Story: Ganga and Her Forgotten Makara

Goddess Ganga aboard her Makara

~

Goddess Ganga, O Goddess Ganga,

Come down we weep.

We’ve spent thirty thousand years,

And now must pass Yama into his sleep.

Our successors will try to possess you, Sweet one,

What will it take to bring the waters’ blessing,

When will you come?

Bygone ash’s sins remitted and Moksha they desire,

For not just the ashes of mine but, too, Bhagiratha’s family lies in the pyre

Pour down the lustrous waters of your goddesship

From Heaven, through Shiva’s head,

 so as Mother Earth you may not tip,

Come down, sings Bhagiratha, heaping austerities at your feet,

Flow freely through this world, lest not arrogance you keep.

Tis arrogance indeed, as think you, swift you’ll come,

Straight from Brahmapura down to Earth summarily, tarrying none.

Shiva, o Shiva, help to save our souls of this world,

We need the goddess Ganga, but not her damage and arrogance that doth swirl,

Through his tangled jata, he slowed her path for years,

Austerities anew were supplied, Bhagiratha to Shiva’s ears.

When at once he disentangled her, and now freely Ganga may travel,

Oh, but alone she does not go, her companion aims to plans unravel,

Finally, She’s here they shouted! But what’s that beneath her seat?

Down, too, comes another, swaying tail but lacking feet. 

For hails her peacock tailed sea creature, Makara,

Choosing a path to wind wearily, downward through the Himalaya.

We’ve been called down to these lands, Makara to the Ganga spake,

But, where, said not they, is the path that we should take.

Shall we stay in the peaks, or to the valleys shall we flow?

We’ve spent years in Shiva’s hair, seeing ne’er any doe,

Let’s travel here, and twist back there, searching for a few fawn friends,

Or rather, to the Ocean, where I may swim with some Indic dolphins.

I’ve a mind of my own, free from Brahmapura’s heaven are we,

Let’s show them our greatness, you and me, to all these people let’s go see,”

But Goddess Ganga seethed with anger, in arrogance she did brew,

“I shall grant the people waters to heaven, but only I, and only just a few”

For on her path, the fantastical Makara she steered,

Ignoring tandem reverence, for her own glory she sought to be revered.

Through the peaks and valleys, and down the Indus way,

She glided til the Ocean lay just beyond this bay.

Tis but an auspicious few who can dip themselves in her waters,

Cleansing away their sins, seeking new karma they acquire,

For in her crafty cunning, as she wound her way throughout,

Cleansing peoples just enough so that others would clamor and shout,

"To the Ganga I must go! Why did she not come my way?"

The peoples whom now flock to her on that Kumbh Mela day.

Ganga ignoring the words of the Makara, together they descended,

Remember, do the people, of the goddess and her creature?

No, only the cleansing waters, is the chiefly remembered feature.

But hastily she guided the sea like beast, back to its resting spot

Where the waters are filled with myth and monsters, remembering people there are not.

Stay here, O Makara, slipping into the dark and deep oblivion,

No one shall remember you, only for my glory, will I the people's heart win.

And she left the Makara down there in the depths, forgotten, o forgotten,

While she hastened to the Underworld, Makara’s memory hath she smotten.”

Modern day Ganges River, taken in Haridwar by Jeevan

Author's Note: I crafted this tale of how Ganga and her Makara descended to the earth from the heavens, based on this retelling by John Campbell Oman (1894) in The Great Indian Epics, which can be accessed from the Public Domain Ramayana: Bhagiratha and Ganga. 

Bhagiratha comes from a long line of rulers, each ruling about thirty thousand years, who have tried numerous times and failed to bring down the cleansing waters of the goddess Ganga. Finally, it is Bhagiratha who, through severe and strict austerities, is able to get her released from the heavens. He happens upon 60,000 of his dead relatives' ashes, and wishes to be able to send them to heaven through the holy waters (the Ganga). He seeks the help of Shiva, as well, so that Ganga does not comes down to forcefully to the earth and destroy it, but Shiva despises the arrogance Ganga has in her power to do this, and so traps her in his tangled dreadlocks for a few years to slow her down. He does not release her, however, until Bhagiratha again performs strict austerities to him, asking him again to release her. Finally he does, and she descends. However, I noticed that in painted art form depictions of the Goddess Ganga, she is frequently seated above her Makara, who is her Vahana, or vehicle. There is no mention of the Makara in Oman's retelling of the tale, so I included it in my version, playing up the arrogance of Ganga so that instead of people remembering the both of them, Ganga and Makara descending from the heavens together to bring the holy waters, people will only remember Ganga -- which is mostly true to this day. Until I did some digging, I had never heard of the Makara being associated with the goddess Ganga either.

The Goddess Ganga is the mythological embodiment of the River Ganges and its waters, which are considered holy and sacred. If one goes the the waters and dips themselves in, their sins are remitted. If ones ashes are sprinkled in the waters, they are able to attain heaven. These practices occur in India on the banks of the River Ganges even today.