Miscellaneous Minor Events [52-58]: a Note on Tij, a Festival Which the Newars do not Have
The waxing fortnight of Ya(n)lathwa (August/September) contains eleven festival events, in some cases two different festivals taking place in the same day. In the latter part of the fortnight the complex festival set of events, Indra Jatra [59-65] begins. We will note here first those miscellaneous festivals that precede the beginning of the Indra Jatra. On the second day of the fortnight is the Surya Vinayaka Jatra [52]. The jatra image of the Surya Vinayaka Ganesa[*] (chap. 8) is carried around the city's main processional route, followed by its devotees. Most of these participants are people from the village, just outside of the city, where the god's shrine is located, but others, as is the case in all minor jatra s, but particularly for those of Narayana[*] and Ganesa[*] , are people who have taken the god as a "private god" for some period of time. The festival is held only in Bhaktapur. (Minor.)
On the same day is the Varahi Jatra [53], commemorating Varahi as the mandalic[*] goddess of her particular section of the city. Local people take the jatra image from the god-house and, accompanied by musicians, carry it around the city's main festival route. This is one of the few jatra s in which both married and unmarried women, dressed in
their better clothes, traditionally join men in their phuki group in following the deity. This festival is only held in Bhaktapur.
The third day of the fortnight also has two festivals. The first of these is the Dattatreya Jatra, [54]. This is primarily a local twa: jatra , but in the course of the day an image of Dattatreya, whose temple is located in the Tachapal twa :, is carried around the city's main festival route. The other festival of the day is a Bhairava Jatra [55]. An image of Bhairava from the main Bhairava temple[48] is, in its turn, carried around the main festival route. These are minor jatra s, as are the others of this period.
The people of Bhaktapur define themselves differentially in part not only by the customs and festivals they emphasize, but by those followed by others, particularly those that are of great importance to others, which they do not observe. One such festival is Tij, which the Indo-Nepalese (and Hindus in general; see Kane [1968-1977, vol. V, p. 144f.) celebrate on the third day of the fortnight, and which the Newars ignore.[49] The Tij events contribute to a ritual complex that is the-matically completed on the fifth day of the fortnight, Rsi[*] Pa(n)cami, according to Lynn Bennett's analysis (1983, 222f.). Some of the themes of Tij are present in attenuated form in Bhaktapur's Rsi[*] Pa(n)cami [58]; for example, women pray to be spared painful difficulties with menstruation, but other of the themes are not represented.
According to Bennett for the Chetri villagers she studied, "Tij is meant to ensure the long life of one's husband, while Rsi[*] Pa(n)cami is meant to purify women from the possible sin of having touched a man during their menstrual period. . .. In my view . . . the two are conceptually related" (1983, 222). Bennett (ibid., 225) emphasizes women's erotic activity during Tij, characterized by behavior that is a "virtual seduction of Siva" (the legendary reference is to the relations of Parvati and Siva, as set forth in the Swasthani Vrata Katha ):
The laughing, singing, and dancing at Tij . . . represents a complete reversal of the Hindu ideal of womanly behavior. To say that a girl is shy, embarrassed . . . is to prasise her highly. On Tij the high spirits, the flirtatiousness, the sexuality which women must ordinarily suppress are released en masse at Siva's temple. However, this display of the erotic side of female nature is only permissible because, on Tij, it is held in check by the strict purifying fast which the women are undergoing for the welfare of their husbands. On the morning after Tij, women must perform a puja and make offerings to a Brahman priest dedicating the merit of their fast to their husband (present, future, or in the next life) before they can break the fast. The dangers of
female sexuality are thus firmly bracketed by the mutually reinforcing ascetic and patrilineal ideals.
The Chetri women go as a group to the riverside on Rsi[*] Pa(n)cami for an elaborate purification ceremony that removes the impurities associated with menstrual blood so that they "may be pure enough to touch men" (Bennett 1983, 225). The bathing is followed by a ceremony (which has a reference to the Rsi[*] , who give the day its name) in which in Bennett's interpretation "women are purifying their own sexuality. They are channeling it in the only direction acceptable to Hindu patrilineal ideology—toward their own husbands" (ibid., 230). In the light of this discussion, the Newar nonadoption of Tij and the very minor echo of the Chetri women's procedures of Rsi[*] Pa(n)cami (below) is consonant with one of the main contrasts between the Newar Hindus and the non-Newar Hindus, the social position of their women. The relative freedom of the Newar women, centrally represented in the mock-marriage and their relations to their natal homes, makes for a context in which the carefully bounded ritual expression of women's sexuality and its subsequent restoration to patriarchal control, which is (following Bennett) the meaning of Tij, is much less significant. As a remnant, perhaps, of their northern Himalayan heritage, these tensions are structured, expressed and controlled among the Newars in, comparatively more diffuse and less oppressive ways.
The fourth day of the fortnight is the pan-Hindu Catha Ganesa[*] day [56]. "Catha" derives from the Sanskrit, Caturthi, the fourth day of the lunar month. This is the occasion in most households for a special puja to Ganesa[*] , and offerings of the foods that are supposed to be his favorites. The day is associated with stories associating Ganesa[*] and this fortnight's waxing crescent moon which is supposed to be dangerous if seen on this day. It is said that there are at least some people, at all social levels in Bhaktapur, who try to avoid seeing it. They reportedly go to less length than do those noted in Anderson (1971, 124) and Nepali (1965, 404) who seal the windows of their house and remain inside on this day in order to avoid seeing the moon. (Minor.)
The last event in this miscellaneous group is on the fifth day, the pa(n)cami , of the fortnight, Rsi[*] Pa(n)cami [57]. The Rsis[*] are worshiped in some households, particularly in upper-status ones, with a dhala(n) danegu puja (app. 4). On this day some women worship the Rsis[*]
for, it is said, good health, including protection against menstrual difficulties and for protection of the house and children in what is, apparently, an echo of the theme of the Chetri practice described by Bennett (1983), in that they are both derived from traditional Hindu vratas of the day.[50] However, the Newar practices are individually performed in the household not in groups of women; they are minor pujas and not elaborate purification ceremonies, and they are not in the dramatic context of the Tij ceremonies, as are the Chetri women's practices of the day. (Minor.)
On the seventh day of the fortnight, the day of Uma/Mahesvara [58], in many households, but especially in Jyapu houses, there is special worship of Parvati and Siva in their manifestation as Uma/Mahesvara represented as an affectionate conjugal couple. Women present ceremonial threads to the idealized couple, and then take one back as prasada and tie it around their husband's wrist. (Minor.)