In Prose, but not Prosaic

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Srimate SrivanSatakopa Sri Vedanta Desika Yatindra Mahadesikaya nama:

 

In Prose, but not Prosaic

 

All of us love poetry. Right from when we were toddlers, we were taught

what were called " Nursery Rhymes " . Whether it was " Ba Ba Black Sheep " or " nilA

nilA Odi vA " , these rhymes were our first introduction to the wonderful world of

literature. We then graduated to " Twinkle Twinkle Little Star " and other rhymes

of its ilk, marking at each stage a liking for lyrical expression.And when we

were in high school, we were introduced to the magnificent verses of Alfred Lord

Tennyson, with their wonderful rhymes and alliteration, those of William

Wordsworth with his enchanting descriptions of such common garden flowers like

" The Daffodil " , of S.T.Coleridge and his " Ancient Mariner " and so on. From there

some of us branched off to savour the delights of Shakespeare, while others

chose the still-living verses of Milton on Paradises Lost and Regained and of

American poets like Robert Frost, Emily Dickinson and so on. And those of us who

were spared the rigorous regimen of Convent schools (where nothing but English

was permitted to be spoken or studied) had an enticing encounter with selections

from the short and sweet verses of Thirukkural, nAladiyAr and so on, with

introductions to such great works as Kamba Ramayanam, Divya Prabandam,

SilappadhikAram etc.

 

We were thus led through a bewildering but bewitching variety of poetic styles

and content, inculcating in us an undying love for lyrical expression, till some

of us tried our hand tentatively at first and then with increasing confidence at

writing poetry ourselves, first in secret with diffidence, constantly consulting

the dictionary, Thesarus and other aids to composition and later, after

encouragement from proud parents and after reading and imbibing master poets,

without the aid of the crutches mentioned above.

 

When we are in the full bloom of youth, romantic verses capture our imagination

and we keep humming some lyric or the other. Some of us are inspired by the

rousing songs of nationalistic poets like Bharati, coming under the spell of his

fiery and stirring verses. And in middle age, when the cares of the world draw

furrows on our brow and our hitherto straight back bends with the burden of

familial care, we turn to more worthwhile reading, developing a lasting liking

for the emotional outpourings of Azhwars, portraying vividly the infinite bliss

that awaits us in the form of the glorious Godhead that is Sriman Narayana.

These savants portray the myriad relationships we can develop with the Supreme

Lord and the unending facets of His beauty and matchless and magnificent

attributes. A perusal of these pasurams fills us with eternal peace,

exhilarating joy and reduces our stony heart to a melting pot of enlivening

emotions. And when one is old and the moment has come to pass on to the other

worlds, one has the Dvayam and Charamaslokam, again in verse form, whispered in

one's ears by kindly souls wishing one well on one's journey to Paramapadam.

Thus from cradle to grave, the influence of poetry on our lives is constant and

unceasing.

 

What is the reason for the enchantment poetry is able to generate in us, moving

even the most banal and pedestrian of individuals to an extremely emotive state?

Why does our heart respond with alacrity to the strains of a verse, rather than

to pages of prose, however well expressed? Why do lyrics unfailingly tug at the

strings of our heart without any apparent effort? If even secular verses leave

lasting impressions on our intellects, need we doubt the indelible imprints

incomparable poems like those of the Azhwars leave on our soul? Perhaps it is

the lilting rhymes, perhaps the economy of expression, perhaps the sublimity of

thought or perhaps the profundity that can be packed in pretty few words, all of

which are the hallmark of uplifting poetry, that induces us to lose ourselves

heart and soul to the mesmerising magic of poetry.

Readers may despair of my ever getting to the point and may well consider all

this to be the ramblings of a lost soul being swept away in a meaningless

torrent of words, trying desperately to grasp an outhanging branch of rhyme and

reason.

 

Abandoning our secular ramblings, if we were to consider religious expression,

we find the scene decisively dominated by poetry. The ultimate authority, the

Shruti, speaks mostly in majestic verse. The Srimad Ramayana is comprised of

24000 incredibly sweet verses of Valmiki, in anushtup metre. The other epic, the

Mahabharata too is in verse and so are the 18 Puranas. The Smritis are mostly in

verse. While all Azhwars have chosen the medium of lyrics to pour out their

love, affection and devotion for the Lord, Acharyas too have exhibited a marked

preference to poetical expression, right from the Stotra Ratnam and Chatussloki

of Sri Yamunacharya to the versatile verses of Swami Desikan in his innumerable

stotras, down to the Yatiraja Vimsati or Thiruvaimozhi nootrandAdi of Sri

Mamunigal. Poetry thus appears to have been the preferred vehicle of conveying

Poorvacharyas' profound thoughts. The verses of Sri Koorattazhwan and his

illustrious son Sri Bhattar have indeed been sources of inspiration to the

Acharyas who followed.

 

Lest poetry be dismissed as the winged vehicle for the flights of poets' fancy

and fantasy, given to exaggeration and hyperbole rather than realism and reason,

this form of expression has been chosen by everyone who matters, to convey

extremely profound, complex and logical concepts. Sri Alavandar's GItArttha

Sangraham and the innumerable stotras of Swami Desikan stand eloquent

testimonies of how philosphy could find expression through verses, with none of

its pristine purity or clarity sacrificed in the process. One single line of Sri

Nammazhwar, " udal misai uyir ena karandu engum parandulan " has greater

philosophical content and refutes a hundred advaitic works than a thousand pages

of verbose prose. Sri Bhattar, in his enlightening commentary " Bhagavat Guna

Darpanam " , specifically refutes the notion that the Vishnu Sahasranama Stotra is

a mere poetical embellishment and exaggeration of the Lord's innumerable gunas.

 

If we need a clinching argument in favour of lyrics being the preferred mode of

theological and philosophical composition, we only need to look at the Bhagavat

Gita, the Song Celestial, a testimony to Emperuman Himself choosing to wax

eloquent in verse. Thus even the Supreme Lord appears to favour poetry to prose,

for conveying the profoundest of thoughts that were ever generated in any

intellect.

 

Amidst all this plethora of poetry, authored by the humblest of devotees to the

omnipotent Lord Himself, there stands out one enlightened individual, an

extremely distinguished one at that, a redoubtable scholar of unmatched

accomplishments, who has authored nine major and monumental works covering the

entire gamut of VisishtAdvaitic philosophy (in fact forming the very foundation

of this school of thought), who has composed not a single, lone verse throughout

his voluminous works. Though he has dealt with all aspects of theology and

philosophy, Sri Ramanuja has managed to speak not a single word of verse, in

total contrast to his predecessors, contemporaries and successors, all of whom

have waxed voluble in verse. All his writings have been in prose, with not a

single verse thrown in for relief, while all his predecessors and idols and all

those who regarded him as their lord and master, swore by poetry. Amidst a sea

of lilting lyrics, his was the lone voice speaking in sober prose.

 

One might say that most of the works of Sri Ramanuja were commentative, being

expansions and elucidations of the Brahma SutrAs and the Bhagavat Gita and of

significant passages in the Vedanta. Such works, by their very elaborate and

polemical nature, do not lend themselves easily to poetic expression and have,

by tradition, been in prose. It is therefore understandable for the Sri Bhashya

and the Gita Bhashya to have been in prosaic text. This line of reasoning would

apply to the Nitya Grantha too, which is a manual of worship.

 

However, what about the three glorious Gadyas, which, being outpourings of deep

devotion and containing vivid descriptions of the bewitching Bhagavat svarUpam

and the glorious guNAs of the Lord, afford ample opportunity for the Bhashyakara

to adopt poetical expression? It is noteworthy that every other Acharya,

preceding and succeeding Sri Ramanuja, has compulsively resorted to poetry in

such contexts, feeling that medium to be appropriate for conveying the

exultation in Bhagavat anunbhavam. But not Ramanuja, who sticks to staid and

sedate prose, whatever be the context. Is it his insistence on painstaking

precision on the literal, rather than the abstract, as well as his desire to

keep the narrative rational rather than clouded by emotion, that keeps him off

the portals of poetry?

 

One would be tempted to conclude that the Bhashyakara deliberately adopted a

demure expression, in tune with the heavy subjects of his choice, not lending

himself to elaborate embellishments or exaggerations that are a sine qua non of

verses, being a sedate person not given to display of extreme emotions. However,

the Gadyas give a lie to this notion, being extremely rich in expression,

speaking vividly of the Lord, His matchless magnificence and auspicious

attributes, all in rapturous language that belongs more to poetry than to prose.

The flowing style of prose adopted by Sri Ramanuja in the Gadyas, mellifluous

and lilting, with certain beautiful and key expressions repeated over and over

again, is indeed a treat to imbibe and impart, leaving one in no doubt that

prose could be as effective a vehicle for conveying Bhagavat anubhavam as any

rhyme of rhapsody. The majesty of expression that characterises Sri Ramanuja's

style, its depth and sweep, the deployment of words that are just right and

would brook no substitution, the preference for the dramatic turn of phrase in

preference to the commonplace, the absolute absence of banality in any form-all

these are a rare treat to the connoisseur of literature, marking a singular

departure from the hackneyed phraseology and over-worked cliches of prosaic

poetry.

 

An important aspect of Sri Ramanuja's style is his unfettered idiom and refusal

to be cowed down by what is regarded as the bane of informed composition, viz.,

repetition of words or phrases ( " punarukti " ). Words steeped in majesty and

grandeur seem to roll off effortlessly from his prolific pen, with absolutely no

concern for searching for a new phrase every time a word has to be repeated. He

lets himself go wherever a detailed description of the Lord is involved, be it

the Gita Bhashya or the Gadyas, with a single narrative spanning more than a

page, all without sacrificing clarity and comprehensibility. All his works are

standing and eloquent testimony to the fact that prose can portray as well as,

if not better than poetry, the kaleidascope of moods and feelings running the

entire range from exuberance, joy, fulfilment and bliss, to grattitude, humility

and servitude, to disappointment, intense longing, jealousy and despair.

 

The following small sample from the Gadyam would exemplify the Saint's powerful

prose, at once simple and majestic, enthralling and enlightening, delienating

philosophy without sacrificing felicity of expression and endowing all phrases

with an underpinning of decisive doctrine-

 

" apAra karuNAmbudhE! anAlOchita visEsha asEsha lOka sharanya! PraNatArthi

hara!Asrita vatsalyaika mahOdadhE! anavarata vidita nikhila bhoota jAta

yAtAtmya! SatyakAma! Satyasankalpa! Apatsakha! KAkuttstha!

SrIman! Narayana! Purushotthama! Sri Ranganatha! Mama nAtha! namOstu tE "

 

Can one word of this brilliant passage be replaced by any other without

affecting the splendour of the structure? Can any poetry, however facile, equal

this plaintive appeal to the Lord with a detailed description of His kalyana

gunas? Can a clearer portrayal of the Lord's functions and our relationship with

Him be ever attempted? Can the majesty and greandeur of expression be ever

equalled or paralelled by anyone, however endowed?

 

To conclude, though all of his compositions are in prose, not a single sentence

of Sri Ramanuja's is prosaic. Every single one of his words is significant,

irreplaceable, without contradiction, sweet, crystal clear, elaborate but only

to the required degree, invigorating and affording perennial bliss to the wise,

says Swami Desikan in the following sloka from Sri Yatiraja Saptati-

 

" nirAbAdhA BodhAyana phaniti nishyanda subhagA:

vishuddha upanyAsa vyatibhidura ShAriraka nayA:

akunttai: kalpantEYatipati nibandhA: nijamukhai:

anidrANa pragyA rasa dhamani vEdhAya sudhiyAm "

 

All said and done, however, two aspects of Sri Ramanuja's scholarship would

remain an enigma forever- first, his avoidance of poetry and preference for

prose for expressing even the most emotive of thoughts, and second, the absence

of even a single reference to the Divya Prabandas in his entire works, despite

his holding the Aruliccheyal in high reverence.

 

Srimate Sri LakshmINrsimha divya paduka sevaka SrivanSatakopa Sri Narayana

Yatindra Mahadesikaya nama:

Dasan, sadagopan