Letters from Sri Ramanasramam, by Suri Nagamma

“Is that so? At what time did you start?” asked Bhagavan.

“At 3-30 a.m.,” I said.

“So early? Who else was with you?” asked Bhagavan.

“No one. I have been going alone. I do not feel afraid,”
I said.

“That is all right. What is there to fear? When we were
going around the hill, we were mostly doing it at nights only,”
said Bhagavan.

A devotee said, “It seems that on one occasion when
you all went round the hill, a devotee requested you to explain
the meaning of the ‘Dakshinamurthy Stotram’ and, by the
time you had completed explaining only one sloka, it was
daybreak.”
Bhagavan: “Yes, naturally; there is so much to explain
if one wants to. When I was on the hill, Palaniswami asked
me and I wrote in verse the meaning of those slokas. I wanted
to write the commentary also but in the meantime the book
was sent for printing. Later on, one devotee sent a man
urgently to ask for material for an introduction. And that
was the end.”
“So that was all we were destined to get,” said the
devotee.

“Today, while going round the Hill, I noticed in the
Arunachala Temple the idol of Dakshinamurthy with the
figure of a demon under the feet and wondered why it was
so. The same thing I observed in the idol of Dakshinamurthy
by the side of the road here and also, in the Amman Temple.

What is the significance?” I asked.

“It is said that that figure represents the magically
created demon called Muyalakan, that was hurled at Siva by
the Tapasvis of the Daruka Forest and that Siva stamped the
demon under his feet, killed it and sat on it. After all,
Dakshinamurthy is one of the five forms of Siva. To explain
esoterically one can say that that demon is ahankara (egoism)
or some such thing,” said Bhagavan.

“There being no form (rupa) for egoism, why do they
say like that?” I asked.

Bhagavan: “Even Dakshinamurthy does not mean only
a form. In the “Dakshinamurthy Stotram” it is that formlessness
that has been described in various ways. They all indicate
only formlessness. Just as that formlessness was invented, so
also descriptions of form.”
Another person took up the conversation and asked, “It
is said that Valmiki got his name because he got out of a valmika
(anthill) and that Vyasa got his name because of his arranging
(vyasa = arranger) the Vedas in their present form. What could
be the reason for Vasishta being called by that name?”
Bhagavan: “Vasishta means a person who knows what
is best (Visishta).”
Devotee: “What is the meaning of the words ‘pasyan
sarvam tavakrititaya satatam’ which occur towards the end of
the fifth sloka of ‘Arunachala Pancharatnam’?”
Bhagavan: “That means ‘seeing everything as a form of
Yours.’”
Devotee: “I am not able to understand that yet. May I
request you to let me have the meaning of the whole sloka?”
Bhagavan: “All right. Now listen. ‘Tvayyarpita manasa’
means with the mind surrendered to you. ‘Pasyan sarvam
tavakrititaya satatam’ = seeing everything as your form at all
times; ‘tvam’ = yourself; ‘bhajate ananya preetya’ = worships you
with wholehearted devotion; ‘saha’ = he; ‘jayatyarunachalatvayi
sukhe magnah’ = gets lost in Thy bliss, Oh, Arunachala! and
thus succeeds in his efforts. That is the full meaning of the
sloka. When the mind gets merged in the Self, everything is the
form of the Self. As, at all places, his own Self is all-pervading,
he worships his own Self.”
Hereunder is given the full sloka:
TvyaipRt mnsa Tva< pZyn! sv¡ tvak«ittya sttm!,
Éjte=nNy àITya s jyTyé[acl Tviy suoe m¶>.

He who dedicates his mind to Thee and, seeing Thee,
always beholds the Universe as Thy figure, he who at all
times glorifies Thee and loves Thee as none other than
the Self, he is the master without rival, being one with
Thee, Oh Arunachala! and lost in Thy bliss.

Arunachala Pancharatna, verse 5