Religion Compass Volume 2, Issue 3, Article first published online: 23 APR 2008

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Religion Compass 2/3 (2008): 301–315, 10.1111/j.1749-8171.2008.00066.x

Ardhanarisvara: What We Know and

What We Do not
Ellen Goldberg*
Queen’s University

Abstract
Ardhanarisvara is an expression of male brahmanical orthodox discourse; yet, this
fact does not dismiss or negate the primary role that Ardhanarisvara plays as a
symbol of wholeness and liberation within Indian religion. We know by looking
at the image of Ardhanarisvara that although Parvati is placed on the left hand
side, she constitutes no less than half of Siva’s body. In other words, Ardhanarisvara
is as much female as he or she is male. Consequently, even though we see the
anthropomorphic body of Ardhanarisvara idealized by the patriarchal norms of
sacred iconographic convention, we also recognize profound attempts at symmetry,
complementarity, and wholeness. In this state-of-the-field review, we look at both
of these areas to establish what we know, and what we do not know, about
Ardhanarisvara.

1 Introduction
Ardhanarisvara (translated as ‘the lord who is half woman’) belongs to
a rich and highly stylized pantheon of Indian sacred art. There are
various textual accounts of Ardhanarisvara from the silpa sastras (texts
on temple architecture including Visnudharmamottara, Silparatna, and
Sritattvanidhi), puranas (‘ancient stories’ including Linga, Siva, Skanda,
Matsya, and Markandeya), yoga treatises, and bhakti (devotional) literature
(e.g. the Ardhanarisvara stotra, see Goldberg 2002a). Until recently,
most scholarly studies of Ardhanarisvara have focused primarily on
the mythological and iconographical details of the image (murti) as
one form (rupa) of Siva (see, for example, Rao 1914; Kramrisch 1922,
1924; Zimmer 1955; Banerjea 1956; Krishnamurthi & Ramachandran
1960, 1964; Agrawala 1966; Adiceam 1967; Sivaramamurti 1984; Pal
1988; Srinivasan 1997; Yadav 2001). These studies, along with the
various canons of Indian iconography, provide brief formulaic
descriptions of Ardhanarisvara. In this essay, I summarize the current
state-of-the field and go beyond current iconographical analysis in
order to review what we know, and what we do not know, about
Ardhanarisvara.
© 2008 The Author
Journal Compilation © 2008 Blackwell Publishing Ltd