Sambodhi 1983 Vol 12

Author(s): Dalsukh Malvania, H C Bhayani, Nagin J Shah
Publisher: L D Indology Ahmedabad

Page 69

Y. S. Shastri
Ilus Supreme Reality can be known either as Siva or Sakti because they are not two different entities, but one and the same, o ? Though one in e senec, yet for the sake of our convenience, we may call Śiva as Static and Saktı as Kinetic energies. Siva is prakasa (Knowledge) and Sakti is l'mmarsa (activity, aspects of the sama Brahman. When we emphasize knowledge side, It is Siva and the same thing is Sakti when activity side is emphasized. Together they form a single Unity called Prahova Immorta Svarūpa. 63. In the form of Siva it is inactive, indeflerent, non-relative, witness self. The same principle in the form of Sakti Is material cause of the Universe. But they are inseparable like heat from fire, whiteness from milk, sweetness from sugar, luminosity from light and weight from material bodies. 04
Vüyü is power of Saktı. Veiling herself with her own Maya, She becomes desirous of creation. Then there arise 36 Tattvasos including Śwa and Saktı and creative, sustantive and destructive powers also arise, then arise the worlds and elements of which they are composed. Creative sustantive and destructive powers are not distinct entities. They are all one and tlie same as paits of her. Creation is a mode of divine existence and Divine energy sustains the Universe that binds the atoms with atoms. Again destruction is also an aspect of Divine energy that goes in hand in hand with the creative energy. Thus creative, preservative and destructive forces are but the three aspects of Divine energy that exists in Brahman, 06
This Tantra has accepted Sahti Pariņāmavada. Sakti itself, transforms into the form of Universe. World is expansion of this Universal Con sciousness. Thus this world is also real. 7 It is not Brahmayvarta like Advaita. This Sakti is not material like Sankhya philosophy but pure Consciousness It is not Praksti of the Sankhyas, which is unconscious and real. Even great Advaita stalwart Sankara treats Sakti of the Tantra as Supreme Brahman.
It is very important to note that this Tantric literature lays stress on the dynamic nature of the creative power ie. Sakti here as Brhman itself. Though the conception of the goddess Tripura corresponds to that Impersonal Brahman of the Upanişads this Tantra literature, emphasizes the dynamic aspect of the godhead-the activity of manifestation of a Jerty in the form of Divine energy. The Säktas have transformed the Impersonal Absolute Brahman of the Upauişads into a personal divinity that is the onnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient Sakti or a Divine Mother the source, support and end of the entire empirical Universe 69