Source: TW
Gradual manifestation
If a God transcends time & is omniscient, He or She will contain within themselves all possible forms, syncretisms, lores, liturgies & rites, which “manifest” in human history over time in a gradual way that we call “evolution of ideas”.
Each and every “infinitesimal” snapshot of a God’s meme as it would have originated in a priest’s or seer’s head throughout history, be it “imagination” or intuition, be it the deity’s lore/ mythos, iconography, etc, has & always will exist in the God. A God is not the sum total of these things but contains the said sum within. Those tiniest of ideas (i.e. the smallest change in detail in what one would call the ’long evolution of a Deity’ and more rarely, the substantial & “chunkier” conceptions (i.e. what we may call ‘revelation’) manifest to deserving individuals in their intellects as imagination or insight over the course of history.
To someone who believes in the pervasiveness of the Gods & divine will, there is not a significant difference between “God-made” & “man-made”. “Man-made” becomes another mechanism through which the Gods’ infinite potential manifests & becomes visible.
Layers
Source: TW
Uninspired people intimidated by data as well as cynically academic individuals are befuddled by the multiple layers & aspects of a deity as they evolved over centuries.
Inspired minds see the various phases in an evolutionary trajectory as existing primordially but manifesting in generations of minds, using the extant realities around those minds to inspire “new evolutes”, which, of course are not new). Imagine a series of infinitesimal phases of a Deity falling into the minds as inspired thoughts, one after another, such that it looks like an evolution. There can be multiple lines of evolutions as well.
Those who are inspired will also be able to see the disparate memes constituting a deity and identify the common logic binding them all together; that logic being the essence (Tattva) of the Deity.
For instance, the Brahmaņaspatitvam, vināyakagrahagaņatvam (a plurality of Vināyakas being grahas which are malevolent & inflict sufferings), gajamukhatvam (the nature of being elephant-faced) & Rudradevīputratvam (being the son of Rudra and Devī) are not arbitrarily & artificially combined into the Gaņeśa we know today. There is a deep link between all these 4 aspects, which represents the uniqueness and unity of the deity.
Due to their differing limitations and karmaphala, different generations had the prāpti to see these different aspects separately and the passage of time was required to inspire the final generation to figure out the real deity who is behind all of those 4 aspects.
If there is time, we may write about the internal logic of the great Gaņanātha, who is another Śiva Himself.
hastimukhatA
Were the four malevolent vināyakas mentioned as gajamukha?
There is a rite which involves feeding a “hastimukha brāhmaņa” in an appeasement of the Vināyakas if I recall.