Neelakesi proved that anybody can be a rishi, irrespective of birth
A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about a fascinating character, who serves as the focal point for a now lost epic, Kundalakesi. In an effort to track down more about Kundalakesi, a few years ago, I found myself in the library of the School of Oriental and African Studies in London, pulling out a book that contained the Tamil text and an English summary of another lesser-known epic, titled the Neelakesi, which, unlike the Kundalakesi does not make the cut for being one of the five great Tamil epics. This summary of Neelakesi had been published in 1936 but not checked out since 1983, which was the year before I was born. It felt like I was stumbling upon something that had faded from recollection a long time ago.
Female protagonist
Neelakesi is an intricate, often difficult to comprehend, philosophical work. The narrative centres round a female protagonist — Neeli, a demoness who is converted to Jainism and becomes something of a philosophical prodigy. Neeli travels around all of India debating various opponents, through a series of dialogue — Buddhists, the Ajivtakas, the Carvaka, even the descendants of Vyasa — and manages to defeat them all. It is a polemical work, one written to advance Jainism, and Kundalakesi features in the first chapter — where she and Neelakesi engage in a debate. It seems to be that Neelakesi was written to refute Kundalakesi — even their names — Neelakesi (the blue haired one) and Kundalakesi (the short-haired one) seem to derive from each other.
There’s a well-known story that centres round another Neeli — one that is still very much alive today — the story of Neeli of Pazhayanur, a figure, who features in the Saivite tradition. It is the story of an abandoned wife, who seeks justice from a council of village elders when her husband abandons her. She turns into a vampire figure, who kills her husband out of vengeance — and thus also sentencing to death the elders, who have promised to sacrifice their lives if something happens to her husband.
Could this Neeli have inspired the Neelakesi or have some connection to her? Despite the similarity in their names an origin — for Neelakesi also originates from Pazhayanur, there seems to be no connection — it could be that the author of the epic chose to use a name that was already familiar and well-known.
But Neelakesi is a fascinating work for other reasons, discussing all sorts of questions — from vegetarianism to ahimsa, whether the soul experiences pain, whether plants sleep, to complex doctrines such as that of the Buddhist Skandas, or the Carvaka materialist doctrine. At one point, Neelakesi even debates with the Buddha.
But to me the real value of Neelakesi is not just in it’s philosophy, but the empowering position the text takes: one of the philosophical opponents featured tells Neelakesi that she cannot take part in debates because not only is she a woman, she is also a Sudra. This provokes Neelakesi into righteous anger. She manages to defeat her opponent and prove him wrong by quoting an ancient scripture to show that even Brahminical traditions concede that anybody can be a Rishi, regardless of birth.
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