It is the last day of our phase today. This morning was Skanda Shashti Homa and Abhishekam… (no pictures today…)

And we conducted the weekly tour as usual later in the morning.

Bodhinatha is still in Chennai as we write today… our team is having a leisurely day there as the rains continue, though flooding has abated somewhat… all is well and they will be departing tomorrow to go back to New Delhi and catch their return flight home.

Also today all the files for the January 2006 Issue of Hinduism Today were shipped to the printer via internet. You can look forward to another beautiful issue.

END OF PHASE
Today is the last day of our phase.
This edition of TAKA will remain posted
over our coming two-day retreat,
until Dasami Tithi, Sun One, Thursday, November 10th.

Our guests watching Sthapati marking a stone…

About 50 visitors today…

Amit and Ketaki from Fremont, California, were here yesterday and returned again today for the Muruga homa and a tour of our grounds.

Like others who were here today they were most impressed with the beauty of Siva’s island sanctuary and fascinated with the rudraksha seeds which are everywhere on the ground on the west side of Iraivan temple.

Talking with Sthapati..

Another young Hindu couple…

Our guests are always amazed at the flora… and we will close today’s TAKA with some of its images….

Chicu fruits…

And bushels of oranges and grapefruit…

For the new book on the Kailasa Parampara we have commission art by S. Rajam for many of the stories. We have extracted vignettes of Yogaswami…

While Yogaswami was a great jnani and mystic… he was also a great bhaktar and exemplar of the path of Saiva Siddhanta wherein theistic worship continues to be part and parcel of religious life, even as we unfold into the celestial heights of advaitic realization. Here he is going to the temple, as he often did… He sang:

THE FLAWLESS WORSHIP.

Aloft on the ladder, the blooms I pluck from high,
And offer them in flawless worship, Thangam dear.
There is no before or after.
I give up the Yoga of eight and Yogic centres six,
In the symphony of Sakti, Thangam dear
I behold the subtle secrets all.
The fickle mind subdued, the life breath set flame,
Immersed in silence I become, Thangam dear
There is neither you nor I, my dear.
The goldsmith makes me a wedlock chain of gold,
I wear it without fastening, Thangam dear
The cause of it I do apprehend.
Unsupported is the stage of Nadantam that I climb,
And unto the wielder yielding, Thangam dear
The feast of communion do I become.
Enwrapped in silken skirt of God, soul and matter,
I don the veil alluring, Thangam dear,
All, all is Truth my dear.
The favour or not of those who give and give not,
I fling aside in flawless worship, Thangam dear.
The Three hath become One my dear.
Ineffable bliss doth engulf me fully,
Yet inscrutable; so touch not, Thangam dear.
But listen and rejoice in its glory.
See without seeing the form of Siva as Effulgence.
Even if it eludes thee, Thangam dear
Look not down my dear.
Ambrosial honey is in the bough far above.
Taste it with discretion, Thangam dear.
There’ll be none to equal thee.
Blessed are those who sing these verses ten,
Full of felicity on earth, Thangam dear,
Sivam art all they realise.

–Natchintanai. 245.