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SrI vishNu sahasra nAmam - Slokam 77 - Part 3.

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Narasimhan Krishnamachari • October 10, 2002 


             SrI vishNu sahasra nAmam - Slokam 77 - a-mUrtimAn.
 

725. a-mUrtimAn – a) He Who has even the subtle and formless things as His possessions.

                b) He Who Forms that are not the result of karma.

                c) He Who has a disposition that is not hard, inflexible, etc.

                d) He Who has Forms that are indescribable, and not fixed.

                e) He Who takes whatever Forms He pleases as His incarnations, and thus One Who has no fixed forms.

 

Om a-mUrti-mate namah.

 

a) SrI BhaTTar interprets the nAma as “He Who owns even the forms which are a-mUrti’s”, such as earth, fire, water, wind, etc.  He gives several references in support:

 

                bhUmir-ApoÂ’nalo vAyuh kham mano buddhireva ca      |

                ahamkAra itIyam me bhinnA prakRtir-ashTadhA    ||   (gItA 7.4)

 

“Earth, water, fire, air, ether, manas, buddhi, and ego-sense – thus My PrakRti is divided eightfold”.

 

                yasya avyaktam SarIram -  He Whose body the Unmanifested prakRti is– subAlopanishad 7.

 

                yasya AtmA SarIram – He Whose body the individual soul is – Satapata brAh. 14.6.30).

 

The pANini sutra 5.2.94 says that the affix matup comes after a word in first case in the sense of “whose it is” – tat asya asti asmin iti matup.   Thus, SrI BhaTTar points out that the interpretation should be “One Who has as His possession the a-mUrti objects”, and not as “He Who does not have a specific murti or  form”.  The latter interpretation will take away the significance and purpose of the specific use of the matup affix in this case.   Thus, according to SrI BhaTTar, the nAma a-mUrtimAn should not be taken to signify the negation of a form for BhagavAn.  In addition to the matup violation, such an interpretation will be contrary to the earlier and later nAma-s, such as viSva mUrtih, mahA mUrtih, dIpta mUrtih, aneka mUrtih, etc. 

 

SrI v.v. rAmAnujan gives references to nammAzhvAr’s tiruvAimozhi, where AzhvAr refers to emperumAn as aru – meaning One He is formless, as well as of such complex forms that He cannot be understood:

 

-          puRa aNDattu alagil polinda tiSai pattAua aruvEyO (tiruvAi. 6.9.7)  – You are the (Formless) soul of the countless mukta jIva-s that are in all the directions of SrIvaikhunTham

-          tollai nan nUlil Sonna uruvum aruvum nee (tiruvAi. 7.8.10) – You are the Only One with a beautiful, enjoyable Form, and you are the also the One who is the abstract, invisible, soul of all things in the world!

-          OnRalA uruvAi aruvAya nin mAya’ngaL (tiruvAi. 5.10.6)– (I wonder) at Your wonders – You who has innumerable Forms, as well as One who is the (Formless) soul of all beings. 

 

SrI rAdhAkRshNa SAstri gives support from the Upanishads expressing that bhagavAn has as His Form the unmanifested objects as well as the manifested ones: divyo hyamUrtah (muNDako. 2.2); dve vA va brahmaNo rUpe mUrtam ca a-mUrtam ca (bRhadA. 3.1).  

  

b) SrI Samkara interprets the nAma as signifying that He has no form brought on by karma – karma nibandhanA mUrtih asya na vidyata iti a-mUrtimAn.  

 

c) As an extension of the meaning “that which has a form, shape, etc.”, the term mUrti also stands for “One who is hard, stubborn, etc.) – mUrtih kAThinyam” – amara koSa.  SrI kRshNa datta bhAradvAj uses this meaning for the word mUrti, and gives the interpretation that because bhagavAn has a disposition that is not hard, inflexible etc., (krUra, kaThora), He has the nAma a-mUrtimAn.

 

d) SrI satyadevo vAsishTha gives the interpretation that because bhagavAn has forms which are indescribable, He is not of a fixed form, and therefore He is called a-mUrtimAn.  SrI cinmayAnanda gives a similar explanation – The limited alone has a form, but He being Unlimited, like “Space”, has no limited form.

 

e) The dharma cakram writer comments that bhagavAn takes the forms that He desires when He takes His incarnations, but He is not constrained in any way by that form.  This is like the lotus leaf that remains in water but is not wetted by the water, or the fish that lives in mud but is not soiled by the mud.  He takes His forms just for the protection of the good and the destruction of the bad.  

 

-dAsan kRshNamAcAryan

 



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