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SAUNDARYA LAHARI - VERSE 56

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SAUNDARYA LAHARI

 

 

VERSE 56

PARTICIPATION OF THE EYES AND EARS
THE PLAY BETWEEN VERTICAL AND HORIZONTAL FIGURES-OF-EIGHT
 
तवापर्णे कर्णे जपनयन पैशुन्य चकिता
निलीयन्ते तोये नियत मनिमेषाः शफरिकाः ।
इयं च श्री-र्बद्धच्छदपुटकवाटं कुवलयं
जहाति प्रत्यूषे निशि च विघतय्य प्रविशति॥
 
tavaparne karnejapa nayana paisunya cakita
niliyante toye niyatam animesas sapharika
iyam ca srir baddhachadaputa kavatam kuvalayam
jahati pratyuse nisi ca vighatayya pravisati
 
O Aparna, afraid of the gossip carried to Your ear bases by Your lengthened eyes
Surely they lie merged unwinking in water like the female sapharika fish
This Lakshmi too, leaves behind at dawn the closed petal doors of water lilies,
And at dusk, forcing them open, She re-enters therein.
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There are two complementary structural and dynamic images in this verse. The first picture refers to a horizontal dynamism, while the second refers to a figure-of-eight dynamism in which the verticalized version is presented in stronger relief. Both belong to the same background of Absolute Beauty. Breaking the surface sheen of certain placid and gently flowing rivers, one sometimes sees species of silvery fish that jump into the air and add a lively gleam to the situation. Here we have a case of participation between numerator and denominator across the bounds of a horizontal axis of reference. Kalidasa in “Shakuntala” speaks of the thin oily gleam remaining on the flat stones in the pond in Kanva Ashram to indicate the same line of demarcation between the plus and minus sides of a hori­zontal partition within the core of the total structure of the absolute beauty of reality.
 
The second picture in this verse depicts Lakshmi finding herself shut out of her chamber at dawn; she is thus obliged to re-enter by forcing the petal doors of the blue water lily, which opens only at dusk, responding to moonlight rather than sun­light like the other varieties of lotus. A bee caught within a lotus at dusk can come out only in the morning. Here the converse is true of Lakshmi, who is shut out of her apartment to wander and probably to spend the whole of her day in the company of merchants and money-makers in the marketplace.
 
So there are two contrasts to be kept in mind in this verse. One is the contemptible frivolity of the sapharika fish, frolicking below the horizontal water level or sometimes above it. Then there is Lakshmi, the Goddess of wealth, who is not sufficiently dignified to make her equal to the absolute Parvati. Parvati is here called aparna (leafless), suggestive of an austere attitude of mind analogous to a leafless tree; as in the case of some women who observe fasting at certain periods because of their very austere contemplative state of mind. The two contrasting figure-eight movements, involving two kinds of participation within a fourfold frame of reference within the purview of absolute Beauty, are to be inserted together and dynamically visualized in living terms with all the modalities or phases natural to them both. This structural dynamism has been treated in plainer terms by Narayana Guru in his “Atmopadesa­ Satakam” (Verses 33, 54, 56, 68 and 83). There is a common Cartesian correlation to be used here to make these two pictures fit into the same pattern.
 
It is especially to be noted that it is implied that the sapharika fish behave with great restraint because they are being watched closely by the all-seeing eyes of the Absolute Goddess who, being steeped in austere contemplation of Shiva, cannot tolerate frivolity from the younger handmaidens of her retinue. The trans­mission of gossip takes place through concepts rather than percepts, and what escapes the direct regard of the Goddess is supplemented by hearsay factors that reach the higher intelligible levels implied in the austere meditation normal to the Goddess. In the last line, Lakshmi, who is excluded from her own lotus apartment at dawn, is required to use force to enter at dusk. A spirit like Lakshmi cannot enter the negative side if she does not do it sufficiently early. She takes some trouble to open it, not really forcing it. Why it does not open by itself, and how much force she has to use, are left unsaid. She has to take some kind of action. There are certain vigils in which spirits wander freely, but they have to return before the cock crows, as with Hamlet's ghost.
 
There are two operations facing opposite ways, like inverted brackets, in this verse; which is perhaps all that we have to understand by Lakshmi´s act of forcibly re-entering her blue lotus apartment at dusk. Between the two kinds of lotuses, the common kamala that opens in daylight, responding to the sun, and the blue kuvalaya or kamuda of this verse which opens at night, responding to the moon, there is a certain alternating symmetry or reciprocity, as between the overt and the innate aspects of beauty-value. The gleaming silvery fish participate across the horizontal axis just as the personification of the value of wealth does at a more negative level. Both of these pictures conform to the same structural dynamism.


From Shakuntala:

'Corn is (seen) falling from the parrot-granary-mouth of the tree hollow.
By confidence, fawns are not dispersing as they are seen to remain, enduring noise.
There is a thin film of oil under the trees, bearing evidence of ingudi nuts having been cracked on stones,
And the path to the water-source is seen traced by markings from water-drops from the tips of bark garments.'
(I, 13)

 

From Narayana Guru's Atmopadesa Satakam:

Verse 33:

Awareness, in order to find its proper state,

Itself the earth and other manifestations became;

In inverted state thus, now mounting, now changing over

Like a circulating fire-faggot it keeps turning round.

 

Verse 54:

The waking state, it obtains not in sleep

And sleep again does not attain consciousness

When awake: day by day these twain are born

Of Maya's womb and keep alternating on.

 

Verse 56:

Like waves instantly arising on the ocean

Each body one after one rises to subside again:

Where, alas, is the term for this? Know this as action

Taking place perpetually in awareness-ocean's prime source.

 

Verse 68:

As the ego sense enters into the double snake-rope-like scheme

Now as knowledge and now as the limited body agent,

It becomes sacred at one time or profane again

Thus, should he understand, the intuitive man.

 

Verse 83:

It breaks up, stays on, rises or changes over,

Again to continue, such is the nature

Of the body here; watching these three from on high

The Self, the uncleft one, it ever changeless remains.

 

 

ADDITIONAL COMMENTS WITH STRUCTURAL DIAGRAMS RELATED TO THIS VERSE FROM SAUNDARYA LAHARI/NOTES.

 

Some little fish are playing in the water, near the ears of the Devi.

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They are afraid of the eyes of the Goddess, which are long and gleaming and shaped like a fish.

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This gleam is of permanent beauty and these big eyes are near the ears, telling the Devi that the little fish also want to emulate the beauty of these large fish-shaped eyes.
 
The little fish are hiding, afraid that the eyes of the Devi might carry tales of their foolishness to Her ears.
 
The subject is Absolute Beauty - the pundits forget this.
Where is this water in which the small fish swim?
They never shut their eyes.
Why small and big fish? Why a lotus which opens at night?
Does the Devi like to open her eyes?
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In the previous verse the Devi´s eye has black, white and red colours in order to purify us - and these colours are separated.
In this verse there are small, young, female fish, afraid of the eyes, which are themselves like fish and go near the ears of the Devi, telling tales on the little ones.
 
This reflects the subconscious of the Devi at night, who is attended by many young attendants: there is a senior attendant who will tell on them.
 
The goddess herself is awake day and night - she is Absolute - she cannot even wink her eyes.
All these little fish are nurses who have to attend on the Devi.
This verse requires a lot of explanation.
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The little fish are below the horizontal axis.
They are a pluralistic version of the large fish (the Devi's eyes): they are disciples of the Absolute Devi.
 
Nothing must go wrong in the universe, so there are night-attendants.
"Our intention is good" say the little fish who are Her disciples.
This is the relation of the one to the many.
They represent the Devi herself, they are her disciples.
 
The one eye is monotheism.
The many little fish, or eyes, are plurality. Put them together: you get the paradox of the one and the many.
 
(This refers to the paradoxes of Zeno, Parmenides etc. and their treatment by Bertrand Russell et al. and also the "quantum Zeno effect" in modern physics.
 
Zeno's argument is as follows:
Zeno attempts to show that there could not be more than one thing, on pain of contradiction. Assume then that there are many things; he argues that they are both ‘limited’ and ‘unlimited’, a contradiction. First, he says that any collection must contain some definite number of things, neither more nor fewer. But if you have a definite number of things, he concludes, you must have a finite—‘limited’—number of them; he implicitly assumes that to have infinitely many things is to have an ‘indefinite’ number of them. But second, imagine any collection of ‘many’ things arranged in space—imagine them lined up in one dimension for definiteness. Between any two of them, he claims, is a third; and in between these three elements another two; and another four between these five; and so on without end. Therefore the limited collection is also ‘unlimited’, which is a contradiction, and hence our original assumption must be false: there are not many things after all. At least, so Zeno's reasoning runs.
 
Infinite processes remained theoretically troublesome in mathematics until the late 19th century. The epsilon-delta version of Weierstrass and Cauchy gives a rigorous formulation of the logic and calculus involved. These works resolved the mathematics involving infinite processes. ED)
 
Lakshmi enters into the blue lotus and comes out - this clinches the point.
The door of Lakshmi´s lotus closes in the daytime and opens at night
- so she goes to the hypostatic, positive, side in the daytime and comes back to the Denominator negative side at night.
 
(Lakshmi is  the consort of Vishnu; the personification of the principle of plenty and prosperity. She is lotus-born and with four arms; one of the first results of the churning of the ocean of good and evil, symbolising a central human value when looked at from the utilitarian point of view. After the highly negative and lifeless values of decadent Buddhist periods, Lakshmi or Sri as a principle of good or Godhead gained popularity in India which she holds to the present day, often suggesting even a sloppy love of comfort in certain pleasure-loving minds. ED)
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This is a vertical movement.
A blue lotus loves the moonlight and blooms at night.
It opens its petals at night to receive Lakshmi and in the morning she leaves again.

 
 
 
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This flower behaves in the opposite fashion to other lotuses.
The two lotuses produce a figure-eight inside the crystal.

The vertical axis functions only at dusk and sunrise.
 
The opening of the bud of the blue lotus is not an "event" or a "function", but is mathematical and beautifully full of intentionality.
 
(Intentionality is a philosophical concept defined by the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy as "the power of minds to be about, to represent, or to stand for, things, properties and states of affairs" The term refers to the ability of the mind to form representations and should not be confused with intention.
 
The opening and closing of the lotuses might perhaps be said to take place in an eternal present or eternal here and now.
 
According to physics all particles in the universe are in contact with all other particles at all times and simultaneously.
 
The laws of quantum physics seem to suggest that particles spend much of their time in a ghostly state, lacking even basic properties such as a definite location and instead existing everywhere and nowhere at once.
 
Eternal return (also known as "eternal recurrence") is a concept that the universe has been recurring, and will continue to recur, in a self-similar form an infinite number of times across infinite time or space.
 
Physical processes at the microscopic level are believed to be either entirely or mostly time-symmetric: if the direction of time were to reverse, the theoretical statements that describe them would remain true.
 
This is only the tip of the iceberg of the ramifications of speculation to which this verse gives rise. Not easy, but fascinating. ED)
 
Guru: "I promise I shall never come near the beautiful women of Ooty and make love to them, I don't deserve that; why should I claim the friendship of anyone": you can abolish yourself and therein lies the joy.
 
Heloïse says to her lover, Abelard: "Don't give me any more than the least of your disciples: but don't omit me from the vertical relationship nor from the teaching either."
 
Narayana Guru said that the Devi should not bless him with twelve hands, but only with one: "You want only one hand to bless me".
 
 
 
 
 
 
Here we have a black-box structure with a mesh structure in perspective and logarithmic spirals.
 

 
(In science and engineering, a black box is a device, system or object which can be viewed solely in terms of its input, output and transfer characteristics without any knowledge of its internal workings, that is, its implementation is "opaque" (black). ED)
 
 
 
There must be a small vertical figure for Lakshmi, and a longer horizontal one for the Devi.
 
 
 
There must also be polar co-ordinates and ramified sets with the Devi and Lakshmi superimposed.
 
(This is a reference to Bourbaki's theory of sets: In mathematics, ramification is a geometric term used for 'branching out', in the way that the square root function, for complex numbers, can be seen to have two branches differing in sign. ED)
 
 
The colour solid exists inside you.

(The colour solid is a three-dimensional representation of a colour wheel. C.f. the introduction to the Science of the Absolute, where the fundamentals of structural methodology are outlined. ED)
colour solid
The colour solid.
 
The eye follows the ear.
The Devi's eye follows the silver Sapharika fish.When She looks at them angrily, they become silent.
(They are young girls afraid of the gossip entrusted to the Devi).
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Parna means "leaf"
 A-parna means "no leaf
Aparna is a name for the Devi, used in this verse to emphasize Her austerity.
 
"tavaparne karnejapa nayana paisunya cakita"
 
(Parvati is referred to as Aparna, meaning 'One who took no sustenance', because of Her fasting and austerities. ED)
 
 

In the gossip at the foot of the ears, the conceptual participates with the perceptual by circulation.
 
 
 
The sapharika fish - a vertical change and a horizontal change.

This means an underlying structure is going to be revealed.
The horizontal movement of the eyes becomes two gleaming lines.
Lakshmi wanders in the daytime in Ooty.
 
 

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There are two figure-8's: one is horizontal at the eyes; one is vertical for Lakshmi.
Aparna means "leafless like a twig or branch"; ramified sets are implied here (See above).
 
 
Ramified sets.

There are two sets of values shown here - one intellectual in the eyes of the Devi, another more ordinary, concerning wealth and everyday phenomena.

The Devi is horizontal here because vitality is an essential ingredient: the horizontal is not bad when it is very, very thin.

Gossip is also horizontal.

Think of polar co-ordinates inside a black box: the structure of thought conforms to a geometric figure.

The structure of the machine and the structure of your brain have something in common.

Travel from the eyes to a river with fish jumping; then back.

Then show a lotus pond with Lakshmi coming out; these form two figure-8's.

Do not try to explain these verses didactically, go to Belsen and Whitney Brothers.
(? This reference is completely obscure; Belsen was a concentration camp; Whitney Brothers seems to be a furniture company. What this means, God alone knows. The original manuscript has this reference. The Guru very occasionally had a surreal sense of humour, is this an example? We would be gratified if any reader who has any suggestions on this subject would forward them to us. ED)
 
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This verse implies a black box structure with a mesh structure in perspective and logarithmic spirals.
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Mesh structure.
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Logarithmic structures.
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Polar coordinates.
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A ramified set.

Below is an example of the structural counterpart of the colour solid, here describing relativity, the horizontal plane may be imagined as a mesh, as in Nataraja Guru's structuralism:


 

 

 

SAUNDARYA LAHARI - VERSE 57

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SAUNDARYA LAHARI

 

 

VERSE 57

THE DEVI'S SIDE-GLANCE ACTING AT A DISTANCE
RECOGNITION WITHOUT FAVOURITISM
KATAKSHA = SIDE-GLANCE.
 
दृशा द्राघीयस्या दरदलित नीलोत्पल रुचा
दवीयांसं दीनं स्नपा कृपया मामपि शिवे ।
अनेनायं धन्यो भवति न च ते हानिरियता
वने वा हर्म्ये वा समकर निपातो हिमकरः
 
drsa draghiyasya daradalita nilopal ruca
daviyamsam dinam snapaya krpaya mam api sive
anenayam dhanyo bhavati na ca te hanir iyata
vane va harmye va samakara nipato himakarah
 
With Your long-extended regard having the beauty of water-lilies just opening,
O Shiva-Consort, do bathe with mercy even me steeped in misery far off
Thus shall I be blessed with no loss to You;
The moonbeams do fall on forest and mansion with equality.
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The section, referring to the grace of beauty lingering round the region of the eyes of the Goddess, seems to be terminating at this verse, perhaps extending to Verse 58, where the ears will have primacy over the eyes. Here we find a tacit reference to the devotee who places himself far off and peripherally, because his supplication does not prompt him to obtrude into the presence of the Goddess except from a great distance. He effaces his own ego completely by this attitude, and is satisfied with retaining the thinnest streak of participation to ensure the bipolarity between himself and the principle of Absolute Beauty. We can easily guess that, as in the case of the first and last verses of this work, as well as Verses 75 and 98, no person other than the author of these verses himself could fit into the context portrayed here. He wishes to efface his own personality to the utmost possible extent, while still keeping what is required as a minimum in the contemplative devotional context. Such a neutral, soft and pure devotion that does not obtrude anywhere is of a superior quality.
 
The reference to water-lilies indicates that a neutral O-Point is applicable to the supplicant, who wishes to keep his neutrality intact. The long-extended regard or glance which reaches those far off can only refer to beams secondarily given out by the beauty of the blue water lily. The pride natural to such an intelligent philosopher is neutralized in this way.
 
One has to be an Aryan to worship Sarasvati as a numerator Vedic value. This is for orthodox Brahmins. The true Advaitin is neither orthodox nor heterodox, and the humble night water-lily suits his purpose even better than the other, prouder, variety of day water lily called the white lotus. The difference between a Mukambika and a Sarasvati is to be remembered here. Misery might be objected to as being a non-Aryan sentiment, as expressed in the Bhagavad Gita (II: 2) by the words anarya jyustam asvargyam, which means “undignified for an Aryan and not conducive to heaven”. Preference for heaven and for a non-sentimental divinity belongs to the plus side, but Sankara, who refers to himself as a “Dravidian child” in Verse 75, is satisfied in taking a humbler position, where the ego of an Aryan is not allowed to obtrude to spoil the cause of true contemplation. The given empirical world is a transitory abode of suffering (duhkhalayam) as the Bhagavad Gita (VIII: 15) puts it. This might be labelled as Oriental pessimism, but sin plays the same role in the Occidental prophetic religions. The fear of Allah is another substitute for the same negative factor in life, without which no question of prayer could arise at all. The whole of this composition is meant to be a prayer and, from the side of the supplicant, would necessarily imply something to be prayed for, recognizing his need for salvation or happiness. All aspiration presupposes some kind of privation or other. There is a touch of agony always implied in contemplation. Contemplation as an ascent pre­supposes such a factor.
 
All that the supplicant asks for here is the faintest form of recognition, as one affiliated to the context of universal motherhood. This could be the humble position of a child or a student, or a worshipper in a temple or, as in this verse, even of a tree in the forest outside a mansion, on which the moonbeams might fall without any personal preference being involved in such a blessing. This kind of spontaneous unpremeditated grace is all that the supplicant expects, without the least touch of egoism on his part, as is clearly indicated in this verse. When bathed in the mercy of the Goddess, the personality of the supplicant is overcome by a sense of blessedness, by itself and for itself. No quantitative loss or gain could be involved in such a pure form of benediction.
 
The arithmetical context of getting and spending is to be completely ruled out here as impersonal devotion attains to its maximum purity. Unlike the equality between citizen and citizen, the vertical relation between ruler and ruled is more like the nature of the benediction conferred on the supplicant in the prayer contained in this verse.
 
The just-opening water lilies show that at dusk they are beginning to respond to moonlight. This picture is not supposed to be a paradise in heaven, but a corresponding paradise available to all mortals at a point where earth and heaven meet, at a neutral O Point. The half-open blue water lilies suggest such a neutral beauty, neither too glamorous nor too humble.
 
We find in the second line a specific reference to a supplicant, speaking in the first person. This cannot be treated as incidental. Sankara is obviously putting himself in the place of the typical supplicant.
 
The reference to the forest, palace and moonlight, lifts the context of worship out of the context of religious holiness altogether. This is in keeping with the attitude cultivated even from the first verse and sustained to the very end. This series of verses is not a text that has to do with holiness or any conventional religiously hidebound belief.
 
 
From the Bhagavad Gitya, II, 2:

Sribhagavan uvacha
kutas tva kasmalam idam
vishame samupasthitam
anaryajustam asvargyam
akirtikaram arjuna

Krishna said:
In (the midst of this) difficulty whence comes to you this dejection, typical of non-
Aryans (anarya), heaven-barring and disreputable, 0 Arjuna?

 

And Chapter VIII, 15:

mam upetya punarjanma
duhkhalayam asasvatam
na 'pnuvantu mahatmanah
samsiddhim paramam gatah

Having attained to Me, they do not return to this transitory
abode of suffering, they having reached the highest attainment.

 

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ADDITIONAL COMMENTS WITH STRUCTURAL DIAGRAMS RELATED TO THIS VERSE FROM SAUNDARYA LAHARI/NOTES.

 

"Bathe me with mercy, o Shiva consort...".
There is a kind of extreme self-pity here "Which deeply touches me".
The "distance" also touches me: this is extreme humility.

Tagore also believes this when he says:
"There are many musicians in your great hall, but I am sitting in a corner ready to sing, and next to me is a beggar - and if called to sing, I will be overcome with emotion" - this is the melting point of mystical emotion.
 
"When Self and non-Self cancel out (with a "click") - then I am ready to weep, but not for particular instances or people."
 
Sankara is saying: "You are not losing anything: give me that delicate thing that will make me the richest man in the world".
 
This relationship between the supplicant and the Devi involves a reciprocity so complete that he is the counterpart of Her, the Goddess - thus, he places himself at a distance to make the equation complete: " you do not lose anything": that means there is a complete cancellation involved.

Nothing horizontal is left.
He wants only a vertical recognition - "don't be kind to me, I am a beggar at a great distance - just glance at me: that pure internal vertical relation is what I want - do not give me anything quantitative and horizontal".
 
This is absolute: when one prays like this, vertical contact is established between the two counterparts.
"You will suffer no loss - I want to belong to the vertical axis only: thus, at a great distance, make me very small and far away."
 
Cf. the letters of Heloïse to Abelard: "don't lose your precious reputation, I won't trouble you by ever coming to your doorstep"
 
Cf. Rousseau, in his Confessions, who doesn't care if "Maman" sleeps with the gardener, as long as she looks at him.
 
So distance is very important.
..
 
What is the purpose of this verse?
Beauty does not discriminate between rich and poor.
It shines even on him who is not endowed with anything, and that person gains satisfaction in knowing that Absolute Beauty does not discriminate.

Beauty is an abstract and universal value - no personal factors are to be considered and no contact is necessary.
Even the thought of it (or the side-glance) will do.

Bipolarity must be established between the individual and the Absolute.
This is all that is important - the bipolarity: then the blessing has its effect.
The only thing important is that the bipolarity be established.
So this is a law of bipolarity, "K" - like the velocity of light.
 
(The Boltzmann constant, K, is a bridge between macroscopic and microscopic physics, since temperature (T) makes sense only in the macroscopic world, while the quantity KT gives a quantity of energy which is on the order of the average energy of a given atom in a substance with a temperature T. ED)
 
Both the observer and the source of light can move - it does not matter.

Knowledge of the Absolute comes to you in this way.
The Devi´s recognition - even a side-glance - has to be absolute.
The thought by which the mendicant affiliates himself with the absolute brings the effect, which is constant, it is always "K".
 
So, no qualifications need be fulfilled by the Devi- She has only to recognise the mendicant.
 
 
Sankara still lingers on the eyes in this verse - because that is the locus of beauty in the face of a woman.
 

The Devi is just a woman - any woman.
 
This is a most touching verse.
Why "askance" and why a "long-extended" glance?
"Long" must refer to the periphery.
 


"Askance" because he is distant from the centre.
He is a poor man, distant from the centre, which is rich.
He is on the horizontal axis somewhere (hence "askance").
Put him on the right hand actual side of the horizontal axis - as a real man, perhaps suddenly reduced to poverty, an indigent man who has lost his business in the real world.
 
Distance means "on the periphery" - "askance" means horizontal.
No pundit can explain these implications without structuralism.
 
This indigent man can be at the furthest periphery, and located horizontally, but, if he has the wisdom to affiliate himself with the Absolute, then he is saved.
This is axiomatic..
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"With your long-extended regard...do bathe with mercy..."
The devotee asks only for a side-glance, not a direct blessing.
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"I am not fit to be regarded as an equal in a vertical sense". (c.f. Abelard and Heloïse)
Negative humility is brought out here, giving a certain dignity..
 
Karuna Kataksha (a side-glance of kindness) - all love requires bi-polar recognition.

The side-glance is enough: a bi-polarity is established between you and God.
There is "no loss to you", it is qualitative and not quantitative.

 

 

SAUNDARYA LAHARI - VERSE 58

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SAUNDARYA LAHARI

 

 

VERSE 58

THE ENIGMATIC PARADOX OF THE PSYCHO-PHYSICAL DYNAMISM IS STATED GLOBALLY
 
अरालं ते पालीयुगल-मगराजन्यतनये
न केषा-माधत्ते कुसुमशर कोदण्ड-कुतुकम् ।
तिरश्चीनो यत्र श्रवणपथ-मुल्ल्ङ्य्य विलसन्
अपाङ्ग व्यासङ्गो दिशति शरसन्धान धिषणाम् ॥ 58
 
 aralam te paliyugalam agarajanya tanaye
na kesam adhatte kusumasara kodanda kutukam
tirascino yatra sravana patham ullanghya vilasan
apanga vyasango disati sarasandhana dhisanam
 
The two sets of curved limiting lines of Yours, O Daughter of the King of Mountains,
Who is it that will not fancy them as the bow of the Flower-Arrowed One;
Where, placed obliquely, and reaching beyond the path of hearing,
As it shines, adhering to Your side-glances, it gives the impression of the fixing of the arrow.
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As the poet watches the face of the Goddess, he fixes his attention successively on certain regions placed in a descending series of vertical points. As he lingers at one point, he tries to describe the enigmatic beauty that plays there. He imagines certain highly suggestive double images, where one image is superimposed by mental construction upon the other, which is more ontologically based. Such two-sided images vie with each other in paradoxical play. At the heart of the Absolute there is an ambiguity, a paradox, an enigma, a two-sided indeterminism, which is not meant by the author to be abolished. This is but in keeping with anirvacaniya khyati (the doctrine of impredicability), which is the final philosophical position that Advaita Vedanta wants to take. Jainism has also its syadvada based on "maybe/maybe not", at one and the same time. Impredicability is not looked upon as weakness in Vedanta, but rather as strength. As in the case of Heisenberg's indeterminate science, it does not mean that ambiguity of this kind is to be avoided or overcome by a better philosophy. There are various khyatis (doctrines) referred to as characteristic of different kinds of idealistic philosophies on the Indian soil. This kind of khyativada (discussion of doctrines) attempts to locate error by fixing the paradox on different grounds or realities. Atmakhyati attempts to fix error onto the ground of the Self. Anyathakhyati is the position which says that “something else” is the cause of error. Akhyati is still another variety, in which error has no real ground at all. Abolishing paradoxes has been the challenge successively taken up by philosophers in India, and variously settled by foisting error on the basic ground. The position of Vedanta is like that of the Jainas, but goes one step further by locating the principle of ambiguity or error, or the possibility thereof, at the core of the Absolute itself. The Jainas and the Buddhists do not postulate any such Absolute. Vedanta postulates an eka purusa, the one supreme spirit or Brahman, within whose personality, by a method of double negation and double assertion, ambiguity abolishes itself in terms of a unitive value revealed in a fourth-dimensional context by cancellation. These are the doctrinal aspects of Vedanta, and if we should not take care to keep them in mind, an irreducible perplexity would still remain as a residue when we try to fix the meaning of each of the verses that follow, especially here in the middle of the work. Once we know that the author only wants to heighten the paradox and leave it there, instead of abolishing it - and in so doing wants to underline the principle of indeter­minism, uncertainty or impredicability as a vestige that can be abolished, at best, in the form of an element of wonder at the core of the Absolute itself - then we shall be able to see his purpose here. It is not, however, an indeterminism without a proper method and theory of knowledge that we should expect to find.
 
In this verse, the subject is again the arrows of the God of Love, aimed at his arch-enemy, Shiva, who is seated at the Omega Point. The beauty of the Goddess is the excuse for Kama even to be able to operate, and affords him a neutral ground on which he can still try his pranks. The Goddess wants to attract; while the God refuses to be attracted except when the right conditions are perfectly fulfilled. So an invisible war - sometimes cold, sometimes hot - is taking place here between the beauty on the upper part of the face of the Goddess, with its appeal directed vertically, and Shiva, who represents the positive side of the same principle. The interplay is not a brute form of fighting, but is meant to be reduced into thin schematic terms, both visible and invisible at the same time. At one moment, it is the side of intelligence that is emphasized in order for us to catch the conflict. At another moment, we have to change our perspective to the perceptual side in order to see the progress of the rival forces. Finally, a slight bias on the ontological rather than the teleological side succeeds, and the battle is declared won by the wonder of the beauty of the face of the Goddess. Then the retrogression continues downward into still lower focal points or loci, always in a vertical succession. As soon as a locus has been fixed in a certain verse, it is required that we put a limiting set of circles around it and call it the bindusthana, as in the case of the Sri Chakra.
 
Such circles may not be explicitly mentioned, but some kind of limiting lines are required, within which the ambiguous play of beauty could live and move. In this particular verse, such limits are the two sets of curved lines marked by the two ears and the two eyebrows. The secret fixing of the arrow of Kama behind the visible scene has been alluded to in different stages from Verse 6 through Verse 47. The enigmatic beauty of the Goddess cannot be brought into relief without a conflict, however subtle, being presupposed between Kama and Shiva. Thus Kama has to figure in many places. The Goddess is not just beautiful, but enigmatically so; and this makes all the difference. Beauty without a tragic touch becomes insipid.
 
Physiologically viewed, there might not really be a circle enclosed by these two sets of curved lines, but in a psycho-phy­sically revised version, we could think of the two functions of seeing and hearing as being contained within the limits of the eyebrows and the ears. The arrows fixed by Kama could have two rival positions at right angles to each other. Kama, as a rival to Shiva, can be expected to let his arrows fly in an oblique direction. It is only occasionally, when every other condition is favourable, that his arrows can be made to fly vertically. This he cannot do without complying with the side-glance of the Goddess and conforming to the same highly verticalized attitude. These differences have been alluded to already, especially in Verse 52. In the present verse the object is merely to represent the functioning of Kama, whose arrows fly horizontally, beyond the limits of the ears. Past this limit, what is spatialized motion could be treated as changed qualitatively into time-like motion.
 
Here the arrows, when they fly, have to adhere to the direction of the side-glances. Kama is not yet letting the arrows fly, he is only represented here as fixing them onto the obliquely-aimed bow as he gets ready to give battle in his normal way. While still in the act of fixing the base of the arrow onto the bowstring, it is permissible for us to think of the two sets of curved lines as marking the limits within which Kama could operate, at any of the four right-angle positions possible to him. As his target is on the plus side of the situation, a ninety-degree tilting of the bow is all that we might have to imagine here. If the arrow belongs to a three-dimensional context, the shining lines of the glances of the Goddess could be said to belong to a four-dimensional context, where visibility and audibility cancel each other out. Only the wonder of Absolute Beauty remains for us to see when paradox has thus been abolished.
 
The fixing of an arrow is the only definite event in this verse. The rest consists of glances and sound elements which make up a kind of Chakra, composed of lines representing light or sound radiating from and circulating round the central locus. Beauty is to be meditated upon; and when Absolute Beauty is the theme, it can produce such contemplative visions based equally on fact and fable.
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(Note: Heisenberg's Principle of Indeterminism: a physical principle, enunciated by Werner Heisenberg in 1927, that places an absolute theoretical limit on the combined accuracy of certain pairs of simultaneous, related measurements. The accuracy of a measurement is given by the uncertainty in the result; if the measurement is exact, the uncertainty is zero. ED).
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ADDITIONAL COMMENTS WITH STRUCTURAL DIAGRAMS RELATED TO THIS VERSE FROM SAUNDARYA LAHARI/NOTES.

 

WORD FOR WORD
aralam te - your bent or curved
paliyugalam - outer ear - limit - margin - edges, row - line - circumference // pair - couple - a yoke of oxen
agarajanyatavaye - -o daughter of the king of mountains
na kesam adhatte - in whom should it not instil
kusumasara kodanda kutukam- the suggestion of the bow of the flower-arrowed one.
tirascino - transverse -horizontal - across - obliquely - against one's will
yatra - in which place - where - wherein.
 
In this verse, we have two arrows at right angles.
This describes the ear and eyebrow limits with Eros' arrow aimed at 90 degrees
.
This verse deals with the pair of arches between the eyebrows and the ears.
The pundits have not succeeded in explaining this.
We have to go to the intentions of the author.
.
First, think of the eyebrows as arched.
Then think of the arrows.
The side-glance is an arrow put at right angles to the arched eyebrows.

The length of the side-glance is such that it goes beyond the ears.
The arrow is horizontal - a side-glance - with arching eyebrows - as a woman deeply in love looks at her husband.

(There is a question as to whether "tirascino" means "obliquely" or " at right angles")
Obliquely - because now the string is being pulled.
This means that the Devi is still capable of emotion.
 
 
Oblique side-glance.

And, he says, anyone can understand this. "Who is it that will not...". The arrow is about to be let go.
She is full of emotions. This is also part of the Absolute.
So She is about to be stricken by love.
This is a front view: the eyebrows are now completely arched - She is full of love for Shiva.
"Who will not?…" - I am not saying something rare when I refer to the bow of Kamadeva (Eros), everyone can see this.
But there is something rare about the side-glance going past the ears of the Devi.
Her eyes are oblique and they go beyond the ears - this implies intentionality
The eyes are exceeding their norm of horizontal limitations in order to attract Shiva.
Narayana Guru and Tagore also ask for the side-long glance of the Devi.
Tagore writes: "In the great hall, I am also a musician, but I cannot sing because my mind is full of devotion to You."
In this verse, Sankara has gone from a streak of magenta in the hair to a pure horizontal aspect of the eyes.
I.e. It is legitimate for women to fall in love, even the Devi.
She has to be negative - She has to have oblique eyes.
This matter of the two bows is very easy to understand.
Sankara says that you should not tax your brain about this, nor should you think that there is anything wrong with the Devi´s love for Shiva.
Think first of a bow - who cannot see this?
But the oblique glance of the Devi has transcended the ears to attract the attention of Shiva or someone.
NOT Shiva but "someone" - this is horizontal, not vertical as it would be in the case of Shiva..

One man is virtual, one man is actual, one on each side of the horizontal - as related to the structure.
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.
 
 

.

 

There is a visible bow and arrow.
Then horizontally, there are the long and oblique glances of the Devi.
There are two ears and two eyes - in the middle is a light.

The eyebrows are arched and there is a glistening light coming from beneath the eyelashes of the Devi.

Eros has put the arrow into position.

Of the two suggestions of Sankara's, the first is easy.
The second says that the lengthening of the eyes transcends the ears; that there is a horizontal parameter and also a horizontal light - this is difficult to understand.
Sankara was born of an Aryan father, who taught him the Shastras (scriptures), and a sudra (low caste) mother, who suckled him on the milk of Tantra and esoterics.
The obliqueness of the glance is simply the horizontal axis - and there is a light there.
 
 
Another version:
 
TRANSLATION
- your bent
- pair of limits
- o daughter of the Himalayas
- in whom should it not bring
- the suggestion of the flower-arrow
- there placed tangentially (at right angles to)
- passing beyond the auditory path
- shining
- the length of your side-glance
- expresses or exhibits
- the semblance of someone joining the arrow to the bow (or "idea")
.

.
 
The "limit" can only be the eyes.
They are bent due to Eros.
There is a line reaching beyond the ears.
Wherever some emotion is present (signaled by Her bent eyebrows) the idea of eroticism is present as well.
The hearing and the eyes are put at right angles to one another - and here we "pass beyond the auditory path" - vision and hearing are two separate axes.
Your side-glance is very long - transcending normal space-time concepts.
It produces the joining of the bow and arrow.
.
To the extent that the side-glance is long it is compassion.
To the extent that the eyebrows are bent it is erotic
So there are two aspects of love at loggerheads with one another.
There are two things - the side-glance and the bent eyebrows.

The possibility of erotic sentiment is there, but the side-glance of compassion is the aspect which is stressed.

He is not saying one thing or the other, but both together.
 
(Cf. the principle of indeterminism referred to above. ED)

The Devi must have the possibility of eroticism as a woman, but compassion is present as well.

There is a subtle relationship between seeing and hearing.
Thus the side-glance extends to the ears; eyes and ears belong together.
"To whom should this not bring the suggestion of the flowery bow?"
The bow is placed at right angles to the line between the ears.
These are shining lights - not something real.

"Your side-glance, which is long, exhibits the function of intelligence…"
It causes the idea to arise, which you are meant to imagine as an arrow being placed on a string.

But the bow is not pulled - the idea of erotic sentiment is there, but it is balanced correctly, so as not to be vulgar.

The possibility of sexual interest is there.
If you meditate on the Goddess, you can remain quiet.
The function of the ears is passed over.
Lines of light alone are under reference here.
Length, curves and right-angles are all referred to.
This is a perfect example of structuralism.
"The bow of the flower-arrowed one…"
Pali yugalam (The outer ear limits) - two limiting curves joined together - two lines which are curved, resembling a bow.
Then there is a line oblique to this - the arrow.
Then there is a blue lotus bud for the tip of the arrow.
To whom will this not suggest something subtle?
There is a structural presence, with a dynamism, because the eyes go beyond the ears.
Sound comes to you as a horizontal line.
Then you put the bow and arrow somewhere, with Eros hiding.
When you abstract and generalize beauty on the face of the Devi, you get a vertical and a horizontal line, which have a reciprocal relation.
Why does the Devi hide Eros - the enemy of Shiva - inside Her?
Yoga is like the fixing of the arrow - using the Devi´s image: only through the structure can you meditate successfully.

There are eight Chakras within you - this is the greatest secret of Yoga - do not see Woodroffe in this connection, his information is not correct.
 
(Sir John Woodroffe, a 19th Century author and translator of Tantric texts, whose views are rejected by Nataraja Guru. ED)
The lower structural triangle is the bowstring; the upper triangle is the momentum, which will result when the arrow is fixed
(mass into velocity equals momentum.)
 
 

There is compensation between the bowstring and the momentum.
 

 
The lower structural triangle is the bowstring.
 
 
 
The upper triangle is the momentum, which will result when the arrow is fixed
(mass into velocity equals momentum.)
 

COMPENSATION BETWEEN THE BOWSTRING AND MOMENTUM

CANCELLATION HAPPENS WHEN THE ARROW HITS THE OMEGA POINT AND SHIVA

 

Cancellation is when the arrow strikes Shiva at the Omega Point.
Why Eros? Because there is no story without him: why does Milton want Satan in "Paradise Lost?

Anyway, see it mathematically.
Everything is beautifully vague here and based on guesswork.
The better the guesswork, the better the Vedantin.
To present this in mathematical form is to abolish all cultural divisions.

-


 

 

SAUNDARYA LAHARI - VERSE 59

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SAUNDARYA LAHARI

 

 

VERSE 59

A MORE DIRECT VERTICO-HORIZONTAL INTERACTION
A VERTICALIZED VERSION OF PARTICIPATION BETWEEN SARASWATI AND PARVATI

 

 स्फुरद्गण्डाभोग-प्रतिफलित ताट्ङ्क युगलं
चतुश्चक्रं मन्ये तव मुखमिदं मन्मथरथम् ।
यमारुह्य द्रुह्य त्यवनिरथ मर्केन्दुचरणं
महावीरो मारः प्रमथपतये सज्जितवते

 

spurad gandhabhoga pratiphalita tatanga yugalam
catus cakram manye tava mukham idam manmatha ratham
yam aruhya druhyaty avani ratham arkendu caranam
mahaviro marah pramatha pataye sajjitavate
 
This, Your face, I consider Kama's chariot with four wheels,
As seen when Your ear ornaments are reflected on Your shining cheeks;
Surmounting which that great hero, Kama, assails the Lord of Hosts,
Who, with sun and moon for foothold, mounting the globe for chariot, is fully ready to give him battle.
.
 
In this verse we have to distinguish a situation in which the battle is about to start between Kama and Shiva, who is here named the Lord of Hosts. It is the beautiful face of the Goddess which is the psycho-physical basis for the chariot of Kama, who was fixing his arrows in the previous verse. Now, on closer scrutiny, the chariot, which is more ontological in status, comes into view. Two of the wheels of the chariot are the large wheel-like ear ornaments worn by the women of ancient India, which were common even thirty years ago. These supply the physical basis for the illusion of the chariot, while the two other wheels are created by their reflections, one degree removed from the physical reality and therefore nearer to the metaphysical. The beauty of the Goddess is neither physical nor metaphysical, but both. In the same way that an actual chair and a conceptual chair could belong together in consciousness to an integrated view of reality, so these two pairs of wheels complement each other and do not enter into conflict with each other. The reflected wheels, however, have only a horizontal status of parity with the two original ones. They are like mirror reflections and therefore virtual The reflecting surface is the glossiness of the cheeks of the Goddess. A thin line has to separate the two sets of wheels because the transition from perceptual to conceptual requires a limiting parameter, as in a mirage which reflects sunlight. A layer of hot air can cause a mirage effect when viewed at a certain angle. The glossy cheeks of the Goddess are therefore aptly referred to as producing this illusion of a chariot with four wheels. Such a chariot has already been introduced into the picture more than once. In Verse 6 it was said to consist of the monsoon breeze favourable to the flowery season. Now Kama takes his position on the completed chariot to let his arrows fly, not only horizontally. The chance of hitting Shiva himself and making him fall in love with the beauty of the face of Parvati is a possibility not to be ruled out in this subtle picture of occasionalism.
 
Having completed the picture of the chariot of Kama, the poet passes on to the chariot proper to Shiva. Shiva does not require four wheels, because the two celestial orbs, the sun and the moon, could be so manipulated by him that they would, perhaps alternately, take over the function of the two back wheels. The front wheel, with the help of which he is supposed to descend along the vertical line, has to be of an order less hypostatic than the former two. Thus, the chariot could be thought of as functioning with a spherical wheel, which could be none other than the globe of the earth itself. The wheels are in any case imaginary and have a highly hypostatic status; so one should not ask why the analogy does not square with cosmolo­gical facts. Cosmology and cosmogony have to differ, and contemplative cosmogony must differ still further. When we make these concessions, we can see that Shiva himself is preparing to fight against Kama. That Kama is a sufficiently dignified rival for Shiva has already been established in Verse 6. He cannot always be victorious, but he has to bide his time as occasionalism dictates. Beauty being an absolutist value, the side-glances of the Goddess can make the arrow of Kama fly more effectively, even in the vertical direction, where Shiva could successfully be hit. That is why Shiva is getting ready to meet the threat. A cancellation will take place in which the Beauty of the Goddess will triumph. The spiritual progress of' the votary of the Goddess thus becomes assured. We have to note that it is readiness for battle, and not actual battle that is to be imagined here. This moment is in the eternal present, in which the paradox of the Absolute is cancelling itself out.
 
We have referred to the glossy skin of the cheeks of the Goddess as reflecting the light of the ear ornaments. The twilights of many moonsets and moonrises or sunsets and sunrises could be fused together to influence the outer skin, even of fruits such as mangoes or peaches. Oranges are said to be “sun-kissed”. The glossy surface of fruits implies a thin film which separates the beauty that is inside from the beauty that is outside, as between the taste of the orange and the sheen of its skin. Many twilight dreams of innumerable sunset and sunrise hours must have produced the dappled coloration seen on certain fruits, and even perhaps the brindled patches on certain cows. The varieties of coloured light can produce all kinds of patterns of beauty in nature, and the beauty of the Goddess here is not outside the scope of such an explanation.
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ADDITIONAL COMMENTS WITH STRUCTURAL DIAGRAMS RELATED TO THIS VERSE FROM SAUNDARYA LAHARI/NOTES.

 

In this verse, we have horizontal chariots versus vertical chariots.
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The gold ear ornaments of the Devi are described here as reflected in her face, thus yielding four wheels.
 

These are the 4 wheels of the chariot, with two actual and two virtual wheels.
 
(See at the bottom of the page for clarification of the difference between actuality and virtuality. ED)

This is the chariot for Eros to ride in when he fights Shiva.
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In the previous Verse 58, Eros fires his arrows horizontally.
Shiva will descend in a two-wheeled chariot, with the sun and moon as wheels.
He will descend in a logarithmic spiral, like a helicopter, to fight Eros.
 
 
 
Shiva descends in a logarithmic spiral.
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They will fight on the horizontal axis and Shiva will win, because time must absorb space and verticality must prevail.
 

 

 

Virtuality and Actuality have met on the horizontal axis (the four wheels, two vertical and two horizontal).
 

The Devi is about to break down in emotional crisis, her eyebrows bending, smitten by love.

The two-wheeled chariot is a verticalized version of the four- wheeled one.

Of the four wheels, the virtual ones are the gold ear-ornaments, since they are ornamental; they are near the ears and thus conceptual, and not an actual  part of the Devi.
 

The reflected rings on her temples or cheeks are sure to be the actual, real ones as they are a part of the Devi herself.
Kama Deva (Eros), in the past verses has been gradually overcoming the face of the Devi.

 

Now he has succeeded and thinks he is powerful enough to fight Shiva, by virtue of his affiliation with the face of the Devi.
 
Shiva's face is the whole globe - with his feet firmly planted on the sun and moon.
 
There are two equations:
- a denominator one - Eros and the face of the Devi,
- a numerator one - Shiva and the conceptualized globe.
 
(BELOW IS A TENTATIVE STRUCTURE WHICH MAY NEED REVISION. ED)
 
This ("fighting", presumably. ED) can only be a vague way of meaning "opposing, hitting or shaking up".
Everything has to be shining and reflecting for purposes of schematics.
Thus, Eros mounts the chariot of the face - the wheels are the ear-ornaments and the reflections in the cheeks are horizontalized.
Shiva is the counterpart - his circle is the globe - he is standing on the sun and moon.
(A hypostatic entity has a conceptualized basis.)
 
 
Then the face of Shiva has to come to the face of the Devi: Eros is the hero, while Shiva is merely prepared to meet the attack - although the attack may only be for one moment when Eros and the face come into the vertical axis.
The Numerator and Denominator are absolute and when they confront each other, there is a participation and a cancellation.
 

Because of this verticalized status of Eros, Shiva can look at the face of his wife without duality.

How do you justify this business of fighting between husband and wife?
There are two vehicles - enemies - confronting one another: what is the word in the text that justifies this fight?
 

It is the face Sankara is talking about: there are no chariots, but only the face of the Devi and the face of Shiva.
 
It is the concept of the earth here - with sun and moon behind - it is hypostatic - a heavenly orb descending to meet the face of the Devi.
 
 
 

There is no opposition, but only participation: there is only a difference of two faces placed near to one another.
 
No man but Narayana Guru can find the meaning of this verse, except perhaps Chettampi Swami (his guru), by becoming an absolutist due to the circumstance of being illegitimate.
The meaning of this verse consists in bringing the globe down to meet the face.
"It is true because it cannot be otherwise" - this is  is rtham - the name of the truth, not the argument.
As opposed to satyam, existent truth, which is true because you can touch it.
 
 
How do you know the child loves the mother? It is mathematical.
Reductio ad absurdum.
(Anupalabdhi pramana - the "impossibility of being otherwise". ED)
Two opposing things neutralize each other: 4/4 =1
If they were really fighting, the result would be O, but it is not O, but 1.
 
Here there are two war-chariots: show Eros' one coming out of the Devi's face and going back again; another chariot, Shiva's, descending from above.

The shine on the Devi's cheek comes from the sun kissing her:
It has the pearly lustre of a 1000 suns .
 
 

THE FOUR LIMBS OF THE QUATERNION.

 

1. THE ACTUAL CHAIR in which the actual man can sit; this chair will exclude another chair, and occupies a particular space.

2. THE VIRTUAL CHAIR, in which a virtual man can sit; much like a mirror reflection.

3. THE ALPHA-POINT CHAIR, the form of the chair generalized,
It excludes all other chairs.
This is the universal concrete version, it excludes horizontally but not vertically.

4. THE OMEGA POINT CHAIR: the word "chair" in the dictionary, purely conceptual.

 

 

 

 

 

SAUNDARYA LAHARI - VERSE 60

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SAUNDARYA LAHARI

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VERSE 60

PERCEPTUAL AND CONCEPTUAL VALUES
THE INTERACTION BETWEEN TWO DICTIONARIES
THE RECIPROCITY BETWEEN METALLIC SOUNDS AND WORDS

 

सरस्वत्याः सूक्ती-रमृतलहरी कौशलहरीः
पिब्नत्याः शर्वाणि श्रवण-चुलुकाभ्या-मविरलम् ।
चमत्कारः-श्लाघाचलित-शिरसः कुण्डलगणो
झणत्करैस्तारैः प्रतिवचन-माचष्ट इव ते

 

sarasvatyas suktir amrta lahari kausalaharih
pibantyas sarvani sravanaculukabhyam aviralam
camatkara stagha calita sirasah kundalagano
chanatkarais taraih prativacanam acasta iva te
 
The good sayings of Saraswati, exuding nectar sweetness,
Ever absorbing as with slow interest, you bend Your ears to them, o blessed one
Each bright wit therein approving with nods,
While Your series of earrings seem to applaud them with their high pitch jinglings
.
 
In the previous section, the arrows of Kama and the side glances of the Goddess figured in collaboration to present before us two fully developed Chakras, one higher and the other lower. The lower Chakra implied the three modalities of nature (gunas) and other aesthetic interests which were sublimated or verticalized in the first half of the previous set of ten verses. In this section we pass on to the domain proper to the Goddess of the Word, Saraswati, who presides over poetry. In the Vedic context she is represented as sitting in white robes on a white lotus, telling crystal beads and holding a book. The “Satapatha Brahmana” which presents a later Vedic revision of Saraswati, speaks of a goddess who sends arrows both ways, that is, toward both the perceptual and conceptual sides at once. Such a Word-Goddess, who presides over both the dictionaries, the conceptual as well as the perceptual, is sometimes referred to as Ubhaya Bharati (a double Saraswati), and is proper to the temple which is said by some scholars to have been established by Sankara himself at the Sringeri Math.
 
For the purposes of this verse we need more than one goddess. So Sankara gives us the picture of one goddess responding to the words of the other. It is important for us to fix the episte­mological status of these two goddesses before trying to understand the dialogue taking place between them. One is represented here as only nodding while the other is actually speaking.
 
The difference between these two versions of the Word-Goddess might be distinguished as between medium and message.
If we take a red pencil and make a line with it, that could be called a “medium language”, based on percepts. The red is immediately evident in the medium itself and the conceptual message or word is not necessary to make the meaning any clearer.
Sarasvati on the other hand, represents the word “red”, when we spell it out with any pencil, not necessarily a red one.
 
The interaction between perceptual realities and conceptual realities is thus a form of agreement or one-to-one correspondence between numerator and denominator aspects of the same word-content. We could have the example of the word “stop” and a red light put together in a traffic signal, where symbol and sign meet to cancel out into the same meaning.
 
The situation in this verse is analogous. The Absolute Goddess has two aspects that belong together to the same meaning. Structurally analyzed, there is an ontologically-biased Goddess having a communication with her own teleological counterpart. The lower Goddess, who is more real, bears real metallic earrings jingling on her ears. She does not speak, but her response is made up of nods which only approve of the verbose statements made by her own higher dialectical counterpart. As Goddesses of the Word, both of them are interested in the aptness of analogies that poets might succeed in choosing. When aptness succeeds, it is the success of the perceptual aspects of an analogy cancelling out against its conceptual aspects. The verdict on this matter has to come from the side of perception, because human experience begins with sensations and perceptions, and only then passes over to higher conceptual constructions.
 
The sayings of Saraswati consist of wise proverbs or witticisms. Witty statements have to be short and convincing. When analogies are aptly employed, those who enjoy good literature will surely applaud the genius of the poet concerned. Without being expressed in words, the applause could come from the ontological side, because seeing is always more convincing than hearing. This is why the jingling of the ear-ornaments, along with the gesture of nodding, is meant here by the poet to express in non-verbose language the Goddess´ nodding appreciatively on hearing wise proverbs expressed in the more verbose language of literature, belonging to the side of Saraswati. Nodding is the vertical link connecting the two sides, and the jingling of the ear ornaments participates both in the world of sound as well as in the world of the “medium”. Thus message and medium meet and cancel out, resulting in a situation that is meant to enhance the beauty-value of the Word Goddess who could be seen as speaking or silent, as required.

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ADDITIONAL COMMENTS WITH STRUCTURAL DIAGRAMS RELATED TO THIS VERSE FROM SAUNDARYA LAHARI/NOTES.

 

This verse depicts a dialogue between Saraswati and the Devi.
 
 
Saraswati.
 
Three values are to be distinguished here:
Saraswati's poem - which is Vedic, and is situated on the Numerator.
Devi hears it - this is on the Denominator.
Thirdly - the Devi appreciates it in the meeting place of all light, sound, electricity etc.
 
(This central meeting point - the O Point of the structure - is where the earrings jingle as she nods Her head. At this point of cancellation the numerator sound is translated by the nodding or oscillation of Her head into the jingling of the concrete, denominator earrings. ED)
 
There are three sounds:
Saraswati speaking and the Devi appreciating her words - this makes up a dialogue between the two goddesses: then cancel  them out with the third sound of earrings.
There is an Aryan Goddess, Saraswati, and a Dravidian Goddess, often called Mukambika, the "Silent Mother".

The three sounds correspond to white, red and black - the three gunas (modalities of nature).
 
There are three levels here:

1) The sound of the ear-ornaments jingling very delicately: thought, which is conceptual - this is the central level, which is red.
2) Saraswati is reciting a beautiful Vedic poem, which descends from the Numerator - this is another level - the white level, on the positive side.
3) The Devi hears it - this is the Denominator aspect of the sound - black, on the negative side.
 
The jingling of the ornaments is due to the shaking of the head of the Devi in appreciation - this is occasionalism.
 
 
(Occasionalism, often attributed to Descartes, is a philosophical theory about causation which says that created substances cannot be efficient of events. Instead, all events are taken to be caused directly by God. (A related theory, which has been called 'occasional causation', also denies a link of efficient causation between mundane events, but may differ as to the identity of the true cause that replaces them. The theory states that the illusion of efficient causation between mundane events arises out of God's causing of one event after another. However, there is no necessary connection between the two: it is not that the first event causes God to cause the second event: rather, God first causes one and then causes the other. ED)
 
(It seems clear that the Guru here intends to say that the words from Saraswati on the Numerator and the jingling on the Denominator are not related by a crude relationship of cause and effect - like one billiard ball striking another - but a more subtle causal relationship, as is the relation between God and events described above. ED)
This verse of Saraswati is in praise of the Devi.
 

You have to think of Saraswati as respectable, on a white lotus on the numerator hypostatic side.

She sings a poem, which has to be appreciated by its denominator counterpart.

The Devi hearkens and strains to hear the song - the sound is like the vibrating of the vertical axis.

The Numerator and the Denominator come together in the centre, without the three levels of structuralism being kept in mind.
.
.
 Guru: this verse is too good to be explained.
This is the secret of Sankara: he puts together Aryan - Saraswati - and Dravidian - Mukambika - and gets Vedanta.
 
(Saraswati is of North Indian Aryan origin and is the "Goddess of the Word" (vak devi), while Mukambika, whose name means the "Silent Mother" is of South Indian Dravidian origin. ED)
A dialogue between Mukambika and Saraswati takes place in this verse - that is, a dialogue between the Denominator and Numerator.
 

The counterparts are Denominator protolanguage and Numerator metalanguage.
 
(In the terminology of Nataraja Guru, these terms are used differently from their usual definitions in linguistics: the structural methodology used throughout his works is protolanguage. The Cartesian co-ordinates are protolinguistic in essence; so also are the longitudes and latitudes of maps. Symbols are protolinguistic; signs are metalinguistic. Alphabets belong to metalanguage and geometrical elements such as angles, points, lines or concentric circles can be used protolinguistically. ED)

The stretching of the ear through protolanguage - through the shaking of her head, which is protolanguage, causing the jingling of the ornaments.
 
There is a telephone call from Saraswati to Mukambika, wherein great secrets are given in words - this is metalanguage.
Mukambika responds (that she understands) by using protolanguage (her jingling ornaments).
In the line "chanatkarais taraih prativacanam acasta iva te", "Iva…" means "it looks as if she is applauding" - it is a response - so it is still an analogy.
 
(This supports the statement above that it is occasionalism that relates the words and the jingling - rather than brute cause and effect - the relation between the two is analogical rather than causal. ED)

It is still a vertical structural relationship: it has no "real" status of two "real" goddesses talking in the horizontal world - there is no duality here - there are no two goddesses - there is only one - the negative principle. The "two" goddesses are only structural monomarks.
 
(Cause and effect are horizontal - occasionalism or analogy is vertical. ED)
 
(This structure is tentative. ED)

It is simply a structural requirement to have two goddesses..
FOLLOW ANYTHING WHOLEHEARTEDLY AND YOU WILL GET THE TRUTH.

THE PEOPLE WHO FIRST FOUND THIS STRUCTURE OF A WOMAN´S BODY WERE MEDITATING FOR EROTICISM, NOT FOR PHILOSOPHY; 
BUT THEY FOLLOWED IT SO WHOLEHEARTEDLY AND COMPLETELY THAT THEY FOUND THE TRUTH INSTEAD.
 
Sarasvatya suktir: ("The sweet sayings of Saraswati")  this is an example of the medium and the message as counterparts, with a line separating them.
 
 
Saraswati is the message,
 
Mukambika (the Devi as the "silent mother") is the medium.

The silence of Mukambika has a terrible power.
 
We are living inside a conic section, the universe moves in parabolas and hyperbolas.
 
 
At whatever level you take a cross-section, you get the same structure.
Draw a vertical axis up from the Sri Chakra to Shiva, he will come down and lift the handle of the mirror of the face of the Devi.
Then Ganesha and Skanda will be born in the lotus-pond.
Shiva will not copulate, but only gaze with his third eye.

 

 
  1. SAUNDARYA LAHARI - VERSE 61
  2. SAUNDARYA LAHARI - VERSE 62
  3. SAUNDARYA LAHARI - VERSE 63
  4. SAUNDARYA LAHARI - VERSE 64