Trimbakeshwar, the temple and the source of the river
Trimbakeshwar is a small town under a big hill, west of Nashik. The temple is the reason the town is there, and it is one of the twelve jyotirlings. The Godavari rises on the hill above it, and in the middle of the town is the kund where people say she comes back out of the hill. This page says how the temple, the kund, the hill and the river fit together, what pilgrims come here for, and which page to read first.
One of the twelve jyotirlings
The ling inside has three faces
Kushavarta
In the middle of the town, a short walk from the temple
Brahmagiri
Where the Godavari rises
The Shaiva and Udasin akhadas bathe here
The Vaishnav akhadas bathe at Ramkund in Nashik
Section I
Why do pilgrims come to Trimbakeshwar?
For the temple, first. Trimbakeshwar is a small town west of Nashik, in the bowl under Brahmagiri, and the temple is in the middle of it. A लिङ्ग ling is the form Shiva is worshipped in, an upright stone in the shrine, and a ज्योतिर्लिङ्ग jyotirling is a ling of light, one of the twelve lings of Shiva that are counted above all the others. The temple at Trimbakeshwar is one of the twelve. The ling in it has three faces, for Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva together, where a ling is usually one upright stone for Shiva alone. Every Monday the god goes out through the lanes in a palanquin to the kund in the middle of the town.
For the river, second. The Godavari rises on Brahmagiri, the hill above Trimbakeshwar. People say she disappears into the hill and comes out again at Kushavarta. A कुण्ड kund is a tank or pool with stone sides and steps, fed by the river or a spring, and Kushavarta is a square kund with steps on all four sides, a short walk from the temple. The kund got its name from the kusha grass Gautama stirred the river with when he brought her down. The river first shows herself high on the hill, at Gangadwar, a cave temple in the rock that you reach by the steps from the town.
And for the rites. Pilgrims come to Trimbakeshwar for Narayan Nagbali, Kaal Sarp Shanti and Tripindi Shraddh, and at Trimbakeshwar a purohit of the town performs them. A पुरोहित purohit is the priest who performs a rite for a family and makes the offerings in the family’s name. The rites a family keeps for its own dead at Ramkund in Nashik are under the rites.
At a Kumbh the town is one of the two places the fair is held. An अखाड़ा akhada is an order of sadhus with its own head, its own rule, its own property and its own place in the bathing order at a Kumbh. In a Simhastha year the Shaiva and Udasin akhadas bathe at Kushavarta, and the naga sadhus among them, while the Vaishnav akhadas bathe at Ramkund in Nashik, and why the Kumbh is at two places has that arrangement.
Section II
How do the places fit together?
Think of it as one small town at the foot of one hill. The temple is in the middle of the town, and Kushavarta is a short walk from it, with the lanes of the town running off the kund on every side. Behind the town the hill goes up, and there are two ways to take it. One is the walk round it. A परिक्रमा parikrama is the walk round a holy thing — a temple, a hill, a river — keeping it on your right hand the whole way. The other is the climb, by the stone steps that go up the face of the hill from the town to Gangadwar, where the water first shows itself. The fort on the top has its own way up, from the north side. Everything else — the god in his palanquin, the akhadas at the Kumbh, the purohits and the rites they perform — happens in the lanes between the temple and the kund, or at the water.
Section III
Which page should you read first?
If you have come for the temple, start with the Trimbakeshwar temple — what is in it, the three pujas through the day, the Monday palanquin, the days it keeps through the year, and what you see when you go. The jyotirling at Trimbakeshwar is the story of how Shiva came to be there at all, the way the Śiva Purāṇa tells it, from a drought to the day the Ganga would not stay unless Shiva stayed too. The twelve jyotirlings has the other eleven and where each one is. The Peshwas and the temple has who built the temple and when, and the family that ran it for two hundred years.
If you have come for the river, start with the source of the Godavari, which tells how the river came to be on the hill — a drought, a cow in a field of rice, and the Ganga sitting in Shiva’s hair — and then the climb up to Gangadwar. Kushavarta is the kund — how it got its name, what comes to it every Monday, and its part in the Kumbh. Brahmagiri is the hill — the sacrifice that gave it its name, the walk round it, and the fort on top.
If you have come for a rite, Narayan Nagbali, Kaal Sarp Shanti and Tripindi Shraddh each say what the rite is and who performs it, and the purohits of Trimbakeshwar says how the temple’s worship and the town’s purohits are arranged, and where the arrangement came from.
The temple and the jyotirling
The temple as a place and what happens in it through the day and the year, the story of how Shiva came to stay on Brahmagiri, the twelve jyotirlings and where each of them is, and who built the temple and when.
The Trimbakeshwar temple
The Trimbakeshwar temple is the temple of Shiva at the foot of Brahmagiri, in the town of Trimbakeshwar west of Nashik, and one of the twelve jyotirlings. The ling with three faces, the three pujas through the day, the Monday palanquin to Kushavarta, the days the temple keeps through the year, the building and its four gates, and what you see when you go.
The jyotirling at Trimbakeshwar
The ling in the temple at Trimbakeshwar is one of the twelve jyotirlings, and it has three faces. How Shiva came to stay on Brahmagiri with a river beside him — a drought, a ditch of water from heaven, the rishis' wives at the water, Ganesha as a cow, and the day the Ganga would not stay unless Shiva stayed too — the way the Śiva Purāṇa tells it, and what is in the shrine now.
The twelve jyotirlings
A jyotirling is a ling of light, one of the twelve lings of Shiva that are counted above all the others, and Trimbakeshwar is one of the twelve. The twelve as the Śiva Purāṇa names them, what it says about saying their names, the smaller lings that go with them, and where each of the twelve is today — from Somnath on the sea to Kedarnath in the snow.
The Peshwas and the temple
The temple at Trimbakeshwar was built by the third Peshwa, Balaji Bajirao, called Nanasaheb, between 1740 and 1760, and opened on Mahashivratri in 1756. The Peshwa paid for it and put the Jogalekar family in charge, and the family ran it for more than two hundred years. The building, the opening day, the Jogalekars from 1752 to 1976, the jewelled crown and the chariot, and how the trust that runs the temple today came to be.
The kund, the hill and the river
The square kund in the middle of the town, the hill the town sits under and the walk round it, and how the Godavari came to be on that hill at all, with the climb up to where the water first comes out of the rock.
Kushavarta
Kushavarta is the square stone kund in the middle of Trimbakeshwar, with steps down into the water on all four sides, where people say the Godavari comes back out of the hill. How it got its name from the kusha grass Gautama stirred the river with, the palanquin that comes to it every Monday, its place in the Kumbh, and what you see standing at its edge.
Brahmagiri
Brahmagiri is the hill that Trimbakeshwar sits under, about three thousand feet above the sea, where the Godavari rises. The sacrifice Brahma performed on it that gave it its name, the walk round it that the rishis set Gautama and that the temple keeps two people for, the fort on top with its own dates, and the climb.
The source of the Godavari
The Godavari rises on Brahmagiri, the hill above Trimbakeshwar, and people say she disappears into the hill and comes out again at Kushavarta in the middle of the town. How she came to be on that hill at all — a drought, a cow in a field of rice, and the Ganga sitting in Shiva's hair — the way the Gautami Mahatmya tells it, and then the climb up to Gangadwar, where the water first comes out of the rock.
The rites, and who performs them
The three rites pilgrims come to Trimbakeshwar for, each performed by a purohit of the town, and how the temple's worship and the town's purohits are arranged.
Narayan Nagbali
Narayan Nagbali is a rite performed by a purohit at Trimbakeshwar, and at Ramkund in Nashik. What Narayan bali is for, as the Agni Purana and the Śiva Purāṇa give it, where the rite is performed, and how it is arranged.
Kaal Sarp Shanti
Kaal Sarp Shanti is a rite of pacification, performed by a purohit at Trimbakeshwar and at Ramkund in Nashik. What the words mean, and where the rite is performed.
Tripindi Shraddh
Tripindi Shraddh is a rite performed at Trimbakeshwar, with a purohit officiating. What a shraddh is, where the bath before it was taken, and the round a shraddh at Trimbakeshwar followed in the 1880s.
Purohits of Trimbakeshwar
Inside the temple the pujaris perform the daily worship, and the purohits of the town perform the rites pilgrims come to Trimbakeshwar for. How the temple's worship is arranged and where the arrangement came from, who the Tungars are, and what the Purohit Sangh is.