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Hanumān: The Power-Dispensing Monkey in North Indian Folk Religion

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 March 2011

Leonard T. Wolcott
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Hanumān, the ancient monkey-divinity of India: for many, he represents the force of life in man's struggle to exist. He is most famous for his devotion to the god-king Rāma, and for his exploits as leader of the monkey army that helped save Rāma's princess from the demon-king of Laṅkā. Yet in the Bhojpurī-speaking area of western Bihar and eastern Uttar Pradesh, Hanumān is a god of great importance in his own right. There he is worshiped as the epitome of strength and vitality; popular legends associate him not so much with the self-restrained Rāma as with Śiva, possessor of creative and destructive energy.

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Articles
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The Journal of Asian Studies , Volume 37 , Issue 4 , August 1978 , pp. 653 - 661
Copyright
Copyright © The Association for Asian Studies, Inc. 1978

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References

1 Dates according to Farquhar, J. N., An Outline of the Religious Literature of India (London: Oxford Univ. Press, 1920; reprinted Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1967), p. 381Google Scholar.

2 Rāmāyana of Tulsī Dās (Tulsīkrt Rāmacaritamānasa), V c33, d33. References will give roman figures for book numbers. The stanza forms in this Rāmāyaṇa—dohā (couplet) interspersed with caupāī (quatrains) and occasional meters called chanda and sorathā—will be indicated by “d,” “c,” “ch,” and “s” together with an arabic figure to indicate sequence position. The Hindi text used for most references is the Gorakhpur text (Gita Press), the most popular printed form. Translations in English, when not by the writer, are quoted from Hill, W. D. P., who used the Gita Press text for his translation entitled The Holy Lake of the Acts of Rāma (Calcutta: Oxford Univ. Press, 1952)Google Scholar.

3 VI d57–C58.

4 VII C2; Hill trans.; the Gorakhpur text reads: “Kapitav daras sakal dukh bīte / mile āju mohi Rām pirite.”

5 IV c1.

6 IV C2.

7 IV c3.

8 IV d3.

9 E.g., IV C2, C4; V d32, C33; VI ch32, d118.

10 “Rām Hanumān ke pālnevalā the … ”

11 These statements are taken from the conversations and responses of people whose native dialect is the Bhojpurī spoken in the extreme western part of Bihar (including Chapra and northwards to the north side of the Saraju (Gogra) River; Shahabad District; the vicinities of Arrah, Buxar, Bhojpur, to a bit south of the Son River) and the eastern tip of U.P. (Ballia District). Tewari, Udai Narain (The Origin and Development of Bhojpurī, [Calcutta: Asiatic Society, 1960]Google Scholar designates this dialect Standard South Bhojpurī.

It was among the people of this area—upwards of 30 million people who live near the heartland of Hindu culture—and among Bhojpurī migrant workers in the industrial centers of Kanpur and Calcutta, that I received my greatest acquaintance with Hanuman folklore. Over a period of 5 years, I shared their interest in the Rāmāyana of Tulsī Dās, observed their religous practices, and listened to their stories about the Rāmāyaṇa characters. My contacts were with people from a variety of backgrounds—illiterates to holders of university degrees, Brahman pandits to Harijans (sweepers), laborers, and craftsmen.

12 IV c4.

13 Where Hanumān's grotesque image is found in connection with the Śiva-liṅga, the phallic symbol of Śiva, it is not as the lesser gatekeeper (dvārpāl); Ganeśa, the elephant-headed god, son of Śiva, holds that position. Rather, Hanumān's image is to the side—often to the right, balancing the image of Kālī (the Kālī-muūrti), which is to the left of the linga.

14 Roṭ is made of white flour and unrefined cane sugar (gud), mixed in the hands with water and made into a ball that is fried in clarified butter (ght), then broken into small pieces.

15 One of the common repetitions is: “Jai Mahāvīra jī / Jai Bajaraftgbalī / Jai Hanumān” (Praise to the Great Hero. Praise to the Powerfully Stalwart, Strong One. Praise to Hanumān.).

16 Quote from a villager. Ghī and gram (a pulse) are considered the essentials of an energy-producing diet.

17 IV d23, C24.

18 Caupāī following V d1.

19 Caupāī following IV d29.

20 Ibid.; also V cIff.

21 V C2 (see also VI C57).

22 V C3.

23 V c3, 4.

24 V d12.

25 V 12–17.

26 V C15.

27 V 24–25.

28 V C17, 18.

29 V C27.

30 VI c35.

31 E.g., VI C76; also C44, C51ff., d83, and C84.

32 E.g., VI C74-C75.'

33 VI C57.

34 Caupāī following VI C58, S59.

35 Caupāī following IV d29.

36 Caupāī following VI CI42; Hill trans.

37 Caupāā following V d1; Hill trans.

38 Bal, zor, and sāmarth are the Hindi words used to define AŚ'akti in Tiwāri, Hara Govind & Tiwāri, Bholā Nāth (eds.), Tulsī Śabdsāgar [Dictionary of words used by Tulsī Dās], (Allahabad:Hindustani Academ, 1958)Google Scholar.

39 See, e.g., P. Thomas, Hindu Religion and Customs and Manners (2nd ed., rev.; Bombay: Taraporevala, n.d.), pp. 148–49.

40 An Introduction to the Popular Religion and Folk-lore of Northern India (Allahabad: Government Press, Northwestern Provinces and Oudh, 1894), P. 52Google Scholar.

41 Once, in the caupāī following I d16.

42 I d25 to caupāī following d33.

43 Caupāī following VI d41 and following d43.

44 Caupāī following V d32; caupāī following VI d81, d94, ch19, ch20, and caupāī following d94.

45 Caupāī and chanda following VI d94; Hill trans.

46 Compare the Devī Bhāgavata 3:30. Compare also the general idea in the Rāmacaritamānasa (caupāā following VI d74 and following d75) of puūjā (worship) for obtaining śakti. It is noteworthy that the demonic foes, doing śakti-puūjā (worship for vital energy) before entering battle, were overcome by those who fought with their minds fixed on Rāma.

47 Songs concerned with barrenness and conception are usually about the goddess Pārvatī, although some are directed to Śaṁkar.

48 Spells that refer to or call upon Hanumān's great power to prevail over demonic spirits sometimes mention Rāma and sometimes Lakṣmaṇ, but more often they refer to Śiva or to his consort Pārvatī. Here is a typical mantra used by a village ojhā of Simrī, District Shahabad, Bihar:

Bind the earth below, bind the sky above.

Then, through my offering, bind the soul of the witch.

Prepare a thread of kāns grass,

And for six months bind the soul of that witch—

But in the three forms of the world below the world.

Then bind its quality.

Becoming mighty, bind it.

Old and feeble it has become.

Then drive the mighty Hanumān

That he catch it by the legs.

Oh, Thou Hanumān, Thou hast power over

these evil spirits!

Possessor of Śaṁkar's reflection, he can do so.

Send him in the middle of che night.

Hanumān has such a power to make him blind,

Having tied the eyebrows of that demon.

Do this through the power of these verses taught by your guru,

And then bow to the feet of your guru!”

There are many similar mantras in which Hanumān is the key figure. Śiva, Pārvatī, and Lakṣmaṇ also appear in many Hanumān mantras.

49 Vālmīki Rāmāyaṇa, IV, śloka 66.

50 Besides being referred to as Hanumān (with variations of that name), the Rāmacaritamānasa also calls him Mārutasuta, Pavanasuta, Pavanakumāra, Pavanakumārā, Pavantanaya—all meaning Son of the Wind-God.

51 Most of the stories relate that Śaṁmkar, or the trimuūrti (the triad: Brahma-Viṣṇu-Śiva) appeared as a sādbu (holy man) to the maiden Anjann, who excited his passion. Some stories say that Añjanī, ugly and undesirable, happened to be the innocent victim of Śamk's excited passion for his consort Pārvatī, or for Rāma disguised as Pārvatī. Anajanī is variously described as a cast-off unmarried girl, as the wife of Kesarī, etc. The conception, it is usually but not always said, took place through an ear (she was buried up to her neck to hide her ugliness); it is frequendy said that the birth of Hanumān was through the other ear. According to the Tulsī Śabdsāgar (n. 38 above, p. 473), Hanumān was the son of Ajanī, wife of a monkey called Kesarī.