Mobilizing Krishna's World by Heidi Pauwels

Author:Heidi Pauwels
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: University of Washington Press
Published: 2018-02-22T16:00:00+00:00

FIG. 4.2 Disguised Akbar with Tansen Visit Svami Haridas, Kishangarh school, ca. 1760. Color and gold on paper (25 × 31 cm). National Museum, New Delhi, accession no. 48.14/61. Courtesy National Museum (New Delhi)

Akbar, the embodiment of dharma, came to know well Svāmī Hari(dās)’s heart. Then he called a painter and had him paint a portrait of Svāmī Haridās. (Nij-mat-siddhānt 109.4)

This may allude to a contemporary painting depicting Svāmī Haridās, Tānsen, and Akbar (fig. 4.2). In fact, the story may be so widespread because of its depiction in art. One painting, now in the National Museum in New Delhi, is attributed to the Kishangarhi painter Nihālcand and estimated to date from 1760.131 There are at least two other close copies of the painting, one in the Vrindavan Research Institute and one in Bhārat Kalā Bhavan in Benares, as well as a late eighteenth-century Mughal copy of a detail.132

This painting illustrates the anecdote in the Garland of Stories and Songs perfectly. Immediately striking is the lush verdure of the setting, as described in the song. Tānsen is portrayed with his instrument resting on his knees, as if he just paused from performing. Haridās is singing, and as he does a peacock calls out, as in the song. The white flowers with yellow hearts and the yellow flowers with white hearts may be the artist’s representation of the cactus flowers mentioned in the poem. The now largely forgotten hagiographical work thus may have been foundational for one of Nihālcand’s most famous paintings.

STORIES ABOUT MĪRĀBĀĪ

Nāgarīdās’s hagiography is an important eighteenth-century source for the famous female saint Mīrābāī’s life and the reception of her songs.133 He elaborates on Nābhādās’s work and Priyādās’s commentary, but with a twist.134 Mīrā is persecuted by the Rāṇā (here her brother-in-law), not just because of her association with holy men, but also because she refused to become a satī and burn herself on her husband’s funeral pyre (PPM 14). Having escaped his plots against her, among which is an attempt at poisoning her (PPM 15), Mīrā defiantly sets off on a pilgrimage, to the Gaṅgā, to Vrindavan, and eventually to Dvarka (PPM 16). Like Priyādās, Nāgarīdās briefly alludes to Mīrā’s meeting with Jīva Gosvāmī in Vrindavan, but he does not include the meeting with Akbar.135 Likewise, Nāgarīdās omits the conflict of Mīrā with her female in-laws who worship the Goddess and press her to do so, too.136 Nāgarīdās tells how the Rāṇā sends a maid to spy on Mīrā, but she is converted (PPM 18), whereas in Priyādās’s account, the spy informs the Rāṇā that there is a male in Mīrā’s apartments, who, when the Rāṇā investigates, turns out to be Krishna himself.137 The story of Mīrā’s arrival in Dvarka and final absorption in the Raṇachoḍa temple is told more elaborately than in the terse verse by Priyādās:138

Mīrā arrived in Dvarka. She stayed there for several days. After that, the purohit and other servants of the Rāṇā who had accompanied Mīrā said, “Many days have passed now. You must return to your homeland now.

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