Nenju Vidu Thoothu (Message through the Heart) Of Saint Umapathi Devanayanar Rendered into English Heroic Verse without rhyme By Sekkizhar Adi-p-Podi T.N. Ramachandran The Nature of God The nimbus-hued Maal of flowery navel The Four-Faced decked with lotus chaplet golden As boar and swan, burrowed the earth and winged the sky But could not of His Nature know;again, Neither Indra, nor dwellers ethereal Nor others of all the different worlds, Nor habitants of Mantra-mountain great, And billowy seas, nor Mantras, Vedas, Nor Naada and Vintu-the crown and flower Of Vedas, His Nature can comprehend. He who is for ever easy of access (To the godly) is past both speech and logic; He is small as He is the subtlest; His Frame His Consort shares; invisible He is formless who hath a form as well And a formless-form too and none of these; He is the deathless One who is the Life Of mortals’ life; He is sooth is the true one To the devoutly true; he indeed is the Deed Behind the deed; unto the false He is The false one fictitious; He is the Father- The Lord-God, the dweller in His Flock The Nature of Soul Though I be eternal as the Bright one I abided not in the abiding state true. But fared orth for ever in transmigration Of all kinds of birth that are engendered In ovum, or sweat, or seed, or matrix And suffered deaths innumerable times; Even then, the more fool that I really am For ever bound to eat of the two-fold deed! Unschooled, with low knowledge condemned was! To join the Lokayaths; than arrow Faster I sped forth and did evil deeds That my family to shame did expose; Heinous murder, larceny, lechery, I sought after and in them all wallowed; I’d not seek to know what ought to be known; Unto the mind folorn and buddhi errant, And to arrogance by buddhi begot, I slaved, grew weary as body wearied, And did waste as my body wasted, sure; I know not of my life’s sorrows to relate. The Nature of Bond To flint-hearted Lust, Wrath, Passion, Pride, Envy And to the faculties ten and matras ten, To the five elements illimitable, To brain-pervading felony three-fold, Gunaas three-fold, malaas three-fold and states Three-fold and to deeds two-fold which all things Embrace, to the invisible airs ten, To relations, the very form of deeds two-fold And to wealth rare, I slaved and hard did work Deep immersed in boundless fear and cruelty Ignoring the pursuit of the path great That leads to the great God, serpent-cinctured But stood plunged, all bewildered in billows Of buffeting sea of deed-breading tools; Dawning wisdom iparts the saving truth That TRUER KINSMAN than THOU, there is none. They that really realise this truth, the knowledge Of Life, and the Great Being that truly is The knowledge behind the knowledge of Life Are the absolutely liberated; Others in the net of bewilderment Are entangled sure; thus did speak the poet Of divine afflatus, Valluvar great. His words of truth I ignored and did toid To propitiate full the sense five, And in this did persist relentlessly Only to sink deep in the sea of sin; Caught was I by the net of damozels’ eyes Where I learnt the fine art of lechery; Little knowing the true state I blabbered Full many a word of cruel import. For ever in the cycle of birth and death I involved myself: Behold, oh my Heart The decadent plight of my piteous life! Now hearken with care to what I relate. The Sate of God He is the One enthroned on the Silver Mount; His smile of frown did to cinders reduce; The forts of those that respected Him not; He is the bright Light supreme that issues From the summation of Vedas boundless; He is the Alpha, the Immaculate; The One to whom blemish is alien; He’s known only by the knowledge of those That possess enlightened knowledge divine; In their bosoms he enters to abide He is the One of Space righteous that sustains The inner space of Space; He is the Light That lights the light by the Grace begotten; He is the Gracious One, the Giver of grace To Grace; immensurable He doth stand Pervading all; He’s alrady with them That think on Him; He is not to be known Bye mere knowledge; He is the fadeless One Of effulgence, the blooming brilliance All-pervasive; the flame immutable One earth; the blemishless One invisible Save to the inner eye; the One immanent And transcendent too; of the ineffable God’s glory, I ……… fetter’d of deeds two-fold…… Will relate to you, as in my power It lies; now I bid thee listen with care. The Ten Insignia (1) The Mountain He is beyond the touch of paasam manifold And His is the Mountain of Love and Grace. (2) The River From the Mountain of Righteousness supreme Down descends His River, winding its course T the delight to earthly lives; destroys Doubt, theft, fear, lust, murder, wrath and effects Of all the deeds; runs with bosom-thrilling Sounds of “Aum” through Vedas and Aagamas Grace-abounding; dashes forth uprooting The thicket of triple mala and passes Beyond the shore of scriptures and instruction To quell experience empirical; Removes the five-fold passion and desire Yclept the long-renowned body, mouth, eyes Nose and ear; wipes out full the weakening Speech, feet, hands, and organs excretory And genitals; gushes torrentially To pull down the irremovable bondage Forest-like; and rolls on everywhere to dash To pieces, by its grace, the mind, buddhi Ahamkar and chittha ever distracting; On it flows washing three gunaas away; The confounding of sense ceases as it Courses with thrill supreme through the human frame To sever the lust bred by damozels Whose bosoms boast of sandal paste fragrant And to fill the fields of passionlessness; Forth it proceeds to purify the abodes Of Sun, Moon and Agni and in justness Is firm attached to the bases six and spreads In the realm beyond the ten airs mighty And higher soars beyond the elemetns five To transcend Ayan, Ara, Mahesa And Sadaa-Siva and all thetatwas too Of Naada and Vintu and the fathomless Zero which it doth subdue and again Passes beyond the land of knowledge great, Absorbent of all the innumerables. (Thus) it grants to Souls clarified and from Doubts freed, its Own Knowledge which his Moksha, And dwells in all flesh inseparable..... …. … And as its own, entering their very lives Like the coursing beyond the five bodily states Towards the great sempiternal haven Of every-lasting effulgence great, doth fun His River of Bliss Stream, Grace-abounding, Perpetual coolth, from deception free. (3) The country Comprehension and practice of Sruti And Aagamas lead to perennial bliss Which is His Country inaccessible. (4) The Town His Town is the dwelling of such souls which Learning by mastery of arts, eight times eight, Have cut asunder the source of all desires; Placid remains their Chinta in Silence Unique of Siva-Gnanam soused for ever. (5) The Garland A flood of tears bred by love cascade from The eyes of devotees; their Chinta Is serene, of confounding doubts well-cleared; Theirs is realisation; constantly thrilled Their bodily hairs stand ever erect; Of falsehood they will have none; their hearts true Atremble melt with love unbounded for Him; The great Grace that draws these hearts is His Garland. (6) The Horse His is the Horse which abides recondite In the thought of those thinkers who reside Beyond the dark realm of space, universe, Mountains, seas, under-worlds-all seven-fold, Transcending the five organs, the elements Life and feeling; they are knowledge, and are All things as well as the reverse thereof. (7) The Elephant Penertrating beyond the nether worlds By rare words pictured, it is the support Of seven-fold-middle and upper-worlds; Is ineffable and effable and is of The form life and soul of Vedas and six Angaas; it quells the vast cruel sorrowing Paasam and smites the sea of birth to turn Dustily dry; again it doth fiercely scorch Doubt-breeding lust, anger, miserliness, Moham and madam and extirpates action Which causes the cycle of birth and death: It does away with the false theories Of all the vociferous religions; Utterly extirpates fear and murder; It speeds dripping ichor of grace divine Into the grove of tattwas and feeds on bliss Of honey with delight; the Vedas four It doth wear as its two pairs of bright tusks; It is the Tusker of Divine Gnosis (8) The Banner His Banner non-pareil wafteth beyond The religions six and clears the world Of its burthensome misery immense. (9) The Drum Queling the rebellious flesh they do Worship the First one in their enthroned hearts; They are oned with Him and are immune from Births future; by yogic process they stay The straying airs in their bodies; the wind Ethereal too they detained and cause the glow Of flame ever uniform and achieve bliss Of the sound of their lives is wrought His Drum. (10) The Fiat In all the worlds created and sustained by Ayan and Maal, beyond them and everywhere, In the upper worlds and in the city Of grace unperceivable, reigns His Fiat. (11) God’s Greatness He is of boundless knowledge; yet He is Not to be seen by mere knowledge; He rules Over the realm of all arts and knowledge By sense utterly incomprehensible; A subtel Trickester is He who fills the worlds And all the cardinal points with His light; He’s the One beginningless and endless; He stands as the root of all, the seed as well; He is that which germinates from the seed; He is the body and the tanmatras, The elements and the pure space of Zero, The void and the things beyond the mere void. (12) Gnaana Acharya Unto me e senseless one He granted Heaven, my fall into the cruel wav-tossed Sea of birth averting; He is my Lord! The Saints great Sampandhan! His blessed feet Worshipped by all, he planted on my poor crown; My King is He; the Rider of the Bull; He’s the meaning of the words of the wise; The First One beyond compare; self effulgent; He needeth no happiness from without. In the hallowed form mighty of Guru Sans gunaa or mark he stood, the great Lord! He did snap the bondage, the cause of birth; He abides in Tillai where dwell the learned, To mere intellect inaccessible. (13) The Abolition of Malaa He the Lord ethereal came in procession; I adored Him, seeing others Him adore; He threw his eyes on me; in that instant Abolished was the bunch of my malaa Five-fold, and He transformed my very thought Uprooting the tattwass-six and ninety, Hard to narrate; to me my inner spa Of honied ambrosia, he did reveal And demonstrate that the sacred ashes white, The form of Siva’s devotee and worship Of Siva alone to be true; ‘Riches And life domestic are false’, he declared; He did inculcate the inner content Of the Pentad of Syllables sacred And how to chant and count and meditate On it; He taught me to look within too Fearless, and trim the inner taper aflame And merge with the inly light of that lamp Bright with boundless effulgence beautiful; Thus abides the Lord like homey in bloom; He is to be contemplated even so; He showed me His light wrought of grace sans form And in place sans gunaa or mark Bade me rest; my life and all He did Unto Himself draw and with me did mate In a flooding grace of intoxication; He made me forget my thievery and did Transform my knowledge into wisdom true; He made me lose my I-ness and My-ness; My cycle of birth and death he snapped; He is past speech; He’s inaccessible To any, howsoever great he be; He is Of divine attributes eight-fold; He is The Wielder great of the letter matchless. He is the Songster great and Dancer grand; He abides in Koodal with a vast court endowed; He is not to be seen by the frivolous. The unfriendly and the flippant; He is The sight of the seer; from Him the Paanar A gift of seat wrought of wood did receive; More incarnadine than russet sun-set Is He who is beyond Maal’s prehension; All things He fills with His omnipresence; By his grace He snapt the cycle of birth And death, ever revolving like the fan, Simoon, beetle and rotating wheel of fire. He is the falsity of the false ones; He is the embosomed truth of them who know; His hand doth wield the axe; Oh my Bosom! Hearken attentively now to the course Of thy journey to the Father’s Abode. (14) The Goal With each dawning day, himselfhe perfumes Gormondises, wars vestment velveteen And longs to be soused in the merry sea Of sexy chits of flower-decked locks And maintains that this life Epicurean Is indeed mukti; other joys aren’t mukti. Like a devil of darkness he doth lie; Beware him, the Lokayath; go not near him; Go not near them who not having seen the Lord But only themselves give out; “I am Brahm”; Be not trapped by the doctrine Buddhistic Which says; “It is no slaughter to eat the slaughtered; The only Deity sure is righteousness, And right conduct is nothing but patience.” With contentment false, their bodies’ hairs pluck And discard shamelessly their accoutrement; They maintain that mukti is controlling The sense five; go not near these deceptive Jains. Believe not as true, the words of the Brahmins Who chant hoary Vedaas of goodly words Composed, but know not their import or use. Shun the base who in their hearts do contemn God-given ashes and God’s own Temple; Befriend not fools who have little regard For the true form of tapas, worship, grace, And knowledge true; shut thine eyes on them all Who adore dying gods and hate Siva. (15) The message His eyes cast looks of grace on us and thus Ruled us; He is the great saint Sambandhan; He is the Beyond that lives beyond the End; He unto His Court, before him prostrate, Adoringly hail Him high and wish Him Victory eternal and praise Him thus; “You once did peel the skin of the warring mammoth! Be stung by the arrows of Manmathan? Will they think on wealth fleeting and flee Thee To wallow in Hell cruel? Or will they Be trapped by religions vociferous? Will they stand confounded many a time? Will they be witched by the dames whose bright teeth The pearl do excel and be thus fuddled By lewd desire for union with them? Will they both day and night take notes of what The stats twenty-seven and planets nine Foretell? O great One whose Eye to cinders Did Manmathan reduce! Setting her mind On the sea of bliss, the damsel hath clean Forgotten her own self; You must rid her Of her sorrows.” Say thus and beg of Him Grant her His roseate feet of lotus; So praying, beseech Him adoringly Again and again; from Him His chaplet Of cassia get; extol Him and of Him take Leave to come back and live with me for ever. * * * To rid the deeds begotten by damsels Whose eyes deceptive pierce like arrow. Oh my Bosom! Fare forth to fetch the garland Of the great Saint Sambandhan who averted My fall into painful transmigration And come back filled with memorised bliss.