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Saundarya Lahari
SAUNDARYA LAHARI - VERSE 17
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SAUNDARYA LAHARI
VERSE 17
SCINTILLATING AND FLUORESCENT LIGHT (LYRIC POETRY)
THE SEMANTIC BLENDING OF VERTICAL WITH HORIZONTAL WORD-BEARING ELEMENTS
सवित्रीभि-र्वाचां चशि-मणि शिला-भङ्ग रुचिभि-
र्वशिन्यद्याभि-स्त्वां सह जननि सञ्चिन्तयति यः ।
स कर्ता काव्यानां भवति महतां भङ्गिरुचिभि-
र्वचोभि-र्वाग्देवी-वदन-कमलामोद मधुरैः
savitribhir vacam sasimanisilabhangarucibhir
vasiyadhyabhis tvam saha janani sancitayati yah
sa karta kavyanam bhavati mahatam bhangirucibhir
vacobhir vagdevi vadanakamalamoda madhuraih
He who can contemplate those word-bearing elements of broken moonstone lustre,
Joined with Vasinis, having an elusively fluid gleam;
He becomes, o Mother, the author of great poetic works,
Adding sweet charm to the lotus face of the Goddess of the Word.
In this verse we are again in the domain of semantics. In this branch of study Sankara shows himself, as in his other works, to be an expert rival to his Purva Mimamsa critics and to the Mimamsakas who, as followers of the tradition of Jaimini rather than that of Badarayana, took an anterior position in respect of Vedanta. Sankara is seen to hold his own remarkably. Semantics has two main subdivisions, called syntactics and semiotics. Modern authorities on semantics, like Bloomfield, Morris and Carnap, have many theories about how meanings emerge from words. The pragmatics and syntactics of language belong to the two other aspects of the study of meanings in relation to words. Some authorities, like Ogden, even think in terms of "the meaning of meaning." In the days of Sankara, Kumarila Bhatta, Prabhakara and Vacaspati Misra, great semantic battles have been fought on the soil of scriptural exegesis, the rumblings of which are heard even to the present day in the domain of advanced punditry and pedantry.
Sankara is content to allude to only two aspects of semantics in this Verse. The "word-bearing elements" of the first line are named savitris, as opposed to the vasinis of the second line. The former have "broken moonstone lustre", while the latter have a "fluid gleam". These two different qualities of precious stones have to be taken into consideration and respected by a master poet who wishes to embellish the beauty of the Goddess of the Word, instead of bringing discredit to her directly or indirectly. The "broken moonstone lustre", here referred to, is the syntactic aspect of word-meaning content where bursting into light is a function recognized in Panini's famous grammar as the absolute principle of sphota. The word sphota is derived from sphut which means "to burst into clarity" as in the case of a diamond, here modified in terms of a broken moonstone, possibly in the interest of contrasting this way of viewing word-meaning with the kind of homogeneity to be assumed between whole moonstones with a fluid gleam, called vasinis in the next line. The syntax refers to the mechanical relationship between word and word in a sentence. Each word is considered by the Bhatta-Prabhakara school to be independent of the total meaning of the sentence and as having a disjunct function of its own. Sankara's followers, however, hold that meaning is an emergent factor resulting from the sentence as a whole and is not to be broken up into bits. Thus the vasini and savitri elements of language are treated here as complementary to each other. The vasinis are to be joined on terms of equality with their counterpart, the individual word- bearing elements or savitris. These word-bearing elements could be viewed as similar to cybernetic information bits in computers.
Semiosis is a process like the flowing of a liquid; while syntax is a sudden bursting into scintillating light, suggesting meaningfulness. As a jeweler might set a ruby and diamond side by side to enhance the beauty of a circular gold ear-ornament, not unlike the Sri Chakra, as worn by Indian women, we can agree that such an arrangement can only enhance the beauty of the poetry by giving equal importance to syntactic bursting as well as to flowing semiotic processes. When an author knows the secret of respecting these subtle semantic requirements, consciously or unconsciously, the beauty of his poetry is enhanced, consciously or unconsciously. The whole purpose of writing poetry is to enhance the beauty of the face of the Goddess of the Word. It could not be otherwise, because no poet wants to defeat his purpose by creating ugliness.
ADDITIONAL COMMENTS WITH STRUCTURAL DIAGRAMS RELATED TO THIS VERSE FROM SAUNDARYA LAHARI/NOTES
savitri bhir vacam - those word-bearing elements
sasi mani silabhanga ruci bhih - of broken moonstone lustre
vasin yadya bhih - with her word Vashinis
tvam saha - as associated with you
janani - o mother
sancintayati - yah - he thus able to contemplate
saha - he
karta kavyanam - the author of (great) poetic works
bhavati - he becomes
mahatam - great (poetic works - above)
bhangiruci bhihi - of scintillating sweetness
vaco bhih - by words
vak devi vadana kamala moda madhuraih - adding sweet charm to the lotus face of the Goddess of the Word
In the bottom half of the structure is a real taste or magenta colour.
These two, word and meaning, can be put together.
This picture involves refraction, reflection, diffraction: the total glow of light on a beard, for example.
This same diffraction can be seen in the cut moonstones which are brought together.
So Numerator words and Denominator experience are brought together.
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Denominator moonstones are pressed together.
This verse shows:
1) The aspect which gives birth to the world (broken moonstone),
2) The principle from which the world originates, (moonstone with a fluid gleam)
the predicate is subsistent.
There is a spot on the moon which does not spoil its beauty but only enhances it.
If Kalidasa's Shakuntala wears an un-beautiful sari made of bark cloth, it only sets off her beauty more.
This means that the negative side is also necessary to the totality of Absolute Beauty.
You should not always ask for Numerator values, Her absolute beauty consists of both Numerator and Denominator.
So, Aphrodite has both a Numerator and a Denominator form.
The Numerator Devi will encourage Brahmacharis, (Wisdom-students. ED)
The Denominator Devi will have lots of children.
(The "Three Dolorosas" of De Quincey's "Confessions of an Opium Eater".
One enters with a key and tells You to commit suicide.
One kicks in the door and drives You mad.
Savitri: the Mother who gives birth to the universe
Vashini: the Numerator aspect of the Devi (Diana).
He says that the "appearance" of matter is due to the diffraction of light.
This means that the diamonds in an earring will glow as one diamond.
VERSE 97
"As the Goddess of the Word, Veda-knowers speak of You as Brahma's wife
Lakshmi is Vishnu's wedded one, and the Mountain Daughter is Shiva's consort;
Certain others as the unattainable and boundless fourth state refer to You;
While you remain as the great Maya, making the universe go round, as queen of the Ultimate Absolute."
Elsewhere, the Guru said that beauty is "Just a light playing on the face".
The diffracted glory of the Devi - this means that "even when You, the Devi, cut the moonstone, it shines as one entity".
The most masterly similes in poetry are used by Kalidasa; Sankara continues this same tradition.
Then, on the Numerator side are the Vashinis, with diferent-coloured lights.
He who can reconstruct Absolute Beauty in these terms becomes a poet, the author of mahakavyas (great poetry), beginning with grandiose Creation, so vague and sublime, encompassing the Absolute.
Kavya is a highly artificial Sanskrit literary style employed in the court epics of India from the early centuries C.E.. It evolved an elaborate poetics of figures of speech, among which the metaphor and simile predominate. Other characteristics of the style are hyperbole, the careful use of language to achieve a particular effect, a sometimes ostentatious display of erudition, and an adroit use of varied and complicated metres—all applied to traditional subjects and themes derived from early popular epics.
The style finds its classical expression in the so-called mahakavya (“great poem”), in the strophic lyric (a lyric based on a rhythmic system of two or more lines repeated as a unit), and in the Sanskrit theatre. ED)
"Reconstructing You, the Devi, in terms of these two principles, secondary to Your absolute status.
He who can reconstruct You together with Your component parts, he becomes a true poet."
Secondary component parts of the Numerator and Denominator have to be integrated around the face of the Goddess, located in the bindusthana (central locus).
The vowels can have various colours - crystal, coral or smoky, ranging from vermilion to yellow, including gold.
I bow to Vasini [she who attracts everything], Kamesvari [she who is the mistress of lust], Modini [she who is happy], Vimala [she who is blemishless], Aruna [she who is magenta in colour], Jayini [she who is always victorious], Sarvesvari [she who is the mistress of all], Kaulini, [the enjoyer, the mistress of kulachara].
There is one kavya (poem) for each of the 14 days of the moon;
two are left over, which must be put in the Bindhusthana, making 16.
A semiotic process follows: Mashinta (?) in the Muladhara Chakra. (Pashinti? ED)
"I feel confident that my hopes to retrieve and salvage this knowledge are worthwhile. Today, because of this verse, I feel confident again." (Nataraja Guru).
This I can see clearly - and it is of the utmost importance.
This verse contains very clear indications (in the commentary of the pundits)." (Nataraja Guru)
The sun's aspects are dovetailed into the moon's (14+2)
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14 and 14 for each of the two lunar fortnights.
| Krishna Paksha | |
|---|---|
| 1. Prathama | 1. Prathama |
| 2. Dwitiya | 2. Dwitiya |
| 3. Tritiya | 3. Tritiya |
| 4. Chaturthi | 4. Chaturthi |
| 5. Panchami | 5. Panchami |
| 6. Shashti | 6. Shashti |
| 7. Saptami | 7. Saptami |
| 8. Ashtami | 8. Ashtami |
| 9. Navami | 9. Navami |
| 10.Dashami | 10.Dashami |
| 11.Ekadashi | 11.Ekadashi |
| 12.Dwadashi | 12.Dwadashi |
| 13.Thrayodashi | 13.Trayodasi |
| 14.Chaturdashi | 14.Chaturdashi |
| 15.Purnima | 15. Amavasya |
There are 8 Vashinis, with Kaulini as the extreme negative and 12 Vashinis as the positive factors.
"Vashini" means "to attract" and "Kaulini" is the bottomless pit.
Yoginis (female yogis) do not attract men, they will throw stones at the hippies who approach them.
Why 12 and 8 ? They can be revalued as 10 and 10.
Why letters? Because it is through them that things come into meaning.
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A woman must be broken from contact with the Bhu (earth): that is, the base-line of the diagram.
All this attraction of women, pulling down men, is called Vashini (? ED.).
Electric current is always 16 (?10) times stronger than its magnetism.
It is an exponential or logarithmic relationship.
Actually, the Yoginis and Vashinis all go on the negative side:
the Yoginis on the left, as virtual and the Vashinis on the right, as actual.
Another version:
- That which gives birth to words (Savitri), Shining like bursting moonstone (scintillating)
- With divinities such as those called Vashinis (like rubies)
- As united together with You
- O Mother
- He who thinks integratedly (i.e. contemplatively)
- He
- The author of poetry becomes
- Of great
- Pleasing because of liquid or fluid beauty
- By means of words
- Of pleasing sweetness belonging to the lotus face of the Word Goddess
The other process - semantic - is like bursting into meaning.
The man who can put these together can write poetry adding to the beauty of the Goddess of the Word (Vak Devi).
Here we have rubies and diamonds integrated into one whole.
This refers to.........., a particular style of Malayalam poetry, meaning diamonds and rubies. (? ED.)
a lotus mouth, with a fragrance and Savitri, the generator of words, giving birth.
The Vashinis are Numerator.
Another version:
- (That which gives) giving birth to words (Savitri).
- Shining like bursting moonstone (scintillating)
- With divinities such as those called Vashinis.
- As united together with You
- O, Mother
- He who thinks integratedly (i.e. contemplatively)
- He
- The author of poetry becomes
- Of great
- Pleasing because of liquid or fluid beauty (i.e. the words)
- By means of words
- Of pleasing sweetness belonging to the lotus face of the Word-Goddess
The circle is the face of the Devi; then there are the generating and the conceptual tendencies - and these give his words a sinuous, tricky quality.
He says there are two kinds of beauty. Sankara says something delicate and elusive.
A man who can weave together both of these aspects of Beauty - Savitris and Vashinis - will succeed in describing it.
His poetry will have an excellence by which it will do justice to Absolute Beauty.
Gems of different kinds have to be intermixed and integrated, not placed in the Numerator and Denominator as before stated.
Pundits used to get all involved in the sounds of words.
Sankara puts together word and meaning; these are semiotic processes.
.Two sets of semantic factors which must be put together - then great poetry emerges.
(There is a parallel between these two kinds of light and the similar image found in Verse 37. ED)
Vertical = streaming
They belong together and have to be treated together and then Vak Devi (The Goddess of the Word) will emerge.
They belong together, like diamonds and rubies.
The man who contemplates this way will be the author of great poetry - doing justice to the face of Vak Devi.
Just take the line out of the diagram (?).
An absolute Vak Devi is in question here: the integration of word and meaning.
Here is a closer view, in term of gems, of semantic and semiotic processes: there is the broken diamond at the Numerator and the fluid moonstone at the Denominator.
These aspects must be blended together to give the best of poetry.
You should use a scintillating phrase, followed by something more dull; there must be a flow between them.
Syntactic and semiotic processes are described here, it is the same idea as before, but more concentrated.
There is a lotus half-open connected with the face, there are no feet: this is a more normalised view.
METHOD:
Show peasant-girl beauty and show film-star beauty together.
Scintillating - a syntactic process, bursts into meaning.
This verse refers to the meaning of meaning.
Sweet >< Savoury
"Dappled" means an alternation.
Vedantic beauty is not pure white.
Switch from black and white to colour.
There are four dimensions of abstraction.
Syntactics, semantics and semiotics are involved here.
Beauty comes from mixing this with Sphota - it is a scintillating light
- meaning that it is derived not from single words but from sentences.
Two rival theories of semantics - part of Karma Kanda, the branch of knowledge dealing with action.
One involves the spread of meaning through the phrases.
Two qualities must blend, broken moonstone scintillation and a fluid gleam.
Savitri = coming from the sun, bright.
Root = to be born, bursts into meaning = Sphota.
Because there is a reflection and refraction there.
Jainas and Muslims penetrated South India, the latter ruling for some 500 years.
Spirituality was thus put into the melting pot from Hyderabad southwards.
In Kerala, the Nambudri Brahmins found Kerala women with their paddy fields, coconuts and fish.
They left many children. Kerala was full of pirates.
This explains why there are so many fair Malayalis who know Sanskrit.
They are descendants of Mughals and North Indians.
Sankara thus says:" I am a dravida sishyu (Dravidian child) and a vidyarthi (wisdom-seeker)." Narayana Guru comes into this category.
Many of the Acharyas and so-called Rishis (wise men) are descendants of Muslims, who have values close to Jainism.
Raos, Iyyengars and Iyers (Three major Brahmin groups in South India. ED): these are the three categories of false "pundits" - not real Brahmins.
"Punyadeshi"(?) is not a great Sanskrit book - but degenerate.
Real Vedanta is far, far away from the Brahmin's ideas. All this has to be explained.
Thus, the commentary in the English version is completely off the mark.
"I must condemn and correct these pundits, otherwise I cannot rebuild and re-establish Vedanta in the style of Sankara and Narayana Guru".
Generators of speech, Vasini and others - the eight deities, Vasini and others of the Sarva-rogahara-cakra. They are said to preside over the eight groups of the letters of the alphabet: a-, ka-,ca-,ta-, ta-, pa-, ya- and sa-varga-s. They are, according to the Agamas, of the color of bright crystal. Some say that the vowels are of crystal white color, the letters ka to ma of the colour of coral, the nine letters from ya, yellow, and ksa, red. Others hold that the vowels are of the color of smoke, letters from ka to tha of vermillion, from da to pha white, from ba to la which included la scarlet, from va to sa of the colour of gold, and ha and ksa of the colour of lightning. Laksmidhara holds that the latter is the view held by the author.
SAUNDARYA LAHARI - VERSE 18
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SAUNDARYA LAHARI
VERSE 18
A KEY VERSE
A COMPLETE AURORA
VITALITY CONTRASTED WITH DELICACY
KIMPURUSHAS AND CELESTIAL MAIDS ARE CANCELLED
CANCELLABLE COUNTERPARTS
तनुच्छायाभिस्ते तरुण-तरणि-श्रीसरणिभि-
र्दिवं सर्वा-मुर्वी-मरुणिमनि मग्नां स्मरति यः ।
भवन्त्यस्य त्रस्य-द्वनहरिण-शालीन-नयनाः
सहोर्वश्या वश्याः कति कति न गीर्वाण-गणिकाः
tannucchayabhis taruna tarani srisaranibhir
divam sarvam urvim arunima nimagnam smarati yah
bhavantyasya trasyad vanaharina salina nayanah
sahorvasya vasya kati kati na girvana ganikah
With shades of your bodily form enriched by the tenderly sunlit sky of a dappled dawn
Submerging the whole earth within its sheer magenta glory able to contemplate thus,
He wins over maids with startled, gentle, wild-deer eyes
Together with Urvasi and how many, how many other such celestial damsels.
Mutual attraction between the sexes is a normal aspiration in the world of erotic life not only of adolescents of no distinction, but also of superior men or women, whether earthly or celestial in their value as beautiful persons, viewed from a neutral point between them, where the prototype of Absolute Beauty is to be attributed to the central Goddess of these verses. All manifestations of bodily beauty have to be derived from this central normative model. If we consider this model as real, all other manifestations of bodily beauty are only shadows or reflected images of the same. When we concede these facts in respect of beauty, and try to fill the total ground or field with this content of beauty, we get roughly the picture presented here by Sankara.
In Verse 13 the same heavenly damsels of this verse were referred to respecting their state of infatuation for an over-aged, ugly man, who had but the side-glance of the Goddess embellishing his attractiveness. There, the attractiveness was a kind of reflected glory, even a little of which was enough to give him heightened personal value. This same idea of the mutual heightening of values between men and women of superior or ordinary levels, though in a more wholesale context of overwhelming beauty, is what is again pictured here in order to view the same subject from a more homogeneously unified viewpoint.
Here it is a devotee within whose consciousness, as he meditates on Absolute Beauty, rich patches of shaded magenta are seen. The shade is derived from the earthy side, but the tender dawn contributes its light pink brilliance. Colours become beautiful by saturation, tint or brilliance. Brilliance is hypostatic in origin; tint or shade must have a reference at the lower, horizontal limit of origin. Saturation is a quality which depends upon the distance of the colour: it decreases inversely when the patch of colour increases its distance from the centre of the structure. These patches are not essentially different from the forest of lotuses described in Verse 16. Here the flower form is made to fade impressionisticaly into the background and the patches take their place with the same overpowering appeal. This is because the contemplation here is evidently that of a yogi, also neutrally placed vis-à-vis the model of beauty at the core of his own field of consciousness.
Yoga could be conceived of as a type of union between values; and when this union takes place, the yogi is supposed to see a vision in his inner space, of which this verse is a description. If we suppose, for convenience, that the yogi is a man, each patch of shaded magenta would represent a beautiful young damsel who is the prototype of the Goddess of Beauty.
The appeal of beautiful young women to men is to be taken for granted. Into the picture here are brought two types of young women, which have to be carefully distinguished: the "maids with startled, gentle, wild-deer-eyes," as opposed to "Urvasi and how many, how many other such celestial damsels." The latter have a hypostatic origin, while the former are evidently ordinary women of tribalistic origin, called kimpurusas in Kalidasa's poetry, who inhabit the slopes of the Himalayas and live among the wild animals, especially the wild deer. The patches of magenta light which invade from the upper limit or those of magenta shade which permeate the scene from the lower limit of reference, represent damsels of one or the other of these two opposite types. The maids with the startled-deer eyes may be humbler and more earthy than the celestial beauties, but what they lose by their humble origin they make up their extraordinary vitality and alertness, as qualities of inner beauty. A cancellation of inner beauty and outer beauty is thus to be understood here, as intended by the master poet.
The yogi who, while meditating on the Goddess, is able to fill the total ground of his own consciousness with these two kinds of overwhelming magenta patches encroaching from both sides, lending light and shade from opposite poles of the situation so as to immerse the scene in a homogeneous glory of neither light nor shade, neither of heaven nor of earth - this yogi has accomplished an important stage in his spiritual progress. The value of such a vision is not to be minimized, and it is indicated here that such an experience of homogeneous and overwhelming beauty is more valuable than the legitimate ambition of all young human beings to be attractive to the other sex. The great number of damsels involved here shows that it is the earthy side that wins the game, while the others are to be counted among the numerous "runners-up".
A most important hint here is found in the second line: "submerging the whole world in its sheer magenta glory". This describes the full aurora effect that we can sometimes see in the Polar Regions. Here Beauty cancels with its own counterpart, and the resultant is the yogic experience characterized by the absolutist touch.
(The reference above to saturation, hue and brilliance or brightness can be best clarified by the colour solid shown below which plays a central part in structural methodology. ED)
.
ADDITIONAL COMMENTS WITH STRUCTURAL DIAGRAMS RELATED TO THIS VERSE FROM SAUNDARYA LAHARI/NOTES.
Tannucchaya bhihi te - with shades of Your bodily form
Taruna tarani srisarani bhihi divam - the sky thus most tenderly and totally overcovered by the dappled dawn
Sarvam urvim - as also the whole earth
Arunima nimagnam - as immersed in sheer magenta glory
Smarati yah -
(WORD-FOR-WORD breaks off here)
Cancellation occurs above the O Point, the girls come running below the O Point.
.
.
This is praise of the aruna (magenta) colour: anyone who can fill both Numerator and Denominator with this colour will fall down in mystical ecstasy.
Any man who can appreciate that can attract any woman.
(Aruna (magenta) = karuna (kindness), ED)
Urvasi is a beautiful, shy, woman of heaven. The aruna (magenta) colour is Absolute, independent of the Numerator; it is both an idea and a reality.
The heavenly maidens participate in heavenly light and thus exert an attraction.
When meditated upon by an intelligent man, the principle of Absolute Beauty cancels out as a Denominator.
A man who can think of the Devi as the magenta colour - which absorbs all of reality - is the man who loses nothing: he is interesting to the heavenly maidens, whose eyes are as beautiful as those of startled deer.
These heavenly maidens will not look at most men, but when they see the Numerator of the man who can meditate properly on the Devi, the absolute point of speculation; then the Denominator is cancelled out: he has arrived at the term of his speculative philosophy.
But it is only the vulgar who take this seriously; it should be put into a schema and then forgotten.
The Vedantin asks for heaven and earth together: they must cancel out and merge into the Absolute.
How many, how many will not fall for him who is able to view the Devi as in a shadow and of magenta colour?
On one side, within heaven, are the beautiful damsels.
The idea of beautiful girls to embrace in heaven is a sublimation of sexual desire.
A Vedantin's meditation is centred in the Bindusthana, or central locus, which is a shadow in which all is effaced by the magenta colour which he sees.
The meditation of Indra is here sublimated and far surpassed.
The Vedantic meditator is merged in the magenta colour.
You would have to put thousands of these heavenly maidens in the picture, all of them chasing after him.
The relativistic picture of heaven is superseded by this absolutist picture, where beauty comes in waves from the centre to both sides.
This is infinite Beauty, the other is relativistic.
The radical note is what gives Vedanta its flavour.
"How many, how many..." means that the relativistic worshipper can have as many maidens as he likes: it is not as good as the absolutist's meditation.
Colour is a universal concrete - both within and without you.
Magenta is the neutral colour - the blue of the sky and red of the earth.
Hills and mountains are all effaced by waves of magenta colour.
Then the meditating yogi falls down overwhelmed by Absolute Beauty - while Indra is still looking at some heavenly maidens.
There are few people in this world who realize the importance of Aruna - magenta.
Another version:
- By the dappled light of dawn belonging to Your body
- The sky enriched with the glory of tender cirrus formation of sky light
- (With) the whole earth
- Immersed in magenta colourfulness
- He who recollects
- For him it happens
- (Maidens) having beautiful wild deer startled eyes
- Inclusive of Urvasi become won-over
- How many, how many may there not be
- Heavenly damsels
On the numerator side there is a man meditating on the world as magenta.
All of these damsels become won over to the man who has this vision.
The beauty of magenta, which is non-representative, is canceled against any amount of natural beauty - like the eyes of a startled deer in the forest, the epitome of natural beauty.
Its equal in terms of relativistic values is an infinite amount of "small change".
An infinite number of relative values (quantitative) becomes an absolute value (qualitative).
"Startled deer"- there is an element of surprise in this beauty - like a streak of lightning, by its suddenness.
The actual and the ideological come together in the Absolute.
The dappled light of dawn is cancelled out against the dappled skin of a deer, producing a magenta colour.
The gold dollar is on the Numerator, the small change on the Denominator.
2) Bring in also the gold dollar, and the small change.
3) The deer is a vertical animal, its eyes are often referred to in Sanskrit poetry, e.g. in Kalidasa's "Shakuntala"
Insert Shakuntala and Dushyanta making love in an arbour; a deer comes to drink water from a lotus: the deer is frightened and runs away from the horizontality.
.
Create an aurora borealis into which the deer disappear, then it covers the world.
The ideal woman is to be like the startled deer, not like an ascetic (tapasvi).
Horizontal and vertical are brought together in the purest context:
Dushyanta wants her to have a baby, not just to have deer for friends.
He says that the head of the ashram is trying to cut a diamond with a blue lotus and that she has been waiting for just such a man to come and marry her.
She does not speak throughout the play; she represents the Absolute, and all of the action takes place around her.
As for the deer, they copulate so gently; as no-one has ever seen.
Then they jump with great agility - this is the point, for the starting point of the negative side is agility, not austerity.
c.f. Verses 17 and 18 of the "Meghaduta", by Kalidasa.
Mt Amrakuta will carefully bear you upon its head, you whose showers extinguished its forest fires and who are overcome by fatigue of the road. Even a lowly being, remembering an earlier kind deed, does not turn its back on a friend who has come for refuge; how much less, then, one so lofty? (17)
When you, resembling a glossy braid of hair, have ascended its summit, the mountain whose slopes are covered with forest mangoes, glowing with ripe fruit, takes on the appearance of a breast of the earth, dark at the centre, the rest pale, worthy to be beheld by a divine couple. (18))
Some of the descriptive verses just preceding can be used - cloud, lightning, hilltop.
Cancellation is above the O Point, the girls come below the O Point.
.
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Two clouds, two trees with ramified branches or streaks of lightning.
Between them, the Devi appears.
Girls or substitute Devis are running in a horizontal cloud.
The celestial damsels are numerator.
The startled eyes of a tribal girl are denominator.
The Devi is magenta and vertical.
The man who is able to bring the three grades of magenta here together, (corresponding to the Brahmin girls, the Devi and the wild tribal girls) - his mind is neutralised.
A deer is neutralised eroticism, innocent and drunken.
Subrahmanya has two wives:
Valli, who is black.
"How many hundreds" of rays (girls running)
One man - the yogi
The two cancel out: the girls are horizontal and many, the yogi is vertical and one.
The girvana ganikas described here are heavenly maidens who study Sanskrit.
All that a man has to do is meditate in a certain way on Absolute Beauty - then he will attract the ganikas.
Sat, Chit, Ananda (existence, subsistence and value) - these comprise Brahman, the Absolute.
There are two moralities: that of the market place and a higher morality. Man should be lifted up out of the market place.
The first step is heavenly values, but this is still relative.
But when he meditates on the Devi - as aruna, the magenta colour - then "How many, how many girvana ganikas will not chase after him?"
Samsara (worldly) values are a relative, alternating figure-eight - action and equal and opposite reaction - while Absolute values are the cancellation of Numerator and Denominator into neutrality.
Absolute Beauty resides in the magenta colour.
If you cannot understand this, do not study Vedanta.
Light and shade merge into the magenta colour.
(In south Kerala, some families had a pundit and thus became Brahmins. The Kshatriyas were warrior classes. There was settlement in Kerala because of the fertile soil.)
Narayana Guru taught that Brahmins were the cleanest priests in the world.
They wash, then recite the Vedas for one hour for one rupee, saying wrong mantras. In spite of all these defects, they are spiritual men.
"I am a Sannyasin - I have renounced everything and within me I have the beauty of a thousand rising suns".
Sankara arrived at this light through both the Vedas (Sarasvati) and his own Vedanta (Advaita).
So there are two diagrams: Samsara and Bindusthana.
From the Bindusthana: (central locus) "Of Your body, the shadow.."
Why shadow (or shade)?
"In the shade of Your (Devi) body, You should merge."
Absolute Beauty comes like the expression of the slender, beautiful deer's eyes when startled.
This is the embodiment of purity, as is the tiger.
The beauty of the deer is often sung by Sanskrit poets.
This beauty has a Denominator element, which is to be equated to the meditating man, who is able to appreciate the shadow of the beauty of the Devi.
"Shadow" because without shadow there is no light.
"Shade" means the slightly negative version of the Absolute.
"You are already in heaven, how can You talk about shadow or shade?"
If a man is able to submerge the whole world into one magenta colour, then all the beautiful maidens of heaven are startled like deer in the forest and are agile and quickly run away.
This is an element like lightning - a wonder.
The Absolute induces wonder. It startles.
The sheer beauty in nature is the Denominator of the beauty which a man feels when he sees the Absolute as magenta colour.
(URVASI AND THE APSARAS
Apsaras are beautiful, supernatural female beings. They are youthful and elegant, and superb in the art of dancing. They are often the wives of the Gandharvas, the court musicians of Indra, King of the Gods. They dance to the music made by the Gandharvas, usually in the palaces of the gods, entertain and sometimes seduce gods and men. As caretakers of fallen heroes, they may be compared to the valkyries of Norse mythology. As ethereal beings who inhabit the skies, and are often depicted taking flight, or at service of a god, they may be compared to angels.
Apsaras are said to be able to change their shape at will, and rule over the fortunes of gaming and gambling. Urvasi, Menaka, Rambha and Tilottama are the most famous among them. Apsaras are sometimes compared to the muses of ancient Greece, with each of the 26 Apsaras at Indra's court representing a distinct aspect of the performing arts. Apsaras are associated with water; thus, they may be compared to the nymphs, dryads and naiads of ancient Greece. They are associated with fertility rites. ED)
SAUNDARYA LAHARI - VERSE 19
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SAUNDARYA LAHARI
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VERSE 19
UNILATERAL AND REVISED SHAKTI WORSHIP
DIGNIFIED EROTICS
THE RELATIVISTIC EROTICISM OF KAULA AND SAMAYA CULTS REVISED
मुखं बिन्दुं कृत्वा कुचयुगमध-स्तस्य तदधो
हरार्धं ध्यायेद्यो हरमहिषि ते मन्मथकलाम् ।
स सद्यः सङ्क्षोभं नयति वनिता इत्यतिलघु
त्रिलोकीमप्याशु भ्रमयति रवीन्दु-स्तनयुगाम्
Mukham bindun kruthva kucha yuga mada sthasya thadha dho
Harardha dhyayedhyo haramamahishi the manmathakalam
Sa sadhya samkshebham nayathi vanitha inyathiladhu
Trilokimapyasu bramayathi ravindu sthana yugam.
Shiva Consort, making Your face the locus with twin breasts below,
And below still, as the better half of Shiva; meditating on Your erotic aspect,
Without delay he can stir the hearts of women; this is but slight,
And at once agitates even Her of the three worlds, when sun and moon form Her twin breasts
The same subject of stirring the sentiments of women is continued here. It is not the Advaitic Yogi to be presupposed here, but evidently a Kaulin or a Vamacarin, in the context of the erotic mystical practices prevalent in India at the decadent period, when rigorous moral standards gave way in the nooks and crannies of temple precincts to questionable practices which were not always above board. It is known that Sankara lived at this very period, and he must have known many Kaulins, Samayins and Vamacarins. This verse subjects the practices of such cults to a drastic dialectical revaluation in the light of Sankara's own uncompromising Advaitic position. The intention is unmistakably evident and it gives the key to how we should view this whole series of verses as having nothing to do directly with Shaktya cults as such.
Certain texts that belong to this pre-Advaitic tradition are popular in Bengal even to this day, as is evident from the long passages reproduced by Sir John Woodroffe, who has specialized in this kind of Indian esotericism. The curiosity of certain scholars is guided by lesser motives than the finding of pure wisdom values. Museum pieces and archives are more interesting to them in their vocation, primarily as scholars who have placed themselves outside the spirituality that they study. It is thus that some of these texts reveal an undertone of disapproval of the importance Sankara gives to the eternal female principle. They would rather have him give up his uncompromising love of pure wisdom in favour of a cult in which Shakti is to be considered the last word in philosophy. Woodroffe and Aurobindo Ghose both say that Sankara did not understand the particular aspects of these cults.
This slightly unilateral point of view prevailing in respect of the absolute principle of Beauty, which is to be brought more correctly under a non-dualistic perspective, gives us a hold on the purpose of this verse. It wants to tell us that in the context of erotic mysticism there are two alternatives in visualizing structurally the Goddess involved. One could imagine a circle and insert into it the two orthogonal axes. One could even put the face of the Goddess at the O Point of the situation and then proceed, step by step, to fill in the items of a vertical series of value factors, in descending order. The verse here enumerates the items thus to be arranged vertically on the denominator side. Sankara wished to point out here that such a form of meditation could be considered good, as far as it goes, but not good enough. He does not condemn the practice outright by saying that it is to be omitted. In the last two lines he brings out the contrast of the two approaches. It is below the horizontal line alone that the meditation should apply. Advaitic meditation requires a double correction or cancellation between numerator and denominator values. It is with reference to the breasts of a woman, placed hypostaticaly in the context of the values represented by the sun and the moon, that the cancellation here becomes possible, when the negative approach is replaced by one in which both sides enter as equal counterparts to be cancelled out against each other.
When this Advaitic approach is ensured, all interest in attracting ordinary women in a given locality gives place instead to something noble, by which it is not an eternal female with an earthy reference who is to be won over, but a Goddess, whose range of Beauty applies to all three worlds: bhurloka, bhuvarloka and svarloka.
The amplitude of the parameter is thus not unilateral but fully absolutist, as indicated in the previous verse where both celestial and tribalistic damsels come under the attraction of a true yogi of non-dualistic status. Beauty goes beyond the question of attracting the opposite sex, for it could be thought of as illuminating the Absolute itself. It is to be noted that Sankara does not discountenance the lower form of the Kaulin cult, but recommends its transcendence through a revised attitude.
Bindusthana is the Sanskrit term for "locus" in the first line of this verse. Meditation requires a point of locus (bindu) where all dimensions converge and also emerge, to be thought of both as the source and the point of re-absorption of all manifestations. This is thus the neutral point placed between the two processes (prabhava-pralaya-sthanam) which cancel each other out. The face is the index of one's beauty, and Shiva is referred to in Verse 67 as looking at the reflection of his own face in a mirror and identifying it as the face of his wife, the Goddess. Thus the bindusthana is both subjective and objective in the revised version of meditation presented here.
The Goddess presiding over the three worlds, referred to in the last line, suggests an absolutist version of the same Goddess, though not only unilaterally understood, as with the Kaulins. In other words, the revalued Goddess comprises within her scope both hypostatic and hierophantic items of value. Appreciation of value of an absolutist order can be said to attract that Goddess who represents in herself the same value. This is based on the law of "like attracts like". Here attraction becomes synonymous with appreciation in the context of absolutist devotion.
(prabhava-pralaya-sthanam, see Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 9,
Verse 18
gatir bharta prabhuh sakshi
nivasah saranam suhrit
prabhavah pralayah sthanam
nidhanam bijam avyayam
[I am] the Goal, the Supporter, the Lord, the Witness,
the Abode, the Refuge, the Friend, the Becoming, the
Dissolution, and Ground of Being, ontological Basis,
and never-expended Seed.
A similar synthesis is effected between ontological or teleological aspects of the Absolute, whether conceived as the Overlord or merely as a Witness. Aspects of Self-surrender are treated on a par with reality conceived in terms of a supreme value as suggested by the term nidhanam (treasure-house) which could also be understood as the simple ontological basis of reality.
(No purpose would be served by going into the various implications of these epithets. They cover every form of possible value in the contemplative context. ED)
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ADDITIONAL COMMENTS WITH STRUCTURAL DIAGRAMS RELATED TO THIS VERSE FROM SAUNDARYA LAHARI/NOTES.
Mukham bindum krtva - placing the face at the locus
Kuca yugam - the two breasts
Adhah tasya - below them
Tad adho - below them
Hara ardham - the better half of Shiva
Dhyayad yo - one who should contemplate.
Hara mahishi - o consort of Shiva
Te manmatha kalam - Your erotic aspect
Sa sadyah - he without delay
Samksobham nayati - can stir the sentiments
Vanita - of women
Iti ati laghu - this is but slight
Tri lokim api - even Her of the three worlds
Ashu bhramayati - at once agitates
Ravindu sthana yugam - when sun and moon both form her twin breasts
It is not enough to contemplate this erotic aspect - the lower half is negligible (it only gives the power of conquering women).
But, if he can supply the sun and moon on the numerator side, he will "conquer the three worlds".
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Balance the Kaulin's Devi with a Numerator, conceptualized Devi
("Kulapata" means of the lowest alphabetical origin (? Kula means a family or clan - "Pata" has many meanings, none of which seems sensible (see BOTTOM OF PAGE FOR A LIST OF DEFINITIONS) - "Pati" means "Lord" No interpretation of this word and phrase can be determined. The original manuscript is unclear and we know shamefully little Sanskrit. ED))
Below that, actual sex - for meditation.
To the Kaulins, he says: "Yes, You can go into the basement for Your orgies, but where is the value, the philosophy?"
The main purpose of life is salvation, You have to be a mukti kami (seeker for liberation).
There are gradations in value, the highest is salvation or Moksha.
-
The lower grade of meditation draws only temple girls.
A dancing girl representing the God Shiva Nataraja.
Shiva Nataraja.
Sun and Moon: these are supplied as the Numerator side of the meditation, on the actual and virtual sides of the horizontal axis.
The pundits interpret this verse only in a vulgar way.
The translations all seem to say that meditation on the Denominator or Numerator is incidental - that the Denominator is all right without the Numerator.
The ancients were not wrong, but the interpretation is wrong.
Sankara is discarding something as negligible: as soon as it is treated schematically, it leaps into meaning.
The Absolute Value Factor is ineffable - Sat (existence) and Chit (subsistence) are absorbed into Ananda (bliss).
Sankara knew semantics, the advanced aspect of Vedanta - see the Brahma Sutras.
The Sun and Moon are to be considered as the breasts of the Goddess - supply them as a Numerator to cancel the Denominator of the Kaulins. (Relativistic Devi-worshippers.).
"Compensation" because one side is seen as being inferior to the other; i.e. supplying the Numerator sun and moon as the breasts of the Devi, meditatively cancelling out the Denominator Kaulin orgies.
"Know Brahman (the Absolute) and You become Brahman" is the boldest statement in the whole of the Upanishads.
Know Absolute Beauty and the same thing happens.
If you can compensate for the Denominator Maya with the conceptual light of the Numerator, then you have done the trick: "knowledge is power".
Bindu is the objective locus exterior to yourself, for meditation.
The man who concentrates on this aspect of the Absolute at once becomes interesting to all women.
But the luminaries of the sky can be supplied by a man and the resultant Goddess is Tri-Loki: (the Goddess of the Three Worlds) at once he will be able to confound the three worlds.
This shows the hierophantic worship of Kaulin orgies.
There are those who gain power over women by concentration on the lower sexual source.
This is Kaula. Sankara corrects it by adding the numerator factor.
Another version:
- Making the face as the central locus
- The pair of breasts
- Beneath that
- Beneath ( even) that
- Better half of Hara (i.e. a triangle.)
- He who can meditate upon
- O wife of Shiva
- Your erotic aspect
- He without delay
- Cause mental disturbance
- To women
- This is negligible
- Even the One of the Three Worlds
- Quickly confounds
- As having sun and moon as breasts
- think of the Cosmic Person filling the whole universe
- then you will have power not merely over ordinary women but over the whole of the Three Worlds.
This verse is a correction of the partial Kaulin perspective.
First focus on the face, then divide into the breasts (cf. sun and moon) as Numerator to the Denominator breasts (they can point downwards.)
The face is the central locus.
2) The relative and actual side, the hypostatic and hierophantic sides: when you put them together, you get the gold dollar, when taken part by part it is pluralistic small change: it gives you a kind of psychic power (siddhi) over women, but not salvation.
3) If you want absolute consolation, you abstract and generalize and concentrate on the Devi as the Absolute Goddess: this is quite a different thing.
This way you agitate the Devi herself "of the three worlds".
(Narayana Guru said the servant woman doesn't have time to go to the WC. )
"Look at the humility of this mango tree, its mangoes reach to the ground, it is not
Then the Numerator aspect here can be shown to develop from the vertical axis, with not much of a head, and thus into a four-fold structure.
The breasts (Numerator) are pointing upwards because the vitality comes from above somewhere: the source of the endless stream of milk is four-dimensional.
Vulgarity does not go anywhere near the breasts, they are fourth-dimensional.
The main thing is that the breasts have a fourth-dimensional aspect and are not to be taken lightly: a woman nursing a baby is not a joke, the function descends from above.
Make a vertical axis of fire, moon and sun.
The fire disappears, the sun dims, the moon dims and they become breasts.
There are four: two ascend and two descend, they merge into just two.
The body of the Devi is the vertical axis.
From nature: c.f. Madhu Brahmana of the Brihadaranyaka Upanisad: gathering pollen, horizontally distributed, like milk. The lower breasts are dark, the Numerator breasts are light, they merge and cancel out.
Women are attracted to you as you are to them.
Ritualism asks for benefits - you get what you deserve - like attracts like - there is a law of togetherness or a binding force in the universe, a cementing force.
This world is relativistic Kaula worship - asymmetric dualistic worship - but it does not attain cancellation.
"Breasts below" means that the Bindusthana (locus) is too low.
Sun and moon mean the breasts are above - asymmetric and hypostatic.
Ida and Pingala (the left and right passages or nadis of the spinal column in Yoga terminology. ED): the yogi goes through the middle without going to one side or the other.
The beauty of the three worlds is eternal.
The Kaulins and the Samayins want to taste sugar, not to be sugar.
Sankara accepts their position, but says it is "atilaghu" and vulgar - très ordinaire - very vulgar.
The girls' breasts have hair, except around the nipple- a circle of ligh.t
In Kalidasa's poetry the breast is described as a hill with bamboos.
The gods look down on it - means you must look at the breasts from above.
- the Brahmins say that women are Sudras (low caste) - here this is corrected.
Just schematismus (structuralism) is Tantra,
Schematismus and cancellation is Advaita.
(For Schematismus, see Immanuel Kant. ED)
EDITORIAL FOOTNOTE:
MEANINGS OF THE WORD "PATA" from the Sanskrit-English dictionary.
This example may give the reader an idea of the problems arising from this text. .
| 1 | paTa | m. (n. L. ; ifc. f. %{A}) woven cloth , cloth , a blanket , garment , veil , screen MBh. Ka1v. &c. (cf. %{marut-} , %{vAta-}) ; a painted piece of cloth , a picture Ya1jn5. Ka1d. ; monastic habit Ka1ran2d2. ; a kind of bird Lalit. ; Buchanania Latifolia L. ; = %{puras-kRta} L. ; (%{I}) f. a narrow piece of cloth , the hem or edge of a garment Ba1lar. Hcar. ; the curtain of a stage L. (cf. %{apaTI}) ; n. a thatch or roof (= %{paTala}) L. |
| 2 | pata | m. flying , falling (cf. g. %{pacA7di} and %{jvalA7di}). |
| 3 | pata | 2 mfn. well fed (= %{puSTa}) L. |
| 4 | pAta | 1 mfn. (for 2. see p. 616 , col. 3) watched , protected , preserved L. |
| 5 | pATa | m. ( %{paT}) breadth , expanse , extension L. ; (in geom.) the intersection of a prolonged side and perpendicular or the figure formed by such an intersection Col. ; = %{vAdya-tUrA7tkara} Vikr. iv , 13/14 Sch. ; (%{A4}) f. a species of plant AV. Kaus3. (cf. %{pAThA}) ; regular order , series , succession W. ; (%{I}) f. see %{pATI}. |
| 6 | pAta | 2 m. (for 1. see under 3. %{pA}) flying , mode of flying , flight MBh. ; throwing one's self or falling into (loc.) or from (abl.) , fall , downfall (also ifc. after what would be a gen. or abl. &c. e.g. , %{gRha-} , fall of a house ; %{parvata-} , fall from a mountain ; %{bhU-} , fall on the earth) Mn. MBh. Ka1v. &c. ; alighting , descending or causing to descend , casting or throwing upon , cast , fall (of a thunderbolt) , throw , shot MBh. R. Pan5cat. ; a stroke (of a sword &c.) Katha1s. ; application (of ointment , of a knife &c.) Ka1vya7d. ; casting or directing (a look or glance of the eyes) Ragh. ; decay of the body (%{deha-pAta}) , death Katha1s. Ba1dar. ; (with %{garbhasya}) fall of the fetus , miscarriage Sus3r. ; an attack , incursion Var. ; a cass , possibility , S3an3khBr. ; happening , occurrence , appearance Prab. Katha1s. Das3ar. ; a fault , error , mistake Su1ryas. ; the node in a planet's orbit ib. (cf. IW. 179) ; a malignant aspect ib. ; N. of Ra1hu L. ; pl. N. of a school of the Yajur-veda ib. |
SAUNDARYA LAHARI - VERSE 20
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SAUNDARYA LAHARI
VERSE 20
KEY VERSE
FINDING THE HEART LOTUS
A NORMAL YOGI - COMPENSATION
THE COMPLEMENTARITY OF PSYCHIC POWERS
किरन्ती-मङ्गेभ्यः किरण-निकुरुम्बमृतरसं
हृदि त्वा माधत्ते हिमकरशिला-मूर्तिमिव यः ।
स सर्पाणां दर्पं शमयति शकुन्तधिप इव
ज्वरप्लुष्टान् दृष्ट्या सुखयति सुधाधारसिरया
kirantim angebhyah kirana nikurumbamrta rasam
hrdi tvam adhatte himakarasilamurtim iva yah
sa sarpanam darpam samayati sakuntadhipa iva
jvaraplustan drstya sukhayati sudhadhara siraya
He who can bring You, as emanating nectar out of Your limbs all around,
Into his heart like a moonstone-made statue,
He can quell the pride of serpents like the King of Birds
And a fever patient cure by his very look of ambrosial streak.
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Verse 20 has to be read with Verse 10; between these two limiting verses we have had various perspectives of the dynamism implied between them. Verse 10 gives us a picture of ambrosial essence emanating from between the feet of the Goddess and of how a double set of ramified streaks is to be visualized. In the present verse, it is not the Goddess who is to be visualized objectively, but her image is to be placed at the centre of the heart of the contemplative who is her votary. Thus there are negative and positive attitudes possible in the practice of meditation or adoration of the Absolute Beauty Goddess here. These subjective and objective versions are complementary, reciprocal, or compensatory; and if one is placed at the limit of the self (the Alpha Point) the other is placed at the limit of the non-self, (the Omega Point). They could even be cancelled out into the neutrality of the Absolute, as indicated in the last verse of this work, where everything is finally abolished.
It is recommended in this verse that the contemplative reduce the Goddess to the semblance of a statue made of moonstone. The gleaming lustre of moonstone has an interesting, subdued tone about it, between brilliance and shade or tint, thus indicating that this statue is to be placed at a neutral point within the consciousness of the yogi, where the transition takes place from the subjective to the objective.
This corresponds to what is technically understood in Patanjali's Yoga as pratyahara: efferent tendencies which are neutralized by afferent tendencies and vice-versa. When this neutralization occurs, one experiences an inner psychic richness akin to samadhi.
The emanation of nectar refers to the efferent tendencies of the psyche, while the crystallization at the heart centre into a "moonstone-made statue" is the cultivation of the opposite (afferent) tendency of centralization at the locus of the heart. When this is accomplished, the yogi's personality, even in the outward sense, comes to have a revised status. He radiates a confidence and a functional alertness or brilliance in respect of his senses, which gain a perspicacity as if some inner light played on his features. This state has been referred to as tejas, and Swami Vivekananda's works, as also his personality , could be cited as evidence of this kind of yogic attainment. The voice is said to become mellow, the skin becomes more glossy and tender and the metabolism functions in such a balanced and purificatory way that it is said to have the effect of nadisuddhi (clarity or transparency of the blood vessels and lymphatic system).
A yogi in such a state generally becomes extremely sympathetic to any man, woman or child who is naturally attracted by him. Jesus was such a healer, always with a multitude of people around him. He becomes "the cynosure of all eyes" and the focal point of everyone's interest. There are many stories about the psychic feats of certain Tamil siddhas (saints); one, especially, was said to make the bones of a dead woman come to life by his songs, when he passed through the scene of a village funeral. We have to make allowances for natural exaggeration here. Another saint could miraculously cure the chronic stomach-ache of a Jaina king by sprinkling holy ashes as a treatment. In the "Yoga Vasishta", Cudala, the young queen of King Sikhidhvaja, tells her husband how, by practicing a yogic and contemplative way of life, she enhances her personal charm and value as a peaceful presence in the palace. Examples of such yogis are found anywhere in the world. They might seem very humble and harmless, but at a given moment they can vomit fire, as it were, if confronted with a proud person who might question his intrinsic positivity coming from pure contemplation only.
The sage Kanva is described by Kalidasa, in "Shakuntala", as having this kind of positive power of asserting himself (tejas). He says that Kanva is like a lens which by itself is cold, but, when confronted with a source of heat or light, can rise to the challenge and produce its own fire. The mild life of forest dwellers is not to be challenged by forces less intense than what their austerities can build up within their psyche.
The Sanskritic literary tradition has created a number of counterparts in the bird or animal world in which the pride of one is cancelled and superseded by the power of another. The lion is the counterpart of the elephant in this respect. The king of birds here, which is a vulture or eagle, has the power to cancel the pride of a serpent. This is cancellation in the created world of creatures, though the operation of psychic powers need not be confined to this outer world of creation. It could also apply to the inner world of emotions.
The second instance of this verse belongs to this order. A man in hospital, who is desperate about his own survival, enters into a negative state of depression, by which he gives up all hope, and as doctors sometimes put it: "the patient himself does not wish to live". Many instances are known in India of a yogi entering such a sorrowful situation and working a miracle of this kind by instilling such confidence in the patients that they begin to gain hope instead of losing it. The turning point is as delicate as the retro-action in a thermostat. It can take place with the subtlest of influences in the world of psychophysics or psychosomatic medicine. Sympathetic emotions are contagious and can work wonders between individuals linked together in a bipolar reciprocity. The tears in the eyes of such a yogi will be found to be on the point of bursting out in sympathy. This kind of psychic power is not to be mixed up with other psychic powers, such as atomicity (anima), etc., whose status is to be discussed in later verses. This is a global state of sensitivity that is very rich intellectually and emotionally at the same time.
The mode of operation for inducing such a state of yogi-hood is here explained as residing at the core of the heart of the yogi. That value represented by the Goddess of Absolute Beauty cancels out into a fully-neutralized state of yogic perfection, by virtue of which, such siddhis, or so-called powers, become natural attributes of the yogically revalued personality. The yogi is always an interesting person to other human beings, especially to women and children.
The streak of nectar in terms of which the psychic powers are to be understood according to this verse, satisfies two requirements at one stroke. Nectar is a perceptual value; while the streak is an intelligible or cancellable value. When fused together, the streak of ambrosia represents an emanation which is neither physical nor mental. One often hears of emanations or presences from saints or yogis. Language has conferred on either one or both of these aspects some kind of reality, because it has to refer to either a fact truth or a logic truth. When fact and logic meet, it is a value like beauty that emerges, and combined words like "thinking substance" or "ambrosial streak" become permissible in this context. The duality, if it persists, must be countered by unitive understanding to become what is neither a streak of light nor ambrosia, but a central value called Beauty.
2) Fire, splendour, light, glow, heat.
3) Healthy appearance, hearty.
4) The fiery and colour-producing power of the human organism. (Situated in the bile.)
5) Power, energy, vital force.
6) Passionate nature.
7) Mental or magic power, strength, influence, dignity, position.
8) Sperm
Aṇimā: reducing one's body even to the size of an atom
Mahima: expanding one's body to an infinitely large size
Garima: becoming infinitely heavy
Laghima: becoming almost weightless
Prāpti: having unrestricted access to all places
Prākāmya: realizing whatever one desires
Iṣṭva: possessing absolute lordship
Vaśtva: the power to subjugate all
They are to be ignored by Vedantins. Nataraja Guru describes them as having the same value as the small plastic toys to be found in Corn Flakes packets. ED)
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ADDITIONAL COMMENTS WITH STRUCTURAL DIAGRAMS RELATED TO THIS VERSE FROM SAUNDARYA LAHARI/NOTES.
Kirantim ange bhyah - as emanating nectar out of your limbs all around
Kirana nikurambo amrta hrdi - gathered to his heart the radiating essence of immortal bliss
Tvam addhatte - he who can bring You
Hima kara shila murtim - like a moonstone made image
Sa sarpanam darpam shamayati - can quell the pride of serpents
Shakunta dhipa iva - like the King of Birds
Jvara plushtan - a fever patient
Drshtya sukhayati - cures by very look
Sudha dhara siraya - of ambrosial streak.
By pratyahara here one gains two kinds of psychic powers.
such or such desirable-undesirable end, who
neither welcomes (anything) nor rejects in anger,
his reason is well-founded.
sides the senses are (withdrawn) from objects of
sense-interest, his reason is well-founded."
The previous verse is not completely absolutist, you have to supply the Numerator and cancel.
Consciousness is a circle or a flower.
The yogi withdraws into it and restrains his outgoing impulses - this is pratyahara.
A statue is considered inter-subjectively and trans-physically by the yogi inside himself - he centralizes himself and conserves his dissipated interests.
The nectar emanated by the Devi's limbs represent value - it is a kind of nervous energy.
A serpent crawling is in a dialectical relationship with a hovering vulture.
They are hereditary enemies - there is an accentuation of polarity; as also with the fever-patient and the curing yogi.
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Moonstone is a stream of intentionality flowing from the Devi in the moonstone bindu (central locus).
The power of the Goddess is uniformly homogenous.
Numerator and Denominator can interact.
The point here is that the Absolute can cancel out all imbalances and discrepancies.
"Showering from Your limbs, which are diffusing an ambrosia from the light - which is like a cut moonstone (body)".(? ED)
How can ambrosia come from light? Because the conceptual and perceptual sides have to be put together.
(He is able, by his look, to do something...)
There is some confusion here as to the intricacies of Sanskrit grammar.
Who or what is referred to as cut moonstone and where to place the fluorescent light?
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- (Of the Devi) diffusing (all around)
- From the limbs
- The sweetness of the nectar arising out of the aggregate of limbs
- He who brings Thee to his heart
- (You who) like the form of a moonstone
- He is able to kill the poison of snakes like the Lord of Snakes (the eagle).
- Those afflicted by fever he cures by the streak of flowing nectar
(THIS IS A LOOK OF THE EYES WHICH CURES - IT IS ABSOLUTE)
"I am like a moonstone and I am reflecting the light of the radiance of the Devi, which is like nectar."
The ambrosial sweetness coming from the light-cluster of the Devi brings to his heart a fluorescent gleam.
Schroedinger: light when falling on certain fibres produces diffraction.
By this light - balance - he can cure imbalance.
(Curran, a disciple, says: the magenta of the Devi, meditated upon as ambrosia, causes the calm light of the cut moonstone to come from the man.)
The psyche swings between two poles: fever, snakebite and LSD are at the Alpha Point.
How can this ambrosia come into the heart like a moonstone?
First, light comes from the limbs of the Devi; then it is given some taste, which is Denominator.
As if She is made of moonstone, he brings Her by descending dialectics down the vertical axis to his heart, by his philosophical speculation.
(The Guru talks about myth-making, in the context of various religions in India - i.e. religious factions or cults.)
One story is as good as any other story, so never mind the mythology.
This verse wants to say: when You are down, "blue", at the Alpha Point, low down on the Denominator side; then you can be helped by the positivity of the Numerator.
(The doctor will talk to the typhoid patient on the 27th day, the day of the disease's crisis, to see if he wants to live. "No Numerator" means depressed.)
These people need to be consoled. Someone must say: "Never mind Your parents, I am Your best friend; come on, now".
Everyone who believes in the Absolute and loves humanity can perform this kind of "magic": it is Absolute Affection.
Think of a moonstone figure of the Goddess and put it in the central locus.
You are related to values - think of all of them .
Every word implies a certain value, every percept has its corresponding concept.
Divide the value worlds into two - each filled with values.
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Moonstone combines thinking and substance, you recognize an image of yourself, as of moonstone.
He can abolish the poison of a snake and by his glance he can save a man who is at the 27th day of typhoid, when the disease's crisis occurs.
The man who is harmonized in this way gets a certain power of the Absolute - this is not an exaggeration.
The Numerator of the bird completely neutralizes the poison of the serpent.
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- Showering, radiating, spreading out ramified or fan-wise
- From the limbs
- The ambrosial essences arising out of the ramified sets
- One who can bring You to the heart
- Like unto a moonstone-made icon
- He can neutralize serpent potent power
- Like the king of birds
- By look cures fever patients
- By streak of ambrosia (Absolute Kindness)
The pride is the thing, there are many proud people who will come to you, and you should know how to counter them.
For example: Narayana Guru and the proud Aryan pundit, puffed up with pride in his learning - he asked his disciples: "Is his (Sanskrit) grammar all right?"
The snake represents the potent negative force in opposition to the Numerator force.
The two have to cancel out.
The pride of an absolutist can be great.
There is a structural difference between them.
Sprinkling blessing over the worlds, and again from that point of high intelligible values,
Turning yourself into a snake-form of three coils and a half,
Both of them treated together form two structural trees; the core is the moonstone.
Normalization and centralization are practices in Yoga.
The Numerator side can quell serpents, the Denominator can cure fever; one side of fever is cured by correction on the other side.
Fever is corrected horizontally.
All disease and fever come from disparity, the man who neutralizes these like two inverted trees has the power to cure others.
Show the Yogi leaving his cave and going to the hospital with some water for te fever patients.
Then show a snake being torn to pieces by a vulture, this means the Numerator entity can correct the asymmetry of the Denominator - death is hiding at the Alpha Point in the form of a snake. (Improve this example).
The bird can come and frighten the serpent which tries to climb up the vertical axis, when he sees the bird he falls down in fear. There are all sorts of possibilities with light tricks by the cameraman.
Take examples from human life - animals fighting is not sufficient.
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SAUNDARYA LAHARI - VERSE 21
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VERSE 21
KEY VERSE
TRANSCENDENCE BY VERTICALIZATION
A THIN PARAMETER IS REVEALED
तटिल्लेखा-तन्वीं तपन शशि वै॒श्वानर मयीं
निष्ण्णां षण्णामप्युपरि कमलानां तव कलाम् ।
महापद्मातव्यां मृदित-मलमायेन मनसा
महान्तः पश्यन्तो दधति परमाह्लाद-लहरीम्
tatil lekha tanvim tapanasasi vaisvanara mayim
nisanam sannam apyupari kamalanam tava kalam
mahapadmatavyam mrdita malamayena manasa
mahantah pasyanto dadhati paramahlada laharim
As lightning-streak bodied, made of sun, moon and fire,
And as placed even beyond the six lotuses in a great lotus grove;
Those great ones, as seers of such, your aspect, having mind freed from dross and ignorance,
They experience the upsurging billow of ultimate delight.
In this verse the same thought is carried over from the previous verse, but in terms of a thin streak of lightning joining the two vertical limits from end to end. We can notice, in the first instance, that the experience under reference here is one of ascent and not of descent, because it is stated in the second line that the six lotuses are left below. The amplitude of the Kaula cult consists of what is limited to the sad adharas - the six Chakras - which are to be imagined as six psycho-physical levels. The Sahasrara and the Kulakunda are to be added, respectively above and below, to this set of six psycho-physical units of beauty-value. They are described here as lotuses in a vertical series.
In the first line, the lightning-streak body of the Goddess consists of the abstract essence of light, to be distinguished when we descend from the sun to the moon to the fire. It is true that the sun is brilliant, the moon subdued, and the fire placed on earth. Although emitting the same light and heat, the fire is weighed down by the weight of the atmosphere. We have to separate mentally the qualitative aspect of light and give to this thin vertical streak its fourth- or multi-dimensional status. This is to be done by a process of reduction, by omitting what is extraneous to the pure essence of light. The Isavasya Upanishad calls upon the sun to reduce its radiance so that a more auspicious verticalized form of sunlight could be revealed.
A flame in a windless room has often been used to describe the state of contemplative intelligence. Even the smoke of burnt incense can be seen to ascend vertically when the atmosphere is not disturbed. Within natural forces themselves, therefore, there is a tendency for a flame to mark out for us a path of spiritual ascent. Some of the Upanishads speak of the flame beckoning to the sacrificer to follow its lead upward to various value worlds. The thinner the streak, the better the absolute quality implied. That is the reason why the lightning-streak body of the Goddess is prominently referred to in the first line. A lightning flash with a thunderclap contains an element of wonder and suddenness which can heighten the meaning of Absolute Beauty, which is to be qualitatively understood rather than in its gross quantitative aspects.
It is necessary that the lightning-streak body be placed "even above the six lotuses" to experience the ultimate delight referred to in the last line. The more the lightning streak is thin and rises beyond the reach of lower utilitarian or hedonistic values, the better it is for the resultant purity of the light it can induce, in terms of an overwhelming experience.
Ontologically, it has to go beyond the limit of the velocity of sound to have supersonic effects revealed to the ear. This is also true of light or intelligence. The experience of delight becomes intensified by the height of the intelligence it can attain on the conceptual side. It is in this sense that "having mind free from dross and ignorance" is to be understood. The Bhagavad Gita also refers to that positive aspect of the vertical parameter which could be arrived at by putting the sun, moon and fire in a descending order to touch the O Point of our consciousness or of the positive cosmological setup. The delight itself may be said to ascend from the Muladhara to the Ajña Chakra. When these two lights meet, originating at the two limits, a fluorescent light glows as a whole, as in the case of a tube-light, irrespective of the two electrodes. The flow of light represents the essence of the light within consciousness as an overpowering emotional experience; they are inseparable, like the two sides of a coin.
ADDITIONAL COMMENTS WITH STRUCTURAL DIAGRAMS RELATED TO THIS VERSE FROM SAUNDARYA LAHARI/NOTES.
Here the wife is lightning and Shiva is reversible lightning.
WORD FOR WORD
Tatil lekha tanvim - as lightning-streak-bodied
Tapana sasi vaisva nara mayim - made of sun, moon and fire
Nishannam - as seated
Sannam api upari kamalanam - even above the six lotuses
Tava kalam maha padma tavyam - such, Your aspect in a great lotus forest
Mrdita mala mayena manasa - having mind freed from dross and ignorance
Mahantah - great minds
Pasyanto - seeing this
Dadhati - experience
Parama ahlada laharim - the upsurging billow of ultimate delight
The wife is lightning; in this verse Shiva is lightning reversible.
The lightning flash is Absolutist: down with relativistic Kaulin (Relativistic Tantric) meditation! This is absolutist and far superior.
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Slow progress in spirituality is discarded.
Put all the Chakras into one integrated whole.
They must be brought together vertically.
If you are able to structuralize and are a man of wisdom and have no other preoccupying interest - then you will straight away enjoy bliss.
One lotus represents the psychic nerve centre. (The six lotuses (?))
(The Guru talks about structuralism; he is convinced that this verse clinches all that he has said about structuralism: a great instrument of research that will be secretly copied by universities long after Einstein's theory has been forgotten.)
"So I am reading to find out if I am a great philosopher or not"
Two sets of lotuses: the highest is where Shiva and Shakti reside.
Put six lotuses in a vertical series, with Sahasrara, the thousand-petaled lotus above.
A great deal of interest was taken in some pundits by the East India Company and the Theosophical Society in order to find out the customs of the people they intended to rule. (They were instructed by traditional Bengali pundits - often belonging to more or less debased Tantric schools - they were dualists, not Advaitins like Sankara. ED)
So, do not be guided by the pundits. They are not aware of the final non-duality of the Upanishads.
Here, career ambition has coloured scholarship: they cannot produce clear literature.
This is a normal structural version.
There is a numerator lotus and also a forest of lotuses.
This is a completely normalized version of the structure which Sankara is going to employ throughout the work.
A sudden streak of lightning is the body of the Goddess; this is the vertical axis.
The sun and moon are on the Numerator and fire is in the centre.
Another version:
- Lightning streak bodied
- Consisting of sun, moon and fire ( as components)
- Seated
- Even above the six lotuses
- Your aspect - perspective - (ensemble
- In the great forest of lotus flowers
- With mind bereft of dross and ignorance
- Great men
- Those who realize experience
- The upsurging billow of supreme delight
There are 64 Kalas enumerated in Monier-Williams' Dictionary.
All of the elements are put in their perspective.
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Then, through the vertical axis comes a streak of lightning - a "wonder" - this is the most powerful epithet.
1) Why "lightning-bodied" ?
2) The vertical axis with sun, moon and fire as Numerator factors.
3) Transcend these six lotuses and put the focus of attention above them.
4) Add the horizontal axis in the form of a forest of lotuses.
5) Relativism is to be transcended, the mind needs to be purified.
6) When these conditions are fulfilled, you can get a vision of the Absolute Goddess.
7) Inspect the vision of the Alpha Point and horizontal axis from the Omega Point.
This vision is a crystal-clear vision of the philosopher; a "monde affiné".
Here show the lightning first, then a vision by ascent.
This verse is complementary to Verse 16.
1) Kalidasa's India seen from a cloud passing over it (in his "Meghaduta"), stress the importance of Shyamala and of Ganesha writing with his own tusk; show the sunset over the battlefield of the Mahabharata.
1) Kalidasa, 2) Sankara, 3) Tagore.
There is little method here, except for work with the camera man.