Gaṇeśa Dvādaśanāma

The Gaṇeśa Dvādaśanāma (“twelve names of Gaṇeśa”) is a set of twelve main names of Bhagavān Gaṇeśa. The Gaṇeśa Purāṇa presents them as a key collection of names that came out of the creation carried out by Kaśyapa after the pralaya (the dissolution of the world). Each class of beings created through Kaśyapa and his wives installed an image of Gaṇeśa under one of these names. So the twelve names are a record of Gaṇeśa’s presence in every kind of created being.

The Purāṇa says that chanting these twelve names every day at dawn or dusk gives full protection from all vighnas (obstacles) and the full fruit of Gaṇeśa’s anugraha (grace).

The Twelve Names

How the Names Arose: Kaśyapa’s Creation

After the great pralaya, Brahmā told the saptarṣis (the seven great ṛṣis) to fill the worlds with life again. Before starting the work of creation, Kaśyapa Maharṣi performed tapas (austerity) for a thousand years with the Ekākṣarī mantra of Gaṇeśa (his one-syllable mantra). Gaṇeśa appeared to him in a four-armed form. He gave Kaśyapa the power to create, and also the boon that Gaṇeśa would be born as his own son.

Through Kaśyapa’s fourteen wives, Aditi, Diti, Vinatā, Kadrū and the others, all the classes of beings came forth: devas, daityas, nāgas, garuḍas, gandharvas, apsarās, yakṣas, rākṣasas, siddhas and others. Each class of beings was thankful for its existence and saw that Gaṇeśa had made creation possible. So each installed an image of Gaṇeśa under a special name that showed how it understood his nature and its own bond with him.

The twelve names that the Gaṇeśa Purāṇa keeps from these installations became the Dvādaśanāma.

The Phalaśruti: Fruits of Chanting

The phalaśruti (statement of the fruits of a sacred text) in the Gaṇeśa Purāṇa says:

One who recites these twelve names at dawn and at dusk will never face a vighna that cannot be removed. The family of such a person will be protected. No enemy can harm them, no disease will persist in their household, and no endeavour undertaken with these names on the lips will fail.

Together the twelve names call on all of Gaṇeśa’s main qualities:

• His beautiful form: Sumukha, Gajānana, Gajakarṇa, Bhālacandra
• His bodily features: Ekadanta, Lambodara, Kapila
• His work in the world: Vighnanāśana, Gaṇādhipa, Gaṇādhyakṣa
• His fierce side: Vikaṭa, Dhūmraketu

Notes on Some of the Names

Dhūmraketu: “the one whose banner is smoke”. This name refers to Gaṇeśa as lord of the smoke-coloured (dhūmra) form. Some traditions describe Dhūmraketu as a form of Gaṇeśa linked with purification through fire, the smoke being the change of offered substance into the divine through the yajña (fire offering). This name is heard less often in everyday pūjā than names like Ekadanta or Lambodara.

Bhālacandra: “the one with the moon on his brow”. This name arose in connection with the story of the asura Anala, when the fire inside the child Gaṇeśa was cooled by dūrvā grass. The crescent moon on Gaṇeśa’s brow is the sign of the cooling power that balanced the fire he had swallowed.

Vighnanāśana: Gaṇeśa is best known as Vighneśvara, the lord of obstacles, who both places and removes them. The name Vighnanāśana in the Dvādaśanāma puts the stress on removing them: “the destroyer of obstacles”. This is the quality that matters most to those who pray for his grace.

Link with the Gaṇeśa Sahasranāma

The Dvādaśanāma is the distilled essence of the full Gaṇeśa Sahasranāma, the thousand names that Gaṇeśa himself taught to Bhagavān Śiva before the destruction of Tripura. The Sahasranāma covers the whole range of Gaṇeśa’s qualities and glories. The Dvādaśanāma gives the twelve names that are easiest to keep in mind every day and most powerful for regular chanting.

Sources

• Gaṇeśa Purāṇa, Upāsanā Khaṇḍa, Chapter 92