Religious & Spiritual Statue

Features

• This dharmic living is captured in the yogic posture of the figure, seated with a yoga pattam or yoga band tying both feet together. As Ayyappa is a Yogeeshwara by nature, the patta helps in maintaining the harivarasanam, or the posture of keeping both legs and the back firmly against the ground while having the spine erect at a right angle to the ground. The patta allows our supreme brahmachari here to maintain this meditative posture with ease (a similar depiction of the harivarasanam is seen in the Narasimha figure kept at the Cleveland Museum of Art). Another defining attribute of the image here is the right hands posture of chinmudra, with the three raised fingers denoting the vanquishment of ahankaram, maya, and fulfilment of karma. The joining of the index finger and the thumb is the symbolic union of the atman and the Brahman.
• It is in these fascinating symbolisms that we appreciate Ayyappans strict adherence to penance, celibacy, the path of dharmic righteousness, and yogic bhakti. The bronze image also details elaborate malas around the Lords neck (today, his devotees, especially at Sabarimala, wear garlands to signify the start of their 41-day strict penance and devotion to attain entry into the temple). Raised on a high circular plinth, we also see an elaborate halo topped by a kirtimukha.
• 12 INCH HEIGHT X 5 INCH WIDTH X 9.5 INCH DEPTH, 7.30 kg
• The opposite hand, the upper left, bears on its palm a tongue of flames. Fire is the element of destruction of the world. According to Hindu mythology at the end of the world, it will be fire that will be the instrument of annihilation. Thus in the balance of these two hands is illustrated a counterpoise of creation and destruction. Sound against flames, ceaselessness of production against an insatiate appetite of extermination. The second right hand is held in the abhaya pose (literally without fear) and so a gesture of protection, as an open palm is most likely to be interpreted. It depicts the god as a protector. The left leg is raised towards the right leg and reaches across it; the lower left hand is stretched across the body and points to the upraised left foot which represents release from the cycle of birth and death. Interestingly, the hand pointing to the uplifted foot is held in a pose imitative of the outstretched trunk of an elephant. In Sanskrit this is known as the 'gaja-hasta-mudra' (the posture of the elephant trunk), and is symbolic of Ganesha, Shiva's son, the Remover of obstacles. Shiva dances on the body of a dwarf apasmara-purusha (the man of forgetfulness) who embodies indifference, ignorance and laziness. Creation, indeed all creative energy is possible only when the weight of inertia (the tamasic darkness of the universe) is overcome and suppressed. The Nataraja image thus addresses each individual to overcome complacency and get his or her own act together. The ring of fire and light, which circumscribes the entire image, identifies the field of the dance with the entire universe. The lotus pedestal on which the image rests locates this universe in the heart or consciousness of each person. The Nataraja image is eloquent of the paradox of Eternity and Time. It shows us that the reposeful ocean and the racing stream are not finally distinct. This wonderful lesson can be read in the significant contrast of the incessant, triumphant motion of the swaying limbs to the balance of the and the immobility of the mask-like countenance. Shiva is Kala, meaning time, but he is also Maha Kala, meaning "Great Time" or eternity. As Nataraja, King of dancers, his gestures, wild and full of grace, precipitate the cosmic illusion; his flying arms and legs and the swaying of his torso produce the continuous creation-destruction of the universe, death exactly balancing birth. The choreography is the whirligig of time. History and its ruins, the explosion of suns, are flashes from the tireless swinging sequence of the gestures. In this beautiful cast metal figurines, not merely a single phase or movement, but the entirety of this cosmic dance is miraculously rendered. The cyclic rhythm, flowing on and on in the unstayable, irreversible round of the Mahayugas, or Great Eons, is marked by the beating and stamping of the Master's heels. Free Shipping. Delivered by to all international destinations within 3 to 5 days, fully insured.