Wednesday, 15 April 2020

THE BATTLE GOES ON

Just when you think you have understood and comprehend lives mysteries and the mystical world of the Siddhas, something takes place that brings us back to square one. Take for instance trying to figure out and piecing together the puzzles of life. Watching so many episodes from the lives of so many people is akin to watching a mega serial. We can either watch it as entertainment or look for an inner meaning or message that comes across from these experiences. As Aesop's Fables always carried a moral of the story, we turn the leaf to study the underlying reasons and consequences to all these plays on this wide stage of life.

I was watching the CGI movie "Epic". A teenager finds herself transported to a deep forest setting and finds herself caught in between a battle between the forces of good and the forces of evil. Here the Boggans which are wicked creatures go against the Greens, tiny humanoid soldiers called Leafmen who protect the forest. Their queen maintains equilibrium in the jungle. When the malevolent leader of the bad guys who represents chaos and decay, Mandrake is sick of the prevailing balance in nature and attempts to wipe out the total greenery, into becoming rot, the teen joins the Leafmen in war trying to check and stop the rot setting in.

It is interesting to note that we are told Agathiyar brought a balanced equilibrium to the world too. Of course, the story goes that the world tilted as a result of the gods and goddesses converging at Mount Kailash to witness the grand wedding of Lord Siva to his consort, hence Agathiyar was called to go south to bring about a balance. Could his purpose in going south have a subtle meaning to it, beyond the obvious?

When Agathiyar asked me to commission his bronze statue in Swamimalai and have it brought over to Malaysia, there were many uncertainties that cropped up in the last moments of shipping, delivery, and his arrival. But he came often in the Nadi to assure me of his safe and timely arrival on our shores just in time for his Jayanthi Vizha on 3rd January 2010. And indeed he arrived as promised. But he did reveal that he had to gate crash and break through several obstacles to arrive. This did not make any sense to me. He said there were many who tried to stop him. Was he speaking about the physical barriers or subtle ones?

When certain disgruntled devotees began to spread lies hoping to sabotage the opening of the new Kallar Ashram in 2016, Agathiyar who is an embodiment of the truth or satyam stood by Tavayogi. We from AVM were blessed with the opportunity to participate and carry out the ceremony without a hitch. 

When our Paramaguru and Tavayogi's guru Chitramuthu Adigal asked Agathiyar to convey his wish that we initiate and carry out a Siddha puja at the Thanneermalai Sri Thandayuthapani Alayam, Waterfall Road, Taiping some 267km away, through the Jeeva Nadi in Tavayogi's possession, we gathered the AVM family and headed there. Before the libation or abhisegam for Lord Ganapathy, Tavayogi called me to fetch some water from a stream that ran through, which had its source in a nearby waterfall. He called me near and surprised me by asking me to bring someone along. His reason: The dark forces will try to sabotage. I was taken aback but followed his directive. I looked around for a strong well-built person and my eyes caught sight of a part-time trainer in a gym. We collected the water and performed the rituals including a Yagam without any interference.

Many years earlier in 2008, when Tavayogi came over to my home and began to fine-tune our ongoing ritual of lighting the fire or Homa, he asked that we place lime around the Homa Kundam or vessel and in the four corners of the home. He did not elaborate but insisted that we place them. I could not understand but we send someone to purchase the lime and placed them as directed.

At the start of the pilgrimages into the Siddha territories, we are told to ask permission to intrude into their space, usually with a prayer or small ritual. How do we explain these phenomena and beliefs?

The war between the good and bad, the saintly and the evil seems to be going on since time immemorial. 
  • Along with her children, Maricha and Subahu, Taraka would harass and attack rishis performing yajnas in the forest. They were ultimately slain by Rama and Lakshmana on behest of their teacher, maharishi Vishwamitra. (Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tataka)
  • Lord Vishnu's many avatars descended upon the earth to empower the good and fight evil, thereby restoring Dharma. A passage from the Bhagavad Gita describes the typical role of an avatar of Vishnu: "Whenever righteousness wanes and unrighteousness increases I send myself forth. For the protection of the good and for the destruction of evil, and for the establishment of righteousness, I come into being age after age."
  • Taking the Matsya avatar, that of half fish - half man avatar Lord Vishnu saves the world from a cosmic deluge, with the help of a boat made of the Vedas (knowledge), and rescues Manu the progenitor of man and all living beings. Demon, Hirnakshya steals and tries to destroy the Book, but Matsya finds the demon, kills him, and returns the Vedas.
  • Taking on the Kurma avatar that of a tortoise, holds and supports the cosmos, while the gods and demons churn the cosmic ocean with the help of the serpent Vasuki to produce the nectar of immortality. The churning produces both the good and the bad, including poison and immortality nectar. Nobody wants the poison, everyone wants the immortality nectar. The demons attempt to steal the nectar. Lord Vishnu appears as Mohini, a beautiful, charming and irresistible woman for whom they all fall, and give her the nectar.
  • Taking the form of a boar, Varaha, he rescues Goddess earth from the clutches of the demon Hiranyaksha who kidnaps and hides her in the depths of the cosmic ocean. Varaha finds her and kills Hiranyaksha. The goddess holds onto the tusk of the boar as he lifts her back to the surface.
  • Taking the form of half lion - half man  Narasimha defeats and kills Hiranyakashipu, and rescues his son Prahlada.
  • Coming as a dwarf  Vamana, he defeats the Demon king Mahabali fought against the Devas and won the right to rule the heavens, earth, and the underworlds. Though he was a benevolent king, he was a demon, and the devas led by Indra went to Lord Vishnu to help them get heaven back. Lord Vishnu, although didn't want to punish Bali. Vamana approaches Mahabali while the king was distributing alms amongst his people. He refuses to accept neither food, money, jewels, or all other riches. However, he asks only for three steps of land. Amused by the requests and thinking how big a step can a dwarf take, Bali grants him his wish. Vamana grows in size and taking his first step, takes the earth and the netherworld, and taking his second step, takes all of the heavens. When Bali offers his head for Vamana to place his foot on as his third pace, Vamana gives him the boon of immortality and allows him to return to his people every year on the occasion of Onam.
  • Lord Vishnu took on the avatar of Parashurama to slain the warrior class that was geting too powerful and seizing other's property.
  • Lord Vishnu then takes the form of Rama and later as Krishna to bring the world into equilibrium and see that justice is done. 
  • What awaits us all is the predicted avatar of Kalki that would see the end of the world, in order that the cosmos may renew and restart.(Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avatar) 
Similarly, Lord Ganesa, Lord Shiva, Goddess Ma Dewi, Lord Brahma are all said to have taken avatars too to bring righteousness to an otherwise degrading world. 

Then the saints tell us that the battle is within us and that we have to combat and win the war. 
  • It is commonly known that the Bhagavad Gita depicts a battle between two warring factions, the Pandus and Kurus. But the battle's importance lies in its symbolism. The battle is a metaphor for the battle of life, and the characters who participate in the metaphoric battle represent the good and bad qualities of each human being. For example, the Pandus represent spiritual qualities, and the Kurus represent evil qualities. Within each human being, the good and evil qualities battle for ascendance. (Source: https://owlcation.com/humanities/Paramahansa-Yoganandas-God-Talks-With-Arjuna)
Patanjali in his "Ashtanga Yogam" states eight components along the path that one has to traverse, which is sort of a battle too, to reach perfection. P.Karthigayan explains elaborately in his book "History of Medical and Spiritual Sciences of Siddhas of Tamil Nadu", Notion Press, 2016. A summary is given below.
  • Iyamam and Niyamam prepare us for a new way of life, that help battle thought patterns that are run of the mill, running along the same grooves of the record for ages. Iyamam is instilled by parents and teachers through discipline and can happen upon self-reflection too. A man who adopts and achieves these will stand out and be unique among his fellow men. He will be a truthful person or utaman. After battling to bring perfection in his qualities, that become habits and later is etched as his character, he moves to Niyamam, where he fulfills the part of spiritual development. He battles to save his soul and spirit from the continuous onslaught of the things of the world. At the end of this mutiny, he becomes divine by nature. 
  • Having tuned his thoughts to another frequency, he now works on his body with the aid of two tools, Asana and Pranayama, the former physically preparing him to battle and to master his body and mind, while the latter perfects his breath and mind. With their grace, the Siddhas begin to move his breath. He now becomes a yogi, one who has perfected body and breath that brings his mind within. 
Assuming we have mutinied through the battle and covered the first half of the journey where we come out as victors having gained mastery of the self, gaining self-control and discipline while engaged in all things external, the activities are then brought to a halt and we are brought within. Thence begins the second half of the journey.
  • Next Prathyagaram and Tharanai shall mentally prepare one to move into a new realm of perception. From here, one travels on to the Kesari Margam, to the cosmos and back as mentioned by P.Karthigayan. The mystical flight and inner journey to countless universes start here.
  • Dyanam and Samadhi bring one to be receptive of the spirituality of oneself, the Siddhas and their wisdom. Going within and with internal worship, one arrives at Samadhi. 
The fight goes on till these days, although the enemy has taken other forms in this age. Currently, we are faced with a virus that is unseen by the naked eyes. The scientific community, the doctors and governments are trying their best to identify the nature of the virus and better understand it, and come out with medicines to counter it; measures to contain it and treat it, and put into place strategies to save the population respectively. Information Technology and Artificial Intelligence have taken a great stride in its usage in the face of this pandemic, replacing people to a large extent, since social distancing has been advocated gathering from the nature of the virus that takes on a new host within moments of contact between others and things around them.  
On 22 January, Dave O’Connor and Tom Friedrich invited several dozen colleagues around the United States to join a new workspace on the instant messaging platform Slack. The scientists, both at the Wisconsin National Primate Research Center, had seen news about a new disease emerging in China and realized researchers would need a primate model if they were going to answer some important questions about its biology. “We put out a call to a bunch of investigators and basically said: ‘Hey, let’s talk,’” O’Connor says. The idea is to coordinate research and make sure results are comparable, Friedrich adds. 
The Wu-han Clan is just one example of how the COVID-19 outbreak is transforming how scientists communicate about fast-moving health crises. A torrent of data is being released daily by preprint servers that didn’t even exist a decade ago, then dissected on platforms such as Slack and Twitter, and in the media, before formal peer review begins. Journal staffers are working overtime to get manuscripts reviewed, edited, and published at record speeds. The venerable New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) posted one COVID-19 paper within 48 hours of submission. Viral genomes posted on a platform named GISAID, more than 200 so far, are analyzed instantaneously by a phalanx of evolutionary biologists who share their phylogenetic trees in preprints and on social media.
“This is a very different experience from any outbreak that I’ve been a part of,” says epidemiologist Marc Lipsitch of the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. The intense communication has catalyzed an unusual level of collaboration among scientists that, combined with scientific advances, has enabled research to move faster than during any previous outbreak. “An unprecedented amount of knowledge has been generated in 6 weeks,” says Jeremy Farrar, head of the Wellcome Trust. (Source: https://www.sciencemag.org/news/2020/02/completely-new-culture-doing-research-coronavirus-outbreak-changes-how-scientists)
The internet has kept my family and friends connected throughout this period of lockdown just as many others do. Then there is a darker side to it too. The “Dark Web” or “Deep Web are mysterious places where hackers, cyber spies, and other Internet criminals lurk, waiting to prey on unsuspecting victims.

One pertinent point that has come to the forefront in these trying times with the COVID-19 lurking around looking for a home to dwell in, is that those who had brought the divine to reside within their homes first and later in their hearts are able to continue their worship. The lockdown enforced has shut the doors to the places of worship besides shutting down businesses and offices etc. As we move into the Tamil and Onam new year, this is the first time that devotees have been denied access to visit the temples and pray to the Lord to grant a good year, full of blessings. It is during these times that we realize that blessed are those who have been taught the rituals and worship, where these can be continued by them in the confines of their homes, minus the need for a middleman or a place, an establishment, temple, or peedham to gather at. We were taught to conduct homa and abhisegam, chanting of mantras, reciting songs of praise, etc that came handy and saved the day. We continue these rituals in the comfort of our homes and with our immediate family. Praises to the Siddhas. Agathiyar and our gurus have made us independent, breaking an otherwise dependency on others for even our own basic religious and spiritual needs.

Thinking that since there are much enmity, backstabbing, betrayal, jealousy and other negative traits in the material world where fame and wealth is much sort after, and this was reason enough for some to leave in search of peace and calm in the spiritual sphere, I was in for a rude shock as those on the religious and spiritual side of the wall carried these dark traits with them into the other side.

Good and evil are practically and almost everywhere. It is just up to us on whose side we want to be. Taking the dark side brings results that are rather obvious to us. Then there is a disadvantage in taking the side of the good or spiritual for that matter too. We tend to see all others as bad or nonspiritual, irreligious, unholy, ungodly, faithless, sinful, unrighteous, corrupt, dishonest atheist, etc. As our sacred texts and saintly men have drawn a line as to what is acceptable and what is not, the right and wrong, there is a constant battle between these two factions.

When I asked Agathiyar if I was on the right track, he told me that there is no right or wrong. Our experiences will teach us to establish the right from the wrong. 

As to my wife's question, if one was in any way an obstacle or in the way of another's achievement, he replied nobody is a hindrance to another but it was up to the individual to place concerted efforts to reach him.

When I asked him to save the prapanjam he tells us that karma and effort shall determine the fate of it. 

Agathiyar brings us to know our karma, telling us that that is what initiated our birth in the present, the past and will determine the future birth too. Along the way, we picked up many messages regarding karma and how it works. Although we have tried to enlighten others on the subject in various posts on this blog, it never drove us to mention to another in the face that his sufferings were because of his past karma. Agathiyar can say that because he is way beyond its hold. Tavayogi can talk about karma or vinai and expound the means to counter it. Who are we to talk about it when we still carry our baggage of karma with us, struggling to find ways to drop it or lay it down?

Whatever we see is, and is carried out of action. The actions are fine. Those done for the good of others and when no claim to it is laid, bring rewards as in good times. But actions with evil intent, create a whole string of episodes that come back to as bad times. As the Abbot in the Chinese movie "Shaolin" says to the ex-general before he is initiated into monkhood, "From evil come afflictions. With justice, they are gone" that is the rule of God and Nature too. We reap what we sow. But the Abbot has a way out for us, "If neither are there you are so purified that nothing remains."

He adds, "Understanding to let go, is knowing how to confront all." 

One need not be identified with a particular faith, a religious body or a guru, to be regarded as a person of high virtues. Being secular, or an atheist, one can uphold good virtues too. A religious person can walk by a man/woman or child on the verge of dying right in front of his eyes, without giving a wink. On the other hand, an atheist can come to their aid immediately. A religious person need not necessarily be compassionate. A religious upbringing does not guarantee that one would be charitable or helpful to another. Its compassion that brings out the divine in us. Its love that brings out the divine in us. For the divine is both compassion and love. We should strive to become a beacon of love and compassion rather than strive to be religious or spiritual.

As Mother Meera once told Andrew Harvey, “Realization is not one marvelous moment. It is a Process", we should not rest on our laurels. Harvey continues his conversation with Mother Meera, 
Andrew Harvey: "You  never treat any of our visions of you or the light as special, because you never want us to rest at any stage or state.”  
Mother Meera: “Yes, There is always more. Always. Even for the greatest of yogis, even for Sri Aurobindo, there is always more. You must go on and on aspiring, praying for more and more Light. Yes. A journey without end. There are different stages in the journey, but the journey has no end.”  
Andrew Harvey: “The great danger for me,” I said, “is that the ego will seize what the soul is learning for itself, to make itself proud.” 
Mother Meera: “It will try. The divine will not use you unless you are humble. My power passes through those who are clear. Keep yourself clear at all times. If they work with the light, it will transform them and give them the power to change themselves and so change the world.” 
Agathiyar and Ramalinga Adigal came and told us to kindle the external flame of the oil lamp and similarly kindle the tiny flame of the spirit within us to grow in its intensity and illuminate the soul that lies silent as a watcher from within. The intensity of the flame shall remove the veils or curtains that hide the One from us.

Jnana Jyothiamma wrote to me in 2013 after visiting Vadalur. (http://agathiyarvanam.blogspot.com/2013/08/molly-menon-at-vadalur-i-think-by-now.html) 
"Vallalar says there are seven screens or curtains preventing us from being able to see the Graceful light and these screens are to be removed one by one and it can be ...... with the Grace of the Divine, when, one attains Spiritual Maturity. We will be able to see the screens in our forehead as we progress Spiritually"
"These seven screens have been placed by Arutperum Jyothi.
  1. The Black Screen. This is the first and the most difficult screen to remove. Once removed, the other screens will be able to fall apart. This screen hides the Sovereignty of Arutperum Jyothi's Grace light with the power of the great 'maya' or the Illusionary nature of the world. 
  2. The Blue Screen. This is the second screen. While the black curtain is to veil or hide the Cosmic Soul, the blue curtain is to hide the Individual Soul. 
  3. The Green Screen. The third screen is the green screen. This screen hides the Cosmic Space representing Divine Energy .. Purification of the Mind's faculties and that of the Soul will tear down this curtain. 
  4. The Red Screen. The Fourth screen is the red screen. This screen is there to hide the space of mystic Powers and at the Appropriate time it is removed. 
  5. The Golden Screen. The Golden screen is the fifth screen. This hides the real matters worthy of human pursuits as a result, we tend to run after Illusionary ones and when this curtain is removed we will be able to perceive the Real. 
  6. The White Screen. This is the sixth screen. This curtain hides the space or abode of the Absolute Truth. This being the Original Energy. 
  7. The Screen of Several Colour. The seventh screen is the screen of Mixed Colour. It veils all experiences of the Aspirant.
By the Grace of the Ultimate Divine, all the above mentioned Screens or curtains can be removed one by one ....." 
I figure that once we realize and experience them, we would still very much be here with the rest of the world, but would have a different perspective or view on them. We would not judge others nor tread on another, but instead love all as one, and be in harmony and peace with all. Tavayogi used to say that we should be free (not tied to doctrines and chained to ideas and concepts) which we came to learn as true, for the Siddhas break every concept and idea we hold or opinioned or understood. Every day is a learning process. Yes as Mother Meera says it is a process.

Meanwhile, the saints have given us songs that are known as kavasam to ward off dangers, evil and demons besides bringing on the grace of the divine. In these challenging times let us take some time, which we actually have because of the lockdown, to recite them for the good of all.






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