Ganesha (
Quick Answers
What is the significance of Ganesha's elephant head in the context of the story?
How does Kenjaku control Ganesha using Cursed Spirit Manipulation?
What role does Ganesha play in the fight between Yuki Tsukumo and Kenjaku?
How does the depiction of Ganesha in this context compare to traditional depictions in Hinduism?
Appearance
Ganesha was a giant curse with an elephant's head, a humanlike body with four arms, and a light complexion. It bore long and sharp ears resembling horns, a crownlike protrusion further back on its head (colored yellow), slanted eyes with red irises and dark sclerae, two short tusks, a trunk curled back and to the right, as well as two astroid-shaped marks of black color: one on his forehead (akin to a third eye) and the other on its distended stomach. Ganesha was also clothed, donning a golden vest-jacket with a black blot pattern, black bands of cloth around its arms, black pants, and black prayer bead wristlets on each arm.[3]
When summoned by Kenjaku, Ganesha appeared from a seeming rift in space that it pulled open with its bare hands.[1]
Synopsis
Culling Game Arc
Kenjaku brought forth Ganesha to prove to Garry K. Johnson that the power of curses surpasses the US' military might. Ganesha used its cursed technique to remove Kenjaku's "obstacles" at the time — the armed US servicemen in the White House — by teleporting them outside the building and having them rain down from the sky.[3]
Later during his fight against Yuki above the Tombs of the Star Corridor, Kenjaku summoned Ganesha to keep Yuki at a distance, but she was able to exorcise the curse with a single attack using her shikigami.[4]
Abilities and Powers
Kenjaku using Ganesha to keep Yuki, a special grade sorcerer, at bay.
Overall Abilities: Ganesha was a special grade curse foreign to Japan, which came into Kenjaku's possession via Cursed Spirit Manipulation and was described by its master as an Asian divine curse that removes "all obstacles" (〝あらゆる
Cursed Technique
Battles & Events
Trivia
- Kangiten is an elephant-headed god (deva) of obstacles, bliss, and success who is venerated in Japanese (especially the Shingon and Tendai) schools of Tantric Buddhism. He is Japan's equivalent of Ganesha, one of the best-known and most worshipped Hindu deities, with both gods conceived of as removers of "obstacles".
- Regarding Ganesha's ability to "remove obstacles":
- Kenjaku has described Ganesha as "a special grade cursed spirit that involves/entangles a concept with its cursed technique's target" (「術式対象に概念が絡む特級呪霊」 "jutsushiki taishō ni gainen ga karamu tokkyū jurei"?).[1] This could be interpreted as Ganesha applying the concept of "obstacle" to its targets to remove them as such.
- After Ganesha had been destroyed by Yuki, Kenjaku said the following: "The concept of the cursed technique's target...!! This overwhelming mass [couldn't] be contained [by it] intensionally and extensionally!!" (「術式対象の概念……！！ その内包と外延に収まらない程の圧倒的質量！！」 "Jutsushiki taishō no gainen……!! Sono naihō to gaien ni osamaranai hodo no attōteki shitsuryō!!"?);[5] intension and extension are two ways to logically or semantically describe concepts (intension means formally defining a concept with the qualities or properties that it connotes while extension refers to the totality of things that fall under a concept's definition). Most likely, Kenjaku meant that the "virtual mass" created by Yuki's Star Rage was too immense to be contained by the concept of "obstacle" and thus could not be "removed" by Ganesha. This already vague and abstract explanation is largely lost in the official Viz translation.
References
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Jujutsu Kaisen Manga: Chapter 205 (p. 4).
- ↑ 2.0 2.1 Jujutsu Kaisen Manga: Chapter 205 (p. 5-7).
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 Jujutsu Kaisen Manga: Chapter 201 (p. 16-17).
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 4.2 Jujutsu Kaisen Manga: Chapter 205 (p. 4-7).
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 Jujutsu Kaisen Manga: Chapter 205 (p. 11).