extent that she threatens to destroy the whole creation. To avoid this Shiva orders for an animal’s head which is found first and is north facing so that it could be placed on Ganesha’s lifeless body to bring him back to life.

After Elephant headed Ganesha is brought back to life, he is blessed to be the first among all the divine beings (Ganas) and no worship should start without first offering prayer to him.

 

Have we ever wondered what does this entire story mean?

Or we just take it as a mythological tale with no logical background to it.

Or is it an encrypted tale which holds in it the secret of creation.

I think we need to find answers to following questions to start our quest in this mystery -

Why in first place Parvati wanted privacy from Shiva? He was her husband after all and till now she had no problem allowing him in.

Why does she not give birth to a child by means of love making? Why to create someone from the dirt of your body?

Why was Shiva in such a hurry to meet Parvati that he could not wait for her to finish bath and come out?

If Shiva is the divine consciousness why and how could he be angry? Same holds true for Parvati as well, why and how could anger grip her if she is a divine mother? They are supposed to overcome anger!

Why to bring Ganesha back to life? Could he not have been recreated by Parvati?

Why Ganesha’s head got replaced with elephants head only, why not with some other animal?

Why Ganesha was given the title to be the first among all divine beings?

The answers to all these questions lie in the complete story which has been narrated below- 

 

One day when Shiva and Parvati were in Arda-Nareshwar form, Parvati part of them got an urge to start creation.

She desired to get separated from Shiva, whereas Shiva was still in deep state of meditation.

Parvati took an independent form and started moving down from kailasha to cover the whole universe with her creation.

Initially she created highly divine beings. But as she kept moving further away from meditating Shiva she started creating semi divine beings till she went so far that her body started getting covered by dirt of Maya. 

This prompted her to take bath. When she started removing dirt from her body she realized that this dirt is also her own creation. So she thought why to waste it and decided to create something with this dirt.

She gave her collected dirt the shape of a boy and instilled life into it. This boy she names Ganesha.

Devi Parvati got too excited to see her creations as Maya that she thought if Shiva comes to see her, this dirt of Maya would get destroyed with the Gyana Agni of Shiva.

One of the attributes of Maya is Moh. She started developing Moh with her creations now.

This made her to ask Ganesha to guard the gates of her Snana Kaksha, which was a dark cave, so that Shiva does not disturb her Moh.

Back there at kailasha as Shiva lost touch with her Divine counterpart his Meditative state ended and he decided to go and search for Parvati.

After covering the whole length of Universe, when Shiva located that Snana Kaksha he desperately ran to meet her lost love.

But he was stopped by Ganesha. Shiva realized that this boy is also her creation like the beautiful beings she created whom he met on the way.

Shiva requested him to let him in but Ganesha was in no mood to disobey her mother’s orders.

All the divine and semi divine beings also requested Ganesha to let Shiva inside as he is his father.

All failed in convincing Ganesha. After all Ganesha was the first creation of Maya without any part of Shiva element. How could he recognize his divine father! He was devoid of Gyana. 

Shiva finally realize that the boy created by Parvati had a flaw. He lacked the intellect to distinguish as he was created in absence of divine wisdom. Similarly all the beings she was creating would also be devoid of divine light and this whole universe will go into pitch darkness.

To stop Parvati from further falling deep into her self-created loop of Maya and bring her back into divine form, Shiva decided to remove adamant Ganesha from the way.

As soon as Shiva removed Ganesha’s head from his body, the divine light of Shiva entered the privacy of Parvati.

This shook the whole place. Parvati who had become Maya got agitated like a child, who is abruptly woken up from his deep sleep. 

Anger which is an attribute of Maya engulfed Devi Parvati and she took a form of Kali and decided to end the whole creation.

All the divine and semi divine beings got so frightened that they requested Shiva to calm her down.

Shiva by now knew that Devi Parvati had completely transformed into Agyana. And if she is not pacified she could end this universe in rage.

Shiva decided to bring back Ganesha back to life by re-fixing his head. 

But he wanted to replace his head by someone who was also a creation of Maya but has divine wisdom or gyana of Shiva.

So Shiva started looking for an appropriate head to replace.

In his search Shiva came across an elephant that was both the creation of Maya and divine wisdom. 

It stuck Shiva that when he had decapitated Ganesha his light of wisdom had entered the cave of Parvati where she was creating a magnificent elephant at that moment. So that elephant was bestowed with blessing of both Shiva and Parvati.

Because that elephant was being made in a state of Agyana so had Asuri qualities and was named by Parvati as Gajasura.

On encountering Gajasura, Shiva asked for his head in exchange for a boon that he will forever live with him as his son.

Gajasura agreed on seeing his divine father and handed over his head to Shiva.

Shiva replaced Gajasura's head with Ganesha’s decapitated head.

This way Shiva Pacified the Parvati who was weeping in Moh of her child Ganesha.

Shiva realized that the creation till now was incomplete. The complete creation was only possible when a beings is born in Maya, goes through the pain of life and death, chooses to move towards the path of Gyana.

This way that being will have knowledge of both Gyana and Agayana and will be valued more than the Gods who only have the knowledge of Gyana and are always in bliss, never experience any pain. 

So Shiva asked Ganesha to again guard the cave of creation and only allow those beings to meet Parvati whose Shiva consciousness has awakened. Remove all obstacles from their way. 

Blessed him that "You will be the first one whom anyone will have to please and pray before getting eligible into entering the world of Sadhna".

This way the creation of mankind began.

We human beings have the choice to forever live in Maya but we also have the potential to rise above Gods by choosing the path of Sadhna whose gates are guarded by Lord Ganesha and will only be opened when he sees Shiva inside us getting awakened.

Om Namah Shivaya !!!