அனந்தன் பாலும் கருடன் பாலும் — "With Anantha and Garuda": Notes on Sufi Pīrs and Syncretic Ability (Part 1)

This section about Nathar Vali R.A. and the serpent (who is very directly a reference to the Sesha-Ananda mount of Trichy's Ranganatha) from "Saints, Goddesses, and Kings" by Susan Bayly always had me wondering if any Sufi pīrs have interacted with Vishnu's moving mount, Garuda...until I remembered this devotional painting of Lal Shahbaz Qalandar R.A. riding Garuda.

 It's interesting to note that the piece not only syncretizes Sufi imagery with Vaishnavite iconography but also lifts from a painting of Jesus for the saint's pose. When a pīr attracts devotion from all corners of society, his cult also absorbs their emblems and further roots itself into local traditions. 

Tangentially, this makes me think about the hundreds upon hundreds of snake-stones in Kanchipuram—they originate as emblems of local Naga-centered animism, but depending on the section of the town, they are modified with lingams and dancing Krishnas to either appear explicitly Shaivite or Vaishnavite, despite the exact same "models" (for lack of a better term) of snake-stones appearing throughout. It is not only the Muslim pīr cults which derive validation from syncretism with folk religion/animism; the "high" gods of what is now known as Hinduism too have always relied on the recognizability of these ancestral and indigenous emblems. 

That being said, these associations are in no way devoid of mystical purpose; one of the reasons why Lal Shahbaz Qalandar R.A. is referred to as "Shahbaz" (falcon) is because the falcon always returns to the hand of the Falconer—who, in this case, is God Himself. The bird represents the wandering human self or spirit (in both Sufism and Vaishnavism) and the saint or deity who conquers the unruly bird has not only conquered themselves, but also directs their followers in return towards the Supreme Truth. (Similarly, the peacock represents the ego and its sensual desires; in both Muslim folktales and in tales of Murugan, the peacock's ego is quelled by self-realization of how unsightly its legs look.)  The serpent on the other hand, depending on context, represents the Cosmic Soul, or fertility, or one's own vices, doshas subdued by the saint or deity, or the Divine Feminine power.

Pic 1 +2 : a story of Nathar Vali R.A. from "Saints, Goddesses, and Kings" 

Pic 3: Devotional poster of Lal Shahbaz Qalandar R.A. Source

Pic 4: Naga cult stones near Sri Vaikunda Perumal temple, Kanchipuram. (Note the dancing Krishna and the Hanuman statue.) Source








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