Lingamलिंग

The lingam (लिंग) is the primary form in which Shiva is worshipped: not a statue but a smooth, rounded pillar, usually set in a spouted base, standing in the sanctum of virtually every Shiva temple. The Sanskrit word means mark, sign or characteristic — the linga is the sign of a god whose own nature is beyond form. Figural images of Shiva, however magnificent, stand on the temple's walls and in its processions; the sanctum belongs to the pillar.

Charter and meaning

The tradition's own account of the linga is the Lingodbhava myth: Shiva manifested as a column of fire without top or bottom, which Brahma and Vishnu failed to fathom. The pillar in the sanctum is that column made approachable. The base in which it sits is the pitha, identified with the goddess and often termed the yoni, so that the complete emblem holds Shiva and Shakti together. Modern discussion has often fixed on phallic interpretations, which some scholars trace in early sources; the worshipping tradition, and texts such as the Linga Purana, overwhelmingly treat the linga as the aniconic sign of the unmanifest absolute. The two readings have coexisted uneasily for over a century of scholarship.

Kinds of lingas

The Agamas classify lingas in detail. Svayambhu lingas are self-arisen, discovered rather than made, and rank highest; among them tradition counts the twelve jyotirlingas, the lingas of light, whose shrines — Somnath, Kashi Vishvanatha, Mahakaleshvara at Ujjain, Rameshvaram among them — form one of India's great pilgrimage networks. Banalingas are river-smoothed stones from the Narmada, worshipped in homes without consecration. Mukhalingas bear carved faces of the god; ice, sand and crystal lingas mark the form's independence of any material, the Amarnath ice linga being the most famous.

Worship

Linga worship is the daily heartbeat of Shaivism: abhisheka, the bathing of the pillar with water, milk and honey; the offering of bael leaves; the recitation of the Shatarudriya. The rite is open in its simplicity — a village stone under a tree receives the same gestures as a jyotirlinga — and in that simplicity lies the form's endurance. The lingam asks nothing of the eye and everything of the understanding: it is the tradition's oldest way of saying that God has no face, and every face.