nirvANa sundarI

shR^i~Ngagiri, where prakR^iti and puruSha come together to salute at the inconceivable pAdukA of shrIvidyA parameshvarI, who excels beyond limited concepts such as shiva, shakti and shiva-shakti sAmarasya. Says brahmAnanda: "Fool! kAlikA is neither shiva, nor shakti nor shivashaktyaikya vastu. She is brahman, shUnya and beyond. If you think you can nail her down with such definitions and concepts, you have not earned the grace of sadguru". After all, she is the one who sports above and beyond the sahasrAra and pancha-shUnyas (which are represented by panchapanchikA-s, incorrectly represented by many as stages between sabIja and nirbIja samAdhi) - as the mahAshUnya which is also simultaneously the mahApUrNa.

There are great scholars and practitioners of tantra who have done yeomen service to sAdhaka-varga through their commentaries. While abhinavagupata and bhAskararAya are well-known within and outside tAntric circles, many others remain unknown and under-appreciated. Mark suggested we remember such forgotten commentators and their contributions occasionally and as always, we never ignore a meaningful suggestion.

amR^itAnandanAtha

Well-known as the author of saubhAgya-subhagodaya and dIpikA, the commentary on yoginIhR^idaya, amR^itAnandanAtha was a disciple of puNyAnandanAtha of hAdi sect and flourished in the eleventh century. His other works include ShaT-trimshat tattva saMdoha, traipura siddhAnta prakaraNa, tripurasundarI tantra, tripurasundarI kalpa, chidvilAsa stuti and tippaNi on tripurA sAra-samucchaya of nAgabhaTTa. Of these, I have personally not seen any available manuscript of tripurasundarI kalpa; rest of his works are available scattered through the subcontinent.

brahmAnanda giri

brahmAnanda was the disciple of tripurAnandanAtha and lived in the sixteenth century. He is the author of shAktAnanda taraMgiNI and tArA rahasya. His shiShya is the well-known pUrNAnanda.

gIrvANendra sarasvatI

A disciple of vishveshvara sarasvatI, he authored the encyclopedic prapamchasAra sAra saMgraha based on shrI shankara bhagavatpAda’s prapanchasAra tantra. Some of his well-known disciples include bodhendra sarasvatI (author of advaitabhUShana and a commentary on AchArya’s Atmabodha), nR^isiMhAshrama (author of advaitadIpikA) and rAmendra (author of vaidikAchAra nirNaya).

hariharAnandanAtha

Well-known as the guru of Raja Ram Mohan Roy, kulAvadhUta hariharAnandanAtha tIrtha authored commentaries on mahAnirvANa tantra an kulArNava tantra (kulArNava prakAsha). He belonged to a village named Palpada in Bengal and was known as nandakumAra vidyAlankAra in his pUrvAshrama.

kAshInAtha bhaTTa

kAshInAtha bhaTTa, known as shivAnandanAtha, lived in Benares during the seventeenth century. A prolific writer, he authored AgamotpattyAdi vaidika tAntrika nirNaya, kApAlika tantra vyavasthA, kAlikA bhakti rasAyana, kR^iShNapUjA taramgiNI, kaulagaja mardana, tantra siddhAnta kaumudI, dakShiNAchAra dIpikA, dakShiNAmUrti kaustubha, mantrachandrikA, yantrachandrikA, vAmAchAra mata khaNDana, vaidika-tAntrika adhikAri nirNaya etc. His commentaries include dIpikA and rahasyArtha sAdhikA on karpUra stava on bhagavatI dakShiNA kAlikA, on durgA saptashatI, gUDhArthAdarsha on jnAnArNava tantra, chakra samketa chandrikA on a portion of yoginI hR^idaya and commentaries on mantra mahodadhi of mahIdhara and shAradAtilaka. Well-known for his siddhis and realization, kAshInAtha displays his extensive knowledge of every branch of tantra in his masterpiece, kaulagaja mardana. I am told that his lineage today considers gopAlasundarI kalpa to be his work as well.

narasiMha Thakkura

Though little is known about him, except that he was the son of one gadAdhara, his works on tArA upAsanA are extremely precious. He is the author of tArA bhakti sudhArNava, tArA panchAnga, tArA paricharyA, tAriNI krama and mahAvidyA prakaraNa.

Premanidhi pantha

Son of umApati and uddyotamati, he was patronized by the rulers of Nepal in the eighteenth century. His works include antaryAga ratna, dIpaprakAsha, commentary on shAradAtilaka named shabdArthachintAmaNi etc. His commentary on the voluminous shaktisangama tantra (of which I have only seen incomplete copies) is truly a treasure.

rAmeshvara

A dAkshiNAtya brAhmaNa of kAshyapa gotra, he was the prashiShya of the great bhAskararAya and his dIkShA nAma was aparAjitAnandanAtha. His most well-known work is the commentary on parashurAma kalpasUtra called saubhAgya-shubhodaya, also referred to as subhagodaya sometimes.

1. shAktAbhiSheka
2. pUrNAbhiSheka
3. krama-dIkShAbhiSheka
4. sAmrAjyAbhiSheka
5. mahAsAmrAjyAbhiSheka
6. yoga-dIkShAbhiSheka
7. virAja-grahaNAbhiSheka
8. mahAsAmrAjya-medhAbhiSheka

shrImAtre namaH

As I sat in immense pain suffering from toothache, the attempt to immerse myself in vedanA-sati as directed by the tathAgata turned futile. The ever favorite practice of being aware of the Awareness as taught by bhagavAn ramaNa refused to become accessible and the mind sought refuge at the lotus feet of our kuladevatA, the six-faced son of parAmbA. ‘lopAmudrA’ Smt. prakAshAmbA had always told us how great Masters such as Sri Muttuswami Dikshitar, father of Brahmasri chidAnandanAtha and others had freed themselves of afflictions through the grace of shrI devasenApati. My own grandfather had been a naiShthika upAsaka of Lord sUryanArayANa and a knower of the secrets of Aditya Tantra. However, after coming under the loving and protective care of Smt. prakAshAmbA, Aditya and agni were replaced by the upAsana of ShaDAnana and he was always the last refuge when in physical distress. The mind, still immature and easily bothered by something as insignificant as pain, appealed to the great Lord to grant relief from pain, reciting the manu of shatrusaMhAra mUrti. Within about 14 minutes, the grace of the Lord was felt as an immense hot wave of energy sweeping through the body. In a matter of minutes, it was hard to believe there ever was any pain in the tooth.

To offer thanks to the brother of our beloved hastimukha, we performed AvaraNa pUjA for both saguNa and nirguNa mUrti-s and concluded the ritual with vaTu-pUjA. A gentleman who arrived at that point mentioned that his ancestor was the great Chidambaram Subrahmanya Dikshitar and that brought back a chain of memories.

Chidambaram Subrahmanya Dikshitar, nearly forgotten today, was one of the greatest upAsaka-s of Subrahmanya in the early part of this century. Though his ancestors were from Chidambaram, his own family had a tiff with the head dIkshitar of Periya Kovil at Chidambaram and had moved to Kumbhakonam. Dikshitar was a postmaster by profession and taught Veda and prasthAnatraya bhAShya in his spare time. He was married to Smt. Tripurasundari and had two sons and a daughter. Greatly devoted to Lord chitsabhApati and bhagavatI shivakAmasundaryambA, Dikshitar visited Chidambaram often. During one such visit, he had the good fortune of meeting Pacchamalai Swamigal, an avadhUta from Kanyakumari who was visiting Chidambaram. Swamigal, known as Ramakrishna Bhagavatar in his pUrvAshrama, was a great upAsaka of subrahmaNya and was respected as the very incarnation of Sage Agastya. Swamigal found great potential in Dikshitar and initiated him into the secrets of kaumAra tantra, where maNi and auShadha were as important as mantra. Dikshitar successfully completed the purashcharaNa of mUla ShaDakShara mantra of guha (which is less known compared to subrahmaNya, kumAra or sharavaNa mantras) in Tiruttani and had a grand vision of the Lord. He is known to have cured innumerable people of various diseases by the power of his mantra siddhi. During this time, he also came in contact with Brahmasri Chidanandantha and was initiated into Srividya by ‘Sir’. Sri Chidanandatha in turn used the treasure trove of kaumAra material in the possession of Dikshitar (which was the lifelong collection of his Guru Sri Pacchamalai Swamigal), condensed it with his own knowledge of kaumAra vidhi transmitted by Paramahamsa Sri Guhanandanatha and designed saparyA vidhis for both saguNa and nirguNa forms of the Lord. Sir also included the nAmAvaLis composed by his paramaguru shrI AtmAnandanAtha which bring out the true essence of subrahmaNya tattva.

Dikshitar himself authored a more comprehensive worked named subrahmaNya pUjA kalpa which, along with mantra, AvaraNa krama, prayogas etc., includes six different trishatI stotras of the Lord. I first came across a copy of this book while looking for a clean version of the shatrusamhAra trishatI. shrI yogAnandanAtha (Sri Kunchita Padayyar), a shiShya of Chidanandantha, was a great astrologer and an upAsaka of Sri Ucchishta Ganapati; he had published a prayoga of shatrusamhAra trishatI which was reasonably clean but still with errors. Having gone through nearly forty different copies and manuscripts of the trishatI, Dikshitar’s version which also had a Tamil commentary was truly the Lord’s gift for me. Both Sri Chidanandanatha and Dikshitar rely on Agastya Samhita as the chief source of mantras and AvaraNa kramas. Though Dikshitar describes the vidhi for tANDava subrahmaNya, the chief form of ShaDAnana worshipped in the AmnAya krama of bimbAmbikA sampradAya, the mantra and vidhis are significantly different. Though the index of the work lists chapters devoted to auShadha and kAyAkalpa, the copy in my possession are missing these chapters. Dikshitar attaches much more importance to mUla mantra trishatI of sharavaNa than the popular shatrusamhAra trishatI in this work. He also refers to a sahasranAma from skandayAmaLa (chitrakUTa-kumAra sahasranAma) which I have so far failed to locate.

Dikshitar was a prolific writer and is said to have authored at least fifty works on Srividya and worship of Brahmanya. It is unfortunate that Dikshitar and his works are forgotten today. akShara shuddhi in his works is remarkable and worthy of emulation.

सुब्रह्मण्यकराम्बुजप्रविलसत् ज्योतिर्मयं सुस्थितम् |
ज्ञानस्योत्तरशक्तिसंयुतमहं वेलायुधं भावये ||

The viewpoint of the dualistic Agamas may now be summed up. Here the divine essence or shiva is conceived as inalienably associated with a shakti or Power which is purely divine and identical with it. The Essence and Power, both of the nature of chit or pure consciousness, constitute the two aspects of one and the same divine principle. Shiva is a transcendent unity. Shakti too is really one, though it appears as jnAna and kriyA according to the character of the data on which it functions. It is the will (icChA) of shiva and is essentially one with Him. Bindu is the eternal material principle outside shakti, and the three principles are usually described as the three jewels (ratna) of shaivism and its holy Trinity. In creation (in pure creation directly and in impure creation indirectly), Shiva’s place is that of an agent, shakti’s is that of an instrument and bindu serves as the material stuff. Shakti being immaterial never suffers any modification during action but bindu does. The modification of bindu, which follows from a disturbance of its equilibrium (kShobha) under the stress of divine shakti at the end of cosmic night (praLaya) gives rise to the five kalA-s which appear as it were like five concentric circles with greater and greater expansion. These kalA-s which precede further progressive modifications called tattvas and bhuvanas bear the names of nivR^itti (outermost), pratiShThA, vidyA, shanti and shAntyatIta (inmost). This represents one line of evolution of bindu, as that of the objective order (artha). The other line is represented by the evolution of sound or shabda. In this aspect we find nAda, bindu and varNa as the threefold expression of bindu arranged in an order of increasing externality.

Bindu is synonymous in this system with mahAmAyA and kuNDalinI. It is pure matter-energy and is to be distinguished from mAyA and prakR^iti, which are impure. In fact shaiva Agamas of all schools which recognize the thirty-six tattvas distinguish mAyA from prakR^iti. They are identified in the shvetAshvatara upaniShad: mAyAM tu prakR^itiM vidyAnmAyinaM tu maheshvaram. In the Agamas generally, mAyA is eternal but prakR^iti is not so. For prakR^iti is evolved from kalA which itself is an evolute from mAyA. But in some places in the tantras they are definitely conceived. prakR^iti stands for the material principle in a general way and mAyA is one of the vikalpas under this category. Bindu this is the matrix of pure creation, i.e. of shabda and artha, so that it is to be looked upon as of a dual nature. The pauShkara Agama says: shabdavastUbhayAtmA.asau bindurnAnyatarAtmakaH.

The order of shabda creation out of the disturbed mahAmAyA is thus given:

1. mahAmAyA
2. nAda
3. bindu
4. sAdAkhya
5. Isha
6. vidyA

In this scheme mahAmAyA stands for para-bindu in its undisturbed condition and nAda represents the same bindu when the chit shakti has acted upon it. As the action of shakti upon bindu is in a sense constant, it may be assumed that mahAmAyA and nAda are really two aspects (logically successive but in actual fact simultaneous) of the same principle, nAda representing the disturbed part of mahAmAyA. If mahAmAyA is kuNDalinI in its essence, nAda is the same kuNDalinI in its awakened and active state. mahAmAyA as such has no relation with puruSha but as nAda or kuNDalinI it resides in every puruSha, normal and super-normal.

contd ...

This worldly soul is technically known as sakala, being endowed with body, senses etc. corresponding to the tattva or bhuvana to which it belongs. Such souls range from the lowest plane to the plane of kalA and migrate from plane to plane according to their karmans. There is another state of the soul in which the mAyIya mala as described above is absent, but the other two malas continue as before. This is a state of pralaya or dissolution in which the soul is free from all the creative principles, is in a disembodied condition and remains absorbed in mAyA. Such souls are called pralayAkalas or pralaya-kevalins. These are bodiless and senseless atoms with karma-samskAras and the root Ignorance clinging to them. When, however, the karmans are got rid of through discriminative knowledge, renunciation or such other means, the soul is exalted above mAyA, though still retaining its atomic state. It is then above mAyA no doubt, but remains within the limits of mahAmAyA which it cannot escape unless the Supreme Grace of the Divine Master acts upon it and removes the basic Ignorance which caused its atomicity and the limitation of its infinite powers. This state of the soul represents the highest condition of the pashu known as vijnAnAkala or vijnAna-kevalin. This is kaivalya. Among these souls those which are thoroughly mature in respect of their impurity are competent to receive divine illumination at the beginning of the next creative cycle. The dawn of divine wisdom which is the result of the anugraha (divine grace) acting upon the soul is the origin of the so-called shuddha-vidyA.

The illumination of a mature vijnAnAkala is either intense or mild according as the kaluSha or original taint attached to the soul has run its course completely or otherwise, the former types of souls are raised to the status of vidyeshvaras and the latter become mantras. The sakala and pralayAkala souls, too, in which the mala is mature, are favored with divine grace and raised to the position of:

1. Mantreshvaras (and AchAryas) and placed in charge of the different divisions of brahmANDa or the planes belonging to pR^ithivI-tattva, and of
2. Bhuvaneshvaras or lokeshvaras with powers over the planes belonging to the higher tattvas beyond pR^ithivI.

The pralayAkalas, however, where mala is immature but karma mature, are associated with subtle bodies called puryaShTaka at the beginning of the next cycle and made to assume physical bodies and migrate from life to life, thus maturing the mala through experience. The shAkta belief in threefold nature of the soul is comparable to the conviction of the Ophites and their predecessors the Ophici in the West – it presupposes a faith that the division corresponds to the degrees of grace and does not imply any essential difference. It is true, however, that according to the dualists, some difference does exist between shiva and paramashiva. The Valentinian conception of essential distinction in human souls has also its parallel in India as evident from the views of sections of Jainas, Buddhist and vaiShNava writers, but finds no recognition in the Tantras.

The states of the soul which follow are not those of a pashu but of shiva himself, though certain limitations still remain. These limitations are those of adhikAra, bhoga and laya according to the dualists (shrIkaNTha in ratna-traya). They are removed in due course of time through fulfillment of experiences etc., in the pure order. The pure order of shuddha-adhvan represents the higher world of pure matter beyond the influence of mAyA.

The successive stages of spiritual perfection consequent on the dawn of wisdom are represented by the tattvas to which the souls are attached. Thus the lowest stage is that of a mantra which corresponds to shuddha-vidyA. The higher states are those of mantreshvaras corresponding to Ishvara-tattva, of mantra-maheshvaras corresponding to sadAshiva and of shiva corresponding to the tattva known under that name. the state of shiva is really transcendent, being that of pure and absolute consciousness, but the true Absolute is paramashiva bhaTTAraka where identity with all the tattvas as well as their transcendence are present simultaneously.

Due to the limitation of its powers the Self is bound. The shAktas hold that there are certain hidden forces latent in chidAkAsha, known as mAtR^ikAs, which reside over the malas referred to above and over the kalAs or letter-sounds of the language. The supreme mAtR^ikA, known as ambikA, has three aspects: jyeShThA, raudrI and vAmA, each of them having a specific function. The kalAs are the ultimate units of human speech with which thought is inextricably interwoven. The mAtR^ikAs beget in each soul, in each act of its knowledge, determinate or indeterminate, an inner cognition (antaH-parAmarsha) and produce a sort of confusion there on account of intermingling with shabda. Knowledge in this manner assumes the form of joy, sorrow, desire, aversion, conceit, fear, hope, etc., under the influence of these forces. This is how bhAvas originate and govern the unregenerate human soul. mAtR^ikAs are thus the secret bonds which bind down a soul, but when they are truly known and their essence is revealed, they help it in attaining siddhi.

These forces function in chidAkAsha so long as the brahma-granthi is not rent asunder. This granthi is evidently the node of identity between spirit and matter and is the spring of ego-sense in man. The moral effect of kuNDalinI is so far clear. It is maintained that if the mAtR^ikA is not propitiated and if the node is not removed, it is likely that even after the rise of truth-consciousness the soul may, owing to inadvertence (pramAda), be caught up in its snares, get entangled in the meshes of shabda and lapse into ignorance or go astray.

The Divine Will is one and undivided, but it becomes split up after the origin of the mAtR^ikAs which evolve out of the nAda co-eternal with this Will. This split in icChA or svAtantrya causes a separation between jnAna and kriyA, its constitutive aspects. This is practically identical with what is described as a divorce between svAtantrya and bodha or vimarsha and prakAsha, which takes place on the assumption of atomic condition by the Supreme Self. In this condition jnAna evolves into three inner and five outer senses, and kriyA into five prANas and five motor organs connected respectively with the vital and reflex activities of the organism.

contd ...