THE MOUNTAIN PATH April 1964

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The Secrets of Arunachala

 

By T. K. S.

 

 

 

"That is the holy place! Of all Arunachala is the most sacred. It is the heart of the world. Know it to be the Secret and Sacred Heart Centre of Siva. In that place He always abides as the glorious Aruna Hill." - Skanda Purana.

 

 

 

What is the Mountain Path? The mountain is Arunachala, and there are two paths, one to the summit and the other around the base.

 

Arunachala shines as Paramatma, the Supreme Self made manifest, the Self of all creatures, not only men but gods and heavenly beings. This same Self was Bhagavan Ramana who declared: "Annamalai* is my Self." This implies that he, being the Self, is not any of the three bodies, gross, subtle or causal, pertaining to the three states of waking, dream and deep sleep, but is the Self-aware Witness of all three. In that Supreme State he is the screen on which the cinema show of name and form is projected; he is also the light by which it is revealed and the person who sees it. He is Arunachala, the Self of all. We have seen Him here on earth as Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi, the great Path-Maker.

 

In the days when he lived in a cave on the hill we used to climb only to where he was - Virupaksha Cave or the Mango-Grove or Skandashram, whichever it was - for he was both the path and the goal, and there was no other happiness comparable to being with him and absorbing the radiance of grace that flowed forth from him.

 

On the path to the summit, starting from the northern gopuram or tower of the great temple or from a small village opposite the hospital at the south-east of the hill, the first landmark is Guhai Namasivaya Cave, the abode of the famous Guru who had an even more famous disciple also called Namasivaya. This disciple he sent to Chidambaram to found his own centre. There the disciple became known as Guru Namasivaya, while his Guru was called Guhai Namasivaya.

 

Proceeding further, we come to Virupaksha Cave, which was already famous before Sri Ramana sanctified it by his abode. It is named after the great Master Virupaksha who lived there and who is said, on death, to have converted his body into a Vibhuti Lingam, a lingam of sacred ashes. There is a small shrine to him there. The cave is said to be in the form of OM, and it is said that, sitting silent in it, one hears the sound of OM.

 

Just above Virupaksha Cave is Skandashram, a more spacious cave where Bhagavan moved after leaving Virupaksha. It was here that an ashram first grew up around him, with food being cooked and his mother presiding. The cave was built out to enlarge it, a spring was released which since then has proved a perennial supply of water, even a few trees were planted. The Ashram now maintains Skandashram and keeps a caretaker there, and it is one of the places that devotees must visit.

 

Higher up, the path curves round to the east slope and, directly below the main peak are the Seven Springs in small crevices of a huge rock with their perennial storage of cool water even in the hottest weather. Just above them is a mound of boulders at the entrance to a deep cool cave. Bhagavan often sat there with his devotees. Saints and rishis have lived there in the past.

 

>From here up to the main peak is a steep climb and indeed may take as long as the whole climb from Virupaksha to the Seven Springs. At last we reach the summit, where is a large flat stone with enormous rock-cut feet on it. It is here that the huge cauldron is placed every year at the festival of Kartikai (about which I will write in a later article) when a beacon of ghee (clarified butter) brought by devotees is lit, visible far around. What is the significance of the feet? Obviously they are the feet of Arunachala. You go to the top and you find there the feet: because in Arunachala, the Supreme, there is neither top nor bottom, there are no parts, there is just wholeness. Also because what is highest in principle is lowest in manifestation; the first is last and the last first.

 

On the northern slope, far from the path, is the place where Arunagiriswara, the great Siddhapurusha, the Spirit of Arunachala, abides under an enormous banyan tree. And it should be mentioned that it is this sage, "God in the form of Arunachala," who is worshipped in the great temple in Tiruvannamalai. There is an ancient legend that anyone who can find his way to this eternal Sage or Spirit in his almost inaccessible abode will receive Realization. Only Sri Ramana succeeded in doing so, and he already had Realization. Can one see in it a symbol of the direct path of Self-enquiry, which had been withdrawn from use in our spiritually dark age, and which Bhagavan Sri Ramana brought down from its inaccessible retreat to his Ashram at the foot of the Hill, making it accessible to all, so that none now need to seek the ancient Siddhapurusha?

 

Bhagavan used to say that there were many paths to the peak. Indeed, he would scramble up to it from Skandashram, often following no path at all, and be down again in less than an hour's time. He used to speak also of caves in the hill and of Siddhas or Sages with supernatural powers who live there. There are legends of cities and gardens within the hill and of great souls sitting in perpetual tapas seeking to attain the Conscious Identity with Lord Arunachala which is Bhagavan's natural and permanent state. When someone asked him once whether all that exists only in the mind, he waved his hand round to indicate the physical, phenomenal world of everyday existence and said: "So does this." Strangely enough, more emphasis is laid on the path around the hill. Bhagavan always took an interest and looked pleased when devotees took this path, making pradakshina, as it is called. He would often ask what time they started, how long it took, at what places they rested by the way. Recently Major Taneja, a devotee from the Punjab who came here first in Bhagavan's lifetime, had been making pradakshina night after night and intended next day to climb to the peak, but that night he dreamed that he was standing facing the hill and a voice came forth from it saying: "Why should you go to the top? My fire is at the base."

 

The eight-mile walk around the hill, going from east to west, that is to say keeping the hill always on one's right, is a pilgrimage and is supposed to be made barefoot and at a slow pace, in a state of remembrance or meditation. It is said that whatever one wishes or prays for during the pradakshina is fulfilled, but it is also said that it is better not to wish, for this is a path to the desirelessness of the Self, and every wish or prayer, however noble it may seem to one, is an affirmation of the limited pseudo-self who wishes and thereby an obstacle to the realization of the desireless Self.

 

Pradakshina is often made at night, especially when the moon is full or nearly full, because, for a large part of the year, it is uncomfortably hot to go round by day. Most devotees start from the Ashram, nowadays, silently seeking Bhagavan's grace before starting. According to the old Brahmin tradition, however, a Brahmin would start out after bathing in the Indra Tirtha or tank on the eastern side of the town. From there he would proceed to the gates of the great temple, prostrate there, and walk slowly on, meditating on the Lord Arunachala. Starting from the Ashram also, one is expected to pass through the temple, from one great gate to another, but on the way back.

 

The eight directions of space on the way round are marked by a monolithic stylised sacred bull, a tank and a Siva Lingam. Sri Ramanashram is at the southernmost point beside the mantapam or diminutive chapel of Dakshinamurthi.. In Hindu mythology Dakshinamurthi (and one interpretation of the name is 'The Southward Facing') is Siva manifested as a youth surrounded by elderly disciples and teaching them in silence. The Guru is the North Pole and therefore traditionally faces south. Bhagavan was often equated with Dakshinamurthi.

 

Due west is the sacred tank and lingam of Unnamulai, that is to say of Uma, the Consort of Siva, who came down on earth to make tapas on Arunachala. The tapas was guided by the Rishi Gautama* whose Ashram is just beside her tank. The myth is that Uma, once in sport put her hands over the eyes of Siva, thus closing them, and this plunged the whole universe into unseasonable pralaya or dissolution, since all exists only in His sight. In penance for this she had to descend and undergo austerities on Arunachala before again being taken back as an integral part of Siva. These old myths are not always easy to interpret. According to Hindu teaching, a phase of manifestation of the universe is succeeded by a phase of dissolution when all is gathered back into undifferentiated uniformity. Uma, the Consort of Siva (knows also by other names such as Durga, Parvati or Kali according to the role she has to play) signifies the Divine Energy or Word. It is this which creates, but also, since all creation contains within itself the seed of destruction, all growth of decay, all birth of death, it is she also who destroys and brings on the pralaya. During the pralaya the Divine Energy is no longer manifest, no longer the Consort of Siva, but undergoing purification for a new cycle of manifestation.

After completing her tapas, it is said that Uma went round Arunachala on the full moon night of the month of Kartikai and was reassumed by Siva; and it is in commemoration of this that the beacon is now lit on the mountain peak every year at this date.

 

In the course of her tapas, Uma had to fight and slay the demon Mahishasura, who attacked her. This she did in her aspect of Durga. This fight with the force of evil is commemorated by Khadga tank and Papanasa Lingam beside it, that is by the 'lingam that destroys sins'. A figure of Mother Durga standing in victory over the head of the vanquished Mahishasura is to be seen in her temple next to Pavalakunru. This place is very popular among those who have boons to be granted. At this Pavalakunru also Bhagavan resided for a while as a young man, and there is a Sri Chakra in the Durga temple which he held in his hands during a consecration in the temple.

 

Further round the hill than Gautamashram and the tank of Mother Uma is the ancient village of Adiannamalai. Here is a beautiful and sacred old temple. People walking round the hill often go and worship there. Here is the temple of Sri Manickavachakar, author of the Tiruvachakam, one of the most ecstatic of the Tamil poet-saints.

 

Coming round to the east side of the hill, we come to the temple and shrine of a much more modern Swami, that is Isana Desika Swami who lived about the 18th Century. He was a saint of great power who is said to have had ashtama siddhis waiting to do his bidding. He is said to be very benevolent and to bestow his grace not only on Hindus but on Muslims and Westerners also who pray at his shrine.

 

The path round Arunachala is very sacred. As one sees the many varied aspects of the hill on going round, one finds that the hill itself is a Sri Chakra, a Sacred Wheel. There is scarcely a day or a night without someone going round. Some devotees go on a fixed day every week, some every full-moon day, some for a regular cycle of forty consecutive days, some indeed every day. Of course, there are particularly auspicious occasions for the pradakshina, the most outstanding of these being, Sivaratri, the Night of Siva, and Kartikai, the night when the beacon is lighted on top of the hill. Holy in itself; the path is made more holy still by all the great saints and Rishis who have trodden it, even by Mother Uma herself, and in recent times by Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi who, as long as health and vigour lasted, often went around, sometimes alone, sometimes with a whole body of devotees. It is said that the pilgrim is accompanied by an invisible host of devas and Rishis.

 

This outwardly; inwardly the Mountain Path is the path laid down for us by Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi, the path of Self-enquiry, the path leading to the experience 'I am the Atma, I am not the perishable body'. How is this experience to be come by? By the Grace of the Guru. So the Guru is both the way and the Goal. Arunachala is open to all on whom its Grace has descended and is the same as Ramanachala. May Sri Ramana Arunachala cut the knot of our primal ignorance and lead us by his path to our final Goal.

 

* Annamalai is a name of Arunachala; it means literally 'Supreme Mountain'..

 

* * Not the same as the Buddha Gautama.