The Universal Shaiva Fellowship is happy to announce the Mahasamadhi Celebration of our beloved Gurudev Swami Lakshmanjoo. This grand occasion will take place on
Wednesday, the 3rd, of October, 2012,
at our Fellowship Center located at 10925 Stever Street in Culver City, California, U.S.A. The havan will begin in the morning at 10 a.m. and culminate in the afternoon with the taking of prashad (food spiritually blessed by the Master) consisting of very tasty vegetarian Kashmiri preparations and sweets.
RETREAT: On the day following the Havan,
Thursday, October 4th, through Sunday the 7th, 2012,
the Fellowship will hold its bi-annual four-day retreat at the Culver City Center.
TOPICS for this retreat are:
Tantraloka: We will be studying in depth Swamiji’s revelation of Abhinavagupta’s 9th chapter.
The two main topics of this āhnika (chapter) are the thirty-six tattvas and the three malas (impurities).
Whereas the concept of the tattvas is central to most Indian philosophical systems, such as Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras and the Samkhya Karikas, yet these traditions maintain that creation consists of only twenty-five tattvas.
Kashmir Shaivism holds, on the other hand, that there are actually thirty-six tattvas, not twenty-five. In this āhnika Abhinavagupta, with profound skill and understanding, refutes these systems and reveals these thirty-six tattvas in great detail.
In his translation of this āhnika Swamiji reveals Kashmir Shaivism’s explanation of these thirty-six tattvas as part and parcel of “the mystical geography of awareness”.
This āhnika also covers the subject of the three malas or impurities, and shows how the malas relate to the tattvas, and also to the different states of subjective awareness.
As they are the building blocks of creation understanding the thirty-six tattvas forms an essential part of the knowledge for the serious student of Indian philosophy and Kashmir Shaivism. Knowledge of the malas helps us to understand the nature of limitation by which we are bound. But impurity in Kashmir Shaivism is not considered to be dirt, impurity is simply ignorance. And what is ignorance? It is non-fullness of knowledge.
85 Verses: In the summer of 1987 Swamiji began compiling important verses from the various scriptures he had studied throughout his life. Each Sunday he would distribute one or two slokas to devotees, at the same time giving in brief their essential meaning. In all Swamiji revealed a total of eight-five verses.
The following year Swamiji traveled to Nepal where he spent a month with the Hughes family.
During that time he translated all eighty-five verses, explaining them and revealing their essential spiritual and practical meaning. We are truly blessed that we were able to video record Swamiji reciting and revealing these special verses on practice.
When asked about the source of these verses Swamiji replied, “It is not for research, it is for your daily recitation . . . maybe sometime you will experience these stages . . . it will be helpful to you in your spiritual practice.”
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