Sakhi

(“friend,” “companion”) The motif of
friendship as a religious ideal was well
developed by the devotees (bhakta) of
the god Krishna, and to a lesser extent
by devotees of the god Rama. Both of
these deities are avatars (incarnations)
of the god Vishnu, and Vaishnava
devotion tends to stress not only worship of the chosen deity, but also the
notions of relationship and communion—both between the deity and
devotee, and among devotees themselves. Vaishnava religious practice
often involved elaborate visualization
exercises, in which devotees would
envision the deity’s daily activities—for
Krishna, the simple life of a village
cowherd, and for Rama, the life of a
prince. Some devotional manuals give
detailed daily schedules of the deity’s
activities to facilitate this process of
visualization. Such elaborate visualization allowed the devotees to symbolically enter the deity’s world and take
part in the deity’s divine play (lila) on
earth, building a relationship with God
through sharing the mundane elements of everyday life. In this sort of
visualization, devotees commonly considered themselves to be the deity’s
sakhis or companions—in some cases
male companions, and in other cases
female companions of the deity’s consorts, Radha and Sita. Taking on the
persona of a sakhi provided a devotee
with a concrete place in the divine
world, in which he or she could both
observe and participate in the god’s
earthly activity.