DakshiNa-mUrti ashTakam Verse 7

[Guest guest]

Verse No.7

 

bAlyAdishvapi jAgrathAdishu tathA sarvAs-vavasthAs-vapi

vyAvRttAs-vanuvartamanam-ahamityantah-sphurantaM sadA /

svAtmAnaM prakaTI karoti bhajatAM yo mudrayA bhadrayA

tasmai SrI-guru-mUrtaye nama idaM SrI-dakshiNA-mUrtaye //

 

Translation:

 

To Him, who, by means of the beatific hand-mudra, manifests to His devotees

His own Self, that, for ever, shines within as 'I' continuously in all the

various states such as infancy, etc., such as waking, etc., to Him of the

form of the Guru,(who has the eye of the fire of wisdom) the blessed

dakshinA-mUrti, is this prostration.

 

Commentary:

 

Verses 7, 8 and 9 talk about the Light in us that makes us see. Whoever was

there before I went to sleep and whatever I am after I woke up from sleep,

-- the two are the same and it is the same 'Me' that was also having the

experience of sleep during my deep sleep; this insight is called

pratyabhijnA. Whatever stage of life and in whatever state of awareness we

are, the concept of 'I' is the single truth that survives as the continuing

thread; that is the Self. It is that which remains when all that we call

'mine' is removed from what we usually, in the mundane world of activity,

refer to as 'I'. To recognize this no effort need be made, says Sankara in

another context: we have only to dispel our beginningless ignorance. The

tragedy here says he, is that the differentiations are nothing but names

and forms stipulated by ignorance and this has misled our discretion and

intellect the

consequence being

 

atyanta-prasiddham suvijneyam Asanna-taram Atmabhutam-api

aprasiddham durvijneyam atidUram anyad-iva pratibhAti avivekinAm //

What is most explicit in us looks implicit,

what is well-known to us appears unknowable,

what is nearest to us seems distant,

what is our own self turns out to be

something other than ourselves.

 

That this Self is the same as the Transcendental Reality, brahman, is what

is shown by the Preceptor's 'cin-mudrA' - the handpose showing the union of

the index finger and the thumb. The index finger represents the 'thou' of

'That Thou art' and the thumb represents the 'that' of the same Grand

Pronouncement. Observe that we naturally point to the person opposite to us

by the index finger and point to ourselves by the thumb. The identification

of the two by the handpose uniting the two fingers is just the teaching of

the Grand Pronouncement. That the 'thou' is Consciousness can be logically

arrived at. That the 'that' is also Consciousness also appeals to our

reason. That the two things identified by intellectual reasoning as

Consciousness are actually the same Consciousness is however impossible to

reason out. That last step in the enlightenment needs the declaration of

the vedas and the prompting of the guru. That is exactly what the cin-mudra

shows and says.

 

Commentary and translation by Prof V Krishnamurthy

The website is at:

http://www.geocities.com/Athens/Rhodes/2952/gohitvip/63page13.html