"sandhyavandanam" and Sri Sudarshan's soup con of thought

[Guest guest]

Dear Sri Sudarshan:

 

Thank you for a spirited and eloquent response to some of my queries.

You have, however, missed the MOST important part of my

earlier message, which provides the context for all that I say:

 

aDiyEn wrote:

 

******begin quote from 8/2/99*******

 

Duty and devotion are not mutually exclusive. Rather, recognition of

their symbiotic, integrated nature in our practices will allow us to

elevate ourselves to mental states closer to that of attaning the

ultimate anubhavam. To even think that devotion requires

relinquishment of duty ("venture to transcend duty in favour of

devotion" in your words) may take us down a path where we will neither

be performing our duties nor have the benefit of being devoted to the

lord. And yes, Azhwaar/Acharya outpourings are not meant for their

own ilk, they are directed towards us, for our specific benefit, as a

consequence of divine insight that those exalted souls were given, a

vision that we may never hope to get near if we are NOT willing to

even consider that they are meant for us.

 

************end quote***********

 

Now, do you see where I (and possibly, Mani) are coming from? Duty

and devotion are not separable as you seem to indicate below:

> Sri Sudarshan wrote:

> So in these discussions of "sandhyAvandanam" and

> "bhagavath-kainkaryam" please do not be carried away by the

> devotional lines of a "pAsuram" divorced from the real context in

> which it was sung. Yes, the lines of the AzhwArs are, of course,

> beautiful and very evocative. But they are the outpourings of

> liberated mystic souls. We are not AzhwArsa. We must learn to first

> temper devotion with duty before we venture to transcend duty in

> favour of devotion.

 

Tell me, Sri Sudarshan, have you been able to imbue duty into

devotion as a separate process? I, like mani, would like to know what

is the source for saying that we should ***first**** try to temper

duty into devotion, then to be followed by a state where we leave

duty to enter into the realm of devotion? Where does one start and

the other end?

 

What is your basis for saying that we should jettison the divine

insights of the Azhwaar's meant for us and relegate them to the realm

of mystic (????) outpourings, simply because we do not make the

effort to comprehend them? Let me reproduce the context (from an

earlier posting) and it is very relevant (contrary to your stated

view) to the current discussion:

 

aDiyEn wrote on 726/99/:

 

*********begin quote************

 

mEmboruL pAsuram, which is the dvayArtha prathipAdakam, in Sri PVP's

words, is to thirumAlai what the charama slokam is to mahAbhAratham.

>> Sri Venkatesh wrote:

>>

>> This is even supported by Thondaradippodi AzhwAr in ThirumAlai, in

>> the pAsuram "mEmporuL pOga viTTu...." which is the heart of the

>> entire work of ThirumAlai. I would like our members to go thro'

>> archives of 1996 where our Sri T.A Varadhan has given an excellent

>> translation of Sri Periya vAchhan piLLai' s vyAkhyAnam for this.

>> Here the AzhwAr says, perumAL loves and grants mOksham to those

>> lazy people, who renouce all the worldly desires, realize that

>> He(Sriman

>> Narayanan) is THE ONLY reality, and control all their senses and

>> just do kainkaryam or even nothing ("sOmbharai ugathi pOlum...").

>

 

However, the sOmbhar referred to above are not those who have turned

their back on nithyAnusandhAnam or nitya karmas that one has to

perform as part of their ordained duties. The sOmbhar above refers

to exalted souls who have realized that they are SrimannArAyaNA's

property, those that have given up anya-sEshatvam and sva-sEshatvam

to seek bhagavat and bhAgavatha sEshatvam.

 

The reference here is to karma phala and phala sanga thyAgam (

(kartrutva buddhi thyAgam) rather than karma thyAgam. They display

total dereliction (laziness) when it comes to taking care of

themselves in that they have realized it is srImannArAyaNA who is

going to be their ultimate care-giver, upAyam and purushArtham

(Aamparisu arinthukoNDU). They have realized that even this

realization is a consequence of His nirhEthuka krupa (athuvum

avanathinnaruLE) in that they display a total lack of

swa-bhOktrutvam.

 

Also, the reference to sOmbhar in the mEmboruL

pasuram has to be used in the context of the meaning of the overall

pasuram because Azhwaar clearly delineates the state of awareness of

those that have found srImannArAyaNA as siddhOpAyam (the very essence

of dvayam) before extolling such sri vaishNavAs as sOmbhar. That is

the reason you have the first three lines describing the so called

'sOmbhar'.

 

As our dear lord KrishNa delineates in bhagavad geetha, one cannot and

should not dissociate oneself from one's ordained duties, the duties

that we have accepted as the basis for our existence. It is said that

emberumAnAr performed arghya pradhAnam as part of every day

sandhyavandanam even at a very advanced age (greater than a hundred

years), in spite of being debilitated due to the the effects of

physical aging, with the assistance of his shishyas. Clearly, given

his gnyAna, bhakthi, vairAgyam, it would hardly have mattered if he

had decided not to persist with all the aspects of nithyA karmas,

but obviously, he chose to toe the line of what was ordained by

shAstram as part of kula dharmam.

 

*********end quote from earlier post*************

 

May be the above context provides adequate clarification of my

position on this issue.

> Sri Sudarshan writes:

>

> Next time when you talk of the "charama-shlOka", you should give the

> pole-vault analogy a serious thought. Who knows, you will never again

> misunderstand its true meaning.

>

 

Sri Sudarshan, please do not take personal affront at what follows,

but is it necessary to make the statements such as the one above? It

does not befit a person of your apparent erudition to be bandying

about with statements that seem simply confrontational. If you had

taken the pains to read my previous post with some attention to

detail, I would be inclined to think that the good folks on bhakti

may have been spared the agony of reading through verbose tales

of pole-vaulters and trembling brahmins.

 

It is important to measure one's words and comprehend them before

going public, especially if we don a hat of being authoritative and

knowledgeable. Because the average reader takes you at face value,

it is especially critical to not comment on azhwaar aruLiccheyals

without proper comprehension obtained through a qualified Acharya.

It is not difficult to indulge in dialectic calisthenics

that tend to often obfuscate than clarify. What is difficult is

recognition of one's own naicchyam (state of inferiority) in terms of

true knowledge and let that recognition subjugate one's ego and

concomitant adrenaline-driven need for ego gratification.

 

Azhwaar EmberumAnAr Jeeyar thiruvaDigaLE sharaNam

 

sridhar