DEIVATHIN KURAL # 151 (Vol # 6) Dated 04 Apr 2013

DEIVATHIN KURAL # 151 (Vol # 6) Dated 04 Apr 2013

(These e-mails are translations of talks given by PeriyavaaL of Kanchi Kaamakoti Peetam, over a period of some 60 years while he was the pontiff in the earlier part of the last century. These have been published by Vanadi Padippagam, Chennai, in seven volumes of a thousand pages each as Deivathin Kural. Today we are going ahead from the last paragraph on page No 1035 of Volume 6 of the Tamil original. The readers may note that herein ‘man/he’ includes ‘woman/she’ too mostly. These e-mails are all available at   http://Advaitham.blogspot.com updated constantly)

சிவன்-சக்தி : உயிர்-உடல்

Siva-Shakti : Life-Body

704.  Only till there is life in the body we can do japa or jalpa, mudra or shilpa, walk randomly or pradakshinam, feed ourselves or conduct Homam, lie down and fall asleep or do namaskãr – or whatever! Once we realise by 'Ãtma-ArpaN' that AmbãL as the life of our lives is making us do all our actions, then jalpa itself becomes Japa, any shilpa becomes a mudra, and all our actions become a part of Pooja procedures.  Like the life in us that makes us do all our actions, we have to come to the understanding that AmbãL who has all the lives as her body is directing, controlling, managing and causing us to function.  Not only our singular individual lives but the whole collective world or universe is the body of that Master-Life. There is a famous saying in Tamil which goes – "அவனன்றி ஓரணுவும் அசையாது", meaning, 'without him not an atom or a blade of grass can move!'  Having comprehended the truth of this statement one is likely to develop a strong sense of dependency on that universal power.  This is well explained in two successive slokas numbered 34 and 35.

705.  "शरीरं त्वं शम्भो: शशिमिहिर वक्षोरुहयुगं

     Shareeram tvam shambho: shashimihira vakshoruhayugam

तवात्मानं मन्ये भगवति नवात्मानमनघं |

tavãtmãnam manye bhagawati navãtmãnamanagham |

अत: शेष:शेषीत्ययमुभयसाधारणतया

ata: sesha: sesheetyayam ubhaya sãdhãraNatayã

स्थित: संबन्धो वां समरस परानन्दपरयो: ||"

          sthita: sambandho vãm samarasa parãnanda parayo: ||

[Bhagawati = Your Highness; shashimihira vakshoruhayugam = having the Sun and Moon as your two breasts; tvam = you (are); Sambho: = for Shambu; sareeram = the body; anagham = faultless; navãtmãnam = of nine forms; known as Ãnanda Bhairava, tava = your; Ãtmãnam = Ãtma; manye = I consider. ata: = So, sesha: seshee iti = as the life and body as well as the owner and owned; ayam sambandha: = this relationship; samarasa parãnanda parayo: = enjoying the equal pleasure of you as Parai and him as the Para; vãm = between the two of you; ubhaya sãdhãraNatayã = mutually and normally; sthita: = is well established.

706.  He starts with saying that you are Sambho: sareeram, meaning the body of Sambhu.  Earlier, he had said that she had stolen his whole body.  What he says now is in consonance with that statement.  But here that body is not the red hued female body with the third eye and crescent moon on the head!  Now it is the whole universe with millions of stars, galaxies and other astral objects of infinite variations covering all the space and time, is that body of Siva whom we call as AmbãL, that is known as the Virãt Swaroopa or the form of the firmament, including all the micro and macro cosmos!  Please bear with the explanation here with some patience since what is being done here is an attempt to define the indefinable and limit infinity in the limited sense of the words we know!  For Paramãtma all the worlds are the body.  In that body, as the life of existence, as the Ãtma in the body, as the brain and intellect of being, as the truth of reality, distributing the work to all and getting the job done is the very principle of Para Brhma Tatvam!

707.  What is said here may look and sound different to what is said in the first sloka of Soundarya Lahari.  There the poet had said that without Shakti Siva cannot even move, which meant that Siva is the Jada Sareera and Shakti the energising power.  That would mean that without Shakti, Sivam is as good as Savam the cadaver, seemingly. Now there is a total turn about when he says, "Amma, You are the body of Sambhu", isn't it?  On a more careful analysis we realise that both the statements are from two different viewpoints!  In the first sloka the poet did not equate the Sivam without Shakti to the dead body.  There the idea is to give the pride of place to AmbãL that she is the Jiva Chaitanyam, and so without her he is like a body without life, is the interpretation I also gave.  But it is not true to think of Swami as a piece of dead wood!  The Sivam is very much the being that is, NirguNa, Nirvikalpa, Nirãdhãra, Nishkãma and Nishkriya state of totality!  When it is not aware of itself as a being, its being and not being is almost equal isn't it?  It is not a state of dead and not a state of not-dead and in fact it is not a state at all!  Instead of its being unaware of itself, the awareness is imparted to it by AmbãL that is Gnãna Shakti.  Then through that Gnãna Shakti Easwara is related to Ichcha and Kriya Shakti aspects that the Nishkãma and Nishkriya Siva becomes 'Sakãma and Sakriya' Siva.  For the NirguNa Brhmam to become aware of itself is like instilling life in a lifeless object!  So there, the poet said that AmbãL is like the force of life or the 'உயிர்'.

708.  Here we are talking about Brhmam that is very actively involved as 'SaguNa Brhmam' aka Easwara as instigated and activated by Kãmeswari.  As the 'Kãrya Brhmam' he is running all the businesses and transactions of world governance and at such times the whole 'Jagat' is his body and he is the life force in it as the 'உயிர்'. Instead of enlarging that Kãmeswari is the 'Ichcha Shakti' the motivating force; 'Brhmam' itself by the power of Maya becomes the 'SaguNa Brhmam and does the governance of the world.  That Power of Maya does not have a separate Chaitanyam or 'உயிர்' as revealed by the Adwaita Sãstrãs.  Brhmam is Siva and AmbãL is the Maya. And since the Jagat appears because of Maya, it is quite on the cards to say that she is the body and Siva in the position of the central life of it as the 'உயிர்'.  This is what is meant by शरीरं त्वं शम्भो: – that you are Easwara's body!

709.  In the Sãnkhya religion too there is a similar view.  'Purusha' is the basic truth of life and 'Prakruti' or Nature is the driving force, both similar to the life and body respectively.  One gentleman said, "Amongst the two things of veiling the Brhmam and causing the world to appear, the veiling power is of the Maya while Prakruti underlines the appearance of the world.  The fact that Prakruti is translated as Nature also indicates that in the place of the basic fact the world is the imagined one with the emphasis on action.  In that Sãstrã, great importance is given to the 24 principles, including the Pancha Boothas (of Space, Air, Fire, Water and Earth), Pancha Tanmãtra-s (of the sense of sound, sight, taste, smell and touch), and the Jiva Ãtma's sensory organs of cognition and action and the mind.  This fact clearly brings out that there is more emphasis on the dynamic aspects of the world.  Since that Sãnkhya Sãstrã has gained much acceptance in the minds of the learned intelligentsia, all those 24 principles have been taken on face value in Adwaitam.  But in progressing in Sãdhana, the knowledge of these principles has no relevance or any practical value as mere knowledge of science has no direct impact in philosophy and not knowing is no loss either!  All told, the importance of this knowledge that Prakruti has undergone metamorphosis as the Jiva and Jagat is of importance only in the Sãnkhya line of analysis."  Having said this with many more logical arguments, that gentleman further added that, "To describe AmbãL as the body of Easwara and as having the Sun and the Moon as her breasts – 'शशिमिहिर वक्षोरुहयुगं' supports the Sãnkhya philosophy more than the Adwaitic line of thinking"!  (That learned gentleman referred here must have been one of many Pundits who used to gather in the august presence of PeriyavãL, unbidden or at times invitees attending a Vidwat Sabha called for especially.)

710.  At the start of this sloka, though we have had to interpret the meaning based on Adwaitam and Sãnkhya thus, much of the material that comes later are very much part of the traditions of Sãktam and Samayam.  There is basis for the opinion that AmbãL is Swami's body and that she is seen in the form of Jagat is so believed in Sãktam.  As outer pooja (Bãhya Pooja), to fix a Yantra and idol in front and go through the procedures of a pooja, is part of Koulam.  To do so within oneself imagining the deity in the space of the heart and go through the whole procedure mentally is Samayam.  Since it talks about the equality between Swami and AmbãL in five different ways, that line of philosophy and religion is known as Samayam, as the word 'Sama' means equality, and this aspect is underlined in this sloka. 

சூர்ய சந்திரரைக் கொண்டு பாலூட்டும் தாய்

The Mother who Breast-Feeds Through the Sun & the Moon

711.  Great philosophies and esoteric principles may or may not be within our comprehension.  Even if we do not understand them, it is alright!  But 'அன்பு' that is Love will reach all of us and that is what we need.  That Love of the Mother of the Universe who is in the form of the very Jagat, while talking about her Love, who is the body of the Life of Swami, our ÃchãryãL brings before us as the Mother's Milk for all the living beings of existence!  ÃchãryãL even while talking of her not as a physical body with parts but as the Viswa Roopa, as the Virãt Swaroopa; could not bear to talk of her as an insentient and inanimate matter.  In this Virãt Swaroopa itself he thinks of her as having the Sun and the Moon as the two breasts of hers!  How true and accurate!

712.  Like a mother breast-feeding her children this mother of the world is breast-feeding all the life forms, by the Sun-Rays and Moon-Rays.  Plants have life.  Much before Jagdish Chandra Bose scientifically proved that plants have life, at the start of the 20th Century, much before from the times of the Vedas, in our land we knew that truth.  What is the meaning of saying that 'She feeds all the life forms by the rays of the Sun and the Moon'?  We all know that plants create food for themselves and all living beings by a process known as Photo Synthesis.  If you place the seeds under the earth where it is dark, the seeds will not take root and sprout.  Having sprouted, they do their cooking for people like us who cannot directly make use of the solar energy and convert it in to food.  The plants do that for us!  When we eat fruits, cereals and pulses, it is the energy from the sun that nourishes and sustains us and gives us energy for life!  We should remember this every time we consume food and be aware that AmbãL is feeding us!

(To be continued.)

Sambhomahadeva