Jain Tantric Cosmogram (Puruskara Yantra)

The followers of Jainism believe in non-violence and seek the liberation of the soul from cycles of death and rebirth with the goal of divine consciousness. This striking image of a human figure with arms akimbo—and incorporating a gridded and checkered hourglass shape and a column of picture panels—visualizes the Jain concept of the universe.

According to Jain cosmology, the universe has three parts: the upper world of gods or the heavens; the middle world of human beings or Earth; and the lower world of infernal beings or the hells. These realms are visualized as forming a colossal human figure, almost invariably a male, known as the Cosmic Man. In this unfinished painting, the figure’s "waist" is a circle that locates the middle world of Earth, which, if completed would show a land mass surrounded by water with a sacred mountain at its center. Below the circle are seven horizontal registers representing seven hells with their inhabitants—sinners and punishing tormentors—barely sketched in. Above the middle world, there are four panels showing the abodes of the gods, who are shown residing in pavilions.

This figural cosmogram also charts a path to an individual’s spiritual perfection, called siddhi. Numbers appear on the stepped grid that forms the hourglass shape of the Cosmic Man. The numbers on the left indicate the length and width of the square unit of measure used in calculating the size of the various sections of each world; the numbers on the right indicate the square measure of each of these sections. When the square measures or areas are added, the resulting immense number reveals the size of the universe and the enormous distances through which a soul must travel to arrive at spiritual perfection, and finally rest within the crescent usually found in the forehead of the human figure.