Type of souls and field in agamic science - part 4

Type of souls and field in agamic science - Part 3

Type of souls and field in Agamic Science - Part 2

Type of souls and field in agamic science - Part 1

Talk by Dr Sivakumar, University Science Malaysia.

The Tamil Hermeneutics and Metaphysics- Part 9

LOVE AND OVERCOMING CONCEALMENT. 







Man is IGNORANT and this, he has been so from the most ancient times; the earlier we go into human evolution through regression into his primordiality, the more ignorant he is seen to be. 


The absolute limit in this evolutionary regression is a condition of ABSOLUTE DARKNESS, the Sutta Kevalam, as the Saivas would say. That which creates this primordial condition AGAINST which he has to FIGHT is the ANavam, the metaphysical stuff; the Black Mass that does nothing but to destroy everything that surrounds it and comes its way. It is LIGHT HUNGRY, destroys and dissolves LIGHT wherever it is and in whatever form it occurs and breeds through that Darkness. 


When BEING, that remains transcendent even to this and sheds light by VIOLATING the hold of ANavam, the human psyche gets EYES TO SEE, no matter how primitive may be the vision. Right at that moment, the psyche becomes PHYSICAL-METAPHYSICAL, bipolar in structure that Tirumoolar first articulates as "sat-asattu aanmaa" , the psyche that is simultaneously physical and metaphysical, that which seeks the absolute as well as the nonabsolute. The LIGHT draws the souls through a psychic phototropism of its own, unto BEING making it METAPHYSICAL and the DARKNESS breeding Anavam too attracts it through making DEATH desirable and hence PHYSICAL. 


In the bosom of man there is both EROS and THANATOS ,( thanks to FREUD here) always in conflict.; the question: to be or not to be always raising its ugly head creating a crisis both personal and cultural.


Suruppak NeRi (Sumerian :.na.ri) of Suruppak, the Sumerian sage of ancient times begins his NeRi (na.ri) with the immensely arresting cosmological thoughts 


Sumerian :" u-ri-a u sud-ra ri-a " which should be understood as : 
Tamil:  uu eria uu suud-ra eri-a : the time when there was fire (light) , the time when there was hot fire balls" and so forth.


The cosmology and in which creature evolution is written begins when the Darkness of Emptiness (Sumerian. gi-ria) was shattered by fires of molten lava spilling out , a notion perhaps suggested to them by the observation of volcanic eruptions in vicinity they might have lived ( the Indonesian archipelago, as I have argued for elsewhere)


When man becomes PHYSICAL and neglects the metaphysical, he becomes GODLESS and hence beastly, the pure acquisitive economic man who sees everything in terms of economics, measures happiness in terms of economic prosperity like what we see today, lost in the desert heat of meaninglessness that he calls postmodernism with its NIHILISM. Disruption of both personal and social becomes the rule of the day and AGGRESSION, the desire to KILL becomes the ruling passion. Modern positive science is methodical aggression on Nature, robing the treasures buried there through mindless and violent intrusion. The LAND ceases to be the SACRED PLACE, the Talam of Gods, a PLACE where divine powers make their presence visible to the physical eyes, a TEMPLE like it was for the ancients and like it is for the primitive people in their pristine naivety.


However when the notion of SCIENCE gets liberated from its physicalism and made HERMENEUTICAL and through that made to recover its originality, it becomes a tool for recovering the METAPHYSICAL WAY OF being, of living, of Existing. It allows DISCONSTRUCTION, destroy the ongoing and through that allow the emergence of the higher. Sometimes in this the personal evolutionary ASCENDANCE where the mesmerizing , the spellbinding magical attractions of the PHYSICAL, the maayasakti (thanks to Sankara here) of the purely material , is overcome and the metaphysical GROUND attained.


It is at this point that CONCEALMENT ( Tamil, tirobavam) as instituted by BEING is recognized as DISTINCT from the DARKNESS injected by Anavam . Concealment is positive in its effect. It promotes the noblest sentiments and highest forms of SACRIFICE.


It is concealment that institutes the philosophical quest, the free expression of search for the deepest where every discovery ushers in a fundamental shift in paradigm and for which reason the conservatives, particularly in religion , always try to arrest it for fear of losing their well entrenched position


And most importantly , every penetration into the Depths develops LOVE and shapes man as more humane and divine. And to the measure LOVE grows and becomes more and more UNIVERSAL , to that measure the transcendent CONCEALMENT is also withdrawn.


Hindu life as dominated by Brahamanism , submerging the LOVE fostering Bakthi , has become loveless life with the mind caught in the prison of caste and which makes even human interactions to be analyzed and regulated in terms of caste distinctions with so many social taboos .


The average Hindu person at the moment appears NOT to be able to think beyond caste, free of caste moorings coming from his birth , as his birth mark.


Where there is no LOVE, where there is no Bakthi, there appears to be no genuine objectivity also.


This life of LOVE unto BEING in which the transcendental concealment gets slowly withdrawn is the genuine life of Bakthi, of loving devotion to BEING. And because the death-bringing ANavam, always there ever ready to jump back and imprison the mind , is kept at bay , life is joyful , full of bliss, with love unto all irrespective of whatever difference that may prevail.


Life with BEING and hence genuine metaphysical life cannot but be beautiful and full of happiness, a life of CONTENTMENT and fulfillment., and it must be added here, of service or ToNdu. It is NOT an accident that the Bakthi revolutionaries are called TituttoNdar - the noble servants -- and caste distinction among them was supremely irrelevant.


All the earthly and physical desires are transmuted into the transpersonal and universal and hence given the eyes of Grace , the ArutkaN, that does not see any difference even if it prevails. 


Ullaganar

( editing and re-paragraphing by his student )

The Tamil Hermeneutics and Metaphysics- Part 8

BEING and CONCEALMENT 
( Friedrich Nietzsche , 1844 - 1900 ) 


What gives the unique flavour to the Tamil Philosophical Tradition is the distinctive Literary Hermeneutics that we find in the end part of Marapiyal in Tolkaapiyam, the like of which are not found anywhere else, as far as I know. 


It is the extesion of this to the field of metaphysics that we find in the early history of Tamil Philosophy that led to the displacement of the incomplete metaphysics of others. 


What Meykandar does, certainly to his eternal credit, is to generalize the literary Hermeneutics of Marapiyal as the methodology of Philosophical Hermeneutics and applying it NOT only to the scriptural texts but to the WHOLE WORLD as a Text. He generalizes not only the notion of utti, the interpretive movements of understanding that illuminates the mind, to make a literary text translucent but also the notion of TEXT itself; it is generalized to include not only the world as whole but ANYTHING that is encountered by human understanding itself . Human understanding is there as such and such only because there is SEEING and there is seeing only because there is a SHOWING and of course that which shows is BEING. And seeing generates texts because the showing itself is TEXTUAL. For who else or what else can show in this TEXTUAL manner such that the creatures can SEE, retain it and begin to understand?


The BEING that SHOWS can show the most appropriate and relevant for the creatures only because IT stands non-alien to the selves; the BEING is with the selves, along with them and also ABOVE them. For showing requires that BEING sees exactly where the self is and in what condition it is. This cannot happen unless IT is WITH them and continuously ALONG with them. ( onRaay, udanaay). But it has to be ABOVE the selves also in order to SHOW, to project a way on Being as possibility for the self to be, if it chooses so ( veeRaay ) and articulate That I am, i. e. tat twam asi?


God is not dead as Nietzsche claimed but only we are dead to His Presence. maybe this is what Nietzsche meant in the first -- human thinking having become arid and atomic with its blindness to the presence of BEING


But despite all these ways of the presence of BEING in the Being of the creatures how is that most of the creatures are largely UNAWARE of BEING as such?


Another way of putting it , why is there IGNORANCE called Avidya, anjnjanam and so forth in Indian philosophical tradition? Not simply ignorance that is because of metaphysical blindness but even given the capacity for acute thinking, including that of brilliant epistemologists and what not, there is not admitting the presence of BEING and accommodating oneself to it?


Well we should note here that there is abconsciousness, not preconscious , subconscious , unconscious etc. but rather ABSENCE of the consciousness of the presence of BEING. This we note because of CONCEALMENT, the THIROBAVA, a casting screen by BEING itself so that the creatures can go on existing as if BEING is NOT THERE. The visions of BEING are blocked off so that the creatures are NOT AWARE and go on living blissfully in their materialism or physicalism, in the IGNORANCE of the presence of BEING.


BEING conceals Himself even from the intelligent only because such people lack aruL, the presence of Grace in their bosom that would make them LOVE and CARE for creatures other than himself / herself. BEING withdraws from loveless heart and for which reason advocates that we should pray for LOVE towards all ( attuvitu anbin tozu )


This is the origin of ATHEISM and the various logical positivisms , and materialistic idealogies of the Indian and European, the Godless metaphysics of various kinds.


However this is also an expression of the GRACE of BEING, for Godless metaphysics have a place in the evolution of Human Understanding. The physical has to be understood in its PHYSICALITY prior to understanding the BEING that is IN it and transcends it. 



ULLAGANAR

( Editing and re-paragraphing by his student )

( photo above taken from wikipedia with thanks )

Are Tamil Gods and Goddesses Historical Figures? - Part 2

Talk by Dr Sivakumar, University Science Malaysia.

Are Tamil Gods and Goddesses Historical Figures - Part 1

Talk by Dr Sivakumar, University Science Malaysia.

The Tamil Hermeneutics and Metaphysics- Part 7

VIOLENCE AND METAPHYSICS 

It is generally little known that metaphysical life is in fact violent, violence turned inwards against the beastly ANavam that obscures visions and thereby disallows the souls from glowing in TRUTH, in Pure Light. Also as the real Satan, with demonic powers to pull unto itself and cause self destruction thereby , cause both psychical and physical death as such, it has to be BATTLED with in order to escape from its ghastly pulls. 

All severe penances, self mortifications , the denial of the "pleasures of the flesh" are expressions of this violence, directed of course inwards at the level of metaphysical existence. But prior to that it may express itself as social violence that we see among the religious along with enormous amount of self sacrifice . Only the VIOLENT can sacrifice self which is in fact KILLING the EGO and offering it to BEING. 

Selflessness is a product of violence of self over itself. 

This is a kind of violence that all great shapers of civilization all practised. They waged wars physical or intellectual not like a king who wants to gain sovereignty over the lands but rather DESTROY the hold of ANavam , the Satanic forces and bring back civilization. 

And they fought all these battles as surrogates to divine powers that takes control over them and hence transpersonal in their thinking acting. 

BEING itself is VIOLENT for it has to BREAK the primeaval DARKNESS spread by ANavam in order to SHED LIGHT. In the beginning there was DARKNESS, only chaos of Darkness and it has to be violated to make present Light and hence consciousness. 

But this violence is out of LOVE, in order to do GOOD for the infinite number of souls that remain atomic and TOTALLY blind in the bosom of ANavam that is BLINDNESS itself. Each violent burst of BEING , the productive intrusion, is shedding light, making VISION as such possible for the souls and because of which they break lose of blindness and atomicity and begin to SEE, of course, in stages. 

BEING is violent only because it is LOVE supreme. And this is where it differs from the violence that is evil and criminal. The violence of BEING is the violence of a HERO who provides SECURITY through battling the evil forces and keeping them at bay . Without the VIOLENCE of BEING the creatures are NOT SAFE against the bestiality of ANavam. BEING because HE is benign also becomes the Rudra and the Terrible Mother Kali and so forth , all to provide security for the creatures so that they can sojourn safely in their metaphysical search. 

The destructive and gruesome archetypal presentations -- Rudra, Kali, Durga , Narasimma and so forth are also benign like a Hero who brings and provides security and hence prosperity for the people. 

The leader who turns out to be HERO is the type of individuals who can provide the right leadership and take the people in the RIGHT WAY, the TiruneRi. 

BEING as the violent throws the creatures into sufferings that are Tiikkai, burning off the inherent atomisers, the mummalam by throwing them into the deserts , into the fires. At physical level, there is actually walking over the fire, sufferings through self denial and social isolation. At metaphysical level, however they become intense thinking , meditation and so forth that breaks through the metaphysical IGNORANCE and secures a PURER WORLD. The acts of meditation are acts of violence that removes the dirt within and brings about self purification. 

Only those who cannot face and execute the INNER VIOLENCE set up certain conformities as THE authoritative and REFUSE thereby to think and effect the metaphysical inner violence. 

ULLAGANAR.

( editing and re-paragraphing by his student )

Pulam as field in Tamil - Part 2

Talk by Dr Sivakumar, University Science Malaysia.

Pulam as field in Tamil - Part 1

Talk by Dr Sivakumar, University Science Malaysia

Tamil Musical Linguistics by Professor Veerapandian- Part 4

Talk by Professor Veerapandian

Tamil Musical Linguistics by Professor Veerapandian- Part 3

Talk by Professor Veerapandian

Tamil Musical Linguistics by Professor Veerapandian- Part 2

Talk by Professor Veerapandian

Tamil Musical Linguistics by Professor Veerapandian- Part 1

Talk by Professor Veerapandian during recent visit to Penang.