Antique
Nepalese bronze deity, age patina with bright areas of gleaming bronze and mineral
accumulations in green. Depicting a four armed Ganesh standing upon a lotus base.
Ganesh is the bestower of knowledge, an amalgam of qualities of power and gentleness,
simplicity and intelligence, gravity and humor. He is greatly beloved, and answers
the prayers of his devotees without fail. He is fond of sweets and holds a sweet
cake in his left front hand, symbolizing the precious nectar of enlightenment.
In the two hands behind him he holds a pasha (noose) to recall the binding nature
of worldly attachment, and an axe to cut through the net of ignorance in order
to see things as they really are. His pot belly signifies the bounty of nature,
and also tells that Ganesh swallows the sorrows of the universe. His large ears
hear all, sifting the real and the unreal, retaining only that which is undefiled.
Ganesh
rests his right foot upon his vehicle, a mouse, again demonstrating that reality
is a contrast of appearances and contains all forms of power, “for the wise do
not find anything in the world disproportionate or ugly. The all-encompassing
soul is the mouse that lives in the hole called Intellect...hiding itself behind
the inscrutable shape of illusion.”
