By Swami Harshananda
Nrttamurti literally means ‘icon in the dancing posture’.
Some deities of the pantheon are sometimes shown in the posture of dancing.[1] They are hence called ‘nṛttamurtis’. The deities thus represented are:
Occasionally we come across some stories in the purāṇas describing the reasons for such dancing. They are:
- Śiva danced the tānḍava dance to please the gods who had assembled in Kailāsa and had requested him to exhibit it to them.
- Gaṇapati was immensely pleased and started dancing when the four-faced Brahmā, the creator, bowed down low before him in great reverence.
- Kṛṣṇa’s dancing is connected with his subjugating the terrible serpent Kāliya who was residing in the river Yamunā making it's water highly poisonous.
- For the apsaras like Rambhā and Urvaśī, dancing is a part of their professional discipline.
References[edit]
- The Concise Encyclopedia of Hinduism, Swami Harshananda, Ram Krishna Math, Bangalore