Celebrating Krishna
ANJANA RAJAN
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Harsh Dehejia talks of the 1000-year journey in the company of Krishna.
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Photo: V.V. Krishnan
Covering a 1000 years: Dehejia moves from the Bhagavad to the Bhakti and Riti periods.
Conceived and edited by Harsha V. Dehejia, A Festival of Krishna (a Roli Books publication) is so luxuriously illustrated you are content to leaf through it without trying to read a word. But then the text draws you in with its own poetry. Because Dehejia writes like a poet-philosopher. Allowing for “so many dry, arid schools of philosophy”, he believes it is important to “let your Atman luxuriate” in the journey of Krishna, which, he explains, is “the journey of your own Atman.”
When this realisation comes, “shringar (love) is replaced by adhbuta (wonder),” says Dehejia, author of a number of works on Krishna and the metaphor of shringar in Indian arts, including The Flute and the Lotus: Romantic Moments in Indian Poetry and Painting.
Wondrous journey
“You say, wait a minute, this is no arena I’m watching. This is the journey of my self I’ve been privy to. Then in that wondrousness, you get rest, as if you hear the flute of Krishna within yourself.”
But that is when you’ve reached the journey’s end. The way is just as wondrous, when you have a cultural colossus like Krishna for company. And this book, says the author, “is really about the romantic Krishna that emerges in the 10th skanda of the Bhagavad.”
‘Festival’ is an apt word here. The study covers approximately a 1000-year journey, from the Bhagavad through to the poetry of the Bhakti and Riti periods. Meanwhile, “the rivers of poetry and painting intersect,” and Dehejia takes us from the Jain paintings that form “the bedrock of miniature painting” through the Rajput style and Pahari kalam to the modern painters. “Everybody from Jamini Roy to Maqbool Fida Husain depicts Krishna,” says the author. And then there are the folk traditions, like Madhubani and Sanjhi painting, Chamba rumal... “And the folk painting of Krishna becomes a part of the celebration of Krishna.”
Krishna is a festival that keeps growing. But, notes the doctor of medicine and of letters (in Ancient Indian Culture), “we are not here just to see paintings and dance, unless we are able to release those streams of honey within us.”
“Krishna’s love is called Madhur Prem. It’s sweet, it steals us because of a fundamental idea that in our innermost selves are latent streams of honey; and when we valorise or worship Krishna, these streams of honey come to life within us.”
Metaphor for the soul
Vrindavan, where Krishna expresses his madhur prem for the gopis, the trees, the cows…, “becomes a metaphor for the Atman. That gives us the idea that the atman is not a dry arid thing; that’s how we become gopis, totally enamoured by Krishna’s flute.”
The book is accompanied by DVD, “Ateliers of Love”. “I enjoyed doing the book, but one always feels this is not enough,” he muses. “There is so much literature, painting, so many metaphors that come up. Whether Krishna was a historical person or not is not important. Maybe he was. But ultimately, Krishna is a metaphor, which you enjoy at many levels.”
Dual perception
At the same time, he emphasises that he is “not negating any of the sensual portrayals of Krishna.” The dual perception of Krishna as human and godhead is a vital part of the lore. The Gita Govind made Krishna more human, marking the advent of “the beautiful tension between the human and the divine”.
The Bhakti and Sanskrit poets worshipped Krishna, while in the Riti period “Krishna and Radha become courtly figures”. Thus, Krishna is depicted as “utterly sensuous”, but “sometimes he becomes completely spiritual,” says Dehejia.
Calling the contribution of the art historians invaluable to the study of the subject, Dehejia feels, “the discourse should not stop at the historical aspects.”
The next step is to “enjoy (the art) subjectively”. Without the “keys of philosophy”, this aspect would remain “locked and undiscovered”.
Vaishnavism is relatively unique in this brand of romantic mysticism, he notes. “The biggest parallel is Sufi romantic narrative. It is very much an Indian concept. Although there are foreign influences like Persian and Mughal, the whole evocative effusion is basically of the Indian soil.”
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