sacrifice, and cuts off Daksha’s head.
Daksha is eventually restored to life, but
with the head of a goat rather than a
human being. He repents of his arro-
gance and worships Shiva as the highest
god. In this story, Daksha is a symbol for
the foolish pride that eventually causes
one’s destruction.
In another mythic story, Daksha is
portrayed in a more sympathetic light.
Chandra (the moon) has married
Daksha’s twenty-seven daughters, but
was paying attention to only one of the
daughters, named Rohini. Daksha
remonstrates with Chandra to give each
of his wives equal time, and when
Chandra ignores this advice, Daksha
curses him to lose his luster. As Chandra
begins to wane, the other gods intercede
with Daksha, and implore him to modify
the curse. At their urgent prompting,
Daksha decrees that Chandra will only
wane for half the month and then wax
for the other half. He then directs
Chandra to take a bath at the Somnath
temple in Gujaratstate, which will heal
him from the original curse. Here
Daksha is still powerful and imperious,
but his actions are rooted in his concern
for his daughters.
Dakshina
(“preceptor’s fee”) Gifts or fees given to
one’s teacher in return for the services
rendered. The paradigm for this goes
back to the dharma literature, or the
texts on religious duty (dharma), which
propose an idealized doctrine for the
four stages (ashramas) of a man’s life.
The first of these stages is as a celibate
student (brahmacharin), in which the
young man will live in his teacher’s
household and commence studying the
Vedas, the oldest Hindu religious texts.
At the conclusion of his studies, the stu-
dent will give his teacher dakshina as a
sign of appreciation. In modern times
this pattern has been extended to other
contexts, particularly the arts, and it has
become customary for students to
give gifts to their teachers on various
occasions, particularly on the full moon
known as Guru Purnima, which usually
falls in June or July. Dakshina is always
given in exchange for services, and is
thus essentially payment that is “owed”
for these services. In this aspect it is a
very different mode of exchange from
dana(charitable giving). Dana gener-
ates religious merit, but the donor
receives nothing tangible in return.Dakshinachara
(“right-hand practice”) In the secret ritual
tradition known as tantra, this is the
term for a type of tantric practice that
does not avail itself of any forbidden
substances or promote any behavior
that the orthodox would consider scan-
dalous or objectionable. It stands in
opposition to the vamachara, or “left-
hand practice,” which uses such forbid-
den substances in its ritual, and shows
no such regard for conventional sensi-
bilities. The most common forbidden
substances are the Five Forbidden
Things (panchamakara), so called
because they all begin with the letter
“m” (in the sacred language of Sanskrit,
makara) madya(wine), matsya(fish),
mamsa (meat), mudra(fermented or
parched grain), and maithuna(copula-
tion). In left-hand tantra these forbid-
den things are used in their actual
forms, whereas right-hand practitioners
substitute other more socially
acceptable things for them. This is one
more instance of the pervasive Hindu
polarity between right and left, which
carries inherent value judgments. In this
case, the left-hand practitioners are
seen as impure and dangerous, because
they intentionally violate social bound-
aries, whereas the right-hand are
socially respectable. For further
information see Arthur Avalon
(Sir John Woodroffe), Shakti and Shakta,
1978; Swami Agehananda Bharati, The
Tantric Tradition, 1977; and Douglas
Renfrew Brooks, The Secret of the Three
Cities,1990.Dakshina