The spirituality of the Puranas is a journey inward by which all outward human action are transformed

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Hindu Spirituality (Vol.II) : Post Classical and Modern

K R Sundarajan and Bithika Mukerji

Introduction

 

" In his introduction to the first volume, Sivaraman describes the

spiritual journey as a process of " turning around, " " turning from

what serves one's temporal ends towards a growing insight into

reality and a resulting fullness of life variously called life

eternal or life divine or more simply life of the spirit. " This

turning around in the Indian context is achieved through what

Sivaraman describes as " worldlessness. " Worldlessness is not " life

and world negation " but a disposition " to live in the world singly or

collectively, not for its own sake, not as a goal in itself worthy of

pursuit as a sufficient `human end,' but as a means or medium to life

`in God,' as a condition of life in spirit. " According to Sivaraman,

the traditional Hindu notion of adhyatma, meaning literally

" pertaining to the atman, " plays almost the same pervasive role that

the category of " spiritual " does in the West. " Adhyatma functions

itself as a symbol pointing beyond itself, opening levels of reality

which remain undisclosed without a corresponding opening of levels

of the human mind beyond the discursive and sense bound. " The

dynamics of Hindu spirituality includes brahman, representing the

highest state of existence, universal, transcendent, unconditional,

the ultimate source of all existence and samsara, the conditioned

state of existence governed by the laws of karma, and the summum

bonum. The ultimate goal of life is liberation or " freedom of the

spirit. " This ultimate goal in the light of the notion of four ends

of human life (purusartha) in the Hindu tradition is a journey

where " every point of the journey is also an arrival point. " " Seeking

and finding are a dialectical continuum involving, in existential

terms, an inner transformation of life. " Thus, Sivaraman points out,

spirituality as an outlook is a " matter of winning an orientation or

a sense of perspective and wholeness or completeness which the ideal

of liberation implies. Living in the presence of the ideal with such

a perspective enables one to look in retrospect at `life in the

world' and to see it as continuous with its transformation. This is

spirituality and spiritual life. " …

 

Part Two, " The Spirituality of the Puranas, Agamas, and Tantra, "

begins with a chapter on Puranic spirituality. According to Giorgio

Bonazzoli, the Puranas focus on the " ideal of fullness, " which may be

described as bhukti (enjoyment of this earth and heaven) and mukti

(release, moksa). Thus, the Puranas cater to the needs of every

person throughout the course of one's life. This ideal of bhukti-

mukti is neither a disembodied spiritualism nor a refined hedonism

but rather a " holistic realism. " The Puranas are " pluralistic " in

their attitude since they incorporate different ways of conceiving

life, different ways of approaching reality, different degrees of

doctrines and morals… Bonazzoli points out that in the Puranas, the

union between God and the individual self is mainly reached

through " internal dispositions. " A person not only must focus his or

her mind on God but must perform all actions—ritualistic, social, and

others—with full attention and with total awareness. Hence, the

spirituality of the Puranas is a journey inward by which all outward

human action are transformed, a process by which the profane is

transformed into the sacred…

 

The final goal or the state of liberation, according to the Agamas,

is gaining " Sivahood " (sivatva). Brunner describes it as realizing

one's identity with Siva:

 

A liberated atman is Siva; it can unite with Siva but does not

disappear into Him… A liberated soul can " feel " itself to be the

equal of Siva without blending into Him, and without being anymore

limited by Him, since it possesses the same infinite power of

knowledge and action. Let us concede, too, that one day it can

discover that it had always been Siva without feeling that its

previous experiences as well as the world in which it was then

plunged, as the other beings still are, were illusory.

 

In the chapter on Tantric spirituality, Sri Hemendra Chakravarty

explicates the spiritual dimensions of Tantric philosophy and

practice. With the focus on Sakti, the goal of a Tantric yogi is to

realize his/her identification with Sakti, who not only transcends

the universe but also is immanent in every entity. The Tantric path

consists in attaining a state of equilibrium at every state of one's

spiritual journey, beginning from the gross, physical level, to the

subtle, and then to the casual. The fourth level is called " Supreme

equilibrium, " which is to be attained only after going through the

first three levels. This state of " Supreme equilibrium, " is described

as the unity of Siva-Sakti, " which encompasses in its cosmic sweep

all diversities of time, space and objecthood. " The worship of Sakti

is an essential feature of the Tantric apth. This is possible only

after receiving initiation from a teacher. In the initiation process,

the teacher connects the student to Sakti by giving a sacred seed

mantra to the student. According to the Tantric tradition it is the

matrkas (letters) that make the mantra powerful and efficacious.

Matrkas are the basic element of all principles, and the human body

is said to be made of them. " They lie within the body forming cakras

[circles, centers in body] in order to create thought-constructs …

and thus push the jives to remain in bondage. But as soon as their

real nature is realized, they become Sakti, and thereby providers of

release or freedom (moksa). "

 

In chapter 12, " The Way of the Siddhas, " T. N. Ganapathy explores the

spiritual path of a group of Tamil Tantrics called Siddhas, the word

siddhar meaning one who has " fulfilled. " These Siddhas are, according

to Ganapathy, God-realized beings " alive in the world for the sake of

humankind and all living beings. " The writings of the Siddhas are

highly symbolic. They can be understood and appreciated only by those

who have been initiated; to the uninitiated they remain obscure and

often obscene. The sexual imagery in the poems of the Siddhas reflect

their understanding of woman as the cosmic energy. It is this energy

that is present in all human beings in the form of kundalini sakti,

and achieving union with this energy is indeed the goal of every

practitioner of yoga. The yogic method of achieving the goal requires

first the realization that the human body is a microcosm of the

macrocosm. According to Ganapathy, " Yoga recognizes the underlying

unity—nay, sameness or oneness—between the cosmos and the individual

and helps one to extend the ego-boundary and liberate one from a

limited attitude, toward a cosmic vision. Once this feeling of

oneness is developed, the internal and the external are no longer

polarized and one sees the universe as though it were within

oneself. " The cosmic vision thus gained provides the groundwork for

the Siddha philosophy of well-being of all, and this is best seen in

the system of Siddha medicine. The Tamil Siddha literature describes

liberation as vettaveli, which stands for an infinite, transcendental

awareness. This state cannot be described in words, as it transcends

language and subject-object duality. Hence the best description of it

is indeed " silence " (cumma). "

 

Hindu Spirituality (Vol.II) : Post Classical and Modern, pages xvi-

xxiv

K R Sundarajan and Bithika Mukerji

Motilal Banarsidass Publishers Pvt. Ltd. 2003

ISBN: 8120819373

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>

> In the chapter on Tantric spirituality, Sri Hemendra Chakravarty

> explicates the spiritual dimensions of Tantric philosophy and

>

 

http://adishakti.org/his_beings_within.htm

[Guest guest]

> The yogic method of achieving the goal requires

> first the realization that the human body is a microcosm of the

> macrocosm. According to Ganapathy, " Yoga recognizes the underlying

> unity—nay, sameness or oneness—between the cosmos and the individual

> and helps one to extend the ego-boundary and liberate one from a

> limited attitude, toward a cosmic vision. Once this feeling of

> oneness is developed, the internal and the external are no longer

> polarized and one sees the universe as though it were within

> oneself. "

>

 

http://adishakti.org/his_universe_within.htm

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http://www.adishakti.org/_/spirituality_of_the_puranas_is_a_journey_inward_by_wh\

ich_all_outward_human_action_are_transformed.htm