Ramana Maharshi’s Aksharamanamalai : Anecdotes and Meanings
Sanjeev Kumar Nath
Ramana Maharshi (1879-1950), one of the greatest sages the world has seen in modern times, was not a well-read person in the ordinary sense of the term, and had not even finished his school education when he had left home at seventeen to live as a sadhu at Tiruvannamalai, Tamil Nadu.
However, his memory was extraordinary, and he remembered the exact verses from many important sacred texts in Sanskrit and Tamil merely from listening to recitations and discussions.
Great Sanskrit scholars like Vashishtha Ganapati Muni and Jagadeesha Sastri would sometimes ask the Maharshi about the meanings of difficult passages in ancient texts, and the Maharshi would come up with remarkably lucid, logical explanations.
May be that is one of the reasons why an Advaitic sage like him is called a Jnani. (Of course, the primary sense in which an Advaitic sage is a Jnani is that he knows the true nature of reality: he knows without any trace of doubt that the world is unreal and the Self alone is real).
It seems his own first-hand experience of the highest truth gave him the authority to expound the deepest meanings of sacred texts. Hence, while he claimed no scholarship, great scholars came to him and got their doubts cleared. (Of course, if anyone came to him with the purpose of showing off their own knowledge or to test the Maharshi’s depth of knowledge, the Maharshi would usually not utter a single word even if asked about meanings of texts.)
Maharshi did not have any inclination to write poetry and establish himself as a poet. However, occasionally, specific circumstances seemed to have brought out verse compositions spontaneously from him.
He wrote very beautiful devotional verses in Tamil, Telegu, Malayalam and Sanskrit. Once (30 September, 1937) a devotee, Somasundaram Pillai, gave Maharshi a note-book and asked him to write something in it.
There are stories about how a devotee would sometimes write something, deliberately making a mistake or two, and show the writing to Maharshi.
Maharshi would then quietly correct the errors and give the paper or notebook back to the devotee, and the devotee would keep that as an object of worship.
So, Somasundaram Pillai also had asked Maharshi to write something, apparently to keep the notebook as an object of worship.
Maharshi asked him, “What do you want me to write?”
Somasundaram Pillai: “Anything. Even one letter of the alphabet will do”
For the phrase “one letter of the alphabet” the devotee had used the phrase ekam aksharam. Immediately Maharshi wrote a simple verse in Tamil kural venba style (a specific two-line verse form in Tamil), describing the constant Self-awareness of the Jnani, and gave the paper to the devotee. Later, Maharshi translated the kural venba into Sanksrit:
Ekam aksharam hridi nirantaram
Bhasate svayam likhyate katham
(“Inside the Heart one letter shines spontaneously and incessantly. How is it to be written/expressed?” There is pun on the word “aksharam” which can mean “letter” but also “imperishable” or “that which remains the same, unchanged”).
Once, the Sanskrit scholar-poet Jagadeesha Sastri wrote the words hridaya kuhara madhye (meaning “in the cave of the heart”) on a piece of paper, meaning to compose a couplet, but could not proceed after writing those three words. He just seemed stuck with the three words. He thought hard, but in vain. Frustrated that he could not complete a couplet beginning with those words, he kept the piece of paper near Maharshi’s seat, and went out.
Later, when he came to the Maharshi’s presence again, the Maharshi handed him that piece of paper, having composed a beautiful little poem with instructions on Maharshi’s teaching about Advaitic Self-Inquiry:
hṛdayakuhara madhye kevalaṃ brahmamātram ।
hyahamahamiti sākṣad ātmarupeṇa bhāti ॥
hṛdi viśa manasāsvaṃ cinvatā majjatā vā ।
pavana calana rodhād ātmaniṣṭho bhava tvam ॥
(“In the interior of the Heart-cave, Brahman alone shines in the form of the Atman with direct immediacy as ‘I-I’. Enter into the Heart by diving deep, with the mind investigating itself, or through control of breath, and abide in the Atman”)
Aksharamanamalai, which is perhaps the most famous of all his compositions, is composed in Tamil, a language I do not know. I have read English translations and explanations, have listened to English talks and discussions on Aksharamanamalai, and have read and sung the Tamil prayer from texts containing English transliteration. The story of the composition of Aksharamanamalai is quite fascinating.
Around 1913, when Maharshi was staying at the Virupaksha Cave on Arunachala Hill, devotees who were with him would go down into Tiruvannamalai town and beg for food. They went in a group, singing Shiva bhajans. The townspeople regarded Maharshi very highly, so housewives would be waiting to offer food to his devotees.
However, other sadhus living on Arunachala Hill soon found out that Maharshi’s devotees were the favourites of the people in the town, and they now played a trick to get the food offerings themselves. They learnt the songs sung by Maharshi’s devotees (Since these were common songs of Tamil Shaivite tradition, it was easy for them to learn them), and went into town before Maharshi’s devotees arrived, singing those songs. The housewives gave them the offerings, taking them to be Maharshi’s devotees.
Then Maharshi’s devotees requested him to give them a new song that they could sing and thus declare their distinctive identity as his devotees. Maharshi did not show any inclination to compose a song, but the devotees kept on repeating their request, knowing that eventually he could say no to his devotees.
Then one day, when Maharshi started on giripradkakshina (i.e., going round Holy Arunachal Hill), someone noticed that Maharshi seemed to be extraordinarily thoughtful, may be in the mood for writing poetry. He took paper and pencil with him and joined the group accompanying Maharshi. Indeed, Maharshi stopped frequently on the road, and wrote verse after verse.
Maharshi always went round the Holy Hill very slowly, and used to tell his devotees that one should walk like a queen in the ninth month of her pregnancy while going round Arunachala, very slowly, with the attention fixed on the Self/Arunachala. Sometimes he would take an entire day to complete the circumambulation of the Hill.
Sometimes he would start on a day, and finish the next day. (Nowadays it is a 14-kilometre circuit, but Maharshi used a shorter jungle-path, much nearer to the Hill) Of course, he hardly ever spoke when Arunachala Hill was in sight. He would be lost, gazing at the Holy Hill. And then there were people who would insist on going with him or serving him while he went round Arunachala.
Once, as Maharshi was walking slowly on the road round the Hill, he suddenly turned towards a bye lane that went off in a different direction. It was the custom for the devotees not to disturb the Maharshi in any way, for after all, he was a completely independent being, not bound to anything in the world, not even to the Ashram that grew around him.
So the devotees didn’t ask him where he was going now, but followed him at some distance and looked. They saw that a poor villager was there on that bye lane, waiting with a quantity of kanji (a sort of rice gruel). The poor man had brought the kanji for Maharshi, but was hesitant to offer it because after all, kanji is only a poor man’s fare.
He had brought it for Maharshi, but was reluctant to offer it, just as Sudama was reluctant to offer the poor man’s fare he had brought for Krishna. Maharshi went straight to him, asked him about the kanji, and consumed it with great delight, telling everyone how wonderful it tasted.
This time (when he was composing Aksharamanamalai) Maharshi’s giripradakshina was really very slow because he often stopped and wrote verses, using the paper and pencil the devotee provided. There were times when his eyes streamed tears of devotion as he wrote those verse. By the time he finished the circuit of Arunachala, he had finished composing Aksharamanamalai consisting of 108 soul-lifting verses of devotion couched in the language of bridal mysticism.
There is also one extra verse—a verse of invocation at the beginning—in which Maharshi seeks Lord Ganesha’s blessings to be able to complete the poem. Maharshi’s devotee, the great Tamil poet Sri Muruganar was fascinated by Aksharamanamalai, and wrote an extensive commentary on the poem.
He also appended a few verses in the beginning of Aksharamanamalai. Many others—scholars, philosophers, devotees—have written commentaries on the poem, and it is also one of the prayers regularly sung at Maharshi’s Ashram.
The bridal mysticism of the poem consists of the devotee-soul imploring the Lord to accept her and unite with her. Bridal mysticism is used in various religious traditions to indicate the relationship of God and men. There is the bridal mysticism involving Jesus, and there are numerous Hindu devotional texts involving bridal mysticism.
This is not about any union of man and woman, but about the soul’s intense longing for losing its identity in the Almighty, like a river losing its identity (but becoming the ocean) on joining the ocean. Aksharamanamalai uses a variety of moods to express the soul’s longing : pleading with God, quarrelling, and even something like threatening!
The medieval Bengali mystic poet Ramprasad Sen’s songs to the Divine Mother also use a variety of moods, making the meanings of the songs startling at times.
It must be remembered, however, that Ramana Maharshi was a fully realized Advaitic sage, and he had nothing to yearn for, not even for God. Advaita is different from Yoga or Bhakti in that it does not involve gradual stages towards perfection. One who has acquired Advaitic jnana does not require to do any sadhana; he is fully and forever established in the Truth; he is the Truth. How does the Maharshi then express the yearning of the devotee soul in his poem? Actually, Maharshi wrote the poem from the perspective of a devotee. It is just like the great Advaita master Adi Sankara composing wonderful devotional verses without any need for him to practise devotion.
In terms of bridal mysticism, Aksharamanamalai is taken to mean the garland (“malai” in Tamil) of the fragrant flowers (“manam” in Tamil is fragrance) of the letters of the alphabet (“akshara”, letters). The verses are arranged alphabetically, too, making the entire poem a garland offering for the Lord. Garlands are exchanged in marriage, and Aksharamanamalai also involves the exchange of garlands between the devotee-soul and her Lord.
However, the true essence of Akshramanamalai is in the assertion of non-duality, the oneness of the devotee and God, the oneness of the Reality : ekam eva advitiyam. In terms of Advaita, it is the fragrant garland of the experience of the imperishable (“akshara”) Reality.
On the evening of April 14, 1950, some time before Maharshi breathed his last, devotees who had gathered at the Ashram collectively broke into Aksharamanalai, and tears of joy streamed through Maharshi’s eyes. Before passing away, he told his attendant just one word in Tamil: “Santosham”, meaning “Contended/happy/satisfied”, expressing his gratitude to Arunachala and the devotees.
Some time earlier, one of the devotees, G V Subbaramaiya, a college professor, had wept before Maharshi, and Maharshi had asked him, “Why are you weeping? What do you want?” Subbaramayaiya said he wanted “abhayam”, “fearlessness in all circumstances”, and Maharshi said in Telegu, the Professor’s mother tongue, “Icchanu” (Meaning “I have given”).
A few years ago, the corona pandemic restrictions were being gradually withdrawn when we were in Ramanasram. About a week ago, the deepam (light/lamp/torch) was lit atop Arunachala, marking the annual festival of Maha Deepam celebrated in Tiruvannamalai. Never before had we been there during the festivities of Maha Deepam, but we knew that a massive container containing ghee and wickers is erected on the peak of the Holy Hill, and the deepam is lit.
A large number of workers/devotees from the Arunachaleswara Shiva temple tend that massive torch-like deepam day and night, keeping it alight for 10 days. This time we had arrived at a Tiruvannamalai quite unknown to us. We were used to the heat of the place in the deep south of India, but this time it was damp, cool, and raining very, very heavily.
Because of thick clouds and the rain the deepam was not always visible, but whenever it flared up on the Hill top, people would take the opportunity to bow to it and say prayers because in Tamil Shaivite tradition, it represented Shiva as the Almighty, the Supreme Godhead.
On all the days of the Maha Deepam festivities, devotees in Ramanasram sit just outside Maharshi’s shrine, facing Arunachala, and sing Aksharamanamalai. One evening we were there, singing Aksharamanamalai with hundreds of devotees, and looking at the peak of Arunachala. It was rainy and cloudy, very cloudy. The deepam couldn’t be seen at all. Then, just as we reached the end of Aksharamanamalai, the deepam burst forth in all its glory on the top of Arunachala.
The flaring up of the deepam now reminded me of what happened when Maharshi passed away in 1950.
When Akshramanamalai was sung before Ramana Maharshi on 14 April, 1950, and he passed away after expressing his gratitude, many people in Tamil Nadu and other parts of India saw a large meteor-like object move rather slowly through the night sky, and people in Tiruvannamalai saw it disappear over the peak of Arunachala.
(Sanjeev Kumar Nath, English Department, Gauhati University, sanjeevnath21@gmail.com)
[Images from different sources]
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