Hello everyone!
The thing I'm going to talk about is really notable. I think I came across this fact about 1.5 years ago, but it was the postcrossing that gave me an impulse to write a note. Yesterday while checking somebody's favourites I found a beautiful Russian painting (the card was immediately added to my favourites :) named
"Lel'" by V.D. Lipitzkiy (1975) ("Лель" Липицкого) and it was like a strike or a dejavu, because there is a rather similar card there already in my favourites, but from a totally different faraway Asian country named India. In the other picture are also 6 persons (1 mal and 5 females), he is also playing a flute and the girls are caught away by the music. These persons are
Krishna and gopis. It's a pity I don't know the name of the Indian author.
So is it just a coincidence? Or is there a ancient connection. I have been researching in this field too much to even allow a thought about it's being a random fact :) Let's look at both Lel' and Krishna! The name of Krishna is known in the whole world I believe. But even Russians and generally Slavic people know not much about their heathen god Lel'.
Who is Lel'? (Unfortunately there is
no Wiki-translation into English)
As I already mentioned Lel' is a Slavic god. He was one of two Lada's sons (This trio also has an
analogy in the Greek mythology). Lel' is responsible for love, love plays, marriage, relationship. He is usually depicted playing a flute with one or more girls enjoying the music. His beloved's name is Rada. Her name is also sometimes Lada, but then she is not his mother. This difference in Lada-Rada is nothing special as a r-l shift is common in the history of the Indoeuropean languages. Some scolars even claim his name being later ethymologically connected with the word "hal
lelujah", but it seems to me to be somehow controversial.
A famous scolar and researcher of the Slavic mythology Rybakov writes that there was no god names Lel' but a female one named Lelya which was the symbol of love and fertility. Maybe that's why Wiki says that Lel's existance is generally disputable, though the name comes more than once (in its male image) in Pushkin's and Ostrovskiy's (in his "Snow White" Lel' is distinctly depicted as a cowherd and cowherd were sacred in the heathen Slavic tradition) works and in innumerable folklore pieces.
Well there's not much about him/her, but a big argument about its gender. Though its existance is a fact.
In comparison to the Slavic god Krishna have been always popular and don't tend to be forgotten. There are a couple of reasons to it. Wiki e.g. offers
information about Krishna in numerous languages from all continents. He is being worshipped all over the world as a supreme avatar of Lord Vishnu (the Sustainer of the Universe). The 10th canto of Śrīmad Bhāgavatam is fully dedicated to Krishna - his life from the the impregnation till his end is described there. By the way he also has a brother (and a sister). Krishna gave us the song of songs with the absolute wisdome - Bhagavatgita. We see that Krishna is really more significant, he has many roles and many names, but the name "Krishna" itself means "bliss of the existance", "an attractive essence", "all-attractive", "the essence of knowledge and bliss". As we see such words as "attractive" and "bliss" have a notional link to Lel' as a god of love. And what a surprise in this role Krishna is depicted on our postcard! According to Śrīmad Bhāgavatam he was about 16 y.o. as he took the part of a cowherd who is the love himself and the love of all the gopis (cowherd-girls), his flute-music was making them leave all their duties to follow and dance with him. His sweethart's name is Radha. What a coincinence!
And one more very notable piece of information as a prove that the coincidence is excluded. This dance with Krishna was not just a leisure time, it is a highly divine and intimate
relationship with God and is claimed to be the highest goal of human existence. This play is called "
lila"!
Well I knew I was kinda discovering America, but I never knew that one of my favourite painters has such an astonishing work. It was painted in 1935 by Nicolas Roerich and it called "Krishna-Lel" ("Кришна-Лель, Н.К. Рерих"). Enjoy! :)
