Thuppul PiLLai- 62- Wonderful gems of Sanskrit Granthas-SubhAshithaneevi

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SrI:

SrImathE Nigamantha Mahadesikaya namah:

SrImAn venkatanAthAryaH kavitArkika kesarI |

vedAntAcArya-varyo me sannidhattAm sadA hRdi ||

 

May the glorious Venkatanatha, the greatest of teachers of Vedanta, and the

lion among poets and debaters, reside forever in my heart.

 

Dearest Srivaishnavas,

Let us continue to enjoy great sanskrit granthas of Swamy.

 

There are seven works, Swamy wrote in Sanskrit which form part of literature

about which we will start now.

 

I would like to firstly take up the work that I relish personally:

“SubhAshitha nIvi”. The Subhashitha nIvi is a didactic poem in 144 slokas

depicting the evil aspects of life in the first sections and the good

aspects in the second seven sections. The slokas are full of wit and humour

and many of them convey the same through double entendre. For example,

misfortune of the well-equipped and deserving persons is well represented

as: “I feel that eminent kinnaras should maintain silence in the world in

which the hum of the mosquitoes is treated as the twang of the lute J “

 

Sri L. Srinivasan writes in his translation of this great work:

 

Vedanta Desika, the eminent Srivaisnava Acarya, philosopher and poet, is

also the author of Subhasita Nivi, a book of didactic verses in a terse

style, which, unlike his other works, may be considered secular. It is,

however, one of his best works as it was born out of his rich experience

and ripe knowledge of men and matters. Out of his boundless compassion for

suffering humanity, he took a suitable opportunity to compose this

wholesome work to help mankind lead a life of peace and happiness.

 

Tradition has it that Singha Bhupala, the King of Rajamahendra, made a

request to the savant to visit his court and honour him. When it was

declined, he followed it up with a prayer to send him a code of conduct for

his guidance, and our poet obliged him through this composition. Colour is

lent to this version by the fact that the treatise contains a chapter on

the cardinal principles of statecraft which would be helpful only to a

king. Vaibhava Prakasika also confirms this and further states that Tattva

Sandesa and Rahasya Sandesa were similarly written for the benefit of the

same king by Sri Desika (sl. 128-129)

 

Significance of the Title

 

Subhasita means apposite saying or an apophthegm. Nivi is a knot or a

treasure-chest. The title may therefore, be taken to mean a Treasury of

Golden Sayings or Knotty Sayings in Fine Verses.Treasures used to be kept

in the olden days in a bag tied securely by knots and impressed with the

seal of the owner on it, so that only the lawful owner or one authorised by

him had the right to remove the seal, untie the knots and enjoy the

contents. Likewise, the treasure in the shape of various delightful

meanings of these slokas is not easy for all to come by. Only those who

have acquired the key to it through learning over a long period at the feet

of their acarya will have the capacity to unravel the knots and get at the

true and enjoyable meanings.

 

Thieves are called knot-looseners in Tamil because they used to loot

treasures kept in bags, untying the knots. The poet avers that they will

not succeed in appropriating the treasures inside this work because they

can only get at the literal meanings of the words and not their real

imports. In those days there was no printing and very few hand written

copies were available of a poet's compositions, and they were difficult to

come by, with the result that plagiarists could steal slokas from the poems

of others and parade them as their own. Vedanta Desika says in 1-2 that

since this work had been presented to the King by well-disposed scholars

and thus attained publicity and popularity, charlatans would not be able to

steal parts of it claiming them to be their own original work.

 

Nivi has also the significance of capital or principal amount which keeps

on earning interest if properly invested. So, the suggestion is that if

this work is properly studied, it will also keep on yielding ideas

endlessly for other works by competent scholars.

 

Division of the Work

 

There is symmetry in the arrangement of the poem. It contains twelve

chapters each containing twelve slokas making a total of 144 stanzas. The

last two verses of each paddhati use longer metres. It is divisible into

two broad heads-matters to be avoided (the first five chapters) and

qualities to be cultivated (the next seven chapters). There are more

chapters on the good and less on the bad, as it is useless to waste more

time on the latter. Further, bad qualities have been dealt with in the

beginning because we must first realize the pitfalls to be avoided or the

shortcomings to be eschewed before knowing the qualities to be emulated or

cultivated, as this is the proper way of improving oneself by stages and in

an orderly manner. A reversal of the present order would not serve the

purpose.

 

Swamy Desikan starts off the work as:

 

I bow with mind, speech and body to that great Lord, who is the best among

all persons, who approaches others of His own accord without waiting for

them to take the initiative because of His innate goodness and agreeable

nature, as also to myself who is chief among the wicked and who harms

others without reason, there being one thing in common to us both, viz.,

that the good or evil done to us once has the effect of wiping off all the

good and or evil done before. If what God, in His wisdom, thinks is good,

though not really good, has been done to Him even once by a person, all the

wrongs committed by him earlier is forgiven by Him. Therefore, I bow to

Him. In my case, if once what I consider wrong, which may not really be so,

is done to me by someone, all the good done by him to me till then is

completely forgotten by me. Fie upon me! Ingratitude being the basest of

vices, it has been mentioned at the very beginning.

 

Subhasita Nivi is unique in many respects, including the naming of its

chapters. Unlike other compositions of its kind, it does not deal merely

with aesthetics, but is highly psychological in its insight into the

various facets of human character. Being an outstanding Acharya of

Visistadvaita, whose basic tenet is that none is so fallen that he cannot

be redeemed, his work is a practical guide even to a reprobate and retrace

his steps, while indicating at the same time to others the pitfalls and

short comings that they should avoid. It is this context that his stress on

good association becomes important and relevant, since man's potentialities

for good and bad evolve according to the company he keeps.

 

The slokas are composed in sweet and simple words, containing at the same

time high potential qualities, being full of figures of speech of both

sense and sound, alankaras etc. There is both clarity of thought and depth

of meaning. The skill with which slesa is used is to be marvelled at,

making it a kavya of dhwani. The poet employs humour, satire and anyapadesa

appropriately. The piece is compact and capable of being got by heart. In

the latter part of the poem dealing with good men, there is an

undercurrent of Vedanta running all through, on the lines of the Gita,

which comes to the surface where they are compared to God Himself, as He is

the ideal towards which they strive all along. Altogether, the work is a

rare treat of the versatile talents and genius of the master. When we come

across a perfect double entendre giving two meanings for the same set of

words, we admire the capacity of the author. Here, when we find that each

sloka is capable of a dozen or more meanings, we are simply staggered

astounded. Probably there is no similar work in world literature. It has

been well and truly said that the poem was composed by as arvajna (Vedanta

Desika) for the benefit of a sarvajna (Singha Bhupala) and that it is

indeed only a sarvajna (an omniscient person) who can find out all that is

intended to be conveyed by the author in this extraordinarily deep piece of

literature. (The above is an extract from Sri L Srinivasan’s article.)

Click here to see the detailed translation of SubhAshitha neevi.

http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Academy/6316/

Swamy Desikan ThiruvadigaLE SaraNam

Regards

Namo narayana

dAsan

kavi-tArkika-simhAya kalyANa-guNa-SAline |

Srimate venkateSAya vedAntagurave namaH ||

 

Salutations to Sri Venkatesa, in whom all perfections reside, who is the

teacher of Vedanta and the lion among poets and debaters

 

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