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By Annanya Dwivedi

The Swastika comes from the Sanskrit term

‘Svastika’ meaning ‘May good prevail’. ’ It representslife, power, strength. A sacred representation of 

Hindu faith, swastikas can be found among Hindu

temples, signs, altars, and pictures, in religious

celebrations and festivals of India and Nepal. The

symbol is also apparent in other distinct cultures1

by 

different names2

but has prime significance within

Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism. . In Hinduism, It 

is the second most sacred symbol after the Om symbol. For Jainas, it is the emblem of their

seventh saint and reminds the worshiper by its four arms of the four possible places of 

rebirth—in the animal or plant world, in hell, on Earth, or in the spirit world. In the Buddhist 

tradition the swastika symbolizes the feet of the Buddha. It is often placed at the beginning 

and end of inscriptions, and modern Tibetan Buddhists use it as a clothing decoration.3

The physical representation of this symbol consists of an equilateral cross with arms bent at 

right angle. The four lines coming out from the center point reach to the four cardinal directions and

hence are often associated is with the Sun. The bent arms signify a form of blessing Hinduism marks

a clear distinction in the arrangement of this symbol. The clockwise direction of  ‘Svastika’ (卐)

represents the solar cycle of the sun, health and good luck while the counterclockwise direction of 

‘sauvastika’ (卍) is a negative connotation of bad-luck or misfortune as it stands for night, the terrifying 

goddess K āl ī , and occult practices.

 At a symbolic level, the four-sided swastika is an archetype for the rotations of time andconsciousness - moving clockwise and counter wise - in upward or downward spirals - allowing souls

to experience many levels of reality simultaneously 4. It depicts the whole story of the cosmos and

man, their contrasting dual aspects, the four directions of space, the revolution of worlds, cyclic

progression, and the union of spirit and matter at the heart of things5

.

However, in contemporary world the Swastika remains  a core symbol of Neo-Nazi groups

associated with Nazism, Fascism and white supremacy. In twentieth century, the National Socialist 

German Workers Party adopted the swastika or Hakenkreuz (hooked cross) that deemed them as a 

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 master race of Aryans. It became a print of German nationalism as they cause of death for Holocaust 

movement. Once a holy and auspicious symbol now became a symbol of hate, anti-Semitism,

 violence, death, and murder6. Many scholars argue that the neo-Nazis symbol consisted of the

sauvastika (counter-clock direction) to the holy symbol, which depicted misfortune and hence led to a 

terrible end of this phase. This inversion whether intentional or not might derive from a desire to

prove that the Nazi's use of the right-handed swastika was expressive of their "evil" intent. But the

notion that Adolf Hitler deliberately inverted the "good left-facing" swastika is wholly unsupported by 

any historical evidence7. 

References:

1. The Swastika; Its History and Meaning, John Prince Loewenstein: Man ol. 41,(May - Jun., 1941),pp. 49-55Published by: Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland  Article Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2793344 

2. Quinn, Malcolm. 1994. The swastika: Constructing the symbol. London: Routledge 

3. http://www.religionfacts.com/hinduism/symbols/swastika.htm 

4. http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Holocaust/Swastika.html 

5.  http://www.crystalinks.com/swastika.html 

6.  http://history1900s.about.com/cs/swastika/a/swastikahistory.htm 

7. http://reclaimtheswastika.com/history/

8. http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/576371/swastika 

9. http://www.theosophy-nw.org/theosnw/ctg/swas.htm 

10. http://www.sanskrit.org/www/Hindu%20Primer/swastika.html 

FOOTNOTES: 

1 http://reclaimtheswastika.com/history/

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  The ancient city of Troy, in the northwest of present-day Turkey

  The Iron Age Koban culture of the Caucasus in Asia minor

  On prehistoric Vince artifacts from South-Eastern Europe

  Amongst the ancient Hittites who lived in the area of present day Syria

  In Ein Gedi, near Israel's Dead Sea

  In the Tang Dynasty of China  In the 13th Century Amiens Cathedral in France

  In ancient Greek architectural designs

  On Native American Indian artifacts including those of the Navajo and Hopi

  On pre-Christian Anglo-Saxon and Druidic artifacts 

2 http://history1900s.about.com/cs/swastika/a/swastikahistory.htm 

http://www.crystalinks.com/swastika.html 

Here is a list of different names by which Swastika was represented in other parts of the

world:

  China  –  wan, Falun Gong   England - fylfot, meaning "four feet", chiefly in heraldry and architecture

  Germany - Hakenkreuz, "four legged", especially when composed of four conjoined legs

Hooked cross

Sun wheel - German Sonnenrad - a name also used as a synonym for the suncross

•  Cao Dai of Vietnam

  Greece - tetraskelion and gammadion

  India  –  swastika

  Black Spider - to various peoples in middle and western Europe

•  Crooked cross

•  Cross cramponned - in heraldry, as each arm resembles a crampon or angle-iron

•  Thor's hammer - from its supposed association with Thor, the Norse god of thunder•  Southwest Africa - Solar symbol among the Akan civilization

3 http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/576371/swastika 

4 http://www.crystalinks.com/swastika.html 

5 http://www.theosophy-nw.org/theosnw/ctg/swas.htm 

6 To read more about the permanent effect of this negative connotation on our society

log onto: http://www.sanskrit.org/www/Hindu%20Primer/swastika.html 

7 http://www.crystalinks.com/swastika.html