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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,
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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.