Dancing with Siva Shloka 150

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What Are the Views on Mahapralaya?

 

SHLOKA 150

 

Monistic theists hold that at mahapralaya, cosmic dissolution, all creation

is withdrawn into Siva, and He alone exists. Pluralistic theists hold that

world and souls persist in seed form and will later reemerge. Aum Namah

Sivaya.

 

BHASHYA

 

Pluralistic Siddhantins contend that after mahapralaya--the withdrawal of

time, form and space into Siva--souls and world are so close to Siva that,

for all practical purposes, He alone exists. Actually, they say, both world

and souls continue to exist, not as things, but as "potentialities." As if

in a deep sleep, souls, now in a bodiless state, rest. Individual karmas

lie dormant to germinate later when creation again issues forth and

nonliberated souls are re-embodied to continue their spiritual journey.

Monistic Siddhantins believe that souls persist through the lesser pralayas

of the cosmic cycle, but hold that only Siva exists following mahapralaya.

There is no "other," no separate souls, no separate world. The universe and

all souls are absorbed in Siva. Pasha--anava, karma and maya--is

annihilated. In the intensity of pre-dissolution, when time itself is

accelerated, all souls attain complete maturation, losing separateness

through fulfilled merger with Siva. Yea, jiva becomes Siva. The Vedas

boldly decree, "By His divine power He holds dominion over all the worlds.

At the periods of creation and dissolution of the universe, He alone

exists." Aum Namah Sivaya.

 

Scriptures Speak on Siddhanta

 

Meditate on the Lord as the object of meditation, for by the Lord the whole

world is set to activity. Brahma, Vishnu, Rudra and Indra have been brought

forth by Him; similarly, all faculties along with creatures. His divine

majesty has become the Cause, the Universe, the Blissful, as the ether

standing unshaken in the mid-air.

Atharva Veda

 

Whoever has found and has awakened to the Self that has entered into this

perilous inaccessible place, the body, he is the maker of the universe, for

he is the maker of all. His is the world. Indeed, he is the world itself.

Yajur Veda

 

All the sacred books, all holy sacrifice and ritual and prayers, all the

words of the Vedas, and the whole past and present and future, come from

the Spirit. With maya, His power of wonder, He made all things, and by maya

the human soul is bound. Know, therefore, that nature is maya, but that God

is the ruler of maya, and that all beings in our universe are parts of His

infinite splendor.

Yajur Veda

 

For the sake of experiencing the true and the false, the great Self has a

dual nature. Yea, the great Self has a dual nature. Yea, the great Self has

a dual nature!

Yajur Veda

 

The seer sees not death, nor sickness, nor any distress. The seer sees only

the All, obtains the All entirely.

Yajur Veda

 

Inconceivable is this supreme atman, immeasurable, unborn, inscrutable,

unthinkable, He whose Self is infinite space. He alone remains awake when

the universe is dissolved, and out of this space He awakens the world

consisting of thought.

Yajur Veda

 

That intelligence which incites the functions into the paths of virtue or

vice am I. All this universe, moveable and immoveable, is from Me. All

things are preserved by Me. All are absorbed into Me at the time of

pralaya. Because there exists nothing but Spirit, and I am that Spirit,

there exists nothing else.

Siva Samhita

 

The Primal One, the indivisible great, Himself into several divided. As

form, formless and form-formless, and as guru and as Sakti's Lord. In forms

numerous He immanent in jivas became.

Tirumantiram

 

You and He are not two separate; you and He are but one united; thus do you

stand, freed of all sectarian shackles; adore the Feet of Paraparai and

with Siva become One--that the way Siddhanta fulfills.

Tirumantiram

 

It is the Primal One without past or future. Its form is free from age and

sickness. It manifests as father and mother. It blossoms as the

Self-Existent. It cannot be described as one or two. No artist can portray

It. It is that which lies 'twixt good and evil. It ever abides in the

hearts of the wise. It permits no distinction between Vedanta and

Siddhanta. It is That which dances at the zenith beyond the realm of sound.

Natchintanai

 

Always my action is your action. I am not other than you, because the

essence of myself which I call "I" does not exist apart from you. Herein

lies the natural harmony between Vedanta and Siddhanta.

Tayumanavar

 

As wide earth, as fire and water, as sacrificer and wind that blows, as

eternal moon and sun, as ether, as the eight-formed God, as cosmic good and

evil, woman and man, all other forms and His own form, and all these as

Himself, as yesterday and today and tomorrow, the God of the long, red hair

stands, O Wonder!

Tirumurai

 

 

Mahabhakti

M