To the common eye,Ardhanarishvarais an androgynous form comprising half of male and half of female the biological unity of the outward duality. The Vedic seers saw it as the unity of aprana and saprana matter and life, which they called the Golden Egg, wherein two merged into oneness, and the one split to become more. Thus, the Vedic seers saw Ardhanarishvara as the cosmic seed, which comprised both, the pistil and the anther, pita and mata father and mother, bhuta and prana matter and spirit, and prakriti and purusha outward nature and enlivening spirit, and propounded the metaphysics of procreation. They asserted that the single one could not effect creation, and so the two, unless they merged into inseparable oneness. The creation might only be effected when the fusion was absolute not only of the male and female but also of their act, which the seers identified as copulation, for in copulation alone, the maleness and the femaleness of the agents vanished. Ardhanarishvara form is sometimes interpreted as combining half male, who isShiva, and half female, who isParvati.
