Bhaironji Explained

Bhaironji
Affiliation:	Hindu god of the underworld

Bhaironji is a Hindu god of the underworld in Rajasthan, India. Some scholars note that he is viewed as form of Shiva in Rajasthan.

Jeffrey G. Snodgrass (professor of anthropology at the Colorado State University^[1]) notes that Bhaironji is seen as "a pan–Indian boss of the underworld".^[2]

Bhaironji and Balaji

Bhaironji, along with Pretraj, is believed to be an assistant deity of Balaji. They are viewed as the foremost prosecutors of Balaji and believed to provide legal assistance to him during the trials of the Bhuts who have possessed people, at Balaji's temple in Rajasthan.^[3]

Rituals by devotess

Snodgrass states that upon the birth of a male child, the Bhats in India offer "gifts" to Bhaironji, especially a ritual sacrifice of goat. He relates this practice to Sanskritisation and observes,

Possession

According to Snodgrass, Bhaironji is believed to sometimes possess people.^[4]

Notes and References

1. Web site: Colorado State University . Dr. Snodgrass editor of new blog series: Bioculturalism . August 3, 2015 . Katie . Horton . October 28, 2020.
2. Culture and Religion . 5 . 1 . 2004 . 71–104 . Hail to the Chief?: The politics and poetics of a Rajasthani 'child sacrifice' . Jeffrey G. . Snodgrass . 10.1080/0143830042000200364 . 144663317 . 1475-5629 . 54683133 . In this paper, I examine a birth ritual practised by a community of low‐status entertainers from the Indian state of Rajasthan known as Bhats. On the birth of sons, but not daughters, Bhats offer gifts to the Hindu god Bhaironji, a pan‐Indian boss of the underworld. Specifically, they sacrifice a goat, extract its stomach, slice it open so that it forms a gaping slit, and pass their wailing newborn through the dripping opening seven times. This ritual, which I interpret as a symbolic child sacrifice, would seem to exemplify ‘Sanskritisation’—the low caste copying of elite life‐styles—in the way Bhats imitate dominant Hindu ideals implicit to a kingly tradition of blood sacrifice. However, I contend that this feast is unique in the way that Bhats simultaneously mimic and appropriate, subvert and contest, as well as rework and combine ritual traditions associated with both kings and priests. [..] Bhaironji is a Rajasthani equivalent of the pan‐Indian Bhairava 'The Destroyer', a 'fierce' or 'terrible' form of Shiva spoken of in ancient Vedic scriptures. For this deity in a pan–Indian context, see White (1991)..
3. Book: Changing Patterns of Family and Kinship in South Asia: Proceedings of an International Symposium on the Occasion of the 50th Anniversary of India's Independence Held at the University of Helsinki 6 May 1998 . 84 . Studia Orientalia . 1998 . 136–141 . Finnish Oriental Society . Suomen Itämainen Seura [Finnish Oriental Society] . 978-9519380384.
4. Imitation Is Far More than the Sincerest of Flattery: The Mimetic Power of Spirit Possessionin Rajasthan, India Jeffrey G. Snodgrass Source: Cultural Anthropology, Vol. 17, No. 1 (Feb., 2002), pp. 32-64