Origin of Jagannath Wooden Deities

Dadi**: Guddu beta, have you ever seen the pictures of Lord Jagannath - those round-faced deities with big eyes and no hands or feet?

Guddu**: Yes Dadi! They look different from other gods. Why are they like that?

Dadi**: Ah, that's a wonderful story! It explains why the most famous deities in Puri look unfinished - and why that incompleteness is actually perfect.

Guddu**: Unfinished? Didn't the artist complete them?

Dadi**: That's exactly the mystery! Long ago, there was a devoted king named Indradyumna who desperately wanted to find a sacred image called Nila-Madhava - the Blue Lord. He sent priests in all directions to search for it.

Guddu**: Did they find it?

Dadi**: Only one priest succeeded - a man named Vidyapati. He found the image being worshipped secretly by a tribal king in a hidden forest shrine. But when he returned to guide King Indradyumna there...

Guddu**: What happened?

Dadi**: A great storm had come and buried the image under the sand! No matter how hard they searched, they couldn't find it. The king was heartbroken.

Guddu**: Oh no! All that searching for nothing!

Dadi**: But the king didn't give up. He prayed deeply, and a divine voice spoke to him: "Build a great temple at the shore. Wait there. I will come to you in a new form."

Guddu**: Did he build the temple?

Dadi**: He built the most magnificent temple in all India - the Puri Jagannath Temple that still stands today! And then the voice told him to wait by the sea for a special log that would float to shore.

Guddu**: A log?

Dadi**: A divine log! The voice said, "From this log, I wish to be carved into four forms - Jagannath, Balabhadra, Subhadra, and Sudarshan chakra. But only one being in all creation can carve me."

Guddu**: Who was that?

Dadi**: An old carpenter appeared at the palace - a mysterious figure who said he would carve the deities. But he had one condition: he would work alone, behind closed doors, for twenty-one days. No one - absolutely no one - could open the doors or disturb him.

Guddu**: That's a strange condition!

Dadi**: The king agreed. The carpenter - who was actually Vishwakarma, the divine architect, some say, or Lord Vishnu Himself - began his work. Days passed. The sounds of carving could be heard from inside.

Guddu**: Did anyone peek?

Dadi**: For many days, no one dared. But as time went on, the sounds stopped. Silence fell. The queen became worried. "What if the old man died inside? What if something is wrong?"

Guddu**: So she opened the door?

Dadi**: On the fifteenth day, unable to bear the anxiety any longer, she convinced the king to open the doors - just a crack, just to check. And the moment the doors opened...

Guddu**: What?

Dadi**: The carpenter vanished! Disappeared completely! And there sat four figures - but they were incomplete. Round faces with enormous eyes, but no arms, no legs, no finished features.

Guddu**: That's why they look that way!

Dadi**: The king was devastated. He had ruined everything by breaking his promise! He prepared to take his own life in shame. But then the divine voice spoke again.

Guddu**: What did it say?

Dadi**: "Do not be sad, dear devotee. This is how I wish to be worshipped. In this unfinished form, I am complete. Worship me as I am."

Guddu**: But why does God want to look unfinished?

Dadi**: Some say it teaches us that God is beyond form - any form we give Him is incomplete anyway. Others say the armless form shows that God needs nothing - He doesn't take, only gives. And those huge eyes? They see everything, missing nothing.

Guddu**: That's deep, Dadi!

Dadi**: Every year, these deities are taken out in the world's largest chariot festival - the Rath Yatra. Millions come to pull the chariots and see Lord Jagannath, Lord of the Universe, in His mysterious, unfinished, perfect form.

Guddu**: I'd love to see that someday!

Dadi**: Perhaps someday you will, beta. But remember the lesson: sometimes what looks incomplete to us is exactly as it should be. God knows what He's doing, even when we can't understand it.

Guddu**: Goodnight, Dadi! I love the story of the big-eyed Lord!

Dadi**: Goodnight, beta. May Jagannath's all-seeing eyes watch over you!