[www.keralites.net] Budha Nilkantha Temple - Sleeping Vishnu

 

Budhanilkantha Temple (Sleeping Vishnu)

Just the feeling to be at this place was divine.. The positive energy and the bliss could be felt in the air.. And mantras and prayers automatically will come from our hearts.

Looking at the mighty scale sculpture of Ananta Shahin Narayan at Budhanilkantha, one might as well say that a pit of snakes is no less than a

bed of roses. Really, lying on the coiled body of the Ananta Sesa, or the eleven hooded serpent, this stone carving of Lord Vishnu represents profound serenity and utmost peace of mind as it seems to float amidst the natural spring on the

lap of the Shivapuri Hill range.

Budhanilkantha is a gigantic sculpture carved on a five-meter-long boulder andis 9 km from Kathmandu city. The temple consists of a pond in which lies a great stone figure of Lord Vishnu reclining on the coils of a cosmic serpent. The huge statue of sleeping Vishnu is carved from the single block of black stone of a type not found in the valley.

It is believed that in a by-gone age, many years before there were two hardworking farmers (husband and wife) who maintained a farm here, and one day they discovered the Deity when they were ploughing their field. According to one of the locals, the legend states that the statue was once amazingly lost. "It was rediscovered when a farmer accidentally hit the sculpture while he ploughed his fields and the statue started bleeding," he says. "On further mining, the statue was finally exposed for the second time," he maintains.

Well, true or not, but all in all and above everything else, this statue here is not as lifeless as a stone! The Deity is over 1,000 years old. Lord Vishnu is about 5m (17 ft) long and is lying in a 13m (43 ft) long tank, as if floating, with His legs crossed. His four hands hold the four symbols of Vishnu: the chakra (disc), club, and conch-shell and lotus flower. It is believed that the deity was carved in the 7th or 8th century during the Licchavi period...

The name Budha Nilkantha represents something of an oddity. It means "Old Blue Neck" and actually refers to Shiva, who drank the poison of the ocean which turned his neck blue. To soothe the burning He threw himself into Lake Gosainkund, from whence, it is said, comes the water in Budha Nilkantha's tank. The shrine itself however is dedicated unambiguously to Vishnu.

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