THE ESOTERIC
KANDAR ANUBHUTI
OR
THE SECRET TEACHING ON
GOD-EXPERIENCE
(A Treatise on Adwaitic Realization)
OF
SAINT ARUNAGIRINATHAR
| THE ESOTERIC KANDAR ANUBHUTI OR THE SECRET TEACHING ON GOD-EXPERIENCE (A Treatise on Adwaitic Realization) OF SAINT ARUNAGIRINATHAR | |
 | by N.V. Karthikeyan |  |
| verses contents 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 .. 51 this verse in PDF version (4 parts) p-1 p-2 p-3 p-4 complete download of this book |
VERSE-46 எந்தாயும் எனக்கருள் தந்தையும் நீ சிந்தாகுலம் ஆனவை தீர்த்து எனையாள் கந்தா கதிர்வேலவனே உமையாள் மைந்தா குமரா மறைநாயகனே.Enthaayum enakkarul thanthaiyum nee, Sinthaakulam aanavai theertthu enaiyaal Kandaa kathir velavane umaiyaal, Mainthaa kumaraa marai naayakane. Thou art my Mother as also my Father that bestow grace, Commentary This is a very powerful prayer to ward off one's afflictions and draw divine grace. This verse is an advice given to seekers to remove their mental afflictions and confusions in Sadhana. The saint wants us to assert our true relationship with God, i.e. He is our real and gracious Mother and Father, our very Self, and resort to Him for the removal of all our afflictions and granting us refuge. The removal of suffering is not for enjoying a comfortable life here but for ('yenai aal') attaining Him and to enjoy everlasting Bliss. He is to be approached with a parental kinship, as the Universal Self, as our closest and not as an extra-cosmic (or other-worldly) being. The prayer in this verse is simple and direct, but it reveals one's true intimacy with the Lord. Such verses are the outcome of the oneness felt with God by Self-realised souls. The Jivanmukta feels his closeness to the Lord so much that he claims his rightful kinship with Him. Hence, he says, "O Lord, you are my gracious Mother and Father." Swami Sivananda says: "God alone is your real father, mother, friend and Guru. Realise God now and here, and be happy forever." The saint reveals the cause of our mental afflictions as also the way to annihilate them and "be accepted" by the Lord. God is our Mother and Father; and He is ever ready to bless us. Our real kinship is with God, the Atman within. God is the universal Reality behind all the particulars (Jivas). He is ever beckoning us from within. But we ignore God and run after the objects of the world thinking that they can give us happiness. In this erroneous attempt, we suffer endlessly afflicted by desire, anger, greed, etc. The only way to get out of this predicament is to go back to God, renouncing the erroneous attitude developed towards the objects. This is done by recognising the Motherhood and Fatherhood of God - the universal nature of God (or the Atman). Not to recognise the universal Reality that is behind all the particulars, but to regard the particulars themselves as reals, is our fundamental mistake and the cause of all our mental afflictions. This verse seems to have greater implications. "God is my gracious Mother as well as my Father." How can one person be both the father and mother? This seems to be strange; but that is the Divine mystery and the clue for our liberation. In the worldly sense, the father and mother are two different persons; the father is not the mother and vice-versa. Evidently, the child is a third one, i.e., different from and other than the parents! But in the spiritual sphere things are quite different. This new vision of illumined souls (Jivanmuktas) is given in this verse. To them, God is the Father as well as the Mother. How? As the Absolute Para Brahman, God is the Father. As Maya, the inscrutable and inseparable power of Brahman, He is the Mother. As He Himself is the Father and Mother, the children, i.e., the Jivas and the world, are also He only. The Jivas and this creation are all, on ultimate analysis, nothing but Brahman itself. Thus, the non-dual concept of the Ultimate Reality is revealed when Arunagirinathar says that God is our Father as well as the Mother. In the Gita, the Lord says, "My womb is the great Brahma, in that I place the germ; thence, O Arjuna, is the birth of all beings. Whatever forms are produced, O Arjuna, in any womb whatsoever, the great Brahma is their womb and I am the seed-giving Father" (XIV-3 & 4). The great Brahma (Mahat-Brahma) referred to by the Lord is the Mula Prakriti (or Primordial Nature), which is also known as Avyakta (or the Unmanifest). The Sankhyas call it Prakriti; the Vedantins call it Maya. But there is a peculiarity with Maya. While Prakriti is a second and eternal reality other than the Purusha, Maya is not so. Maya is a mystery. It is a term employed to solve the riddle of the universe in which the Jiva finds itself, as we introduce an "x" in solving algebraical sums. There is no "why" and "what" of Maya, even as in the case of "x"; its necessity is to solve our difficulty - the problem. When the sum is solved, which is the purpose, the "x" vanishes as it was only supposed for the purpose of solving the sum. So is Maya. It is resorted to only to explain our present predicament - the Jiva's inability to understand the relation between the Absolute and the relative; between the Invisible and the visible; between Reality and appearance; between what is and what appears to be - in short, between God, world, and itself. When Reality is experienced in the immediacy of one's own experience, the problem of this mysterious relation is solved and with it Maya disappears; non-dual Brahman alone remains - the God who is Father as well as the Mother. Hence, a true understanding of the nature of God and our relation to Him, i.e., that of Maya, is the only means of freedom from suffering. Else we will be, as we are now, in misery. If a student does not know the principle and the technique of employing "x" in a sum, he will only complicate the matter and will find himself caught up in a big mess instead of getting a solution for the sum. It is not unusual to see students endlessly working a sum, wasting sheets of paper and hours, where the sum could be solved in a few minutes. Thus, while "x" can help solve the problem quickly, easily and correctly, if employed properly; it can also make one get giddy and puzzled, if the technique is not correctly learnt and understood from a teacher and employed wisely. So is the case with Maya. Those fortunate ones who are gifted with the needed subtle understanding and the guidance of the spiritual Master understand this mystery behind Maya, cross over it and realise God. Others find themselves in a mess, asking hundreds of questions about it, raising objections against it, not knowing that thereby they only get more entangled in it. It is purely Guru/God's grace that can save one from this miserable situation. Hence, Arunagirinathar says, "My grace-bestowing Father, too, art Thou." Lord Krishna also says in the Gita, "Verily, this divine Maya of Mine, made up of the (three) Gunas (of Nature) is difficult to cross over; those who take refuge in Me alone cross over this Maya (through My Grace)" (VII-14). It is grace (Arul) that reveals things in their true perspective. When that grace is not there, the Jivas (minds) are afflicted with varieties of pain and suffering, because they do not understand this divine mystery of Maya, i.e., their true relation to God and the world. They regard themselves as separate from God, and the world as a real entity outside God, with which an objective relationship is to be established. This wrong notion is the cause of all one's mental afflictions. And so the prayer is for the removal of this wrong notion and to re-absorb us into God. Addressing God as both the Mother and Father is to suggest that God is non-dual, which also means the non-differentiation of Jivas and the cosmos from God. This frees the Jiva from externality-consciousness whereby it is freed from all mental afflictions; and enables the Jiva to rest in God, which is to be accepted by Him or absorbed in Brahman. By all this, what seems to be implied is that the secondless Brahman alone exists, that as long as duality is experienced the Jiva's afflictions cannot cease, and that to be freed from afflictions the Jiva has to recognise its true relation with the non-dual Brahman, i.e., become (or be one with) Brahman. The nature of the Lord (or the Atman) with whom we have to re-establish (or recognize) our kinship is graphically given in the verse. He is addressed as Skanda - the scorcher of enemies; the enemies of lust, greed, anger, etc., which are the causes of one's mental afflictions. Again, He is the Kathir Velavan (Lord with the self-luminous Vel). It refers to the Self-revealing nature of the Atman. The Atman is a mass of consciousness (or Light) that destroys the darkness of Avidya (ignorance). He is also the Son of Uma Devi - the Tejas (Light) that emanated from the third eye of Lord Siva, which finally assumed the form of Lord Skanda whom Uma Devi took and nursed. He is also Kumara, the remover of the world-delusion. And, finally, He is the Lord of the Vedas, the revealer of Wisdom, to "accept" the soul that is, thus, purified of Avidya. Thus, in this simple verse, which moves one to tears when recited even once with a sincere heart, Arunagirinathar shows the way, i.e., to make a direct appeal to the Lord in a spirit of great intimacy with Him. We have almost to demand of the Lord the destruction of the afflictions of the mind and to "accept" us, as a child would demand from its parents. How? First declare and affirm our kinship with the Lord, saying: "Thou art my Mother and Father, too," and not: "Art Thou not my Mother and Father?" Thus make the way clear, and then demand our acceptance. Parents cannot reject the child's demands. The child does insist on its demands and gets them fulfilled from its parents. What Saint Arunagirinathar says of the Lord in this verse compares favourably with what Lord Krishna says of Himself, in the Gita, "I am the Father of the world, the Mother, the Dispenser of the fruits of actions and the Grandfather; the (one) thing to be known, the purifier, the sacred monosyllable 'OM' and also the Rig, the Saama, and the Yajur-Vedas" (IX-17). |
| contents 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 .. 51 this verse in PDF version (4 parts) p-1 p-2 p-3 p-4 |
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