Antarangam

Hridayantarangam II

2006-08-27T21:22:00.000-07:00

Continuing...................

'tad etat try-aksaram; hr da yam iti' - The word for heart in Sanskrit is ‘Hrdaya’, a word with three letters, ‘hr’, ‘da’ and ‘ya’

'hr ity ekam aksaram': The first letter is ‘hr’. The grammatical meaning of the root (‘dhatu’) ‘hr’ is ‘to draw’ or ‘to pull’. Drawing, to attract, to pull towards oneself, to compel everything to gravitate towards oneself, to bring everything under one’s control, to overpower and subjugate everything, to command over all things - all these and more can be implied by root meaning of the letter 'hr'. Those who know will appreciate the reference to ‘strange attractor’.

Given this, the functionality of the heart, as far as relationships go, is set by

‘abhiharanty asmai svas canye ca, ya evam veda’ – It is proclaimed that everything or everyone gets pulled to that object ‘Heart’ or person with heart. Thus everyone gravitates towards that person that has learnt to master the heart. So love is but the invisible gravitational string that draws and pulls others to one’s heart.

‘da ity ekam aksaram' - The second letter is ‘da’. The root ‘da’ connotes the meaning, ‘to give’ in Sanskrit. The words ‘dana’ (gift) or ‘Narada’ (giver of knowledge), originate from this root. Now the letter could presage the giving by the object or being the recipient of what is given to the object. So the etymological significance of the letter lends itself to the act of transfer or exchange, a representation for reciprocation. In other words it is a perfect syllable to connote the ability of heart to either give or accept love.

This dual role of our core that builds on the ability to pull or draw is defined by

‘Dadatyasmai svas canye ca ya evam veda’: It is proclaimed that ‘Everyone shall give to you’. Thus the heart is the center of an irresistible force that receives everything towards itself analogous to an ocean that receives all rivers into itself.

‘Yam iti ekam aksaram’ - The third letter is ‘ya’. The root ‘ya’ implies ‘to go’. The heart epitomizes the journey of our life. We go where our heart leads us to. We follow the dictates of our heart, our soul our conscience.

In fact the culmination of our journey is set by

‘ iti svargam lokam ya evam veda’: You go not anywhere but to the highest Heaven . This is the ultimate destination. Of course what Heaven constitutes is to be subjectively interpreted.

If we cannot or do not want to go deep into philosophical, metaphysical, spiritual and mystical interpretations of the roles of our Heart, let us understand that even a mere linguistic meaning, a grammatical connotation, a literal significance of the word Hrdaya, leads us to the conclusion that we are its slaves. We humans hope and despair, suffer and enjoy, love and hate as we draw and pull, give and receive and go with the ebb and flow as defined by our Hridaya.

Hridayantarangam - The literal dissection of Heart

2006-08-23T21:14:00.000-07:00

A sloka from Brihadaranyaka Upanishad

“esa prajapatir yad hridayam, etad brahma, etad sarvam, tad etat try-
aksaram; hr da yam iti. hr ity ekam aksaram; abhiharanty asmai svas
canye ca, ya evam veda; da ity ekam aksaram, dadatyasmai svas canye ca
ya evam veda; yam, ity ekam aksaram; eti svargam lokam ya evam veda”

The hymn begins with ‘Esa prajapatir yad hridayam’ which translates to ‘This heart within us is Lord Himself’. This sets the equivalence of ‘Hridayam’ the word, for heart in Sanskrit, to the concept of God at the outset. Any Aranyaka is supposed to give details on mediaition as methods to achieve specific aspirations. In the same vein, the hymn goes on to describe its (the heart’s) role in the pursuit of the Absolute and the Supreme.

Millions of words, in a variety of languages, have been used to describe Heart and its rich and varied functionality. Reams of prose have been written and streams of poetry have flown from romantic, wise and brilliant minds. The collective wisdom however has declared that despite these analyses ad infinitum, and at times ad nauseam, the heart is the most inscrutable of all things inside us, and that it cannot be understood easily.

Be that as it may, my aim here is to understand the etymological construct of the Sanskrit word and wonder at how apt the Sanskrit word is in describing the dynamics and functionality of this internal organ (Antarangam) that controls our emotions, feelings and relationships.

The title of this piece ‘Hridayantarangam’, implies a literary sense of word Hridaya that holds a mirror to the spirit, the feelings, the deepest motives and intensions within as opposed to the literal sense of the word as might be described by a biologist or a physician. There is an obvious difference in the implication of the word ‘heart’ in the two sentences, ‘The surgeon operated on the heart’ and ‘I love you with all my heart’.

Spiritual discourses emphasize the theme that the heart is an object for meditation. Gurus, irrespective of religion, have stated, ‘Your heart is you’, ‘What your heart is, that is your being’, ‘You cannot accept rational conclusions which are opposed to the feelings of the heart, or the dictates of conscience’, or for that matter, ‘Your heart is the touchstone of Reality’.

Here in this verse the literal meaning of the very word Hridaya is taken as a symbol for meditation. The verse takes spirit into consideration when it defines Hridaya or heart as the essence of a person. It establishes that the symbolic representation of the Absolute, is embedded in our own being by being situated in our own heart. And that our heart speaks the language of God, and thus whatever the heart speaks can be regarded as a directive from the Above.

My thesis is to show by etymological deconstruction that a similar relationship can be established between heart and love and other intense feelings. No wonder with a name like that, for our internal organ, we are doomed and have no chance whatsoever in resisting the lure of the proverbial apple.

Comeback for more good stuff.............It is a promise...The dissection begins next........

Antaranga tarangam - Dance of thoughts and feelings

2006-08-18T23:55:00.000-07:00

Antarangam - It is such a beautiful word. It is rich in meaning and offers wonderful possibilitities for word play.

If one were to dissect
antar - internal, psychological
angam - organs such as mind and heart

One of the early usages was in the context of yogic practices, Yoga Sutras,

Trayam antarangam puurvebhyah

Commentators explained that the three "internal practices", Dharana (pertaining to Intelligence or Intellect), Dhyana (Meditation) and Samadhi (Perfect concentration) were better than external yogic practices.

Instead of delving deeper into this, I just want to play with the word and indulge in wordsmithy.

In Sanskrit, Antarangam is written with 4 letters, An Ta Ran Gam.

The word as I said, deals with thoughts and feeling, mind and heart. For those of you who know Telugu the following statement renders a tone, a feel, a vision to the usage of the word.

ఏ పూర్వపుణ్యమో నీ పొందుగామారి అపురూపమై నిలిచే నా 'అంతరంగాన '

There are interesting variations in different languages. I will muse on these in a later post.

To continue with our word play, if you strip the first letter in succession, you will still get whole words each time, that have multiple meanings, implications and usage.

For example Ta Ran Gam - ( also written as tha ran gam) could be interpreted as a wave in the ocean as in Samudra Tarangam. Once again Telugu speakers would immediately appreciate the usage in

పడిలేచె కడలి తరంగం

or a confluence, a musical movement as in Naada Tarangam, Raga Tarangam.

Another beautiful usage is in the form of dance movement, especially in Kuchipudi form, as in that wonderful exposition on Infant Lord Krishna, 'Bala Gopala Tarangam'.

Once again this will be subject for analysis in the future. The last two letters Ran Gam - give you a stage, a setting, battle field, a feeling among others.

Last but not the least the letter Gam - the Sanskrit root word ('dhatu') for 'to go' can also be related to cow or earth.

There is a plethora of possibilities.

Tail piece

The Sanskrit root word analysis reminds me of a nice website that is a must for lovers of Sanskrit, Sanskrit-The Mother of All Languages. As they claim it gives us 'A Glimpse of the Perfection of Sanskrit Grammar '. It is worth checking out.

Finally, the Telugu scripts are made possible by the incredible efforts of the developer at Lekhini.

Sen on Tagore

2006-08-16T15:11:00.000-07:00

On the occasion of India's independence day, I thought it would be appropriate to think about the person who has given us our national anthem. Let us set aside the debate about the intent and import of the song and get a glimplse of his 'Antarangam' through the analysis of Amartya Sen.
Interestingly as Sen points out Tagore may well be the only person to have penned the national anthems of two different countries. Read on.............

http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/literature/articles/sen/

2006-08-14T13:58:00.000-07:00

Welcome to my world.