Goraksha is convinced of the utter futility of a yoga where the subject remains for ever separated from the object; and Prabhudeva, realising that Goraksha is ripe for the Linga-initiation, instruct him in the Linga lore, and finding that the Siddha has rapidly matured for higher things, bestows on him the knowledge of the Absolute Void.
Sri Gorakshanatha
Goraksha was born in Pattadakal, a historic town in the present Bijjapur district. History tells us nothing about his parentage but records that he was king Naravarma's cowherd (this is clear from his name Goraksha itself) and was the disciple of Matsendranatha who was the chief protagonist of the Siddha sect. Goraksha, as a disciple of the Siddhas, achieved some supernatural or occult powers. After some years, he went to the city of Kolhapur, in the present Maharashtra State, and became famous by displaying his siddhis.
Once Revanasiddha, one of the well-known five Veerashaiva acharyas, went to Goraksha's house for alms. Goraksha, in his foolish pride, gave him a steel dagger, which Revanasiddha melted with his fire-eye and drank the molten steel. But the effect was that Goraksha found the weapon thrust in his chest. But somehow, at the intercession of Mahalakshmi, the chief local goddess, Revanasiddha made Goraksha spit out the dagger.
Greatly humiliated, Goraksha came to the Shrishaila mountain, where through Hathayoga he was able to make his body as hard as diamond. When he was in high spirits about his unique achievement, Prabhudeva came down to Shrishaila, where he met this great Siddha Goraksha. As Shunyasampadane tells us, Goraksha was utterly defeated by Prabhudeva and was initiated, at his earnest request, into the sharana path. His glamour for occult powers having completely disappeared, Goraksha achieved great heights in the sharana spirituality. Few in number, his vachanas are mostly enigmatic in nature and contain some profound truths regarding the sharana way of life. His vachanas end with the dedicatory phrase Gorakshapalaka Mahaprabhusiddha Somanathalinga.
INTRODUCTION TO THE SAMPADANE OF GORAKSHA'S ATTAINMENT AND EVERYBODY'S UNITIVE STATE
At last we come to the final act of this divine drama. The end of the sharanas was foreshadowed by Prabhudeva.
Prabhudeva, having satisfied himself about the spiritual attainment of the sharanas, bids them end their lives in places dear to their hearts. For himself he chooses the plaintain grove at Mount Shrishaila. There is a ring of dissatisfaction in his words: true sharanas can no longer live in the age of Kali.
He seems to have a feeling that the world is not yet ready for the spiritual revolution the sharanas had intended to bring about. Yet, we cannot say that their mission had gone in vain. With them, as with every great religious movement, something new, something of inestimable value had come into the world which would never be effaced.
Bidding the sharanas goodbye, Prabhudeva leaves for Shrishaila. On the way he meets a Siddha, Goraksha by name, who had, by occult powers, made his body as hard as a diamond (vajradeha), and lived in the belief that he had conquered death. What, Prabhudeva asks, if the body is made as hard as diamond? Nothing is indestructible except the indestructible One:
How can one know the future that does not
The past!
The creatures born at dawn,
Alas, have perished at the set of sun!
Embodied creatures of but a day have gone
Along the road they came. Good Sir,
Guheshvaralinga is not for any one!
Prabhudeva does not approve of any kind of yoga or Siddhi which removes the yogi farther away from the one Reality; nothing else is of any avail – neither ambrosia, nor the philosopher's stone, nor the life-restoring plant:
Go to, your yoga of trickery and fraud
With roots and fibres, is no yoga!
Go to, it is no yoga to have
The trance of body, senses and the soul!
The real and natural
Is Guheshvara!
Goraksha is convinced of the utter futility of a yoga where the subject remains for ever separated from the object; and Prabhudeva, realising that Goraksha is ripe for the Linga-initiation, instructs him in the Linga lore, and finding that the Siddha has rapidly matured for higher things, bestows on him the knowledge of the Absolute Void.
The vachana which tells how, when Prabhudeva had mocked at all yogic accomplishments including Goraksha's physical feat and his possession of various kinds of yogic tricks, Goraksha gave them up and having obtained initiation, submitted as follows:
Study of alchemy
May give you mastery over metal, but
Surely not over alchemy itself!
Study of magical effects of many sorts
Such as to make yourself invisible,
Is physical accomplishment; does it mean
Perfection of the soul?
Battles of wit are string of words,
They don't involve the self.
When one thinks of You and I, you became me,
But I do not turn into you!
Though you became Gorakshapalaka Mahaprabhu
Siddhasomanathalinga,
Yet I do not turn into you!
Though you became Gorakshapalaka Mahaprabhu
Siddhasomanathalinga,
This merging does not make me Linga itself.
Prabhudeva reveals the secret of spaceless trance:
What sort of knowledge is it now,
When consciousness has ceased, to say
'Wonder has seized me'?
When you say 'I am not' who is this 'I'?
When you say, 'Who am I' who was this 'I' before?
When you say 'I am Parabrahma' what was this 'I' before?
What is this chain of births
Fashioned by 'I'ness, which proclaims
'I am the Consciousness'?
What is the reason why we droop
Fast cleaving to the word that says
'Silence is Brahma', O Guheshvara?
And now the vachana which tells how, when Prabhudeva had spoken this, thereupon Goraksha was convinced of the connection between Linga and anga:
If I would question you,
I have an anga, you have none.
When I would speak to you, I am
Related, you are not.
When your anga is installed in mine
Until your knowledge finds
Abode within my soul
And I have learned to know you,
There is one place for you and me;
Gorakshapalaka Mahaprabhu Siddhasomanathalinga
Is yours and mine the same!
Prabhu proceeds to Shrishaila. As he stands before the entrance of the grove, he gives us a glimpse of its dreadful nature. However, more dreadful still is the grove we call the body. The plaintain grove on Mount Shrishaila can be crossed and conquered; but it is well-nigh impossible to conquer the body. Prabhu crosses and conquers them both. This is the vachana wherein Prabhudeva, who has explained his own ultimate realisation, goes into the plaintain grove and abides in the absolute as his own home:
I see no one who can
Conquer the body's vast plaintain grove:
The seven seas of the world
Encircle it.
In life's vast wood
The poisonous rain of the five senses pours.
Anger's huge tiger roars and roars:
The elephants of eight prides
Are stamping about; the counter-shafted rain
Of lust is pouring; jealousy,
Enormous serpent, is spitting fire;
That child of sin called greed
Is chewing and eating; the triple pain,
Like rain of fire, will not permit
Your stepping out;
Mountains of self
Have fallen across the path;
You cannot face the fear of ghosts
Called the five elements;
Maya, the ogress, devours raw flesh;
The well of passions cannot be used;
Infatuation's creeper tangles your feet;
The sharp-edged sword of covetousness
Is not to be unsheathed ...
Unable to go
Into this plaintain grove, gods, demons, men
Have all gone crazy and run off;
Those who have eyes upon their soles,
Those who have eyes all o'er themselves,
Have lost their heads and tails.
But I
Have entered that plantain grove,
Have fought my way, and, never touched
By thorn or bramble,
have won
By knowledge, the plaintain grove,
And crossed it safe;
And dwelling in the ultimate trance
Of Guheshvaralinga, lost in ecstacy,
I'm now more tranquil than tranquility!
The vachana wherein, Prabhudeva having attained the ultimate state, Lord Basavaraja praises him:
He who is as great as Linga
Has lost his sense!
He who is as great as Jangama
Has lost his motion!
He who is as great as Prasada
Has lost his form!
He who is as great as Discipline
Has lost his limbs!
He who is as great as Consciousness
Has lost his action!
When, in Lord Kudala Sangama, Prabhudeva
Attained the ultimate state,
Sangana Basavanna's soul at once went after him.
Thus ends the life divine of the super-eminent hero of this great drama, Shunyasampadane.
Note:
Some attempts have been made in recent times to publish the original Shunyasampadane in Kannada; but for the benefit of non-Kannada readers, a
comprehensive edition with an English translation of each vachana and an introduction in English was felt to be necessary. This suggestion was,
in fact, made by Shri Kumarswamiji of Navakalyanamath of Dharwar. He also offered to help translate these vachanas into English and to write a
general introduction to the work. At that time, he was Honorary Professor of Veerashaiva Philosophy at the University; but owing to pressure of
other commitments he had to give up the teaching work in the University and also that of editing Shunyasampadane as he originally desired to do.
So an independent committee consisting of Dr. S.C. Nandimath, Prof. Armando Menezes and Dr. R. C. Hiremath was formed. This committee has now
completed the first volume of the work, consisting of the first three chapters of the Shunyasampadane. The remaining chapters will be published
in about five further volumes in the course of the next year or so.
Karnatak University
Dharwar, July 15, 1965
This article 'Shunya Sampadane - Sampadane of Gorakshanatha's Attainment and Everybody's Unitive State' is taken
from SHUNYASAMPADANE, Volume V, 1972, KARNATAK UNIVERSITY, DHARWAD.
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