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Published: 20 October 2008

Created: 20 October 2008

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SAUNDARYA LAHARI

VERSE 13

UNDER THE AEGIS OF THE ABSOLUTE
AMBIVALENT COMPENSATION

नरंवर्षीयांसंनयनविरसंनर्मसुजडं
तवापाङ्गालोकेपतित-मनुधावन्तिशतशः।
गलद्वेणीबन्धाःकुचकलश-विस्त्रिस्त-सिचया
हटात्त्रुट्यत्काञ्योविगलित-दुकूलायुवतयः

 Love affairs can take place under mild circumstances or under the stress of high voltage. Erotic mysticism, as it is to be understood in the Saundarya Lahari, is of the high voltage type, which is more conducive to revealing the underlying structure of the absolute ground on which the overwhelming dynamism of the principle of beauty must necessarily operate. In Verse 12, Shiva-maids have an advantage over ascetics in the matter of gaining a first glimpse of that exalted value represented by the Goddess. Even an initial participation with what Shiva represents in himself, as the highest of values beyond all states of mind known to lesser artificial austerities or disciplines that the usual recluse might practice, is to be accomplished only through a lifetime of step-by-step endeavour. In this verse, the dynamic content of erotic mysticism is further accentuated and brought into clear relief. One falls in love suddenly, and expressions like "love at first sight" reveal the unpremeditated and overwhelming nature of the event called "falling in love". The mechanism and dynamism involved in this lightning-like process are critically examined in this verse.

 .

ADDITIONAL COMMENTS WITH STRUCTURAL DIAGRAMS RELATED TO THIS VERSE FROM SAUNDARYA LAHARI/NOTES

The girls are on the negative side - see Rousseau and l'Espinasse.

Ugliness is normal on the Numerator.
Beauty is normal on the Denominator.

 

 

WORD FOR WORD
naram varsiyamasam - a man overaged
nayana virasam - uninteresting to the view
narmasu jadam - inert in sport
tava apanga loke patitam - falling within the range of your side-glance
anudhavante - they follow running
satasaha - in hundreds
galad veni bandhaha - with hair disheveled
kuca kalasaha - their rounded pot-like breasts
visrasta sicaya - by blown off clothes revealed
hathat trutyat kancyo - with their waist bands bursting
vigalite dukulaihi - silk shawls (saris) in disarray
yuvatayaha - damsels

 

 

.

The old sage, or Rishi, gazed at by the Devi's side-glance, attracts hundreds of maidens.

 

This is because he acts as a medium for Absolute Beauty.
The maidens forget the ugliness of the old man because of his absolute quality.
Their belts are bursting like a flash of lightning.
The Devi is in the Bindu or central locus, sending side-glances to the ugly old fellow, who gets some of the value-light of Absolute Beauty.

 

(Editorial Note:
There is always a danger, when one is trying to understand this text, of thinking of the Devi as something abstract.
The Devi is not outside ourselves.
Those who really understand the Devi know her as the Great Maya - Mahamaya. Maya is this universe, the "ocean of change and becoming".
There is no inside nor outside to the eternal self.

Consider the following quotes from the Guru:

"Why should I be afraid of the Devi - she is just me upside-down."

"The Devi is just a woman, any woman."
Then a student, Judy Albert, asked; "What, just any woman?"
The Guru replied: "Just any woman."

"When a woman looks into a mirror, she sees God."

 

"Everything is a reflection except Brahman."

 

(A nice paradox to reflect on. ED)

"Put the beauty of your girlfriend together with the beauty of the sunset and you are a mystic."

"There is nothing closer to the Absolute than a sixteen year-old girl."

"Erotic Mysticism is the major contribution of India to World Culture."

This is the end of this Editoral Note - our personal opinion and of uncertain value. ED )

 

.

.

Absolute Beauty is independent of physical attraction.

 

FOR A FILM:

 

 

Even a very old man, incapable of any love affairs, if the Devi's glance has fallen upon him, all of the hundreds of dancing girls will fall in love with him, with their hair hanging down and their clothes neglected, their girdles bursting.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Side-glances of the Devi.

 

("The Devi is just a woman, any woman.")

 

In schematic, structural, language, this verse wants to say that the Devi, with a side glance...(illegible in the original manuscript)...maidens on her negative side.

Then there is an old pundit, very intelligent.

He is able to describe the beauty of the Devi, because of the side-glance.
(He need not have had the full glance - and may thus be fully absolutist, like Shiva.)

 

He wants to say that the whole of nature is constituted of a bi-polarity between the mathematical function and the real, female function.

 

(They are in hundreds, because the quantity is unimportant.)

 

.
A woman's body is mainly constituted to nourish
A) a foetus
B) a baby.

Women still want the mathematical counterpart.
They fall in love with some intelligent principle.

 (The old man, as a representative of wisdom, provides the women with a positive intelligent principle and a mathematical counterpart. ED)

 

                                                      

 

They forget to fix their hair and they forget to cover their breasts.

 

It is like a flash of lightning - something bursting.

 

 

Absolute Beauty becomes absolute to the extent that it is not physical.
Then, the disparity in age between the young girls and the very old man means that the relationship is pure.
.
(In Rousseau's "Nouvelle Heloïse": a rich, noble lady comes running to the tutor.)
.
How to represent this in the scenario?
First, take care of Rousseau on the screen.

 

 

The lovers in "La Nouvelle Héloïse" meet on Lake Geneva.

 

So, hundreds of young girls have their breasts exposed by the movement of their saris,

Their hair is dishevelled and their waist-bands are bursting:

because they have come in contact with an old man (a log of wood);

because he has been glanced at sideways by the Devi.

 

Here the Omega and Alpha Points are attracting one another.
.
VERSE 14 - all of the Chakras are passed in review.
VERSE 15 - shows numerator and denominator values.
VERSE 16 - the effect on the lotus-like mind of poets.
VERSE 13 - (Blank in the original manuscript. ED)
.
Absolute Beauty is not physical, yet it is overwhelming in its appeal, transcending sex.
An old, dry man will become attractive to young women

- on the condition that he represents some absolute value within himself.

Then there is a breaking of waist bands and corsets,

suddenly there is an element of surprise in Absolute Beauty.

 

The women have abandoned themselves here, forgetting all conventional modesty.

A side-glance to an old man attracts women.
.

The multiplication table of G = symmetry.

 

(This does not have any meaning that the Editor can discern. There is a possibility that the manuscript read "G" instead of "9". This does have some meaning, though still a bit obscure in this context. ED)

.

(This word is not in the original verse, but the Guru would often describe this movement as similar to the way tribal women moved. ED)

Details

Written by Patrick Misson

Parent Category: Content

Published: 20 October 2008

Created: 20 October 2008

Last Updated: 27 September 2015

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SAUNDARYA LAHARI

VERSE 14

NUMEROLOGICAL STRUCTURALISM
AN ASCENDING VERTICAL SERIES
VERTICAL CONIC SECTIONS NUMEROLOGICALLY ANALYZED

This verse marks a further degree in the abstraction and generalization required before placing oneself in the correct perspective to be understood in these verses. The overwhelming experience of erotic joy pictured in the previous verse refers to an event that could take place in the span of one day. But there are 364 other days in the year in which young men and women must live continuously, without having such an occasion repeated in the same way each day. It is suggested here that one live through that period by verticalizing one's interests to another degree of subjectivity by abstraction and generalization, and not only live the 365 days of the year, but continue in a dispassionate manner, looking forward to no overwhelming event that might tend to make one day different from the rest of the 10,000 years within the context of which, as stated in the "Ruba'iyat" of Omar Khayyam, each human being is expected to place himself philosophically.

ADDITIONAL COMMENTS WITH STRUCTURAL DIAGRAMS RELATED TO THIS VERSE FROM SAUNDARYA LAHARI/NOTES

 

WORD FOR WORD
ksitau - for earth
sat pancasad - 56
dvi samadhika pancasad - 52
udake - for water
hutase - for fire
dvasastih - 62
catur adhika pancasad - 54
anile - for air
divi - for sky
dvih sat trimsat - 72
manasi ca - for the mind
catur shasti iti ye - 64 and thus what
mayukhaha - rays (come out)
tesam api upari - above all these
tava - your
padam buja yugam - your twin feet (are placed)

-

"56 for earth..." etc. there are six levels, with the seventh level at the twin feet.
Below and above are the Brahma Chakra and the Brahma Randra, making nine.

365 (The total here is 360, but the manuscript is clear. This discrepancy is characteristic of the problems with the numbers in this verse. ED) days are arranged vertically.

The Mandala language used in the first part of the poem  begins here.
The Devi's feet will be put in many places from now on.

-

 

-

.

In this verse we have a review of the Chakras - placing the feet on the Sahasrara - this is a revision by Sankara.

 

 

 

 

(EDITORIAL NOTE: the above structure is tentative and subject to revision. Like so much about this very difficult verse, there are many ambiguities in the interpretation the Guru gave to it. We should perhaps remember in this context that the Guru would often say: "You can't pin it down once and for all, if you fix the four limbs of the structure rigidly in place, you will get a chair or a table - it will not dance". Structuralism is a methodology, not a doctrine.)

 

VERSE 14 - all of the Chakras are passed in review.
VERSE 15 - shows numerator and denominator values.
VERSE 16 - the effect on the lotus-like mind of poets

.

Another version:

 

TRANSLATION

This verse is situated at the Omega Point, involving rays and numbers.
- in earth
- 56
- 52
- in water
- in fire
- 62
- 54
- in air
- in the sky
- 72
- in the mind
- thus 64 indeed
- rays (mayukhaha)
- even above those
- your
- pair of feet (are placed)

.

This is a numerator schema because it deals with numbers rather than with visible things.

 

 

Each number in this series is divisible by 2, which shows bilateral symmetry and an ambivalence.
In this verse, there is a descent from mind to air and an ascent from earth to fire.

 

 

 

The resultant sum of the numbers, 360, gives a total structure, or a structural whole.
The 360 is four right angles.
The same 360 will also be found in the vertical axis.

 

(EDITORIAL NOTE: the editor was present at the study sessions when the Guru produced his commentaries on this verse. When he was asked about the significance of the numbers making up 360 (56, 52, 62, 54, 72, 64) he stated that they seemed to belong to some numerological system with which he was not familiar and that this was in any case not essential to the understanding of the verse. We have requested an analysis of these numbers from a mathematician, but so far there seems to be no discernible pattern of any interest. Other experts on the Saundarya Lahari and Tantra whom we have consulted have also come up with no results. Any suggestions are welcome.)

The feet can be put at three points on the vertical axis:

at the top at the Omega Point, as in this verse;

centrally at the O Point;

at the bottom at the Alpha Point.

 

Here, it is the Absolute seen as an Omega Point structure.
A universal elsewhere is implied in the rays of light.

64+72+54=190
62+52+56=170

 

(EDITORIAL NOTE: this unequal relation between the two sections may have some parallel with the Sri Chakra of Verse 11, where there are 5 triangles facing upwards and 4 facing downwards. )

 

Sankara is confident of his ability (see later verses) because he knows he is using a structure which meets his descriptions.

Note - "sky" and "ether" are the same word in Sanskrit.
This structure is akin to Pythagoras' tetraktys.

(Both are diagramatical representations of a series of numbers. ED)

 

Another version:

TRANSLATION

The earth element, Muladhara, 56,
In water there are 52, Manipura,
Svadhisthana, in fire , 62, Anahata, in air 54,
The 72 of ether, Visuddhi, the 64 of the mind, Ajña;
Thy feet are far beyond, (above) the rays of these.

 

Instead of saying that she is sporting with Her Lord, the attempt here is to grade all of the Chakras with numbers - 56 to 74 and then renormalized to 62.

 

The rays are supposed to correspond to letters of the alphabet.

 
1) In the previous verse, girls are able to appreciate the Absolute, even in an old man (Verse 13);

2) Here, in Verse 14, the Devi's feet placed in the Bindhusthana and thus normalized - think of the feet there in a kind of bright moonlight.

 

In this verse there is a very tricky use of numeralization and structures.
It is a renormalization from the previous verse.

At the central Bindusthana there is an active principle - the Devi's feet.
The Numerator is an idea, but the Universal Concrete goes at the bottom.

The burning of the candle is in the middle - at the meeting of the idea and the concrete.

 

 

The generalized candle gets its power to burn from Shiva and its substance from the Devi.

 
The nominal candle is at the Omega Point.
The actual candle burns a single man at a time and a place.
(It can be verticalized by abstraction and generalization)

 

 

(This structure is tentative and probably needs revision. ED)

 

A verticalized candle is its reflection; the physical candle is at the Alpha Point.

At the core of your being something is changing (burning) at every moment.

This is the universal concrete man who is eating something.

 

(The reference to a candle in the first place is obscure. We presume it is an example used to clarify the four poles of the quaternion structure, like the more familiar example from Eddington reproduced below. ED)

 

 

EDDINGTON 'S QUATERNION STRUCTURE:

1. The actual chair in which the actual man can sit; this chair will exclude another chair, and occupies a particular space.

2. The virtual chair, in which a virtual man can sit; much like a mirror reflection.

3. The Alpha Point chair, the form of the chair generalized, it excludes all other chair.
This is the universal concrete version, it excludes horizontally but not vertically.

4. The Omega Point chair: the word "chair" in the dictionary, purely conceptual.

 

Devi - the idea here, in this verse, is to provide a Numerator (with the numbers. ED) to balance the Devi's Denominator.

.

Narayana Guru talks of Numerator and Denominator, front and back mirrors - everything is a reflection except Brahman, the Absolute. (Which is neutral and comprises both Numerator and Denominator. ED)

.
The author, here in this verse, reduces, categorizes, schematizes, abstracts, and generalizes.

Finally you become That; That becomes This.
The world is you, you are the world.

Experience what is inside, and the world that is outside.
When these tally, you have achieved Brahmavidya, or the Science of the Absolute.

Place yourself at the inside.
The ferryman counts ten people, then crosses over, then counts nine (without counting himself), and says: "one must be dead".

It was himself. (similarly with the number of the Chakras. ED.).
You can say it (what you see and what you are) but they must tally.
There must be an apperception.
The Darsana Mala contains the essence of Vedanta, it is all there.

 

Another version:

TRANSLATION
Earth - Muladhara - 56
Water - Manipura - 52
Fire - Svadhisthana - 62
Air - Anahata - 54
Ether - Vishuddhi - 72
Mind - Ajna - 64
And the two feet beyond these rays in the Bindusthana.

 

Which epistemology allows you to include Mind as a cosmological factor, among the list of elementals, Earth, Water, Fire etc.?

Mind is included as an universal concrete reference point.

Here the mind is put at the top, descending and interpenetrating matter, (with earth at the bottom).
The elementals must not be considered as separate or distinct from one another. (Like a blue lotus: the blueness and the lotus are not to be separated.)

Also, the elementals may be construed or seen as two sets - one for the Devi on the denominator, one for Shiva on the numerator.

Sankara multiplies the tattvas, etc., by two - because there is duplication.
But a duplication of what?

Even Socrates could not manage to include the Mind in the same schema with the Earth. He said. "I cannot philosophize with mud" (like the hylozoists). (He gave primacy to the conceptual over the perceptual - unlike Vedanta. ED)

So the two legs of the Devi are reciprocal.

We can allow Sankara to normalize upward - putting the feet at the top instead of in the middle.

The Devi is also a nourishing principle - there is a baby inside (denominator) as well as outside (numerator).

 

The two feet, vertically, come one from above and one from below.

The key word is "rays" (mayukhas)
Peripherally the rays are very colourful, and not so colourful at the centre.

The letters of the alphabet finally represent the wisdom of the Vedas.
So the letters are placed in the schema, as the bursting of the Devi - the vehicles of wisdom.

All of the numbers are duplications.
See the multiplication table of 9. That is the Absolute staring at you.

 

Below, as illustration, are some further examples from saundarya lahari/notes:

EVIDENCE OF STRUCTURALISM
1) The Cartesian Correlates
2) Probability curves - curves on graphs

 

3) Multiplication, subtraction, addition and division form a quaternion structure.

 

4) The multiplication table of 9

 

5) The four forms of logic
6) What is "pi" ?
7) Fourier functions - sinus curves in electromagnetics

 

8) "Architectonique musicale"

How do you explain this symmetry, both mathematical and logarithmic?
So these numbers must be seen in terms of duplication.

Verse 14 and Verse 9: both relate to numerology.

The most important point in this verse is that the Devi is breaking through the Chakras. This is like Verse 9, where the Devi is described as: "Sporting with Your Lord secretly in the thousand-petaled lotus"; this means that the Devi and Shiva are equal and that they are participating and absorbing one another.

What about the lower stages? Duality cannot be admitted.

See Gautama, Kanada, Kapila, Patanjali and Jaimini.
The Axiology, epistemology and methodology which unites these six Rishis (wise men), the founders of the traditional Schools of Indian philosophy, was known to Sankara and further elucidated by Narayana Guru, then expanded by Nataraja Guru in "The Science of the Absolute".

 

 

This sequence is the relative way to see the ascending relationship: the intermediary stages should be seen.
What is not clear is how they (the Devi and Shiva. ED) could meet and sport together.

 

There are now numerological and alphabetical implications.
(The vowels are close to the centre, the consonants are horizontal.)

 

 

 

 

There are certain words which are used often in the Mantra diagrams or Yantras.
So letters are taken and graded structurally - a finalization of the thought-word to reveal the Absolute in terms of the Devi, both abstract and concrete: her peripheral aspects (in the Tantra).

 

The Tantris say that the sounds can be correlated with the Colour Solid. Newton, Steiner and Goethe all had colour schemes.

 

 

 

 

(EDITOR'S NOTE: this phenomenon is known as Synaesthesia: in one common form of synesthesia, known as grapheme → colour synesthesia or colour-graphemic synesthesia, letters or numbers are perceived as inherently coloured.

See also Rimbaud's poem "Voyelles".)

"Unless people can prove to me that colour is not real....etc"

(This is a quotation from Bergson, as far as we know. ED)

Colour is a Universal Concrete.

 

 
Why should the rainbow be an illusion? c.f. Bergson.

 

 

Light, line and colour, these are the elements of a painting. (See Ruskin.)

The Colour Solid:

 

 

 

The infinite elsewhere and the infinite here and now are described.

 

The two feet of the Goddess (See Verse 9) come one from above and the other from below.
In the present verse, Verse 14, all the numbers are divisible by two.

The mayukhas (rays) are greater on the Numerator side.
But these numbers are not strict.

Different parts of the Upanishads give different numbers. Sankara here is not able to decide on the finalized numbers.

(But he is a prodigy, he knows every nook and cranny of the Upanishads.)

After three days meditation on Verse 14, the Guru has found some errors in his structuralism. (See Eddington, P. 57. Of which book is not clear. ED))
This is manifestation from the conceptual side with the six Chakras or mayukhas (rays).
You can fix the Bindusthana, that is, the central locus of meditation or interest, where you like - it can be pushed up to the top.

 

The two feet occupy the centre in any case.

The feet can represent proto- or meta-linguistics.
You can combine the two aspects and arrive at a description of Absolute Beauty.

 

As in the example of the amethyst quartz crystal; it is smoky on the bottom, but there is no difference in the beauty of the top or the bottom.

In the mystical language handed down from Sankara and Kalidasa, the touch of the Absolute is often given a slight blue or black colour.

In this verse the Devi is lifted to the utmost white-light principle.
The Gita speaks of this light which puts out other lights.

 

(Eddington and Oppenheimer saw it when looking at supernovae.)

 

As regards these numbers, the numerator side is always greater than the denominator.

Narayana Guru says that the experience must be there first, then the speculation can come to coincide with it.

 

 

 
Something is burning inside you - something warm and bright which transforms the elementals into concepts - into manas (Mind).

These numbers need not trouble us. Examine the multiplication table of 9, and examine the symmetry.
(See Verses: 9, 18, 27, 36, 45, 54, 63, 72, 81, 90).

.

 

1- Structuralism is here viewed from the Omega Point; there is a contrast between Omega and Alpha Points of perspective:

At the Alpha Point is a colour solid,
At the Omega Point is a brilliant light.

Here and now, the universal nowhere and elsewhere, at a point in time; at the O Point, the structure tends to be a matrix.

 

 

 

Letters of the alphabet of any language can be used as the monomarks for the various rays, held together at the core or bindu where the feet of the Goddess can...(ends here.ED)

The whole range of possibilities from earth to sky or mind are covered here in ascending order, and the pure notion of the Absolute in fully conceptual terms is represented by the twin feet of the Devi at the Sahasrara, the positive pole or Omega Point.

 

2- The Bindu can be lit up as by a torch and pointed at any of the intermediate Adharas or stable resting places.

Each will have some constant dignity by the cancellation of counterparts.

When this structural dynamism is kept in mind, the purpose of this verse becomes understood.

 

MATTER FOR A FILM:

Four-sided semantic polyvalence is to be brought out in this verse.
The subject here is balanced poetry; a law of rhetoric is given: alternate two things in order to give absolute balance to your poetry: this is a rhetorical and dialectical secret.

Word and meaning have to belong together, do not get lost in the conceptualised world of description.
Show a quartz crystal with light and dark sides..

 

 

 

 

Vishnu.

 

.

Kali.

 

Vishnu and Kali are very, very dark: in that darkness, suddenly show the diamond that Vishnu wears.

 

 

,

 

Saraswati.

 

There is a total structure to be shown in the four hands of Saraswati, or some other god, to show the conceptual and perceptual aspects.

(A big mirror in a dining hall: a poor man cannot eat the meal he sees there - he is actual, the reflection is virtual - this is an example of the two poles of the Horizontal Axis.)

 

The absolutist touch is supplied by the crescent moon and the matted hair - these are the same as worn by Shiva.

 

Bhadrakali.

 

Contrast Saraswati with Bhadrakali (the terrible form of the Devi).

Narayana Guru says that the Absolute is terrible, do not say that it is not.
Humanity is in agony, let your Goddess reflect this agony.

 

METHOD:

Show the silhouette of a meditator; with a red, green or white light in the centre.

.

.

 

.

 

Mark six intermediate stages or Chakras on the vertical axis, and represent the moving image of eternity with a figure-8.

 

.

 

Pass gradually from the lower to the higher.
Increase the voltage to show the ambivalence between the lower and the higher halves.

Show a radiant colour solid at the bottom, a matrix at the middle and a radiant luminary at the top.

Play with the voltage and colour techniques on crystals, make it light and dim alternately.

Let the matrix glow as if set with moonstones of different grades of fluorescence.

 

Show a scintillating diamond emitting sparks at the top - a blinding brilliance.

 

Show the imprint of red feet at the topmost point, the closing Chakra, the Thousand-Petalled Lotus of Sahasrara, the Guru and the Vidyarthi (wisdom-seeker).

 

 

 

 

Like the Pythagorean Tetraktys, this is a symmetrical picture.
It is cosmologically real here - not only imaginary.
Ontology is here related to teleology.

Water is less solid than earth - 56 - 52
Fire is less solid than air - 62 - 54
Mind is less solid than ether - 72 - 64
Altogether making more or less 360 days of the year.
(Twelve 30-day months)

 

What you gain in objectivity you lose in subjectivity.

 

 

What you gain in ontology you lose in teleology.

 

The series of Chakras can be compared to the vertebral column, which is made up of nodes.

 

 

The nodes of a bamboo are stable states of mind of the seasons recorded in the nervous system.
This is the effect of the outside on the inside.

 

Stable points are at intersections between the practical and the theoretical.
There is cancellation at different points and a one-one correspondence.

This is a secret of the universe. The feet are above.
"Feet" means any point of intersection, here they at the limit on the hypostatic side.

 

 

 

(THIS STRUCTURE IS TENTATIVE AND MAY NEED REVISION.)

 

The Goddess is lifted from an ontological to a teleological status.

The next verse, Verse 15, has a hypostatic goddess.

The six seasons are nodes of experience of the seasons in the memory: these are indeterminate, not exact numbers.

 

(EDITOR'S NOTE: the six Chakras could perhaps in some way be seen to correspond to the traditional six seasons of the  Indian year, as it progresses through the 360 or 365 days. This is just a thought.

The six Indian seasons are:

1. Vasant Ritu or Spring
2. Grishma Ritu or Summer
3. Varsha Ritu or Monsoon
4. Sharad Ritu or Autumn
5. Hemant Ritu or Pre-winter
6. Shishir / Shita Ritu or Winter)

Interpersonal and trans-subjective - there are variations between two people, it is not fixed.
Shadadharas means "six stable positions".

Subjected to critical evaluation = Mimamsa philosophy.
Advaita can put woman on top - Tantra cannot.

Panchikarana (quintuplication - the five elementals) can be:

"panchi krita tanmatra" and be cancelled out or
"apanchi krita tanmatra" - not cancelled out.

 

Numerator and Denominator must not be made to cancel and balance too precisely.
The world is not rigid, it is dancing.
If it is fixed rigidly it is a bench or stool - it is not dancing.

-

 

Details

Written by Patrick Misson

Parent Category: Content

Published: 20 October 2008

Created: 20 October 2008

Last Updated: 27 September 2015

Hits: 16107

SAUNDARYA LAHARI

VERSE 15

VEDIC WORD-VALUE IS COMPENSATED BY PERCEPTUAL VALUE

In the second line, the crescent of Shiva is also duplicated as the natural heritage of Parvati, though her glory has a negative reference only. The ambivalence is transcended when existence and subsistence, or fact truths and logic truths, meet and cancel out into the significant value of beauty, although expressed through words here.

 It might further be suggested that there is a gentle touch of sarcasm that a keenly critical eye can discern in this verse. This sarcasm is of the order of "damning with faint praise". There are numerous places in the Bhagavad Gita and the Upanishads where veiled sarcasm and faint praise blend into something ineffable, beautiful and harmless.

ADDITIONAL COMMENTS WITH STRUCTURAL DIAGRAMS RELATED TO THIS VERSE FROM SAUNDARYA LAHARI/NOTES

Hedonistic beauty without renunciation.

 

WORD FOR WORD
saraj jyotsna subhram - clear as autumnal moonbeams
sasi yuta jata juta makutam - with matted hair-made-diadem attached with crescent
vara trasat trana sphatika ghatika pustaka karam - with hands bearing refuge or boon-giving gesture, rosary of crystal beads and book
sakrt - once
natva na tva - worshipping you but once
katham eva satam - how long could a good man
sannidadhate - not attain the presence of
madhu - honey
kshira - milk
draksa - grapes
madhuri madhurina phanitayah - (blank in the original manuscript).

 

The tongue is the locus here, the transition point from perception to words. .
On the Numerator side read good poetry,
On the Denominator drink a glass of wine.

 

Before, in Verse 14, the Devi's feet were above the mind at the positive limit of the vertical axis.

 

Here he descends to the level of the goddess Saraswati, the consort of Shiva, slightly lower than in Verse 14, but still at the top of the vertical axis.

 

 

The Devi is here seen as hypostatic, with four hands, holding a rosary and a book. (traditional attributes of the goddess Saraswati, symbolizing meditation and learning).

Sankara is descending through the Chakras, from the top of the vertical axis in Verse 14.

"Having at least worshipped this Goddess once, how could his words not have the sweetness of honey, milk and grape juice?" (These are on the denominator, perceptual side. ED)

The numerator Goddess, when understood, will give this denominator benefit.
Saraswati must have the corrective principle, which is the absolute status given by Shiva's crescent moon, worn in her crown.

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Here, Sankara is equating experience with knowledge.
That is, he is equating the Experimental Denominator and Axiomatic Numerator.

 

(The experimental method involves the use of controlled observations and measurements to test and prove hypotheses.

An axiom is a proposition that does not require proof. ED)

 

 

 

 

Put the experimental and the axiomatic in two compartments and equate them.

 

 

Conceptual and perceptual entities are here brought together: perceptual factors -  honey, milk, etc., are canceled by the numerator aspect of Shiva; this cancellation is represented by the fact that the Devi wears Shiva's ornaments.

The existential satisfactions coming from the three foods are on the denominator side.

 

 

The crescent is above the Himalayas on the numerator side.

 

 

 

Ganesha is to the left - the actual side, and Subrahmanya to the right - on the virtual side.

 

The crescent moon is above; there is a dangerous middle ground of forest; then the Devi at the Alpha Point at the bottom of the vertical axis.

 

Numerator and Denominator cancel.

 

How could anyone who has seen this vision at least once ever miss tasting the absolute value of these words which describe the Absolute?

(The question is: "Why should the words of a man who has seen this vision not have the sweetness and pleasure of honey, milk and grape-juice?")

 

 

 

(The above illustration is from a popular print and does not conform exactly to the correct traditional model ED)

 

The book is Numerator, the rosary is Denominator; if you think something right, She will pull you towards Her.

 

 

 

 

The rosary beads she holds in Her hands are for Herself, for Her introverted meditation, and are thus on the negative side.
The book  is positive, like the Vedas, which are public rather than private.

The space between the beads and the book; between ontology (atman - the individual soul, roughly translated) and the teleological concept (Mimamsa) must be filled (eliminated) by the disciple in his meditation.

Reference by commentator. (? ED)

In the ocean of beauty, there is the Devi, with three eyes and eight arms - four above and four below as a reflection of the upper four.

Monomarks are marks which give you the function of certain elements in a mathematical function (equation).

The eight arms that appear in an example verse from the Malayalam edition have the function of monomarks.

 

 

 

(Maha Saraswati, a variant of  the Goddess, appearing in certain legends (puranas) is depicted as eight-armed and is often portrayed holding a Veena whilst sitting on a white lotus flower. ED.)

 

 

 

A blueprint is a conceptual entity, the house built from it is real, but depends on the blueprint and its inclusive data.

 

Exponential mathematics gives you Pythagorean distances: > trigonometry >logarithms > differential calculus.

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(In mathematics, the exponential function is the function "ex", where e is the number (approximately 2.718281828) such that the function "ex" is its own derivative. The exponential function is used to model a relationship in which a constant change in the independent variable gives the same proportional change (i.e. percentage increase or decrease) in the dependent variable.. ED)

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Eddington first created "e numbers". By them fact can verify calculation.

 

 

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(There is also an "e" number which is a famous irrational number, and is one of the most important numbers in mathematics. The first few digits are: 2.7182818284590452353602874713527 (and more ....) It is often called Euler's number after Leonhard Euler. ED)

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Calculate first, verify later.
Why are there eight arms, representing monomarks? Because there are eight functions of life.

 

(Reproduction, excretion, growth, transport, absorption, circulation, synthesis etc. ED)

 

 

 

 

Concepts and percepts participate or cancel out, as do future and past.
Matter participates in mind, mind in matter.

They participate at the interstices, at the the hub.

 

 

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Subsistential and existential values have to belong together in the same Absolute.

This verse clearly indicates a numerator Saraswati, with crystal-clear (colourless) beads or rosary.

Everything about her is white.
This is the Vedic Saraswati - sattvik - a pure, numerator factor.

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But to this, Sankara wants to add something ontologically real - a denominator factor - milk, honey and the essence of grapes: this is the Dravidian touch.

("Dravidian" was often used by the Guru to signify negative, down-to-earth ontological factors. ED)

The point here is that the numerator is valueless without the introduction of the denominator factor.

 

 

(Hylozoism is the philosophical point of view that all matter (including the universe as a whole) is in some sense alive. ED.)

 

Another version:

TRANSLATION
- Brilliantly clear as the rays of the autumnal moon
- Wearing crown of matted hair, having crescent
- Having hands bearing the boon-bestowing or refuge-giving gestures, rosary of crystal-clear gems and book
- Once
- Having adored that
- You should not be
- In whatsoever manner might be that good men
- Should come to have the pleasing sweetness
- Of honey, milk and grapes
- The array of words

 

 

If one knows the Numerator value, here represented by the Devi - to that extent, somehow or other - one will have the eloquence of flow of words of the sweetness of honey, milk and grapes.

 

One is the corollary of the other. One implies the other.
One side is the numerator Vedas; one side is denominator experience.

The crescent moon that Saraswati wears refers to lordship or kingship of the Himalayas, and of Shiva (which is a numerator factor. ED.).
This is the "idea of the holy" - the mysterious.

 

The Himalayas are like crowns and the crescent moon is particularly beautiful there.

Saraswati is described here with some of the attributes of Shiva.

(The crescent moon, matted hair etc. ED)

What is the value of numerator music to a man who is starving?

(He needs denominator food - like honey, milk and grapes. ED)

She holds a book and rosary, for she is alternately reading and meditating.

The other two hands are in the gestures of protection or boon-bestowal.

(An illustration of this is not available for the moment, so we shall have to be content with images where the two other hands play the vina. ED)

Any man who adores a two-sided goddess of this type, will somehow or other succeed in having within his reach those words which are like honey, milk or grapes.

.
If you know the Numerator side of Absolute Beauty, the Denominator comes by itself.

In the domain of the Word there are the conceptual and the experiential sides. Why should he who knows the numerator value also have the denominator value?
The array of words would have the pleasing sweetness of honey, milk and grapes.

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There are two sides which meet in any certitude. (Certitude comes from cancellation of the two sides - Numerator and Denominator. ED)

 

The value in this verse is the gift of sweetness which is as good as successful poetry.
Poetry is the art of arranging phraseology.

The presiding deity of the Word (who grants word-power to great poets) is the numerator goddess Saraswati - who is the same as Kali, as understood in the more natural proto-Aryan setting.

 

 

Saraswati.

 

 

Kali.

 

Kali is the negative or mute aspect of the Absolute Feminine Principle, and the mute denominator Bhadra Kali belongs to the negative aspect of the Word.

In the Vedic context, she transcends the horizontal axis and emerges on the numerator side as Saraswati, the benediction and the source of the four Vedas.
Kali, thus upgraded, carries a book, representing the Vedic world.

The first half of this verse refers to the presiding deity of the Word.
Even the beads of the rosary are represented as of a crystalline, colourless quality.

She is often seen in white, seated on a white lotus, with a vina (stringed instrument).

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The two remaining hands are represented as showing gestures of protection and boon-bestowing, with a reciprocity of attraction and repulsion implied. This gesture is called abhaya, protection; it indicates no alternative but surrender for the devotee.

 

 

Abhaya Mudra - "Do not fear!"

The image of the Goddess occupies only the numerator aspect here, per Sankara.
The poets should have not only the concepts, but also their perceptual counterparts, in the form of enjoyable inner experiences.

 

The creative urge is to be presupposed as a counterpart to the facility with words: thus an alternation between the two cancel out, yielding the overwhelming beauty of the Absolute.

He who sees this principle at once gets the right to be an absolutely gifted poet: whatever he writes will hit the target in the centre.

There is only good and bad poetry.

The poet who has once had this experience - tantamount to prostrating to the Goddess - can make great poetry.

 

The array of words would be awaiting the poet's command to fall into order.
But not every Goddess can grant this gift - there are secret indications here - the crescent moon and the crown of matted hair. (Which represent the asceticism she shares with Shiva. ED.)

This is the secret: the drop-out touch, the absolutist, Vedantic revaluation; the austerity and renunciation of Shiva, rising above all conventional life.

The crescent moon has a thin, logical status, this is to signify that She is as generalized and abstract as Shiva himself, representing his own value at the Omega Point.

There is no actual Saraswati to worship: she is an abstracted and generalized principle of the Omega Point.

As against this numerator aspect, above the line, think of examples of ontological experiences: like Krishna saying "I am the sapidity of water" in the Gita - it is a perceptual image raised to the status of the Absolute, representing all other perceptual factors.

 

Similarly, Sankara here uses honey, milk and grapes to represent all other perceptual enjoyments: touch, etc.

The teaching is that numerator and denominator factors must cancel out.

They represent two great ensembles: name, which is conceptual, and form, which is perceptual.

 

 

 

They are of equal epistemological status, so as to be cancelled out mutually into the resultant Absolute Beauty in poetry.

 

The book held by Saraswati means that the world of poetry is intended here.

 

Also there is a legend that Kali wrote a secret syllable on the tongue of Kalidasa, giving him the gift of "vidyabuddhi" - knowledge and wisdom. Sankara's treatment in this verse is reminiscent of this.

Honey, milk and grapes - this is still a sensuous paradise.
"Worship even once" - perhaps there is a very slight satirical touch here.
The matted hair, traditionally worn by ascetics, is negative, signifying renunciation.

(See John Stuart Mill - the principle of agreement and difference, uha-apoha in Sanskrit - see Jnana Darsanam in the Darsana Mala and the Science of the Absolute.)

 

(Mill's method of induction - that is, the process of deriving general principles from particular facts or instances -  consisted of Agreement, Difference, Agreement and Difference, Residue and Concomitant Variations. ED)

In this verse we have cancellation of the medium and the message to make poetry.

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One who can think of Saraswati in a very real sense, with matted hair, can produce poetry with the Numerator equivalent of honey, milk and grapes.

Hedonistic beauty is without renunciation.

(Here, Saraswati's beauty is not hedonistic and sensual, but austere. ED)

Here there is no colour and She has matted hair, these are signs of renunciation.
She is Gauri, the wife of Shiva.

She is Saraswati modified by the matted hair.

This shows the sympathy of a wife for Her husband, the austere Shiva with his matted hair, but She is still on the Numerator side.

The previous verse traveled upward to the feet.
Now we have a descending movement.

Here there is a thin, mathematical Vedic Devi, as though seen in moonlight.
This is a theoretical picture, but there is also a very thin perceptual experience of moonlight.

She wears Shiva's moon in order to identify with him inside, although She is not on the positive level of Shiva.

In the Mahabharata, Kunti Devi is blindfolded in sympathy with her blind husband. (The Devi here has a similar sympathy with Shiva's renunciation. ED.)

In Verse 4, Sankara rejects hand gestures or Mudras of the Devi, in favour of her feet as a source of blessing - here he accepts them, but at a very high level.

The reward is the poetic gift - as desired by Brahmins.
The crystal beads have no colour: pure intelligence is white.
Worshipping "but once" gives the power of words - not morality etc..

Honey, milk and grapes - this is not a theoretical value
- it descends to the ontological level of enjoyment and cancels the conceptual side of the rosary and book.
Even a Vedic goddess can give actual results.
Beauty arises from the cancellation of the actual and the conceptual.

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Written by Patrick Misson

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Published: 20 October 2008

Created: 20 October 2008

Last Updated: 27 September 2015

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SAUNDARYA LAHARI

VERSE 16

KEY VERSE  

Here, in Verse 16, we have to imagine two sets of persons of perfected aesthetic taste: the creative artists on one side and those who can admire the artist's creation on the other. A good car is not compatible with a bumpy dirt road; nor can a beggar wear satin or silk without making himself look ridiculous. In the same way, the poet must have a reader sufficiently intelligent, or his high-class writings will have no market at all. This is why Kalidasa and other great Sanskrit poets are now going into cold storage forever. In other words, the reader and author belong together in the same context of word-wisdom; they are inseparable counterparts. This justifies the pointed reference to "superior poets" in the first line, culminating in "the same select ones" in the last line The value called word-beauty applies equally to both of them. It is in the mind that the function of good poetry operates, whether by mind-expansion or by mind-contraction, as the case may be. If champagne contracts the mind, LSD expands it. Champagne makes you feel very comfortable but LSD can make you feel like lying on the ground on Mount Tamalpais and saying your prayers again and again.

 ("A thing of beauty is a joy forever; its loveliness increases, it will never pass away into nothingness." from Keats' "Endymion". ED)

 

ADDITIONAL COMMENTS WITH STRUCTURAL DIAGRAMS RELATED TO THIS VERSE FROM SAUNDARYA LAHARI/NOTES

 

WORD FOR WORD
kavindranam - in superior poets
cetah kamala vana balataparucim bhajante - who adore the sweetness of the mental lotus forest, when touched by the tender rays of sunlight
bhajante - ye santah katicit - such rare good souls
arunam eva - as magenta itself
bhavatim - you become
virinci preyasyas - as one dear to Brahma
tarunatara srngaralahari gabhira bhih - by profound words of most tender, yet overwhelming, erotic content
vagbhih vidadhati - by words he pleases
satam ranjanam ami - to those very good souls he affords pleasure

 

Eroticism produces poetry.

 

 

An earlier, provisional translation:

- of great poets.
- those good men who see in the forest of lotuses in their minds.
- You, who are no other than Aruna (magenta).
- for good ones, they give pleasure
- by means of Saraswati's noble words of love content.

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The forest of lotuses is the aruna (magenta) colour, the same as is seen by good men.

They recognize also that the words of love poetry give pleasure to the wise.
There is one wise man who hears the words and another who appreciates it.

 

The joy of the thing heard and the thing experienced is the same.

 

Saraswati and aruna are the same.

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(Aruna (magenta) = karuna (kindness), ED)

 

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The aruna colour belongs both the dawn and of the lotus.

 

Nominator words correspond with the denominator experience of the aruna colour.
Saraswati here is on the numerator side where poetry etc.reside.The magenta colour (aruna) colour fills the whole picture.

 

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MATTER FOR A FILM:

This is the same thing as apperception in teaching, the fusing of the old and the new - i.e. the previous Verse 15, of which this one is the converse.

 

(Apperception; in Psychology, "the process by which new experience is assimilated to and transformed by the residuum of past experience of an individual to form a new whole." ED)

This Verse 16 is the normative reference for the Goddess throughout this work.

The four-fold semantic polyvalence of this verse is found in Kalidasa:
Parvati is watering plants and Parvati is feeding Subrahmanya.

 

(The reference to watering plants comes from Kalidasa's play, Shakuntala, where she is described as watering the plants in the Ashram garden and the round water-pots are implicitly compared to her breasts. Shakuntala is the eternal feminine, "das Ewig-Weibliche" of Goethe, as is Parvati. ED)

 

The pot-like breasts of a mother are a holy thing.
You can see God there, He has used his grace to fill them with milk.
The shape of the breasts is very important: it shows that the woman has been meditating very hard; that the intuition to feed the baby is very strong.

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(Subrahmanya is referred to in the above diagram as drinking milk from the Devi's breast, in Verse 73 and elsewhere in the Saundaraya Lahari. ED)

 

In the Bindu or central locus is the abstraction and generalisation of the total value factor.
This is semantic polyvalence.

 

 

(Semantic polyvalence: the breasts and the water.pots are not limited to one meaning (semantic monovalence), as is the case with a sign, such as the letter "r" which signifies one sound and one sound only, to the exclusion of other sounds such as "p", "m" etc. On the other hand, the colour red symbolizes many things: blood, danger, "stop!" etc. which is an example of semantic polyvalence. ED)

 

This is necessarily vague, and it is Aruna (magenta) in colour: it is essence itself.
This also refers to Verse 15; these two must be studied together.
All of these verses which refer to the aruna colour should be taken together.

 

 

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Anything not affected by place or time is an Absolute, according to Sanskrit scholars.

 

 

 

 

The magenta colour is Absolute.

Magenta is the result of the cancellation of two opposites.

(The colours blue and red cancel out into magenta when brought together. ED)

An electric fan is switched off but still goes on turning; in the same way, desire, as for example the love of ice-cream, is cancelled out, but it will only be completely gone in ten years or so.

The poet and philosopher and seer are all used interchangeably.

 

The Saraswati of the previous verse is nearer to the Vedic context, but here also it is the "daughter of Brahma".
Brahma is denominator and gives a denominator touch.

 

Verse 15, 16, 17, and 18 all go together, as they all deal with colour effects.
Verse 17 also deals with poetry and Verse 18 with light effects.
Turn the light 45 degrees to the right or to the left and you get ultra-violet and infra-red.

 

(In the same way, different aspects of the Devi are revealed from being seen from different angles, ED)

There are three Devis and three sets of poets appreciating them in different ways.
Verse 17 deals with poetry and Verse 18 with colour.

A mahakavi (superior poet - from maha - great - and kavi - poet) is someone who appreciates the Vedas.

The Devi of the previous verse was white - this one is coloured.
Two light effects from above and from below meet in an actual lotus..

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