Pashupatinath

Temple and sacred site (tirtha) in
Katmandu, Nepal. The temple is named
for its presiding deity, who is the god
Shiva in his form as Pashupatinath, “the
Master of the Lord of Beasts.” This is a
considered an extremely powerful site,
and one of its charter myths connects it
to Kedarnath, a sacred site high in the
Himalayas. According to the story, the
five Pandava brothers, who are the protagonists in the epic Mahabharata, are
making their final journey into the
Himalayas in search of a vision of
Shiva. They finally see him at a distance, but when they try to get closer,
Shiva takes the form of a bull and
begins running through the snow. The
bull burrows into a snow bank, and
when the Pandavas follow, they find the
body of the bull in the snow. The ridge
of rock that forms the Kedarnath linga
is considered to be the hump of this
bull. The bull’s head continues traveling over the hills, eventually stopping
in Nepal, where it takes form as the
deity Pashupatinath.