Why is Krishna called Giridhar?

God's names are innumerable

Without doubt, God's names are aplenty focusing on features, characteristics, incidents and also on the feelings of devotees. The names of the Lord keep on adding with every passing era.

All names are of God's

Another way of putting it would be that all names belong to God, because we believe that everything belongs to God.

Krishna has many names

Likewise, the avatar of Lord Krishna has many names ascribed to him. Krishna was engaged in number of Leelas and he got lot of sobriquets and monikers due to that.

Giridhar is one them

A very beautiful name ascribed to Lord Krishna is Giridhar or Giridhari. This name became more popular when the devotee-saint Meera Bai used it extensively in her devotional poetry.

But why this name?

But why Lord Krishna is given this name? Is it an event based or describes one of his features or characteristics? We will explore the reason in this article.

The incident

Govardhan Parvat is associated with Gokul--a village that worshiped Lord Indra. It's this mountain (Giri) that Lord Krishna held on his hand (Dhar), and subsequently was called as Giridhari.

The story goes like this

Indra, the god of rains, was propitiated by the villagers of Gokul under the leadership of Nanda, the foster father of Sri Krishna. Indra was a fierce god and used his power of thunder and rain to make people worship him. People worshiped him out of fear.

The promise given to Govardhan Parvat

In the previous avatar as Lord Rama, mountain Govardhan was given a promise that he will used by God in the next avatar. The mountain was being carried for making the bridge to Lanka when word reached that no more stones are required. Govardhan parvat cried that it failed to serve the Lord--his devotion moved the heart of God and he promised that he will be used in the next avatar.

Going against Indra

Sri Krishna, who realized that Indra was a power monger, argued that instead of worshiping Indra, the village should worship Govardhana as he was the one who was protecting us from natural calamities and he also blocked the clouds and thus brought rain. A very scientific approach it would seem.

The village started worshiping the mountain

Krishan was already the favorite of the village, and the people found this logic to be true and started performing Govardhana puja. This infuriated Indra, who brought torrential rain in Vraj region.

Krishna needs to save the village

Because the change in routine was called upon by Krishna, the villagers accused Krishna for this ordeal. Krishna asked to take refuge at Govardhana. As we had worshiped it, the holy mount would protect us, he said.

Lifting the mountain

On approaching the mountain, Sri Krishna lifted it with his little finger and gave refuge to all living beings in Vraj under the mount. This holy act earned Sri Krishna the name Giridhar. Indra was humbled and people stopped worshiping Indra from the day.

The inner significance

This holy act symbolically extols humans to not to surrender before calamities. Though nature takes a furious form of destruction, but God has provided us means to protect ourselves and rebuild our lives.

The image of child Krishna

At the time of this incident, Krishna was in his childhood and the image of a child Krishna lifting the mountain has etched in the memory of every devotee.

Have you seen it?

I am sure you must heard or seen this incident depicted on a poster or calendar or heard the name Giridhar in a bhajan or a song. Let's offer our prayers to 'The lifter of the mountain'!