lifting up the Govardhana mountain, which is part
of the Krishna mythology.
The image here is treated as Krishna himself
and the worship follows a cycle of the events of
Krishna’s life. The image was taken from Mathura
in 1669 to preserve it from destruction by the
iconoclastic Muslim Mughal king Aurangzeb.
Further reading: Amit Ambalal, Krishna as Shrinathji:
Rajasthani Paintings from Nathdvara (Ahmedabad:
Mapin, 1987); Anne-Marie Gaston, Krishna’s Musicians:
Musicians and Music Making in the Temples of Nathdvara,
Rajasthan (New Delhi: Manohar, 1997).
Sri Vidya
Sri Vidya is an all-India cult of the worship of the
GODDESS Sri Lalita or Tripurasundari. It initiates in
the right-handed tantric tradition (see TANTRISM),
which emphasizes Sri Lalita as the Great GODDESS.
Iconographically, she is seen as a beautiful 16-year
old with a parrot on her shoulder; however, this
is just her gross form. Her subtle form is the Sri
YANTRA or Sri CHAKRA, which is a geometric design
around a basic point, showing four entranceways
at its outer portion that are representative of
temple entranceways.
The highest form of Sri Lalita is the 16-syl-
lable MANTRA that is chanted in worship of her.
As is the tantric norm, she is the mantra and one
who chants the mantra becomes the goddess. She
in effect enters that person and becomes that per-
son. The Sri Vidya PUJA (worship and offering) is
done at homes and not publicly. The devotee first
burns his or her self up symbolically, readying for
the transformation into the goddess. “One must
become the Goddess to worship the Goddess” is
the operative phrase. Doing ritual worship to the
diagram of the Sri Yantra, one places mantras on
one’s body to transform it into the body of the
goddess. The reverse is done when the puja is
coming to a close. At the end of the ritual proper
the 1,000 names of goddess Sri Lalita are usually
chanted.
South India has a particularly strong cult of
Sri Lalita, where the initiates tend to be BRAHMINS.
Thus, though there are tantric aspects to this rit-
ual, there is no consumption of forbidden things
such as beef or alcohol, as in the left-handed rites.
Substitutes are used to make the rites palatable to
Brahmin practitioners. The philosophical system
involved is a tantric ADVAITA non-dual system,
understanding that the manifest world is real and
an aspect of the supreme Goddess.Further reading: Douglas Renfrew Brooks, Auspicious
Wisdom (Albany: State University of New York Press,
1992); ———, The Secret of the Three Cities (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1990).Sri Yantra See YANTRA, SRI.
states of consciousness
There are four states of consciousness outlined
in the MANDUKYA UPANISHAD, one of the classi-
cal Vedic UPANISHADS often cited in VEDANTA and
other Indian traditions. The four states are jag-
arita (jagrat), the waking state; svapna, the dream-
ing state; sushupti, the deep sleep state; and turiya,
the transcendent state beyond conventional con-
sciousness, in which one realizes the BRAHMAN or
ultimate reality. Some early Upanishads conflate
the last two states.Further reading: Swami Krishnananda, The Mandukya
Upanishad: An Exposition (Shivanandanagar: Divine Life
Society, 1977); Swami Nikhilananda, trans., Self-Knowl-
edge (Atmabodha): An English Translation of Sankaracha-
rya’s Atmabodha (New York: Ramakrishna-Vivekananda
Center, 1946); S. Radhakrishnan, The Principal Upanisads
(Atlantic Highlands, N.J.: Humanities Press, 1992).Sthanakavasi
The Sthanakavasis are a minority sect within the
Jain community founded by a Jain layperson fromK 422 Sri Vidya