India is united through timeless mystic strands. Some of them visible. Some of them popular. Some of them hidden in plain sight, waiting for us.
One such strand is the series of sun temples that unite India. The Konark Surya temple in the east, Modhera Surya temple in the west, Mulastan Surya temple in, what is now Pakistan, and Marthanda Surya temple in Kashmir — all these unite India.
In the Puranas, the pan-Indian spread of Surya worship is associated with Samba, the son of Sri Krishna through Jambavathi, the daughter of Ramayana-fame Jambavan.
Actually, this might suggest, in terms of history, a very ancient root to Sun worship.
Historically though, the Multan temple was built not later than sixth century CE, Martanda temple at Kashmir around eighth century, and the Konark temple around thirteenth century.
The Modhera temple in Gujarat as we see today, was built around the eleventh century. The Chalukya king, Bhima I, built the temple. It was destroyed with a fundamentalist fury by the forces of Allauddin Khilji in 1299 CE.
My visit to the Modhera temple was on 4 February 2023 and was planned by Prof Ram Sharma of the Centre for Indic Studies at Indus University.
The team was accompanied and guided by Dr Shika Roi, a historian with an in-depth knowledge of ancient and classical Indian history, archaeology and also local traditions.
Read More at https://swarajyamag.com/culture/rays-of-hope-how-sanctum-sanctorums-of-many-templesbroken-by-invaderscan-be-revived
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