Time and Destiny

Notions of time (kāla) and destiny (daiva, bhāgya, vidhi) are important factors in the interpretation of favorable and unfavorable circumstances for ritual, social, political, or individual activities. Calculation of time units and assessment of the qualities of time have been important for ritual performances since vedic times. In later texts time emerges as a cosmic entity that can be detected through “signs” or omens. Some Hindu gods appear in the form of deadly time (kālarūpa). Notions of destiny play an important role in both Hindu textual traditions and popular Hinduism in order to explain unexpected and uncontrollable events or results of human efforts.

Time (Kāla)

In the earliest ritual texts of vedic literature, there is no word for “time” in the sense of an abstract philosophical category or of a general term comprising different units of time. Rather, the quality of certain moments and the sequence of time units are of interest for the ritual experts. This is corroborated in the only passage in which the word kāla is used in the Ṛgveda (in one of its younger parts). At Ṛgveda 10.42.9 a dice player is mentioned who throws the dice kāle, “on time,” that is, in the appropriate moment when it is his turn to play (see Geldner, 1953, 197). The word kāla is used in the sense of “point of time” in many passages in the Brāhmaṇas and the Upaniṣads as well. The main interest of vedic ritual texts is the calculation and interpretation of time units with regard to their conduciveness for the successful performance of rituals. Therefore, the texts deal with time units like year or month and with different stellar and planetary constellations. All this later becomes the subject of a whole branch of vedic sciences (jyotiṣa, astrology). Time units and their regular, periodic sequence (krama, paryaya) are constitutive elements of the cosmic and ritual order as they manifest certain life-sustaining rhythms (such as seasons, solstices). Furthermore, they indicate opportunities for strengthening and confirming relationships among the different realms and inhabitants of cosmos (as, for instance, in the case of ancestral rites). Stars and planets ( navagrahas ) are regarded as cosmic entities or divinities that influence ritual performances. Time units are not only quantities, but also, and perhaps primarily, qualities. Therefore there are “ideal” numbers of time units (such as 100 years being the ideal life span) as well as auspicious and inauspicious times for ritual and social activities. All this indicates to the expert, and to those he councils, in which larger cosmic constellation a ritual act or any other activity is embedded and what needs to be done to either use this constellation (when auspicious) or else avoid it (when inauspicious). Conversely, some ritual acts are explicitly performed in order to regenerate the regular sequence and repetition of time units. This is, for instance, stressed in a passage in the Jaiminīyabrāhmaṇa in which the daily libation into the domestic fires (agnihotra) is regarded as prompting and ensuring the daily reappearance of the sun (see Caland, 1917, 6). There are numerous passages in the vedic texts that deal with the different time units and their ritual significance. In the Taittirīyasaṃhitā (2.5.6.1) the full- and new-moon rituals (see yajña ) are regarded as procuring the connection between the “limbs of the year,” the year being compared to a living organism, as explained by J. Gonda: "By duly performing these sacrifices man contributes to the realization of the organism, complete in itself, that is the year" (Gonda, 1984, 25).

The regular repetition of the sequence of days, nights, months, and seasons as limbs of the year is also compared to a revolving wheel (cakra). Perhaps the oldest source for this idea is Ṛgveda 1.164.11ff., which contains a praise of a “wheel with twelve spokes” (dvādaśāraṃ cakram) on which 720 sons are mounted and which shows no signs of wear and revolves continuously. The wheel is the year comprising 12 months (the spokes) and 720 days and nights (the sons). Although the word kāla is not used in this passage, it has been interpreted as the earliest occurrence of what is in later texts called the “wheel of time” (kālacakra; see Geldner, 1951, 229f.) and thus as testifying to concepts of “Indian” cyclical time, that is, of time as revolving around itself in endless repetition (see Eliade, 1955; for a critique of this interpretation, compare Malinar, 2007c). This seems to overstretch the evidence since the passage emphasizes the regular repetition of the revolutions of the wheel, but does not indicate that the wheel would just revolve around itself. Rather, each revolution of the wheel means movement through the addition of years that make up one’s life span (āyus). The wheel thus signifies both revolution and movement, and the wheel of the year moves on through the sequence of months, days, and nights (Malinar, 2003).

In some later vedic texts, there is evidence for the development of a more abstract interpretation of the word kāla in the sense of “time.” In the Atharvaveda we find several instances of kāla as the designation of an entity that produces and encompasses all temporal units and process of the cosmos. In two hymns (19.53, 54) kāla is depicted as a cosmic power that is the cause of the birth and death of all beings. Furthermore, kāla is regarded as the encompassing realm of time and temporality, in which all living beings exist. Different types of agency are accorded to kāla, which is seen as the cause, instrument, origin, and basis for all the activities in the world. Time is praised as “our first god” (prathamo no devaḥ; AV. 19.53.2 [= 19.54.6]), as the ruler of all, and is equated creator god, “father” Prajāpati [kālo ha sarvasyeśvaro yaḥ pitāsīt prajāpatiḥ; AV. 19.53.8). Kāla is compared with a horse with thousand eyes, ageless, full of semen and fertility. Heaven, earth, and sun are born from time, which encompasses the past (bhūta) and the future (bhāvya). Yet, past and future are not interpreted as modes of time as in later texts and therefore do not define time as a concept. Rather, time is described by referring to its manifestations. In both hymns, only the creative and encompassing character of time is dealt with, a situation that stands in contrast with the emphasis on the destructive and deadly aspects of time in epic and puranic literature (see below). While there a many passages in the Upaniṣads in which kāla is used in the older sense of “point of time”, “right time” or “period of time” (e.g. KauṣU. 4.13; BĀU. 2.1.10; 2.1.12; 1.2.4), it is also depicted as a cosmic entity. At the beginning of the Śvetāśvataropaniṣad, kāla is mentioned as one of the possible causes of the world (ŚvetU. 1.2). Furthermore, we also find the idea that time consists of three modes, past, present, and future, as is implied in the compound trikāla (lit. three time; ŚvetU. 6.5.; see also MaiU. 6.5 ascribing the three modes of time to the creator god). The three modes of time and time as an abstract category are of special importance in grammatical literature and in the classification of syllogistic reasoning (anumāna) in Nyāya philosophy. These interpretations of time as an abstract category or as one of the constituents (tattva) of the cosmos is further elaborated in the different philosophical and theological schools of Hinduism (see the essays in Prasad, 1992). In late vedic texts, kāla has become a well-established term for “time” both as a cosmic entity and as an abstract concept. However, this does not mean that these new interpretations of time did replace the older idea of “ritual time” or “moment of time.” Rather, ritual, philosophical, theological, and popular ideas of time and moments of time coexisted, each operating in its respective conceptual framework but nevertheless referring to and drawing on one another (see the essays in Malinar, 2007d). These different frameworks also become manifest when dealing with the etymology of the word kāla, which has received some scholarly discussion without coming to a definite conclusion. Quite often the word is derived from the Sanskrit root kal–, “to propel, incite,” but has also been connected to the Dravidian noun kāl (“leg”; “a quarter”; see Parpola, 1977; for an overview, see Wessler, 1995, 395–401).

Death and the Agency of Time

The composers of the Mahābhārata epic not only drew on current meanings and interpretations of kāla, but also added other aspects. Firstly, there is a strong emphasis on the connection between kāla in the sense of “time” and “death,” respectively. Secondly, time is connected to notions of destiny and offered as an explanation for the inevitability of the disastrous events related in the epic. In this connection, time is vested with a specific agency. Time now has not only a course, but also a direction and a destination, which is experienced as fatal and lethal by those who find themselves being exposed to it. Time is qualified as an agent, and beings are depicted as “cooked” or “ripened” by time (kālapakka; MBh. 5.130.3; 5.126.31; etc.); they are, even against their will, “propelled” by time to take a certain course of action (kālacodita; MBh. 6.66.17; 12.103.3–4; etc.), and people are “assailed” by time (kālopahata; MBh. 7.1.19; 7.120.16; see also Hill, 2001).

Although the agency of time is invisible, it can be detected through certain manifestations, through nimitta, “signs of time,” “omens,” which indicate the course of events before they actually happen. Omens (nimitta) function as anticipations of future events and are based on a suspension of the otherwise chronological sequence of past, present, and future. These signs lend visibility to the otherwise hidden course of time. However, they need to be recognized and interpreted by specialists who are called kālavādin, experts of time, such as Vyāsa (MBh 6.4.2). One important task of these experts is to recognize that the time of death has come. Kṛṣṇa, the epic hero and god, is said have understood that “his time” has come and prepares for death when being shot by an arrow (MBh. 16.5.17). J. Scheftelowitz (1929) has shown that notions of “destiny” in the epic are part of a specific discourse on heroism and has pointed to parallels with old Iranian concepts of time. It is then connected to astrological knowledge (kālavāda) and the presence of astrologers (kālavādin).

The interplay between deadly time and its omens can be exemplified with the appearance of the god Kṛṣṇa as time in the Bhagavadgītā . The god explains to the epic hero Arjuna that the enemies he refuses to kill have been killed already:

"Deadly Time (Kāla) I am, ready to bring about the end of the world, coming forward to absorb the worlds here ... Long ago all these were killed by me, be only the sign (nimitta) of this, left-handed archer! Slay ... [the] warrior-heroes who all have already been slain by me" (BhG. 11.32–34).

By interpreting Kṛṣṇa as time embodied, the imminent battle is turned into a future that has already passed. The warriors will no longer exist, since they have already been killed by the agency of time. Any attempt to change the course of events is futile because they have already happened and can no longer be prevented. The future is presented as already past; conversely, the present appears as the moment in which this future is disclosed as an actual fact. Seen in this perspective, the present moment is not a chance to influence or change the course of time according to one’s individual preferences, as the doctrines of karman and puruṣakāra (human agency would have it. When a course of events is about to reach its termination, individual agency is confined to enacting what has already happened – in brief, to be the sign and executor of time, a nimitta (see Malinar, 2007b, 175ff). This structure has often been regarded as “determinism” or “fatalism,” without sufficiently considering the specific time structure implied in the notion of fate which implies reconsidering the place of one’s own agency and responsibility for events, in the light of larger time frames in which individual acts are embedded. Seen in the larger context of the epic, the revelation of Kṛṣṇa as kāla can be regarded as a theistic interpretation of an older, impersonal notion of time and destiny. Manifestation of gods as embodiments of kāla gain prominence in the Purāṇas. Time as a constitutive element of the created world is regarded as a manifestation of the highest god. In the Viṣṇupurāṇa, for instance, Viṣṇu is said to appear as time (Kālarūpin; ViP. 1.2.14–18; 5.38.60). The convergence of time and death gains particular importance in the mythology of the god Śiva, in which he is depicted as the “Deadly Fire of Time” (Kalāgni), which brings about the temporary dissolution of the cosmos. There are also numerous iconographic representation of Śiva as Mahākāla, “Mighty Death,” and speculations and ritual practices focusing on time as a manifestation of the divine are a topic in tantric literature. The liberating power of the goddess Kālī is in particular depicted in her form as the “Destroyer of Time” (Kālasaṃkarṣiṇī) that is worshipped in a “golden limbed, twenty-armed” iconographical representation (Sanderson, 1988, 674f.). A paradigmatic presentation of an older “epic kālavāda” and notion of destiny (Schrader, 1902, 33) is the dialogue between Indra and Bali in Mahābhārata 12.116–117. Indra, the king of the gods, meets Bali, the former king of the demons, who presently finds himself reborn in the body of a donkey. Indra feels that one should bemoan one’s losses and asks Bali why he does not feel grief for the loss of his kingdom. Bali replies that bodies are finite and subject to the course of time. Since he is not responsible for this, he cannot lament. Bali then turns to one characteristic feature of the relationship between human efforts and the workings of time, which confirms the message of the Bhagavadgītā, that destiny in its form of “time that is ripe” is nothing other than a future that has already happened. The fatal and lethal dimension implied in the convergences of “time” and “death” in the world kāla presents the fulfillment and termination of a course of events and therefore can be distinguished from other interpretations of destiny as a factor interfering in human efforts (see below).

"Who brings about the creation and destruction of the people, only brings about what has already been brought about. Its agent is another ... Someone may be learned or ignorant, strong or weak, handsome or plain, happy or unhappy – time, the profound creates all this with its own energy. I am subject to time – why should I, who understands this perfectly, worry? Man burns down what has already been burned down, he kills what has already been killed, he destroys what has already been destroyed from its very beginning – he gains what he must gain" (MBh. 12.217.14–20).

This passage stresses that humans are not capable of achieving anything outside the activity of time; to a large extent, their efforts depend on the right moment. Human activity is embedded in larger temporal frameworks that restrict chances and open them up. Rather than being the “creator of one’s own destiny,” a human being can only respond to and enact the potential of a given moment. The agency of time sets a limit on human aspirations; conversely, human beings disclose and enact this very agency through their activities. This dialectic is also at the center of the discourse on the relationship between human efforts and the agency of destiny. Like time, destiny works only when there is an agent who is involved in its enactment. This is also why, in some debates, it is pointed out not only that one must surrender to fate, but also that one must calculate one’s chances and try to protect oneself from whatever appears to be inevitable and uncontrollable. Therefore, discourses on time and destiny are also connected to notions of human agency (puruṣakāra, mānuṣyakarman).

Destiny (Daiva) and Human Agency

The opposition between destiny and human efforts serves to explain why the result of one’s deeds (karman) and efforts (puruṣakāra) is not totally foreseeable and why even unexpected and undesirable results may accrue for the agent (Hill, 2001). In this connection karman is used in the sense of action and the intention of such actions, and it is not primarily referring to karman in the sense of law of retribution or of the “karmic baggage” one carries from former lives into the present existence and which may therefore play the role of destiny in an individual’s life. Such an interpretation of karman as destiny is of particular importance in popular Hinduism (see below). When contrasted with human efforts, destiny serves to explain why a human agent is never totally in control of the effects of a deed. Daiva, bhāgya, vidhi, or diṣṭa are words that are used frequently when explanations for unexpected or unavoidable events are sought (for a discussion of semantic differences, see Schrader, 1902, and Bailey, 1983, 141–159).

It is a mechanism of causation that – once it has been set in motion – cannot be stopped or circumvented and therefore amounts to a fate awaiting the individual. There are also discussions who or what is behind such inevitability. Several agents or causal mechanisms are mentioned in the texts. These can be natural disaster (adhibhūta) or interventions by divine beings (adhidaiva) that overrule and suspend an individual’s responsibility for and influence on his own life. Destiny is thus interpreted either as an impersonal force in its own right or as something “sent” or “schemed” by a god (Hill, 2001, 195–230). This god is sometimes called Dātṛ or Vidhātṛ, “Ordainer.” In some texts the god Brahmā is seen in this role (Bailey, 1983, 139–159). Sometimes this kind of divine agency that does not seem to take notice of human being’s efforts is criticized as indicative of a divine “play” (krīḍā, līlā ), as is pointed out, for instance, in the Mahābhārata:

"The blessed God, the self-existent great-grandfather, hurts creatures with creatures, hiding behind a disguise ... Joining and unjoining them, the capricious blessed Lord plays with the creatures like a child with its toys" (MBh. 3.31.35–36; trans. van Buitenen; see also Malinar, 2007a).

In a similar vein, grammarian and poet Bhartṛhari has composed the well-known stanza: "Time (kāla) plays at any moment by casting day and night like dices with living beings as pieces on the game-board that is the earth" (Thieme, 1977, 522; trans. by author).

This view is still very much present in the contemporary context, as is the case with another explanation that identifies the quality of the time or the world age one lives in, that is, the kaliyuga , as being the reason for failure and disaster. In a paradigmatic discussion at Mahābhārata 5.75 about the interplay between destiny and human agency, it is stated that “human agency is doubtful” (saṃdigdhaṃ karma pauruṣam; 5.75.6), which means that there is never any certainty with regard to its outcome because every deed is a combination of human action and destiny (daiva):

"A human action, however well counseled and conducted and however correctly carried out, may be opposed by fate. Also, human action countervails against what fate does or leaves undone – like cold and heat, rain, hunger, and thirst .... A fertile, cleared acre may be all prepared by the farmer, but without rain it will fail to yield a crop, Kaunteya. On this some might say that human effort does help, like irrigation made possible by hard work, yet in that case too one might surely find that the water dries up due to fate ... the affairs of the world are contingent on both fate and human effort. I myself shall do the utmost that human agency allows, but I am unable in any way to take care of fate" (MBh. 5.75.7–8; 77.2–5; trans. van Buitenen).

The conclusion that is drawn in this passage seems remarkable. Although “destiny” is always a factor that needs to be taken into account, this must not result in a fatalistic attitude; to the contrary, one should never stop acting and always do whatever possible in order to either achieve the desired result or change, if not stop the mechanism of fate. This is also a way to cope with destiny that is produced through specific powerful acts, which are regarded as being automatically effective. In this connection, destiny is an unstoppable causal mechanism initiated by another agent’s deeds or words. One of the most important “fatal” acts is the curse. A curse belongs to a whole class of “truth acts” (satyakrīya), in which words spoken are endowed with an immediate efficacy, which turn the spoken word into reality. It not only is a topic of many stories, but also is regarded as a cause for certain events happening to a person in contemporary Hindu settings (see below). One well-know story is that of King Parikṣit, who was cursed by the son of an ascetic to die from a snakebite (MBh. 1.36–40; 1.45–46; also BhāgP. 1.18.24–1.19.40; 12.6.11–12; DBhāgP. 2.8–11). The different versions of the story also offer different reactions to “fate” (Malinar, 2005). According to the Mahābhārata and the Devībhāgavatapurāṇa, counteraction is called for. When the king learns of the fate that awaits him, he seeks advice from his Brahmanic councilors as to whether there is anything to be done against it. Following the advice that one should never stop trying, the king orders a multistory building to be erected, in which he then resides, heavily guarded, on the top floor. Yet, eventually he cannot escape his fate, which sneaks into his room in the form of a worm hidden in an apple. This example shows that destiny and “higher agency” need to be acknowledged, but this does not necessarily result in passivity and fatalism. Yet, the Bhāgatavapurāṇa offers a more devotional view on “fateful” events and depicts the king as accepting the curse as a chance to practice ascetic renunciation and therefore to prepare himself for liberation and reaching Kṛṣṇa.

These examples show not only that human action (karmapauruṣa; puruṣukāra) is dependent on concurring circumstances, but also that the manifestation of destiny is connected with the individual who accepts or challenges it (as the case of the Bhagavadgītā shows). An interesting variation of these notions is the interpretation of the role of the goddess Lakṣmī (herself representing good fortune [Skt. lakṣmī, śrī] as one dimension of destiny) by some teachers of the Pāñcarātra tradition, such as Piḷḷai Lokācārya (Kumar, 1997, 96ff.). According to these theologians, she acts as an intermediary for the individual, karman-ridden devotee of the god Viṣṇu, who strives for liberation. Thereby the goddess counteracts karmic hurdles by representing the puruṣakāra (human effort) side of deeds, which may influence positively the results of one’s efforts. A text in which notions of destiny (daiva), puruṣakāra, and time are brought together is the so-called puruṣakāra chapter of the Viṣṇudharmottarapurāṇa (2.66), when it is claimed that all three need to be regarded as “bestowing fruits of actions” (phalāvaha; 2.66.8).

Destiny in Popular Hinduism

Ideas of destiny and fatalistic interpretations of karman are no less important and widespread in popular Hindu contexts than is the emphasis on karman as a self-produced bondage for which the individual is to be held responsible. This popular understanding stands in contrast to an interpretation of karman as a theory that “rationalizes” and explains otherwise unexplainable differences among human beings and gives a reason for why efforts yield fruits for one person, while the very same efforts result in disaster for another. According to the influential sociologist M. Weber, this “rationalization” results in a passive acceptance of one’s social and personal situation (Weber, 1923, 117ff.). This view has been criticized by L.A. Babb (1983, 163ff.) and others, as it does not only efface the different interpretations of karman, but also overshadows the importance of actual notions of fate and destiny in both textual and popular traditions. As C. Fuller puts it: "Fate is a basic concept in popular Hinduism ... taking the sense of an uncontrollable, impersonal force determining destiny in relation to past lives for which no one can be held responsible" (Fuller, 1992, 251).

Ethnographic studies in various contemporary, local Hindu contexts have demonstrated that notions of destiny and of different agents that are capable of initiating a “fatal” course of events are very much discussed when a family or community is faced with unexplainable events. S. Daniel’s study on ideas of fate and individual responsibility in a Hindu community in Tamil Nadu demonstrates that destiny plays an important role in a multifaceted referential framework that is used for explaining the unexplainable. The local tradition also offers its own version of what happened before a world full of living beings equipped with different karmic dispositions was created by the god Śiva. Drawing on the popular notion that destiny is written on the forehead at birth (Tam. talai eḻuttu), it is told that before creation Śiva himself wrote upon each creature: "its 'headwriting' (talai eṛuttu [sic] ), which was an exact and very detailed specification of every act it would perform, of all the thoughts it would have in its life, and of every event, good or bad, that would befall it" (Daniel, 1983, 28).

The notion of “headwriting” points to factors in one’s life that cannot be changed, but may still be influenced (see also Kolenda, 1964). Other studies also point out that fatalism is not the answer to fate. In her studies of a tribal community in Orissa, T. Otten (2007) has explored the importance of ritual performances that need to be conducted when the inauspicious, “fateful” planetary constellations in a horoscope threaten a person’s well-being. S. Wadley (1983) has dealt with the widespread practice of vratas , fasting observances especially popular among Hindu women, and how the stories, which explain the origin and the efficacy of these observances, deal with notions of fate (bhāgya) and propagate vratas as a way to change it. In the case of women, this often refers to the quality of their marital destiny, which may yield happiness (saubhāgyā) or misfortune (durbhāgya).

If gods or goddesses are identified as the agents who indulge in activities or “sports” that result in human beings becoming rather helplessly exposed to the blows of fate, notions of “game” or “play” (līlā) are put forward by the believers, and destiny is turned into a peculiar encounter with god or goddess (Daniel, 1983, 50ff.; Fuller, 1992, 251f.). While this may for some confirm the miraculous and hidden ways of the divine, it raises doubts for others, who criticize that it is somehow unfair that gods play with human beings as if they were toys or the wooden figures on a chessboard (see also above). The criticism implied in these proverbial statements reemphasizes that destiny is a factor that ought to be acknowledged, but this does not rule out protesting against it.

The notion of fate has only rarely been turned into an elaborate doctrine of determinism and even predeterminism. The only philosophical tradition in which the notion of determinism (niyati) became the central doctrine was the Ājīvika school of thought (Basham, 1951, 225–239; Bronkhorst, 2007, 105ff., reserving fatalism for the unchangeability of past karman). In most traditions and in many practical contexts, destiny is a factor one needs to take into account and may even be seen as an explanation for “fatalities,” but it is also a call for action, for instance, by performing rituals. In devotional contexts of bhakti traditions, fate is interpreted as a chance to demonstrate the strength of one’s faith, which means to regard fate as being just another name and form of the divine. This becomes evident in many myths and legends about determined devotees who manage to avert and in fact change their destiny through a powerful enactment of bhakti.