Interesting Facts On Lord Puri Jagannath

One of the four sacred abodes of Hinduism Puri is one,where ancient legends still live on. Puri is a sleepy seaside town in eastern India namely Odisha and a place where we find pilgrims,adventurers and explorers more in number.

This city is the abode of the god Vishnu,Popularly known in Puri as lord Jagannath which means the lord of the universe.The city of puri in eastern India,gears up once in every year for a magnificent journey of the gods.

Puri is also called as Sri purushottham dhama,The abode of lord Vishnu on earth.Hindus believe in holy trinity,

Brahma the Creator 

Shiva the Destroyer and 

Vishnu the Preserver

According to beliefs Vishnu takes various avatars down the ages to protect humanity from evil.

Lord  Vishnu is also worshiped as Krishna or Narayan and here in puri as lord Jagannath.

Situated across four corners of the country Puri,along with Rameshwaram Dwaraka and Badrinath makes the 'Chardham' are four abodes of Hinduism.The home of lord jagannath attracts thousands of pilgrims every year,as these 'Dhams' or four holy abodes are considered as  sacred by the Hindus and to be visited once in our lifetime.

The people have a lot of faith in the lord jagannath and they believes in the god and their faith continuous till their last breath.

Radha Yatra or the Chariot Parade:

The idea of 'Yatra' in India is not created by politicians and the kings,It is created by pilgrims who traveled across india,travelling to a holy place to a river or to a mountain or to a cave has been recorded at-least 2000 years ago,so the yatra is a very important idea in Hinduism. The idea of yatra has a special significance in the holy city of puri where the gods themselves go on a journey each summer.

This hugely popular event is called 'Radha Yatra' or the 'Chariot Parade'.Lord jagannath and his siblings balbadra and subadhra travel a distance of about 3 kilometers from their resident jagannath temple to the neighboring Gundicha temple in three magnificent chariots.Thousands of the pilgrims came around the globe to travel a glimpse of the beloved lord during the yatra in the hope of gaining Nirvana or Salvation.

Puri begins to prepare chariots for yatra more than two months before the event.The preparation gets kick start with sourcing of wood from nearby village of Dashapalla.

Three towering chariots one each for lord jagannath,his brother balabhadra and his sister subadhra are constructed from scratch every year and there are no written instructions for the craftsman instead all the knowledge is handed down orally from one generation to another.

June becomes a critical month for chariot making under the blazing summer sun the craftsman are working relentlessly to complete the magnificent structures in time.Each Radha or chariot will be over 40 feet high roughly a height of four storey building and the artists begins with colossal wheel then comes with axle and finally finish with rest of the body.Total of 42 wheels are needed for chariots and their proportions are extremely important that will ensure a smooth journey for the gods.

Incredibly the construction of gigantic chariots is based on the centuries old tradition of using hand-spans to measure the wood.

Neel Chakra

One of the greatest attraction in puri is the magnificent jagannath temple built in 12th century.It sprawls over 400,000 square feet of land with an imposing fortifying surrounding wall about 22 feet high.The main structure rises to a height of 200 feet almost as height as the famous Tajmahal. The main temple is surrounded by 30 smaller temples of varying sizes housing different gods of the Hindu pantheon.

It has a wheel right on top, made of eight metals known as the NeelaChakra or the Blue wheel.The wheel symbolizes the primary weapon of lord Vishnu. The sudharshanchakra while serving an important practical purpose as it protects the high rise temple from thunder strokes.Everyday a flag is hoisted on the wheel.A sevak or servitor harnessed only by faith climbs up swiftly to change the flag nearly 200 feet above the ground.

The pilgrim tax apparently introduced in the 17th century was a source of revenue for the government of odisha on account of the popularity of the temple.As per administrative orders of the temple authority, only Hindus are permitted to enter the temple the entry to the temple is through for massive intricately carved gates,the lions gate,the elephant gate,the horse gate and the tiger gate.

Food Feast to Lord Jagannath:

The temple of puri is in vaishnava framework and it typically is about for celebration of life.

SO THE DEITY LIVES LIKE A KING.

Here the every day the god served with food and there is a belief in Hinduism,when lord Vishnu descends on earth every day.he bathes in rameshwaram then goes to dwaraka where he is adorned before he rules.In the afternoon he cames to puri to feast.Its an abode for food.

The food is cooked in one of the largest temple kitchens in the world about 100 feet long and 150 feet broad. Only vegetables are used in cooking the meal,for lord jagannath and getting those vegetables from 1000 year old market called 'Laxmi bazaar'.

Daily lord jagannath enjoys 56 varieties of food-items seems like a lord who loves to feast.Over 1000 Pots,600 cooks who prepare 'Grand Prasad' and by only the ancient technique of using wood goes into making special dishes for lord.All the food is cooked in a traditional wood fire stove.It is about 3.5 feet in height which was a unique wood fire stove.It can accommodate about 9 to 12 earthern pots.The pots are used only once,then they used to break after use.

The food is firstly served to god then to goddess vimala after which is deemed the grand prasad. It is an integral part of the temple to take this grand prasad,the kitchen feeds nearly 25000 people everyday but during yatra time it would be double the number.

 

Story Behind the Wooden idols:

Centuries of myths legends and history have woven themselves into a rich culture of traditions and beliefs around lord Jagannath. The images are deformed,May be the first thing that strikes in us,we have a god with circular eyes no ears,no hands and no feet,its almost like a tribal totem and this imperfection takes us back to the legend story how the tribal god Neel Madhav came to be worshiped as lord jagannath.

On the  king Indradyumna's instructions his trusted servant vidyapati managed to locate the truest form of lord Vishnu worshiped in the forest of odisha as Neel madhav. On hearing this news the king immediately set out on a pilgrim to odisha but when he made his way into the secret cave he found that the image had disappeared.The king was devastated but he receives a divine vision that he should go to puri and draw a shore a log of wood which would be floating on the waves. The king obeyed and found log floating the shores of puri,he brought it to the palace only to face a grater challenge,No one could carve through that hardwood and since no one else had seen. Vishnu and the task was getting impossible to execute. Vishwakarma,the artisan of the gods appeared in the guise of an old carpenter.He convinced the king that he could carve out the idols on the condition that no one should disturb him for 21 days.The king readily agreed.

After the 15th day the queen grew impatient and persuaded the king to open the door.There to his dismay he saw that the carpenter had disappeared only to leave behind wooden images in their incomplete form and it is believed that the same form of these wooden idols is housed in the famous jagannath  temple, in Puri.