Letters from Sri Ramanasramam, by Suri Nagamma

Bhagavan: “Yes, it was written while I was there. In
1915 I had to write it on account of Jagadiswara Sastri.”
The Devotee: “Is that the reason? In the Sri Ramana
Gita it is indicated that Bhagavan himself wrote it.”
“No, No,” said Bhagavan. “In 1915 Jagadisa was in
Skandasram during Chaturmasya
1
and one day he wrote
down on a piece of paper ‘Hridaya kuhara madhye’, held it
in his hand and sat down. When I asked him what it was,
he said that he wanted to write a sloka, but when he actually
began it, only that much he could write. And when I asked
him to write the rest, he said he was unable to do so
however much he tried. After a time, he went out
somewhere, leaving the paper under my seat. Before his
return, I completed the sloka, wrote underneath it the
word ‘Jagadisa’ and showed it to him as soon as he
returned. He asked me why I had put his name to it. I
said that it was because Jagadisa had begun it. He said
that if that were so, he should have the paper for himself,
1
The Chaturmasya period begins in the month of Asadha (June-
July) from the day of Ekadasi called Sayana-ekadasi, in the fortnight
of the waxing moon. The period ends in the month of Kartika
(October-November) on the Ekadasi day known as Utthana-ekadasi,
in the fortnight of the waxing moon. This four-month period is
known as Chaturmasya. During the four-month period of
Chaturmasya one should practice giving up all food intended for
sense enjoyment.

and took it away from me and carefully kept it with him.

He was very young at that time.

“Some time afterwards, I wrote down that same sloka.

I was sitting on a big stone slab near the Ashram and all
gathered round me and wanted me to tell them the meaning
of the sloka. I acquiesced and explained it to them for some
two or three hours. Taking advantage of this, Jagadisa
recently wrote a long commentary on it in the same style as
had been done on a sloka of Sankara’s. The manuscript has
apparently been lost somewhere. When Nayana
2
wrote the
Ramana Gita, he took this sloka as the opening sloka for the
second chapter. That is the whole story. I have not written
anything unless for a good reason.”
“Did you write this sloka at about the same time as
Nayana wrote the Ramana Gita?” asked someone.

“No,” said Bhagavan, “it was some time later; he wrote
in July 1917. But there is an interesting thing about it. In
1913, he asked me some questions and learnt something.

When what he had learnt became fully implanted in his mind,
he used, whenever he gave a lecture, to recite a sloka
extempore and say that it was from chapter so and so, sloka
number so and so, in the Ramana Gita. And that was long
before he began to write the Ramana Gita. When he bluffed
thus, no one dared to call his bluff, for he was a powerful
personality, full of resourcefulness. Reciting thus from time
to time, he finally wrote the Ramana Gita.”
Someone asked, “Had anybody asked where the Ramana
Gita was, what would he have done?”
Bhagavan laughed: “Who had the courage to challenge
him like that? That was his strong point. Even after writing
2
Kavyakantha Ganapathi Sastri who used to be addressed and
referred to as ‘Nayana’.

the Ramana Gita, do you know what he used to do? He used
to quote some slokas which were not in the Gita and cite them
as examples. If any one had the courage to say that they
were not in the printed book, he would say that they were in
the Maha Ramana Gita, an enlarged version of the original.

He had planned to write that also, but was finally unable to
do so. He used to say that he would write a commentary on
the “Arunachala Pancharatna”, and thereby show off all his
knowledge, but that too was never done.”
“It seems that Nayana once spoke in the same way on
the ‘Saiva Siddanta’,” said another devotee.

“Yes,” answered Bhagavan. “That was in the early days
of his coming here. At that time, he knew nothing of Saiva
Siddhanta. The Association of Saiva Siddhantis decided to
hold their conference in this place and invited Nayana to
preside over it. They also published that he, being a great
pandit, would speak at length and authoritatively on Saiva
Siddhanta. He was informed of the exact date only four or
five days before the conference. On the very morning of the
conference he came to me and said, ‘These people have asked
me to attend Saiva Sabha and speak, but I do not know what
that Siddhanta is and what really is its nature.’ I thereupon
took out a Tamil book, the Siva Jnana Bodha, selected twelve
aphorisms from it, explained their purport and then briefly
told him the essence of that Siddhanta. That was enough.

Being very intelligent he grasped the fundamentals in no
time and went to the conference. Able to compose slokas
extempore, he recited them with great confidence and then
lectured in Tamil so authoritatively that everyone present
was surprised at the profundity of his thought and erudition.

When Nayana returned from the Conference he said, ‘It
was not out of my knowledge or capacity that I spoke today.

It was all due to Bhagavan’s grace. The Saiva Siddhanta which
I have never read appeared to me as though I had had it in
my mind all these years’. Such was his intellectual power.”
Said one devotee: “It seems that even for the
Umasahasram he did not get ready until the evening before
the day fixed for its reading.”
Bhagavan replied, “Yes. Invitations had been sent out
to several people saying that the Umasahasram would be read
out at the Apeetha Temple on a certain day, and so many
people came even the day before. It was to be read the
following morning, and still 300 slokas had to be written.

Nayana came to me and said, ‘These 300 slokas have to be
written before daybreak. How can it be done?’ ‘Why worry?’
I said. ‘It will be all right if we sit up after food.’ ‘Then you
must come there,’ he said. All this happened when I was still
living on the hill. As desired, I went to the Mango Cave and
sat down in a corner, keeping my eyes open all the time.

Nayana sat down opposite me, kept four disciples by his side
to write and, giving them extempore, each a part of a sloka,
finished all 300 slokas by midnight.”
The devotee said, “Is it a fact that Bhagavan kept
intently looking on until all 300 slokas were finished, and as
soon as they were done, sat up and said, ‘Have you taken
down all that I said?’”
Bhagavan nodded: “Yes, it was so. I felt that I had
dictated all those slokas.”
The devotee further asked, “Is it also a fact that Nayana
changed the other slokas several times but never touched
even one of the 300 slokas?”
Bhagavan nodded his head in assent and was once more
silent.