I have had a listener specifically request today’s story. So this week, we’re going to talk about dancing. And no, I am not accidentally reading a script from the wrong podcast.
The dance we’re talking about is an earth shattering one. Quite literally. It’s called the Tandav.
But this isnt a dance that anyone can perform. So dont expect to see it on “Dancing with the stars” or “Strictly come dancing” anytime soon. The only one who can perform it is Shiva, the destroyer in the holy trinity in Indian mythology.
There are two versions of this dance. There’s the happy one and the sad one. There isn’t much value in making a distinction between the two because both of these result in earthquakes.
Our story begins in a dark forest. Where a few dark rishis met for a dark purpose. Now if you have seen Star Wars or seen or read Harry Potter, you can easily imagine what Dark Rishis are. They are like the Sith or the Dark Jedi or like Death eaters. They use the dark side of the force. And their magic is generally pretty powerful magic. They can do things that ordinary rishis can’t. In this case that included terrorizing the villagers near the forest.
Three of the Dark Rishis were plotting their next move, chatting about what morally objectionable action to try next.
Dark Rishi 1 wanted to teleport food from the local bakery – they baked the most delicious cakes and he had a sweet tooth. Dark rishi 2 wanted to hide people’s stuff, you know car keys tv remotes. Dark rishi 3 wanted to rob the bank, but that wasn’t evil enough so he was voted down easily.
The villagers had absolutely no proof that their problems were caused by the dark rishis. Nevertheless they prayed to the gods to rescue them from the obviously evil dark rishis. And they made the right call in praying to Shiva the destroyer.
Shiva appeared before them right away. Very different situation from the individual people we have met before who had to wait 100s or 1000s of years for an audience. There is power in numbers!
Shiva appeared before them and said you know, I don’t know guys he said to the villagers. This is iffy. You want me to destroy the dark rishis just because you cant find your TV remotes and your car keys? Have you looked under the couch?
But the villagers had, and they were convinced that this was dark magic at work.
Fine, but it’s going to cost you extra. And I won’t destroy the dark rishis, I will bring them to the light. I know there’s still some good in them.
That was acceptable to the villagers who immediately began preparations for a temple on the spot.
Meanwhile Shiva disguised himself as a handsome beggar. Note that begging wasn’t nearly as bad a profession then as it is now. In fact there were highly sought after coaches who would teach you the right posture, the right begging bowl to pick and train your voice and tailor your begging techniques to the audience. Shiva needed none of the instructions of course. Being part of the whole trinity automatically gave you supreme knowledge. In his disguise Shiva walked around the forest casually stumbling upon each of the dark rishis huts….. conveniently at a time when the dark rishis were away cooking up new mischief. Shiva made quite the impression on the ladies, even in just the couple of minutes of their interaction of him holding out his bowl and a dark rishi wife pouring rice in it. So much so that when their husbands got home that evening they began nagging their respective husbands to try and switch to the begging profession. Its noble work said one wife. Its easy work said another. And we won’t have to eat cakes all the time. Said the third.
This went on for a while, with the stranger visiting the wives daily for food.
This is unacceptable said a dark rishi later when the three rishis got together to discuss their problems.
This beggar stranger who’s been visiting is a bad influence. Pretty soon our wives will have independent thoughts, something we have long worked to suppress. We must act! They all agreed.
Dark rishi 1 said, it’s my turn. Dark rishi 3 got to put sand in the villagers’ dinner last night, so I am up next at the bat.
He thought for a moment and then laughed an evil laugh. “Oh yes,” he said “black mamba from africa, Taipans from Australia, some local Cobras and some rattlesnakes should do the trick”. He waved his wand and magically an angry set of snakes appeared in a bag. He magicked the bag of hissing and spitting snakes towards the part of the forest that the stranger was in. Even the other two dark rishis looked at each other nervous. And not just because of the ecological effects of introducing an invasive non native predator. They were worried their colleague had tipped over the edge.
Next morning dark rishi 1 decided to go see the results of his hardworking! As he approached the stranger on the ground he was surprised when the stranger woke up with a smile and good morning-ed him.
Oh, hey hi. Said the rishi awkwardly I am your new neighbor.
The stranger replied – then, you must be the one who left those nice belts and necklaces for me last night. I loved your gifts thank you!
With horror the dark rishi realized the strangers belt was wiggling. It was the black mamba! The Taipan and the rattlesnake were around the stranger’s neck! This was too much for the dark rishi, he ran away in a fright.
Dark rishi 2 decided to try next. This time he sent a ferocious lion, but the next morning the stranger thanked him for the comfortable lion hide blanket, though he had to kill the lion and skin it and make the blanket himself.
Dark rishi 3 tried with an angry elephant but the stranger merely ended up with a nice ivory decorations for his hat. Made him look like a viking and everything.
Frustrated and itching for revenge, the dark rishis tried to do something different. They would work together to create something- a demon who personified ignorance and arrogance and the ego because the way to defeat a strong opponent is obviously to make them ignorant, arrogant and overconfident.
Obviously that wasn’t going to work on Shiva. The demon Apasmara walked towards the handsome beggar. And the beggar suddenly wanted to dance. He snapped his fingers and suddenly there were disco lights everywhere. As Shiva started dancing in one move he casually hopped on Apasmara. That bound Apasmara to the ground. The reasoning of course is that ignorance and arrogance must be crushed underfoot to keep it in check. Otherwise it has the potential to crush you.
When they saw the dancing Shiva, the dark rishis realized who he was. Given that Shiva has the title of “the destroyer” it’s easy to see why the rishis were eager to not displease him. They swore off any mischief and promised to use their power for good.
Notes
The villagers did finish making the temple. It still stands today. In Chidambaram. And the idol in it was obviously going to be that of Natraj, a version of Shiva dancing on Apasmara. This image is quite widespread. It has visited the Russian space station Mir. There is also a statue at the LHC, which is the biggest machine and largest science experiment on Earth, located at C.E.R.N. in Geneva.
A physicist Fritjof Capra has famously compared Shiva’s dance – the Tandav with high energy astrophysics. Given my complete and eternal knowledge of everything I can say he is mostly right!
That’s all for now
Next Time
In the next mini-episode we’ll meet a character from the Mahabharat. He’s the son of Bheem the strongest of the Pandav brothers. His name literally means bald pot. Because his head was shaped like a pot and it was hairless. Way to get creative there.