d they are, in fact called the 'Hindu Trinity. The gods involved are Brahma, Visnu, and Siva. The first is supposed to create the world (at the beginning of each cosmic cycle), the second to maintain it in being, and Siva, at the end of a cosmic cycle, to destroy it again. But then a further idea is added, which is ignored by the proponents of the theory of a Hindu Trinity. What is added invariably implies that over and above these three figures lies a single reality. This 'one above the three' controls the activities of the creation etc. Brahma and the others, who carry out these functions, are merely manifestations of that highest being, or they relate to it in some other, equally secondary form. This concept of a single, all-powerful, eternal, personal, and loving God is the concept of "Bhagavan."
But who is this Hindu Bhagavan? At least to us the outside observers, he is not one, but many. Siva, Visnu, Krsna, Rama, Karttikeya, and Ganesa may be mentioned as the most important Bhagavan figures. But to speak of many Bhagavan's has
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