Les Vaikuṇṭha gupta de Mathura : Viṣṇu ou Kṛṣṇa ?

Abstract

During the gupta age some sculptures of a three-headed form of Visnu appeared in Mathura : Visnu is represented with one human head flanked by the muzzle of a lion and the snout of a boar. These images were first identified as being representations of Vaikuntha, a four-headed form of Visnu described in the Visnudharmottara-Purana, where the supplementary heads of the god symbolize the emanations springing up from the cosmogonie deity. This identification was questioned a few years ago and the so-called Vaikunthas were then recognized as being images of Visnu flanked by the heads of two of his avatara, the lion and the boar which are among the most ancient and important ones. Now, the thing is that Krsna's figures appeared before the boar and the lion ones, especially in the Mathura region in which his cult could have originated. The principal avatara of Visnu in the gupta Mathura should then logically be Krsna. Thus he should also figure on this multi-headed form of Visnu. In fact he may be the central human sculpture. The gupta images of Visnu are indeed directly derived from the kusana representations of Krsna, at that time a four-armed divinity who holds a mace, a discus and a conch. The human part of the "Vaikuntha", could represent Krsna, the human (manusya) avatara of Visnu, or rather could be a representation where Krsna and Visnu are merged in each other. I think that, like other gupta representations, these figures highlight the ambiguity of the bond between Krsna and Visnu, from the IVth century when the iconography of Krsna was modified because of the apparition of Visnu's cult figures. The creative power which was attributed from very ancient times to Vasudeva-Krsna could also explain why in a text like the Visnudharmottara-Purana the creative emanations coming from Vasudeva-Krsna and the avatara of Visnu are mistaken ones for the others.