Somnath Temple – History
The site of Somnath has been a pilgrimage site from
ancient times on account of being a Triveni Sangam (the confluence of
three rivers — Kapila, Hiran and Sarasvati). Soma,
the Moon god, is believed to have lost his
lustre due to a curse, and he bathed in the Sarasvati River at this site to
regain it. The result is the waxing and waning of the moon, no doubt an
allusion to the waxing and waning of the tides at this sea shore location. The
name of the town Prabhas, meaning lustre, as well as the alternative names
Someshwar and Somnath ("The lord of the moon" or
"the moon god") arise from this tradition.
According to popular tradition, the first Shiva temple
at Somnath is believed to have been built at some unknown time in the past. The
second temple is said to have been built at the same site by the "Yadava
kings" of Vallabhi around 649 CE. In 725 CE,
Al-Junayd, the Arab governor of Sindh is
said to have destroyed the second temple as part of his invasions of Gujarat
and Rajasthan. The Gurjara
– Pratihara king Nagabhata
II is said to have constructed the third temple in 815 CE, a
large structure of red sandstone.
However, there is no historical record of an attack on
Somnath by Al-Junayd. Nagabhata II is known to have
visited tirthas in Saurashtra, including Someshwara (the Lord of
the Moon), which may or may not be a reference to a Siva temple because the
town itself was known by that name. The Chalukya (Solanki)
King Mularaja possibly
built the first temple at the site sometime before 997 CE, even though some
historians believe that he may have renovated a smaller earlier temple.
In 1024, during the reign of Bhima
I, the prominent Turkic ruler Mahmud
of Ghazni raided Gujarat, plundering the Somnath temple and
breaking its Jyotirlinga. He took away a booty of 20 million
dinars. Historians expect the damage to the temple by Mahmud to have been
minimal because there are records of pilgrimages to the temple in 1038, which
make no mention of any damage to the temple. However, powerful legends
with intricate detail developed in the Turko-Persian literature regarding
Mahmud's raid, which "electrified" the Muslim world according to
scholar Meenakshi Jain. They later boasted
that Mahmud had killed 50,000 devotees. The devotees had tried to defend the
temple from being vandalized and looted.
The temple at the time of Mahmud's attack appears to
have been a wooden structure, which is said to have decayed in time
(kalajirnam). Kumarapala (1143–72 AD)
rebuilt it in "excellent stone and studded it with jewels," according
to an inscription in 1169. During its 1299 invasion of Gujarat,
Alauddin Khilji’s army, led by Ulugh
Khan, defeated the Vaghela king Karna, and sacked the
Somnath temple. Legends in the later texts Kanhadade Prabandha (15th century)
and Khyat (17th century) state that
the Jalore ruler Kanhadadeva later
recovered the Somnath idol and freed the Hindu prisoners, after an attack on
the Delhi army near Jalore.
However, other sources state that the idol was taken to
Delhi, where it was thrown to be trampled under the feet of Muslims. These
sources include the contemporary and near-contemporary texts including Amir
Khusrau's Khazainul-Futuh, Ziauddin
Barani's Tarikh-i-Firuz Shahi and Jinaprabha Suri's Vividha-tirtha-kalpa. It is possible that
the story of Kanhadadeva's rescue of the Somnath idol is a fabrication by the
later writers. Alternatively, it is possible that the Khilji army was taking
multiple idols to Delhi, and Kanhadadeva's army retrieved one of them.
The temple was rebuilt by Mahipala I, the Chudasama king
of Saurashtra in 1308 and the Lingam was installed by his son Khengara sometime
between 1331 and 1351. As late as the 14th century, Gujarati
Muslim pilgrims were noted by Amir
Khusrow to stop at that temple to pay their respects before
departing for the Hajj pilgrimage.
In 1395, the temple was destroyed for the third time by Zafar
Khan, the last governor of Gujarat under the Delhi
Sultanate and later founder of Gujarat
Sultanate.
In 1451, it was desecrated by Mahmud
Begada, the Sultan of Gujarat. In 1546, the Portuguese,
based in Goa,
attacked ports and towns in Gujarat including Somnath and destroyed several
temples and mosques. By 1665, the temple, one of many, was ordered to be
destroyed by Mughal emperor Aurangzeb. In
1702, he ordered that if Hindus revived worship there, it should be demolished
completely.
Proclamation
of the Gates incident during the British period:
In 1782-83 AD, Maratha king Mahadaji
Shinde, victoriously brought back three silver gates from Lahore after
defeating Mahmud Shah Abdati, to Somnath. After refusal from priests of Gujarat
and the then ruler Gaekwad
to put them back on Somnath temple, these silver gates were placed in the
temples of Ujjain. Today they can be seen in two temples of India, Mahakaleshwar Jyotirlinga and
Gopal Mandir of Ujjain. In 1842, Edward Law, 1st Earl of
Ellenborough issued his Proclamation of the Gates, in
which he ordered the British army in Afghanistan to return via Ghazni and bring
back to India the sandalwood gates from the tomb of Mahmud of Ghazni in Ghazni,
Afghanistan. These were believed to have been taken by Mahmud from Somnath.
Under Ellenborough's instruction, General William
Nott looted the gates in September 1842. A whole sepoy
regiment, the 43rd Bengal Native Infantry,
was detailed to carry the gates back to India in triumph. However, on
arrival, they were found not to be of Gujarati or Indian design, and not
of Sandalwood,
but of Deodar wood (native to Ghazni) and
therefore not authentic to Somnath. They were placed in the arsenal store-room
of the Agra
Fort where they still lie to the present day.
There was a debate in the House of Commons in London in
1843 on the question of the gates of the temple and Ellenborough’s role in the
affair. After much crossfire between the British Government and the opposition,
all of the facts as we know them were laid out. In the 19th century
novel The Moonstone by Wilkie
Collins, the diamond of the title is presumed to have been stolen
from the temple at Somnath and, according to the historian Romila
Thapar, reflects the interest aroused in Britain by the gates.
Reconstruction
during 1950–1951:
Before independence, Prabhas
Patan was part of the princely
state of Junagadh, whose ruler had acceded to Pakistan
in 1947. After India refused to accept his decision, the state was made a
part of India and Deputy Prime Minister Patel came to Junagadh on 12 November
1947 to direct the stabilization of the state by the Indian Army and at the
same time ordered the reconstruction of the Somnath temple. When Patel, K. M.
Munshi and other leaders of the Congress went to Mahatma
Gandhi with their proposal to reconstruct the Somnath temple,
Gandhi blessed the move, but suggested that the funds for the construction
should be collected from the public and the temple should not be funded by the
state.
He expressed that he was proud to associate himself to
the project of renovation of the temple. However, soon both Gandhi and
Sardar Patel died and the task of reconstruction of the temple continued under
Munshi, who was the Minister for Food and Civil Supplies, Government of India headed by Prime
Minister Jawaharlal Nehru. The ruins were pulled
down in October 1950 and the mosque present at that site was shifted few kilometers
away by using construction vehicles.
In May 1951, Rajendra
Prasad, the first President of the Republic of India, invited by K M
Munshi, performed the installation ceremony for the temple. The President
said in his address, "It is my view that the reconstruction of the Somnath
Temple will be complete on that day when not only a magnificent edifice will
arise on this foundation, but the mansion of India's prosperity will be really
that prosperity of which the ancient temple of Somnath was a symbol." He
added "The Somnath temple signifies that the power of reconstruction is
always greater than the power of destruction."
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