Soundarya Lahiri 2

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sitam_subba wrote:

 

taniyamsam pamsum tava carana-pankeruha-bhavam

virincih samcinvan viracayati lokan avikalam

vahaty enam saurih katham api sahasrena sirasam

harah samksdy'ainam bhajati bhasito'ddhulana-vidhim

 

Gathering a minute particle of dust from your lotus feet,virinci,

the skilled architect creates this perfect universe of many

worlds.Sauri sustains this complex and vast creation with the

thousand hoods ascribed to him.Hara destroys them into dust which

he smears all over his body to worship you in the prescribed method

(vidhi).

 

ViriNci - the same as ViriNca of the first stanze; both the words

denote Brahman, the creator.

 

Speck of dust - used in a collective sense, as otherwise the worlds

could not ostensibly be created out of a single speck, nor would it

require the thousand heads of Sauri to carry it with effort, nor

would it be enough to smear the prodigious body of Hara with.

 

The lotus-like feet - Thy of Thee, the prime cause of all the

worlds; hence the dust on her feet acquires all her virtues.

According to KanAda, the founder of the Vaisesika school and

AksapAda, the founder of NyAya schook, the world is made up of the

primary atoms of Earth, Water, Fire and Air, which, at the desire of

Isvara, arrange themselves, in the first instance, into Dvyanuka-s

consisting of two atoms each, which, in their turn, arrange

themselves into Tryanuka-s, consisting of three Dvyanuka-s each. It

is on groups of these Tryanuka-s, that the cosmogony of these two

schools is based. Such a conception of the order of creation should

not be considered as a mere surmise of the poet, as it is the fact

that the ParamAnu [ of the Devi's feet] is the prime cause of the

creation of the world, that forms the basis of their theory.

 

The worlds - both animate and inanimate.

The seven upper worlds : BhUr, Bhuvar, Suvar, Mahar, Jana, Tapas and

Satya, as also the seven nether worlds : Atala, Vitala, RasAtala,

TalAtala, MahAtala and PAtAla may also be meant.

 

Sauri - Visnu, the sustainer, who is said to be lifting the fourteen

worlds, the nether seven in the form of SimsumAra, a porpoise, and

the upper seven as Sesa.

 

LaksmIdhara construs the word as Balabhadra, [the descendant of

SUra, the YAdava chief] lifting the worlds in the form of Sesa. It

may however be noted, that according toAmarasimha, Sauri is one of

the recognised names of Visnu an dnot Balabhadra.

 

Hara - SamhAra-rudra the destroyer.

 

 

The greatness of Devi is borne testimony to by the object dependence

of the creator, the sustainer and the destroyer of the worlds on the

dust of her feet, for carrying out their respective avocations. It

is further enhanced by the fact, that the single peck of her feet

provides material for the creator to create all the worlds, with

their various contents. The same speck calls forth great effort from

Visnu, the thousand-headed, to lift its weight with his myraids of

heads, and the mighty SamhAra-rudra, with his prodigious form, has

to reduce this tiny speck to ashes, by way of destroying the worlds,

for his Bhasma-snAna. Again, as observed by KaivalyAsrama, the ashes

are but the residium left by all the elements and their various

transformations, after the application of his SamhAra-sakti by

Rudra, with a view to smear his body with ashes, in conformity with

the Mantra presecribed therefor.

 

Further, the same commentator, fortified by DattAtreya's view,

explains the estoteric significance of the speck of dust as follows :

The Devi has four feet, named Sukla, Rakta, Misra and NirvAna, the

first two resting on the two-pettaled lotus of the AjnA-cakra, the

third on the twelve-petalled lotus of the heart, and the fourth on

the thousand-petalled lotus of the DvAdhasAnta, with Visnu, Brahman,

Rudra and SadAsiva as their respective deities, who, assuming their

characteristic Guna-s - Sattva, Rajas, Tamas and GunAtItatva,

through the speck of dust resting on the four feet, occupy

themselves in their respective avocations of creations, sustenance,

destruction and bathing in the nectar of the region of the Moon in

the thousand-petalled lotus.

 

Kamesvara-sUri, however, rebuts this view and points out that it

runs counter to what Samkara-bhagavatpAda would uphold, as,

everywhere in the entire work, he refers to only one pair of feet of

the Devi, and that as such it is far fetched, and adds that if it

was meant merely to derive the three Guna-s of Hari, ViriNci and

Hara, that could as well be attained by explaining that the speck of

dust, being of variegated colours, partakes of the three Gunas-s.

 

KaivalyAsrama's view may, however, be reconciled by pointing out

that his exposition is only esoteric and should not be taken to hold

good to the very letter.

 

 

The Ocean Of Beauty

Saundarya-Lahari of SrI Samkara-Bhagavatpada

with Transliteration, english translation, Commentray, Diagrams and

an Appendix on Prayoga

Pandit S Subrahmanya Sastri and TR Srinivasa Ayyangar

[Ninth Reprint 2000]