Thus Spake the Divine - How Magnificent is such a form of Ambal?

Thus Spake the Divine

How Magnificent is such a form of Ambal?

Look at the face of someone who feeds tens or hundreds of poor people (Annadanam) for just a day. We can see enormous compassion flowing from that face. The person feels glad seeing people eating happily and satiating their hunger. The irony is that in any Annadanam, the giver receives more happiness than the receiver. When a person feeding just a few hundreds of people can feel immensely happy, imagine the magnificent face of Ambal, who has been feeding billions and trillions of people for millions and trillions of years. She is Annapoorneshwari Ambal. She is feeding billions and trillions, including those who don’t deserve even a square meal due to their loads of sins. Can we ever measure the magnitude of Her compassion and immensity of happiness arising out of feeding the entire Universe?

Ambal is exotically beautiful. Acharya describes Her as “Waves of Beauty (Saundarya Lahari)”. Her entire beauty and elegance is the outcome of only compassion and love. Compassion alone is beauty. The physical beauty is not real beauty. Human beauty is just skin deep and it may turn ugly with mildest fever or even in anger. Ambal remains ever compassionate and possesses eternal beauty. She takes several forms to bless devotees, who can absorb Her in whatever form that appeals to them. She takes the forms of Raja Rajeshvari, Bhuvaneshvari, Durga, Kali and so on, which include both pleasant and also belligerent forms. This enables people to worship Her as per their mental outlook.

If one wishes to have Dharshan of each form, the person has to chant a set of pre-defined Mantras. A Mantra is nothing but composition of alphabets and sounds. Ambal, who is in different forms, exists in different sounds and alphabets. In Shyamala Dhandakam, Poet Kalidasa describes her as “You are the alphabets; You are all the Mantras – Sarva Varnathmikie; sarva Mantrathmike”. You may think Varnam means colour. No. Varnam also means alphabets (akshara). The sound-borne alphabets and light-borne forms have emerged from only one origin and they are very closely connected to each other. Experiments have been conducted with sounds on a water surface. Based on the extent of vibrations of these sounds, water surface transforms into different shapes. This demonstrates that sound has the power to create shapes.

There is a musical instrument called Veesi Tharangam, which produces the sound of large waves becoming smaller and smaller and at the end subsiding completely. There is another sound, which is similar to that of a blast of water getting scattered into smaller sounds, known as Mukulam. Like this, there are different forms of sounds. All such sounds form the 51 alphabets (Akshara). These are called as Mathruka. Mathru in Sanskrit means Mother. The source of all sounds is Mathruka. This signifies that Ambal is both in the form of sounds and alphabets. When a combination of these alphabets is chanted, its form or shape becomes distinct. Such compilation of letters is known as a Mantra. All Mantras are Ambal’s form and shape. If we chant Mantras with utmost focus in mind, Ambal will give us Her Dharshan adorned with Her ornaments, postures and or weapons depending on the respective form of the Mantra.

Pranavam is the source of all these Mantras. From Pranavam emerges the entire Universe of names and forms. Ambal is Pranavam too. Pranavam is symbolised by AUM (OM). In this, ‘A’ is creation, ‘U’ is maintenance and ‘Ma’ is destruction. Thus, Pranavam is the source of all these three functions. Suppose we rearrange these functions and commence with the function of maintenance, which is a special function of Ambal to protect all living beings, then the arrangement of AUM will change to “U”, “Ma” and “A”. That is the name UMA. Upanishads also address Ambal as Uma Haimavati.

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.