Pañcamukha Āñjaneya
Hanumān in His Tantric Pañcamukhī (पञ्चमुखी हनुमान)
The origin of Sri Pañcamukha Hanumān can be traced to a story in Kṛttivāsī Rāmāyaṇa, or the Śrīrām Pā̃cālī, composed by the fifteenth-century Bengali poet Krittibas Ojha. The incident is not found in the Valmīki Rāmāyaṇa. During the war between Rāma and Rāvaṇa, Rāvaṇa took the help of Ahirāvaṇa, the king of pātāḷa.
Ahirāvaṇa kidnaps Rāma and Lakṣmaṇa and takes them to pātāḷa lōka. Hanumān enters pātāḷa in search of Rāma and Lakṣmaṇa, and realises that in order to kill Ahirāvaṇa he is to extinguish five lamps burning in five different directions, simultaneously. He takes the Pañcamukha form with the heads of Hanuman, Hayagriva, Narasimha, Garuda and Varaha and kills Ahirāvaṇa.
In this tantric representation of Hanumān, he strides boldly forward, trampling on demons and brandishing an array of weapons and other attributes. Above his crown are five animal heads: a goose, snake, mule, lion, and horse (or) sometimes depicted with the additional heads of Garuda, Narasimha, Hayagrīva, Varaha (the vāhana-s/ avatārs of Viṣṇu).
The pañcamukhi form of Hanumān is known from Sanskrit texts such as the Śrīvidyārṇavatantra that carries an iconographic description:
pa cavaktraṃ mahābhīmaṃ tripa canayanair yutam |
bāhubhir daśabhir yuktaṃ sarvakāmyārthasiddhidam ||
pūrvaṃ tu vānaraṃ vaktraṃ koṭisūryasamaprabham |
daṃṣṭrākarālavadanaṃ bhrukuṭīkuṭilekṣaṇam ||
atraiva dakṣiṇaṃ vaktraṃ nārasiṃhaṃ mahādbhutam |
atyugratejovapuṣaṃ bhīṣaṇaṃ bhayanāśanam ||
paścimaṃ gāruḍaṃ vaktraṃ vakratuṇḍaṃ mahābalam |
sarvarogapraśamanaṃ viṣaroganivāraṇam ||
uttaraṃ saukaraṃ vaktraṃ kṛṣṇaṃ dīptaṃ nabhonibham |
pātālānilabhettāraṃ jvararoganikṛntanam ||
ūrdhvaṃ hayānanaṃ ghoraṃ dānavāntakaraṃ param |
ekavaktreṇa viprendra tārakākhyaṃ mahābalam ||
kurvantaṃ śaraṇaṃ tasya sarvaśatruharaṃ param |
khaḍgaṃ triśūlaṃ khaṭvāṅgaṃ pāśam aṅkuśaparvatam ||
dhruvamuṣṭigadāmuṇḍaṃ daśabhir munipuṅgava |
etāny āyudhajālāni dhārayantaṃ yajāmahe ||
pretāsanopaviṣṭaṃ taṃ sarvābharaṇabhūṣitam |
divyamālyāmbaradharaṃ divyagandhānulepanam ||
sarvāścaryamayaṃ devam anantaṃ viśvato mukham |
A visualisation of pañcamukhi Hanumān from Hanumad-rahasya by Shivadutt Mishra, 1971:
“Garuda said, ‘Thus I will explain the visualization, listen, Lovely One
The Supreme Lord created this visualization of his beloved Hanumān:
Having five faces, fifteen eyes, and ten arms, exceedingly terrible,
it grants the fulfillment of all aims and desires.
To the east the face of a fierce monkey, radiant as a billion suns,
a face having sharp teeth and arched eyebrows.
To the south the fierce face of the great being, man-lion,
extremely terrible, with radiant form, awful, and fear-destroying.
To the west the fierce face of Garuda, with curved beak, immensely strong, stifling all serpents and destroying poisons, ghosts, and so on.
To the north the fierce face of a boar, dark and glittering as the firmament, destroyer of the netherworld, lions, ghouls, fevers, and so on.
Above, the terrible horse-face, supreme destroyer of demonic titans,
the face, best of seers, that destroyed the great warrior Tārakāsura.
The one who seeks shelter will have all his enemies destroyed
by visualizing the five-faced Rudra, Hanumān, treasury of mercy.’ ”
The textual and artistic representations of pañcamukhī Hanumān evoke five animal forms associated with heroic acts of Viṣṇu. The ślokas allude to the mythological associations of these forms: Nṛusiṃha, the fear-destroying man-lion; Garuḍa, the enemy of snakes and antidote to venom; the boar Varāha, who plunged into the netherworld to rescue the earth from demons; and Hayagrīva, who is likewise said to have gone to the netherworld to retrieve the Vedas.
Iconography
The iconographic features of Pañcamukha Āñjaneya are elaborated in the Śrītatvanidhi, a work of the 19th century A.D., attributed to Krsnarāja of the Mysore Uḍaiyār family. The compilation cites the Sudarśana-saṃhita as source of the dhyāna śloka. According to this text, Hanumat is pañcamukha ‘five faced’ and terrific in appearance. Each and every face is provided with three eyes and so totally there are fifteen, all dazzling like a thousand suns illuminated at a time. The faces represent the following creatures: Vanara ‘Monkey’ (1), Nrsimha ‘Man-Lion’ (2), Garuḍa ‘eagle’ (3), Boar (4) and Horse (5). The Monkey is said to be in centre, Nṛsiṃha to the right, Garuḍa on the rear side, Boar to the left and Horse at the top (ūrdhvamukha).
The Lord Monkey is very powerful, has protruding teeth, knitted eyebrows and so fails to look directly but has a distorted view. The face of Nṛsiṃha evokes surprise and wonder. It is full of tejas, ‘illumination’. He creates consternation among enemies and to devotees affords the satisfaction of fear-eradication. Garuḍa has an aquiline nose and shining countenance. He gives pātāḷa siddhi, affords immunity from poison and safety from demonic forces. The Lord Boar is black in colour and has a shining complexion. He controls all demonic evil forces and affords tapajvara nivṛtti, ‘quench high fever’.
The Lord is said to hold the following in his hands: sword, khatvanga, pdsa, ankuśa, a garland, a tree, gomudrā and muṇḍam. Only eight are accounted in the cited dhyāna and so the editor of the text adds that in another dhyāna śloka, the following ten are listed: khadga ‘sword’, kheṭaka ‘shield’, pustaka ‘book’, amṛta kalaśa ‘pot of ambrosia’, ankuśa ‘elephant-goad’, a garland, hala ‘ploughshare’, khaṭvaṅga, snake and tree (Śrītavanidhi).
From the above iconographical description what we are able to glean is that the attributes peculiar to Viṣṇu as Vaikuṇṭha-Caturmūrti noted in the Viṣṇudharmōttara Purāṇa (III 44: 9–13), and those of Siva in his five-faced aspect as Sadāsiva find a harmonious blend in this form of Hanumat. The five-faced aspect is a typical Śaiva idiom and so an influence of the Sadāsiva form. By appropriating this Śaiva idiom, its symbolism has also been borrowed and so Pañcamukha Āñjaneya is symbolic of the pañcakṛtyas. The pañcakṛtyas are an elaboration over the three basic cosmic activities, viz., sṛṣṭi ‘creation’, paripālanam ‘maintenance’ and saṁhāra ‘destruction’ which gods of the Hindu Trinity (Brahma, Viṣṇu and Śiva respectively) are supposed to represent.
The iconogrpahy is unique in that generally, no other god below the level of Śiva or Viṣṇu or Brahma or Śakti is endowed with a polycephalous form in the Hindu pantheon, especially the pañcamukha aspect, which symbolises the pañcakṛtyas.
Nepal, circa 14th century
The fierce Hanumān in the Nepali icon above is striding in alidhasana over two crawling figures (demons) on a lotus base, clad in battle armor and holding various weapons and ritual implements in his ten hands, with the face of a lion, monkey, boar, and horned eagle surmounted by a horse’s head. The lion and boar represent two avatars of Viṣṇu (Narasimha and Varāha, respectively), and Garuda is Viṣṇu’s vāhana. In one of his hands he is also holding the Droṇagiri (Sanjīvani) mountain. The stele has a flaming aureole and a prong beneath, the surface with traces of red pigment.
In the invocatory verse to the Kambha Rāmāyaṇa (written in Tamil), the significance of the number five is poetically expressed:
“The son of one of the five elements (Vāyu), crossed one of the five elements (water; the ocean), through one of the five elements (the sky); meet the daughter of one of the five elements (Sīta, the daughter of the earth) and burnt down Lanka with one of the five elements (fire).”
References:
- Hanuman’s Tale: The Messages of a Divine Monkey, Phillip Lutgendorf
- Pañcamukha Āñjaneya in Canonic Literature and Art, Raju Kalidos
Source: East and West , December 1991, Vol. 41, №1/4 (December 1991), pp. 133–151
______________________________________________________________
If you find value in my work, I hope you consider becoming a patron or making a contribution to hindu.aesthetic@okicici. Hindu Aesthetic requires a lot of time and effort and your support would mean that I can continue bringing you the best possible content. ❤
