Religion

It often surprises Western visitors to learn that Nepal is, by a huge margin, a Hindu country, not a Buddhist one. That’s what the statistics say, anyway. In truth, both religions are underpinned by shared tantric traditions that are distinctively Himalayan. For long the subcontinent’s last great Hindu kingdom, Nepal was also the birthplace of Buddhism. Today, you can broadly judge a Nepali’s religion by altitude: Tibetan-style Buddhism prevails on the ridgetops and in the high Himalayas, where you’ll find Sherpas, Tamangs and other Bhotiya or Tibetan peoples; the Madheshi peoples of the plains, and the caste Hindus of the Middle Hills, are fairly orthodox Hindu. In the hilly heartland of the country, Nepal’s ethnic groups intertwine Hinduism with animist or nature-worshipping traditions, ancestor veneration and shamanistic practices, often worshipping local gods under nominally Hindu names. Many Rais and Limbus, however, are partly or largely “Hinduized” in terms of religion, while Magars and Gurungs have been more strongly influenced by Tibetan Buddhism. In the Kathmandu Valley, the Newars practise their own extraordinary, tolerant mix of the two main religions, bound together by Nepal’s vibrant tantric legacy.

Long supported by the monarchy and Brahmin-dominated government, many Hindu institutions are now facing a more uncertain future. Elements within the Maoist movement are aggressively secular, and in 2008 the government attempted to throw traditional priests out of the Pashupatinath temple and withdrew funding for key Kathmandu festivals. By contrast, Buddhist and indigenous religious groups are enjoying something of a renaissance – partly thanks to the mighty amounts of foreign funding that Tibetan Buddhism attracts. The ethnic groups of the hills, meanwhile, are increasingly asserting political and religious autonomy, rejecting the creeping Hinduization of past decades and turning back to local traditions.

Hinduism

Hinduism isn’t so much a religion as dharma, meaning duty, faith – an entire way of life. Hindus seek the divine not in books or prayer meetings but in the ritual rhythms of the day and the seasons – festivals are hugely important – and in the very fabric of family and social relationships. Having no common church or institution, Hinduism’s many sects and cults preach different dogmas and emphasize different scriptures, and worshippers can follow many paths to enlightenment. By absorbing other faiths and doctrines, rather than seeking to suppress them, Hinduism has flourished longer than any other major religion.

According to the philosophical Upanishads, the soul (atman) of each living thing is like a lost fragment of the universal soul – brahman, the ultimate reality – while everything in the physical universe is mere illusion (maya). To reunite with brahmanipi8hfBu+Fu1Tqp6g5eaALs= , the individual soul must go through a cycle of rebirths (samsara), ideally moving up the scale with each reincarnation. Determining the soul’s progress is its karma, its accumulated “just desserts” (nothing to do with kama, which means sexual desire), which is reckoned by the degree to which the soul conformed to dharma in previous lives. Thus a low-caste Hindu must accept his or her lot to atone for past sins, and follow dharma in the hope of achieving a higher rebirth. The theoretical goal of every Hindu is to cast off all illusion, achieve release (moksha) from the cycle of rebirths, and dissolve into brahman.

You cannot escape the sound “AUM” or “OM” in Nepal. Once you’ve learned to recognize the written form of the sacred syllable, you can see it everywhere: on temples gates and monastery walls, carved on rocks beside trails, painted on the sides of buses and hanging on pendants around people’s necks. Once your ear is attuned, you’ll hear it everywhere too: in Hindu prayers and the bhajan hymns sung at dusk, in the endlessly repeated sotto voce incantations of Buddhist pilgrims, and in the relentless blaring of tourist music shops playing New Age mantra recordings.

Some would say you can’t escape the sound anywhere outside Nepal either, as it represents the very vital energy of the universe, of which all material things are manifestations. Among Hindus, it is known as the “four-element syllable”, standing for birth, existence and dissolution, as represented by the three great gods, Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva. It also stands for the three human states of selfhood: wakefulness, dreaming and sleep. The fourth element is the eloquent silence out of which the sound arises, and into which it returns; it represents the transcendent state of “peaceful, benign pure oneness”.

The syllable itself reflects the idea: the basic sound (and the core shape of the written letter) is an open “a”; this is modified by the “u” part of the vowel (represented in writing by a hook-like curl behind) before being closed off with a nasalized “m” (shown as a moon-like dash with a dot on top).

As with any good mantra, actually uttering OM is supposed to have real effects: it is said to align your body with the resonant spirit of the universe itself. For Tibetan Buddhists, OM is the first element in the most essential mantra of all: Om mani padme hum (pronounced “om mani peme hung” in Tibetan). It’s usually translated as “Hail to the jewel in the lotus”, which is a salutation to the bodhisattva (a kind of Buddhist saint) Avalokiteshwara, who represents compassion and is known as the jewel-lotus.

For Buddhists, the mantra’s meaning is many-layered, however. Each syllable corresponds to different deities, symbolic colours and magical effects in the Tibetan tradition, and each represents one of the six paramitas, or “perfections”. Om and Hum, for instance, do not have any meaning as words, but represent white and black respectively, and the perfections of generosity and diligence. The mantra also has political significance. Chanting it is a sign of devotion to the Dalai Lama (said to be an incarnation of Avalokiteshwara), and thus of resistance to the Chinese.

The Hindu pantheon Hinduism’s earliest known origins lie in the Vedas, sacred texts composed in India in the first and second millennia BC. They tell stories of a pantheon of nature gods and goddesses, some of whom are still in circulation: Indra (sky and rain) is popular in Kathmandu, while Surya (sun), Agni (fire), Vayu (wind) and Yama (death) retain bit parts in contemporary mythology. As the messenger between the gods and humanity, Agni was particularly important, and sacrifice was thus a major part of Vedic religion. Gradually, the Vedic gods were displaced by the Brahminical “trinity”: Brahma the creator, Vishnu the preserver and Shiva the destroyer. Every locality has its own forms, often derived from ancient nature worship. Even today, many ancestral spirits of the Nepali hill peoples are being given Hindu names, their worship adapted to fit more conventional rituals – a process known as Hinduization. When pressed, Nepalis often refer to their local deities as aspects of Mahadev (Shiva), Vishnu or one of the other mainstream gods, either out of respect for foreigners’ potential bewilderment or out of a widespread notion that they all boil down to one god in the end. Shaivism, or the worship of Shiva, is the most widespread devotional cult in Nepal, as part of the tantric legacy (see box, p.401). In art and statuary, the most important gods can easily be identified by certain trademark ipi8hfBu+Fu1Tqp6g5eaALs= implements, postures and “vehicles” (animal carriers). Multiple arms and heads aren’t meant to be taken literally: they symbolize the deity’s “universal” (omnipotent) form. Severed heads and trampled corpses, meanwhile, signify ignorance and evil.

Vishnu Vishnu (often known as Narayan in Nepal) is the face of dignity and equanimity, typically shown standing erect holding a wheel (chakra), mace (gada), lotus (padma) and conch (sankha) in his four hands, or, as at Budhanilkantha, reclining on a serpent’s

coil. A statue of Garuda (Garud in Nepal), Vishnu’s bird-man vehicle, is always close by. Vishnu is also sometimes depicted in one or more of his ten incarnations, which follow an evolutionary progression from fish, turtle and boar to the man-lion Narasimha, a dwarf, an axe-wielding Brahman and the legendary heroes Ram and Krishna, as portrayed in the much-loved epics, the Mahabharata and Ramayana.

Ram is associated with Hanuman, his loyal monkey-king ally, while blue-skinned Krishna is commonly seen on posters and calendars as a chubby baby, flute-playing lover or charioteer. Interestingly, Vishnu’s ninth avatar is the Buddha – this was a sixth-century attempt by Vaishnavas to bring Buddhists into their fold – and the tenth is Kalki, a messiah figure invented in the twelfth century as Muslims took the upper hand in India. Vishnu’s consort is Lakshmi, the goddess of wealth, to whom lamps are lit during the festival of Tihaar. Like Vishnu, she assumed mortal form in two great Hindu myths, playing opposite Ram as the chaste princess Sita, and opposite Krishna as the passionate Radha.

Shiva Shiva’s incarnations are countless but to many devotees he is simply Mahadev, the Great God. He is the pre-eminent divinity in Nepal. The earliest and most widespread icon of Shiva is the linga, a phallic stone fertility symbol often housed in a boxy stone shivalaya (“Shiva home”), often garlanded in marigolds and dusted with red abhir powder, and sometimes encircled in a yoni, or vulva symbol. Shiva temples can be identified by the presence of a trisul (trident) and the bull Nandi, Shiva’s mount.

Many sadhus worship Shiva the yogin (one who practises yoga), the Hindu ascetic supreme, who is often depicted sitting in meditative repose on a Himalayan mountaintop. In his benign form as Pashupati (“Lord of the Animals”), he occupies Pashupatinath as his winter home. As Nataraja, lord of the “dance” of life, he maintains and destroys the cosmos. As the loving husband of Parvati and father of Ganesh, he represents family life – the divine couple can be seen leaning from an upper window of a temple in Kathmandu’s Durbar Square. Nearby stand two famous statues of the grotesque Bhairab, the tantric (see p.401) interpretation of Shiva in his role as destroyer: according to Hindu philosophy, everything – not only evil – must be destroyed in its turn to make way for new things. Bhairab alone is said to take 64 different forms.

Mahadevi – the mother goddess The mother goddess is similarly worshipped in many forms, both peaceful and wrathful. Typically, she is the consort of Shiva, and represented as the vulva-like yoni symbol. In Nepal she is widely worshipped as Bhagwati, the embodiment of female creative power, and in the Kathmandu Valley she takes physical form as the Kumari, a young girl chosen to be her virginal incarnation. She is appeased by sacrifices of uncastrated male animals, a practice far more common in tantric Nepal than in more orthodox India. In art, she is most often seen as Durga, the many-armed demon-slayer honoured in the great Dasain festival; as angry Kali (“Black”, but often painted as dark blue), the female counterpart of Bhairab, wearing a necklace of skulls and sticking out her tongue with bloodthirsty intent; and as the Ashtamatrika in the form of eight (or sometimes seven) ferocious “mothers”. On a more peaceful level, she is also Parbati (“Hill”, daughter of Himalaya), Gauri (“Golden”) or just Mahadeviipi8hfBu+Fu1Tqp6g5eaALs= (“Great Goddess”).

Ganesh, Annapurna and Saraswati Several legends tell how Ganesh, Shiva and Parbati’s son, came to have an elephant’s head: one states that Shiva accidentally chopped the boy’s head off, and was then forced to replace it with that of the first creature he saw. The god of wisdom and remover of obstacles, Ganesh must be worshipped first to ensure that offerings to other gods will be effective, which is why a Ganesh shrine or stone will invariably be found near other temples. Underscoring Hinduism’s great sense of the mystical absurd, Ganesh’s vehicle is a rat.

Of the other classical Hindu deities, only Annapurna, the goddess of grain and abundance (her name means “Full of Grain”), and Saraswati, the goddess of learning and culture, receive much attention in Nepal. Saraswati is normally depicted holding a vina, a musical instrument something like a sitar.

Prayer and ritual In practice, Hinduism is chiefly concerned with the performance of day-to-day rituals. Puja, a gift to the divine that acts as worship, is particularly important. It can be done before a shrine in the home – and should in fact be performed first and last thing – at a public temple, or simply on an ad hoc basis: when encountering a sacred cow in the street, for instance, or while whizzing past a particular shrine on a motorbike. In a more formal puja, offerings (prasad) are made to the chosen god: flowers (usually marigolds), incense sticks, light (in the form of butter lamps), abhir (coloured powder) and “pure” foods such as rice, milk or sweets. In return for the puja, the worshipper often receives a mark (tilak, or tika in Nepali) on the forehead, usually made of sandalwood paste, ash or coloured powders.

If the day is regulated by puja, the year is measured out in seasonal festivals. The most important Nepali festivals, Dasain and Tihar (see p.36), both take place in the autumn. Life, meanwhile, is marked by key rites of passage (samskaras). Among the most important in Nepal are the ceremony for a baby’s first rice and the upanayana or “rebirth” rite for highercaste (Baahun and Chhetri) pubescent boys. The boy’s head is shaved (except for a small tuft at the back) and he is given the sacred thread (janai) to wear sash-like over one shoulder, next to the skin, signifying his twice-born status. In some communities, especially Newari ones, girls may undergo barha, a purification rite around the time of first menstruation. Weddings are hugely important and correspondingly lengthy, involving endless processions, gifts and offerings. In Nepal, they’re often loudly signalled by a live band – either the traditional Nepali ensemble of sahanai (shawm), damaha (large kettledrum), narsinga (C-shaped horn), jhyaali (cymbals) and dholaki (two-sided drum) or, for more urban types, a brass band in military-style uniforms. The other key rite is, of course, the funeral. Hindus cremate their dead, and the most sacred place to do so in Nepal is beside the river at Pashupatinath, just outside Kathmandu. Mourning sons are supposed to shave their heads and wear white.

Priests can be full-time professionals or simply the local Brahman. They officiate at the more important rites and festivals, and may also give private consultations for wealthier patrons at times of illness or important decisions. Temple priests preside over the act of darshan (audience with a deity), providing consecrated water for the devotee to wash him or herself and to bathe the deity, leading the puja and the symbolic offering of food to the deity, and bestowing the tika on the devotee’s forehead.

HINDU BHAJAN AND TANTRIC HYMNS

The most visible form of Hindu sacred music is bhajan – devotional hymn-singing, usually performed in front of temples and in the half-covered loggias, or sattals, of rest-houses. Bhajan groups gather on auspicious evenings to chant praises to Ram, Krishna or other Hindu deities and to recite classical devotional poetry. Like a musical puja, the haunting verses are repeated over and over to the mesmeric beat of the tabla and the drone of the harmonium. The group of (male) singers usually follows one lead voice, gradually coming together as the hymn ipi8hfBu+Fu1Tqp6g5eaALs= accelerates to a triumphant, energizing conclusion. During festivals, round-the-clock vigils are sometimes sponsored by wealthy patrons.

Bhajan is mostly a Hindu import, but Newars have their own style, often sung in the Newari language and sometimes even invoking Newari Buddhist deities. Some Newari Buddhist priests still also sing esoteric tantric hymns which, when accompanied by mystical dances and hand postures, are believed to have immense occult power. The secrets of these are closely guarded by initiates, but a rare public performance is held on Buddha Jayanti, when five vajracharya costumed as the Pancha Buddha dance at Swayambhu.

The caste system One of Hinduism’s unique features is the apartheid-like caste system, which theoretically divides humanity into four main varnas, or groups. The Rig Veda, Hinduism’s oldest text, proclaimed that priestly Brahmans (Baahuns in Nepali) had issued from the head and mouth of the supreme creator, warrior Kshatriyas (Chhetris) from his chest and arms, Vaishyas from his thighs, and “untouchable” Sudras from his feet. In Nepal, the system is thought to have been instituted by the fourteenth-century king Jayasthiti Malla, who further subdivided his subjects into 64 hereditary occupations – a system that remained enshrined in Nepali law until 1964.

Discriminating according to caste is now illegal in Nepal, though most “higher” caste Hindus are still careful about ritual pollution, being careful not to accept food or water from lower castes, and avoiding physical contact with them. Marriage has been slowest to change: intercaste couplings remain shocking, often resulting in families breaking off contact – a serious punishment in a country where connections are everything.

The ethnic peoples of the hills, or janajaati, don’t quite fit into the caste system, though internal migration has led to much intermixing, and a great deal of Hinduization. As a result, the janajaati have been given a place half inside Nepal’s caste system: practices such as eating meat and drinking alcohol have placed them below Chhetris but above Dalits. This puts them roughly on a par with foreigners (bideshis), incidentally – though Westerners are technically untouchable.

The usual term for caste in Nepali is jaat, though it can signify ethnicity and traditional occupation, as well as caste in the proper sense. A further subdivision is thar, usually defined as a clan. Members of a thar have a common surname, which may or may not indicate common lineage, but may often indicate a hereditary occupation and position in the social hierarchy – and may enforce caste-like rules regarding marriage.

Buddhism

The Buddha was born Siddhartha Gautama in what is now Nepal in the fifth or sixth century BC (see p.263). His teachings sprang out of Hinduism’s ascetic traditions, adapting its doctrines of reincarnation and karma, along with many yogic practices, but rejecting the caste system and belief in a creator God. The essence of the Buddha’s teaching is encapsulated in the four noble truths: existence is suffering; suffering is caused by desire; the taming of desire ends suffering; and desire can be tamed by following the eightfold path. Wisdom and compassion are key qualities, but the ultimate Buddhist goal is nirvana, a state of non-being reached by defeating the “three poisons” of greed, hatred and delusion.

Buddhism quickly became a full-time monastic pursuit but it also evolved a less ascetic, populist strand known as Mahayana (“Great Vehicle”), which took root in Nepal from around the fifth century. Reintroducing elements of worship and prayer, Mahayana Buddhism developed its own pantheon of bodhisattva – enlightened intermediaries, something akin to Catholic saints, who have forgone nirvana until all humanity has been saved. Some were a repackaging of older Hindu deities. Nepal – and especially the Newar people of the Kathmandu Valley (see p.153) – gradually developed its own unique blend of Hindu and Buddhist traditions, with a strong tantric flavour (see opposite). Buddhism reached its apogee in the medieval Malla ipi8hfBu+Fu1Tqp6g5eaALs= dynasty, but following the Mughal invasion of India, the arrival of orthodox Hindus from the south and west increasingly diluted the Buddhist part of the mix. When the Hindu Shah dynasty took control of Nepal, in the latter half of the eighteenth century, Buddhism went into a long decline. The fortunes of Buddhism in Nepal only recovered thanks to the arrival of another wave of refugees, this time Tibetans fleeing the Chinese takeover during the 1950s. They brought with them their own unique form of the religion, Vajrayana. As a relatively structured typeset of beliefs and practices, it is now far stronger and more visible than the indigenous Nepali strains.

Nepal’s highly coloured religious practices owe much to the feverish influence of tantrism, a ritualistic and esoteric strain of religion that courses through the religious blood of Hindus and Buddhists alike. The tantric cults originated in the Shiva worship of Nepal and the surrounding Himalayan regions in around the eighth and ninth centuries, but their influence soon spread across India, pervading both Hinduism and Buddhism. When India succumbed to first Islamic and then British overlords, Nepal became not just the last remaining Hindu kingdom, but the bastion of tantric traditions. Tibet, meanwhile, developed its own distinctively tantric version of Buddhism.

Tantra has nothing to do with the Western invention of “tantric sex”. Or almost nothing: some extreme Hindu followers turned orthodoxy on its head by embracing the forbidden, seeking spiritual liberation by means of transgression. Ascetics from the Kapalika tantric sect took up residence in cemeteries, following “left-hand” ritual practices such as the consumption of meat and alcohol, and the use of sexual fluids in sacrifice. But these now-notorious rituals were always rare, and tantrism today is chiefly concerned with using rituals to speed up the search for enlightenment or union with the divine. Quasi-magical techniques are passed from teachers to initiates, who progress upwards through levels of understanding. Through meditation and the practice of yoga, the body’s energy can be made to ascend through the seven (or sometimes six) chakras or psychic nodes, beginning at the perineum and ending at the crown of the head, where blissful union with the god Shiva can be achieved. Mantras, or sacred verbal formulas, are chanted; worship is intensified with the use of mudras (hand gestures). Arcane geometrical diagrams known as yantras or mandalas are drawn to symbolize and activate divine principles.

So strong did tantrism become in Nepal, that the entire Kathmandu Valley – then known as Nepal mandala – could be conceived as a kind of interactive map of the divine cosmos, studded with religiously supercharged sites and temples. Many sites are dedicated to the chief objects of tantric worship: the “Great God” Shiva, and his female counterpart Shakti, the mother goddess. In Nepal, they are often depicted in art as the fierce god Bhairab and his terrifying consort Kali, and sometimes seen locked in a fierce sexual embrace which symbolizes the creative unity of the male and female principles: masculinity is conceived as passive and intellectual, female as active and embodied; together, they sustain the life force of the universe.

Buddhist tantra, known as Vajrayana (“Thunderbolt Way”), reverses the symbolism of these two forces and makes the male principle of “skill in means” or compassion the active force, and the female principle of “wisdom” passive. In tantric rituals, these forces are symbolized by the hand-held “lightning-bolt sceptre” (vajra; dorje in Tibetan), which represents the male principle, and the bell (ghanti), representing the female. Expanding on Mahayana’s all-male pantheon, Vajrayana introduces female counterparts to the main Buddha figures and some of the bodhisattva, and sometimes depicts them in sexual positions.

Vajrayana – Tibetan Buddhism Buddhism was originally exported from Nepal to Tibet, courtesy of the Licchavi princess Bhrikuti, who married Tibetan emperor Songstän Gampo in the seventh century. At the time, Tibet was under the sway of a native shamanic religion known as Bön, and Buddhism absorbed many of Bön’s symbols and rituals. (Even today vestiges of the Bön tradition may be encountered while trekking in Nepal: for example, a follower of Bön will circle a religious monument anticlockwise, the opposite direction to a Buddhist.)

Buddhism only really took off in Nepal and Tibet in the eighth century, however, thanks to the founding father Padmasambhava. Better known as Guru Rinpoche or “Precious Teacher” – and recognizable in paintings by his wide-eyed stare, and the ipi8hfBu+Fu1Tqp6g5eaALs= thunderbolt symbol and skull-cup he holds in each hand – he introduced magical and ritualistic practices from the tantric cult (see box above) that was then sweeping across South Asia. In doing so, he apparently meditated in just about every cave in the region, frequently leaving foot or handprints in the rock as signs of his passing.

Bön and tantra proved an explosive mix, giving rise to the spectacular branch of Buddhism now known as Vajrayana, or “thunderbolt way” Buddhism. It takes its name from the vajra or thunderbolt (dorje in Tibetan), a diamond sceptre or dagger used in tantric rituals to signify indestructability. True to its tantric roots, Vajrayana placed

great emphasis on close contact with a lama, or spiritual guide, who steers the initiate through the complex meditations and rituals, and progressively reveals teachings at ever higher and more esoteric levels. (It’s sometimes called Lamaism for this reason.) The most important lamas are regarded as tulkus, reincarnations of previous teachers.

Four main sects developed in Tibet, all now represented in Nepal. The oldest, founded by Padmasambhava, is the Nyingma-pa sect – known as the “Red Hats” for obvious reasons. The Sakya-pa and Kagyu-pa orders emerged in the eleventh and twelfth centuries –the latter inspired by the Tibetan mystic Marpa and his enlightened disciple Milarepa, who also meditated his way around Nepal. The Gelug-pa sect, or “Yellow Hats”, led by the Dalai Lama, is the only one that takes a significantly different theological line. Born out of a fifteenth-century reform movement to purge Lamaism of its questionable religious practices, it places greater emphasis on study and intellectual debate.

Vajrayana disciples make heavy use of quasi-magical rituals, such as the ringing of bells, the reading aloud of holy texts and the chanting of mantras or sacred syllables – most importantly, Om mani padme hum (see p.397). In part, these rituals are aids to meditation, the most important action of all, but they also serve to accelerate the passage of the disciple towards the ultimate goal: enlightenment.

The most visible sign of Vajrayana Buddhism is the stupa (chorten in Tibetan), a dome-like stone structure that serves to enshrine the relics of the saints and to act as a giant abstract representation of Buddhist beliefs. Around Kathmandu’s Swayambhu stupa, for instance, stand five statues representing the transcendent or dhyani (meditating) Buddhas. Stupas are also surrounded by prayer wheels and prayer flags, Tibetan innovations that allow written mantras to be not spoken but spun or fluttered into the air.

Newari religion

Ask a Newari man whether he’s Hindu or Buddhist, the saying goes, and he’ll answer “yes”: after fifteen centuries of continuous exposure to both faiths, the Newars of the Kathmandu Valley have concocted a unique synthesis of the two. Until the eighteenth century, most Newars held fast to the original monastic form of tantric Buddhism – as the bahal of Kathmandu and Patan still bear witness. Gradually, the Kathmandu Valley

BUDDHIST MONASTERIES

Increasing numbers of lavishly endowed gompa, or monasteries, have sprung up all over Nepal in the last 25 years, thanks to the growing wealth of the Tibetan community and the generous sponsorship of Western followers. Rather like medieval cathedrals, gompa are vehicles for esoteric religious symbolism as much as places of worship. Fierce guardian demons (dharmapala) flank the entrance, while the interior walls are riotously covered in paintings of deities, Buddhas and geometric mandalas, and hung all over with silken thangka icons. Gorgeous banners of brightly coloured silk brocade hang from the ceiling, often with elaborately carved and gilded cornices and panelling. On low trays, butter lamps burn pungently alongside heaps of rice piled onto three-tiered silver stands, rows of incense sticks and offerings of fruit, money, flowers and conical dough cakes called torma – sacrifices of a uniquely vegetarian kind. The eye is inevitably drawn, however, to the golden statues of Buddhas and bodhisattvas that line the altars. Often mistaken for deities, these provide a focus for meditation as well as an object of devotion. The most popular figures are ipi8hfBu+Fu1Tqp6g5eaALs= Shakyamuni, the historical Buddha; Avalokiteshwara (Chenrezig in Tibetan), a white male figure with four arms (or, sometimes, a thousand), who represents compassion; Tara, a white or green female figure, also representing compassion; Manjushri, an orange-yellow male youth gracefully holding a sword above his head, who represents wisdom; and the founder of the monastery’s sect, perhaps the Nyingma-pa’s Padmasambhava, better known as Guru Rinpoche. Though these figures are peaceful and benign, there are also wrathful bulgingeyed figures wearing human skins and bearing skulls filled with blood; they symbolize the energy and potency of the enlightened state, and the sublimation of our crudest energies.

More astounding, even, than the polychrome decor of a Tibetan Buddhist monastery is the crashing, thumping, rasping ritual music that rings out during the puja or prayer ceremonies. (Typically, these take place at daybreak and in the late afternoon, before dusk, but timings vary.) The cacophony is supposed to shock you out of your everyday thoughts – and it works. At the core of the ritual is the recital or hymn-like chanting of texts, which usually begins with the master, or cantor, and spreads in rhythmic ripples down the rows of monks. Monks from the Gelug-pa order (see p.401), most dramatically, use the extraordinary overtone or “throat-singing” technique; this ultra-low, growling tone produces rich harmonics sometimes called the gyü-ke, or “tantric voice”. Alongside the virtue regarded as inherent in the recitation of holy texts, such demanding vocal techniques create their own meditational discipline.

In the Tibetan tantric tradition chanting alternates antiphonically with instrumental music, whose crashes and blasts and bangs punctuate and disrupt the hypnotic vocal line – and thus serve to turbo-charge the meditation. Music can represent fierce protective Buddhas or calming, peaceful ones, and different instruments have different ritual significance or uses. The dung-dkar conch, for instance, embodies the clear voice of the Buddha. The rkang-gling trumpet, traditionally made from a human thighbone, is apparently like the whinnying of horses on their way to paradise. Cymbals can be soft and peaceful (gsil-snyan) or brassily fierce (rol-mo). The rgna, or double-drum with its distinctively crooked beater, typically leads the orchestra. Oboe-like rgya-gling shawms play intense, microtonally sliding melody lines, while the long (up to 3m long), alpenhorn-like dung trumpets play sustained, almost subsonic rasping notes in discordant pairs. The dril-bu hand bell and damaru rattle drum usually mark off different sections of the ritual, or guide the tempo. The damaru is a particularly powerful instrument: commonly used by shamans in Nepal, it may be made of two human half-skulls, and the pair of pellet beaters should ideally contain male and female pubic hairs.

became “Hinduized” thanks largely to the Hindu kings who ruled it. The monasteries largely disappeared, and the title of Vajracharya (Buddhist priest) became a hereditary subcaste much like that of the Baahun (Brahman) priests. When Newars refer to themselves as Buddha margi (Buddhist) or Shiva margi (Hindu), they often do so only to indicate that they employ a Vajracharya or Baahun priest. Yet many jyapu (farmers) will attend Hindu festivals and use Vajracharyas as well.

Animal sacrifice is an important part of Hindu – but not Buddhist – Newari religious practice. Newari priests don’t perform sacrifices, but they do preside over the rituals that precede them. Similar ceremonies and feasts are held at private gatherings of patrilineal groups during the Newars’ many festivals and during digu puja, the annual reunion based around the worship of the clan deity (digu dyo).

Many other members of Newari society function in spiritual capacities, either as full-time para-priests or in bit parts during rites of passage and festivals. Members of the Vajracharya subcaste, Gubhajus are tantric healers who employ vajrayana techniques and accoutrements to cure ailments caused by malevolent spirits. Baidyas play a similar role but draw from a more diverse range of Hindu, Buddhist and shamanic techniques including jhar-phuk (“sweeping” away bad influences and “blowing” on healing mantras), puja, amulets and ayurvedic medicines. Jyotish – astrologers – specialize in helping clients deal with planetary influences and their corresponding deities. ipi8hfBu+Fu1Tqp6g5eaALs= The Newari pantheon All the Hindu and Buddhist deities are fair game for Newars, along with a few additional characters of local invention. Some deities specialize in curing diseases, others bring good harvests – as far as Newars are concerned, it doesn’t matter whether they’re Hindu or Buddhist so long as they do the job.

The widely worshipped Ajima, or Mai, the Newars’ grandmother goddess, is both feared as a bringer of disease and misfortune and revered as a protectress against the same. There are innumerable Ajimas, each associated with a particular locality. Some

are also worshipped as Durga, Bhagwati or Kali, including the Ashta Matrika, the eight mother goddesses, whose temples in and around Kathmandu are considered especially powerful. Similar are the tantric Bajra Yoginis (or Vajra Joginis), who command their own cults at four temples around the Kathmandu Valley. Local manifestations of Ajima are represented by clusters of round stones (pith) located at intersections and other strategic places. Chwasa Ajima, the Ajima of the crossroads, has the power to absorb death pollution, which is why Newars traditionally deposited possessions of deceased persons at crossroads. Nag (snake deities), who control the rains and are responsible for earthquakes, may be similarly indicated by modest roadside markers.

Machhendranath, the rainmaker par excellence, is known by Buddhist Newars as Karunamaya, and associated with Avalokiteshwara, the bodhisattva of compassion.

A VISIT TO THE ASTROLOGER

His name is Joshi – in Newari society, all members of the astrologer subcaste are called Joshi – and to get to his office I have to duck through a low doorway off a courtyard in the old part of Patan and feel my way up two flights of wooden steps in the dark, climbing towards a glimmer of light and the sounds of low murmuring. At the landing I take off my shoes and enter the sanctum. Joshi-ji doesn’t even look up. He’s sitting cross-legged on the floor behind a low desk, glasses perched on the end of his nose, scowling over a sheaf of papers and, except for his Nepali-style clothes, looking exactly the way I’d always pictured Professor Godbole in A Passage to India. Shelves of books and scrolls are heaped behind him, and over in one corner a small shrine is illuminated by a low-watt bulb and a smouldering stick of incense.

To Newars, the astrologer is a counsellor, confessor, general practitioner and guide through the maze of life. He acts as mediator between the self and the universe (which are one), and his prognostications are considered as important as a priest’s blessings and as vital as a doctor’s diagnosis. He knows most of his clients from birth. For new parents, the astrologer will prepare complex planetary charts based on the baby’s precise time and place of birth, together with a lengthy interpretation detailing personality traits, health hazards, vocational aptitude, characteristics of the ideal marriage partner, and a general assessment of the newborn’s prospects. When a marriage is contemplated, he will study the horoscopes of the prospective couple to make sure the match is suitable and to determine the most auspicious wedding date. During an illness, he may prescribe a protective amulet, gemstone or herbal remedy corresponding to the planets influencing the patient. He may also be consulted on the advisability of a business decision or a major purchase.

Although it’s misleading to speak in terms of planetary “influences”, the karma revealed by an astrologer’s horoscope strongly implies the future course of one’s life. The astrologer’s role is to suggest the best way to play the hand one was dealt. Hindu astrology recognizes the usual twelve signs of the zodiac, albeit under Sanskrit names, and assigns similar attributes to the planets and houses as in the West. The basic birth chart indicates the sun sign (the sign corresponding to the sun’s position at the time of birth), the ascendant (the sign rising above the eastern horizon at the time of birth) and the positions of the moon and the five planets known to the ancients, plus a couple of other non-Western points of reference. The positions of all of these are also noted in relation to the twelve houses, each of which governs key aspects of the subject’s life (health, relationships and so on). Where Western astrologers use the tropical zodiac, in which Aries is always assumed to start on the spring equinox (March 21, give or take a day), Hindu astrologers go by the sidereal zodiac, which takes all its measurements from the actual positions of the constellations.ipi8hfBu+Fu1Tqp6g5eaALs=

In practice, if you have a horoscope done in Nepal, you’ll probably be presented with a beautifully calligraphed scroll detailing all these measurements in chart and tabular form, using both tropical and sidereal measurements. Interpretation of the chart is an intuitive art requiring great eloquence and finesse. The astrologer can draw on numerous texts but at the end of the day, the usefulness of the reading comes down to his own skill and experience. As I found on my visit to Joshi-ji, the specifics aren’t everything. The astrologer isn’t peddling facts; he’s offering insight, hope, reassurance and a dash of theatre.

Depending on his incarnation (he is said to have 108), he may be depicted as having anything up to a thousand arms and eleven heads. Kumari, the “Living Goddess”, is another example of Newari syncretism (religious fusing): although acknowledged to be an incarnation of the Hindu goddess Durga, she is picked from a Buddhist-caste family. Bhimsen, a mortal hero in the Hindu Mahabharat, who is rarely worshipped in India, has somehow been elevated to be the patron deity of Newari shopkeepers, both Hindu and Buddhist. Manjushri, the bodhisattva of wisdom, plays the lead part in the Kathmandu Valley’s creation myth, and is often confused with Saraswati, the Hindu goddess of knowledge. He is always depicted with a sword, with which he cuts away ignorance and attachment, and sometimes also with book, bow, bell and vajra. Tara, the embodiment of the female principle in Vajrayana Buddhism, assumes special meaning for Newars, who consider her the deification of an eighth-century Nepali princess.

Shamanism

Shamans – sometimes called medicine men, witch doctors and oracles, or jhankri and dhami in Nepali – exist to mediate between the physical and spiritual realms. Shamanistic practices are often found alongside animism, or nature-worship, and the ethnic groups of Nepal’s hills, including those who would unhestitatingly describe themselves as Hindu or Buddhist, will often turn to a jhankri. Urbane Nepalis may publicly ridicule the shaman in favour of more “modern” beliefs such as orthodox Hinduism, but many will privately call on a shaman to exorcise a new house or deal with a case of toothache. In Kathmandu, at night, the shaman’s double-headed drum is still heard beating behind closed doors.

Most ethnic groups clearly distinguish between the true shaman, whose duties, rituals and powers are concerned with the spiritual world, and other types of tribal priest, whose concerns may be with seasonal rituals, rites of passage or tribal myth, and whose roles have been more easily absorbed by mainstream religion. For all the many local variations, a jhankri – usually carrying a double-sided drum and often wearing a headdress of peacock feathers – is always unmistakeable. And even across ethnic and religious divides, jhankris may come together on high hilltops or at lakes deep in the mountains for melas, or religious fairs.

SUPERNATURAL FORCES

Nepal has a rich lore of demons, ghosts and spirits who meddle in human affairs and, like deities, must be propitiated to safeguard passage through their respective domains. Demons are sometimes thought to be the wrathful or perverted manifestations of deities, or more often as supernatural ogres, vampires and the like. Some demons, such as the lakhe, are regarded somewhat fondly, or, like the betal, can also serve as temple protectors. Bhut pret – restless ghosts – are thought to be the spirits of people who died an accidental or violent death and were not administered the proper funeral rites. Other evil spirits take the form of poltergeist-like dwarfs, furry balls, or temptresses with their feet pointing backwards; the design of traditional Newari windows is intended to prevent such spirits from entering the house. Since spirits are believed to attack mainly at night and are repelled by light, it is sometimes said that they are driven out when electricity arrives in a village. ipi8hfBu+Fu1Tqp6g5eaALs=

Nepalis often blame their troubles on witches (bokshi), who are believed to be able to cast “black” tantric spells by giving the evil eye or reciting mantras over their victims’ food. Evidence of bewitchment is often seen in bruises called “bokshi bites”. “Witches” are usually neighbours, in-laws or other people known to their alleged victims. Although laws prohibit false accusations of witchcraft, this doesn’t protect many people (particularly elderly women) from suffering unspoken fear and resentment for their alleged dark arts.

A final category of supernatural forces is negative planetary influences (graha dosa), caused by the displeasure of the deity associated with the offending planet.

The jhankri may be “called”, or born, or both, and his (almost never her) main job is to maintain spiritual and physical balance, and to restore it when it has been upset. As a healer, he may examine the entrails of animals for signs, gather medicinal plants from the forest, perform sacrifices, exorcise demons, chant magical incantations to invoke helper deities, or conduct any number of other rituals. As an oracle, he may fall into a trance and act as a mouthpiece of the gods, advising, admonishing and consoling listeners. As the spiritual sentry of his community, he must ward off ghosts, evil spirits and angry ancestors – sometimes by superior strength, often by trickery. All this, plus his duties as funeral director, dispenser of amulets, teller of myths and consecrator of holy ground and so on, puts the jhankri at the very heart of religious and social life in the hills.

Few visitors to Nepal will encounter a jhankri, as their rituals are usually performed in homes, at night, and shamans have a tendency to guard their esoteric knowledge jealously, wrapping it up in archaic, poetic language that veers between the mystical and the mystifying. There are signs of new confidence, however, with the recent establishment of a Gurung shamanic cultural centre and training school in Pokhara.

Islam and Christianity

A significant number of Muslims inhabit the Western Terai, especially around Nepalgunj, where they’re in the majority. Musalmans, as they’re called in Nepal, form a distinctive cultural group. They have their own language (Urdu), clothing styles and customs – including the institution of purdah for women. In the hill areas, Nepali Musalmans are traditionally wandering traders. They specialize in selling bangles and in “teasing” cotton quilts, and they can often be heard in Kathmandu and other towns calling on housewives to come-buy-my-wares, or giving a prompting twang on the instrument of their cotton-teasing trade. Many are now farmers, tailors or run clothing shops.

Christianity barely registered in Nepal for centuries, due to a vigorously enforced ban on missionary conversions. The interdict was largely lifted in 1990, however, and since 2006 Nepal has been an officially secular state. The result has been a significant influx of evangelicals from all over the world, mostly targeting lower castes and other disadvantaged groups. There has been a corresponding growth of churches, especially in the Kathmandu Valley, and there may be as many as half a million Nepali Christians today.

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