The Icon Thinking of En Hudu Anna

The Cosmos is a Woman

As I started the study the Bakti literature (after decades of concern with Logic and Epistemology) it was a delight to discover the Icon Thinking, which  I recognized as  more basic than analogical metaphorical and so forth.


Such a form of thinking is the essence of Living Hinduism, the Hinduism of ordinary people who go to the temple and in visions of deities, be it in stones, copper, bronze etc, get solace of a kind and as if they have witnessed the gods themselves. They are certainly naive and possess only what can be called “folk wisdom” but somehow they strike me as more authentically religious compared to the widely read and literature spewing scholars, the caattiram ootukinRa sazakkarkaL (the verbose who only study the sastras) of Appar. 


There is something beautiful and alluring about this naivete and this because, I believe, they have an implicit believe in the presence of deities and that they are around there to help the suffering people. I have talked to many ordinary and common people (like my mother who was illiterate) and they also disclose a profound wisdom which is the understanding that all gods are the same - be it Siva, Muruka, Vinayaka, Turumaal, Krishna etc - they are the same and all deserve to be respected and worshipped! Such simple people can penetrate and go to the depths and see the SAME BEING at the depths of all deities.


I think that this is all because of the basic and primordial Icon Thinking which has been buried by scholastic and analytical concerns and who by that have become very distant to genuine and simple religiosity. At the moment the Acaryas are the least religious despite their weighty scholarship in selected literature!


I would like to show in thus essay the 'Icon Thinking of En Hudu Anna’ to show that this form of thinking was there in one of the earliest civilizations in the world, SumeroTamil Civilization and that it was the kind of thinking that formed the basis of culture itself and in that the human culture was forged by the gods themselves by erupting into the human mind and possessing it.


I have taken for a renewed study En Hudu Anna’s immensely beautiful 'Exaltations of In-Anna' that have I called Sirbiyam (c. 2200 BC), using a word that occurs in Sulgi’s Hymn B. I have done the whole text with Tamil renderings. 


What I want to do now is not to discuss  so much the linguistic aspects, which I have already already done in in my other papers, but to bring out the Icon Thinking as available here and through that show the very ancient genesis of Bakti that constitutes the essence of Hindu way of life both high and low. 



The text begins as below:

1. nin-me-sar-ra u-dalla-e-a 

Lady of all the me's resplendent light 
நின் மெய் சர்வ உள் தெள்ளிய 


2.mi-zi me-lam gur-ru ki-aga-an-uras-a 
Righteous woman clothed in radiance,  beloved of heaven and earth 
மை-சீ மேலம் கூறு காங்க வான் ஊரŠய 


3. nu-gig- an-na suh-kesda- gal-gal-la 
Hierodule of An, (you) of all the great ornaments 
நங்கி ஆண்ண சூ‹கட்டு கள்கள்ள 


4. aga-zi-de ki-aga nam-en-na tum-ma 
Enamored of the appropriate tiara, suitable for the high priest-hood 
அங்க சீத்தே காங்க ஏண்ணநம் தகும்ம 



In the first line itself, the praise is NOT to Fire as in Suruppak’s Neri where the ancient ri, eri, the fire was invoked, as was also the case with Rig Veda, the agnim Ile. 

There is description of Fire but as u-dalla-e-a, the uL teLLiya, the Brilliant and Clear LIGHT, the Pure radiance. And furthermore this is NOT the impersonal Light, the Sunyata (sun< suur< suul) but rather the FORM of In-Anna Herself, the Woman, the creatrix of all, and because she is the Lady of all me’s, the Nin me sar-ra, i.e., Nin mey sarva where Nin means the immensely tall and great (Tamil: nil: to stand up, nivar; to rise up) and the beholder of all powers (me Tamil : mey, moy: power, strength)


This Pure Light is the woman, the later Parai of the Saivites but here also the hierodule or consort of An, (Tamil: aaN, aaL> aaNdavan) the righteous woman (mi -zi: mai cii) and who wears the radiance itself as her attire (me-lam gur-ru: meeLam kuurai). But most importantly, bright and brilliant as such, she is the beloved of all, both in the world and the heavens (ki-aga an uras-a: kaama vaan uraasya). 


So the Pure radiance is NOT impersonal and indifferent light but rather someone who is LOVED dearly by all the creatures in the world as well as   the celestial beings in the heavens. By her beauty of Pure Radiance she captures all and makes them LOVE her and PRAISE in true Bakti! The Woman, ParaSakti, is being viewed as a spiritual entity and NOT just simply as alluring stream of light. What was eri sudra, eri bad-da, the ancient and primordial burst of molten rocks etc, is now a Woman, immensely beautiful and alluring by her garment of Brilliant Light.


For En Hudu Anna, the spiritual essence of In-Anna, doesn’t stop here. She sees the heavens so filled with stars and other objects and immensely beautiful as such as  In-Anna herself wearing the aga-zi-de (aNi ciiyitee: beautiful ornaments), the crown studded with diamonds and wearing which she becomes fit for high-priesthood (nam-en-en-na tum-ma: eeNNanam takumma). In those days the high-priesthood was not different from queenship, the kingly was one with the priestly.


Of course she is describing the Universe but NOT  simply as a physical system where the impersonal gravitational and magnetic forces enact all the dramas. There is Organismic thinking like in ‘u-ulluh-ha’ where there is  viewing the cosmos as Se-er Maal, the Purusha of Purusha Suktam, BEING showing Himself with a thousand heads and limbs and even here  showing only part of Himself and concealing the rest.


But for En Hudu Anna, the most outstanding woman poet-philosopher of the Third Millennium World, the Cosmos is a Woman, whose man An, (aaN) remains hidden and concealed in her brilliance!


These notions are still available in Saiva Siddhanta where it is said that unless blessed by Parai, no one could witness BEING(Siva) and enjoy Civanjanam and so forth



ULLAGANAR.
( AG 7-4-2003 )


( editing and re-paragraphing by his student )