Thengalai/Vadagalai

[Guest guest]

Thengalai/Vadagalai: about some settings related to the concepts

as heard from elders.

Part 2, contd.

 

The desire 'to be' and the desire 'to do' are base urges of all human

beings. What 'to be' and how 'to do' have been the primary concerns of

the spiritually inclined in elevating themselves with the guidance of

whatever spiritual instructions they were exposed to. The three Acharyas

were fully conscious of their role in this guidance but their methods

were based on their own disposition towards their sishyas and followers,

appropriate to the Samskaras, the environment, and the Purusharthas

of the syshyas and followers themselves.

 

In this regard, Acharya Ramanuja demonstrated remarkable ability in

opening up to the aspirants, the appropriate paths suitable for them.

He tried to harmonize their 'needs to be' with their 'will to do' without

imposing nothing more than their capacity to accomplish their goals in

the most gratifying and pleasant way imaginable. He was master_minded

in the art of devising individual salvation without compromising the

tranditional values of the Vedic dictates, the Pancharathra principles

and antecedents, the 'be and do' of the Bhagavat Gita, the glorious

humanism of the Bhagavata, the tempered rigor of the Upa-Sashtras and

the Saramsas of the Ithihasas and Puranas, all centered around the

prevailing human concerns and cast into methods flexible enough to absorb

their evolutionary patterns at the social level. This style of the unique

and all-embrazing approach has never been seen before in human history.

 

During the Acharya's life time and the period of several decades that

followed, the revolutionary and evolutionary methods outlined were

exposed to scathing criticisms and attacks with a view to eliminate the

entire system out of existence. The initial royal support the system had

received from the Chola kings, often went through subsequent phases of

push and pull to varying degrees. The well-routed existing systems and

practices of the brahmin-theocrats, the mis-interpreted, mis-represented

but well-meaning preachings of holy and poly 'Azhwars' as well as the

Thirthankaras, miscellaneous sects of Jains, Adeenams, the residual

Buddhist-agnostics and a whole host of spiritual peddlers who had a

strangle hold on the various sections of society, women as a class and

the down-trodden were finding in the new force, either a threat of

their existence or the hope for a healthy change. This resulted in many

actions and reactions of every kind. The society was in great flux.

 

Apart from this sort of reactionaries, even the spiritually conscious

but unstable section were polarized by sheer tradition or otherwise into

the overly 'be's and the overly 'do's. I shall call them the 'bebes' and

the 'dodos'. The balance was missing. These polarizations were the

result of the socalled Vedantins in action and simplistic Vaishnavas in

reaction. I shall cover this situation in the following section.

 

To be continued... venkat v.rao,

Oct.6,1994