Gaṇeśa Notebook. Slide 14, Condensed Visual Classroom Guide to Daikokuten Iconography in Japan. Copyright Mark Schumacher. 2016.
Gaṇeśa Origins

Elephant Skin

Dual Form, Pairing, TwinningFaure, p. 78-79. “The well-known stories regardingGaṇeśa’s birth and his hybrid form reflect a latedevelopment of Puranic legend, and they actually obscureVināyaka’s demonic origins. They have many variants, and abrief outline will suffice here. Gaṇeśa is usually described as
one of the two children of Śiva and Parvatī, the other being
Skanda.23 In the standard myth, he is the guardian ofParvatī, who created him from the secretions of her body.24In some variants he is produced by Śiva alone, or by theunion of Śiva and Parvati. In later Hinduism, he is also said
to be self-born (svayambhū): being the creator, he has nofather or mother.”25 Gaṇeśa’s elephantine appearance issaid to have originated in the following episode. On one
occasion, having been told by his mother to guard the doorof her bathroom while she was taking a bath, he incurred
his father’s wrath for refusing him entrance. Śiva’s looks
can kill, and in this case his angry third eye reducedGaṇeśa’s head to ashes. To placate Pārvatī’s wrath, orperhaps feeling some remorse, he managed to replace thechild’s head with that of an elephant, which happened tobe nearby. In some versions of the myth, the confrontation
between Śiva and Gaṇeśa turns into a real fight... In spite ofthe myth, the motif of the elephant head remains difficult
to explain. Perhaps one should see there a sign of thedemonic aspect of the god. Michel Strickmann attempts toexplain it by citing the obedient nature of the elephant, but
to be precise, Vināyaka is anything but obedient. I believethat the elephant head points to the uncanny nature ofthat god. On the other hand, the motif of the substitutionof heads can be interpreted simply as an allusion to his
non-brahmanical (lower caste, village) origin.27 In anotherversion, Śiva creates Gaṇeśa to help the devas in their fightagainst the asuras…In this version, it is Parvatī herself whogives Gaṇeśa his elephant head. In another version, thebeheading of Gaṇeśa occurs after a fight with Śiva that calls
to mind the fight between the higher (divine) and the lower(demonic) orders. Once beheaded, Gaṇapati submits toŚiva, who makes him the leader of the gaṇa (hence hisname Gaṇapati).28 We will retain from this myth not onlyGaṇeśa’s antagonistic, albeit not simply Oedipal,relationship with his “father” Śiva, but also his function asguardian of the door (and keeper of secrecy).” 29

Faure, p. 94. “The demonic image of Vināyaka fuses withthat of Gajāsura, the elephant demon killed by Śiva (or byGaṇeśa himself in certain versions).89 In Buddhist
iconography, the theme of that subjugation is picked up in
the motif of the elephant skin which Mahākāla holds above
his head, and in the depictions of Vajrapāṇi and his doubles(Trailokyavijāya, Ācala, and Ucchuṣma) trampling supine
Vināyakas (instead of Maheśvara and his consort).90

Faure, p. 89. “In Japan, this elephant-headed god is mainly
represented in two ways: when standing alone, he isusually called Shōten or Vināyaka (J. Binayaka 毘那夜迦);
when in sexual embrace with a consort, he becomes thedual-bodied Kangiten, the Bliss Deva (or devas).” Faure, p.
10-11. “Kangiten 歓喜天 (or Sōshin Binayaka 双身毘那夜迦) is said to represent not only the blissful sexual union ofthe demon Vināyaka with his consort Senāyaka, but also
the subduing of the former by the latter (a form of
Avalokiteśvara/Kannon), as well as the nonduality of theWomb & Vajra realms.” Faure, p. 77. Shōten, also known
as Binayaka 毘那夜迦 (Skt. = Vināyaka), Kangiten, or Daishō
Kangiten 大聖歓喜天, is traced back to the Indic godGaṇeśa. His name, meaning “Saintly Deva,” appearsparadoxical in view of his ambiguous nature, unless one
reads it as an allusion to Shō Kannon (one of the figuresthat constitute the dual-bodied Kangiten).”17 Faure, p. 78.
“Technically speaking, Gaṇeśa is not Śiva’s son, since hewas produced from the filth of Pārvatī’s bath; in the sameway, his half-brother, Skanda, was born from Śiva’s semen,outside his mother’s womb.26 It is paradoxical that this“parthenogenetic” god would become a god of sexual
union. This characteristic puts the two brothers in thebroader category of gods who are not born from a mother’swomb.” Faure, pp. 107-108. “Stein’s analysis shows how
the pair Skanda & Gaṇeśa, the young warrior & the potbellied protector, after being dissociated in Buddhism,
reconstituted itself partially in other pairs such as Mahākāla& Hārītī, Vaiśravaṇa & Kubera, Mañjuśrī & Piṇḍola,
Vajrapāṇi & Vināyaka, and above all, Weituo 韋駄天 & Mile弥, the gatekeepers of China’s monestaries. It is the case ofKangiten, a dual deity formed by Vināyaka & the 1000armed Senju Kannon 千手観音, and that of the dualbodied Vaiśravaṇa (Sōshin Bishamon) that are the mostsignificant. Importantly, it is the same Skanda who, underthe erroneous transcription Weituo, became, as gatekeeperof Chinese Buddhist monasteries, the companion of Budai,
the pot-bellied “laughing Buddha,” a great friend of children. Stein argued that the figure of Gaṇeśa influenced thatof Budai, so that the pairing of Budai & Weituo at the gateof Chinese monasteries is, through a strange détour, that ofGaṇeśa & Skanda as “gatekeepers.” See Slide 24 for images.

Faure, pp. 46-47. Mahākāla is often represented holding anelephant skin over his shoulders. This motif can be traced
back to a mythical episode in which Śiva, appearing asMahākāla, kills the demonic elephant Gajāsura.94 According
to a variant, the asura Nīla tried to kill Śiva by taking theform of an elephant. Nandin, the guardian of Śiva’s palace,killed him and offered his skin to Śiva. Covering himself
with it, as a kind of armor, Śiva went to fight another asura,
the demon king Andhaka, to punish him for desiring
Parvati, Śiva’s consort. Because the blood of the woundedAndhaka, as it fell to the ground, produced clones of him,Śiva and the other gods created female forms (śakti) ofthemselves—the seven or eight Mothers (mātṛkās)—todrink this blood before it touched the ground.95 Andhaka
eventually repented and took refuge in Śiva, whomagnanimously gave him to Parvati as her son. Andhaka
then became the leader of Śiva’s troupe, that is, Gaṇeśa.
This quasi-Oedipal myth thus describes the birth of theSeven Mothers and their relation to Vināyaka.96 In theMahākāla mandala, the god is surrounded by the SevenMothers <See Slide 32 for images>, to whom is added aneighth female called Bontenmo (Brahmā mother, i.e.,
Brahmānī).97 Mahākāla is frequently represented as
trampling on the elephant-headed deity Vināyaka (demonicaspect of Gaṇeśa), for reasons to be examined later.98 Yet
Mahākāla & Gaṇeśa were closely related and occasionallyperceived as identical. The affinities (& antagonism)
between Mahākāla & Gaṇeśa may explain, on the formal
plane, the exchange of certain of their features (such asGaṇeśa’s pot belly) after they enter the Japanese pantheon.
Like Gaṇeśa, Mahākāla was related to female demons suchas the Seven Mothers and the ḍākinīs.99