Shri Devi (Buddhist Protector)
I find that something about the “wrathful deities” in Himalayan art compels my attention. In the displays at the Rubin Museum they are surrounded by serene Buddhas and peaceful bodhisattvas, by mandalas that invite contemplative study, and by portraits of sages, lamas, and saints. In those calm surroundings the fierce energy of these pissed-off divinities almost vibrate right off the walls. And since human existence does not consist only of tranquility and joy, they are a necessary and welcome counterbalance. They may be a bit more challenging to a viewer, but if one function of art is to help us organize and make sense of our existence, art that fails to take account of the darker aspects of that existence is necessarily lacking.
Among the paintings I liked at the Rubin, I have chosen to focus on the depiction of Shri Devi, Glorious Goddess and Wisdom Protector. I didn’t realize, at first glance, that the subject of the painting is a goddess. Her assertive posture, the flaming sword brandished on high, the fierce glare on her face, all said “warrior,” and in general, “warrior” indicates “male.” Closer examination of the painting, however, shows an exposed breast. But only one: the other breast is concealed behind the bowl she holds in one of her four hands, a bowl made of an upturned human skull.
Western religious art is short on powerful female figures, just as Judeo-Christian tradition usually places women in subservient positions. Oh sure, you’ve got Mary and a cluster of female saints, but for the most part they derive what power they wield from their ability to intercede with a powerful male god. Their power is not innate, but borrowed.
There are a few exceptions, of course, like Judith of the Old Testament. And there are some powerful females in the western religions that predated Christianity. There’s Hera with her
grudge against the Trojans because Paris awarded an apple to Aphrodite rather than to her. There’s Medusa with her petrifying coiffure. There’s the Morrigan of Irish mythology and Freyja of the Norse. But even among the ancients, the various pantheons are usually headed up by gods, not goddesses. And when you get to the monotheistic religions that have dominated Western civilization for the past couple of millennia, god is inevitably seen as male.
The forceful women refused to go away entirely, of course. Over the decades and centuries during which Christianity struggled to supplant more ancient belief systems, some of the ancient goddesses -- or at least their traits and symbols -- snuck into Christianity in disguise. The Madonna, for example, with the infant Jesus bears a strong resemblance to Isis with Horus at her breast, just as Brigid of Celtic myth became Saint Brigid of Irish Catholicism. But they have lost much of their intrinsic power as they lurk there in camouflage, and the gentler females seem to have been more successful in making the transition than their fiercer sisters.
Tibetan Buddhism, at least according to Wikipedia, has eight major deities, only one of whom is female, so perhaps the balance of power there is not really all that different. Still, that one is is Shri Devi, and here she is in this painting, with her halo of fire and her belt of severed heads, wielding her own power as surely as she wields that flaming sword. I can think of no equivalent figure in Western religious art. And yet she is also a protective deity, wrathful yes, but not pointlessly malevolent.
I knew nothing about the goddess when I was first drawn to the painting, to this depiction of female power, so I looked her up on line. I read the description of the painting in the Himalayan Art Resource, and I read the article on the goddess in Wikipedia. The two sources both described her as being a wrathful, protective deity, but they didn’t agree on exactly what she was responsible for protecting, wisdom in general or Tibet and the Dalai Lama. (She’s not been too successful in protecting Tibet from the Chinese, true, but then she does have her ankles chained, so there are obviously limitations to her power.)
When I had read the two descriptions that didn’t quite match, my first thought was that I should do a bit more research, that perhaps one of the descriptions was wrong, or that they could be reconciled in some way. Perhaps, for example, she was responsible for protecting the Dalai Lama because he was seen as a source of wisdom. I decided, however, against looking for more information. Maybe I’m just rationalizing my own laziness, but I decided I didn’t really need to know who Shri Devi was to a practitioner of Tibetan Buddhism. I wanted to relate to the painting, and to her, on my own terms. I wanted to see her as the goddess I would like her to be.
As an agnostic, I tend to assume that all divinities are projections of their believers’ wants and needs. I’m quite willing to accept the possibility that one or more divinities exist, but to me, he/she/it/they is/are unknown and unknowable. So I feel quite free to project onto Shri Devi the divinity I want, the goddess that I think twenty-first century America could use. And if she does exist, I suspect she won’t take offense. At least I hope not. This is not a lady I want to have mad at me.
I’d like to see her as, not only a protector, but also a grantor of wisdom. After all, even a goddess can’t protect what doesn’t exist, and god(dess) knows that today, more than ever, the world does not suffer from an oversupply of wisdom. It sometimes seems that the more information that’s out there, and the more efficient we become in disseminating it, the less we succeed in processing it into knowledge. Even when we do, the more knowledge we accumulate, the less wisdom we show in applying it. We could use some divine help dealing with the flood, and there’s precedent for such a divinity of wisdom being female, Minerva, Athena, or Sofia. (Athena was, in fact, sometimes depicted helmeted and armed, if not exactly as fierce as Shri Devi.)
I’d like to see my goddess as embodying female power to a worthy end, as being wrathful in the service of the wisdom she grants, ready to punish or destroy those who reject it or who try to twist it to serve their own ends. She doesn’t need to be a nurturing goddess because those who seek out and accept the wisdom she grants are able, as a consequence, to nurture themselves and
those around them. Such a goddess would be worthy of prayers and worship. And if I were to pray to such a goddess, my prayer might go something like this:
Oh Glorious Goddess, Wrathful Deity, Grantor and Protector of Wisdom, hear the prayers of an agnostic who would like to believe you are real.
Grant wisdom to our political leaders. Grant them the wisdom to realize that pissing off large segments of the world does not make us safer at home. Grant them the wisdom to devise and implement a fair tax system, along with a budget large enough to fulfill government’s responsibilities. Give them to understand that no amount of campaign contributions from oil companies can change the facts that global climate change is real and that we are causing it. Let them understand that the NRA has become a lobbying group for gun manufacturers who are more worried about their profit margins than about the safety of our citizens. It’s obvious, Shri Devi, that you gave the Founding Fathers the wisdom to call for the separation of church and state, so please grant those who now sit in their places the wisdom to realize what a good idea that was, and to support it.
And if our political leaders are too dense for your grant of wisdom to penetrate their thick heads, grant their constituents the wisdom to vote them out of office and replace them with wiser women and men.
Grant wisdom to our religious leaders. They need to accept that they should stay out of government. Grant them the wisdom to understand that they should not try to impose the prohibitions specific to their faith on people who don’t share it. Give them see that legalizing same-sex marriage has no effect whatsoever on the marriages of mixed-sex couples. Let them understand that clerics who abuse the power their position gives them, in any way whatsoever, are not to be tolerated, let alone sheltered.
And while we’re on the subject of religious wisdom, I’m sure you remember the Westboro Baptist Church, those idiots who believe in a Christian god who is every bit as wrathful as you, and who feel it’s their job to traipse around harassing the rest of us for not being as bigoted as they are. It would be great if you could get them to see the wisdom of a little tolerance. Failing that (I do realize your ankles are chained), maybe you could teach them to keep their hatefulness to themselves. But if, after all that, you still can’t convince them to go home and shut the hell up ... well, I’m not usually a violent person, but I notice you could fit a few more heads on that belt.
But we all, of course, could use a bit more of your wisdom. Grant wisdom to us all in cultural matters. Grant us the wisdom to eat less junk food, watch less TV, value our families, and recycle our trash. Give us the wisdom to ignore Rush Limbaugh, Donald Trump, and the Kardashians. Teach us to educate our children to think, not to take tests. Let our fashionable young women see the stupidity of stilts masquerading as high heels. Let our fashionable young men pull up their pants because I’m sick of looking at their underwear. Give my friends the wisdom to post fewer photos of kittens and puppies on Facebook. Grant the more conservative members of my book club the wisdom to realize that there’s an inherent contradiction in selecting Reading Lolita in Teheran while refusing to read Lolita because they think it’s “a dirty book.”
And I guess it wouldn’t hurt if you could grant me the wisdom to be less judgmental. (Except about politicians and the Westboro Baptist Church -- they deserve it.) Grant me the wisdom to see my own flaws, even if you can’t always grant me the wisdom, the self-discipline, and the energy to correct them.
And while I do understand that there’s a distinction between wisdom and knowledge, so I do realize that this isn’t exactly a part of your range of responsibilities, if you could grant me a little assistance in memorizing the conjugation of the passato remoto in Italian, well, I’d be eternally grateful. (Surely wisdom dictates that no language needs that many past tenses!)
So thank you, Great Goddess, for listening to my prayers. You, in your wisdom, will know which, if any, deserve to be granted. Thank you for all you do to keep our world from being even crazier than it already is. And have a nice day.