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Gopuram, or Tower
Sri Meenakshi Temple, Madurai. This tower has over 1500 statues covering it.The main reason I came to India was to travel to Tamil Nadu, India’s southernmost state, to see its temples. I’ve enjoyed the three temple towns I’ve visited – Madurai, Trichy, and Thanjavur – more than Bangalore and Mysore. Partly it’s me; I have adjusted to India. But partly the towns are more manageable and the sights are better. Tamil Nadu is a great place to visit.
Tamil Nadu was never conquered by Muslims, in contrast to most of India. It therefore maintained a uniquely vibrant Hindu culture. My guidebook says that Tamil Nadu is one of the few places on earth where a classical culture has survived into the present. Ancient Greek chroniclers wrote about Tamil towns and temples, and their descriptions of religious life largely ring true today. While that may be guidebook hyperbole, the temples of Tamil Nadu are undoubtedly fabulous.
Madurai. My first temple stop was Madurai, home to the Sri Meenakshi Temple complex, one of the most famous temples in India. The most notable feature of this temple was its pyramid-shaped or wedge-shaped towers, called gopurams. These gopurams are incredible, as the photos suggest. On some of them, every inch is covered by multicolored
Closeup of Gopuram
Here you can see some of the 1500 individual statues that cover the tower. Sri Meenakshi Temple, Madurai statues of the gods. The largest gopuram had over 1500 statues covering it. You can see it in the photos. Actually, many of the photos are from Sri Meenakshi Temple; it was lively and photogenic.
Trichy. I spent a good bit of time in Trichy, or Tiruchirappalli. Trichy has two famous temples, Sri Ranganathaswamy Temple, which may be India’s largest, and Rock Fort Temple, which I’ve described in detail below.
Thanjavur. The third temple town I visited was Thanjavur, also called Tanjore. Thanjavur was the center of the Chola empire, which reached it’s peak in the 1000s to 1200s. At its peak, the Cholas ruled much of the Indian peninsula. They also expanded their kingdom to Southeast Asia.
I went to see what locals call the Big Temple (technically Brihadishwara Temple). It’s a Chola temple built in 1010. It’s still extremely active, as active as any other temple I visited. Despite the fact that it was built in 1010, it’s not an archeological site; it’s a vibrant, pulsing, living temple.
I was fascinated to wander around the Big Temple, because I saw the original cultural patterns of temples I have seen in Southeast Asia. The shape
Gopuram Sculpture Details
Here you can see well the carvings on the huge towers. Sri Meenakshi Temple, Madurai of the temple structures were exactly the structures I have seen at Parambanan and Dieng Plateau in Java. The sculptures on the side of the temples were clearly the original versions of the sculptures that line much of Angkor Wat in Cambodia.
So many famous archeological sites in Southeast Asia are Hindu, essentially Chola, structures. The impact of the culture developed in this relatively small market town in Tamil Nadu echoed across Indonesia, Cambodia, Thailand, and Vietnam. I find that fascinating.
Rock Fort Temple, Trichy. To give you a flavor of what it’s like to visit a South Indian temple, here’s a description of my visit to the Rock Fort Temple in Trichy.
The photos from this blog are not from the Rock Fort Temple. I didn’t take photos there, because it was an extremely active place of worship, and it would have been intrusive to take photos. The photos are mostly from other temples. Still, the photos generally reflect the feeling or gist of the description.
For any Hindus who might read this, especially people from Tamil Nadu, I apologize for any inaccuracies or unwittingly disrespectful comments. I also apologize if I have photographed things
View from Bus Window
On the way to the Rock Fort Temple, Trichy I shouldn’t have. Sometimes it was unclear when it was OK to take photos, and when it was not OK. Anyway, I hope I am not being disrespectful with this description or these photos.
Getting to the temple. So, I leave from my hotel around 8 am, because it gets so hot in Tamil Nadu this time of year that it’s almost dangerous to be out in the middle of the day. I walk from my hotel to the bus station, a five minute walk. Already car horns are blaring, and at the bus station the busses blare their horns continually as they pull in and out of the station. It sounds like tubas going hoomph, hoomph, hoomph, continually, as loudly as you can imagine.
I’m looking for a route #1 bus. I stand with the locals. There are already a lot of people waiting for buses. There are just so many people in India; always there are large crowds. It’s quite orderly and pleasant, though, and I don’t wait long.
When the bus pulls in there’s a bit of a scrum to board the bus, but I’m able to get a seat. The bus is packed
On the Bus
On the way to the Rock Fort Temple, Trichy full by the time we leave, with people filling the aisles and doorway. It’s an old, rattling bus, open to the air, but the seats are comfortable and the bus riders are considerate even though we are all smashed together.
We roll through the city, hooting our tuba horn continually. The bus plays Bollywood tunes, probably actually Tollywood tunes (from Tamil movies rather than Bombay-made movies). Even though it’s early, people are out and the city is active. People are everywhere, everywhere. Other vehicles are all over the road, other busses, cars, autos or tuk-tuks (three-wheeled motorcycle taxis), bikes, and people. Everywhere people. And the streets are just so, well, Indian. Almost nothing is familiar. It’s all so crowded, perplexing, different, overwhelming.
The ticket taker tells me where to get off. I ask someone on the street for directions. Most people speak English, and they point me down a bazaar street, full of stores and stalls just opening up.
Going up the stairs. The Rock Fort Temple is a couple of temples high on a huge rock or small mountain looming above Trichy. There has been a temple on this rock since the 500s.
Eventually people
Elephant Blessing
You give the elephant a bit of money, and he blesses you by touching you gently on the head. Sri Meenakshi Temple, Madurai point me to the stairs leading up to the temple. There is a row of temple shops as I start up the stairs of the hill. These temple shops are either inside or just outside all of the temples. They sell small statues of the gods, but also the things you need to worship: offerings of flowers or fruit or what looks to be stalks of grass to give to the gods in the temples. Some people are buying massive bunches of bananas.
I come to the shoe stall. Before entering a temple, everyone takes off their shoes and socks. The temple workers store my shoes while I’m inside. Next is a ticket stall, where I pay a small fee to enter and to take a camera inside.
Each temple also has an elephant near where you enter. Worshippers give the elephant a bit of money, and the elephant blesses them by putting its trunk gently on their head.
I start up the stairs. There are many, many Indian worshippers going up the stairs to the two temples. There are all kinds of folks: the very young, the very old, and everyone in between.
The red-and-white
Temple Store
Goods for sale at one of the many temple stalls inside or just outside the temples. Sri Meenakshi Temple, Madurai painted stairs go up past several tiny mini-temples. These are everywhere in Tamil Nadu. Right alongside the road, there will be a statue with a covering over it, and people worshipping just after coming out of a store. So people stop and worship as they walk up the stairs.
I’m dripping sweat. It’s not yet 9 am, but it’s already brutally hot, and we’re going up, up, up. The Indians around me don’t seem to be bothered by the heat.
There are people everywhere, but everyone is friendly. But it’s closed-in with people. Not oppressively so, but always in India there are people all around you. So many people, everywhere, always.
Visiting the temple. In most of the temples I have visited, there is a clearly marked place that says “Non-Hindus Not Allowed.” Usually there is a long line of Indian worshippers waiting to go into that area. I’ve never seen what goes in in the most sacred parts of the temples. Even in the outer parts, there is plenty of active worship.
Always the temples are made of stone, and they’re open, and there are large stone columns. Sometimes the columns are beautifully carved. Usually
Large Temple Hall
This gives a feel for the large interior halls in the temples. People chatting and visiting. Sri Meenakshi Temple, Madurai there is a wornness to the stone, a darkness, an aged look and feel, as if people have been worshipping here daily for centuries and centuries.
It’s dark and cool in these temples, like a stone cave. The temples always have a smell of melted butter too, because one way of making offerings is to place a small cup-like candle of ghee (which is like butter) as an offering to the gods, so there are these smoky, melted-butter-smelling little offerings all around for the gods. The temple is shaded and cave-like, and the butter lamps glimmer and smoke, and it’s all fascinating and atmospheric.
Praying to the gods. In the other temples I visited, most of the temple had a holiday feel, a Fourth-of-July-picnic sort of feel: large families sitting on the cool stone floor together, chatting and laughing and wobbling their heads back and forth.
One of the temples that I wander into at the Rock Fort Temple feels different. It’s more intense. There is no sign saying “Non-Hindus Not Allowed,” but I have the feeling that probably I am heading into a place that tourists are not usually allowed, because it has a particularly sacred
Small Nandi, Butter Lamps
This photo is typical - a small Nandi statue with ghee lamps in front of it. Sri Meenakshi Temple, Madurai feel.
This temple is a large rectangle, all stone, with large worn stone columns in the open spaces. All around the outer edge of the temple are large nooks, with statues of gods in them. You can see these nooks and their statues from another temple in some of the photos.
In each temple nook or mini-temple (I have no idea what they are called), there is a statue of a god or goddess. Usually the god or goddess is dressed, as you can see in the photos. Usually there is at least one hanging butter lamp, and often there is an offering area with many butter lamp offerings. Sometimes people have made offerings to the gods, by placing fruit or flowers in front of them or on them.
This temple has temple nooks full of statues much like in the photos, but the statues in this temple are much more elaborate and the clothing and flowers adorning the gods are more elegant, and there are more of them.
In the center of the temple room is a large, closed door that leads to some sort of central room of the temple, and a large group
Looking into the Inner Sanctum
This photo looks into the Hindus-only area. You can see the number of worshipers. Sri Meenakshi Temple, Madurai of people are sitting in front of the door singing or chanting. There is another group of people chanting on the other side of the central room of the temple, so the whole space is filled with the sounds of the two chanting groups. One group is led by some priests or student priests; they are clearly reciting from holy books.
As these two groups chant, worshippers come by in large and small groups, some individually. They worship at each of the statues in in the temple nooks. Sometimes they prostrate themselves before the gods. Sometimes they hold their hands over their heads in prayer and recite a chant or song. Sometimes they bow to the gods. Sometimes they make offerings: flowers, fruit, a small butter lamp, incense.
So, it’s dark, and cool, and smoke is wafting about, and there’s this very rich and sweet buttery-lamp smell everywhere, and the butter lamps are flickering beautifully and lighting up the statues of the gods, and the gods are all dressed and flower-bedecked, and all around people are chanting and praying and prostrating.
The central temple. Then there’s a crescendo of the drum being played along with the chanting,
Sacred Space
This photo is zoomed in to a Hindu only worship space. It's from the Big Temple in Thanjavur, but it captures some of the feeling of what I've described in the text. and the large door to the central temple opens. There’s a priest chanting and waving in slow circles a large flickering triangle of butter lamps as he prays.
It’s a dramatic moment: the door opens fairly suddenly, and there is this priest and this large statue and the flickering of many butter lamps and the flames are moving through dark, cave-looking space as he swings the butter lamps. I can’t quite see what’s in there, but I can tell that it’s a Hindu-only area, the most sacred part of this temple.
I watch for a while. There is a large statue inside this inner temple, and two statues of Nandi, the bull. (You can see other statues of Nandi the bull in the photos).
There’s an outer room and an inner room to this inner temple. Worshippers go into the outer room. Only the lead priest goes into the inner room.
The lead priest is an older man. He is shirtless (as area many of the male worshippers), and he wears an orange lungi, basically a sarong. (Many Tamil men wear lungies regularly instead of pants.)
The lead priest goes into the inner room, where
Stone Column Altar
This photo gives a good feel for temple worship. Note the yellowish ash on the girl in the lower left, mentioned in the text. Sri Meenakshi Temple, Madurai the statue is. It’s a large statue. It might be Ganesh, the elephant god, I can’t tell. It has a sort of crown of lights above it, and butter lamps all around it, and it’s dressed. I can’t make out the statue, but the effect of it is quite moving and powerful. It seems real, it feels real. Well, not real as in alive or anything, but real somehow. There is something to the statue, something ineffable but real.
So the priest goes into the room with the statue. He has a butter lamp holder, some sort of gold or brass implement. He chants to the statue, and moves the butter lamp holder slowly in circles as he chants. He chants for a while, and the worshippers mostly sit on the ground and watch.
After a few minutes, he comes into the outer room. He hands each worshipper what appears to be a pinch of ash. Most of the worshippers smear the ash across their forehead in a wide swipe. Most of the people in the temple have a wide ash swipe across their forehead as they walk around and pray. A noticeable number of women also have
Temple Nook, Butter Lamps
Sri Meenakshi Temple, Madurai a yellowish, almost turmeric-looking ashy paste all over their face and ears as well. As the priest comes out of the inner temple, people also reach their hands towards the flickering flames of the butter lamps, and sort of wave their hands just above, or maybe through, the flames of the lamps.
This same pattern of worship occurs over and over again, as new groups file through the temple.
Praying, in various ways. After they receive their ash from the inner temple, most worshippers make a round of the statue nooks or mini-temples around the outer wall of the temple. Sometimes they stop at each one; other times they head for a specific god.
Once the head priest comes out near where I’m standing and says a specific chant to a large golden statue that is dressed in silk and flowers. As he chants, he throws flower petals on the statue. At the end, he gives ash to a family who had been praying as he chanted, and they wipe the ash on their forehead.
As I stand and watch, people come by and chant to particular gods, and prostrate, or just bow their heads for
Worshiping Ganesh
This photo gives you a good feel for worship in South Indian Temples. Sri Meenakshi Temple, Madurai a moment. Twice people come by with large bunches of bananas, and give everyone in the temple two bananas.
Individual worshippers are chanting or singing, and one of the large groups has been singing in front of one particular set of gods since I came in over an hour ago. This is the group with the priests reciting from the holy books.
What I’m feeling. I don’t understand anything I’m seeing, but I can feel the power in the room. I now look at it all quite differently than I did before. Before I walked by those statues and thought, “Oh wow, how interesting, look at those statues with silk clothes on and flowers all over them.” I looked at them as a tourist looks at a fascinating sight. But they were just statues.
After spending a couple of hours in this temple, they’re more than statues. I have a lot more respect for them. There is something holy about them, something real. I don’t know what, and it is just a feeling, and I can’t put words to it.
But I have some sense of awe, of power. It is disquieting and disorienting, and it
Worshiping Nandi
Sri Meenakshi Temple, Madurai roils me up a bit in a good way. I feel shivery, shaken, a little thrown out of whack. There is something here that is ineffable but real.
I have had this feeling before. In Tibet, the holiest temple for Tibetan Buddhists is called the Jokhang Temple, in Lhasa. It too is dark and full of statues and butter lamps, and intensely devout worshippers. In the Jokhang too the statues of the gods felt like more than statues. You could somehow feel or sense the gods in them, or through them. That’s not completely true, but there is something intense and real about both the Jokhang and these South Indian temples.
Writing that, and reading back over it, it doesn’t make sense. It’s not rational. But it’s real, it’s true. There’s something there.
So that’s the sort of thing I’ve been doing in Tamil Nadu. It’s all quite intense, and it’s extremely hot outside, so often I go out in the morning, rest in my hotel during the heat of the day, then go back out once it becomes tolerable again in the evening. I wouldn’t quite say that it’s fun, but it’s extraordinary. I will never
Photo with Paul
Often I feel like a character at Disneyworld. I'm constantly approached by excited, smiling Indians who introduce themselves and request a photo with me. It's a hoot, a lot of fun. forget my experiences here.
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Joyce Hollyday
non-member comment
Spectacular colors!
Paul, the colors of India are truly spectacular -- as are the intricate carvings. Makes us look kind of pale and simple...Thanks for capturing and sharing it all. Keep cool! Joyce