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Pushkar and the Temple of Brahma

The next stop on my journey to Jodhpur was Pushkar and Pushkar Lake. Once again this was a place that I did not research beforehand so it was going to be a total surprise to me. The city of Pushkar is about 93 miles from Jaipur. It's not a huge city and it's sort of in the middle of nowhere. Its significance to Hindus and Sikhs, as I would learn on my tour, is very significant. The best way I can think to phrase it is like this: Christians have the Vatican, Muslims have Mecca, and Hindus and Sikhs have Pushkar. It is the ONLY Hindu temple dedicated to the deity Brahma. Ok so who is this Brahma guy and why does he only get one temple?

Brahma is referred to as "the Creator" within the Trimurti (Trinity) of supreme divinity in Hinduism. The other two deities that join him are Vishnu and Shiva. He is associated with knowledge, creation, and the four Vedas. The Vedas are the sacred ancient texts of Hinduism. In the painting above Brahma is depicted with four heads. This is because each head points to a cardinal direction: north, south, east, and west. His female consort is Saraswati the Goddess of knowledge, music, art, and speech.

According to Padma Purana this is why Brahma only has one temple in the entire world.

One day Brahma saw a demon trying to kill his children and harassing the people. He immediately slew this demon with his weapon, the lotus flower. During this process three lotus petals fell to the ground and created three lakes: The Pushkar Lake, the Madya Pushkar, and Kanishta Pushkar. At the biggest lake, Pushkar Lake, he decided to perform a yajina or fire ritual. To do so peacefully he created all the hills around Pushkar to protect it from more demons. Every ritual in India to this day is designed to be done by a male and a female. So this is where he gets into trouble. Brahma's wife Saraswati was not ready at the designated time to perform her part. Supposedly she was waiting for her female companions. So Brahma, being a typical male, decided to marry another woman named Gayatri to complete the ritual. When Saraswati finally arrived only to see another woman sitting in her spot she was furious! To make a long legend shorter she did bestowed many curses, but most important was that Brahma could ONLY be worshipped in Pushkar. Hence why it's so important for Hindus and Sikhs to make their pilgrimages there.

While the city does perk up during other parts of the year when the host animals shows etc., it's basically just a temple, a giant bazaar, and a giant lake where people can go and bathe in the holy waters at various ghats or steps leading down to the water. I was not permitted to take any pictures in the temple and I did not want to accidently catch anyone bathing so these pics are from the internet. What I never understood and no one could really explain to me is why some of these women bathing in public were topless like in front of EVERYONE. Most women kept on their sari tops or their bras which to me seemed normal. Some women however were completely topless. Not being showy about it, but everyone could see. India is a conservative country so this seemed odd to me.

Above is the temple, the shrine inside, and the ghats. It was a beautiful place and I wanted to make an offering. My guide told me "no" which is unusual. I usually do at least one when I visit India. This time I actually didn't do any which still feels weird to me. The pictures below are ones that I took.

These beautiful items that look like bracelets are actually what the women put on their heads to help them carry things up there! I wish I had bought one.

Women all over India actually do carry lots of items on their heads. It's amazing to watch because they carry everything from bundles of sticks to large bags of rice.

One of the bazaar streets still decorated with orange flags long after the opening of the new Rama temple.

Finally, this video I took upon entering Pushkar. It says everything about rural India in one video. You have boars randomly crossing the street, the cows roaming, then a dog.

Here are some more random pics I took on our way to Jodhpur: