Shiva Sutra Sanskrit Pdf
ShivaOriginal by Vasu GuptaTranslation by SubhashC. Kak PrefaceI translated the Siva Sutra many years ago. An earlyversion of that translation, together with a brief commentary, appearedin the Prachya Pratibha. I have since been asked by many friends toenlarge my commentary and this essay is a result of this demand.Baton Rouge, May 15, 2001Subhash Kak IntroductionOur knowledge of the physical world is based on empirical associations.These associations reveal the laws of the physical world. But how dowe study the nature of consciousness? There is no way to observe one'sown awareness because we are aware through the associations with thephenomenal world.
The Vedas deal precisely with this central questionof the nature of knowledge. The consciousness aspect of the Vedas wasemphasized most emphatically by Dayananda (1824-1883) and Aurobindo(1872-1950). It is seen with directness in the Upanishads.
For an overviewof the Vedic tradition see the recent book coauthored by me (Feuersteinet al, 1995); this book summarizes new insights from archaeology andhistory of science. It has been less than a century that the theories of relativity andquantum physics have brought the observer center stage in physics. Itis not surprising, therefore, that the Vedic ideas, with their emphasison cognition, have been a source of enduring inspiration in modern science.As is well known, the idea of brahman in the Vedas being a representationof all possibilities, as in the statement prajnanadm brahman, wasthe inspiration in the conception of the wavefunction of quantum theorydefined as a sum of all possibilities (Moore, 1989; Kak, 1995b).Modern science has had great success in explaining the nature ofthe physical world.
But these successes have not brought us any closerto the resolution of the mystery of consciousness. In the applicationof quantum theory to the macroworld and in the neuropsychological explorationsof the brain, one cannot any longer ignore the question of the observer(e.g. Kak, 1995a, 1995b, 1996a, 1996b, 1996c). The notion that themind emerges somehow out of the complexity of the connections insidethe brain is too simplistic to be taken seriously. It is like BaronMunchhausen pulling himself out of the bog by his own bootstraps! Ifmind emerges from matter, how does it obtain autonomy?
If the worldis governed by laws then how do we have free will? If our autonomy (freewill) is an epiphenomenon then are we walking shadows? Should one considerconsciousness to be the ground-stuff of reality?
If that is so thenwhat is the connection between consciousness and the physical world?These are just the questions that we come across repeatedly in theIndian tradition. Is there something to be learnt from the insightsof this tradition?The Aphorisms of Shiva ('Siva Sutras) (SS) are a late reiterationof the Vedic view of consciousness. According to legend, Vasugupta (c. In Kashmir) `saw' the aphorisms (sutras) in his dream. SivaSutras led to the flowering of the Kashmir school of consciousness (KashmirShaivism). It is due to a very clear exposition of the issues the KashmirShaivism has come to be quite influential in contemporary scholarship.In this paper we present a translation, along with the Sanskrit text,of the 78 aphorisms of the SS.
(The 78 number itself has a very importantsignificance in the Vedic system of knowledge may be seen elsewhere(e.g. Kak 1994, 1995c)). The commentary provided in this paper is notbased on the commentatorial tradition from within Kashmir Shaivism (seee.g. Jaideva Singh, 1979; Dyczkowski, 1992) so as not to burden thereader with the unfamiliar vocabulary of the tradition. I present mytranslation, as well as my commentary, in as modern terms as possible.The universal and the individual in the SS According to SS the individualknowledge comes from associations. Owing to this our phenomenal knowledgecan only be in terms of the associations of the outer world. But theassociations in themselves need something to bind them together.Thisis the binding problof neuroscience to which no solution, within thestandard scientific paradigm, is known (see Kak 1995a for details).The binding energy is called matrika (matdrka).
It is matrika thatmakes it possible for us to understand words or symbols strung togetheras language. Lacking matrika, computers cannot understand language orpictures. Universal consciousness, as a unity, is called Shiva or Bhairava.Shiva makes it possible for the material associations of the phycisalworld to have meaning. But the domain of the union of Shiva and thephenomenal world is puzzling and astonishing (1-12).This is a restatement of a metaphor that goes back to the Rigvedawhere the mind is seen as two birds are sitting on a tree where oneof theats the sweet fruit and the other looks on without eating (RV1-164-20); one of the birds represents the universal consciousness,the other the individual one. There is only one bird; the other is justthe image of the first energized by the fruit!
Shiva Sutra Sanskrit Pdf Free
There is a paradox herewhich is left unresolved. But certainly root consciousness (Shiva, prakasa,cit) is what makes it possible to comprehend. In later texts the capacityof consciousness to reflect on itself is called vimarsa.Another metaphor that has been used elsewhere is that of the sunof consciousness illuminating the associations in the mind. What facilitatesthis illumination is the ``power of the will.' 'Innate knowledge is taken to emerge from the mind, which is equatedwith mantra, taken here to not as a formula but the inherent capacityto reflect.
Mantra leads to the knowledge of the reality that lies beyondmaterial associations.Consider sound made meaningful in terms of strings that, as words,have specific associations. But what about the `meaning' of elementarysounds? This happens as one opens the `crack' between the universaland the individual.
The individual then gets transformed into a statewhere knowledge is his food.The detachment from one's own associations is the key to the knowledgeof the self-the universal being. One is supposed to take oneself asan outsider.
By separating the senses from the source of consciousness,one is able to reach to the heart of the self. ReferencesAbhinavagupta, 1987. With the Commentary Vivekaof Jayaratha, R.C. Dwivedi and N. Rastogi (eds.). MotilalBanarsidass, Delhi.Abhinavagupta, 1989.
A Trident of Wisdom. State University ofNew York Press, Albany.Dyczkowski, M.S.G., 1987. The Doctrine of Vibration. StateUniversity of New York Press, Albany.Dyczkowski,M.S.G., 1992. The Aphorisms of Siva: The SivaSutrawith Bhaskara's Commentary, the Varttika. State Universityof New York Press, Albany.Feuerstein, G., Kak, S.C., Frawley, D., 1995.
In Search of theCradle of Civilization. Quest Books, Wheaton, IL.Kak, S.C., 1992/4. Reections in clouded mirrors: selfhood inanimalsand machines. Presented at the Symposium on Aliens,Apes, and Artificial Intelligence: Who is a person in the postmodernworld? Southern Humanities Council Annual Conference,February 13, 1993.Kak, S.C., 1994.
The Astronomical Code of the R.gveda. Aditya,New Delhi.Kak, S.C., 1995a. Quantum neural computing. Advances in Imagingand Electron Physics, vol 94, 259-313.Kak, S.C., 1995b.
The three languages of the brain: quantum,reorganizational, and associative. 4th Appalachian Conf. OnBehavioral Neurodynamics, Radford, VA, September.Kak, S.C., 1995c. The astronomy of the age of geometric altars.Q. Soc., 36, 385-396.Kak, S.C., 1996a. Information, physics, and computation.
Foundationsof Physics, 26, 127-137.The Siva Sutra 15Kak, S.C., 1996b. Speed of computation and simulation. Foundationsof Physics, 26, in press.Kak, S.C., 1996c. Why machines cannot be conscious. Presentedat Towards a Science of Consciousness, TUCSON II, Tucson,April 8-13.Kramrisch, S., 1981. The Presence of Siva. Princeton UniversityPress, Princeton.Moore, W., 1989.
Schrodinger: Life and Thought. CambridgeUniversity Press, Cambridge.Singh, Jaideva, 1979. Siva Sutras: The Yoga of Supreme Identity.Motilal Banarsidass, Delhi.Source: 2007.
Original translation by Subhash C. Kak Louisiana StateUniversity Baton Rouge. The Sanskrit verses have been convertedinto Transliteration script and the entire manuscript has been rearrangedand reformatted by Jayaram V for Saivism.Net.