SAUNDARYA LAHARI - VERSE 9

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SAUNDARYA LAHARI

 

 

VERSE 9

 

THE KULA PATH
A SERIES OF VERTICAL VALUE-SYSTEMS

 

महीं मूलाधारे कमपि मणिपूरे हुतवहं
स्थितं स्वधिष्टाने हृदि मरुत-माकाश-मुपरि ।
मनो‌உपि भ्रूमध्ये सकलमपि भित्वा कुलपथं
सहस्रारे पद्मे स हरहसि पत्या विहरसे 

 

mahim muladhare kam api manipure hutavaham
sthitam svadhisthane hrdi marutam akasam upari
mano'pi bhrumaddhye sakalam api bhitva kulapatham
sahasrare padme saha reahasi patya viharase

 

The earth placed in the Muladhara, water in the Manipura,
Fire in the Svadhisthana, air in the heart, with space above,
And amid eyebrows placing the mind, and breaking through the whole Kula-path
You do sport with your lord secretly in the thousand-petaled lotus.
.

 

After placing the absolute principle of Beauty, presented in the most realistic, universal and concrete form, in her proper position at the core of the total structural setup, in the eighth verse, this verse carries over the same into the other grades of stable positions on the vertical parameter, where a natural equilibrium of psycho-physical forces could be expected. As we have pointed out, the classical dancing girl, Kandukavati, begins at the proper ontological starting point by respectfully touching the firm earth before elaborating the graded varieties of her art at more and more perfected levels which fill the whole field or ground with magenta glory.

 

Here also the most stable ground for an equilibrium to be established between psycho-physical forces, introspectively or intuitively understood, is the earth principle, which is the rich ontological basis where the consciousness of the contemplative can naturally find repose and be at ease.

 

In contemplative literature we know of various grades of value-systems, some of which are "of the earth, earthy" while others are placed in essences at higher hypostatic levels. The Puranas (traditional heroic or epic lore), which have a popular philosophical appeal , speak of "twice seven worlds" of such values, totalling fourteen; seven being above while seven are below. Names are given to each of these value worlds. When we include the subjective self or the objective self as an additional point of psycho-physical equilibrium, we get eight worlds which are subjective and eight worlds that belong to the objective or non-self side. The Bhagavad Gita marks out just these sixteen possible stratifications in Absolute Consciousness in Verse 4, Chapter VII. Buddhism knows of the "Noble Eight-Fold Path", and the Patanjali system of Yoga has its astangas (eight grades or divisions). In the opening verse of his play "Shakuntala", Kalidasa gives importance to this way of dividing the whole of the range covered by the vertical parameter by marking eight points, one set of which is in the descending scale and the other in the ascending, which latter alone figures in the opening verse. The subjective series is omitted evidently because the onlookers of the play themselves bring the subjective side to bear on the total situation, while the players represent the objective side. The joy of the play results from the interplay of the subjective and objective sides.

 

There is also in the "Vivekacudamani" a reference to this graded unit consisting of eight items, there called puryastakam (eight cities), which make up the eight levels describing the subtle body, referred to there as the sukshma sarira. The number eight thus seems to be a normal figure when the whole range of literature is considered; but in this verse there is only reference to six positions.

 

Sankara, in his bhasyas or commentaries, comes up against this kind of difference between text and text, and votes there in favour of a bigger number, saying that having some extras is always safer than being strictly limited, as for example in the number of players in a game. In his "Epistemology of the Gnosis", Narayana Guru analyzes the same question, and comes to a fairly conclusive version of the epistemological problem involved. Knowledge is either of things present to the senses or of elements experienced from inside oneself, and these two aspects could be broadly divided by putting a horizontal line between the self and the non-self; that is, between the knower and the known. We can go upward in an ascending scale of stable positions, rising gradually into the region of the non-self, or sink introspectively to the source within, starting with the most stable ontological pole marked by the firm earth. The question of inserting your own self (atman) as the eighth item on the objective side to complete the series of eight, could be done last of all, in the manner of 7+1, 5+3 or 6+2.

 

We are concerned with explaining the problem of only six positions being discussed in the present verse. We could easily add one more below the Muladhara, which would mark the position of the Kulakunda of Verse 10; and in this verse there is the Sahasrara, the thousand-petaled lotus, which does not seem to be included in the six. Thus the puzzle is cleared without us having to suggest some modification of what is identified in this work in very clear terms as the six Adharas, or stable positions. We enumerate them in an ascending series, as given in this verse:

 

  1. Muladhara
  2. Manipura
  3. Svadhisthana
  4. the Heart (Anahata: not named here) the Space above (Visuddhi: not named here)
  5. the Mind, between the eyebrows (Ajña: not named here)

 

In the Patanjali system, which is based on the dualistic Samkhya philosophy, the dynamism of yoga is in terms of a gradual process of spiritual progress, in eight grades of discipline, ascending to what is marked by the word kaivalya, aloneness, at the culminating point attained by yogic ascent, taken step by step. This kind of gradual process of spiritual progress between two points, representing ends and means, is repugnant to the more dynamic unitive view proper to Advaita Vedanta, where no vestige of duality could be tolerated, whether in ends or means, which have to be treated together. This is the correct Advaitic approach of the Upanishads and the Bhagavad Gita.

 

The "Kula path" here is a reference to those who follow the Shakti cult, whether known as Kaulins or Samayins; the latter being considered more respectable than the former. We have explained the difference in our "general remarks", elsewhere. The words "breaking through the whole Kula path" imply the revaluation of those two kinds of esotericism in terms of the more radical or absolutist approach denoting this work. The dynamism of this verse is complemented and completed in the next verse as both an ascent as well as a descent.

 

There is a reference to a snake that sleeps in the hollow of the lower limit called kulakunda. This is the much-talked about Kundalini snake. Kundala means a hoop or ring. It is thus sometimes thought of as a circle enclosing an Absolute Value ideogram. An improved version is when we think of it coiled up like a viper, rather than a cobra, appearing like a spring of three and a half coils, as specifically indicated in the next verse. This snake is not only sleeping in its most easy-going state, but can uncoil itself with a hissing noise, as mentioned in some yogic texts, to become a verticalized and rigid version of the same without coils. By this verticalizing ascent, another hole at the top of the psycho-physical setup is reached, passing through, if possible, what is referred to as an "Absolute Passage" situated somewhere below the pituitary gland at the soft palate, behind the uvula. When the head of the snake touches this highest of plexuses or points of psycho-physical synergism or syndromes, the yogi is supposed to experience an exaltation that makes him, in principle, attain the Absolute Vision. These upper and lower limits have to be clearly visualized by us in studying Verses 9 and 10. Here we are only explaining how "breaking through the whole Kula path" is a dynamism to be understood as resembling the sudden increase of electric voltage, rather than any slow process, as in the case of slow nuclear reactions.

 

"Sporting secretly" only means that the yogi's whole dynamism has a public and a private reciprocity in terms of enjoyment. What is private on the minus side is public on the plus side, and vice-versa. The secret alluded to here is to be understood as having a minus-side reference.
 

(Bhagavad Gita, Chapter VII, Verses 4 and 5:

"Earth, water, fire, air, sky, mind, reason also, and
consciousness of individuality: thus here is divided
My eightfold nature.

This is the non-transcendental (apara = immanent).
Know the other to be my nature, which is transcedental,
constituting life, 0 Mighty-Armed (Arjuna) by which the
phenomenal world is sustained".)

 

(THE NANDI, OR BENEDICTION FROM SHAKUNTALA.
"That which is the first creation of the creator,
That which bears the offering made according to due rites,
That which is the offerer,
Those two which make time,
That which pervades all space, having for its quality what is perceived by the ear,
That which is the womb of all seeds,
That by which all living beings breathe:
Endowed with these eight visible forms, may the supreme Lord protect you."
.
This is the translation as found in the Motilal Banarsidas edition, see the bottom of this page for further comments on this text. ED)

 

 
(Click here for a commentary by Nataraja Guru on Kandukavati, the prototypical dancing girl, as described in the Dasakumaracharita ("The Tale of the Ten Princes") by Dandin, a classic of Sanskrit Literature. ED)
 
(See the bottom of this page for the text of Narayana Guru's "Epistemology of the Gnosis". ED)
 

 

 

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

 

WORD FOR WORD
mahim muladhare - the earth placed in the Muladhara
kam api - the water also
manipure - in the Manipura
hutavaham - the fire principle (receptacle of sacrificial offerings)
sthitam svadhisthane - established in the Swadhisthana
hrdi - in the heart
marutam - the winds
akasam upari - the sky placed above
mano api - the mind also
bhru maddhye - between eyebrows
sakalam api bhitva kulapatam - breaking through the whole Kula path
sahasrare padme - in the thousand-petaled lotus
saha rahasi patya viharase - you do sport with your lord in secret
 
In this verse we have an ascending series of elementals.
(Elementals are the traditional series of Earth, Water, Fire etc. as also known in Greek and other European philosophies. ED)
 
Parvati ascends and meets Shiva in the Sahasrara at the top of the vertical series.

Digital and binary are horizontal.
Analog is vertical.
 
 

(Analog - in an analog audio signal, the instantaneous voltage of the signal varies continuously with the pressure of the sound waves. It differs from a digital signal, in which a continuous quantity is represented by a discrete function which can only take on one of a finite number of values.relating to or using signals or information represented by a continuously variable physical quantity such as spatial position, voltage, etc.

Binary - relating to, using, or denoting a system of numerical notation that has 2 rather than 10 as a base.
Digital - of signals or data expressed as series of the digits 0 and 1, typically represented by values of a physical quantity.

It seems that digital and binary are horizontal because they are a language using  signs - numbers are signs - while analog is vertical because it uses a one-one correspondence between two factors.
 
A sign is like a letter of the alphabet - "r" represents one particular sound and no other - it has only one meaning - it is "semantically monovalent".
A symbol is like the colour red on a traffic light - it means "stop" in this particular case, but can have many other meanings - it can symbolize danger, blood, in India it symbolizes mourning for the dead etc.
 
In mathematics, a bijection (or bijective function or one-to-one correspondence) is a function between the elements of two sets, where every element of one set is paired with exactly one element of the other set, and every element of the other set is paired with exactly one element of the first set.
THIS IS A VERY TENTATIVE INTERPRETATION. ED)
 
 
One-to-one correspondence or bijection.
 

The action in this verse is taking place inside the yogi.
.
.

 

"Breaking through all these, sporting with thy Lord".
There is interpenetration here between the Chakras: it is the same thing happening, at whatever different level.
Cancellation happens in every Chakra and cancellation is cancellation, it is the same Absolute Value at every level
 
 .
.
.
 
You must break through all these chakras to arrive at the 1000-petaled lotus at the Omega Point at the top of the vertical axis.
Here Sankara revises Patanjali, author of the authoritative Yoga Sutras (q.v.)
He is anti-Samkhya.
.
(The Yoga Sūtras of Patañjali are 196 aphorisms that constitute the foundational text of Yoga, which is one of the six orthodox schools of Indian Philosophy; it is paired with the Samkhya school, which is dualistic, and both are thus rejected by Vedanta. ED)
 

Non-dual Yoga and Patanjali´s Yoga are here revalued.
Here the Chakras are taken together, and dealt with in one stroke - burst through.


Do not say at any point that there are two realities - anyone who sees more than one, "he goes from death to death".
The Advaitic approach is to burst through all the six Chakras at on stroke.
Duality between ends and means is not admitted.


When we say Kundalini, we refer only to the denominator side.
Khecari Mudra, on the Numerator, must be dealt with at some other time.

(Khechari Mudra is dealt with in Narayana Guru's "Darsana Mala", in the chapter on Yoga, where it is translated as a "space-freedom attitude." ED)

 

"When meditation with gaze fixed between the eye-brows
And the tongue-tip touching beyond the uvula takes place
Then happens that space-freedom attitude
Of drowsiness and fatigue - dispelling capacity."
 

Another version:

TRANSLATION
the earth
in the lowest of the series of Adharas (stable positions)
(Muladhara)
the water
in the second of the Adharas from below (Manipura)
fire
established
in the third (Swadhisthana)
in the heart
the air
space
above that (it is) in the fourth
also the mind
between the eyebrows
everything breaking through the Kula path
in the thousand-petalled lotus
together, secretly, with Your lord
You do sport

 

THE REVOLUTIONARY APPROACH IN THIS VERSE IS THAT WE BURST THROUGH ALL THE CHAKRAS AT ONCE, INSTEAD OF TREATING THEM AS PROGRESSIVE STAGES TO BE CROSSED ONE-BY-ONE, AS IS USUALLY THE CASE.

 

ABOVE ALL OF THEM IS THE SAHASRARA - THE THOUSAND-PETALED LOTUS

 

Then, in descending order, we have:

6) AJNA CHAKARA, Manas, or mind

5) Above the heart - space - VISUDDHI

4) Heart - air - ANAHATA

3) Fire - SWADHISTHANA

2) Water - MANIPURA (SWADHISTHANA and MANIPURA are inverted here)

1) Earth - MULADHARA


There is complete reversion in this verse: there is no ascent here, the Absolute is sufficient unto itself, at any level.

(Patanjali's Yoga, generally accepted as the most authoritative by non-Advaita Vedantins, envisages progressing upwards, in stages, through the Chakras. This is a consequence of its dualistic approach. (See above). ED)


There are three ideas of Yoga:
1) Patanjali's eight-stage Yoga,
2) Samkhya,
3) Kapila.

(For a brief discussion of these schools of Indian Philosophy, see Nataraja Guru's comments on the six schools of Indian Philosophy. A more detailed study of this subject may be found in An Integrated Science of the Absolute. ED)

 

SHAD-ADHARAS (The six Adharas or Chakras) - these are six levels or ways of looking at things; a hierarchy of syndromes, c.f. psycho-somatic medicine and the Weber-Fechner laws of psychophysics.

 

One has to go "up the tube" through the Chakras - ascending like the Kundalini snake - between the snake and the tiger - there are two nadis or passages rising vertically - one is actual, the other is virtual or subtle.The nearest thing to this in physiology is the sympathetic nervous system, c.f. Holt Mc Dougal.


Here the process of gradual ascent through the Chakras favoured by the Samkhya school is eliminated at one stroke.

 

(The Weber–Fechner law combines two different laws. E.H. Weber (1795–1878) was one of the first people to approach the study of the human response to a physical stimulus in a quantitative fashion. His law states that the just-noticeable difference between two stimuli is proportional to the magnitude of the stimuli. G.T. Fechner (1801–1887) later offered an elaborate theoretical interpretation of Weber's findings, in which he attempted to describe the relationship between the physical magnitudes of stimuli and the perceived intensity of the stimuli. Fechner's law states that subjective sensation is proportional to the logarithm of the stimulus intensity. ED)

 

(The sympathetic nervous system is the part of the autonomic nervous system originating in the thoracic and lumbar regions of the spinal cord that in general inhibits or opposes the physiological effects of the parasympathetic nervous system, as in tending to reduce digestive secretions, speeding up the heart, and contracting blood vessels. ED)

 

There is no process of evolution here.

 

MATTER FOR THE FILM
The four kinds of Yoga must be shown here - almost as a lesson.

(The four kinds of Yoga are, traditionally, Karma, Jnana, Bhakti and Raja Yoga. The Bhagavad Gita and Narayana Guru state that there are TWO varieties of Yoga - Jnana and Karma - wisdom and Action. ED)


Four kinds of Gurus can be shown as the method.
Fifteen minutes can be given for this section, due to the widespread interest in the subject.


Each philosophy plays with certain categories.
There are six basic categories ("schools") of Hindu philosophy: they reach their glory in the Advaita of Sankara. (c.f. Brahma Sutras)

(The Brahma Sutras are, together with the Bhagavad Gita and the Upanishads, the Prasthanatrayi, or three foundation texts of Vedanta. ED)

The Mahavakyas (great sayings), aphorisms such as tat tvam asi ("You are That (the Absolute)")
- these are the basic dicta of Advaita.


Transcend and generalize and abstract;
if you are good at this, you attain the Absolute.

There is a progression in this series of verses:
 
VERSE 4 - Stresses the importance of the feet of the Devi - "I do not care for all your gods" - The bottom of the vertical axis is important as the square root of minus-one.
 
VERSE 5 - Eros, as horizontal, is brought in, also virtual beauty, not yet verticalized. (Read the Puranas and find out where Vishnu took the form of a woman)
 
VERSE 6 - Ananga (Eros, "the limbless one") represents Absolute Beauty in this verse. Eros rules. Although he is a passion (and thus horizontal. ED), he still rules. (See Othello).

VERSE 7 - A picture of the Devi - very slim of waist - a kind of double structure - the slim waist is to show there is no real existence at the horizontal level. There is only a slim horizontal parameter.

VERSE 8 - There is a progressive building up of schemas until we come to Verse 8 which is a circle or Mandala. Conics and Mandalas are introduced.
 
VERSE 9 - "Broken through..." - the earth consciousness at the base of the vertical axis here becomes a flame, breaking through the various stratifications.
Alpha and Omega are sleeping together - but not in a bedroom. Kundalini Shakti is bursting through.
 
 
If one should take a backward glance at the two previous verses, it will be noticed that there is a progressive use of structural language. The duplication of the form of the Devi in VERSE 7, with reference to symbols held in the duplicated four-fold hands of the Goddess pushed realistic representation to the very limits of pure structural expression.
 
In VERSE 8 the conic-sectional version is introduced.
 
In the present VERSE 9 the Shad Adhara Chakras or structural units, placed serially from the Alpha to the Omega Points of the vertical axis, are passed in review in summary fashion. Of all the elementals, the earth is the richest factor in terms of ontological reality or existence.
 

The earth as such, in a real workaday sense, is not the earth-factor abstracted and generalized with contemplative intentionality implied in it, which is referred to in this verse.
 
In other words, here it is a verticalized version of earth as prime matter or as the unmoved mover, as Aristotle would call it, that we have to think of.
 
The same holds good for the other elementals mentioned later in the verse, such as water, fire, air and ether, which become thinner in ontology, but richer in teleological import - both comprised under Absolute Value as a normalizing reference.
 
After fire as an elemental principal, those higher in the scale, such as air, space and the mind principle, tend to have a conceptual rather than a perceptual status. In his revaluation, the author seems to omit the names Anahata, Visuddhi and Ajña which are generally applied to the principles of air, sky and mind respectively.

All these can be on the two ambivalent limbs of the vertical axis; the numerator being conceptual and the denominator side perceptual.
 
The thinnest mathematical or mystical value-factor is like a parameter passing through and linking all gradations of value-units and is conventionally referred to as Sushumna, symmetrically placed at the middle of the bilateral functional factors called the two nadis: Ida and Pingala.
 
At each of the Adharas or stable points or Chakras (structuralized representations as units placed at different psycho-physical levels) there is to be imagined a neutralized version of a value-system proper to the level implied, but any two of them cancel out into a higher third till the highest, in the thousand-petaled lotus called the Sahasrara, is reached.
 
There the cancellation of counterparts becomes complete and thus the Alpha meets the Omega with parity between them. The mind, being the seat of willing, is placed in between the eyebrows.
 
Each of the Adharas or Chakras named here represents a stabilization, like the notes of music made by the frets of a guitar.

Six such Chakras are usually named and recognized, although it is possible in principle to add more intermediate stabilized positions.
.

 

The six Adharas are stable stages or serialized steps of epistemologically equal status, representing existent, subsistent and value systems. Thus, structurally, they take positions on a vertical parameter, each point compensating, reciprocating or cancelling by neutral absorption. The serial pluralism is only for schematic purposes without intrinsic difference or gradation.

The lower Chakra absorbs the higher in the ascent that is implied here. Other later verses will stress further structural peculiarities. There could be ascent as well as descent and normalisation at the central points of origin. Numerological indications are also possible.
 
 
A REVIEW OF THE CHAKRAS
The Chakras are supposed to begin at the base of the spine - earth, which is placed in this verse at the base of the spine -  is matter in its purest form, in which the Devi plays a part, as it belongs to the negative, existential side of the structural situation.
 
When you shut your eyes in meditation, feel matter at the base of the spine and light at the top.

To know this axis, and to have everything melt into it, this is the secret of yogic mystical practice.

The music goes inside the vertical column, at six intermediary levels - the Chakras - producing variance in octaves (stillness?) (illegible).

It is an axis with two ambivalent limits: matter at the bottom and consciousness at the top.

It is below what is known and beyond what is known (See Upanishads).
There is no sound beyond the upper and lower limits.
 
The Goddess is flirting with her consort. She at the bottom of the axis at the Alpha Point and Shiva at the Omega Point at the top.

You have gone from the ground floor of a building and have passed through mysticism in an ascending series of stages.

She goes straight to the top, stopping at no intermediary levels.

Although the Chakras are in a serial order, they must be taken as a trans-finite series of ordinal numbers, 1st, 2nd, 3rd..etc.

These are not distinct or separate - finite or cardinal - they are to be considered as just a part of a series.
 
(Trans-finite numbers are numbers that are "infinite" in the sense that they are larger than all finite numbers, yet not necessarily absolutely infinite. The term "transfinite" was coined by Georg Cantor, who wished to avoid some of the implications of the word infinite in connection with these objects, which were nevertheless not finite. Few contemporary writers share these qualms; it is now accepted usage to refer to transfinite cardinals and ordinals as "infinite". However, the term "trans-finite" also remains in use. ED)
.
Only five Chakras are mentioned here, there must be six - an error of the pundit. The Guru will use his intuitive structuralism to place it correctly.

The whole of this is known as the Kula Path - from the heart onwards it changes from the elemental to the conscious: i.e. the heart (air), space (ether), and mind.
Interpenetrated, the Kula Path is seen as a unified whole.

The fire chakra has to be placed in the heart.
 
 
A tentative earlier translation:
 
"You remain secretly sporting with Your lord in the thousand-petalled lotus.
Having broken through the earth principle of the Muladhara,
The water principle of the Manipura and the fire principle placed in the Svadhisthana,
In the heart, the air, with space above, as also the mind between the eyebrows and breaking through these,
Transcending thus the whole Kula Path".

Why did he not use the names of the three upper Chakras?
These are not existential factors but intelligent factors.

The function of space is to allow anything else to exist within it without contradiction - (Space = Akasha).

Anyway, we approach space by a negative process
- as Sankara, so Einstein.
.
(Akasha in Sanskrit means "Aether" in both the elemental and metaphysical senses. ED)
.
(See the difference between demi-relativity and real relativity, also the Michelson - Morley experiment, Fitzgerald-Lorentz Contractions etc.).
 
The heart - "never killed" is  the centre of life (intermediary?).
The mind, ether, breath or breeze - are both material and immaterial.
But the three existential Chakras have been mentioned, and not the three conceptual ones.
 
 
 
This eliminates the duality between mind and matter.

This Kula Path began to thrive as an esoteric doctrine with the fall of Buddhism.
The Devi here is called Mula Prakrti (root nature), bursting out from the vertical axis.

Horizontally, space is impermeable but, as you become verticalized, there is a process of inclusion, as opposed to exclusion.

The physical heart is the centre of vitality, thus it corresponds to air or prana, which has an intermediate position in this series.
The heart has a locus, seen vectorially.
 
 
The Six Chakras:
Muladhara - Earth
Manipura - Water
Swadhisthana - Fire
Anahata - Air
Visuddhi - Ether
Ajna - Mind
 
 
In VERSE 6, half of the Devi's body is filled with eroticism; eroticism is normal bliss. You cannot throw eroticism out of the picture as Christianity does. The Absolutist picture gives Eros a place in the Devi's legs.
 
In VERSE 7, the Devi as "Purushika": do not try and copulate forcefully with Her: the Absolute cannot be defeated.
 
In VERSE 8, the Yogi has to meditate on something: a gem-island.
 
In VERSE 9, stable positions of cancellation ascend on a vertical axis.
 
In VERSE 10, there are two "trees of Porphyry"- one spreading upwards, the other downwards.
 
Beauty is an Absolute value.
Abstract and generalize and you will get the ultimate adorable Absolute.

The word "Absolute" has no fixed content, it varies with each discipline - it is also known as a constant or a universal.
Anything that persists unvaried through time and space is the Absolute.
 
("The Absolute is that to which all other things are relative.", Nataraja Guru. ED)

Taking some one existent thing as an idol, to the exclusion of all others, and treating it alone as holy - this is idolatry.
The relativistic idol-worshippers make an idol both subsistent and existent.
 
How to give a tangible content to the Absolute so that it is acceptable to all?

Sankara says in the Saundarya Lahari: what we adore is not an object - it is a valuable idea, sufficiently real and tangible.
This idea is Beauty, the tangible form of which is colour.
Beauty is both outside and inside the mind.
 
Shiva is not sufficiently mixed up in the phenomenal world - he has no function.
Shakti, however, is manifested force.

Wherever vegetation is luxuriant, the Mother Principle is exalted.
The Advaitin fuses the two together.
Sankara represents the cult of Shakti or the Devi in its revised and revalued form.
 
 
 
AS A CLASSICAL EXAMPLE OF A VERTICAL SERIES OF VALUES SIMILAR TO WHAT IS DESCRIBED IN THIS VERSE:
 

FURTHER NOTES ON KALIDASA'S SHAKUNTALA

THE NANDI, OR BENEDICTION FROM SHAKUNTALA.

"That which is the first creation of the creator,
That which bears the offering made according to due rites,
That which is the offerer,
Those two which make time,
That which pervades all space, having for its quality what is perceived by the ear,
That which is the womb of all seeds,
That by which all living beings breathe:
Endowed with these eight visible forms, may the supreme Lord protect you."

 

The benediction is a masterpiece of structuralism: a god with eight visible forms, both cosmology and psychology together.


1. The first creation is fire, the centre, as with Thales etc.


2. That which bears the fire (what is put into it or sacrificed) according to a certain order in the universe: some grains.


3. The Hotri, or sacrificant, who makes the offering.


4 and 5. "Those two who make time" the sun and moon are to be verticalized so as to rise and set in your consciousness as if presented to the five senses.


6. The visible world - i.e. attainable in a schematised form.


7. Whatever you call the horizontal world - the womb of all seeds.


8. That by which all things live - breath.

 

ALL THESE FALL INTO A VERTICAL AXIS.
ABSTRACT AND GENERALIZE AND YOU GET STRUCTURE, THAT IS, FORM.


 


THE NANDI FROM SHAKUNTALA
One god is praised here: Ishana.
A Puranic or mythological interpretation of the eight forms would be wrong, it should be understood structurally.

Kalidasa must be read as a Vedantin.
Quote the Gita, Brahma Sutras, and Upanishads in support.


Shabda Pramana means that "the words" (e.g. The words of an authority or scripture. ED) are taken as being true.


Other Pramanas (sources of valid knowledge. ED) are:
1. Pratyaksha - what is given to the senses.
2. Anumana - inference (where there is smoke, there is fire).
3. Upamana - analogy between two examples.
4. Sastrimitva - all Shastras would be wrong if there were no Brahman.
This is Shabda Pramana.


These are four of the ten Pramanas ("commonly accepted in Vedanta" see Science the Absolute on this website)

 

In the Nandi, we find:

1. Fire.


2. Ghee (Clarified butter, used as an offering. ED).


3. The Brahmin sacrificer (these two - "That which bears the offering made according to due rites, that which is the offerer" -  are interchangeable: "ya cha hotri...")


4 and 5. Time as sun and moon. There is an alternating figure-eight dynamism here.
Time mounts the vertical axis, like S and S' (see Bergson in the Science of the Absolute on this website).


They must be verticalized.
Substance, attribute, sound, "that even which we speak of as Nature".
(Manifestation itself is the last mentioned, it goes at the top; it is a nature-principle which gives breathing to all things).


Thus, here are eight presences that you can approach as being the visible universal concrete: also with the eight-fold content or aspects.


Let this universal principle be your saviour - let it save you.
"I worship you and I want to be saved by what you see".


The same elements are used in the play: Shakuntala, a pregnant woman, is the centre, the king forgets her; this is the tragedy.


If you are not tuned to the Absolute, not completely verticalized, you will forget your own wife as Dusyanta forgets Shakuntala, which is the greatest injustice.
Dushyanta is horizontally oriented - thus he forgets his wife.
Shakuntala is vertical.

 

The existing translation (Motilal Banarsidas edition) of the Nandi proves to be inadequate, the Guru's translation follows:

 

 

PROVISIONAL TRANSLATION OF THE NANDI BY NATARAJA GURU:

1. That creation which is the first of all created (things),
2. That which is the clarified butter.
3. That which is at the same time the sacrificer
4 and 5. Those two which make time
6. That ground in which inhere (stand established) quality, sound and substance
(i.e. the horizontal world), filling the whole universe (vyaya visvam)
7. That which is said to be the seed of all manifestation.
8. That which gives life to all living beings
May all of you be saved by the eight bodies (presences)
Let these, the eight manifestations of the Lord,
attainable by what is given to the senses, save you.
(This is the Atman that is at the top of the vertical axis - the Omega Point).

 

 

ARIVU - KNOWLEDGE
(The Epistemology of Gnosis)
By Narayana Guru
 
1
This which is known here, is none other
On reflection, knowledge it becomes;
As knowledge is one with this ever,
Nought else there is but knowledge alone.
 
2
Without knowledge this could not be,
Even granting the known to have reality;
Should but this one knowledge be wanting
What knowing could there be for knowledge; none such we can know.
 
3
Beyond the measure of knowledge, whatever we can know
As knowledge even that too shines;
As within consciousness here, dream abides.
So comprised in knowledge is all that is there.
 
4
If knowledge be all-filling,
Non-knowledge, where could it abide?
Going after knowledge from here,
As knowing that there, where could it reside?
 
5
If from knowledge no fading out could be
And knowledge alone is, to where could all this descend?
Knowledge is not known. here
When known both become one and the same.
 
6
Prior to knowledge "What?" if we should ask
Other than knowledge nothing here is found;
The unknowing, what limitation could it have?
And as for knowledge, there is nothing here to see.
 
7
Of knowledge we are aware; of its absence
We have no awareness here; which in which abides
Though known here; not as knowledge do we un-know
When we ourselves should here regard.
 
8
Even from the day that knowledge ever was, this too has been;
(But) how Could this stand if knowledge alone was real?
Of knowledge no disjunct category there is;
(And) whatever could there be if but knowledge were not?
 
9
There is a habitation for knowledge
None distinct there is for the known;
If there is knowledge as an item distinct
How could the known enter thereinto?
 
10
Consumed by the known, all will be gone.
What in knowledge is it that is not known?
And as for knowledge, how could it arise at all?
 
11
As the knower of knowledge, what makes known here
That we do become; if this is conceded
What kind of knowledge, and how comes
The known; and what kind could it be?
 
12
Yourself is what is known as knowledge;
By putting down your own knowledge, it becomes the known.
The known is thus twofold: one conscious of knowing
And the other not conscious of the same.
 
13
Knowledge too, likewise in its turn proceeding
Became reflected in the knower once again
And one spark of knowledge falling into this the known
Into five shreds it became split up.
 
14
If one could still be cognizant of oneself
As the knower of knowledge, still knowing knowledge to be all,
The one that is knowledge and the one that is the knower
Within that which is known, six and eight, too, they become.
 
15
Corresponding likewise with this known
Knowledge too seven and one makes eight;
Knowledge is thus specifically distinguished
As also the known, when separated one from one
 
 
It will be noticed in the above analysis of consciousness into duplicate eightfold items, Narayana Guru does not make any attempt to fill it with any ontological or value content. After all the variety of realistic imagery or suggestions contained in the various Upanishads, as well as in the Brahma Sutras, dealing more picturesquely with the implications of the items for careful scrutiny, it is sufficiently clear that this epistemological analysis is meant merely to serve as a structural and categoric reference. The Bhagavad Gita (XIII.4) makes pointed reference to the great variety of literature extant on such a subject.

 

With reference to special relativity, a subject suggested by the mention of Fitzgerald and Lorentz above, the diagram below may serve to illustrate the universal applicability of the schematism or structural methodology adopted in this work, inter alia.
.