Thus Spake the Divine - “Swami” Means Only “Kumara Swami”

Thus Spake the Divine

“Swami” Means Only “Kumara Swami”

The term “Swami” is true to only one God – Subrahmanya, says, Paramacharya! In this chapter, Maha Periyava quotes extensive references from Amara Kosham, the Sanskrit Dictionary and Thesaurus, to substantiate His stand. Go through the enthralling narrative of Amara Simha in Maha Periyava’s own striking style.

“Swami” is the generic term for God. To us, Parameshvara is Swami, Maha Vishnu is Swami and Ganesha is Swami. However, the term “Swami” is true to only one God. For all other Gods, the term

has been borrowed from one God, who is Kumara Swami, also addressed as Muruga Perumal, Muruga or Subrahmanya. The title is the most relevant only to Him.

You may ask how authentic my statement is. My reference is from Amara Kosham, which is the dictionary and thesaurus for Sanskrit language. Here, I would like to make a mention about the author of this dictionary, though it may not sound really relevant at this juncture. However, there are some interesting accolades on Adi Shankara in it, which I want to speak about.

The word “Kosam” refers to Treasure Chest. This book is the treasure that gives meanings of words in Sanskrit. The word “Amara” refers to the immortal celestial being (Deva) and, incidentally, Sanskrit is regarded as the language of Devas.

However, this book did not get the title “Amara” from this perspective. The book was composed by a person called Amara Simha. That is where the title of this book has evolved from. Amara Simha was highly knowledgeable and intellectual. He was not a Hindu; he was a Jain. Jains are highly literate and they hold a strong position in the literary world in almost all languages of India. The literary books on Chintamani and Valaiyapati, exemplary Tamil literature works, are only by Jain scholars. Amara Simha also wrote several books on Jainism. Today, what is surviving is only his dictionary. The reason for the survival of this book is our Acharya, whom Jains treated as their tough rival.

We have seen in the earlier chapter that Adi Shankara, our Acharya, had travelled far and wide in India to establish the foundation and principles of Hindu Religion. During this travel, he met Amara Simha too.

The Advaita Doctrine of Bhagavadpada says, “There is only One Substance, which is absolute truth, and that manifests in innumerable substances. One should engross oneself into that One Substance and become that Substance itself”. Buddhism says everything is nothing but Maya. The philosophy of Mahaveer, the Founder of Jain religion, is: In some respect ‘It is’ (asti), in another ‘It is not’ (nasti) and in yet another aspect ‘It may be and may not be’” (Asti-nasti). Making this simple, Shankara says, ‘It is there’, Buddhism says, ‘Nothing is there (Maya)’ and Jainism says, ‘It is and It is not’ and ‘It may be or may not be’”.

Amara Simha wanted to hold a debate with Acharya for establishing Jain Philosophy as against Advaita. Amara Simha said, “I would answer the questions of Acharya from behind a screen”. Acharya agreed to this without giving much thought over this condition.

The debate started. Acharya shot the questions and Amara Simha answered the questions instantly from behind the screen. Though Amara Simha was very intelligent and scholarly, Acharya was astonished with the answers. Acharya, being the avatara of Parameshvara, could find the reason in a fraction of a second. It was not Amara Simha who was answering all his questions. It was Goddess Sarasvati replying in the voice of Amara Simha. Jain philosophy does not subscribe to worship of God in different forms, like that of Sarasvati. But still to write a book in favour of Jainism, he sought the grace of Goddess Sarasvati. He was thus highly hypocritical.

Even today, many rationalists, atheists and others claim that they don’t believe in God. But once they get inflicted by some problem, they immediately seek the blessings of God. If so-called atheists, for example, when inflicted by some disease, pray to Venkatramana Swami (Lord Balaji); they also offer sacrifices to Mariamma. If you ask them, they say, “I did not want to do this; I just wanted to value the words of my wife; I was respecting her feelings.”

Similar was the case with Amara Simha too! Though he was highly knowledgeable, Amara Simha knew that he cannot compete with Acharya. All his knowledge was a mere candle in front of a glowing sun who is the Acharya! If a devotee worships wholeheartedly with utmost commitment, be it for good or bad, Goddess bestows Her grace depending on the sincerity of the devotee’s prayers. Hence, Amara Simha had invoked Sarasvati Devi, Goddess of Knowledge, in a mud pot filled with water (Kumbha). Thus, Sarasvati Devi, in this case, had bestowed Her grace on Amara Simha to win in the debate.

On knowing this Acharya appealed to Sarasvati Devi, “Oh! Mother Sarasvati! How can you do like this? You are favouring a person who propagates anti-God philosophy. You have helped him win the debate with me all along. I think you are blessing him more than what he deserves. You need to draw a line now!” His calculation was right! Sarasvati Devi realised that She had bestowed Amara Simha more grace than he deserved. At that moment, She vanished from the pot and the screen too fell down. After that Amara Simha could not manage the debate and he accepted his defeat. He realised that his books were no more relevant to the world in view of the philosophies having been disproved in the debate. He had written as many books on Jainism as Acharya had done on Hinduism. Once his philosophy failed, he felt, it would be an injustice to leave the books for the rest of the world.

There are honest people irrespective of any religion and Jainism is no exception. Once Jains bet that if they lose a debate with Jnyanasambandhar they would commit voluntary death through “Kazhuvetral” (Kazhu Maram was a slippery wooden post with a sharp edge that would pierce through the bottom of the body leading to a painful death). On losing the debate, they died of “Kazhuvetral”. Jnyanasambandhar literally prevented them from doing so. But the Jains were insistent in fulfilling their vow and committed themselves to death. Some might think that Jnyanasambandhar was responsible for extinction of a large number of Jains. But reality is that though Pandya King authorised him to punish Jains, he forgave them.

Since the Jain Philosophy was disproved by Acharya, Amara Simha set up a fire and started throwing all his books (Suvadi) into the fire. The books, which were written by him with great efforts, were fed to fire for establishing his honesty in acceptance of his defeat.

Knowing this Acharya became very sad. He ran to Amara Simha and pleaded him to stop burning the books. He said, “Amara Simha! Whatever religion you belong to, you are a great scholar and I adore you for your vast intellect. Your books may contain philosophies against the reality, but yet you should not destroy your books. Your books do contain literary merit”. By that time Amara Simha had put all his books into fire. Only the last remained in his hand and it was Amara Kosham, which Acharya saved from the fire.

All the books on Jainism were thus burnt except Amara Kosham. Amara Simha had composed Amara Kosham in such a way that all Sanskrit students can memorise the various writings easily. Even today, students of Sanskrit are continuing to memorise Amara Kosham in full.

One may wonder as to how a dictionary can be memorised! Amara Kosham has been presented in the form of Shlokas, which are easy to memorise. In those days all Vedas, Shastras, Music, Medicine and even Dictionaries were in the form of Shlokas. Why? There was no printing machine and all these could not be printed into books, which would have been easier to refer at a later date. So, instead of presenting in the prose form, these were presented in the poetic form with rhyme and rhythm, which enabled people to memorise them easily.

Now that there are printed books, we are always lethargic that “we can refer to them anytime”. Knowledge of such people is quite superficial and not in-depth. Memorising was the key attribute of a student and thus people were mobile encyclopaedias in those days.

While referring to all the Devatas of Hinduism in Amara Kosham, Amara Simha has provided the equivalent names of every God. If you listen to them, they would appear as Archana or Namavali. For example, see the equivalents of the name Shambhu (names of Shiva).

shambhu easu: pashupati; shiva: shooli maheshvara:

ishvara: sarva eshana; chandrasekhara;

bhootesa: khandaparashu; gireesho mruda;

mrutyunjaya; kruttivasa; pinakee pramathadhipah:

Amara Simha’s compositions of equivalents for each God are filled with affinity and adoration. They resemble a garland with beautiful flowers.

Amara Simha also composed names of Shaivaite and Vaishnava Gods without any prejudice. In his Amara Kosham, he has given the prefix of Swami to only Subrahmanya and not to any other God. Therefore, we have to necessarily accept the same!

Devasenapati: Soora: Swami Gajamukha Anuja (Means the Brother of Lord Ganesha).

That is what Amara Kosham says about Subrahmanya Swami!

This article is a snippet from the Book Thus Spake the Divine, is available online at www.giri.in and across Giri Trading Agency Private Limited, A chain of Speciality Stores dealing in all kinds of products needed in Indian Culture and Tradition.