Menoculayshunal; The Intellectual Feast List

Before starting this post properly, I just wanted to share with you an image I hunted frantically through the archives for last week and failed to find. Typically, it turned up when I was looking for something else later in the week. Sums up menoplyxinaemia, really. Anyway, it was one of only two images I have of Nandi in the Jagadeeshwara mandir at Sandeepany. Not entirely sure why it meant so much to find it for you, but here it is. Nandi is a guardian but also a vehicle. A protector and a conveyor. When circumambulating the garbha, devotees might stop and whisper in the ear to have their prayers communicated by this intermediary to the Lord. It may just be the Taurean in me, but I love Nandi...

(I decided to do a retrospective of my Indian photographs through July over at My Take bloggy. and other Nandi's will appear there in due course... Keep your eyes on that one from Thursday!)

As I sat to prepare this post, I wondered where to wander next and realised that this weekly memoir, which was begun with no clear focus, is not as random as I had thought it might seem. There was the arrival, some rationale, the setting and the settling, the nourishment of the body (food), a little more rationale and, latterly, the arrangement of the average day. Occasional dips into the memoir pure. It's all still rather scene-setting with a slight brush with a character or two. I think it has to continue in this vein as I build up to the deeper, much more personal aspects. ... I realise that I am along for this ride as much as you, the reader, and like most writers, even though I know outcomes according to the plot, I am still eager to uncover any little gems or revelation. Thinking out loud does that for one. 

In short, there is a sort of catharsis going on here. Following the departure from India, I had no time at all to properly decompress. Two months back in OZ before repatriating to the Bonny Land after thirty years apart. In the seven-plus years back here, much of my time has been taken up - as most of you are aware - with duty to family.  This is fine - but now I have to come to terms within myself on various matters, not least my life as a Vedantin. 

It is my anchor, and it has been dragging a bit as the storms of life buffeted. It has stabilised me, albeit with a ding or two here and there. Now it is time to relax and repair and lift that anchor to sail back into the deeper sea. That is what prompted the resurrection of Aatmaavrajanam bloggy. Some of the personal discipline and routine is returning. But that is, once more, a rationale. A sift and sort of thoughts. Let me say, to round off this post, and about the content of a regular day back in Sandeepany, there were a lot of texts to get through. To give you an idea, here's an indication of what was included. 

You already learned, of course, that Sanskrit and Vedic chanting were on the curriculum, but the bulk of the study was the various writings of Vedanta, both ancient and more recent (as in those of Adi Shankara).  It is to be acknowledged that many of the suktams and mantras learned are, of themselves, texts, but they are not necessarily Advaitic. Previously, I mentioned the Sadhana Panchakam as the first we embarked upon. There were also the Tattva Bodha, Atma Bodha, Upadesh Sara, Bhaja Govindam and the Keno Upanishad as foundations. We built up with Drg-Drshya Viveka, Vivekachudamani, Vakya Vritti, Panchadashi (Selected Chapters), Advaita Makaranda, Vedanta SaraH, Saddarshanam, Hastamalaka Stotram, Manisha Panchakam, Dakshinamurti Stotram... then into the Bhagavad Gita and the Upanishads, including Isha, Katha, Mundaka, Aitereya, Taittiriya, Prashno, Mandukya (+Karika), Chandogya, Kaivalya, AmRta Bindu and Shvetashvatara. Many devotional texts, the already mentioned Bhagavatam, the Narada Bhakti Sutra, Makunda Mala and so forth, plus plenty of stotrams and there were bhajans ("happy-clappy songs").

...still here? Well done. Just reading that list doesn't of itself convey much - particularly to non-Indians. Think in terms of starting with the high school chemistry text, for example. Gradually working up to biochemistry and add in physics. Then astrophysics, quantum theory ... and keep on going. If we choose, we can read texts from these things - but how much would we truly understand? To the point that we can make connections and start to arrive at our own conclusions? For that, we require systematic study and the guidance of those who have already travelled that way.