Great Devotees of Lord Siva 66C

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Om Namah Sivaya Akka Mahadevi In the 12th century, Karnatak witnessed a renaissance which exerted its influence on religious, social, economic and educational spheres. The leader of this renaissance was Basaveshwara, a Prime Minister to King Bijjala, who ruled from 1157 to 1167 over the Kalachuri Empire. Kalyana, a city of historic importance in the present day Karnatak State (India), was the capital. Basaveshwar was a mystic by temperament but a statesman by profession. The world presents few instances in whom fugitiveness of a mystic and precision of pragmatist are demonstrated by one and the same individual. Basaveshwara was an instance in point. One of the monumental works that Basaveshwara did was the establishment of an institution named Anubhava Mantap. It was a spiritual as well as a social academy presided over by Allama Prabhu. That this rare but monumental institution in the cultural history of India was founded by Basaveshwara is corroborated by the sayings of his contemporaries. It was a nucleus around which gathered persons of all shades and all professions and of all ranks, ranging from the prince to the peasant, to take part in the deliberations of the Anubhava Mantap. It is gratifying to learn that amongst the assemblage of these persons numbering about 300, there were nearly 60 women mystics of whom Akka Mahadevi was the beaconlight. She could stand in comparison with any woman mystic either of India or of the rest of the world. She excelled all in point of her astounding asceticism and intense desire to realize God. Her sayings are

characterized by the exuberance of emotion, the sublimation of elegance and the transfiguration of grace. When Mahadevi came to Kalyana she found herself in the midst of the saints who were near and dear to God. Communion with the saints brought a great change in her life. The subtle but irresistible influence of the saints enabled Mahadevi to scale the heights of spiritual life. She speaks in eloquent terms of the benefits she derived from the company of the saints. "I sing, dance, hear, walk and speak in happy fellowship with thy saints, Oh! Lord.... Through conversation with the blessed ones, I have gained respite from my grief. Oh! Lord, I cannot bear parting from the blessed ones who know Thee. ... When a soul rubs another and divine experience is born, the traits of the body are all burnt. .... the infirmity of my body is no more; the tremor of my senses is now stilled; the mind perplexed is now calm and serene... all this I gained through the

company of the saints. Basavanna's devotion, Channabasvanna's enlightenment, Madivala's firm faith, Prabhudeva's fearless and carefree state, Ajaganna's clarity of perception, Nijaguna's purity of conception, Siddharama's trance state; the mellowing grace all these saints showered upon me, Oh! Lord." The communion with the saints brings wisdom to the simple and sudden calm to those who are tormented by doubts. It floods the personality with new light and the passage from one spiritual state to another is achieved. At the moment of indecision it gives birth to authoritative commands which quell the sufferings of the self. By the communion with the saints even spiritual conversion is attained. Penetrating with the

strong sense and feeling of which, the soul skippeth in its body for great joy and in the strength of this virgin love exulteth and praiseth the great God for His blessed gift of grace. Akka Mahadevi started from Udutadi, arrived at Kalyana and proceeded to Shrishaila, the place of her last destination where she saw face to face God Channamallikarjuna and was absorbed by him in the plantain grove. This is indeed the secret union here the heart speaks to the heart: "With thy sweet soul, this soul of mine Hath mixed as water doth with wineWho can the wine and water part Or me and Thee when we combineThou art become my greater self Small bonds no more can confineThou hast my being taken

on And shall not I now take on Thine?Me Thou for ever hast affirmed That I may ever know thee mineThy love has pierced me through and through Its thrill with bone and nerve entwineI rest a flute laid on Thy lips A flute, I on thy breast reclineBreathe deep in me that I may sigh Yet strike my strings and tears shall shine." Mysticism is essentially a movement of the heart, and an intuition of love to the reality. It seeks to transcend the limitations of ego by surrendering it to the real, to satisfy no idle curiosity, to obtain no other worldly gain than to establish conscious relationship with the object of love. This intuition of the real lying at the source of the tangible world is present in a modified form in all the arts. It is this which gives to them that peculiar vitality, that strange power of communicating a poignant emotion, a heightened form of experience. Blake says that painting as well as music and poetry exist and exult in immortal thoughts. But every artist who has these partial intuitions of reality is not entitled to be called a mystic. The true mystic is a person in whom such powers transcend the merely artistic stage, in whom the transcendental consciousness can dominate the normal consciousness and in whom the surrender of ego to the embrace of reality is complete. An artist tries to give us in colour, sound and words a hint of his ecstasy, his glimpse of truth. We know how small a fraction of his vision he can contrive to represent. The mystic too strives to tell us his experiences of the beyond. Were the mystic a

musician, it is probable that he could give his message to others in terms of that art far more accurately than language can allow him to do. Mysticism finds closest correspondence in the purely artistic and deeply significant form of music. Of all the arts, music alone shares with mystic literature the power of waking in us a response to the life movement of the universe. The mystic is actually aware of the music of soul, discerning in it a correspondence with the measured harmonies of the spiritual universe. In those enraptured descriptions of Mahadevi's inward experiences, nothing is more remarkable than her constant and deliberate employment of musical imagery. The pictures of warbling parrots, singing cuckoos, humming bees, dancing peacocks are indeed charming to visualize. They conjure up a world of music which arrests the attention of the readers: Ye parrots singing in mirthful ease And Oh! ye swansFrolicking near the lake And ye joyous cuckoosPiping full throated And ye proud peacocksStrutting up and down in glee Over hill and daleTell me, Oh! tell me Ye one and allDid you ever chance to see my lover My own Channamallikarjuna. The condition of joyous and awakened love for which Mahadevi reaches, when her purification is at an end is to her the state of melody. A living symbolism of experiences seems almost essential to mystic expression. The mind employs some imagery if its

transcendental perceptions are ever to be grasped by the surface consciousness. Sometimes the symbol and the perception become fused in that consciousness and the mystic's experience then presents itself to him as visions and voices, a garment which he has himself provided to veil that reality. Personal idealism finds its exponent in Mahadevi, who is more emotional in temperament. She is deeply religious and the religious mind is concerned primarily, not with the explanation of things, but with experience of values. It regards experience and treats things from the standpoint of value. The religious man relates values to the supreme good, the ultimate good becomes the test and measure of all other goods. To know, to hold, to converse with and enjoy this good is the ultimate end of spiritual endeavour. Hence there runs through all religious consciousness the impulse for communion and fellowship with a divine object that can

satisfy the need of the soul. And this communion which is ethical and spiritual is a communion of self with the Supreme. Religious faith construes the object as person. For only the personal life makes values real, and only personal communion can satisfy the soul craving for a living embodiment of goodness. Hence, the validity of this postulate of a Divine personality becomes a central problem for the mystic. For Mahadevi, Channamallikarjuna is a divine personality in whom she finds the fulfilment of her spiritual endeavour. Mahadevi emphasizes the individual and personal sides of experience; in harmony with this she holds that our ethical and religious value judgements must help to determine our idea of God as the ultimate ground of Reality. Sivaya Namah

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