History of the Amarnath Pilgrimage
The separatists
in Kashmir and their “secular” supporters are trying to spread the myth that the
Amaranth Yatra is of a recent origin. They claim that it started only after a
Muslim shepherd of Batakot, a certain Buta Malik, originally “discovered” the
Amarnath cave when he lost his flock and found that it had strayed into the
sacred spot some 150 years ago. There is no documentary proof of this so-called
discovery, the story having probably been concocted to give credit to Muslims
for having started the most popular Hindu pilgrimage of Kashmir.
There is ample and conclusive historical evidence, on the other hand, to prove
that the holy cave and the ice lingam were known to the people since very
ancient times and have been continuously and regularly visited by pilgrims not
only from Kashmir
but also from different parts of India. While the earliest
reference to Amarnath can be seen in the Nilamata Purana (v.1324), a 6th century
Sanskrit text which depicts the religious and cultural life of early Kashmiris
and gives Kashmir’s own creation myth, the pilgrimage to the holy cave has been
described with full topographical details in the Bhringish Samhita and the
Amarnatha Mahatmya, both ancient texts said to have been composed even earlier.
References to Amarnath, known have also been made in historical chronicles like
the Rajatarangini and its sequels and several Western travellers’ accounts also
leaving no doubt about the fact that the holy cave has been known to people for
centuries. The original name of the tirtha, as given in the ancient texts, is of
course Amareshwara, Amarnath being a name given later to it.
Giving the legend of the
Naga Sushruvas, who in his fury burnt to ashes the kingdom of King Nara when he
tried to abduct his daughter already married to a Brahmin youth, and after the
carnage took his abode in the lake now known as Sheshnag (Kashmiri Sushramnag),
Kalahana writes:
“The lake of dazzling
whiteness [resembling] a sea of milk (Sheshnag), which he created [for himself
as residence] on a far off mountain, is to the present day seen by the people on
the pilgrimage to Amareshwara.”(Rajatarangini, Book I v. 267.Translation: M. A.
Stein).
This makes it very clear
that pilgrims continued to visit the holy Amarnath cave in the 12th century, for
Kalhana wrote his chronicle in the years1148-49.
At another place in the
Rajatarangini (Book II v. 138), Kalhana says that King Samdhimat Aryaraja (34
BCE-17CE) used to spend “the most delightful Kashmir summer” in worshiping a
linga formed of snow “in the regions above the forests”. This too appears to be
a reference to the ice linga at Amarnath. There is yet another reference to
Amareshwara or Amarnath in the Rajatarangini (Book VII v.183). According to
Kalhana, Queen Suryamati, the wife of King Ananta (1028-1063), “granted under
her husband’s name agraharas at Amareshwara, and arranged for the consecration
of trishulas, banalingas and other [sacred emblems]”.
In his Chronicle of
Kashmir, a sequel to Kalhana’s Rajatarangini, Jonaraja relates that that Sultan
Zainu’l-abidin (1420-1470) paid a visit to the sacred tirtha of Amarnath while
constructing a canal on the left bank of the river Lidder (vv.1232-1234). The
canal is now known as Shah Kol.
In the Fourth Chronicle
named Rajavalipataka, which was begun by Prjayabhatta and completed by Shuka,
there is a clear and detailed reference to the pilgrimage to the sacred site
(v.841,vv. 847-849). According to it, in a reply to Akbar’s query about Kashmir
Yusuf Khan, the Mughal governor of Kashmir at that time, described among other
things the Amarnath Yatra in full detail. His description shows that the not
only was the pilgrimage in vogue in Akbar’s time – Akbar annexed Kashmir in 1586
– but the phenomenon of waxing and waning of the ice linga was also well known.
Amareshwar (Amarnath) was
a famous pilgrimage place in the time of the Mughal emperor Shah Jahan also. In
his eulogy of Shah Jahan’s father-in-law Asif Khan, titled “Asaf Vilas”, the
famous Sanskrit scholar and aesthete Panditraj Jagannath makes clear mention of
Amareshwara (Amarnath) while describing the Mughal garden Nishat laid out by
Asif Khan. The King of gods Indra himself, he says, comes here to pay obeisance
to Lord Shiva”.
As we well know Francois
Bernier, a French physician accompanied Emperor Aurangzeb during his visit to Kashmir
in 1663. In his book “Travels in Mughal Empire” he writes while giving an
account the places he visited in Kashmir that he was “pursuing journey to a
grotto full of wonderful congelations, two days journey from Sangsafed” when he
“received intelligence that my Nawab felt very impatient and uneasy on account
of my long absence”. The “grotto” he refers to is obviously the Amarnath cave as
the editor of the second edition of the English translation of the book,
Vincient A. Smith makes clear in his introduction. He writes: “The grotto full
of wonderful congelations is the Amarnath cave, where blocks of ice, stalagmites
formed by dripping water from the roof are worshipped by many Hindus who resort
here as images of Shiva…..”
Another traveler, Vigne,
in his book “Travels in Kashmir, Ladakh and Iskardu” writes about the pilgrimage
to the sacred spot in detail, clearly mentioning that “the ceremony at the cave
of Amarnath takes place on the 15th of the Hindoo month of Sawan” and that “not
only Hindoos of every rank and caste can be seen collecting together and
traveling up the valley of Liddar towards the celebrated cave……” Vigne visited Kashmir
after his return from Ladakh in 1840-41 and published his book in 1842. His book
makes it very clear that the Amarnath Yatra drew pilgrims from the whole of India in his time
and was undertaken with great enthusiasm.
Again, the great Sikh Guru
Arjan Dev is said to have granted land in Amritsar for the ceremonial departure
of Chari, the holy mace of Lord Shiva which marks the beginning of the Yatra to
the Holy Cave. In 1819, the year in which the Afghan rule came to an end in
Kashmir, Pandit Hardas Tiku “founded the Chhawni Anmarnath at Ram Bagh in
Srinagar where the Sadhus from the plains assembled and where he gave them free
rations for the journey, both ways from his own private resources”, as the noted
Kashmiri naturalist Pandit Samsar Chand Kaul has pointed out in his booklet
titled “The Mysterious cave of Amarnath”. Not only this, Amarnath is deeply
enshrined in the Kashmiri folklore also as stories like that of Soda Wony
clearly show. One can, therefore, conclude without any doubt that the Amaranth
Yatra has been going on continuously for centuries along the traditional route
of the Lidder valley and not a century and a half affair. May be during the
Afghan rule when religious persecution of the Kashmiri Hindus was at its height
and they were not allowed to visit their places of worship the pilgrimage was
discontinued for about fifty or sixty years and during this period the flock of
some shepherd may have strayed into the holy cave, but that in no way makes it
of a recent origin or a show window of so-called Kashmiriat.
The temple is reported to
be about 5,000 years old[1] and was mentioned in ancient Hindu texts. The exact
manner of discovery of the cave is not known.
The Amarnath Yatra,
according to Hindu belief, begins on Ashadha Purnima (day of the Full Moon in
the Hindu Month of Ashadha) and ends on Shravana Purnima (day of the full moon
in the Hindu month of Shravana).
--(Source: Wikepedia)
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