Sankarananda and Chidgananandagiri and Tamil Vedanta

 Sankarananda was a great 'Mahaan' of 13th - 14th CE. He was said to be the teacher of Sri Vidyaranya Swami, who has written Panchadasi, a work explaining Advaita tenets. Swami Sankarananda was also a great Yogi. He was said to be keeping himself under the earth by the feat of Lambika yoga. He wrote a rare work called Atma Purana. The ultimate import of even all the Puranas is said to be the knowledge of Atman. So it is in a way more fitting to write Atma Purana. Are we not all, adepts in 'I' Purana? Day in and day out, every second we are extolling our ego, unabated. Perhaps he thought of teaching us a new way of talking not about oneself but about one's Self, to be involved more deeply into our Atman.

A couple of centuries ago one great person translated this Atma Purana into Hindi. We do not know where he was born, when and all that. But his name was Swami Chidgananandagiri. Perhaps he was born in Sindhu Desa as people used to say. In his Brahmacharya stage he learnt Grammar residing in Kankal and went to Kasi to learn Vedanta under Paramahamsa Swami Uddhavanandagiri. He was initiated into Sanyasa by the same Swami. He was then for quite some years deep into Samadhi and then it was perhaps divinely communicated to him his mission in life. He started Theerthayatra and while at Bavanagar in Kathiyawad, due to earnest requests of Diwans SriGaurisankar and Vijayasankar, who were highly matured Sadhaks in spirituality, he stayed there for thirteen years and composed a lot of works. The Diwans requested him to venture upon a project. It was to compose compendium-like works in Hindi, one Atma Purana, two, SriGudartha Deepika on Gita, three, a work on Brahma Sutra, viz., Thathvanusanthanam, four, a summary of all the views in both old and new schools of Nyaya called Nyayaprakasa. His Nyayaprakasa was also a comparative summation of both Nyaya and Vaiseshika systems.

Perhaps you may be taken aback if I say all these four Hindi works of Swami Chidgananandagiri have been translated into Tamil, even by 1917 itself. Atma Purana has been translated by Sri Veera Subbaiyya Swamigal of Kovilur Math. Again Sri Veera Subbaiyya Swaamigal has also translated Sri Gudartha Deepika on Gita. The work on Brahma Sutras viz., Thathvanusanthana has been translated by Sri K Aranganatham Pillai. Nyaya Prakasa, which is a thousand pager has been translated by Sri Nagarathina Nayakkar of Sadhu Rathina Vedantha Vicharanai Sabha, Chennai, ably published by Sri Murugesa Mudaliyar. From 1907 to 1917, all these four great works of translation from Hindi to Tamil have been brought out. All the four together numbering more than 3500 printed pages !. Are not all these illustrious, our forefathers? Have they not done what best they could in their times to advance the cause of Hinduism and the betterment of Hindu society? Coming after them will we just be bickering and quarrelling, definitely not. With all our added technic comforts how much we can do ! Is it not?

Srirangam Mohanarangan

***

My Bharath

People are born to work out their karma.
But you were born to weed out our karma.
Liberation is the general goal.
But you were born for transforming
The very world into spiritual in its core.
Evolution just a primary schooling
You have taught the world
The Param Atman's involution
Carrying the destiny of beings
To the final Realisation.
You are the Terra of the Divine
Lotus, Aravinda of Transcendence!
All loving Mother of beings, every and all!
My Bharath Divine!
You are my worship,dream and solace.
Suprabhath pranams on this happy day.
Srirangam Mohanarangan

Reality and Ideology

 What is reality? What is Ideology? Does Ideology reveal and underline Reality? Or Does Ideology block the vision of Reality? When I touch a stone I am just touching a stone. But if I begin to think I am touching matter then do I bring in an idea of matter. Does the idea matter become a cover over the stone? Or am I always in touch with only ideas and pure things are only later deductions? But sensations are they not immediate? Or are they really mediate? The sensations become things only after mediated by processes and interpretations. Such mediation if tampered may not be informative about objects out there but will furnish their details as their own content.

But Thirumoolar makes an axially different statement when he says ' Wood is hidden in the elephant visible. Image elephant now is hidden in the wood. Ultimate Reality now hidden by the world of five elements. In Ultimate Reality is merged this world of five elements.'

Srirangam Mohanarangan

***

Domestic superstitions

 There are some superstitions in persons who ring the calling bell.

First, thinking that the host is just waiting behind the door for the bell to go.

Second, thinking that the host is intentionally delaying to respond even after two successive rings.

Thirdly, thinking that the host will be able to smell from the absence who has come and gone away when the door is opened.

Coupled with this is the comedy - reaching back home or going somewhere, from there making a call through mobile saying that having waited and rang the bell a couple of times, returned with the door unopened.

Best answer to this is always : 'oh sorry my friend. A mismatch. When opened the door nobody was around. It was you at last. Great. Sorry yea.'

Of course you need lot of ascetic practice to maintain the civic temperance.

Srirangam Mohanarangan

***

Transcendent Symbol

 I am wondering at the genius of Rishis. Making fire, Agni, itself as the symbol - idol - sign of the Supreme Being. The fire that is lit, even at birth looks inverted as if coming from beyond into the mundane, with his mouth on things and take-off to the beyond always. Established There participating Here. What better natural symbol-idol-sign can be there than this to meditate on Param Atman, Transcendent Supreme Being? And lo! the Rishi makes another stroke of Ojas when he says that the fire Agni resides always as the fire inside our cave of heart, our consciousness. 'Guhaiyil vaLarum kanalE'. - Nihitam GuhAyAm.

Srirangam Mohanarangan

***

About a Russian book in translation

 A book in translation in Tamil which I like is 'manidan eppadi pErARRal mikkavan AnAn'. I bought it some decades ago, in street pandalled book shop of Russian books in translation, (into English, into Tamil, on various subjects Science, History, Literature etc). The book I mentioned is one written by M Ilin and E Segal. In English translated by Beatrice Kinkead. Who translated in Tamil I do not remember. But the get up of the Tamil book was so aesthetic, that you wanted to read it just because you take it and open it. Not only that, how the Tamil translator was able to capture full tones of the original is something amazing. In Beatrice Kinkead's translation the theme of the book is on the following lines:

"There was a time when man, too, lived in just such an invisible cage and was bound by just such an invisible chain. If we want to find out how he succeeded in breaking the chain and getting out of the cage, we'll have to go to the woods and see how our relatives there, who are still prisoners, live.

So we must begin this book about man with a walk in the woods and a talk about wild animals and birds.

You've often heard people talk about being "free as a bird." But do you suppose a woodpecker is free ? If he were a "free" bird he could fly anywhere he happened to take a notion and live wherever he pleased. And that's absolutely not the case. Just try moving a woodpecker to a treeless prairie. He'd die, for he can live only where there are trees. It's just as if he were chained to a tree by an invisible chain which he can't break."

But can we appreciate this sentiment just at present moments? Then are we caged by our own blindness of the haughty ahankara? Knowledge can liberate but perhaps wisdom alone can maintain freedom from the great onslaught ever possible, that is, from our own selves.?

Srirangam Mohanarangan

***

Proof of faith.. ?

 Are there proofs for faith? Proofs are there if you do not believe in things of common experience. But for faith? Faith alone may be common but not its contents. May be you will like to say what does not need proof is actually faith. But who knows? Faith sometimes may search for anchor or a collateral yes, however remote. In the great commentaries of Sri Vaishnavaite devotion there goes an observation to this effect. That when you are sleeping, who is in charge you? your system? voluntary and involuntary? Who maintains your fort till you wake up? (of course even after you wake up, there are so many things happening to make it possible for you to make conscious moves, that is a different matter). If the supreme principle immanent in you is in charge during your sleep, if Paramatma is taking care of you when your eyes are closed, your system shutdown, then why should you doubt when you are awake? - 'who protects you while asleep will not fail you when you are awake'.

Czeslaw Milosz, a great Polish/Lithuanian poet, who won Nobel Prize in 1980, expresses his sentiments on faith in a poem, which are so resonating with what I understood about the Sri Vaishnavaite observation in the commentaries.

"Faith is in you whenever you look

At a dewdrop or a floating leaf

And know that they are because they have to be.

Even if you close your eyes and dream up things

The world will remain as it has always been

And the leaf will be carried by the waters of the river."

Perhaps dispassionate details may not interest you unless and otherwise accented by a hurt personal, reminding and reassuring. But can one call such hurts painful? when they really are soothing scathing bruises of doubts?

"You have faith also when you hurt your foot

Against a sharp rock and you know

That rocks are here to hurt our feet."

*

Things concrete sometimes come as proof of things abstract. Things tangible may underline our transcendent hopes. Perhaps our humility must become more and more understanding rather than just a vehement stance.

Srirangam Mohanarangan

***

How we approach..

 How we approach, our methodology may be illuminating the subject of study or just discounting it whole and thereby prove a torch of not light on something but a torch of darkening something. Do we ever doubt that such a thing may happen? Perhaps not. When we have our reasoning, why not all subjects behave themselves accordingly. We may expect the subjects of study to learn discipline, to behave to our approach. Swami Nampillai, a great commentator of Tamil songs on Sri Vishnu, sung by the Tamil saints Alwars, has something to say on this. According to him, this human being by approaching all things in ego-centric ways finds itself ultimately destroying whatever is touched by its approach. Rather it can choose to change its approach. By realising its intrinsic nature of meaningful subservience to the Inner Soul, Bhagavan, the approach will become divine-centric and instead of destruction it will find exuberance and fulfillment of whatever is being touched. It all depends on seeing one's own fulfillment in the Immanent Soul, Bhagavan.

Resonating with this thought are these poetic lines frrom Lucian Blaga, the Romanian philosopher and poet.(died 1961)

Non compromising to the communist regime, he was an important Romanian poet. In his book of poetry, 'At the court of yearning' -

"I will not crush the world’s corolla of wonders

And will not kill

with reason

the mysteries I meet along my way

in flowers, eyes, lips, and graves.

The light of others

drowns the deep magic hidden

in the profound darkness.

I increase the world’s enigma

with my light ....."

Parallel reading has its own resonance and mutual illuminations.

Srirangam Mohanarangan

***

How to read Savitri?

 "It does not matter if you do not understand it, but read it always; you will see that everytime you read it there will be something new revealed to you. Each time you will find something new, each time a new experience; things which were not there, things you did not understand arise and suddenly become clear. Always something unexpected comes through the words and lines. Everytime you try to read and understand, you will see that something is added, something which was hidden behind is revealed clearly and vividly."

"To read Savitri is indeed to practise Yoga, spiritual concentration; one can find there all that is needed to realise the Divine. Each step for you is noted here, including the secrets of all other Yogas also. Surely if one sincerely follows what is revealed here in each verse, one will finally reach the transformation of the Supramental Yoga. It is the infallible guide who never abandons, it is support; he is everywhere always there for him who wishes to follow the path."

(Mother on Savitri)

So true, every word of it. Pranams Mother and thanks for expressing these thoughts.

***

Meditation

What if we all meditate during this time,
thinking positive thoughts,
shedding off all feelings of hatred,
wishing for the welfare of the world !
Will it not be great to do it ?
Perhaps it will open in us
an inward path,
an inner door
all the time locked and not seen!
Perhaps a period of reset
of our emotions and stances
Perhaps we evolve spiritually
more into the higher stages
An Old Relative
whom we never visited
is waiting inside
in the heart of each one of us
now when we have all the time
at disposal sans exposure
when Time itself bends inward
forcing us as it were
to visit the Great Mother
deep into our hearts
who has been waiting ages
waiting for us to turn and see
Her graceful and benign watch.
Perhaps... we can meditate.
Mother please pardon us
and give your grace.
Srirangam Mohanarangan

***

me and Self

A dark enclosure
me inside
nothing else around
a hole in the enclosure
opening out to the blue bright sky
contours of the hole
silhouetting the bluish bright beyond

Or a piece of round blue 'skyish' object
fixed on to the enclosure
if you want to be loyal to your perception.
Anyhow I have a choice, an option
if I say it is blue object round
I am dark enclosed and me inside
If I see the bright blue sky beyond
with the hole as just an 'upadhi'
a chance condition helping the appearance,

I am not inside, not out
but as space and sky
blue and formless
spread everywhere
as unseen and seeing eye;
I do have the option
which way I choose
the sky is there ever
the truth is here for ever

but of course I can choose
to be the enclosure and enclosed
dark with a bright blue round around
an option
I do have a choice
or do I

Srirangam Mohanarangan

***

Details.. and details

Details. Is there perhaps a philosophy of details? Of course Soren Kierkegaard or Nietzsche might have told something. But the enormity of details and variations and variations even in those which are seemingly repeating. Why bother? Carry on... yea it is an option we can give to ourselves or at least imagine so. Or with the poet of ancient Tamil 'aestheticize' the problem with 'knowing you only finish by coming to know that there is yet to know'. Or with Nammalwar you can make a devotion on that 'within every hidden micro space within every subtle matter in that, He resides in full as if in the whole cosmos'.

Or to get the feel of wonder and fear at the same time on the phenomenon of details of this our world you can watch George Steiner how he is able to recreate in words chaos in cosmos or cosmos in chaos:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1z3sMGYjNk

Festival of Tiruvaimozhi

It is not just an honorary encomium to call Srirangam as Sri Vaikunta on Earth. It closely follows the descriptions of Sri Vaikunta given in Agamas. Great scholars like Parameswara Samhita Govindachariyar Swami were able to say the significance of each and every piece of the theological topology around - so I have heard it said by scholars. In Vedanta and Agamas there are descriptions of souls after death reaching through the path of Archiraadi, the Ultimate Divine Land. Archiraadi comes from the root 'archis', which means light. How very positive the very eschatology becomes! The picture of grim death is transformed into a journey through light!

But alas! we have left everything to the fag end of life, all things spiritual to be bothered only after 60th or 70th year. And before we turn 50 we incur all diseases and eye problem, ear problem, if we walk our body lags behind, we cannot attend to anything for long, too much strain is against doctor's advice and so on so on. Such is our involvement and luck!

'Hey! you do not know what cares, what problems, ... bread winning is tough... Job's demands rule large and thick! No time.. as if it is not enough, family worries raking'

Yea yea... of course... but no problem prevents us from long hours of watching cricket, our favorite cine shows, and and... Nothing wrong. World is full of different tastes. But sometime, if at all we care and stop and listen to this line of Nammalvar, "Before the brimming youth withers away, Temple of Mayon of abounding brilliance, wit and wisdom indeed to go and worship undelaying", if one really understands these lines and takes to heart to go to Srirangam, a rare scene indeed to be seen there during the month of Margazhi.

Day break, the cool fogs and the streaming chants of Thiruppavai making the very land of Srirangam as Sri Vaikuntam. Hot pongal and the pleasing morning rays beating rhythm with divine music and Sri Ranaganatha showing the path of liberation all through the month. Araiyars chanting and reciting the Divine Tamil of Divya Suris to Aranga! Who made it possible when? It was Thirumangaimannan. He built the wall around the town. Encircling Truth fashioned his Tamil. Sri Andal woke up the dormant devotion. The unwinking God was fully aware in His wakeful sleep. And Sri Ranganatha, the chasing lover of Tamil, is all attendence in His Divine Office when Tamil is pouring forth all around. Kaliyan was so fond of Nammalvar and his Tamil. He was waiting for an occasion. Once the divine voice spoke to him, 'Kaliyan! what is that you want?' Kaliyan said, 'You must hear our Alwar's Tiruvaimozhi beginning from Ekadasi of Sri Vaikunta.' So it started and so it is coming down. The Tamil planted by Kaliyan, watered by Nathamuni became Karpaga Vritcha in Sri Ramanuja's time, Tamil of Sanga blossoming as Tamil of Ranga.
Srirangam Mohanarangan 

***

Vedanta in Tamil - Coimbatore V Kuppuswamy Iyer's translation of Gita

At the start of the twentieth century a wonderful book of translation in Tamil has come out. It is the translation of Srimad Bhagavad Gita. Why this translation is wonderful, when more than one translation were coming out even in nineteenth century and even after this translation in the twentieth? It is because of the format and coverage of this attempt. This translation was by one V Kuppuswamy Iyer of Coimbatore. He is Villavarambal Kuppuswamy Iyer, who was a Vakkil in Coimbatore District Court in 1901 (the traditional year of publication given is Kali 5002).

The book runs to nearly 900 pages. Perhaps a further edition came out later which contains 995 pages in total published in two volumes. The slokas are given in grantha lipi, followed by word by word meaning in Tamil. Then follows explanatory elaborations which contain varied and many interpretations of great Acharyas and Commentators, sometimes in great detail and sometimes only the portions which bear on the differences. The author seems to have avoided as per his own declaration the caustic criticisms among various schools of thought. His approach seems to be a new one whereby we can see the varied perspectives on Gita slokas in a continuous narrative in Tamil. Perhaps he might have missed the detailed nuances of colloquy that happen back and forth across time between different schools. But it is a unique treat for the somewhat deep and common reader to get a feel of the variety without the heat of the difference. In the second volume Sri V Kuppuswami Iyer has done a great thing in the 18th chapter on the subject of Brahma Jnana. He has collected nearly all the relevant passages from the various Upanishads on the theme of Brahma Jnana and has given it in 60 pages as part of the elucidations. 

It is really astounding to see how many persons down the centuries have put forth their efforts in Vedanta in Tamil.
Srirangam Mohanarangan

***

Vedanta in Tamil and Sri Ramakrishna Math

I have been writing every now and then on the subject of Vedanta in Tamil. And this subject will not be complete and meaningful if we do not mention and praise with our full heart the glorious services of Sri Ramakrishna Math. Not only in Tamil, but in very many languages across India and all over the world, RK Math makes available in easy and accessible style the great scriptures of Hinduism. Accessible mainly to the lay public and common readers everywhere. In Tamil in the recent years a great feat has been accomplished by a monk of the Ramakrishna Order, viz., Swami Asutoshananda.

The main books basic and referential in Hinduism in a broad sense can be listed as the following three books - Upanishads, Sri Brahma Sutras, Srimad Bhagavat Gita. These three books have been termed as 'Three systems of books'. In Sanskrit it is termed as 'Prasthana Traya'. Ten Upanishads form the most referenced and universal out of a vast collection. Sri Brahma Sutras otherwise known as Vedanta Sutras, a systematic presentation of the core concepts of Upanishads. Again Sri Bhagavat Gita is a summary in poetic form of all important ideas of the Upanishads. All these three sets of books have been engaging great minds of our Hindu society belonging to different schools of conviction and as a result we have in our heritage many libraries of commentaries and meta-commentaries down the millennia. But in Tamil for the common people and lay public good and readable translations have been a recurring necessity. There have been excellent attempts to satisfy this need many times in premodern and modern days. (Sri Anna of R K Math Chennai, Sri Kuppuswamy Raju of Thanjavur) But now we can be satisfied that a solid attempt has been made by Swami Asutoshananda. Care for the common reader is so very evident in each and every page of the monk's efforts. 

Of course each and every book deserves praise from an eager reader. But what he has achieved in Brahma Sutras is so brilliant by way of communication and easy putting forth. It is not to say that there are not points to differ and argue between scholars but when viewed from what a common reader will be getting for the meagre price, it is wonderful. And the duty of a common reader of Hindu society, if not of any serious minded reader, begins with investing in such rare sets of the three books of reference.
Srirangam Mohanarangan

***

Holy Company

What is Satsanga?

It is just the narrow aisle behind the door in Tirukkovalur.
Just a space for one spanning for two accommodating standing for three and all together with the transcendent thrust as the four. All four in good unison consciousness. Such is good company.

The first entrance of spirituality is Satsang. And holy company is very precious and immeasurable. Is it for nothing that Sri Adisankara says 'by holy contact all wrong contacts wither away. Bad contacts gone make the intellect strong. When the intellect is strong and unshaken it is verily freedom in life.'

Holy company has the capacity to bring the Transcendent above alive on earth. Our Ego is the multiheaded snake Kaaliyan. To quell it we need the feet of Sri Krishna to dance on its heads. Holy company is verily those divine feet of Krishna. Sages are the sacred feet of the Supreme Soul. Sri Krishna Premi used to say in a talk. 'why do you bother that you are not having company? Resort to holy books. Great sages will meet you there in those pages. When you open Bhagavata the great Suka himself will come and talk to you. If you open Bharata the great Vyasa will give you company. You will never be alone.' Premi has a point in saying that.

In those times of old to meet holy company you have to travel physically, time-consuming and very exerting. But in our days how facile and helpful is technology! Kaliyuga is not all that bad. It has its benign aspects also. In Kali, the Divine Name and the Holy Company are very powerful. Whether we travel in person or we make virtual contacts modern science and technology have made things much more easier and joyful. It is up to us to put things in proper use. Take for instance Puri Jagannath ! How holy the land is! What association of Holy Personages! The great Chaitanya with his singing HariBol! Sri Ramakrishna brought some sand from the land of Brindavan to be laid in his Dakshineswar sadhana cottage. When he went there he saw divine visions. But when we visit we see only carts and trains, monkeys and birds only. Yea we have willfully closed our inner eyes and introvert ears. We have forgotten how to open them also. No problem. When the right time comes the buds will blossom! When the tunes from His flute reach our souls, the drooping shriveled hearts will light up and aflame again the journey will be resumed! Till that time perhaps we can play with pebbles.
Srirangam Mohanarangan

***

Sri Parasara Bhattar and Thirunedunthandakam

An episode from the life of Sri Ramanuja. In his ripe old age Sri Ramanuja who was called Emberumaanaar asked somebody to go and fetch Sri Parasara Bhattar. Sri Parasara Bhattar was young then and so full of erudition and wisdom even in that young age. Seeing Sri Bhattar with eyes full of affection and kindness, Sri Ramanuja told everyone around to hold Sri Bhattar in high respect equal to himself. Sri Ramanuja then in a very affectionate tone told Sri Bhattar, "My child! I have become very old and there is a task yet to be finished. My age will not allow me to take that up. I am leaving that task to you. When time becomes ripe you must finish that task without fail. That task is nothing but bringing Sri Madhava Vedanti of Mysore to our Visishtadvaita Darsana. He is now busy and deep in Mayavada and he is an adept in all six systems. This is what I am leaving with you to finish and I believe you will do it.

Sri Parasara Bhattar was firm and he was waiting for an opportune time to initiate the task. Once an itinerant brahmin came to Sri Bhattar's residence and began to narrate his various experiences in different parts of the country. He began to talk about Sri Madhava Vedanti of Mysore and Sri Parasara Bhattar's attention grew keen. The itinerant person was saying that while conversing with Sri Madhava Vedanti, he dropped a reference about Sri Parasara Bhattar himself and the said Vedanti became very much interested to know more about Sri Bhattar. As a consequence, the itinerant person seemed to have briefed the Vedanti about the voracious studies and erudition of Sri Bhattar in all known subjects. When Sri Bhattar heard this he just smiled and observed, 'why Sir? you have just narrated about me only those details which are ordinary and not of much significance. You are a person of great civility having visited very many cities and towns. A person of culture and exposure like you should be able to specify the most extraordinary qualifications of a person, while introducing him to another reputed scholar. Whereas you have left out what is extraordinary in my acquisitions and just described about me only the ordinary things which are common everywhere in the scholarly world.'

The itinerant person was taken aback and said that he would be doing amends the next time. But first he must know for himself what is that extraordinary thing about Sri Bhattar's erudition. Sri Bhattar told him about his deep involvement and knowledge in a particular work of Sri Thirumangai Alwar, viz., 'Thirunedunthandakam'. It was a poetical work of deep theological import containing some thirty verses in all. But the meanings of the work when elucidated are really deep and vast. The next time when the itinerant person met Sri Madhava Vedanti in Mysore, he unfailingly remembered to mention this fact about Sri Bhattar to him. Sri Vedanti was very much intrigued and he began to wonder 'what is this scholar in Srirangam! He is so thorough and deep in such a work, even the name of which is unheard of by me! My God!'

And in his round of holy visits to temples and towns the itinerant person came to Srirangam again and updated Sri Bhattar about the dismay and wondering of Sri Vedanti. Sri Parasara Bhattar after some days set out to Mysore with the aim of meeting Sri Vedanti and holding discussions with him. People who knew about Sri Vedanti told Sri Bhattar that he could not just like that go and visit Sri Vedanti, for, the disciples of Sri Vedanti will never allow him to go past themselves and approach the main Scholar. They would engage him in endless arguments and circles of debates and vex him even for months together. So how then to approach him? The only way seemed to be going incognito as if for alms, in the beggars' queue. This queue will not be inspected by anybody and what more, the said Vedanti himself used to attend doling out alms personally.

So Sri Bhattar went like an ordinary person-in-need in that queue and when he was nearing where the great Pandit was standing, Sri Bhattar broke the queue and went straight towards the Pandit. Everybody was crying at him. 'Hey this way this way, go for alms there!'. But Sri Bhattar was intent at his target. Sri Madhava Vedanti was also perplexed at the very strange behaviour of this man of alms. He asked him, 'What bhiksha do you want?' Sri Bhattar replied, "Traka bhiksha. It is the alms of debate which I want and not of any food.'

Then and there they sat for discussion and the debate went on for days, both sides silently appreciating in their hearts the extraordinary erudition of each other. At last, as the great Bhagavan willed it, things became suddenly so very clear in his dreams for Sri Vedanti and after that he became just a silent admirer and enthusiast of Sri Bhattar. Sri Vedanti wanted to follow his new found Master back to Srirangam. But Sri Bhattar desisted and told Sri Vedanti to take all his time in absorbing the changed perspective in full. And in more composed times and confirmed moods to take proper decisions.

When Sri Parasara Bhattar reached back Srirangam, he went straight to the shrine of Sri Ranganatha and began to narrate everything that happened to the Lord. It was his custom always to do so, after visiting any place and coming back, to go and report to the Lord personally. And it was the day prior to the start of Pagalpatthu - Day Ten festival of Sri Vaikunta Ekadasi. Sri Ranganatha asked him how he won over the Pandit. 'It was by the merit of explicating Thirunedunthandakam my Lord!' was Sri Bhattar's reply. Hence the hoary custom of Thirunedunthandakam chanting being held before the start of Pagalpatthu even to this day.
Srirangam Mohanarangan

***

Sri Ramana Maharishi - some thoughts on

Sri Ramana Maharishi, I came to know when I was a boy through the book of Sri Ramana Vijayam, written by Yogi Suddhanandha Bharathi in Tamil. Excellent photos of Bhagavan and the Arunachala Hills and caves were enchanting to the eyes and engaging the mind. In the front even Yogi's photo was such an aura.

Invariably, all spiritual personages were given those days in books, a circular-light background to the head. So in the school days, the natural idea was spirituality means something fantastic, suffusing with brilliance, light and rays. It was more optical and luminary. After reading epic-like narrations of Yogi about Maharishi it added all the more to the irradiance. Even now Yogi's 'language' is unforgettable.

And that too, appendixed by my father's memory of meeting Bhagavan, added still more to the depth of the event of my getting introduced to the Ramana's loka. My father Mr R Venugopal, used to have a photo of himself acting the part of Prince of Morocco from Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice, , where the still portrays the moment of the dialogue -- "Hey pluck the young sucking-cubs from the she-bear"- when he was showing the action of gripped right fist across his chest, along his left eye.

I asked him one day, 'why do you keep this photo always in your purse?' Then he was telling it carries a story, associated with Sri Ramana Maharishi. I was all eager and babbled out - 'have you seen him? did you talk to him? what did he say? what did you ask?'

My father was saying, "cool boy cool. There was no talk and questions. Once I went to the Hills to have his Darshan. First day it didn't click. Second day I tried, thinking, if not that time then to return back home, visiting temples. Fortunately I found entry among the devotees sitting in front. It was uniquely calm to watch him and just sit there. For some purpose, I took out my purse to take or place something there. Perhaps Bhagavan was seeing that, I do not know. This photo, a still of the just-staged play, I was keeping it there. He asked for the photo and stared at it for a moment. Then doing the same action in the photo by folding his fist and looking at me, he returned it. I consider this as his blessing and am keeping it as the sacred memory."

*

A Thiruppugazh on Thirumal

A rare song of the genre 'thiruppugazh' on Thirumaal. This is my translation of the piece -

You created this world
you recovered this world
you saved this world
you measured this world
you swallowed this world
not only that
you brought this world out again
you have been born in this world
and you have taken form
similar to the beings of this world
and you have become the goal
of all the religions sixfold as a sport
to suit the tastes and understandings
of all the worlds triune
sustaining ever
is it possible for me, a slave
to extol and praise your grace
and narrate the great acts
of your incarnations
done for our protection?
when the cows and oxen hedged in their yards
were driven asunder by the fiery rains,
seeing their plight you rushed
and took a mountain aloft as a shelter
for the pining kine
are you not one tall form of Love, my Lord!
You were born in Madura
famous for swans beautifully asleep in ponds
and the musician-bees ringing
lisps of sweet ragas while exploring
the buds of lotuses in the morn"

This is my translation of one old Tamil Thiruppugazh song sung by one Kuravai Iraamaanuja Dasar written about 1850 and published in 1857 and again in 1897. This forms part of his work which is called Noorriyettutthiruppathi thiruppugazh - a composition on 108 temples of Thirumaal. The original of this verse is as follows -

உலகுப டைத்திடந்திவ் வுலகமெ டுத்தளந்திவ்
வுலகம டுத்தருந்தி
யொழியாதே
யுலகம றித்துமிழ்ந்திவ் வுலகுத னிற்பிறந்திவ்
வுலகுயி ரொத்து நின்று
நிலையாகும்
அலகில்ச கத்ரயங்க ளவரவ ருக்கிணங்கி
யறுசம யத்தினின்று
விளையாடி
யருள்புரி ரட்சகங்க ளுனதுச ரித்திரங்க
ளடியனெ டுத்தியம்ப
வசமாமோ
பலகிடை யிற்கிடந்த பசுநிறை தட்டழிந்து
பதறவி டுத்திடுங்கன்
மழைமாரி
படுமொரு விர்த்திகண்டு மலைகுடை யிட்டுநின்று
பரிபவ ரட்சைதந்த
நெடுமாலே
மலர்வன சத்தரும்பும் முகையவி ழக்குடைந்து
மழலைவ ரிச்சுரும்ப
ரிசைபாட
மடவெகி னக்குலங்கள் விழிதுயில் பொற்பிலங்கு
வடமது ரைப்பிறந்த
பெருமாளே !

My homage to Thiru Kuravai Iraamaanuja Dasar! (and Thiru S E Arangasamy Mudaliyar who brought this out in 1897)

***

Four kinds of knowers as Thirumoolar says

How many ways of knowing are there! The great mystic of Siva, Thirumoolar speaks about many types of knowers.

Some knowers are like rainy water. They are always reductive. They reduce everything to mundane level and interpret accordingly. Some are like pearl-divers. They dive in one place and go on exploring in one square. Some are like winds. When knowing they go about vast areas, without staying-put anywhere. They like to spread and spread always. May be their grasp of anything is shallow. Some are really knowers with clarity. They are precise and clear in their understanding.

So as per Thirumoolar we can classify knowers into four types. Rainy-knowers, Diving-knowers, Windy-knowers and Clear-knowers. Shall we say the formula is RDWC? 

Rainy-knowers - thaLi arivaaLar
Diving-knowers - kuLi aRivaaLar
Windy-knowers - vaLi aRivaaLar
Clear-knowers - theLi aRivaaLar

Sri Thirumoolar says Rainy-knowers (thaLi aRivaaLar) are like rain-water which always flow towards low levels. For them the Ultimate Truth looks always banal and materialistic.

Diving-knowers (kuLi aRivaaLar) concentrate always in one point and one angle and they lose sight of the whole.

Windy-knowers (vaLi aRivaaLar) always go about roaming and blowing here and there, around. So they may by chance get at the Truth, perhaps. May be they may not hold on to that.

Clear-knowers (theLi aRivaaLar) are those who are in grasp of the Ultimate Truth. The Truth resides in their thought.

First I will give my attempt in translating the verse and then the original.

For the Rainy-knowers It appears as if mundane and reductive
For the Diving-knowers the Whole Truth evades their grasp
For the Windy-knowers perhaps by chance they may come across
For the Clear-knowers He the Ultimate Truth resides in their thought.
(Thirumanthiram, 51 Theertham, 510, pp 74, Saiva Siddhanta Mahasamajam, 1940)

தளியறி வாளர்க்குத் தண்ணிதாய்த் தோன்றும்
குளியறி வாளர்க்குக் கூடவும் ஒண்ணான்
வளியறி வாளர்க்கு வாய்க்கிலும் வாய்க்கும்
தெளியறி வாளர்தம் சிந்தையு ளானே.

(This is just my attempt in understanding the verse. Great scholars can kindly excuse.)

***

A Tamil translation of Bhana

More than 500 years ago, a Tamil scholar and poet decided to translate in Tamil Bana Bhatta's Kadhambari in honeyed verses. In the intro-verses he himself says that in the Kali year 4562 he composed his Tamil verse translation. But why it didn't come out and become famous among scholars, no body knows. It has all the qualities to become a fond work of deep readers. Tamil is so excellent and resonating in its inherent elements. You begin to forget that the work is a translation.

The great scholar-poet was one Vaazhavandha Perumal. But even time could not stop the work seeing the light of day in 1912. A rare manuscript was with one Vakkil at Srirangam. He was Sri J Krishnayyangar. He asked the Tamil Pandit Sri P R Krishnamachariyar and Srirangam High School Tamil Pandit Guru Subbiramaniya Iyer to do a prose rendering of the same Tamil work. and got both the verses and the prose published in 1912 through The Wednesday Review Press at 'Trichinopoly' as Thiruchirappalli was so called at that time. My humble respects to J Krishnaiyangar of Srirangam. But for him perhaps we would not have come to know of such a work. He has really pleaded in the court of Time.

Even the verses indited as prayers in the beginning bespeak the fertile Tamil of Sri Vazhavandha Perumal.

பொன்கொண்ட நேமிப் புயல் பூமகள் புல்லிவாழும்
மின்கொண்ட மார்பன் எழுபார் சதுவேதனோடு
முன்கண்ட நாபி முதன்மூவகை மூர்த்தியான
என்கண்ட கோமான் இருபாதம் இறைஞ்சலுற்றேன்.

சொல்லும் பொருளும் கனியும் சுவையும் சுடரும்
எல்லும் சசியும் நிசியும் இயலும் இசையும்
ஒல்லும் உடலும் உயிரும் எனநாளும் ஒன்றிச்
செல்லும் பரசத்தி சிவன்றனைச் சிந்தை செய்வாம்.

முன்னான் முகனாவில் இருந்து மொழிந்த வேதம்
தன்னால் உலகம் தழைப்பித்தருள் தையல் துய்ய
நன்னாமம் என்னாளும் நவின்று நவின்று வாழும்
என்னா உளதாக எனக்கரி தாய துண்டே.

செங்கோல மேனிச் சிவனார் திருமைந்தன் எங்கள்
பங்கோன் முராரி மருகன்கடம் பற்கு முன்னோன்
வெங்கோப வேழ முகவன்வினை வேர றுக்கும்
எங்கோனடி சேர்பவர் இந்திரன் என்ன வாழ்வோர்.

மஞ்சுண்ட கோல மயிலுண்டு அயில் வேலும் உண்டு
துஞ்சுண்டு இனிநான் மறலிக்கு உயிர் தோற்பதுண்டோ
நஞ்சுண்டநாதர் மகனார் திருநாமம் உண்டு
நெஞ்சுண்டு பாட நினைவுண்டு அதி நேயமுண்டே.

So the mellifluous Tamil goes on and on. What better sweets can we add on this day, except to think of such poets and readers and literary enthusiasts of the old!

***

A book on 'seven appropriates'

A good book is more beautiful than any beauty so called. Two such books written in Sanskrit make the beauty limitless. The two books are Sapta Saamanjasi prakaranam by Araiyar SriRama Sarma and Thrisankhu, a book of modern poetry in Sanskrit by the poet Sri D D Bahulikar. The second I will write about later. Now the first -

Sri Araiyar SriRama Sarma of Melkote has written Sapta SaamanjasI Prakaranam. It deals with a theme related to Sri Bhashya of Sri Ramanuja.

In Visishtadvaitic philosophy or even in Vedantic parlance in general there is a way of expressing the ultimate import of theology as such in terms of Five Major Themes called Artha Panchaka. Those five themes are the Transcendent Ultimate Reality, the Soul, the Way that should be trodden by the Soul to reach the Ultimate Goal, the Final Goal to be realised by the Soul and the Impediments that block the attainment of the Soul. In short we can say Brahman, Jivan, Upaya, Upeya and Virodhi are the five topics of Theology. The whole Sri Bhashya, which is the commentary of Sri Ramanuja on the Brahma Sutras of Veda Vyasa explicates in various ways how the Five Topics are sufficiently and precisely explained by the Sastras be it Upanishads or the Brahma Sutras.

Araiyar SriRama Sarma concentrating mainly on these five topics and their relevant places of conclusive elucidations signified by the use of the phrase 'Saamanjasam' (i. e. a traditional way of denoting that the said point has been sufficiently and precisely dealt with hereby). In addition to these five places there are two other places in Sri Bhashya where Sri Ramanuja explicitly uses the expression Saamanjasam denoting that the point explained has been sufficiently dealt with. Araiyar Ji has taken care to formalise his whole exposition and narration of all these seven places, where the Great Commentator has expressed openly about the sufficiency of elucidation. And it is really a feast for any serious student of theology in general and Visishtadvaitic Theology in particular.

'atra sarIraka mImAmsa samAkyE brahmasUtrE, arthapanchakam pramEyam kutra katam nirUpitam asti iti srI bhAshyasUktibhi: Eva nirUpaNam saptasaAmanjasI prabandhasya uddEsyam'

'here the intent of this treatise is to provide proof of how the Five Topics of Theology (Arthapanchakam) have been proved to be the subject matter of the whole Sariraka Mimamsa called by the name Brahma Sutras' (translation mine)

This forms the intent and purpose of Araiyar SriRama Sarma Ji. And I was so much gladdened by the simple and beautiful style of Araiyar Ji, the Sailee as it is called in Sanskrit circles.

He is not exposed to modern book presentation formats or styles of presentation. He has been a traditional right from his own boyhood days of learning at the feet of Guru. But the way he has presented his treatise so much matches the modern style. He states specifically what he intends and in what way he is going to present his matter, everything at the outset and prepares the reader for what follows. And he is very much awake to his initial promise right through out.

Academy of Sanskrit Research, Melkote has done a wonderful thing by bringing out this valuable book. And for all that the price is a mere Rs forty four. Sapta SaamanjasI Prakaranam, by Araiyar SriRama Sarma, Academy of Sanskrit Research, Melkote, 571431,

***

Knowledge of Sastras and mental peace

What is learning if the learning does not lead a person towards the supreme reality of existence? What is knowledge if it is not liberating human beings from illusion and bondage?

saa vidya: yaa vimuktayE - that is knowledge which makes one free.

kaRRadanAl Aya payan enkol?
vAlaRivan naRRAL tozhAr enin? (Tirukkural)

- what is the purpose or use of study? if one does not worship the naRRaaL - Good Feet, of Absolute Knower?

DarsanOdaya is a great book written in Sanskrit on the subject of Darsanas in general. It raises a valid and pertinent question - why do persons learn Darsanas or Sastras? What is the result of such a study? How can we identify a person who has learnt multivarious studies, Darsanas or Sastras?

The one identification of such a person will be 'calmness' 'being quiet' Saanthi.

No anger, no rancour, no mental agitation will you find in such a person who has devoted his time towards the study of Saastras or Darsanas.

DarsanOdayA quotes the following verse from Mahabharata -

samArtham sarva sAstrANi vihitAni manIshibhi: |
sa Eva sarvasAstrajna: yasya sAntam manassadA ||
yat srutam na virAgAya na dharmAya na sAntayE |
subaddhamapi sabdEna kAkavAsitam Eva tat ||

'The meaning of all Sastras is verily calmness and being content - so deem persons intelligent.

That person is called 'knower of all sastras' whose mind is always calm and quiet.

What is learnt, if it has not led one towards detachment, towards ethical living, towards mental peace, then such a learning is just a cry of crows, however beautiful the words and sentences are constructed in that learning'.
(trans mine)

***

Resonance of meditations

Resonance of meditations -

"To invoke God as a blanket explanation of the unexplained is to make God the friend of ignorance. If God is to be found, it must surely be through what we discover about the world, not what we fail to discover." - Paul Davies, Physicist.

"God is realised through Knowledge attaining the form of passionate devotion." - Sri Ramanuja.

"Only through Knowledge comes emancipation" - Dictum of Shastras.

Just pondering over the resonance between different words !

***

Efforts on epics by uncle and nephew

Sometimes the uncle and nephew combination works in a great way in history. One person, who is the uncle is a great poet. He has sung the great epic Ramayana in a shortened form as 'Sangraha Ramayanam'. His name is Narayanaswamy Iyer. It was in, say, before 1908. In about 1000 stanzas in Tamil Mr Narayanasswami Iyer has wrought a miracle. The diction is chaste and the flow is streaming and the imagination is cool. One example is when Hanuman returns back to Sri Rama after seeing Seetha Devi. The famous line in Kambar starts with 'Kanadanan' 'Have seen'. So also here in Sangraha Ramayanam

கண்டனன் சனகன் குலமானைக்
கடுவா யரவங் கலைமதியை
யுண்டா லனைய முகத்தாளை
உணவுன் உணர்வாய் உடையாளை
வண்டார் பொழில்சூழ் இலங்கைநகர்
வனத்தோர் மரத்தின் வடமுகமாய்த்
தண்டா மரையா லுலகேழுந்
தந்தா யெந்தாய்த் தவநிலையை.

Seen the dearest girl of Janaka
with face sorrow-engulfed
like the moon swallowed by the nodes
Her only food is awareness of Thee
seated in the grove under a tree
of Lanka facing the direction north
seven-fold world begotten by Thee
through a Lotus yea I have seen
austerity itself as a form. (Tr mine)

Mr Narayanaswamy Iyer's nephew was one Govindaswamy Iyer. The nephew has written a beautiful life history of the great teacher of Advaita, Sri Sankara. His work is Sankara Vijayam in 767 verses in Tamil. How both are competing each other in diction style and rhythmic flow of poetic fibre! This book came in 1909. One example is when Govinda Yogi teaches Sri Sankara -

நான்கு மாமறை முடிப்பொருள் நான்கையும் நவின்று
வான்க ருப்பொரு ளொன்றிட உத்திகள் வழங்கித்
தான்கு றிப்பொடு பிரணவப் பொருளினைச் சாற்றி
ஊன்க ழித்திடு யோகமுந் தெளிவுற உரைத்தார்.

Teaching the great four Mahavakyas of the four Vedas and instructing on the methods of gaining the nondual identity and giving the secret special teachings about Pranavam and clarifying the salient steps of non-bodiness in Yogic practice Govinda Yogi taught the Great Teacher. (tr mine)

Such an uncle and such a nephew... sometimes it happens so. Is it not?

***

Management theory some thoughts

The Management Science has been dealing so far with the question leadership vs management. Who is a leader? who is a manager? and like that. Now at last it seems management studies have striken paydirt by taking up the question of Followership.

The old adage goes - who knows how to obey knows how to lead. The art of intelligent obedience and following and definitely not the blind toeing. Good followership must be able to intuit the mind of leader. Not only that good followership knows how to park the ego with no loss to dignity in the dynamic flow towards efficient and effectual process. (Perhaps Sri Ramanuja can make you think not only as a manager, not simply as a leader but more so as an efficient follower when he says - Seshatva is having its pratikodi in Seshitva) That means a good and intelligent follower implies and presumes a true leader.

*
But 'followership' vis a vis 'Leadership', if it should not become reductive in understanding towards cultish behaviour and if really scientific understanding should happen in the context of organisations and business, another aspect equally important is that of 'Dissenting' or 'Deviant perception' or 'differing in view'. How a leader relates to this equally creative voice as that of intelligent follower matters not less. The art of intelligent followership is a great task. And equally tough and crucial is the task of 'meaningful dissent'. Being passionate towards impersonal vision and being intelligent and aware in personal relationships, motivated and defined by the vision and energised by the goal and results calls for great personal and group intuitive empathy and order which results from such intuitiveness.

***

Reading Ayn Rand again

Do we understand deeply when we are unto something thick with emotional? Or do we need some distance to go deep into anything? Emotions make one feel intense and intimate. But to go deep and map the contours I think a free mind unbiased helps much more. 'Biased' need not be always against but can be also 'attuned'.

After a long gap of time and interest I saw the opening lines of Fountainhead by Ayn Rand. What a sheer poetry! But why did I lose it before in those days when I was emotionally so intimate with the book? When the whole passages used to chime in memory at the drop of any excuse.. Does passionate holding on to anything blinds us to the facts facing us? Mind in its working is always a mystery.

'Howard Roark laughed.
He stood naked at the edge of a cliff.
The lake lay far below him.
A frozen explosion of granite burst in flight to the sky over motionless water.
The water seemed immovable, the stone flowing. The stone had the stillness of one brief moment in battle when thrust meets thrust and the currents are held in a pause more dynamic than motion.
The stone glowed, wet with sunrays.
The lake below was only a thin steel ring that cut the rocks in half.
The rocks went on into the depth, unchanged. They began and ended in the sky. So that the world seemed suspended in space, an island floating on nothing, anchored to the feet of the man on the cliff.
His body leaned back against the sky.
It was a body of long straight lines and angles, each curve broken into planes.
He stood, rigid, his hands hanging at his sides, palms out.
He felt his shoulder blades drawn tight together, the curve of his neck, and the weight of the blood in his hands.
He felt the wind behind him, in the hollow of his spine.
The wind waved his hair against the sky.
His hair was neither blond nor red, but the exact color of ripe orange rind.
He laughed at the thing which had happened to him that morning and at the things which now lay ahead.'
(Ayn Rand, The Fountainhead, Opening lines)

How controlled and puissant are the lines flowing like the molten steel before becoming ingots jolting the index of industry!

The unusual juxtapositions of the stream vs the stone and the granite and the human presence firmly footing - suggesting the axial change of perspective going to come out in the novel.

***

The language and the twist

Do you think along with Cleanth Brooks that the language of paradox is the very soul of poetry? Poetry includes all angles but eludes any straight-jacket, it seems. When you read T S Eliot's lines

"And indeed there will be time
For the yellow smoke that slides along the street
Rubbing its back upon the window-panes;.."

Sheer incongruity made so beautiful! Yellow smoke rubbing its back upon the window-panes! Or again

"Streets that follow like a tedious argument
Of insidious intent
To lead you to an overwhelming question…"

We have felt the streets and the questions separately. But when the poetry makes a connection, a paradox...mm yea...one is tempted to half agree.

*

The real person

Suppose you are meeting a person and the person is sitting right in front of you. Suddenly you begin to say that that person is gone and asking, exclaiming with people around 'where has he gone? He is no more here...' like that. People will laugh at you. They will say, 'Hey man, are you blind? or out of mind? He is there just in front as he was before when he began to talk and you are saying he has gone... what..!

It is totally meaningless, totally out of place. It doesn't fit in. You begin to seem instantly quixotic.

But why when a person is lying dead, when you say 'he has gone... he is no more....he just gone...' nobody is mocking at you saying, 'hey man are you mad? he is just here, just in front of you, just lying on the floor... why do you say he has gone... he is very much here... this is the person with whom you were seeing talking sitting....don't you see..

Yeah... this is his body... but he has gone...

Why baba... we have been talking only to this body... only with this form we have been doing business. And that person is very much here lying.

But his soul is not there.....

Soul ...? who is that? we have not seen him so far, not talked with that soul, what form we have been transacting with is very much available right here now. Why do you posit an unseen, unrelated thing as 'Soul' anew now in this instant and claim that the person was that soul?

A person whom we have seen with our very eyes we say 'has gone' -

A person whom we have never met or seen or talked we say that person was along with us transacting till now.

Lie after lie belying the lying down. 

***

A good researcher

A good researcher is one who allows his subject of study to become eloquent by itself, by his adroit handling of documents and reference-materials. But hasty ones are too impatient and thereby become themselves eloquent about their subjects, in the meanwhile their subjects of study becoming all too dull and dumb. Gilles Deleuze, a famous philosopher, expressed his opinion about Michel Foucault in this manner --

"You were the first to teach us something absolutely fundamental: the indignity of speaking for others."

Brilliant! But perhaps there is another side. How many are able to talk for themselves?. Altruism is bad when imposed but a help is timely in need also. Yea there are many shades of course.

***

Criticism, Edward Said, Jagannatha Pandita

It seems in one way that Literature is the highest achievement of us as human beings, in whatever way different groups approach it and hold it. Just pure appreciation, involved and empathetic, is discounted nowadays in preference to operating upon the literary creation, dissecting, boring into, peeling off, dismembering and critical investigation. Many literary theories of all hues and purposes serve the modern transacting with Literature. Of course I am aware of the gains by such processings and I do appreciate to a large extent the panoply of theories applied. But when all operations are over and various readings got and verified, there is nothing to compare with the alter-awareness that we achieve through a pure, simple and straight aesthetic involvement in a literary piece. We may think of mixing the two ways but it will be a hard mix even then and the elements resisting each other. Man is not only a 'heady' being but also a 'hearty' being and it is perhaps an art really, how he manages the two beings of his own identity from the vantage of what being of his inner reality, supra or meta or composite. Perhaps solving this in the literary world will empower the human being to face more drastic issues of the concrete world with more wisdom. 

What is Criticism and that too literary criticism? Where does a Critic find his own position? Is it a simply negative stance or wakeful being in the now or an alteration between two negations? Is it just positioning oneself against all aesthetic appreciative involvement, a pretense to make good the absence of a heart quality? But I know too well the clarification that the critical theories give and also the pure delight in aesthetic involvement. What Edward Said is saying is very much adding to my cogitations on the status and efficacy of criticism in general.

"Criticism in short is always situated; it is skeptical, secular, reflectively open to its own failings. This is by no means to say that it is value-free. Quite the contrary, for the inevitable trajectory of critical consciousness is to arrive at some acute sense of what political, social. and human values are entailed in the reading, production, and transmission of every text. To stand between culture and system is therefore to stand close to - closeness itself having a particular value for me - a concrete reality about which political, moral, and social judgements have to be made and, if not only made, then exposed and demystified. If, as we have recently been told by Stanley Fish, every act of interpretation is made possible and given force by an interpretive community, then we must go a great deal further in showing what situation, what historical and social configuration, what political interests are concretely entailed by the very existence of interpretive communities.This is an especially important task when these communities have evolved camouflaging jargons.'
(Edward W Said, The World, The Text and The Critic pp 26, Harvard University Press, 1983)

Whereas in Sanskrit literature, critics have been distinguished from creative authors. Creative authors were attributed with creative spark of cognition, whereas the critics were attributed with critical reading and understanding spark of cognition. A great critic and creative genius of Sanskrit poetry, Jagannatha Pandita in his Rasa Gangadhara talks about the nature of poetic delight or elation of aesthetic communion, which in Sanskrit is called Rasa. He says Rasa is nothing but Consciousness made free of its blindfold of ignorance. This concept of Jagannatha Pandita teams with what Edward Said is trying to say above in the excerpt from his book.

***

Space stitions or super stition?

Mr A S Eddington in his book 'The Nature of the Physical World' writes a beautiful statement, which tells what all need be told about the micro and macro worlds in which and between which man lives or is supposed to be living.

'The atom is as porous as the solar system. If we eliminated all the unfilled space in a man's body and collected his protons and electrons into one mass, the man would be reduced to a speck just visible with a magnifying glass.'

So are we so solid as we think or ......one relative opaque space talking to another relative opaque space? in the meanwhile all the so called properties are in a way.......
'super+stitions'? There is much to Space than there is space to anything.

* 

Who is Vivekananda

Vivekananda, a biography, (Jan 2013), by Swami Nikhilananda, pp 326

"At one of the public meetings in New York, after addressing a tense audience for about fifteen minutes, the Swami suddenly made a formal bow and retired. The meeting broke up and the people went away greatly disappointed. A friend asked him, when he was returning home, why he had cut short the lecture in that manner, just when both he and the audience were warming up. Had he forgotten his points? Had he become nervous? The Swami answered that at the meeting he had felt that he had too much power. He had noticed that the members of the audience were becoming so absorbed in his ideas that they were losing their own individualities. He had felt that they had become like soft clay and that he could give them any shape he wanted. That, however, was contrary to his philosophy. He wished every man and woman to grow according to his or her own inner law. He did not wish to change or destroy anyone's individuality. That was why he had had to stop."

What a Man he was! 

"We are the worshippers of that God, who by the ignorant is called Man." so said he.

*

A small book of Vedanta in Tamil

I am astounded by a very small book published way back in 1908. The author is Thalavai Iramaswami Mudaliyar. He is one of the three sons of Thalavai Thirumaalaiyappa Mudaliyar. Some four hundred and fifty years back, Thalavai was a title awarded along with powers and functions by Krishna Deva Raya. The family has done many acts of charity and public cause. Our author Thalavai Iramaswami Mudaliyar, living in Tirunelveli during 1908 was so ardent and anxious in spiritual pursuits and the book bears evidence that he was very advanced in his knowledge of advaita books of reference. To assist aspirants who may toil and fret in future, he has beautifully capsuled very salient thoughts and rules of advaithic practice in just 30 pages, called Vedantha Sangirakam, in Tamil. Some nuggets for your touch-stone -

’வேதாந்த சாஸ்திராப்பியாசிகளான முமுட்சுக்களில் அதிதீவிரதர பக்குவிகளாயும், விரிந்தவை அல்லலென்று நினைப்பவர்களாயும் இருப்பவர்களுக்கு உபயோகப்படுமாறு பலசாஸ்திரங்களின் சாராம்சத்தைத் திரட்டி வசன ரூபமாயும், சுருக்கமாயும் வேதாந்த சங்கிரகம் என்னும் இந்நூல் இயற்றப்பட்டிருக்கிறது.’

so goes the preface. One Brahmmasri Narayana Swamigal, called Coimbatore Swamigal, has indited a stanza of praise like this -

’சற்சங்க ராமசா மித்தள வாய்ப்புனிதன்
நிற்சங்க மாநிரா லம்பமெய்தத் - தத்சங்க
நற்சுவையா வேதாந்த சங்கிரக நல்கினான்
சிற்சங்க மாகச் செறிந்து.’

The book proper -

’ஜெக ஜீவ பரத்தின் குணதோஷங்களை நன்றாய் ஆராய்ந்து அதன் உண்மையை அறிந்து அதனிடமாக வைத்த பற்றுக்களை நீக்குந்தன்மையே வைராக்கியமாம்.’

ஜெக சீவ பரம் மித்தை என்று அறிவதே வைராக்கியமாகும்’

’ஆத்துமாவில் தோன்றின அறிவு அதில் ஒடுங்குவதே முத்தி என்றறிந்து போக இச்சை ஜெகக் காட்சிகளை நீக்கினவனே பக்குவன்’

’அறிவதெல்லாம் அறிந்த மனதுக்கு அடைவு ஏதென்றால் போகங்களைத் தனது என்று எண்ணும் நினைவைத் தவிர்ந்து நிற்றலாம். இதுவே பக்குவம்.’

‘காளைப் பருவத்தில் உலகாசாரத்தை நீக்கித் தன்மனத்தில் உதித்த அற்ப விசாரத்தால் ஞானத்தில் மனதை நிலைபெறச் செய்வது ஆச்சரியம்.’

’பிரமமே உல்லாச லீலையால் சரீரம் உடையவனைப் போலவும், புமானைப் போலவும் பிரகாசிக்கும்.’

’பிரமமாகிற நமது ஆத்துமாவே, பிரமமென்றும் கூடஸ்தனென்றும் ஈசுரனென்றும் சீவனென்றும் நான்கு சைதன்னியமாகும்.’

So goes through all 30 pages full of aphoristic mint.

The Thalavai has been a Thalavai of Meignana also. And the small book is a great act of charity for even the yet-to-come souls pursuing non-dual realisation. My humble salute to the great soul, so generous. 

Namo Parama Rishibyo namo Parama Rishibyaha.

(Ref : Vedanta Sangirakam, Thalavai Iramaswamy Mudaliyar, 1908, Thirunelveli Siththivinaayakar acchuyantira saalai, pp 35)

***

A J Ayer and NDE

A great philosopher of the logical positivist school, A J Ayer, was uncompromising in his stand that statements which do not lend themselves to empirical verification or analytical exercise are quite meaningless. A great hit at the traditional metaphysics indeed. He was not a shy away philosopher when he confronted the unwanted advances of Mike Tyson on a new model in a party given by a fashion designer, saying 'I suggest we talk about this like rational men'. 

Just one year before his death, A J Ayer had a near-death experience. On recovery he said that the experience slightly weakened his conviction that his genuine death will be the end of him. Later he opined that he should have rather told instead 'my experiences have weakened, not my belief that there is no life after death, but my inflexible attitude towards that belief'.

Strange! We demand that we should experience ourselves to accept anything. But will we allow ourselves to accept our experiences?

***

Reality and Study

When we were studying High School or College, we were not having high tech resources of study materials. At the most some extra libraries some miles away and expecting perhaps half a day's journey to and fro to take one or two books of your choice or luck and another hour or two towards rest before you can zero in on your book load in some recluse corner in the rooftop. If it is a great find and hefty material of your interests then to share about it you have to wait till the next day when in the college you can chat over chaayaa. Naturally many authors worthy of note who belonged to the period from the end of 19th CE to the middle of 20th CE. But what we covered by way of college study and personal study and extra studies seemed sumptuous. Of course the mental culture had a great time to shape, enough rest and space to digest and progress. But after the internet what we covered in regular and extra curricular seem little and sparse.

Otherwise how to account for this man Mr L P Jacks, Lawrence Pearsall Jacks, whom I simply didn't hear about mentioned. But see his writing! If this is not sanity then what else?

"To say that the universe is a Rational Whole appears to me true. But to treat this as an adequate account of Reality appears to me false. I am equally averse to regarding the rationality of the universe as the fundamental or all-inclusive or even the dominant form of its self-expression.

What does form a Rational Whole and is adequately described by this term is the movement of thought throughout the ages—in a word, the History of Philosophy. To equate this movement with the universe to which it refers, to make the History of Philosophy into a History of Reality, appears to me an error. We are constantly tempted to make this equation, and constantly prevented from seeing its falsity, by the habit of treating speculative thought as a form of ours into which all experience must manage to fit itself."

(L P Jacks, The Alchemy of Thought, Williams and Norgate, 1911, Preface)

*** 

Some thoughts on Leadership - Management studies

The Management Science has been dealing so far with the question leadership vs management. Who is a leader? who is a manager? and like that. Now at last it seems management studies have striken paydirt by taking up the question of Followership.

The old adage goes - who knows how to obey knows how to lead. The art of intelligent obedience and following and definitely not the blind toeing. Good followership must be able to intuit the mind of leader. Not only that good followership knows how to park the ego with no loss to dignity in the dynamic flow towards efficient and effectual process. (Perhaps Sri Ramanuja can make you think not only as a manager, not simply as a leader but more so as an efficient follower when he says - Seshatva is having its pratikodi in Seshitva) That means a good and intelligent follower implies and presumes a true leader.

*

But 'followership' vis a vis 'Leadership', if it should not become reductive in understanding towards cultish behaviour and if really scientific understanding should happen in the context of organisations and business, another aspect equally important is that of 'Dissenting' or 'Deviant perception' or 'differing in view'. How a leader relates to this equally creative voice as that of intelligent follower matters not less. The art of intelligent followership is a great task. And equally tough and crucial is the task of 'meaningful dissent'. Being passionate towards impersonal vision and being intelligent and aware in personal relationships, motivated and defined by the vision and energised by the goal and results calls for great personal and group intuitive empathy and order which results from such intuitiveness. 

*

Large presence of Shakespeare

Shakespeare sits very large in our midst, huge and big centrally. We with all our creative pranks are only children trying to scale his laps, his back, his shoulders. We do pretend sometimes his absence sitting on his own shoulders and we proclaim also sometimes that we have outrun the Bard of Avon. We snob ourselves out with all sorts of badges, MODERN, POSTMODERN, POSTSTRUCTURAL, POST...this and that. No offence. It is our right. But universe itself has as it were connived to give us all lies at the end of day, if we are forgetting Shakespeare. But he sits cool, the Stage Bird, careless and casual in the centre big and vast. How else to react to this opening lines in A MIdsummer Night's Dream! -

'Theseus.-
What say you, Hermia? be advised, fair maid:
To you your father should be as a god;
One that composed your beauties; yea, and one
To whom you are but as a form in wax
By him imprinted and within his power
To leave the figure or disfigure it.
Demetrius is a worthy gentleman.

Hermia.-
So is Lysander.

The.-
In himself he is;
But in this kind, wanting your father’s voice,
The other must be held the worthier.

Her.-
I would my father look’d but with my eyes.

The.-
Rather your eyes must with his judgement look.

Her.-
I do entreat your Grace to pardon me.
I know not by what power I am made bold.
Nor how it may concern my modesty,
In such a presence here to plead my thoughts;
But I beseech your Grace that I may know
The worst that may befall me in this case,
If I refuse to wed Demetrius.'

***

Nietzsche! you may frown

Nietzsche! you may frown
But let me speak my mind now
I overheard the morning Sun
Self-repeating the evening Sun :
'I don't shine for you to praise,
neither for anybody to appraise
I just am the way I am Zaratushtra !
I neither rise up in the morn
Nor go down in the even,
Nor I go anywhere to the darker half
To make my shine in any way useful;
Beings and things rotate around me,
part time in light, part time in darkness.
Beings are yet to become fully of light;
Perhaps they need darkness as much as light;
Whatever, please act not under apparent sight;
When you know what you can know
there the light of knowledge shines;
when you know not what you cannot
there the light of ignorance shines.'
Nietzsche! you may frown
But I have spoken what was in my mind. 

*** 

This was written in reference to the opening section of Nietzsche's 'Thus Spake Zarathushtra'. 

some after thoughts - 

Poetry and Philosophy are perhaps the same Consciousness of opposite vectors. Poetry across sensuous reaches the transcendental. Philosophy translates the transcendental in terms of the sensuous. Or you may have it the other way also. - Poetry suggests the transcendental in the context of the sensuous and Philosophy makes sensational the transcendental

Meeting a great poem like a friend...

Sometimes you happen to meet a great friend or a great poem. One such is the paasuram, the poem of Tiruvaimozhi, TheerthanukkE.

'The Lord of Beauty sanctifies
and wins you for ever and ever;
knowing well that there is no other refuge,
mentally resolved, happy, restful in Him, the great refuge;
Satakopa of the rich land of Kurukur
has uttered these thousand sanctities,
these thousand poems pure;
of these, even this decad, if anyone masters,
that person will be worshiped
by the Eternal Citizens of Vaikunt
and those celestials will fondly
describe that person illustrious
as the walking purifiers
to their mates
in their thick moments of service
to the Great God.'

(Reflecting meekly the EEdu..)

The key word in this poem is the Tamil word 'Theerthan'.

Theertham - taan parisuddhamumaai, tannai Sparisittaarukku parisuddharaampadi paNNumatAyirRu.

Theertham - that which itself is pure and also again that which purifies whatever comes in contact with itself.

theerthanukkaRRapin - He has won over me by His beauty and has made me dislike everything else.

When the heart goes after Tirumaal
pleasures all lose their hold on me

who is crazy over Paramaatma and dislikes anything which makes one forget Paramaatma.

So intense devotion to God itself makes you detached from worldly things. That is the meaning of Theertha.

Nammazhvar's poems are personifications of such intense devotion and not only that, those who have mastered and dedicated their hearts to his poems are also forms of Theerthams.

***

Unlimited Grace in the context of limitations

A beautiful poem from Kalhana on the form of Ardhanaari of Siva.

'His form seems limited
by sharing his left with the daughter
of the Mountain-King;
On His head shines the moon
limited by digits few;
And He has a weapon
with a break in the middle;
But how does His grace abounds
unlimited on every being
taking refuge in Him !'
(tr mine)

text -
வபு: கண்டே கண்ட: ப்ரதிவஸதி சைலேந்த்ரதுஹிது:
சிகண்டே கண்டேந்து: ஸ்வயமபி விபு: கண்டபரசு:|
ததாபி ப்ரத்யக்ரம் சரணமுபயாதம் ப்ரதிவிபோ:
அகண்டோ வ்யாபாரோ ஜகதி கருணயா விஜயதே ||
(அர்த்தநாரீச்வர ஸ்தோத்ரம்)

*
The tension and the contrariety between the temporal and the eternal, the limited and the unlimited, the local and the universal, the atomic and the all-pervading, the imperfect and the perfect is captured poetically in the form of Siva. His grace alone is the bridge which connects the transient being with the ever-abiding. But nothing can limit that Grace, which is the only saving factor. All else, we do not know and perhaps we can never know.

***

A story about Kalidasa

Sometimes the stories about the poets are as poetical and interesting. Once an ordinary person approached the great poet Kalidasa and expressed his difficulties and dire need of money. Kalidasa had an idea. 'OK today is the birthday of our King. Go and bow down before him and say 'Let you be free of three hurdles'. Definitely you will get something. Don't show in the Sabha that you are known to me or that I have given you this hint.

The person came to the Sabha and bowed before the King and said forgetting the exact words 'Let you be three hurdles!' 

What will happen? Dare any person on the face of the King say that the King be three hurdles! Poor man he forgot the exact wordings - Let you be free of Three hurdles. The King became furious and was about to order something dangerous. But the presence of mind of Kalidasa ! Kalidasa told the King 'Oh Great Emperor of the world! The poor man has said only blessings on you but he has been too economical with his words. Some poets happen to be like that. You see what he said 'Let you be three hurdles" Yea when you sit on the throne he wishes you to face often the hurdle of standing up and welcoming extraordinary scholars to your court. That means he wishes for you the abounding of world-renowned scholars in your court. It is a blessing really even though it is worded as hurdle. It is a welcome hurdle.

And again, while eating he wishes you to face often the hurdle of being disturbed by the pranks of your children, rising up on your laps, snatching your morsels of food, taking sweets away from your plates and eating themselves. Again this hurdle is a blessing in reality. This person wishes such a hurdle for you.

Again in your bed you must be disturbed by your wife and thereby you must lose your sleep in dallying of pleasure. Again is it not a welcome hurdle, a real blessing?

So it is we who must read this person in the right way.'

Wow.. the person got rewarded in extra.

***

Mahabharata and medicine

Do you know Mahabharata? Yea.. you must be knowing. Mahabharata has been written in Tamil poems as Villibharatam by Villiputhurazhwar or Villiputhurar. Also by Nalla pIllai. Also there is one Perundevanar Bharatam, an old work in venba metre. But what I am going to tell is completely different.

This is Mahabharata. That too in Tamil. But it is a medical book. I will come again. This work deals with Vyasa's Mahabharata in so many parvams. Yea sure. And the story is the story of Mahabharata. But it is a medical book. :-) Perplexing?

That is the whole work which is called Theraiyar Maruttu Bharatam is loaded doubly, each verse with two senses, one of the story and one of the medical info. The prosody of Slesha Alankara has been used by Theraiyar to do this.

The book has come out in 1909 published by Mr K S Murugesa Mudaliyar in Vijaya Vikatan Press, Chennai. The book is called Theraiyar aruliya Maruttu Bharata Natakam.

மொழிந்த மருத்துப் பாரதத்தின்
முறை நாடகத்தின் உரை அருத்தம்
உன்னிச் சிலேடை இருபொருளும்
முடித்துக் கொள்ளுவார் பண்டிதரே....

மொழிந்த தேரப் பெருமானும்
உதவியாகப் பண்டிதர்க்கு இங்கு
உறுதி மரும நூல் உரைத்தான்
ஒன்றும் இனிமேல் உரையானே.

So this is perhaps the final work of Theraiyar in his series of medical works in different genres. Here in this work he has spun the epic and the medicine into one. Even the opening prayer song is doubly loaded.

வாதமாய்ப் படைத்துப் பித்த
வன்னியாய்க் காத்துச் சேட்பச்
சீதமாய்த் துடைத்துப் பாராந்
தேகத்திற் குடியாம் ஐந்து
பூத இந்தியமாம் ஐவர்
பூசைகொண்டு அவர்பால் விந்து
நாதமாம் கிஷ்ணமூர்த்தி
நமக்கென்றும் துணையாவாரே.

How very creative people have been down the time! But does anybody care for such rare things in our heritage? That too nowadays people have become highly cell-centric.

***

Ideology and human goodness

Anything which makes us more human, more awakened is good. If religion makes us more broad-minded and more humane then it is good. If what we read makes us more understanding and cognitive of democratic virtues and humane vales then our reading is in the right direction. But if our religion or studies make us more narrow-minded and tradition-bound then what good can come out of it? To become an educated fool cannot be the end of a really worthy life.

The spirit and the letter of a book, that too ancient books, are always different. The letter belongs to an age which is archaic. But if understood in the best of human interests, the spirit of the book may still be inspiring. When you try to understand the spirit, the 'authorities' of the letter become tense and expect you to apply for their sanction, nod and approval. According to them, preferably, you get the whole sense of the text from them. Generally people who are meek and who want easy ways to wisdom prefer to toe their guidance. But it need not be like that, especially if you prefer to retain your freedom of thinking and self-autonomy. Your sincere efforts and meticulous study are guidance enough to make you arrive at any essential and meaningful concept of any path. So don't load any 'authorities' over your head, when you are quite sufficient as a human being.

*
You see, we take to reading to gain knowledge and expand our awareness. The immediate help are the books. Thank God, not like the olden days, when to read or study a work you have to devote a considerable part of your time to get the work from others in any form. Then aids to understanding are another task in those days. If you are fortunate you may get something. But our age has crossed all such miasma. Now chances for knowledge are plenty and free. Only thing is you must have that passion and need.

But while reading there are subtle games played by us, by society and by who not and by what not. When we are deep into any subject we tend to appreciate great people who have very clearly explained things. And we feel extremely grateful when we read the original masters who have given us various theories in various subjects. But so far so good. But the matter does not end there. Slowly we idolize the authors we like in our minds and develop what is called 'hero-worship'. Any worship makes you blind to the aspects of criticism in the person or the field. We tend to attribute only great and sweet things to our idols. That is either we must eulogize or spew hatred. These extremity-addiction is another virus that slowly gets into our mind. But all these show that we possess a bad self-confidence. If we are confident about ourselves we should be more creative in our reading and that too in our reading of very ancient masters to whom we think nothing but salutations should be in our minds.

Another thing, just because we identify something wrong in what has been said by a person contemporary or old need not disturb our general attitude of like or respect to that person. Perhaps we must be more realistic and compassionate both to that person and to us.

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Swami Vivekananda's Chicago speech and Tamil translations of early decades

Some event in history becomes a sort of magnet-event, attracting the enthusiasm, efforts and involvement of contemporary and succeeding generations. Swami Vivekananda's speech at the Parliament of Religions, Chicago was one such event. Otherwise why should the owner of Anandabodhini journal Mr N Munisamy Mudaliyar ask the Tamil teacher of National College High School in Trichy, Mr E S Varadaraja Iyengar, to translate the Chicago speeches of Swamiji. This was happening in 1929. The Tamil teacher was living in Uraiyur, Saraswathy Nilayam.

Anandabodhini was given its name by His Holiness Karapatra Swamigal, who was at Sadhu Nilayam, Vyasarpadi. From 1915 it was running as a monthly, attracting a subscription of 20000, as the blurb in the backpages says. And when the translation of Chicago addresses was coming out in 1929, in the same year Sri Ramakrishna Math Chennai was bringing out a selection of Swamiji's words bearing on Nationalistic themes and about our country as .Namadu Thaainadu, selected and translated by Ra Krishnamurthy, with the foreword of Swami Yathiswarananda. In the Munnurai Swami Yathiswarananda says that the complete works of Swami Vivekananda was yet to come out in Tamil at that time, 1929 and opines that the said selection of Swamiji's words will well fill the gap in the meantime.

Already in 1921, Mr M S Nateson of Trichy brought out the Tamil translation of the paper on Hinduism by Swami Vivekananda, which forms part of Chicago speeches through The Vivekananda Publishing House, Teppakulam, Tiruchi.

I think even this itself will form a good research theme. i. e. various translations in various regional languages both during when Swamiji was living and after his time in the following decades. And also what were the reactions, informal and written or some comments occurring in some other places.

Yea .. An event having reverberations through time.

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Something about old books in Tamil

Sometimes the uncle and nephew combination works in a great way in history. One person, who is the uncle is a great poet. He has sung the great epic Ramayana in a shortened form as 'Sangraha Ramayanam'. His name is Narayanaswamy Iyer. It was in, say, before 1908. In about 1000 stanzas in Tamil Mr Narayanasswami Iyer has wrought a miracle. The diction is chaste and the flow is streaming and the imagination is cool. One example is when Hanuman returns back to Sri Rama after seeing Seetha Devi. The famous line in Kambar starts with 'Kanadanan' 'Have seen'. So also here in Sangraha Ramayanam

கண்டனன் சனகன் குலமானைக்
கடுவா யரவங் கலைமதியை
யுண்டா லனைய முகத்தாளை
உணவுன் உணர்வாய் உடையாளை
வண்டார் பொழில்சூழ் இலங்கைநகர்
வனத்தோர் மரத்தின் வடமுகமாய்த்
தண்டா மரையா லுலகேழுந்
தந்தா யெந்தாய்த் தவநிலையை.

Seen the dearest girl of Janaka
with face sorrow-engulfed
like the moon swallowed by the nodes
Her only food is awareness of Thee
seated in the grove under a tree
of Lanka facing the direction north
seven-fold world begotten by Thee
through a Lotus yea I have seen
austerity itself as a form. (Tr mine)

Mr Narayanaswamy Iyer's nephew was one Govindaswamy Iyer. The nephew has written a beautiful life history of the great teacher of Advaita, Sri Sankara. His work is Sankara Vijayam in 767 verses in Tamil. How both are competing each other in diction style and rhythmic flow of poetic fibre! This book came in 1909. One example is when Govinda Yogi teaches Sri Sankara -

நான்கு மாமறை முடிப்பொருள் நான்கையும் நவின்று
வான்க ருப்பொரு ளொன்றிட உத்திகள் வழங்கித்
தான்கு றிப்பொடு பிரணவப் பொருளினைச் சாற்றி
ஊன்க ழித்திடு யோகமுந் தெளிவுற உரைத்தார்.

Teaching the great four Mahavakyas of the four Vedas and instructing on the methods of gaining the nondual identity and giving the secret special teachings about Pranavam and clarifying the salient steps of non-bodiness in Yogic practice Govinda Yogi taught the Great Teacher. (tr mine)

Such an uncle and such a nephew... sometimes it happens so. Is it not?

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