Singhadwara The Lions Gate
Singhadwara The Lions Gate. The Lion Gate is situated on the east side of the Shri Jagannath Mandir, Puri. Singha Dwar or The lions’ gate is the main entrance to the temple. Singhadwar is about 300 feet from the Ratna Singhasana where the four Idols Jagannath, Balabhadra, Subhadra & Sudarshan are worshiped.
There are two giant stone lions on both sides of the entrance, so it’s called Singhadwara or the Lion’s Gate. But this lion pair is not the only feature of the Lion Gate. The two pairs of Jaya-Vijay statues in front of the door, the Lakshmi idol attached to the gamut or facade adjacent to the Lion Gate, the sculptural class of Dashabata, and even the brass leaf-shaped doors.
Jaya, Vijay is the two gatekeepers of the Lord. The four-armed gatekeepers hold the conch and chakra in the upper hand and the mattress and Japamal in the lower hand. There are two triumphant statues on either side of the majestic Lion Gate on the front wall, as well as two very stunning eight-foot-tall statues near the two statues. At the top of the door is a sculpture class of Dashabata. It carves a statue of Jagannath as the ninth incarnation. In the Indian History and Jayadeva’s ‘GitaGovinda’, the ninth incarnation of Lord Vishnu is called Buddha; But why is there a statue of Jagannath in place of the Buddha in the temple? It is clear that Jagannath and Buddha are one and the same.
The statue of Lakshmi is even higher up in the sculptural class of Dashabata. The Goddess Padmasan is seated, just like the idol of the Lakshmi temple within the enclosure of the temple. The lion statue on either side of the door below is quite large — about eight feet long and six feet high. The statues are probably made of sharp stone.
The main entrance to the temple is closed by a two-sided brass door. The height of the door is about 15 feet. The width of the doors is slightly more than three feet. The door in front of the left-hand side has a door or a thief’s door inside the door. The size of this gate is two and a half feet. Before sunrise, some devotees first go to the temple through the gates to perform some morning rituals. The brass sheet of the Lion Gate also has a metal pattern on the shell and wheel.
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