Tara and Nyai Lara Kidul: Images of the Divine Feminine in Java

Abstract

Nyai Lara Kidul, still venerated by the Javanese today as the spirit queen of the Southern (Indian) Ocean, is a well-known figure in Javanese mythology. She has been previously studied as an indigenous Austronesian fertility goddess who in Hindu-Buddhist times (c. 600-1500 C.E.) was associated with the Hindu goddesses Durga and Dewi Śri, goddesses who came to be matched with the malevolent and benevolent sides, respectively, of Nyai Lara Kidul's vacillating character. The present article attempts to connect her with the Buddhist goddess Vaśyā-Tārā, the presiding deity of Candi Kalasan, a Central Javanese temple founded by a ruler of the Sailendra dynasty in 778 C.E. This identification of Candi Kalasan's presiding deity was accomplished by using iconographic data whose interconnections had not been analyzed earlier.

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