Every Hindu God Explained in 10 Minutes

#hindugods #hinduism #hindumythology #shiva #krishna Brahma, Vishnu, Shiva, Lakshmi, Saraswati, Durga, Kali, Ganesha, Hanuman and Krishna: the ten Hindu gods you need to know, and the one thing most people don't know about each of them. Why the creator of the universe barely has a temple. Why Shiva's throat is blue. Why the goddess of wealth rides an owl. Why Ganesha's tusk is broken. And the line Krishna speaks in the Bhagavad Gita that J. Robert Oppenheimer remembered after the first atomic bomb. ⏱️ CHAPTERS 0:00 Brahma 0:59 Vishnu 1:53 Shiva 3:08 Lakshmi 3:52 Saraswati 4:39 Durga 5:42 Kali 6:29 Ganesha 7:24 Hanuman 8:02 Krishna 9:04 The gods 📚 SOURCES • Brahma: iconography (Britannica); very few temples dedicated to him, Pushkar the best known; the pillar of light (Lingodbhava) story is from the Shiva Purana and its tellings differ • Vishnu: Sanskrit avatara, "descent" (Britannica); the Dashavatara lists vary (Buddha or Balarama); Kalki at the end of the Kali Yuga • Shiva: the churning of the ocean (Samudra Manthan) and the halahala poison; the order of what emerged varies by text, and Parvati holding his throat is a popular telling; Neelkantha. The Nataraja statue at CERN was a gift from the Government of India, unveiled 18 June 2004 (CERN Bulletin) • Lakshmi: her vahana is the owl (Uluka); "ullu" is colloquial Hindi for a fool; Diwali 2026 is on 8 November • Saraswati: Rigveda 2.41.16 calls her the best of rivers; the river's identity is debated by scholars • Durga: created from the gods' combined energies against Mahishasura (Devi Mahatmya); the number of arms and the wording of the boon vary by text. Sharad Navratri 2026: 11–19 October; Dussehra: 20 October. Durga Puja in Kolkata was inscribed on UNESCO's Intangible Cultural Heritage list in December 2021 • Kali: Raktabija (Devi Mahatmya); the story of her stepping on Shiva is a later popular tradition, especially in Bengal and Odisha • Ganesha: the turmeric-paste story (Shiva Purana); Ganesha as the scribe of the Mahabharata is a later tradition, and the broken-pen version is one popular telling; the Mahabharata has around 100,000 verses • Hanuman: the herb mountain (Ramayana); one of the Chiranjivi, the immortals • Krishna: the Bhagavad Gita, 700 verses, chapter 11 (the universal form). J. Robert Oppenheimer studied Sanskrit at Berkeley; he recalled Gita 11.32, "Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds", in NBC's 1965 documentary The Decision to Drop the Bomb • "33 gods": the Vedic texts count 33 (trayastrimsat); the word koti can be read as "ten million" or as "kind/class", and scholars disagree Sources: Britannica, Wikipedia (Brahma, Vishnu, Dashavatara, Samudra Manthan, Lakshmi, Sarasvati River, Durga Puja in Kolkata, Raktabija, Ganesha, Mahabharata, Hanuman, Bhagavad Gita), CERN Bulletin 2004, MIT Technology Review. These are living gods of a living faith, told here with respect. Myths are told as myths, and many have more than one version. Which one does YOUR family pray to? Tell me in the comments, and where you're from. 👇