Martial Arts Of The World - Webs

Indra, thinking the golden orb was a succulent orange. Indira threw his
spear and knocked Hanuman unconscious to the ground. At this, Vayu,
god of the Wind and surrogate father of the young monkey, withheld his
power and threatened to suffocate the world unless his son’s life was saved.
At this moment, the whole pantheon of gods rallied to Hanuman’s side and
bestowed on him their respective supreme powers. As a result of this,
Hanuman is immortal and invincible. He also has the ability to change
form and change size. He—again betraying the subhuman attributes of his
lineage—is not conscious of these powers until he is made so by a suprahuman
deity, in particular his lord and master, Sri Ram.
Lord Hanuman is one of the most popular deities in the Hindu pantheon,
in part because he is a deity whose primary spiritual attribute is his
own devotion to Lord Ram. In other words, Hanuman provides human
supplicants with a clear divine model for their own devotional practices,
and, significantly, it is from these devotional practices that Hanuman is
wise beyond the wisest and an expert in the use of all weapons, among
many other things. From the act of sensory withdrawal and complete emotional
transference, Hanuman derives his phenomenal strength, skill, and
wisdom. For the vast majority of supplicants, devotionalism is an end in itself.
And, given the metaphorical link between celibacy and fertility, newly
married women often pray to Hanuman to bless them with the birth of a
son. However, Hanuman is most clearly recognized as the patron deity of
akharas (gymnasiums), and in this context he is an explicit link between the
domain of spiritual, cosmic shakti, celibacy and the embodiment of shakti,
and the performance of martial arts. A shrine dedicated to Lord Hanuman
is found in almost all gymnasiums, and in addition to performing rituals of
propitiation and offering prayers to him, men who engage in martial arts
training attribute their skill and strength to the extent of their ability to embody
celibacy and thereby become in their relationship to Hanuman as
Hanuman is to Lord Ram.
Celibacy is an integral feature of the martial arts in India, and in addition
to being closely linked to Hanuman, it is an important aspect of two
other forms of practice that together constitute one of the central coordinates
around which Hindu doctrine has been constructed: sannyas (world
renunciation) and yoga (the union of the individual self with the cosmic
soul). Technically, a sannyasi is a person who has moved through each of
the first three stages of the ideal life course—celibate discipleship, ritualperforming
family man, and forest-dwelling monk—and has gone in search
of moksha (final liberation from the cycle of rebirth). As a sannyasi, a person
must have no possessions, no family, no home, and no desire for
worldly things. After performing the rites to his own funeral—thereby symbolically
dying—he secludes himself to perform tapas (austerities), and
Religion and Spiritual Development: India 467