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{{Useful Notes|wppage=Hindu mythology}}
[[File:The Churning of the Ocean (6125128576).jpg|thumb|400px|The Churning of the Sea of Milk]]
'''Hindu Mythology''' is the mythology of both Ancient and Modern India, used as moral allegory to convey spiritual truths. There are as many myths in Hinduism as there are people, so it is impossible to describe every single one.
Vedic Gods
The Vedic Gods live in Heaven and continuously fight the Asuras, their evil cousins, to prevent them from obtaining immortality or dominance.<ref>All these also have fascinating common etymological connections to stuff further west. The evil Asuras are equivalent to the good Ahuras of Zoroastrianism, while the ''Daevas'' are evil; this may or may not have inspired [[Friedrich Nietzsche]]'s thinking about the origins of good and evil. The Asuras are also equivalent to the major grouping of gods in Norse
The Hindu Trinity is post-Vedic
Other important deities include Kali (a berserk form of Durga/Parvati), and Kanon. Maya is more akin to a lesser apsara that illustrates illusion.
Major Hindu sacred texts include the ''[[Mahabharata]]'', ''[[Bhagavad Gita]]'', ''[[Ramayana]]'', and Upanishads. The above are [[Older Than Feudalism]], but the four Vedas<ref>The ''Rig Veda'', ''Yajur Veda'', ''Sama Veda'', and ''Atharva Veda''</ref> are [[Older Than Dirt]], and the Puranas are only [[Older Than Print]].
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== A-E ==
* [[Achilles' Heel]]: Duryodhana had his thighs, and Ravana had his heart. Every demon will have a weak spot. Every single one.
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* [[Achilles in His Tent]]: In the Mahabharata, Karna walks out of the war because he did not respect Bhishma enough. Bhishma's impending death changed his mind.
* [[Adaptation Expansion]]: The Puranas.
* [[Adaptational Personality Adjustment]]:
** Parashurama, one of Vishnu's avatars, is immortal, so he makes a cameo in ''[[The Ramayana]]'' and has a [[Small Role, Big Impact]] in the ''[[Mahabharata]]''. The sage is known for being a violent ax-wielder with a bad temper, who hates Kshatriyas because a group of them killed his father while the latter was meditating. Yet in ''The Ramayana'' when challenging Rama, [[Mind Screw|another Avatar of Vishnu]] (don't think about it), for breaking a celestial bow, he grudgingly accepts that Rama's archery prowess is divine. He's less reasonable in ''The Mahabharata'' when Karna, who still thinks himself a charioteer's son, goes and begs to be his student. Despite the fact that Parashurama has retired from his kshatriya rampages, he still hates them and curses Karna for faithfully letting him rest on his lap despite a bug drawing blood from him, accusing him of being a kshatriya because only royalty would be that durable. Karna, who at this point doesn't know he's actually a prince, begs him to lift the curse and apologizes, saying he only lied because no one will teach a charioteer's son. Parashurama refuses. It is downright petty. Towards the end of the epic, {{spoiler|Parashurama comes to Karna in a dream. Karna by now knows who he really is but has kept it a secret from everyone out of loyalty to Duryodhana, who wants the throne. He bitterly calls out Parashurama for the curse, saying he didn't know his identity and it wasn't fair. Parashurama tells Karna that he has to die per his curse, because political chaos will ensue if Duryodhana wins the war, and he will win if Karna lives. It's unclear if Parashurama did this as a form of [[Let Them Die Happy]], or understood that Karna was truly honorable.}}
* [[All Amazons Want Hercules]]: Parvati. Hidimba, a Rakshashi, falls for Bhima, the strongest man in the Mahabharata.
** Part of the reason that Parvati falls for Shiva is because he is stronger than her.
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* [[Alternate Company Equivalent|Alternate Mythology Equivalent]]: Indra and [[Classical Mythology|Zeus]] are very similar characters. Both were the [[Jerkass God]] chief god of their respective pantheons, wielding [[Bolt of Divine Retribution]] and enjoying pretty amusing sexual lives.
* [[Always Save the Girl]]: Inverted in the dice game in the Mahabharata, where it is Draupadi who saves the honor of her five husbands.
* [[Amazon Admirer]]: Parvati and her incarnations is the Amazon who is admired:
** Parvati was supposed to marry Shiva as Sati, but Sati's father basically kidnapped her after the wedding and showed disrespect towards his son-in-law. This motivated Sati to burn herself on a pyre. Parvati tries to first win over Shiva by doting on him; it ends up not working because he realizes that the love god Kama is trying to use magic to bring them together, and burns Kama alive in front of Parvati and his wife Rati. Instead, she decided to fast and make penance to the god of death. To test her, Shiva posed as a youth who trolled Parvati by saying that Shiva is ugly, covered in ash, and doesn't bathe, so why bother worshipping him. She said she doesn't care, she loves the god selflessly and not for his looks. Shiva is impressed and proposes to her on the spot.
** Devi Durga, one of Parvati's shakhtis, represents her fierce side. Durga rides on a lion and usually beheads men. A form of Durga named Ambika appears when the gods are asking Parvati for help. One rakshasa king says that she's beautiful and asks if she will marry him. She says yes, ''if'' he can beat her in battle. He says that sounds silly but sure. She proceeds to kick his ass, using the power of Parvati's other shaktis and revealing they are all her.
* [[Anguished Declaration of Love]]: Shakuntala's husband Dushyant when he first sees her.
* [[Angry Dance]]: Shiva, when he gets angry, dances a dance called "Rudra Tandava" that can annihilate everything. The universe is described in Saivism (a branch of Hinduism) to be like a creation of the dance of God.
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* [[Death by Sex]]: Pandu. The previous king, Vichitravirya, also dies because of this.
* [[Did We Just Have Tea with Cthulhu?]]?: Ananta Shesha, lord of all Nagas, is a gigantic serpent with a thousand heads. It can hold all the planets on its hoods. It's also one of the few beings that will remain after the destruction of the universe. While that sounds like a fearsome [[Eldritch Abomination]], Shesha is a good deity. Shesha prefers to sing and praise the glories of Vishnu, who sleeps on its back, rather than cause destruction.
* [[Distracted by the Sexy]]: Pretty much the only job of Apsaras is tempting mortals who gain too much spiritual power. Then again, half the time they fall [[In Love with the Mark]], leading to one more enhanced human bloodline.
* [[Divine Date]]: Indra, as well as Krishna with the milkmaids.
* [[Double Standard]]: ''And how''.
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** When reincarnated as Rama, Vishnu rescued some sages from a demon. The sages became sick with longing for Rama's beauty, so Vishnu promised he would return to them in another reincarnation (Krishna), and that the sages would be reincarnated as cowherdesses who would make endless love with him.
** One version of the myth of Shiva falling for Vishnu's female avatar, Mohini (mentioned below), has Mohini transform back into Vishnu when he/she is having sex with Shiva. This does not stop them from continuing.
== F-J ==
* [[Flat Earth Atheist]]: Somehow, Demons with magical abilities that drive out the Devas disbelieve in the existence of a God.
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* [[Getting Crap Past the Radar]]: Hindus interpret Krishna's act of playing his magic flute to get wives to leave their husband's beds and dance with him in the moonlight, as a metaphor of man leaving behind all earthly possessions to commune with God. Sure...
* [[Gilded Cage]]: When Sita is kidnapped by King Ravana, he holds her in the palace of Lanka for an entire year.
* [[Give the Villain a Hero's Funeral]]: It's a staple of [[Hindu Mythology]]. You can have evil people, demons, and deities, but if they stuck to their dharma and honor, they can receive a funeral that purifies them of their sins and ascend to heaven.
** After Vishnu as his Narasimha avatar kills Prahlad's father for attempting to kill his son, Narasimha says Prahlad must have a boon for his worship. Prahlad requests his father is purified for his sins in death. Narasimha says if Prahlad takes the throne and rules wisely, that will be done. He gives his father a kingly funeral.
** When Karna dies in ''[[The Mahabharata]]'', the Pandavas just remember him as the charioteer boy that beat them in archery and the [[Number Two]] to the war's instigator, Duryodhana. It's only after the war that their mother Kunti begs them to give him a proper funeral, because he's their older brother. She had him out of wedlock and sent him out on the river, where charioteers found him. [[My God, What Have I Done?| They don't take it well]], especially [[Jerkass]] Arjuna, but give him a funeral.
* [[The Great Flood]]: Manu escapes this on the back of a fish.
* [[Grand Theft Me]]: Yayati, after the curse of his father-in-law that he should become old and infirm, asked his sons to exchange their youthful body with his. All refused except the youngest son, Puru, who was crowned after his reign. Puru was the ancestor of the Kauravas and the Pandavas in the Mahabharata. His brother Yadu was the ancestor of the Yadavas - thus the ancestor of Krishna.
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* [[Hartman Hips]]. See the [[Stripperiffic]] entry below.
* [[Honor Before Reason]]: Most of Karna's adulthood problems can be blamed on the fact that he swore allegiance to a guy who turned out to be with the bad guys, and Karna refused to go back on his word.
* [[Honorable Enemy Ace]]: This was basically Karna's whole deal; Krishna himself notes that Karna is an honorable enemy and [[The Ace]] when it comes to combat or archery. In fact, Karna ''would'' have been on the hero's side of the Pandavas hadn't been utter jerks to him for being a charioteers' son, and Drona refused to teach him due to not being a kshatriya. Duryodhana got an [[Even Evil Has Standards]] combined with a [[Pragmatic Villainy]] moment and makes Karna King of Anga to earn his loyalty and let him quality for a tournament. Indeed, when Karna learns that he is the Pandavas' eldest brother and the real heir to the kingdom, he refuses to tell anyone, even if it ended a [[Succession Crisis]] peacefully because it would surpass Duryodhana's claim to the throne, and he says he owes Duryodhana his loyalty. When Duroydhana himself finds out the truth after Karna dies, he tearfully says Karna should have ''told'' him; Duryodhana would have supported Karna's claim for the throne.
* [[Hot-Blooded]]: Durvasa. Don't ever piss off Durvasa.
** Vishwamitra could have easily been a Brahmarishi much sooner than he did if he were not so hotblooded.
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== K-O ==
* [[Lawful Stupid]]: Daksha hated his son-in-law, Shiva, for living a rather chaotic lifestyle. Shiva didn't mind that until his wife, Sati, committed suicide in grief of her father defiling and mocking her beloved. Shiva was infuriated; he later killed Daksha, then revived him, with a goat's head as punishment. In his humility and repentance for his graceless and sinful acts, Daksha became one of Shiva's most devoted attendants.
* [[Let's You and Him Fight]]: When the asura brothers Sunda and Upasunda had a divine boon that nothing except each other could harm them, and got quite troublesome running with it, Tilottama was created on Brahma's order specifically to tempt them both enough to cause rivalry. A duel to [[Mutual Kill]] ensued.
* [[Loads and Loads of Characters]]: Some estimate put the total number of gods at ''300 million''. Of course, only a relatively small fraction of that number is widely known.
* [[Loads and Loads of Races]]: Rakshasas are demons who live on earth, Asuras are demons who live elsewhere, Yakshas are nature deities, Apsaras are beautiful nymphs, and Gandarvas are strong, beautiful and powerful creatures. Nagas worship snakes or are snakes, depending on the epic.
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** Krishna is supposed to be older than fifty at the start of the Kurushetra War. He looks perpetually 20.
* [[Overshadowed by Awesome]]: Brahma may be the creator god, but he has the least followers, compared to Vishnu and Shiva.
== P-T ==
* [[Petting Zoo People]]: Ganesha, who has the head of an elephant (reasons for this vary across stories).
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** He does it again when his consort Kali finally kills the demon Raktabija and dances on the field of battle. Each step of her joyous dance causes a terrible earthquake. Shiva is aware this might cause an [[Earthshattering Kaboom]], so he shields the earth with his body. This causes Kali to stop her victory dance, as she realizes that she's stomping on her husband.
* [[Time Abyss]]: Reality is said to last for as long as Brahma's lifetime. Brahma will live to be a hundred years old, except one ''day'' in the life of Brahma is four billion, three hundred and twenty million human years. The true end of reality will come about when Brahma dies at the end of ''311 trillion'' human years. We've got a while to go, then.
* [[Toe-Tapping Melody]]:
** As a cowherd boy, Krishna could induce the local gopis and cows to dance when playing his flute. When he had to leave his village home to face Kamsa, a village girl named Radha asked him to leave behind his flute, so she could always remember him.
** Meerabai or Saint Mirabai was a Krishna devotee who declared the avatar was her husband, even though she lived hundreds of years after his time. She wrote many hymns and poetry dedicated to Krishna. The ''Amar Chitra Katha'' comic depicting her life shows her leading entire groups of devotees into songs.
* [[Trick Arrows]]: Astras, usually in the form of [[Elemental Powers]] taken [[Up to Eleven]]. Some of the milder effects include [[Making a Splash|flash floods,]] [[Shock and Awe|thunderstorms]] and ''[[Dishing Out Dirt|falling mountains.]]''
== U-Z ==
* [[Ugly Guy, Hot Wife]]: Dattreya and Silavati. Ahalya and Gautama Maharishi.
* [[Unstoppable Rage]]: Shiva.
** Vishnu as Narsimha
* [[The Villain Must Be Punished]]: Asuras and rakshasas have a habit of asking for boons from the gods that would allow them to conquer the humans. Sometimes they then go for the devas in an attempt to conquer heaven and rule all three realms. They forgot one thing: the same gods that granted them the boons ''always'' put in a loophole. They then either reincarnate as the avatar that can defeat them, or create a warrior to do the job for them. While the usurper may be given a fair chance to back down, they're too prideful or arrogant to consider that surrendering may save their lives.
** Prahlad's father Hiranyakashipu made this mistake by saying he wanted to be slain by "Neither man nor beast, with or without a weapon, indoors or outdoors, at neither day nor night, and not on the Earth or the sky" as told to Brahma. Then he proceeded to conquer the heavens. The devas went to Vishnu, asking him to stop the king. Vishnu said he was on it. When Hiyanyakashipu threatened his son for being a Vishnu devotee, complete with a few murder attempts, Vishnu reincarnated as Narasimha, a man with a lion's head. Narasimha beat Hiranyakashipu with his clawed fists, dragged him to the palace threshold at twilight, placed him on his lap, and tore him apart.
** Another Vishnu incarnation was made for vengeance. Parashurama was a Brahman "blessed" with a warrior's temperament, and he received an axe that would help him do the job. He killed a king named Arjuna for stealing sacred cows from the ashram, which Arjuna did to bait Parashurama into a fight. The problem is the princes sought vengeance by killing Parashurama's father, who was not nice but also not part of this. After Parashurama found his mother wailing and cremated the body, he swore to wipe out kshatriya royalty to avenge his father. The gods had to step in after he wiped out the bad kshatriyas and started going after the good ones.
* [[War in Heaven]]: The war between Devas and Asuras is a perennial, ongoing conflict which seems to effectively be at a stalemate, although one side or the other may gain a temporary upper hand.
* [[The Worf Effect]]: Indra suffers from it badly.
* [[World's Strongest Man]]: Bhima, Kumbarkarna.
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{{reflist}}
[[Category:Useful Notes/India]]
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[[Category:Useful Notes/Religion]]
[[Category:Hinduism]]
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