Mother divinity: River Sarasvati, Hindu civilization traditions and metaphors created by rishi-s and artisans
http://www.scribd.com/doc/3509029/sarasvatimetaphor
Mother divinity: River Sarasvati, Hindu civilization traditions and metaphors created by rishi-s and artisans
Hindu civilization has a unique metaphor: river as mother, river as divinity; vedic River Sarasvati as mother, as divinity. In many parts of India, the lingua franca phrase used for a river is: nayi maa, (mother river); in Ca_ran.a sahitya (the songs of bards) of Rajasthan and northern India, the word used for a river is amba_ ‘mother’, evoking the Rigvedic phrase ‘ambitame’ (best of rivers). Rigveda also refers to River Sarasvati in the following exquisite terms: sarasvati_ saptathi_ sindhuma_ta_ (Sarasvati, the seventh, the mother river). The artisans of the civilization which was nurtured on the banks of the river depicted their life-activity of smithy through many metaphors derived from mleccha (meluhha) lingua franca in a linguistic area. A river is also depicted as a kumbha ‘sacred pot’ as in kumbhamela held every 12 years in a confluence of Ganga, Yamuna and Sarasvati rivers at Prayag.
A metaphor for Sarasvati river is kumbha...
Read on...
Mother divinity: River Sarasvati, Hindu civilization traditions and metaphors created by rishi-s and artisans
Hindu civilization has a unique metaphor: river as mother, river as divinity; vedic River Sarasvati as mother, as divinity. In many parts of India, the lingua franca phrase used for a river is: nayi maa, (mother river); in Ca_ran.a sahitya (the songs of bards) of Rajasthan and northern India, the word used for a river is amba_ ‘mother’, evoking the Rigvedic phrase ‘ambitame’ (best of rivers). Rigveda also refers to River Sarasvati in the following exquisite terms: sarasvati_ saptathi_ sindhuma_ta_ (Sarasvati, the seventh, the mother river). The artisans of the civilization which was nurtured on the banks of the river depicted their life-activity of smithy through many metaphors derived from mleccha (meluhha) lingua franca in a linguistic area. A river is also depicted as a kumbha ‘sacred pot’ as in kumbhamela held every 12 years in a confluence of Ganga, Yamuna and Sarasvati rivers at Prayag.
A metaphor for Sarasvati river is kumbha...
Read on...
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