Introduction
I have chosen to examine Yama, the god of death who grants justice and punishment to good and wicked souls respectively. Within this Storybook, I will examine the creation of Yama and his cohort Chitragupta, his role as God of Death, and how he interferes in the lives of men. Two of the stories I want to tell are the creation of Yama's realm by Brahma and the story of devoted love between Savitri and Satyavan.
As a person thoroughly interested in religion, I wanted to delve deeper into the Hindu religion by understanding its afterlife beliefs. I have taken courses on Greek and Roman mythology and I see some similarities between the gods Pluto and Yama. Pluto rules the underworld known as Hades in the Roman belief and supervises the souls that come to him. Christian belief in a heaven and hell as reward and punishment for the soul are also very similar to Hindu belief. Religion is so fascinating because of the similar ideas that all religions share. As mortal beings, humans everywhere deal with death. It is the similar situation that all humans share that create similar stories to explain the afterlife.
There are several stories surrounding the creation of Yama. One story in the Vedas text tells of Yama being born to Vivasvat the god of social morality (the Vedas are ancient Indian scriptural texts). He has a twin sister Yami and both are considered the first humans. Together they perpetuated the species until Yama dies. He is the first to do so and is the first to find a way to make his soul live immortally. In doing so, he became the God of Death. His name means restrainer and he exercises his restraint over mankind.
Images of Yama vary based on the status of the soul. If the soul is pure then the image of Yama is comparable to Vishnu. He will have a dark complexion and lotus eyes. He will smile and be charming. To the wicked soul he appears with his crown afire, arms that are many leagues long, and his voice roars! In both appearances he would ride upon a buffalo.
He reigns over the south quadrant of the earth and is sometimes called Dakshinasapati, which means "lord of the south." The road to his palace is guarded by two dogs with four eyes. He has a smaller god named Chitragupta record the deeds of men and Chitragupta reads them aloud at the soul's eternal sentencing. Yama holds a mace in one hand to deal out justice and a noose in the other to rope the soul from the body. In addition to being God of Death, Yama is also the God of Justice. Yama pronounces the punishment for the wicked soul or permits the good soul to heaven. The call of Yama refers the the cawing of the crow from overheard announcing that death is near. For more information please visit Indian Mythology and Wikipeda.
Eventually every character that dies in the texts we have read for this course will stand before Yama. By examining the sentencing of Yama for these souls, the stories of the Ramayana and Mahabharata characters can continue. I have choosen Chitragupta to narrate the majority of this Storybook because of his diligent record keeping. Who better to tell the story of Yama, himself, Ravana and Savitri than the meticulous book keeper of Yama. For Chitragupta no detail is too small to record so the full story of each soul is laid out for the reader to witness. By reading The Call of Yama, I hope my readers will acknowledge that one day Yama (death) will call. Will you be ready to hear your soul's story?
Stephanie Gifford
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Image
information: Yama riding buffalo, no further info available. Website.