"अगस्त्य ऋषी - भाग १३"

"अगस्त्य ऋषी - भाग १३"

1.Agastya is one of the most important figures in a number of medieval era Southeast Asian inscriptions, temple reliefs and arts. 2.He was particularly popular in Java due to his teaching of Saiva Siddhanta which was easily accepted into the Javanese society.

3.He introduced the Vedic science and the Pallavan Grantha script, his popularity declined when Islam started to spread throughout the islands of Indonesia.

4.He is also found in Cambodia, Vietnam and other regions.

5.The earliest mentions of Agastya is traceable to about the mid 1st millennium CE, but the 11th-century Javanese language text Agastya-parva  is a remarkable combination of philosophy, mythology and genealogy attributed to sage Agastya.

6.The Agastya-parva includes Sanskrit verse (shlokas) embedded within the Javanese language.The text is structured as a conversation between a Guru (teacher, Agastya) and a Sisya (student, Agastya's son Drdhasyu).The style is a mixture of didactic, philosophical and theological treatise, covering diverse range of topics much like Hindu Puranas.

7.The chapters of the Javanese text include the Indian theory of cyclic existence, rebirth and samsara, creation of the world by the churning of the ocean (samudra manthan), theories of the Samkhya and the Vedanta school of Hindu philosophy, major sections on god Shiva and Shaivism, some discussion of Tantra, a manual like summary of ceremonies associated with the rites of passage and others.

8.While the similarities between the Agastya-parva text and classical Indian ideas are obvious, according to Jan Gonda, the Indian counterpart of this text in Sanskrit or Tamil languages have not been found in Indonesia or in India.

9.Similarly other Agastya-related Indonesian texts, dated to be from the 10th to 12th centuries, discuss ideas from multiple sub-schools of Shaivism such as theistic Shaivasiddhanta and monistic Agamic Pashupata, and these texts declare these theologies to be of equal merit and value.

10.Agastya is common in medieval era Shiva temples of southeast Asia, such as the stone temples in Java (candi).

11.Along with the iconography of Shiva, Uma, Nandi and Ganesha who face particular cardinal directions, these temples include sculpture, image or relief of Agastya carved into the southern face.

12.The Shiva shrine in the largest Hindu temple complex in southeast Asia, Prambanan, features four cellae in its interior. This central shrine within Prambanan group of temples dedicates its southern cella to Agastya.

13.The Dinoyo inscription,dated to 760 CE, is primarily dedicated to Agastya. The inscription states that his older wooden image was remade in stone, thereby suggesting that the reverence for Agastya iconography in southeast Asia was prevalent in an older period.

14.In Cambodia, the 9th-century king Indravarman, who is remembered for sponsoring and the building of a large number of historic temples and related artworks, is declared in the texts of this period to be a descendant of sage Agastya.