Friendship Poem

Posted on October 18, 2017 by janeadamsart

Let my face cave into your SELF.
Every picture of my thought
spills out of being wordless.

Let my fear of you go,
let lion talk. Let the lion see.
The sun doesn’t bother what goes on
when it rises and sets on earth.

The disk of the world’s hidden side
is a darkness on my light.
The wonder of that silent spreading corona
pulls away the cloth behind my eyes.

I have no support. The saying stops.
Let soles of my feet be eyes
to see and love, pick up the ground.

The darkness on the sun
is angel’s finger on my lips
stopping speech, making me hear.

EK83 Flower of night 86.JPG

I wonder much at my concerns.
As the reel unrolls, I clench in my seat
so forming views ; the Inward, inexpressible
gift of the holy, returns
as soon as I go.
No matter what happens
to me, my walls arise and fall, like
Rome on the ocean wave.

The safety in just looking
has no sense at all.
It takes the risk,
the leaping
of the absolute deer

and skittering over the threshold
pushed, each moment
opens from each point
of space a bright DAN DE LION —
Be brave ! be bold ! be
absent !
Let it go !

When chimerae collide
in the upkeep clashing, let
the Lion see
how in relationship,
several masks combine,
clashing and colliding
anxiety and peace.

Raising your heads together,
unquiet mother and fishy friend,
let your patterns pull
and drag you home.

The pull to drown within
opens the flower’s corona upturned:

a voice with
nothing to say.

from “Poems of Eclipse 1999”

My adventure invites fellow travellers. I am a poet, an artist and a seer. I welcome conversation among the PHILO SOFIA, the lovers of wisdom. See also Aquariel

All art and creative writing in this blog is copyright © Janeadamsart 2012-2017. May not be used for commercial purposes. May be used and shared for non-commercial means with credit to Jane Adams and a link to the web address https://janeadamsart.wordpress.com/

Why does Isis have Horns?

Posted on June 19, 2015 by janeadamsart

Part 7 in the ‘Mysteries of Isis’ –
Some early writings on Isis, from my “Arcanum Two”:

25 September 1991 – The symbol for Taurus the Bull, ruled by Venus, is a circle crowned with a crescent – a pair of horns. Why the horns? To explore this question is fruitful.

How does it feel? The horns have sharp points. They are a heavy head-dress. They give majesty to the Full Moon, and define the New Moon. They are a garment of authority and they inspire fear. The horns of the Bull are antennae of the earth’s fecundity and riches. To encounter suddenly in my life a blindfold soothsayer or white witch, crowned with archaic and savage horns and sitting so still, is startling.

The horns are there to drive away or impale unwary or merely inquisitive trespassers into her subtle magnetic field. They make a repellant aura around her: a defense system. The priestess is in myself. What am I guarding? What am I protecting? Whom do I attack?

To look inward, into the well of God within atoms, is to create a surrounding “field” of space which reinterprets my material body. As “I” collapse inward – like into a black hole – this field extends outward in all directions from the singularity. It is the veil of the inner sanctuary. In all the old legends the dragon or serpent is coiled around the golden fleece. The hero must, in stepping over or neutralising the dragon, confront the storms around his own Cape Horn, and master the creative daemons that arise from his “unconscious” seeking consciousness. His chaos must transmute to kosmos — the Greek word for harmony. Only then, when the tumult dawns transformed in his being, might he behold the light of the golden fleece, by the gentle light of Isis – her moonbeam.

The hero in all these tales is the alchemist, and the adventure is trans-formation. Tentatively I suggest that the lady Isis in her pure state, together with Thrice Great Hermes who flows and makes speech with metals, is the catalyst of this transformative process. But I speak now personally …. I suppose I speak from many lifetimes. They are all only this one. For instance: I sit down each day here to write, and I do not know what it will be, and the content may flow or not as the case may be, but I am almost invariably astonished.

In the classic The Golden Ass, Lucius Apuleius gives an allegorical account of his initiation. Transformed into a donkey he had to suffer and witness the depth of human iniquity, and be beaten and abused by his inner discordancy, before the lady Isis rising from the midnight sea offered him the key to his release into human form … he must eat the rose carried by the Great Hierophant during the procession the following day, of her Mysteries. In the vision of Apuleius, as she rose from the dark sea to instruct his still asinine form:

“Her long thick hair fell in tapering ringlets on her lovely neck and was crowned with an intricate chaplet in which was woven every kind of flower. Just above her brow shone a round disk, like a mirror or like the bright face of the moon, which told me who she was. Vipers rising from the lefthand and righthand partings of her hair supported this disk, with ears of corn bristling beside them. Her many coloured robe was of finest linen; part was glistening white, part crocus-yellow, part glowing red, and along the entire hem a woven bordure of flowers and fruit clung and swayed to the breeze.

“But what caught and held my eye more than anything else was the deep black lustre of her mantle. She wore it slung across her body from the right hip to the left shoulden where it was caught in a knot resembling the boss of a shield; but part of it hung in innumerable folds, the tasselled fringe quivered. It was embroidered with glittering stars on the hem and everywhere else, and in the middle beamed a full and fiery Moon.”

Apuleius The Golden Ass

Her mantle of night is that of the visible universe, the stars and the spaces between. The snakes that support her disk, besides echoing the pair of horns, suggest the caduceus of Hermes:

Two serpents, the positive and negative polarity, entwine a staff of authority or directed power, and are held in equilibrium. The equilibrium forms the circle of her disk.

The ears of corn in Apuleius’s description, remind me of Ceres. Ceres is the ripe standing wheat of the earth, and the mother of Persephone who married the dark Underworld. “Hades”, king of the Underworld, is derived from the Greek eidein, to see.

“The centre, the depths of this sphere (of the universe) is named Hades the invisible, because the centre of a sphere cannot be seen from without. It appears visible only by means of those special forms whose images appear graven upon it, it shows itself only in effigy; but in reality it is always invisible in itself.”

Trismegistus, The Virgin of the World

Ears of corn, or wheat, are the vessels of that sprouting grain of the inner world. They are the visible allegory which is “graven upon its surface”. I, dreaming twice in the last few nights about taking earplugs out, am perhaps being advised to hear; to be here, listen and hear. For this is the way the priestess receives information … silently into the oracle or shell of her ears. The oracle, coracle, is a celtic craft on the waters. The waters dance and play with reflections from the sky in crescents of light like fallen leaves or “boats of mine a-floating … Where will all come home?”^[1]

She has her eyes closed because the instruction is to be still and hear, to be not taken in by the deception, the flickering screem of sensory sight. To hear the unruffled depth of the settling water is to be the quietness of the water itself.

I drew the ears of earth (that is Ceres) with wheat growing in them, like little masts in a walnutshell boat.

Burial and Hermetic Initiation – the Grain Sprouts
To be the awareness of the ears is to extend and receive the lateral sense of consciousness; the Capitols of the two pillars. I am what rests between them, that which is, as it is.

From that alone comes forth what is relevant to the time. Silence must receive its own information, before delivering it. Thus is truth. Open the ears, the arms, of my Soul. These horns are the ears or antennae of some creature of the deep.

The horns of Isis are the sense organ through which she receives the waves. This is her focus of divination. Between the horns is held, or hung, the equilibrated breath of her magnetic field.

* *

In the Masons’ craft, there is a ceremony of passing, from being an entered apprentice to receiving the degree of fellowcraft. This represents work on the soul, or ability to listen, in the Middle Chamber. The candidate must bear in time and maturity the fruit of his own work. So upon acceptance he is given an ear of corn.

In this gesture there is a profound mystery, which lies in the ancient body of Egypt. Isis is the dark earth or body receiving the golden grain of Osiris in the flood of the Nile river which spreads it to all parts of the black land^.^[2]^. . When the waters ebb the grain sprouts. This is the Child who is also the Father. The land of upper, middle and lower Egypt was, in ancient times the head, thorax and abdomen of the subtle body. These are parts of the embodied fragment of God which lay beneath heaven.

Like the lower arm of the letter BEIT, this fragment – like all the “fragments of hermetica” that survived the destroyed Alexandrian library – echoes but is not quite the same as the Firmament. But from within the fragment (the rock, the tomb of forgotten awareness) can be resurrected the light of Osiris. I am reminded of Thomas Browne again: We are somewhat more than ourselves in Sleep, and the Slumber of the Body seems to be but the Waking of the Soul.

It seems that in most cases the slumber or apparent death of the body, (death of the world-orientation) was a pre-requisite to resurrecting the consciousness – the Spirit – outside and encircling the spacetime continuum.

The Egyptian Book of the Dead was written to guide those who, plunged by subtle arts into profound physical sleep, awoke to behold the Holy One. The weighing of the Soul and all that followed, was not the sole prerogative of those who had reached the end of their earthly span. Some who passed through the gates or pillars of “death”, returned re-born in the light of the Sun to bear witness (and keep the secret). This idea was explored in some of Paul Brunton’s meditations in his Search in Secret Egypt.

The Sacred Books of Hermes are a collection of fragments and discourses written down in Alexandria just before or after the time of Christ. In them seems to be reflected the essential wisdom of Thoth. Thoth is the ancient secretary to the gods. He has the head of an Ibis bird, and carries his pad and pencil. The hieroglyph for AKH – Light, or the scribing of a light that pre-exists Creation – is in the form of an Ibis. The crest and plumage of this bird is dark green and shot through with glittering metallic specks of light. The root of AKH is Spirit, to shine, to irradiate. The curve of the Ibis’s neck is like the uraeus or cobra, worn by Pharaoh as his “third eye” or pineal body^*. And it is not altogether unlike the neck of a swan.

The letter BEIT is a “neck” or channel of the current of speech. Yes! Speech is Hermes. The neck through which the silvery river flows, is the lady Isis. Isis and Hermes together are Thoth, the month of the harvest, the art of the priesthood. Isis’ womb-brother Osiris is then Self knowledge within the art, for he is the Sun.

The precious stone assigned to Hermes is emerald. The Bible of spiritual alchemy “As above so below” was traditionally inscribed by him on the legendary Emerald Tablet which – says Eliphas Levi – contains all of Magic in a single page. It was found by Alexander the Great in the depths of the Great Pyramid where priests in ancient times had concealed the tomb of Hermes. In the time of the Romans the emperor Severus buried the Mysteries in Alexander’s tomb, and Diocletian destroyed all the books on alchemy. Christianity dawned upon a devastated battlefield of esoteric knowledge, a burnt-out wound of the world, a Way swept clear.

*In this light, consider the ideas of modern physicists: “Light – the range of electro magnetic frequencies – precedes the the manifestation of luminous bodies. Radiant energy is held to be the basis of all things within the range of human perception.” (P.Foster Case). The symbols and colours which picture the ancient-world mysteries are tools equivalent to the equations used in our day.

These inscriptions, burials and tombs are direct reference to language, its events and its veils. The esoteric language had to be veiled from temporal powers who would exploit or destroy it: yet perennially accessible to ‘those who knew’.

I feel the Hermetic cosmology – which has been handed down as an oral tradition, like the Kabbalah – has a Vedic antiquity. There were originally four Sacred Books of Hermes. These were subdivided into forty-two volumes, the same number as those of the Vedas which were carried from India into Egypt by the Yadava emigration (cf. Mrs Child: The Progress of Religious Ideas, 19th century). There are innumerable stories and conjectural confluences of this kind, behind the shadows we see on the wall.

But, more importantly, the Egyptian doctrine of initiation, that the Eye of God opens in the most profound “sleep” of the organic and astral body, corresponds to advaita or “Not Two” of the elder East and of Gautama. Ramana Maharshi said the SELF of God awakens in the Fourth state of consciousness – that of deepest physical “sleep” … and is always awake. The other three states of consciousness are: the physical world, dreaming, and normal sleep. All three conform to the conditioned self-world view, a horizontal play on surfaces. Awareness in the Fourth state alone is unchanging and infinite.

Awareness in the Fourth state intersects the worldview everywhere at each point vertically. The worldviews of the three other states are sections across it, and thus illusory. Our worldview has the measure (or maya) of rings of time across a living tree. The presence of the Tree itself, its root, its many branches, the birds in the foliage, and seasonal colours and sound of the wind, is invisible to the cut surface spectrum. To appreciate that a whole Tree exists NOW, above and below the surface, requires a radical leap in the inner life which till then was occupied with one ring after another of historical time.

The way is : I AM THE TREE ITSELF. I AM ROOT AND SHOOT.

In both Western and Eastern traditions, pentacles and yantras combine the flat, diagrammatic plane of sacred geometry, with the vital dimension of which it is a talisman. The solar system itself, apparently a disk of planetary orbits of time around the Sun, is a section across a living organism like a whole egg, or the petals of a rose without an outline … So it is also with the structure of the atom. Electrons around the nucleus are not things, or even points, but waves ensphering it. Sages know this intuitively, which is why they say “All is well”; for they are That. The human worldview, like music in the grooves of a flat disk, perceives what begins and ends, and must take the sage’s view on trust until the limited perception “dies”.

Nature is full of allegory: the section across the tree: concentric ripples of sound, or over water: the vessel which rises from the potters’ wheel: the spiral of seasons and orbits. The clean section across a tree is itself artificial, conforming to human tools. The faculty is specialised, and yet it still obeys the ripple form.

Awareness in the Fourth State alone unchanges. The disciple of life has no access to it through the normal senses, and so in its presence, he sleeps, he “dies”, it is night to him.

In the ancient world, the physical catalepsy, through which the divine bird flew free of the mortal frame, is a conditional form of enlightenment. Advaita teachings call it “nirvikalpa samadhi”: the bird flies free but then returns to ignorance. The Sun is hid again in the night, and becomes a memory. In unconditioned illumination, no catalepsy of the body is necessary. The sage moves easily as air with his environment. He or she is the SUN. In all their atoms, they are and know the source, as simply as the stars.

The idea is not the temporal histories and how they might all be filed together on the disk, but what the currencies of mysticism all have in common, free from time; for it is obvious that many rivers within one River flow … from the pregnant void of Source, to the ocean which is itSelf. Here again, the human view is specialised, seeking in attainment, peace.

The inner Light has no past or future. Maybe it is a musical chord of kalpas, ever present.

July 2011

The foregoing was an exploration, turning up from the subconscious field, spontaneous references to ears, hearing and speech. The title, Why Does Isis Have Horns? delivered to me, the Taurus symbol … in which the Moon (High Priestess) is exalted. This means, that when the Moon is going through Taurus, the tidal fertile function is supreme, in nature and humanity.

The Moon’s actual ruling sign is Cancer – the sensitive shoreline, the rhythm of the tides, the breath and endochrine system. When the Moon is in the Earth-sign Taurus, the tide deposits the fruits of earth on fertile ground.

Taurus’s planetary ruler is Venus – attraction, affinity, passion, the laws of gravity. With reference to hearing and speech, Taurus is assigned to the faculty of hearing, and to the throat – which I was not aware of, at the time of writing.

So sea birds follow the plough – the upturned furrows of earth – to feast.

Seagulls and plough – woodcut by Tunnicliffe

FOOTNOTES
[1] A Child’s Garden of Verses, R.L.Stevenson
[2] Ancient name for Egypt: KEMET, meaning black land – Alchemy – the Raven’s Wing

My adventure invites fellow travellers. I am a poet, an artist and a seer. I welcome conversation among the PHILO SOFIA, the lovers of wisdom.

This blog is a vehicle to promote also my published work – The Sacred India Tarot (with Rohit Arya, Yogi Impressions Books) and The Dreamer in the Dream – a collection of short stories (0 Books). Watch this space.

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All art and creative writing in this blog is copyright © Janeadamsart 2012-2014. May not be used for commercial purposes. May be used and shared for non-commercial means with credit to Jane Adams and a link to the web address https://janeadamsart.wordpress.com/

Robert and the Tanya

Posted on February 6, 2015 by janeadamsart

Arcanum 0 – the Fool: A pilgrim in Sedona. (In the distance you can see the peak called Thunder Mountain, at the foot of which Robert lived)

When I met Robert Adams in 1996, the surrounding Arizona landscape spoke volumes to me of his teaching and his face and eyes. I walked and explored each day into the sacred red rock wilderness: Robert’s Ashram. At the end of my booklet “Imponderables” – (see the last four posts) – I included the following Kabbalah passage from the Lubavitcher Tanya, which also spoke and sang to me of Robert: about No thing.

Ampitheatre – Bishop’s Rock

From the ‘Tanya’:

“… FOR WHEN the intellect in the rational soul deeply contemplates and immerses itself exceedingly in the greatness of G-d, how he fills all worlds and encompasses all worlds, and in the presence of Whom everything is considered as nothing – there will be born and aroused in his mind and thought, the emotion of awe for the Divine Majesty, to fear and be humble before his blessed greatness which is without end of limit, and to have the dread of G-d in his heart.

“Next, his heart will glow with an intense love, like burning coals, with a passion, desire and longing, and a yearning soul towards the greatness of the blessed En Sof. This constitutes the culminating passion of the soul, of which scripture speaks as ‘my soul thirsts for G-d, my soul longs for thee.’ This thirst is derived from the element of Fire, which is found in the divine soul. As students of natural science affirm, and so it is also in the Tree of Life, the element of Fire is in the heart, whilst the source of Water and moisture is in the brain (or third eye?) … referring to the faculty of Hokhmah called ‘the water of the divine soul’.

“The rest of the seven emotional attributes of man are all offshoots of fear and love and their derivations.

“Da’at, whose etymology is found in the verse: ‘And Adam knew Eve’, implies union. It is that faculty which binds one’s mind with a very firm and strong bond to, and firmly fixes one’s thought on, the greatness of the blessed En Sof, without diverting one’s mind.

“Even one who is wise and understanding of the greatness of the blessed En Sof will not – unless he binds his knowledge and fixes his thought with firmness – create in his soul true love and fear, but only vain fancies.”

From the ‘TANYA’ Ch.3
by Rabbi Schneur of Liadi, 1787

NOTES
En Sof – ‘without end’, the Infinite, ‘has no beginning
Hokhmah – revelation, wisdom, ‘the potentiality of what’ – the second of the Ten Sefiroth or emanations of En Sof
Da’at – unknown cognition, awe, abyss. Union of worlds and of man with woman. Knowledge in the sense of concentration.

The meaning of these three letters within Bishop’s Rock – Aleph, Cheth, Daleth – is ‘EChD – from One to Oneness’. It emerges from the infinite Silence, and returns into the Silence.

The fear and love of God are Gevurah and Hesed on the Tree of Life: the soul triad’s equilibrium.

Tree of Life with Robert’s teaching of Four Principles, Three Vehicles and Three Virtues. Note Gevurah and Hesed – constraints/severity and grace: the fear and the love.

When Robert was a teenager in New York, he woke up saying “God … God … God” – who passed his school exams for him while he gazed upon the atoms in class. He had a Jewish mum and a Catholic dad – or was it the other way round?

To me he said, “it never ends, there is no end”; and he said, “relax“. He said other things, but I couldn’t understand them through his Parkinsons whisper – I could only absorb and feel.

Robert’s transmission of the silence between the words, felt part and parcel of my Kabbalah and alchemy studies. It is all the One, wearing Joseph’s many coloured coat of dreams, dharma and pilgrimage. As the Sufis say – from the Source, we return to the Source. We emerge from God, moving into God.

From my photo album –
Bishop’s Rock and Oak Creek, Arizona

“Your Self doesn’t know the answer.
The true Self has no question.
Therefore there is no answer.”

Robert Adams

My adventure invites fellow travellers. I am a poet, an artist and a seer. I welcome conversation among the PHILO SOFIA, the lovers of wisdom.

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Robert’s Imponderables: Part Four

Posted on January 27, 2015 by janeadamsart

Completing this series of Robert’s sayings in Transcript §85:

“There never was a time when you were not, and there will never be a time when you disappear. There is no birth for you, there’s no prevailing of your body, there’s no disappearance. There is only eternal life . . . Ponder this.”

“The mind cannot destroy the mind, pondering cannot destroy the mind, thinking cannot destroy the mind. The only way to destroy the mind is to inquire, ‘To whom is there a mind?’ . . . Ponder this.”

“You are already free and liberated, and there’s really nothing you have to do. Just be your Self . . . Ponder this.”

“To be your Self means that you’re nothing else. To be your Self means that you’re not the body, nor the mind, nor the world, nor its things. To be the Self means that you are the imperishable Self, which is all pervading.

“Water cannot drown it, fire cannot burn it. You are that Self that has always existed. Some people call the Self ‘God’, some people call the Self ‘Brahman’, some people call the Self ‘choiceless effortless pure awareness’. It makes no difference what you call the Self. Just to know you are That, will free you immediately . . . Ponder this.”

Sedona Landscapes – click on image to view

“There is really no one who can do anything for you. I cannot really do anything for you, because I am really in your Self. There’s no difference between my Self and your Self. There’s one Self. Therefore, when you look at me, you see your Self. What do you see? . . . Ponder this.”

“Ponder the one who has been pondering all this time.”

“Ask yourself, ‘Who am I? Why is it so hard to become the pure unblemished Self? For whom is it hard?’

“Ask yourself, ‘Why do I think I’m human, and have to go through experiences?’

“Ask yourself . . . Ponder this.”

“That’s enough pondering.”

My adventure invites fellow travellers. I am a poet, an artist and a seer. I welcome conversation among the PHILO SOFIA, the lovers of wisdom.

aquariel link

Robert’s Imponderables – Part Three

Posted on January 24, 2015 by janeadamsart

Part Three of extracts from Robert’s satsang transcript §85 – see previous posts …

“You have absolutely nothing to do with pondering anything, for the truth is already present, shining in all its glory and splendour, and you are That . . . Ponder this.”

“There is really nothing you have to do to get yourself Self-realised, only to get yourself out of the way . . . Ponder this.”

“Since there is no one to ponder, why are you pondering this? You are beyond pondering, beyond trying to change conditions, beyond trying to improve your humanhood, beyond trying to get along in the world. Since you are already the world, there is nothing else to do but to awaken to the truth . . . Ponder this.”

“To be your Self means not to be the body, or the mind, or the conditions in your life . . . Ponder this.”

“To be always happy, to be always contented, always at peace, and not to think at all, are the marks of a realised being . . . Ponder this.”

“What you see in this world is only your self. You can never see anything else. Wherever you look, you will see yourself. If you have troubles, you will see troubles everywhere. If you are at peace with yourself, you will see peace everywhere. You are the cause and creator of your particular world, and yet you have the power to change it, by turning within and not reacting to the things of this world whatsoever . . . Ponder this.”

“You are born into a certain situation, with certain parents, a certain religion, a certain environment. This is alright, and this is all good, and this is how it should be. Use the opportunity to awaken. Instead of feeling sorry for yourself, and comparing yourself with others, use the opportunity to awaken, to become totally free, by negating all these things and understanding the truth about yourself . . . Ponder this.”

‘It is a rare privilege to be born as a human being, even though it is an illusory birth. But to be born as a human being is the only way you can find your Self. An animal, a tree, a mineral, cannot do this. You have been given the rare opportunity of birth, so that you may find Self realisation, and unfold into your true nature. Do not use your time for anything else. This is the purpose of being in this birth: to become absolutely free and liberated . . . Ponder this.”

Ramana siddha

My adventure invites fellow travellers. I am a poet, an artist and a seer. I welcome conversation among the PHILO SOFIA, the lovers of wisdom.

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Robert’s Imponderables – Part Two

Posted on January 22, 2015 by janeadamsart

See previous post for more soliloquies from the late American sage and jnani, Robert Adams, who sat with Ramana Maharshi …

“You are not what you appear to be. The world is not what it appears to be. The universe is not what it appears to be. Your God is not what it appears to be . . . Ponder this.”

“The substratum of all existence is absolute intelligence, choiceless pure awareness. Therefore, how can there be evil so called, on this earth?

“How can there be sickness, man’s inhumanity to man, lack and limitation on this earth, if the substratum is pure consciousness? . . . Ponder this.”

“Everything that you behold with your senses is an optical illusion. . . . Ponder this.”

“There is only one intelligence, one consciousness, one awareness, one ultimate reality, one life, and you are that . . . Ponder this.”

“To free yourself from this optical illusion, this maya, the mind has to be controlled, by finding its source . . . Ponder this.”

“You find the source of the mind by following it to its original place of origin. From where did it arise? Who gave it birth? How did you come by a mind? By inquiring into the ultimate nature of the Self, you attain unconditional freedom . . . Ponder this.”

“When one intelligently investigates the source of ‘I’, one then ultimately becomes free from the bondage of ‘I’, and becomes all pervading, omnipresent Consciousness . . . Ponder this.”

“Your past only exists because you think about it. Your fears, your frustrations, only exist because you think about them. Where would they come from if you didn’t think about them? If you didn’t bring them into play in the present? Where would they come from? And how would they be there? You are the cause of your problems . . . Ponder this.”

“The so-called good things of your life are equal to the bad things of your life. They are both karmic, and you have created these things at one time or another. You are now experiencing them. The only way to remove them from your life is through inquiry: To whom do they come? What is their source? . . . Ponder this.”

“Who is the one that is pondering all these things? That one must go ! . . . Ponder this.”

Robert Adams , 1928-1997: Peace

To be Continued

My adventure invites fellow travellers. I am a poet, an artist and a seer. I welcome conversation among the PHILO SOFIA, the lovers of wisdom.

aquariel link

Happy Birthday, Robert

Posted on January 21, 2015 by janeadamsart

Here are some “Imponderables” from the American sage Robert Adams (21 January 1928 11.30pm – 5 March 1997).

I woke up this morning, saw something on facebook, and was inspired to celebrate his birthday with these “imponderables” from transcript 85 of his satsangs. It is called “Ponder This” – some sips of rare wine to mull along the day while riding on buses and recovering from sore backs and concerned about the world situation, and so forth.

A new sketch for Robert’s birthday

“All of your desires, all of your needs, all of your wants are already within you, waiting to be fulfilled and expressed . . . Ponder this.”

“All of the masters, the teachers, the saints, the sages you worshipped all your life, whether it is Buddha, Christ, Mohammed, Moses, whomever, have always been within you, waiting to be expressed . . . Ponder this.”

“The only problem you have, that does not allow these sages, your desires, your wants to be expressed for you, is your noisy mind . . . Ponder this.”

“Whatever you see in your life right now, good or bad, is a result of your thoughts and your belief. It has no other reality. It is not permanent . . . Ponder this.”

“There is absolutely nothing in this universe that can hurt you, or cause you physical harm, or cause you pain, except when your mind is trained to believe these things . . . Ponder this.”

“You have absolutely nothing to do with this world, this universe, or with others. Yet, at the same time, you are this universe. You are places and things and others . . . Ponder this.”

“No one is responsible for where you are right now, whether you like your position or you do not. This is where you are Karmically. This is where you are supposed to be, and all is well . . . Ponder this.”

Robert and Dmitri

… To be continued, over the next few days. I made these imponderables into a little book, and illustrated it, at around the time Robert passed away in Sedona, in 1997. To read my posts about meeting Robert, type Robert Adams in the search button.

Happy birthday, beloved one.

My adventure invites fellow travellers. I am a poet, an artist and a seer. I welcome conversation among the PHILO SOFIA, the lovers of wisdom.

aquariel link

Ganapati Muni’s Science of Mantra – Part Four

Posted on November 20, 2014 by janeadamsart

In this concluding post of the series, Ganapati Muni’s commentary elucidates the forms of Skanda and Indra which bear the mantra’s sound-wave, Sabda Brahman, seeing them realised in his spiritual brother and mentor, Ramana Maharshi of Arunachala. See also the three preceding posts, and search “Puranas” on this blog for a racy account of the Skanda mythology.

Note: the god Skanda is also known as Kumara, Murugan (or Subrahmanya) and Krtikkai.

Third Chapter: The Vedic Mantra of Guha
by Ganapati Muni

We have commented upon the two Tantric Mantras of the master Ramana. Yet his Mantras are found even in the Veda. Amongst them, here is a clear cut Mantra of Bhagavan:

“Vrsa jajana vrsanam ranaya
tamu cinnari naryam sasuva.
Prayah senanir adha nrbhyo astinah
satva gavesanah sa dhrsruh.”

The seer is Vasishtha. The Deity is Indra and the metre is Trishtubh.
vrsa is “Rudra who is of the form of Sabda Brahman”. He is vrsa because “he pours down (varsati) the special knowledge”;
vrsanam “the God who showers down flames ranavya for battle”.
To wage war brings forth the meaning – vrsa jajana – (Rudra)

Tamu – the way God, u, is indeclinable (without inflexions) – suggests the loftiness of the Name with which it is closely associated

nari cit is the divine Force: cit is indeclinable, used to denote the indescribable.
If nari is derived from nara, men, then the word nari (feminine) means the Kundalini sakti hidden in man. (*)

sasuva – “is produced”. In what way ? Naryam – “born amongst men” – are the leaders, or perfected beings.

FOOTNOTE -
* Nari is feminine (nari-kundalini)

THIS IS THE TRANSLATION IN ESSENCE:

“Kundalini sakti in the body of perfected man produces for ‘battle’
Indra’s form within the fire of astra from Sabda Brahman.”

God, taking birth, “becomes the commander – senanih – of the armies of the Gods”.
The third and fourth lines of the verse conclude:

adha nrbhvo asti – “and a helper to their leaders”
inah (means) svami – “the Master”,
satva “is the possessor of sat, of Truth”
gavesanah “seeking out”
sa “the acclaimed God”
dhrsruh, “assailer of all foes.”

Arunachala, inner path

To read here that Indra is being referred to and not Subrahmanya (Skanda), presents no problem. The ‘ordinary’ name for the fire of astra is Indra, and Kumara (Skanda) is the special name.

In what way ordinary? or special? For instance, the common name for the sun is Light, but his special or personal name is Surya.

Indra denotes broadly, all ideas of multi-faceted strength.(18)

According to a thing’s true nature, each facet of it has separate specific or ‘special’ names. In the Veda and the Brahmana it is well-known that Indra is the god of strength. The fire of astra is a powerful and mighty concept, for which, combined with supreme Lordship, Indra’s name (as the ‘ordinary’) is appropriate. The commanding fire of astra is described specifically as Kumara. There exists another reason beyond all this, which we shall submit later.

FOOTNOTE:
18 Indra denotes the strong lord, as in Mahendra, Kavindra, 
Munindra, etc.

Sacred India Tarot – Indra and Garuda

WHERE ‘ITIHASA’ IS APPROPRIATE

When the world was afflicted by powerful Asuras, the Gods begged and prayed to Brahma the Creative power for relief. Brahma replied the young Kumara (Skanda) born of Rudra from Gauri would destroy the Asuras. Later Kama the god of lust was sent by the Gods to incline ascetic Rudra towards the idea of progeny. Kama was burnt up (by one look from Rudra’s third eye). Thereupon, the young Gauri did tapas. Attracted to the severity of her tapas (spiritual effort) Rudra married her. Uniting with her, he ejected his seed upwards. The seed took shelter successively in the fire, in the water and in the stalk of sara grass, and finally became the young one, Kumara.

Parvati(Gauri) and Siva with Ganapati and Skanda

Parvati(Gauri) and Siva with Bull Nandi and their children Ganapati and Skanda. Ganapati’s vehicle is the rat, and Skanda’s is the peacock.

In other words: All human means were futile to conquer the Asura race (of demons) who devastated the world by the strength of their maya. Here we should take the Asura race as a specific, or special human type; in the world of men the Kingdom of Asuras became perpetual. (A problem cannot be solved with itself; the higher octave has to be called in.) The Gods gave astra, wisdom (*) to the seers, in order to destroy the Asuras. With the destruction of the Asuras, the Kingdom of the devotees of God became once more established on earth.

This story is related by Itihasa in a covert manner. When the jiva does tapas, firstly kama, desire, is burnt by the glory of tapas. We should not forget the fact, that the state of tapas is poised in the effulgence of Sabda Brahman. Though desire is burnt up in its gross form, it prevails in the seed form, and impels the Kundalini sakti, called Gauri (or Parvati), to perform tapas. About Kundalini being called Gauri, it is said in the Upanishad: “pita bhasatyanupama.” (19) Gauri’s form of Kundalini is fairly wellknown in the Tantra. By her tapas, the Sabda Brahman manifests.

The whole purport is that the form of the Supreme Vak (pronunciation, divine speech) becomes capable of experiencing. When Kundalini herself, reunited with Sabda Brahman, performs tapas, the sound vibration (energy) manifests. It impels the energised sound in the sky, and becomes the astra.

The seed of Sabda Brahman is cultured in the fire of muladhara (root) and the nectar of the head (sahasrara) – these are said to be its consecutive sojourns in Agni and in Ganga. (20)

The manifestation in the stalk of sara grass has been described in the Second Chapter.

We have to take the Asuras as belonging to all times, not as born in a particular period. Itihasa’s aim is to propound an all time truth.

FOOTNOTES: 
* - or Awareness

19 - Gauri, lit. "of golden yellow colour." The Narayana 
Upanishad says "Yellow, like an atom, she shines."

20 - In the subtle body, the centre at the base of the spine 
is muladhara and the centre at the top of the head is 
sahasrara. Muladhara is the seat of Fire, while sahasrara 
is the seat of the moon wherefrom the nectar flows.
 
As Ganga is the celestial river, she symbolises the nectar 
in sahasrara while Agni is the element in muladhara. The seed 
of the Sabda Brahman passes from muladhara to sahasrara, and 
has its sojourn in both centres before it manifests. 

This is the meaning of the Puranic story that Skanda is 
born from Agni as well as from the Ganga.

Gauri – Parvati – being pestered by sages

WHO IS THE ASURA TARAKA?

Well, is it not to destroyTaraka that Skanda is born? Is Taraka a historical personage?

No. Yet, Tarakasura represents a truth. Taraka is death, one who (as the ferryman) takes across – tarati – all men. (20A) In both ways, Guha (in heart’s cave) conquers Death. By granting Self knowledge, he conquers death, the lack of awareness which causes samsara. By the strength of the astra, he conquers death, the desire of his foes. It is said in the Puranas that the Tripura Asuras are sons of this same Taraka. The Tripura Asuras are none other than the three bonds. (21) Their father is lack of awareness. That is, we fall from the Self into the body – into the idea (of being separate), of considering it as the self.

FOOTNOTE:
20A See also tara, goddess of time

21 The Three Bonds are the three pasas from which release is 
sought from Varuna by the Vedic Rishi. In the later Tantra, 
these take the form of the three granthi knots in the subtle 
body: Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva.

Asura Lord (Demonic)

COMMANDER OF ARMIES

How do the words commander of armies in the Mantra signify ‘commander of armies of the gods?’ Indra, the King of Gods, becomes in this context their commander. This is made clear in another Mantra:

“Indra asem neta brha spatir Let Indra be the leader. Let Brhaspati
dakshina yajnah pura etu somah           go in front, Dakshina, the sacrifice, and Soma
Devasenanam abhibhanjatinam   Let the Maruts march in the forefront
jayantinam maruto yatvagram.”    of the army of the Gods that demolish and conquer

Rig Veda X.103.8

This Mantra is mentioned in the chapter on astra. Also, the word ina in the Mantra became later on in the common parlance the word svami, (22) Master.

“Vavrajasim anadatir adabdha   He moved all round the seven mighty ones
divo yahvir avasana anagnah   of Heaven; undevouring, inviolate.
Sana yatra yuvatayah, sa yonir        neither were they clothed, nor were they naked;
Ekam garbham dadhire sapta vanih.”   here, young and eternal in one native land
the seven Voices held in their womb the one Child

Rig Veda III.1.6. (Sri Aurobindo’s translation)

Sapta vanih are the Seven metres* in Sanskrit poetry. The birth of Agni as this Mantra is nothing other than the fire of astra. This is revealed in the hymn of Agni in the sense of burning: but not with the idea of physical fire.

FOOTNOTES:
22 - Svami is one of the principle names of Skanda.

* - The seven metres represent also seven stars in the 
Pleiades constellation, the 'natural mothers' of the child 
Skanda.

Gauri Siva's bride was the daughter of the Himalaya. She is
also known as Parvati in the Puranic cycle. The river
Ganga, lit by the seven stars and the moon,"poured down"/
descended through Siva's matted dreadlocks in their love-play.
As stated earlier, neither the fire (Agni) nor the water 
(Ganga) could receive his seed. It finally came to rest
in the stalk of the mantric sara grass. From the mythology
we gain some idea of the elemental power of mantra. 
See previous post - Part Three.

Skanda as Muruganar and Krttikai (pleiades

Another version of this tale is Siva's seduction of the 
wives of seven Rishis (seers) in the forest. Entering 
the heart of the fire (Agni) to which the women came to 
warm themselves,Siva impregnated them through their hair 
follicles, causing chaos in the ashram. The seed could
not be held by them, or by fire or by water, until it 
came to rest in the grass; then Gauri's breasts filled,
and the world rejoiced, unknowing as yet where the 
divine child with six heads lay.



Ganapati Muni saw in his spiritual brother Ramana 
Maharshi, the effulgence of Skanda the warrior of light who
delivered us from Taraka. Ramana taught Self-enquiry which 
dismantles the mind and quests consciousness:  the "I ... I".
(J.A.)

Bhagavan Ramana Maharshi

COMMENTARY CONTINUED: ENQUIRY INTO THE PERSONALITY

Now we must say a word about the individualised Personality of the maya (23) form of Brahman with attributes, which is known as Subrahmanya.

We say that Indra alone is Guha’s form pertaining to the Gods. This is because Agni, the energy of sound-vibration is in the middle region; and Indra is the Lord of the middle region. This is proven in the Aranyaka when, referring to Indra, it closes with the words, Subrahmanyam, Subramanyam.

Indra’s Vedic fame as the War God, lends additional support.

What is Siva’s form among the Gods? It is Indra only. If it is said, that as father and son they are one and the same, this is correct. The only difference to note, is regarding the hidden Sabda Brahman and the manifest sound vibration. The relationship of father and son is mentioned to specify Siva and Subrahmanya (Skanda).

What is Ganapati’s form among the Gods? It is Indra only. If it is said, that as brothers Ganapati and Subrahmanya are one and the same, this is correct. The only difference to note, is that regarding the perfected mantra within, and the astra Agni impelled by it. The fraternal relationship demonstrates that first the mantra is born from Sabda Brahman; then the astra Agni. Through the concept of Ganapati, we explain Brihaspati and Brahmanaspati. (24)

What is lightning’s form pertaining to the Gods? It is Indra only. Here he has a unique quality. Indra is named as the deity of Lightning.

There are other great conceptual facets in the middle region, with Indra as their deity. They are not mentioned here, as we would have to go into a lot of detail.

FOOTNOTES:
23 Maya - form - the form that we measure out of the 
immeasurable

24 Ganapati, Brihaspati and Brahmanaspati - all three names 
denote the same Godhead in the Veda of the famous Rik 
"Gananam tva ganapatim lawamake ..." 

Brishaspati - Lord of the letters; Brahmanaspati - Lord of 
the Mantras. Brahma means both letter and mantra in the veda. 
Ganapati Lord of tantra, and these two names, denote the 
same Godhead.

Doorstep chalk pattern at dawn in Tiruvannamalai

THE APPROPRIATENESS OF THE DIFFERENT DESCENTS

By means of whichever portion of energy the Lord Indra descends into awareness, the descent bears that specific or personal Name.

Indra’s descent as a portion of the lightning bears his own name. His descent as a portion of Sabda Brahman is named Rudra. His descent as the force of Tantra is known by the name Ganapati, and his descent as a portion of sound vibration is called Skanda. Ganapati and Subrahmanya (Skanda) are brothers, and they are interdependent.

We have briefly interpreted the three great Mantras of the Master. We shall develop the conceptual truth of Skanda in our Devata mimamsa. (25)

FOOTNOTES
25 - Another of Vasishtha Ganapati Muni's works, where he 
unravels the significances of the Deities

Thus Ends the Third Chapter.

Thus ends the Commentary on the Mantras of the Master,
a work of Ganapati Vasishtha, son of Narasimha
and disciple of Sri Bhagavan Ramana Maharshi

The Closing Verse

“Munina srimukhe simhe dive suryendusangame
Suryoparagasamaye bhasyam etadudiritam.”

“In the month Sravana of the year Srimukha
on a new Moon day, at the time of Solar eclipse,
this Commentary was given out by the Muni.”

APPENDIX TO THE COMMENTARY

1). Subrahmanya is the one who is born of the auspicious Brahman, that is, Sabda Brahman.

2). By this we have explained the name Brahma garbha (from the womb of Brahma)

Vide Amara: “Subrahmanya brahma-garbha svami saravanodbhavah”.

3). Kumara, eternal child. He is born, finishes the work and again vanishes. Again manifests at the time of work. Therefore, he is called the eternal child. In the Veda, in the Hymn to Indra, is mentioned ‘arbhako na kumarakah‘26 . Also, ‘sadyo jajnano nirinati saturn’.27

4). By this we have explained the name sanat kumara – sanat always; kumara, young one.

5). Sanatsujatah also in the same way. sanat, always; sujatah, well born.

6). Sanandana samanah equal nandanah, son (giver of happiness) to Rudra along with Ganapati.

7). Sanakeh, eternal.

Thus these four names denote one and the same person. Perhaps because of their different manifestations, it appears they were mentioned as four (28) .

26 The youth like a little child

27 Born at once, he demolishes the foes.

28 The four disciples of Shiva as Dakshinamurti: Sanaka, 
Sanandana, Sanatkumara and Sanatsujata. Etymologically they 
have the same meaning and denote one and the same principle.
(See also Sanatanadharma)

Here the Commentary and Appendix by the Muni ends.

We express our grateful thanks to Sri K.Natesan of Ramanasramam for making this rare manuscript available to us, and for his help with the text. Ganapati Muni’s Commentary on the Mantra of the Master, was recently published by Ramanasramam, along with the first translation into English of Kapali Sastri’s sanskrit Commentary on the Ramana Gita. Material from this has been utilised for the present work.

For the benefit of English readers, the language and presentation of the Guru Mantra Bhashya text have been slightly adjusted, and translations of Vedic Mantras, that were provided as footnotes, are now incorporated in the text, for easier reference..

J.A. Ramana Maharshi Foundation UK 2002

Arunachala village children

My adventure invites fellow travellers. I am a poet, an artist and a seer. I welcome conversation among the PHILO SOFIA, the lovers of wisdom.

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Ganapati Muni’s Science of Mantra – Part Two

Posted on November 18, 2014 by janeadamsart

My blog includes my “landmarks”, which I archive within the creative process. As a western sadhak searching to become more focused, and to plug in to the “dimension”, I am inspired again by Ganapati Muni’s Guru Mantra Bhashyam – it helps to ‘hold my feet on the Path.’

My elder Indian roots go very deep: the light is in the well.

Adapting the Muni’s mantric analysis (translated from sanskrit by K Natesan) to my understanding, was a landmark about 14 years ago. It is rather technical; here is (see previous post) the second of four parts – a few readers (including dancing yetis) may find this curious treasure a-musing to mull over. But if you incline more to neti-neti … then enjoy the pictures!

I am no scholar; but I spent many a lifetime scribing the thoughts of scholars, which I love doing. My heart caught fire and now dances around it. I found this second part difficult to understand, especially at the beginning, but worth persevering with, as it elucidates the living entities in Mantra, and the salutation to God. The footnotes include a precise definition of Maya, and Sanskrit “keys” for meditation to nourish the soul.

For some of the Skanda background mythology, search “Puranas” on this blog.

Ramana and the Muni. A devotee enquired if it were a fact that they used to swim in Pandava tank. Bhagavan replied, “Yes. That also was only in those days” (i.e.the Virupaksha Cave period). We used to try to excel each other in swimming. That was great fun.” (From Suri Nagamma’s Letters from Ramanasramam no.59)

HOW THE GODHEAD IS OF THE FORM OF BRAHMAN by Kavyakanta Ganapati Muni

The Mantra’s general meaning has been stated. (see Part One). Now we enquire into its specific meanings. If Skanda is a distinct Godhead, how can he be of the form of Brahman? for Brahman is That Supreme which transcends all Gods.

Ramana as Skanda Siva’s son – Sacred India Tarot Knight of Staves

(Scroll down a little way for footnotes )

Well then, if we say Brahman is the all, his form as ascribed to Skanda is no contradiction, and the sense of it clarifies. But this, in worship, is wrong. In worship we should reflect on the object as representing the superior – not confer inferior status onto a superior Subject. That is why Badarayana (7) says “Brahma drstir utkarsat”.

If you worship Guha(*) in the form of Brahman, you will limit, in the all pervading Brahman, your vision of the pervaded Guha. The misrepresentation will be removed if the following meaning is given: vacadbhuve Om namah – “Salutation to Brahman in the form of Guha.” However, it will then be the mantra of Brahman, not of Guha; and this goes against what we set out to establish.

FOOTNOTES -
7- Badarayana is the author of the Brahma Sutras. This Sutra 
1V.1.5 says that symbols are to be regarded as Brahman, and not 
vice versa. An inferior object has to be looked upon as 
symbolic of the superior.

*- "Guha means literally the cave of the divine, the secret place, 
Heart cavern. However the Guha mentioned here is in the sense of 
personal God, another name of Skanda"- K.Natesan

When doubt assails us on both sides, we should clarify the overall meaning as: “Salutation to Guha who in the form of Brahman is Brahmasvarupa”. (i.e. as an image of the immanent and formless Brahman).

Notions of inferior and superior belong to the realm of attributes. In Brahman without attributes or qualities, whence superior or inferior? The notion depends for its existence upon attributes, as also upon differences. If Brahman is the integral Wholeness, then relative to what is His superiority? If He is the all Self, to whom is he superior? His superior state is experienced through His worldly manifestations, and His inferiority through the ignorant jiva’s limitation (8) .

Just as Brahman becomes superior by upadhi (9) , so is he also inferior. In the present context, Guha is worshipped, and the worshipper is the jiva. If there is no upadhi, then both (worshipper and worshipped) are of the form of Brahman: therefore they are one. In this undifferentiated reflection, a doubt may arise in the worship as to whether we picture ourself in Guha or Guha in our Self? It appears logical “to see Guha in our Self”. The chapter on Worship in the Sutra Brahmadrstir utskarsat (**) relates to Saguna, the God with attributes. There is then no conflict.

FOOTNOTES -
8- Jiva - the soul or strand of ego that experiences incarnations
as "its own" memory base in vasanas (Karmic tendencies).

9- Upadhi, conditioning. "A superimposed thing or attribute that 
veils and gives a coloured view of the substance beneath it;
Or - a limiting adjunct, instrument, vehicle, body, a technical 
term used in Vedanta philosophy for any superimposition that gives 
a limited view of the Absolute and makes it appear as the 
relative.  Jiva's Upadhi is Avidya or ignorance.  Isvara's 
Upadhi is Maya or divine hypnosis."     
(Definition from Yoga Vedanta Dictionary/Swami Sivananda)

**- "Brahmadrstir - the view of Brahman. Utskarsat - on account 
of superiority, i.e. being exalted, all should be seen as the 
Supreme Self" - K.Natesan

It is established then, that with and through the Mantra, Guha (as a personal god) in the form of Brahman is worshipped. As Brahman is the universal Self, the Guha image in Brahman emerges.

Here another doubt arises. It is said that a portion of Guha’s effulgent form which is of the Gods, and is gracious to devotees, may enter well deserving individual souls who have destroyed their erratic tendencies.

Is this an image of Brahman (the formless) with attributes? Or a perfected Person of divine origin? What distinguishes the two?

The former is the Lord whose body is the entire universe, and who, to favour the devotee, took a divine body by his maya. (10) The latter is an exceptional being who individuated amongst the crores of jivas, and attained a divine body by the excellence of his virtues.

If we say ‘let the Lord himself be Skanda’, we will be faced with the postulate of several other Gods, with nothing to mark out Skanda from among their great and glorious galaxy. And if we say ‘let him be an exceptional being amongst the jivas’, then the problem of inferiority will crop up. Let it then be said: the Lord alone is Skanda – not an exclusive being amongst the crores of jivas. Thus, we do not postulate several Gods. For the sake of the world’s work, Brahman takes forms by maya in the world, and thus conducts the universe. If mere perfected souls have the capacity to take many forms by maya, what can we say about the all powerful God?

FOOTNOTES -
10- MAYA, from ma, to measure, the skill of measuring the
immeasurable, therefore an impossible feat, the intrinsic 
power of the Lord, the marvel.  Later in Vedanta, this word 
came to mean"illusion".  From the same root comes the Mother 
or birthgiver - and also the French word la mer - the ocean.

Click on image and again on ‘view full size’ in gallery

Amongst those forms of God taken by maya for the sake of the world’s work, Skanda’s form pertaining to the Gods is unique. We shall touch on such authoritative forms taken by God through maya.

The votaries of Vishnu claim that “Narayana alone is the form of the Lord pertaining to the Gods”: “the Supreme Shiva alone”, say the Saivites: “none but Ganapati”, proclaim the followers of Ganesh: “Savitr (the sun as creative godhead) is All”, say the worshippers of the sun. Men of Indra say “He alone”; and “Jesus alone”, claim the Christians: Allah is One, say the Mohammadans. Then “he alone is Subrahmanya”, say followers of Skanda.

Furthermore, if one sees the usages in the Veda, like tam i mahe purustutam yahvam pratnabhir utibhih (11) it looks as if another name of Indra is yahva, the Judaeo-Christian Jehovah. Perhaps ahla da (12) – Allah – is another name for the Person in the orb of the moon.

When such dispute arises among the votaries of various religions, what is the truth? On investigation, the Vedas give us no unanimous answer. Here, as we have hitherto said, we must reconcile distinctions in an overall harmony.

FOOTNOTES -
11- "We praise through new hymns, Him (JahveH) 
Who is hymned by all creatures."

12- Ahlada, delight. Moon is the source of delight.

young ramana

In this context, here is the Vedic Rik:

“Indram mitram varunam agnim ahur “They call Him Indra, Mitra, Varuna, Agni atho divyah sa suparno garutman. and he is the divinely beautiful plumed Garutman Ekam sadvipra bahudha vadant – One Alone existent; sages speak of it differently. Yagnim yamam matarisvanam ahuh” They call it Agni, Yama and Matarisvan.”

Rig Veda 1.164.46

On enquiry into the meaning of this mantra, some say these are alternative Names for the One God. Others point out that as the forms taken through maya are diverse, different Names are conceived. The latter view is better. Then only will it harmonise with that of other sages. Here even, the view of the followers of Nirukta that there are just three Godheads, is preferable.(13)

FOOTNOTE - 
13- Nirukta, the work of Yaska on Vedic etymology.  The three 
Godheads are Agni, Vayu and Aditya

Agni – the sacred fire

WHO IS AGNI, THE PRODUCER OF SKANDA?

It is established that Guha’s form, pertaining to the Gods, is specific, amongst the forms taken through maya by Brahman with attributes.

Now in the mantra, the father of Skanda, Agni, is mentioned as vacadbhuh. Who is this? We shall enquire. There are five energies in the world – solar, lunar, electricity, physical fire, and the sound. Sound is not a quality but an energized substance, with the action of movement and the attribute of resonance.

A quality by itself is without action or attribute. The sound caught in a recording instrument is understood as a substance. When sound is transmitted through an instrument to a great distance, it appears first as energy and then manifests as sound. This illustrates that sound is a vibration, or energized substance. Many Vedic Riks support this view. We shall cite only two mantras as example:

wood grain & cosmic egg

“Ima abhiprano numo vipamagresu dhitayah
Agney socir na didyutah.”

“Here we put forth loudly the words,
in front of illuminations luminous like the blaze of fire.”

(Rig Veda VIII.6.7.) (14)

Here dhitayah are said to be luminous like Agni’s flame. Dhitayah are the words.

FOOTNOTE - 
14- Alternative translation by Sri K.Natesan for this Mantra: 
"We bow to the syllables, effulgent as Agni, foremost among
those who protect themselves, and others."

“Tam tva marutvati paribhuvadvani sayavari
Naksumana saha dyubhih.”

“Sound, the divine Omnipresence
is One in Name with the Divine splendours”

(Rig Veda VII.31.8)

Here vani – the word – is said to have a Name (naksamana)through dyubhih, energies.

Rudra Immerses

This vibration of pervasive sound is also named as Sabda Brahman; the form pertaining to the physicality of the supreme Siva. Its Vedic name is Rudra. Yaska gives the etymology as one who cries, Rudra. This same sound vibration known as Rudra is mentioned as vacat in the Mantra. When the sense of speech is spiritualised it becomes the manifestation of Sabda Brahman. Thus there is no difference between this vocalisation and Sabda Brahman.

In this manner, Kumara the young one is born from Agni. Here Agni pertains to sound and not to physical matter. The Mantra does not say agnibhuve but precisely, vacadbhuve in order to clearly indicate the truth. Though the word Agni is used in connection with physical fire, it also denotes any form of subtle energy.

Therefore, in the Name, the ordinary meaning flashes. The word vacadbhuva … flashes forth specifically the meaning of energised sound or Agni.

ganapati gives mantra – into his devotee’s hairy ear, he whispered sabda brahman – the unforgettable sound which never ends

THE MEANING OF SALUTATION Now we shall touch on the salutation itself, and what it signifies in the course of the japa.

There is a doubt here. Should we when repeating the Mantra imagine some divine form of Guha, to contemplate as our prayer? or is the meaning of the salutation a simple notion that: “you are superior, I am inferior”? Neither are proper. In both methods, we would with each repetition of the Mantra, resort to the idea that we are different, and imagine some form which is false and of little glory to the Godhead. The nature of our Self would be lost.

There is however, another, third meaning: the salutation is not to the gross body, but to the subtle body. The subtle body is the mind, its place the head. It bows.

trinosofia inner cave of light

Bhagavan the Master has said:

“Kirtyate hrdayam pinde The Heart is said to be in the microcosm
yathande bhanumandalam as the orb of the Sun in the macrocosm.
Mavah sahasraragatam bimbam Like Moon’s disk is mind
candramasam Yatha” in the thousand petalled Centre.

Ramana Gita Chapter V.verse 13

When the mind bows down to seek the form of Self placed in the Heart, or to plunge itself into the effulgence of its own form placed in the Heart, this is bowing down, salutation. In both cases, we should not forget to see Skanda as the Self.

The japa of the Mantra thus performed, will seek our own realised Truth. It will not be polluted by any diversity.

Brahmana

Maharshi revealed the whole truth of these two forms of worship in a foot of this verse: “Hrdi visa manasa svam
cinvata majjata va”

“Enter into the Heart by the mind which seeks Self
or which wants to take a plunge.”

Ramana Gita, Chapter II verse 2

trinosofia bird lamp

Thus is revealed the meaning of the Mantra:

Om Vacadbhuve Namah

“I enter or plunge into Bhagavan the Master,
who is the descent of Skanda,
as the true form of my Self”.

Thus ends the First Chapter.

My adventure invites fellow travellers. I am a poet, an artist and a seer. I welcome conversation among the PHILO SOFIA, the lovers of wisdom. This blog is a vehicle to promote also my published work – The Sacred India Tarot (with Rohit Arya, Yogi Impressions Books) and The Dreamer in the Dream – a collection of short stories (0 Books). Watch this space.

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Ganapati Muni’s Science of Mantra – Part One

Posted on November 12, 2014 by janeadamsart

Vedic goddess

Here’s a four-part post series for scholars!

I haven’t studied the layered meanings in Sanskrit. But I learnt a few sacred Names and phrases along the way; I hear the chanting and smell the sandal paste; the syllables are long musical frequencies; from in between them, emerge the tantras. Tantra is the art of touch throughout the universe. Needing to touch base with some of my Indian and Vedic threads, I turned to Ganapati Muni’s analysis of his mantric science. I prepared this text in the 1990s from Sri K Natesan’s translation, for the Ramana Foundation Journal Self Enquiry. Sri Natesan – a “grandchild” in the Muni’s sacred lineage – checked it for mistakes.

In the text the secret known to knowers of truth is mentioned: when we truly know that we do not know – we begin.

“Guru Mantra Bhashyam” by Ganapati Muni

Introduced and Translated by S.Sankaranarayanan
Adapted for English readers by J.A., with the help of Sri K.Natesan at Ramana Ashram

The Muni

The eighteenth chapter of Sri Ramana Gita contains a series of verses which describe the characteristics of Ramana Maharshi. Amongst them, the tenth verse enunciates in the style of the Tantra, the Mantra by which the Maharshi has to be invoked.

Ganapati Vasishta Muni valued this Mantra very highly. When disciples approached Ramana Maharshi for elucidation on the Mantra, he directed them to the Muni. So Vasishta Muni decided to write a commentary on the 10th verse of the eighteenth chapter of Sri Ramana Gita for the benefit of aspirants. The Guru-mantra-Bhashyam was written in sanskrit and it was published along with the Text and Sri Kapali Shastriar’s Prakasha Bhashye (Commentary) of Sri Ramana Gita.

Considering the importance of the work and the wealth of spiritual insights it unfolds, a free translation in English of the whole commentary and Appendix to the Commentary is provided here, in four parts. Footnotes explain certain terms and concepts occurring in the commentary.

Meeting

Ramana and Ganapati were spiritual brothers – Ramana the silent jnani or Realised One and Ganapati the tantric philosopher and poet. Ramana was regarded as the embodiment of Skanda or Kumar: Ganesh and Skanda are the sons born to Siva and Parvati. When the two wild young sages sat together in the caves of Siva’s hill Arunachala, Ramana taught Ganapati that the root of the mantra and of the breath are one and the same, to dissolve into Self enquiry. Ganapati’s outpouring of verses to the Mother brought their ageless Saivite brotherhood into the 20th century.

skanda and ganapati

Some years ago, Alan Jacobs and I wrote 55 sonnets on the Ramana Gita English version; the sonnet form was chosen, to interact imaginatively with the formal Sanskrit text, and as a spiritual practice. Here below, to provide the setting, is a sonnet based on verses 8 – 11 of Chapter Eighteen, Ramana Gita (see below). It contains our interpretation of the Mantra OM VACADHBUVE RAMANA.

In Praise of Ramana: Three

FROM grasping freed, his peace
in quantum abyss unheeding
restores our alchemy. He pilots the seas.
Ganapati child at breasts of Parvati feeding,
cried “Mother’s mine!” In her lap, Kumar his brother
replied, “Never mind, for mine is Father!
I rest in his right heart, he kisses my head!”

Give glory, elephant child, to He whose lance
in Kumar’s hand pierced hill to the heart, ‘tis said.
Boon bringer, pour poem from His holy glance
by Vedic vessel whence emerges Word
by power of Fire as mystic Sword.

Without a staff, our song you uphold –
ferryman, defend everyman from demon gold!

THE VERSES FROM ‘RAMANA GITA’ CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

v.8 Free from infatuation, greed, distracting thought and envy, he is ever blissful. He is ever active, helping others to cross the sea of Becoming, regardless of reward.

v.9 When Ganapati saying ‘Mother is mine’ sat on the lap of Parvati, Kumara retorted ‘Never mind, Father is mine,” and got on to Siva’s lap and was kissed by him on the head. Of this Kumara who pierced (with his lance) the Krauncha Hill, Ramana is a glorious manifestation.

v.10 He is the mystic import of the mantra ‘OM VACHADBHUVE NAMAH.

v.11 An ascetic without danda , yet is he Dandapani. He is Taraka for crossing the sea of suffering, yet is he the foe of Taraka.

NOTE - Danda is a "Staff"or wand, yet Dandapani is the staff 
holder - even one who no longer uses it.  
The word Taraka means Deliverer, but "Taraka" was also the 
great demon Taraka who almost destroyed the universe. 
These are typical Sanskrit word-plays.

Sacred India Tarot – laws of Manu as the Hierophant – Ganapati the scribe near Arunachala

THE COMMENTARY ON THE MANTRA OF THE MASTER

“Om Vacadbhuve Namah Nahasyam”-
“Salutation to the Fire of Brahman whence emerges the word”

First Chapter: Pronouncing the Mantra
VERSE TEN, Chapter 18, RAMANA GITA

Vedådi påkadamanottara kacchapesair “He is the secret sense
Yuktair dharadhara susuptyamaresvaraisca of the group of words arrived at
Suksmamrtayug amrtena saha pranatya by uttering the following Sampannasabda patalasya nahasyam artham* Om Va ca dbhu, ve and Namah”

—Vedadih “the beginning of the Veda”, or Pranama OMKARA (1)
–Pakadamanat “from the destroyer of Paka Asura”, that is, Indra bija, whose letter is la
–Uttarah the letter next to it alphabetically, that is VA ; pakadamanottara kacchapesah —the bija (2) of Rudra in His form as Lord of the tortoise Kurmesa” that is, the letter CA.
—With these letters OM   VA CA, – Dharadharah, the bija of the Mountain,
the letter DA.
—Susuptih   the sakti power of deep sleep, whose bija is the letter BHA.
–Amare-Isvarah “the Lord (Isvara) of the immortals” (Amara, deathless) – Rudra dwells in this Name, his seed-letter U ; therefore DBHU.   Yuktaih, “union” (at the beginning of the line) joins this with the letter DBHU.
–Suksmamrta, whose Sakti’s bija is the letter E ;   Yuk joined to amrtena, (nectar) whose seedletter is the watery VA, form the letter VE.
–Pranatya, (Salutation) unites with the suffix namah (3.) The Sampanna sabda patalasya group of words forms the secret of the mantra OM VACADBHUVE NAMAH NAHASYAM. This can be known only to the knowers of Truth.

(Sabda is another word for Primordial Sound, Word, the Vedas, Omkara.)

The secret (Nahasyam) of this Mantra is revealed only to knowers of Truth. To them alone can the artham or full meaning be outwardly expressed; as in the form of the king of ascetics, Bhagavan Ramana (4 ), when questioned by Amrtanatha. (Ch.18, Ramana Gita)

—Thus “OM Vacadbhuve Namah” is established as the Mantra of Bhagavan the Guru.

Sri Kapali Shastri – a disciple of the Muni – in the 1930s

Kapali Sastri’s Commentary on this verse in the Ramana Gita, states in brief:

“By joining all these letters we arrive at the group of letters OM VACADBHUVE NAMAH. This group of letters forms the Mantra. Its secret sense, known to the learned, expresses the meaning “RAMANA WHO IS THE FORM OF THE DEITY INVOKED BY THIS MANTRA”.

Who is God, expressed in this Mantra ? Subrahmanya. How so ? ‘Om Vachadbhuve Namah’ – Omkara is the supreme Brahman. The word is indeclinable, and so it will make sense with all the case endings. Vacadbhu, the field that creates, releases the Word, the Fire. The fire became the word and entered the mouth. So explains the scripture. Born from the god who presides over speech is Vacadbhu, born from Fire, Kumara. Salutation to Him.

“This is not physical fire, but the effulgence of the word. In order to drive this home, in the Mantra, Agni is denoted by the word ‘vacat’. It is the tradition of the Tantra Shastra to expound the Mantra by using words of similar sense. Following this, the Master (Ganapati Muni) has expounded the Mantra of Subrahmanya. The author of this work, our Master has been praising the Maharshi, as one born out of a portion of Kumara. And so the essence of the Mantra is said to be Ramana.”

Kapali Shastri

FOOTNOTES - PRONOUNCING THE MANTRA:
* - Sri K Natesan states: "The literal translation is given here.
In Tantra Shastra (science) the mantras are not mentioned plainly 
and directly. There is a way of symbolic expression for which a 
working knowledge of their terminology is needed."

1 - pranava the letter OM:  the primordial sound from which the 
Veda, the word of revelation, has sprung

2 - The Tantra talkes about bijakshava, SEED LETTERS which contain
in a potential form what they would be manifesting. The SEED LETTER
is fixed for each Deity.  For example Indra's SEED LETTER is la. 
By convention, each SEED LETTER is connoted by one or more names.
The Bhija-nighantu, the Dictionary of seed-letters, 
gives the corresponding names.

3 - Pranati, bowing down, which is expressed by the word namah 

4 - This verse is one of twenty four verses in praise of the
Maharshi, at the end of which the questioner Amrtanatha addresses
him.

K Natesan & Vamadeva Shastri (David Frawley)

The Detailed Commentary by Ganapati Muni now Continues :

If we are asked: is not this mantra, the famous one of Skanda, mentioned in Tantric works like Saradatilaka? we say it is only the mantra of our guru, Bhagavan. It is known that Bhagavan Ramana, the Master, is avatara, descent of effulgence from the original guru, Skanda the Godhead, another of whose names is Sanat kumara. (5)

Ramana sat in silence, then asked the Muni – “Did you write down all I spoke?”

THE BODY OF THE MANTRA

This great mantra is originally of six letters as vacadbhuve namah. It becomes a mantra of seven letters with the pranava which is usually employed by certain Tantrics at the beginning of all mantras. Just as the five-lettered namah shivayah becomes six letters with the Omkara, so also here. All godheads have four forms. One pertains to the spirit, the other to the physical, another to the gods and the last to the form of the mantra.

Elsewhere we find this vedic piece:

Vacam astapadim aham navasraktim rtasprsam “Around Indra I create the body
Indrat paritanvam name of the Word with eight steps and nine parts
close in touch with the Right Law.”

(Rig Veda VIII 65.12)

By this Rik, the Rishi says that he creates the body of Indra, in the form of mantra. The Tantrics also say this:

Derike manavabhrantim                                   “To inferno he goes who mistakes
pratimasu silamatim                                        the guru for a man,
Mantresvaksarabhuddhim                          the idol in the temple for a piece of stone
ca kurvano nirayam vrajet.                                 and the mantra for a group of letters.”

Here the popular parlance that Gayatri is the Deity of the most famous Mantra, Tat Savitah serves as evidence. (6) Gayatri is the Mantra itself alone, not ‘a woman’; (this word indicates the name of a metre – the feminine sakti as the name or vessel). What does this establish? that the body of God Guha in the form of mantra has six letters. In this view that the body is formed by the Mantra, six letters become the six faces of the Lord.

Likewise, the five letters in the Panchakshara Mantra of the Supreme Shiva — NAMAH SHIVAYA — are his five faces. This is the same as the saying of the Mimamsakas: that the Deity is formed by the Mantra.

vedic vessel

THE GENERAL MEANING OF THE MANTRA

Om to the One in the form of Brahman. As the word OM is indeclinable, it keeps the same syntax with all cases. As acclaimed in the Upanishads, the letter OM denotes Brahman.
Vacadbhuva – Vacatah “from one who speaks”, creates statements. This is derived from Agni (god of sacred fire) in whose subtle form is the inner sense of ‘word’.
Bhu born, to Him Namah, salutation. It is well known that Skanda was born from Fire, Agni.

Agni

TO BE CONTINUED.

FOOTNOTES: GANAPATI'S COMMENTARY CONTINUES ...
5 - Chandogya Upanishad (7:26:2) equates Sanatkumara with Skanda,
and says that he takes ashore across the (ocean of) ignorance, 
the pure soul with constant awareness.

6 - "Tat savitur varenyam bhargo devasya dimah
Dhiyo yo nah pracodayat" -
"We meditate upon that excellent splendour
of the Lord Savitr.  May he activate our thoughts."

7 - Badarayana is the author of the Brahma sutras.  This Sutra
IV.1.5 says that symbols are to be regarded as Brahman, and 
not vice versa.  An inferior object has to be looked upon as
symbolic of the superior.