Swastika

The swastika (as a character 卐 or 卍) is an ancient religious icon used in the Indian subcontinent, East Asia and Southeast Asia, where it has been and remains a symbol of spiritual principles and values. In the Western world, it was historically a symbol of auspiciousness and good luck. It was adopted by the German National Socialist (Nazi) Party in early 20th-century as an emblem of Aryan race identity and became highly stigmatized in the West with hate and mass murder. The Swastika is an icon widely found in human history and the modern world. It is known outside Asia as the , gammadion cross, cross cramponnée, croix gammée, fylfot, or tetraskelion. A swastika generally takes the form of a symmetrically arranged equilateral cross with four legs each bent at 90 degrees. It is found in the archeological remains of the Indus Valley Civilization and Mesopotamia, as well as in early Byzantine and Christian artwork. The name Swastika comes from Sanskrit (Devanagari: ), and denotes a "conducive to well being or auspicious". The clockwise swastika is a sacred and auspicious symbol in Buddhism, Hinduism and Jainism. In Hinduism, the clockwise symbol is called swastika symbolizing surya (sun) and prosperity, while the counter clockwise symbol is called sauvastika symbolizing night or tantric aspects of Kali. In Jainism, a swastika is the symbol for Suparshvanatha – the 7th of 24 Tirthankaras (spiritual teachers and saviours), while in Buddhism it symbolizes the auspicious footprints of the Buddha. Western literature's older term for the symbol, gammadion cross, derives mainly from its appearance, which is identical to four Greek gamma letters affixed to each other. The swastika was adopted by several organizations in pre-World War I-Europe and later, and most notably, by the Nazi Party and Nazi Germany prior to World War II. It was used by the Nazi Party to symbolize German nationalistic pride. To Jews and the enemies of Nazi Germany, it became a symbol of antisemitism and terror. In many Western countries, the swastika is viewed as a symbol of racial supremacy and intimidation because of its association with Nazism. The reverence for the swastika symbol in some cultures in contrast to the stigma in others, has led to misinterpretations, misunderstandings and mutual accusations.