113bC4l

siddhas and the religious landscape ⁄ 187
marginal siddha topography
Thus the literary and epigraphic evidence suggest that the term “siddha” indicated
a spectrum of religious practices and related behaviors in premedieval
and medieval India. Much of the conduct may be ascetic (tapas) in pursuit of
personal dominion, either over karmic impediments (as the Jaina) or over other
groups (as in most traditions). None of these narratives necessarily involve
cults to quasi-divine siddha figures who enjoy residence in a realm beyond the
senses and above the clouds, although divine goals appear from time to time
primarily under the rubric of Vidyadhara, rather than siddha. Instead the
sources reveal a subculture of individuals whose apparent purpose is to gain
power or authority and to provide services of a dubious ethical nature to kings,
generals, and councilors in search of dominion, gifts, lucre, or women of easy
virtue. The services include prophecy, spirit possession, demonic control, love
potions, wealth generation, magical killing or actual murder, and a host of
other practices that do not entail the supermundane culture of liberation. We
get no sense that they are necessarily involved in any specific cultus to %iva,
Buddha, Visnu, Devi, Surya, or any other single transcendent or pan-Indic divinity,
although any of these may appear associated with them. Rather, their
chosen objects of ritual propitiation are the demons (raksasa), ghosts (pi$aca),
[un]dead (preta), tree spirits (yaksa/yaksi), and ghouls (vetala) of the charnel
grounds, the forest, and the periphery of the kingdom. Beyond their exotic appearances
before their patrons in the court, the siddhas are commonly associated
with criminals (manava), tribal peoples (atavi), alchemists (dhatuvadin),
dramatic troupes (nartikas), and spies. In this sense, the category of “siddha”
is the logical consequence of a civilization whose medieval expression is a concern
for (and sometimes obsession with) status, hierarchy, political power, religious
authority, and personal indulgence. Accordingly, the goal of turning
into a siddha frequently becomes the aspiration of those excluded from status
and hierarchy, either by birth or by accident.
This is not to say that these siddhas did not have an idea about their own
religious affiliations, and no data support the model that siddhas represented a
modern, nonsectarian, quasi-Unitarian idea of religion as extrapersonal and
transcultural. Such figures, even if they occasionally change their religious identities,
often support a vociferous allegiance while they are members of one
group or another. If we were to draw similarities (which I believe we might),
siddhas were often contentiously in support of their respective factions of the
moment—%aiva, Bauddha, Vaisnava, Kaula, Jaina, Saura, tribal, or caste-based.
Their individual allegiances should not be underestimated, and the tantras con