In this excerpt, from the Shiva Sutras, First Awakening, Verse 4, Swami Lakshmanjoo reveals to us how we become the victim of bondage. This is a continuation of the first part of Verse 4, “How does this threefold mala becomes the cause of bondage (Shiva Sutras 1.4 part 1)“.
Karandhra citi madhyasthā, so this Mātṛkā does a very bad thing to this victim who has become the play of this mother, who has become the play-ball of this mother.
karandhra-citi-madhyasthā brahma-pāśāvalambikāḥ /
pīṭheśvaryo mahāghorā mohayanti muhur-muhuḥ //
(Śrī Timirodghāṭa)
Karandhra citi, although this Mātṛkā resides in brahmarandhra (karandhra means brahmarandhra, ka means brahma; ka-randhra, i.e., brahmarandhra); in the state of brahmarandhra there is citi Mātṛkā, the universal mother; and the universal mother is situated in the center of brahmarandhra, and around that citi are situated pīṭheśvaryo (pīṭheśvaryo means those who are seated at his seat, around her, around the mother), and those pīṭheśvarīs are called organs of knowledge, organs of action, mind, intellect and ego. These are all pīṭheśvarīs to him.
To whom?
The one who is played by Mātṛkā, i.e., who has become the play of the mother.
The one who is the player with Mātṛkā, i.e., who is the player there, not to him. He is not played by the mother; the one who gets the state of player, being player.
We are played by the mother.
JOHN: Then that mother becomes his svatantrya (freedom).
SWAMIJI: Svatantrya.
Pīṭheśvaryo, and these pīṭheśvarīs, mahāghora, these become mahāghora (mahāghora means very fearful), mohayanti muhur-muhuḥ, and he gets always illusion at each and every corner.
There is no Beauty Corner, there is no Book Corner; there is only corner of pain and pleasure everywhere found by him.
JOHN: These are deities of these organs?
SWAMIJI: Yes, these are . . .
JOHN: Gocarī, khecarī, those?
SWAMIJI: Yes, these are khecarī, gocarī, [dikcarī and bhūcarī]: these organs; organs of action and organs of knowledge, mind, intellect and ego.
JOHN: So they serve to bind him, even more, every day?
SWAMIJI: Yes.
DEVOTEE 1: Where is the brahmarandhra?
SWAMIJI: Karandhra means brahmarandhra.
DEVOTEE: When consciousness does it the right way [unclear?] . . . in karandra?
SWAMIJI: In karandhra there is consciousness. And that consciousness has come out from the D.P. Dhar’s body and is dead.
DEVOTEE: So brahmarandhra means consciousness?
SWAMIJI: No! Citi means consciousness.
DEVOTEE: It resides in brahmarandhra.
SWAMIJI: It resides in brahmarandhra, in brain. It’s a good point.
iti śrītimirodghāṭa-proktanītyā varga-kalādyadhiṣṭhātṛ-brāhmyādi śakti-śreṇī-śobhinī / (repeated)
So this is the śloka of Timirodghāṭa. Timirodghāṭa says that in brahmarandhra there is citi and around her are all these deities who delude the one who is played by Mātṛkā. The one who is player with Mātṛkā, he is not deluded by these.
JOHN: What is the chief way they delude? By having him think that they are his self?
SWAMIJI: No. He becomes the victim of grief, he becomes the victim of pleasure, he becomes the victim of sex, he becomes the victim of enjoyment, he becomes the victim of being carried away. All these good and bad things, what come in front of us in our daily routine of life.
But the one who is the player he will never be sad, he will enjoy that also.
DEVOTEE: Not the one who is played; the one who is played, he will not?
SWAMIJI: He will not enjoy. He will be the victim of grief; he’ll be the victim of pleasure.
So it is varga kalādi adhiṣṭhātṛ brāhmyādi śakti śreṇi śobhinī. The adhiṣṭhātṛ, the way how he becomes the victim of pleasure and pain is by the word, the sound what he hears. He will hear the sound that, “our business is gone down,” (although it is not down); if he hears sometimes, “our business is finished,” bas, he’ll be the victim of grief.
Won’t he be?
Sometimes he will hear, “our business is growing more and more rapidly,” he’ll be also the victim of pleasure at that time. Both ways he’ll be played by Mātṛkā, not the player. This is not the way of being the player.
DEVOTEE: Pīṭhas means pīṭheśvarīs?
SWAMIJI: No, Mātṛkā. Mātṛkā is the chief factor. Pīṭheśvarīs are the agents.
JOHN: So the player doesn’t have the experience of pleasure in this sense then, the player?
SWAMIJI: He has, but he is aware of his own nature, he never comes down.
JOHN: It doesn’t bind him then?
SWAMIJI: It doesn’t bind him.
DEVOTEE: What is the meaning of kalā, varga and kalā?
SWAMIJI: Varga kalā ādi adhiṣṭhātṛ. Varga means . . .
DEVOTEE: Nine vargas.
SWAMIJI: . . . nine vargas (classes of letters).
Varga means nine vargas, that is words, sentences and letters.
Kalā means kalā, vidyā, rāga, kāla and niyati or, nivṛtti, pratiṣṭhā, vidyā, śāntā and śāntātīta, all this world, objective world. The objective world (vācya), and the world of letters (vācaka).
Vācaka means varga; vācaka will be found in varga [letters], and vācya world will be found in kalā [objective world].
Vācya: object, objective world; and vācaka, the world which is told, nominated.
This is objective world [Swamiji holds a pair of spectacles].
What is the subjective world of this?
The word “Specs!”
DEVOTEE: This is objective world?
SWAMIJI: This is objective world, vācya, the object.
What is the subjective world of this?
DEVOTEE: “Specs.”
SWAMIJI: “Specs!”
This [object] is not “specs”. This is another world being attached with this.
[Swamiji points to a devotee named Kṣemā].
This [lady] is the objective world.
What is the subjective world for this?
“Kṣemā . . . Kṣemā, this name! She is not Kṣemā. Kṣemā is vācaka [the subjective world].
JOHN: So then the subjective aspect of some object is the name of that.
SWAMIJI: Subjective is also bondage; objective is also bondage.
JOHN: But the idea of that, is it the word that’s the idea, or is it the picture of the idea in your mind?
SWAMIJI:
When you put subjective in subjective state and objective in objective state, then it is not bondage . . . it is not bondage. If you unite it with each other, that is bondage. You must not unite it.
JOHN: Subjective and objective?
SWAMIJI: Yes.
Somebody will tell me, “Your father has died, your father is dead. He has died just now in Lahore Hospital, finished.”
So this word, if I unite this word with that real father of mine, that is bondage. If I leave it separately, what is that, what is there in it!
Father is dead, what is that?
Father, “f-a-t-h-e-r i-s d-e-a-d,” finished.
DENISE: It’s only letters.
SWAMIJI: It is only letters; it is only the collection of letters.
So I won’t be played by this. If I am played by this, then I will be the victim of grief, or pleasure, or sorrow.
JOHN: So in other words, if somebody were to write you a letter, and that would to affect you; cause you to feel grief . . .
SWAMIJI: It doesn’t affect.
JOHN: No, but if it caused you to feel grief, then that would be bondage.
SWAMIJI: That is bondage; that is bondage.
sarva-vīra-āgama-prasiddha-lipikrama-saṁniveśa-uthāpikā
So it is uthāpikā, the written characters of letters which has given rise to the wheel of energies; the written characters of the letters.
DEVOTEE: What is lipikrama?
SWAMIJI: Lipikrama: written characters.
When you write a letter to some of your friends that, “I am almost dying, I may die in two or three days, come soon,” he will arrange a plane and come. Although you are alive and you are hale and hearty, he will come. Lipikrama, by that character of letters you have given him a push to another world of grief or pleasure or sorrow.
DEVOTEE: These two things are not there before that man; he is just like a lump of stone?
SWAMIJI: No, when awareness is there.
DEVOTEE: But he must have the awareness?
SWAMIJI: When awareness is there then Godliness is there, then God consciousness is there. God consciousness is never excluded in this state. Otherwise, this situation is found in jaḍa [objects] also, i.e., in trees also, in stones also. They don’t get grief or pleasure by words or sounds. But in rocks there is no awareness. In elevated beings there is awareness.
ambā jyeṣṭhā raudrī vāmākhya śakti-cakra-cumbitā śaktir -adhiṣṭhātṛ, (repeated)
So this energy which is kissed by the four-fold energies of the Lord: Ambā, Jyeṣṭhā, Raudrī and Vāmā.
Ambā is the first energy, [the creator of obstacles]
Jyeṣṭhā is another energy [Aghorā śakti]
Raudrī is the third energy, [Ghorā śakti] and
Vāmā is the fourth energy [Ghoratarī śakti].
These four energies are being kissed by that Matṛkā, by that Mother.
When that Mātṛkā kisses the energy of Ambā, when she kisses the energy of Jyeṣṭhā, when she kisses the energy of Raudrī, and when she kisses the energy of Vāmā, they give another separate fruit.
When she kisses the energy of Vāmā, this Vāmā śakti gives you the fruit of saṁsāra (repeated births and deaths).
When that universal Mother kisses the energy of Raudrī she will put you in a fix, “What to do . . . should I do this or should I do that?” She won’t let you do anything good or bad. That is the action of Raudrī.
When she kisses the energy of Jyeṣṭhā then you will rise to the knowledge of your own nature.
And when she kisses the energy of Ambā, then you will neither go down, nor up.
tadadhiṣṭhānādeva hi antarabhedānusaṁdhivandhyatvāt kṣaṇamapi alabdhaviśrāntīni bahirmukhānyeva jñānāni,
(not recited in full)
By kissing these four energies, antar abheda ānusaṁdhi-vandhyatvāt, you are deprived from your own real nature of universal consciousness. Kṣaṇamapi alabdha viśrāntīni, not even for one second are you situated in one-pointedness; bahir mukhānyeva jñānāni, so your organs of actions [karmendriyas] and organs of knowledge [jñānendriyas] lead you to bahir mukha state, to the external world, not the internal world.
iti yuktaiva eṣāṁ bandhokatvoktiḥ. /
So, these threefold malas are well said to be binding your own nature. This is explained in these two ślokas in Spanda.
śabdarāśi samuthasya . . . . . . . / (Spanda Kārikā 3.13)
When by sound you are carried away from your own nature, by hearing some sound good or bad.
svarūpāvaraṇe cāsya śaktayaḥ satatotthitāḥ /
(Spanda Kārikā 3.15)
The energies of Lord Śiva are always bent upon covering your own nature, just to cover and conceal your own nature.
Bas! we will do only this much today.
|| End of text for sūtra 4 ||
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