SHIVA

Real Name: Shiva Nataraja (also spelled Siva)

Occupation: God of Destruction and Rebirth, Lord of the Bhuts

Legal Status: Citizen of Nirvana

Identity: The general populace of Earth is unaware of the existence of Shiva except as a figure in Hindu religion. He is well known to the people of India and countries that practice Hinduism.

Other Aliases: Jyotirlinga, Siwa (Balinese name),

Place of Birth: Unknown

Marital Status: Married

Known Relatives: Gaea (mother, alias Ammavaru), Vishnu, Brahma (brothers), Himavat (father-in-law), Menaka (mother-in-law), Parvati (wife), Kali (daughter/wife), Ganehsa, Skanda (sons), Dharma, Kama (nephews), Padma, Vach (nieces), Lakshmi, Sarasvati (sisters-in-law),

Group Affiliation: The Hindu Gods (Daevas); The Council Elite; apparent ally of Dansen Macabre and the Cult of Kara-Kai

Base of Operations: Kailasa in the Nirvana Dimension

First Appearance: Thor I #301

History: Shiva is part of the ruling triumvirate of gods in the Hindu Pantheon, which boasts over five hundred gods. Very little is known about his origins, but according to Dravidian myth, he was conceived from an egg given birth by Gaea in her role as Ammavaru, the Dravidian goddess of the earth. With him were his brothers Vishnu and Brahma. Together, they lifted one half of the egg to become the heavens and they created the earth from the lower half. Together, the three brothers rose to ruling council of the Hindu gods after Vishnu overthrew the Rakshasas, the Hindu demons who had overthrown their Vedic ancestors, once worshipped as gods by the Aryan tribes on earth.

In their battle for supremacy, the Rakshasas poisoned the drink called amrita that provided the Hindu gods their immortality. Shiva, however, drank the whole tainted vial down to save the rest of the Daevas (The Hindu Gods), but he held it in his throat for a time and spat out the poison within it. As a result, the color of the skin around his throat is darker than the rest of his body.

Shiva loved the goddess Sakti, the youngest daughter of the sun god, Daksha, and wanted her as his wife. Daksha meanwhile had the decision to approve her husband, but he did not want Shiva as a son-in-law and after gathering all the gods of Nirvana for his daughter to choose a husband from, Sakti became distressed that Shiva was not invited for her to choose from. She tossed her bridal veil far into the air, but Shiva appeared and presented it to her. When Shiva revealed that her father did not support their marriage and that as a result they could not truly marry, she became so forlorn that she cast herself into a sacrificial flame than marry anyone else. Shiva took his revenge for his broken heart out on Daksha by beheading him, but after an intercession from the gods, Brahma later restored Daksha to life with the head of a ram.

Sakti was later reborn as Parvati, one of the daughters of the mountain-god Himavat, and Shiva finally took her to be his wife. Parvati was sister to Lakshmi and Sarasvati, wives of respectively Vishnu and Brahma. According to one story, after Sakti’s death, Shiva entered into a ascetic existence. While in a trance-like state, he was wounded by one of the shafts of desire from the love-god, Kama, son of Vishnu and Lakshmi. Awakened from his trance, Shiva opened his third eye and incinerated Kama with the power from it. (Kama would be re-born years later from Krishna, the mortal avatar of Vishnu, with his wife Rukmini.)

Due to Kama's spell, Shiva fell in love with Parvat and eventually married her. She eventually gave birth to his sons Ganehsa, the wisdom-god, and Skanda, the war-god. While his father was away for several years, Ganehsa was guarding his mother’s bedroom when one day his father returned home. Not recognizing his son, Shiva beheaded the young man but realized his error when Parvati screamed. He restored Ganehsa to life with the head of an elephant taken from Airavata, the elephant mount of the thunder-god, Indra.  

Kali, the destroyer aspect of Parvati, eventually became so powerful that it broke free of her to destroy demons. Although she technically conceived the dark goddess, Shiva saw Kali as another form of his wife. 

Under the Hindu Religion, Shiva was one of the chief gods alongside Vishnu and Brahma. As god of destruction and rebirth, Shiva apparently granted power in recent years to the woman who would become Dansen Macabre. In the wake of Ragnarok, the Asgardian god Thor appeared in Nirvana seeking a portion of the life energies necessary to resuscitate the Asgardians. Vishnu, Brahma and Shiva, however, put the option to a vote and decided not to donate the energies to former deities that had outlived their ascendancy and preferring rather the energies go on to other immortals. A clash of tempers, however, caused a confrontation between Shiva and Thor. Realizing he could not overwhelm the power of the Hindu god, Thor cast them both to Bifrost, the rainbow bridge to Asgard. Realizing he was overwhelmed by the thunder-god's passion, Shiva formulated an uneasy truce between them and relinquished the energies Thor wanted as the two separated with uneasy tension.

Shortly thereafter, Yama, the Hindu god of the dead, entered into a pact with several other gods of the dead including Hades, the Olympian god of the dead, and Seth, the Egyptian underworld-god to unite their realms. Their ritual released the entity known as Demogorge who saw them as malevolent deities and then commenced with consuming them to destroy them. Odin, Ruler of the gods of Asgard, sent a plea to the rulers of Earth’s gods to send champions to battle Demogorge. Vishnu sent the god Indra who for reasons of his own used his powers to impersonate Shiva and assist Thor, Apollo and the other gods present to defeat Demogorge. Although briefly consumed himself, Indra was freed after Thor caused a shift in the creature’s palate that restored it back into Atum. Indra then departed realizing that he had dissolved any further enmity between Thor and Shiva.

Seth subsequently dissatisfied with these events launched and manipulated events that allowed him to conquer Celestial Heliopolis, home of the Egyptian Gods, and to invade Asgard. Shiva watched the events unfold out of morbid curiosity partially interested in the outcome. During his observation, he overheard the primal scream of Amora the Enchantress over the death of her then lover, Heimdall, who had been slain by Seth. (Odin restored Heimdall to life sometime after).

Shiva joined forces with the other Hindu gods as the mad Titan Cronus laid siege to the gods of earth in trying to conquer the multiple realms and heavens of the gods of earth. Wonder Woman and the demigod Rama joined forces to sever the flow of Godwave energies fueling Cronus that allowed him to conquer Nirvana and Shiva, Vishnu and Brahma were able to defeat him and spread his molecules to the universe.

After Odin’s death battling Surtur, Thor inherited his place as ruler of the Asgardian Gods. As a result, he was called before the Council Elite to be tested for worthiness to join them as a replacement for Odin. The Council Elite served as the high governing committee for affairs occurring between pantheons and Shiva was a member along with Vishnu and Brahma. Shiva was present at this meeting as well, and it was he who insisted that Thor perform the Koronkakkta, a ritual that would test his character. Thor, however, failed in one of the tests and was judged as having failed the test and prevented from replacing his father’s seat in the council.

Most recently, energies of Shiva present at a mortal Hindu wedding on Earth became attracted to the White-Lighter Leo. Simultaneously, his wife, Piper Halliwell, a powerful Wiccan in her own right, was imbued with energies of Shiva's wife, Parvati as the mother goddess. Leo used Shiva's energies to hunt down demons that threatened the future of his mortal son, but Piper's sisters, Phoebe and Paige Halliwell, cast spells that restored Leo and Piper to their normal power levels.

Height: 7’2”
Weight
: 510 lbs.
Eyes
: Blue
Hair
: Black

Unusual Physical Features
: In his true form, Shiva has light blue skin and four arms. His neck is dark blue due to the poison he ingested.

Strength Level: Shiva possesses Class 100 level strength enabling him to lift (press) well over 100 tons.

Known Superhuman Powers: Shiva possesses greater physical powers than the majority of the Daevas (Hindu Gods). Like all of the Hindu Gods, he is immortal. He has not aged since reaching adulthood and cannot die by any known conventional means. He is immune to all known terrestrial diseases and is invulnerable to conventional injury. If wounded, his godly life force would enable him to recover with superhuman speed. It would take an injury of such magnitude that it dispersed a major portion of his bodily molecules to cause him a physical death. Even then, it might be possible for Vishnu or a number of gods of equal power working together to revive him. Shiva does have some superhuman strength and his own Daeva metabolism gives him far greater than human endurance in all physical activities.  (Daeva flesh and bone is about three times as dense as similar human tissue, contributing to the superhuman strength and weight of the Hindu Gods).

Shiva has extra-ordinary power to tap into and manipulate the cosmic forces of the universe on a level comparable to Vishnu or Brahma although Shiva might be the most powerful of the three. With his powers of life and death, he can restore the dead to life or completely destroy anything beyond restoration. Most of this power is concentrated in his third eye which when opened even he cannot completely control. This third eye is capable of releasing flames that can completely incinerate anything at which he is looking. It is known that he had so completely immolated Kama that the love god could only return to life after being reborn anew.

Shiva can also use his powers to move between dimensions and command the forces of the universe such as erecting force fields and rays of less destructive power.  He has a strong association with flame and can generate it at will or manipulate existing flames. He can mentally shape it into hands or columns or force it take on material objects exuding great heat. Because of his godly attributes, he is immune to their effects and cannot be burned. His godly stamina is also immune to fatigue and he can stay in a meditative state for exceptional periods without food or drink. He has immeasurable strength and stamina in physical form. He also has such complete mastery over his body that he can slow his breath and pulse to the brink of near death and move about in a solely spirit state. In this form, he is still in complete command of his cosmic power and cannot be harmed by any means. He has exceptional cosmic awareness, which is greater when he is in his spirit form.

Weapons: Shiva uses a number of weapons including a club, curved dagger called a vajra, bow and arrow and swords. His statues generally depict him as carrying a skull, drum and noose in addition to these items.

Pets: Shiva rides a great bull named Nandi. Possessing extra-ordinary size, Nandi seems to have a sentient level intelligence and can create thunder with one stamp of its foot. His origin is unknown, but he may be a god in an animal form.

Comments: The use of Shiva, one of the principal gods of the Hindu religion, and his defeat at the hands of Thor, did not sit well with members of Hinduism, still one of the largest, thriving religions on the planet. As a result, Marvel ret-conned that appearance to be Indra, posing as Shiva.  Nevertheless, Shiva has still continued appear in the Marvel Universe as a more supporting character.

In Hindu myth, a bhut is a ghost, the spirit of a person who had not been given a funeral.

Clarifications: Shiva should not be confused with: