SrI vishNu sahasra nAmam - Slokam 89 - a-cintyah.
From the Bhakti List Archives
• April 26, 2003
SrI vishNu sahasra nAmam - Slokam 89 - a-cintyah. 836. a-cintyah – a) He Who is incomparable to anything known. b) He Whose power cannot be imagined. c) He Who cannot be completely comprehended in our minds. Om a-cintyAya namah. SrI satyadevo vAsishTha gives the root involved in the nAma as cit – samj~nAne – to notice, to understand. He Who cannot be described as such and such, is a-cintyah; Or, He Who cannot be comprehended completely in our mind is a-cintyah. cintayitum – iyattayA paryavasitum Sakyah cintyah; na cityah a-cintyah; manaso'pi agocarah. There are many other ways to enjoy this nAma – He Whose leelA-s are incomprehensible, He Whose power cannot be imagined, etc. a) SrI BhaTTar's interpretation is that the nAma indicates that He is beyond comparison with anyone or anything. vaLLuvar declares that bhagavAn is "tanakku uvamai allAdAn". The Sruti attempts to describe Him - the chAndogya Upanishad declares that bhagavAn is "golden-colored, with golden colored moustache, eyes resembling the just-blossomed lotus" - ya eshontarAditye hiraNmayah purushah dRSyate, hiraNmayah smaSruh, hiraNya keSa apraNakhAt sarva eva suvarNah; tasya yahtA kapyAsam puNDarIkamevam akshiNI – He is in the middle of the sun, with golden hue, golden mustache, golden hair, eyes resembling the just-bloomed lotus, etc. But the Sruti also declares that He is beyond words and beyond mind – yato vAco nivartante, aprApaya manasA saha (taitt. upa.). nammAzhvAr conveys the two ideas together in his tiruvAimozhi pASuram 1.3.2: kaTTuraikkil tAmarai nin kaN pAdam kai ovvA SuTTuraitta nan pon un tirumEni oLi ovvAdu oTTuraittu iv-ulagu unnaip pugazhvellAm perumpAlum paTTuraiyAip puRkenRE kATTumAl param jotI! (tiruvAi. 1.3.2) "O Supreme Effulgence! You are to be merely enjoyed. Any attempt at verbal description of You is futile, especially if one compares You with familiar objects that are not even remotely comparable to You in any respect. With beautiful eyes, feet and arms, to all of which lotus is but a poor simile, with a dazzling stature to which pure unalloyed gold is a poor comparison, You are often being pictured by the world with words that do You no justice. Any comparison of You to the worldly things is just a failed attempt to describe You". It is like some commoner who has never seen a precious stone, describing that precious stone as "something resembling a pebble". nammAzhvAr proceeds in the very next pASuram to declare that even after describing His greatness by the words "param jyoti – The Supreme Effulgence", if one proceeds to describe His auspicious qualities – His simplicity, His sauSIlyam and His saulabhyam, there is no word that we have that can describe these aspects of bhagavAn. AzhvAr exclaims: "param jyoti! govindA! PaNbu uraikka mATTEnE" – "I won't even attempt to describe Your auspicious qualities". So, bhagavAn is a-cintyah in every sense of the word., especially when it comes to His auspicious qualities. He is "govindA" – Who can mingle with even cows. nammAzhvAr laments at the unimaginable behavior of this emperumAn who is sarva lokeSvaran, who subjects Himself to the insult of being called the "butter thief" – ne'njAl ninaippu aridAl veNNey UN ennum Enac-collE (tiruviruttam 98). SrI rAmAnujan refers to a tiruvAimozhi pASuram by nammAzhvAr that nicely explains the nAma a-cintyah: mAyan en ne'njil uLLAn maRRum yavarkkum ahdE kAyamum Seevanum tAnE kAlum eriyum avanE Seyan aNiyan yavarkkum Sindaiyum gocaram allan tUyan tuyakkan mayakkan ennudait tOL iNaiyAnE (tiruvAi. 1.9.6) The following explanation of the above pASuram is partly drawn from SrImad tirukkuDanthai ANDavan's bhagavad vishaya sAram, and is my poor attempt at capturing my great AcArya's thoughts: "He is our body, and He is also the soul of our body; He is the soul of the pa'nca mahA bhUta-s (air, water, etc.)., He is aNiyan – very easily accessible to His devotees; He is also SEyan – inaccessible to those who do not surrender to Him; yAvarkkum Sindaikkum gocaran allan – a-cintyan – He is beyond the reach of the mental capabilities of even the greatest of j~nAni-s; tUyan – Even so, He decided to bless me by residing in my heart; tUyan - He Who considered that being with me is the only thing that He longed for in all His life; tuyakkan – By revealing His guNa-s, He draws us towards Him; mayakkan – He draws us to Him through the sheer joy of thinking about Him; ennuDait tOL iNaiyAn – Such a Great One has now decided to take possession of me by sitting on my shoulders (treating me like garuDa)". He is mAyan – Ascarya bhUtan – personification of wonders". Sri Sa'nkara's vyAkhyAnam is: pramAtrAdi sAkshitvena sarva pramANa agocaratvAt a-cintyah - The simplest way to explain this is that just as the eye cannot see the eye itself since it is the means of seeing all other things except itself, so also bhagavAn is the means of perceiving everything else, and so He cannot be perceived by any means of perception. SrI Sa'nkara gives the alternate interpretation: ayam IdRSa iti viSva prap'nca vilakshaNatvena cintayitum aSakyatvAd-vA a-cintyah – He Who is different from this expanded Universe. All that is in the domain of our perception in this universe is but a tiny fraction of His manifestation, and the full extent of His vibhUti-s is beyond comprehension. Lord kRshNa declares this in the gItA: nanto'sti mama divyAnAm vibUtinAm parantapa | esha tUddeSatah prokto vibhUter-vistaro mayA || (gItA 10.40) yad-yad-vibhUtimat-sattvam SrImad-Urjitameava vA | tat-tadevAvagaccha tvam mama tejo'mSa sambhavam || (gItA 10.41) "There is no limit to My divine manifestations. Here the extent of such manifestations has been explained in brief by Me. "Whatever being is possessed of power, or of splendor, or of energy, know that as coming from a fragment of My power". b) In his gItA bhAshyam, for the next Slokam, bhagavad rAmAnuja explains that this Universe consisting of sentient and non-sentient entities, whether in effect or causal condition, whether gross or subtle, is supported by bhagavAn with an infinitesimal fraction of His power, in such a manner that it does not violate His will in preserving its proper form, existence or various activities. He quotes bhagavAn parASara from vishNu purANam: yasyAyutAyutAmSAmSe viSva Saktir-iyam stithA (V.P. 1.9.53) - On an infinitesimal fraction of His energy, this universe rests. In other words, His full power is beyond our comprehension – He is acintyah. c) SrI cinmayAnanda gives the reference from the gItA, where bhagavAn is described as a-cintya-rUpan – sarvasya dhAtAram acintya rUpam – gItA 8.9 – The Creator of all, and One Who cannot be comprehended mentally. SrI baladeva vidyA bhUshaN points out that He is called acintyah because He cannot be understood through tarka or discussion and analysis, but is revealed only through the Sruti vAkya-s – tarka agovarah Srutyeka gamyah. -dAsan kRshNamAcAryan -------------------------------------------------------------- - SrImate rAmAnujAya namaH - To Post a message, send it to: bhakti-list@yahoogroups.com Group Home: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/bhakti-list Archives: http://ramanuja.org/sv/bhakti/archives/ Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
- Next message: Madhavakkannan V: "PeriyAzhwAr Thirumozhi 4.3- naal vEdhak kadal amudhu--"
- Previous message: T. Sampath Kumaran: "Sri Ramanuja"
- Messages sorted by: [ date ] [ thread ] [ subject ] [ author ] [ attachment ]