THE SOUNDARYA LAHARI : Jagad Guru Swami Sri Adi Sankaraacharya’s Immortal Creation :

27/10/2018
1.

The Saundaryalahari (wave of beauty) is an unique lyrical composition. It combines the virtues of a devotional poem, a foundation text for saktisim (sakti worship) and a mantra sastra all in one.

It consists of two parts : the first, called the Anandalahari (wave of bliss) consisting of forty one verses and the second called Saundaryalahari, composed of fifty nine verses.
Notwithstanding this, the entire set of hundred verses are referred to as the Saundaryalahari. An additional three verses are accepted by some, bringing the number of verses to one hundred and three.

Traditionally the work is ascribed to Sri Sankara, but some dispute this. Their contention is that the master of advaita vedanta postulating the non duality of the self and the  absolute, could not have composed a devotional work, glorifying the duality of Sakti and Siva. And that the intellectual purity of the paramahamsa parivrajaka acharya could not have concerned itself with tantra, yantra and mantra. Indeed they go so far as to claim that none of the other devotional poems attributed to him were authored by him.

While not wishing to get into a polemical debate with erudite scholars, one cannot but assert what is obvious to the meanest intellect. The first point is that Sankara, the supreme dialectician spent his life in an unceasing effort to analyze, criticize, edit and restate the best in Hindu spiritual traditions, discarding the unappealing, the immoral, the crude, the unthinking and illogical aspects that had crept into the religio spiritual fabric over time.

The shanmathas or six religious traditions (the worship of Siva, Sakti, Vishnu, Ganapathi and Kumara) were not invented by him, but were living traditions of Bharatavarsha. These were merely refined by Sankara emphasizing their upanishadic basis which had taken a back seat over time, allowing the more visible but intellectually and spiritually void aspects to the forefront. Sankara, in the traditions set down by the divine author of the Gita, truly believed in the idiom “ to each, his own”.

Unlike many other religions of this troubled world, the Hindu way of life has never sought to destroy the many modes of religio spiritual life prevalent in India or indeed their followers by sword and fire. It has always been inclusive rather than exclusive, assimilating local ideas, beliefs, traditions etc, by bringing them in line with the esoteric upanishadic traditions of the absolute, which may not be comprehensible or indeed of any interest to the common man. The enlightened seers of sanatana dharma only saw the glory of unity in the charm of apparent multiplicity.

When looked at from this perspective, one is not surprised that the best of Sakta tradition is contained in this composition. Indeed the conceptualizing of Sakti and Siva is not a matter of accepting duality of the absolute, but of emphasizing them as comprehensible points of reference for understanding the abstract absolute.

To be Continued ..