It will be disrespectful for me to divulge into mentioning about Ayya without first paying my gratitude to all my wonderful spiritual friends and teachers; each sharing thier story, experience and Ayya's past.
Each time I hear of Ayya,I am amazed to realize how deep within the sacred eternal fire as journey that is beyond enlightenment is.
Each moment of meditating on Ayya to feel the ancient tapasic energy, i am humbled to write of this immenseness of Being who is as a human still in tapas. Jai Guruve Thunai! Jai Guru, please be with me! may each breath of 'mine' be your fire that unites 'me' to you as my joy!
Ayya is in his 16th year of tapasic meditation in his cave like abode near the peak of the sacred Thiruvannamalai. For more than 17 years he was in mouna (silence), practicing the higher form of yoga, kecheri mudra. He still drinks just a cup of milk a day- from the time he began meditating on the mountain. He has been sitting in the powerful posture (adopted by Siddhars who after attaining realization then begin perfecting thier human limitations by adopting this posture of sakthi, that as swami ayyappa) for all these years.
Ayya's Guru-
Ayya follows the path of his Guru who was called Ayya Vaikunthar.Ayya Vaikunthar was an incarnation of Lord Vishnu. The first Ayya(Ayya Vaikunthar) exposed the sublime Siddha teachings to the common man and created a social movement to rid society of the evils of caste and ignorance. The waves of empowered divine insight has silently transformed the society of mankind on the whole today.
Swami Vivekananda, after being revealed his enormous divine vision in Kanya Kumari, the sacred Southern tip of India. It was this vision that brought Swami Vivekananda to USA and the Western world. Immediately after this beautiful sacred vision, Swami Vivekanda sought Ayya Vaiukunthar whose hermitage was near by.
Swami Vivekanda was blessed by Ayya Vaikunthar and given the sacred turban. It is this sacred turban that Swami Vivekananda always wore so to be empowered by the ancient energy of all the Sages of India.
Now, as the New Age blossoms in the West with Swami Vivekananda and then followed by the divine waves of Siddhar MahaAvathar Babaji who directed Sri Paramahamsa Yogananda.... the ancient fire reveals more to all.
Ayya Vaikunthar's teachings for society ill with ignorance of those days were-
No idol worship- to break the discrimination that was encountered by the lower caste who were not allowed in major temples in South India prior to 1940's.
Vegetarianism- so to convey the sacredness of life within ourselves as the lives of all the living.
Ahimsa- the non harming and the soul force that enables a Siddhar to sit in the forest by himself in a forest of tigers. (How effectively Mahatma Gandhi demonstrated that this wisdom of ancient India works!)
The worship within that sees the Divine within and in all.
The Divine to worship within in His/Her formless, nameless attribute.
Connecting many with the empowering Siddhar mantras that grows the fire of bhakthi and the light of knowing.
To know "Love" as the essence of the Heart. No journey above is possible without having lit the heart cave's lamp.
Worship of Divine in the many ways as each perception seeks. As Swami Vivekananda said, "A cat's God is a Cat".
As a Siddhar, Ayya Vaikunthar lived his time in the camouflage of human duties, married with children and yet as the eternal yogi who transcended time to live through many as thought's Source... as Ayya now, above in the peak of sacred Thiruvannamalai.
Ayya Thunai.
http://www.nandhi.com
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Love and Joy,
Shahid.