Jagannath

(“Master of the Universe”) Presiding
deity of the Jagannath temple in Puri.
Puri is and has long been a major center
for Hindu culture, a circumstance that
has underlined and reinforced
Jagannath’s importance as the city’s
presiding deity. Although Jagannath is
identified as a manifestation of the
god Krishna, his roots lie elsewhere.
He is generally considered to be an
autochthonous (“of the land”) deity,
who was originally the local deity of Puri
but who has been assimilated into the
wider pantheon as a form of Krishna,
and therefore, by extension, a form of
Vishnu. This assimilation shows
Jagannath’s importance and influence
in the local setting, since he could not
be simply marginalized. It is also an
example of the Vaishnava tendency
for such assimilation, most often
through the doctrine of the avatars or
divine incarnations.
In the Puri temple and other iconographic representations, Jagannath
invariably appears as a member of a trio:
Jagannath (Krishna) appears on the
right, his brother Balabhadra
(Balarama) is on the left, and the smaller figure in the center is their sister
Subhadra. This triadic grouping and the
depiction of a female figure are very
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unusual in Krishna devotion, as is the
form of these images, which clearly
come from a folk or tribal tradition. All
three deities are made from logs so
roughly cut that the facial features are
almost indistinguishable, their arms are
unnaturally short and stubby, and the
images are brightly painted. Each of
these peculiar elements is seen as further evidence of Jagannath’s indigenous
roots. A final piece of evidence for his
local origins is seen in his connection
with his hereditary servants, the daitas,
a tribal people who are considered
virtually untouchable. Despite their
marginal status in conventional society,
the daitas are responsible for sculpting
new images of the trio when they are
periodically replaced. The daitas also
consider Jagannath their blood relative,
further pointing to his ambiguous roots.
The myth explaining these images is
based on the virtuous King
Indradyumna. Indradyumna has a
vision of Vishnu in a dream, in which
Vishnu directs the king to make an
image of Jagannath from an enormous
log that he has found. While the king is
wondering how to do this, a mysterious
man appears, who is actually
Vishvakarma, the architect of the gods.
The mysterious man offers to carve the
statues, on the condition that he will not
be disturbed until he is finished. He then
disappears into his workroom for two
weeks, but the people are mystified by
what he is doing, since they hear no
sounds of carving. This seeming inactivity piques the people’s curiosity, and
finally one of the queens prevails on the
king to look inside. When the king opens
the door, he finds no one there, and the
statues only half-finished. In another
dream that night, the king is ordered to
paint and consecrate the statues as they
are, and this form has reportedly
remained the same ever since. For further information on the history and
influence of Jagannath, by far the best
source is Anncharlott Eschmann,
Hermann Kulke, and Gaya Charan
Tripathi, The Cult of Jagannath and the
Regional Tradition of Orissa, 1978.