BRAHMĀ is the creator in Hindu mythology; sometimes he is said to form a trinity with Viṣṇu as preserver and Śiva as destroyer. Yet Brahmā does not have the importance that creator gods usually have in mythology, nor is his status equal to that of Śiva or Viṣṇu. Though Brahmā appears in more myths than almost any other Hindu god, as the central figure in quite a few, and as a bit player in many more, he was seldom worshiped in India; at least one important version of the myth in which Śiva appears before Brahmā and Viṣṇu in the form of a flaming phallus explicitly states that Brahmā will never again be worshiped in India (to punish him for having wrongly sworn that he saw the tip of the infinite pillar). Brahmā's ability to create is little more than an expertise...