Beyond All Images

Among the Hindu Trinity, ParamaSiva is generally found in a state of samadhi or trance. He often roams in the cremation ground, as he never perceives any separation from any part of the universe. In his absence, Parvati felt lonely. She therefore asked him to teach her to attain the samadhi state so that she would not feel separated from her consort.

Siva asked her to sit in the asana posture, close her eyes and turn her gaze within and meditate. The following dialogue is then supposed to have taken place between them, according to a story related by Swami Ramdas of Anandashram in North Kerala:

Siva: What do you see now?
Parvati: I see your form in my mental vision.
S: Go beyond that form. What do you see now?
P: I see a brilliant light.
S: Go beyond the light. What do you see⁷
P: I hear the sound "Om.
S: Transcend the sound. What is now your experience?
To the last question there was no answer. Parvati had become one with the cosmic self. There was now no subject and object, no seer and seen for her, only "existence." There was only the nameless, changeless and the formless reality. Some time later when Parvati was gradually coming back to consciousness, she was heard uttering softly, "I am Brahman."

There are many important things that one can learn from this story. Meditation is shown rightly as going beyond everything. Lord Siva, asks his wife Parvati to go beyond a vision of Siva, because reality is formless. The brilliant light that Parvati sees thereafter, reaching which stage, most devotees are satisfied, is again negated by Siva. Parvati hears within herself the sound of the anahata sabda, and Siva denies that as well suggesting to Parvati to go still further. The mental visions have vanished, the seeing and the listening have been transcended, and Parvati is now one with existence. She has realized unity, and from this oneness or samadhi, arise compassion and love.

When a devotee told Arunachala Ramana that in her meditation she constantly saw the form of Ramana, he advised her to persist in her meditation and that one day the image would vanish, taking her to a different state!

Jiddu Knshnamurti, who always feared that those who listened to him would get attached to his personality, advised them to forget the speaker, while attaching utmost importance to the "teaching." The true friend in the field of spirituality, will always induce you to go beyond all forms, be they human or divine, lest you get stuck somewhere on the way.

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