Enlivening images: The Śaiva rite of invocation based primarily on the major Śaivāgamas

Abstract

The Saiva Siddhanta rite of invocation, which secures Śiva 's special presence in a linga during pūjā, articulates specific theological postulates of Śaiva philosophy. The rite objectifies these postulates within the actions of the worshipper. Invocation explicitly aims to make Śiva manifest in an object, and the actions of the rite make sense only when seen as a means of gaining the real presence of the deity in a support that is external to and apart from the soul of the worshipper. Since Śaiva Siddhānta regards Śiva as ontologically distinct from the soul of the worshipper. The Śaiva worshipper must reach beyond himself to summon Śiva into the ritual domain. No "projection of the worshipper's own mental attitude" could ever, in the Śaiva Siddhānta view, be adequate to invoke Śiva. Rather, the worshipper must employ the powers of mantra and visualization to bring Śiva from his highest state outside the worshipper's body, into a specially-prepared "divine body" which is itself a model of Śiva 's active presence in the world. Reversing I Huntington's formulation, we should say that Śaiva invocation refers to Truth precisely in order to reveal it, fully manifest in the Śiva linga.