Lalleshwari
An apostle of Human
values
by Prof. K. N. Dhar
Cultural
heritage of a country borrows measured sustenance
from the philosophy of life
nurtured inch by inch,
by its denizens from the time, man awoke to the
consciousness of self and spirit. It may well be
called the culmination of quest of man from finite
mooring, to infinite dimensions. At the same time,
this search of man for finding his feet on the
spiritual plane, can in no way be the last word on
this subject, since such pursuits are cumulative
in character and content. This edifice comes into
being brick by brick, hammered into proper shape
by savants and saints from time to time. However,
it calls for reinterpretation every day in and
out, so that the erring human being, with all his
frailities, in not derailed into the abyss of
animality. Perhaps this is the veritable theme of
the famous word of Lord Krsna in Gita "when
vice prevails and virtue dwindles, I resurrect my
own being for proffering refuge to the virtuous
and annihilating vice completely; thus re-establishing
human values in every age".
In our happy
valley Lalleshwari most charitably projected such
human values, so dear to Kashmiris from the dawn
of history. An irrefutable proof of this attitude
of concilliation instead of confrontation can be
gleaned from the pages of Nilamata Purana wherein
Lord Buddha has been acknowledged as an
incarnation of God Avatara. Buddhism, to speak
squarely, was essentially a revolt against
Brahmanism, yet the catholic Brahmin with his
proverbial forbearance did not use the same
language or adopt the same attitude as the
Buddhists had employed with respect to Brahmanism.
The healthy approach of Kashmiri Brahmins was
never negative in essence but purely positive. So,
we can safely assert that Lalleshwari, a vigilant
sentinel of Kashmiri culture displayed highest
magnitude of courage and foresight in those not
very auspicious times beckoning man not to
discriminate on the basis of religious labels:-
<verses>
It was actually the
continuation of that Catholic attitude of mind
displayed by Kashmiris from times immemorial.
However, time does not
maintain a uniform tenor or temper. It is at times
moody and capricious; and when the political map
of Kashmir was redrawn in the fourteenth century
by the induction of sultans over the Kashmir
scene, this accomodation of head and heart
received a jolt. Kashmiris became oblivious of
their pristine past; present consequently got
divorced from it, mutilating its brilliant face
and its attendant decorum. During those unsavoury
and all the more unpalatable times, Lalleshwari
fortified to her marrow by the innate strength of
her conviction, rose to the occasion and strove
hard put to an end to this dismal era of
persecution and vandalism. In this crusade her
tools were not abjuration but affirmation;
bitterness changed hands with sweet and more
persuasive compromise. Having elected to tread
this path of self-suffering, she became a model
for millions of her country-men to abjure the
mundance and propitiate the sublime. It was no
less than a miracle by which the sufferings of the
people lost their sting and they learnt to bear up
with these with stoical resistance. They were
exhorted to rise above the self and reach up to
the super-self at which stage pleasure or pain
have no relevance or meaning. Some say it was
self-deceit, fleeing from the actual life, rather
self-forget-fullness to feel shy of the stark
realities of life. The most apt answer to this
faulty assertion is provided by ever-awake
Lalleshwari herself in these words:-
<verses>
"Some may heap cavil
on me, even some may curse me; They may say
whatever they like to say. Some may worship me
with the flowers of inherent cognition; yet I do
not feel ruffled with this kind of impeachment or
praise, since I am concerned with my own self and
do not grudge what others have to say about
me."
Muslim rule over Kashmir,
for reasons obvious, sounded the knell for the use
and propagation of sanskrit language. Bilhana, the
famous lyricist of Kashmir had once boasted that,
"In their household the Kashmiri women even
speak sanskrit and prakrit as fluently as their
mother-tongue." It was now an old wooden
story. However, a bridge was to be built between
the present and the past for which sanskrit had
been a very potent instrument; but the general
public had lost contact with it. Persian was the
order of the day in its stead. So, Lalleshwari
chose to speak to the people in their own idiom;
hence Kashmiri became the vehicle of her message.
In this way, she did not only make her message
more intelligible and comprehensible to the
masses, but also achieved the purpose of bridging
the gulf between the past and the present. Present
is an improved version of the past providing the
base on which future can be built. In her time the
friction between the past and the present was the
loudest; hence, she like an expert alchemist, by
her healing touch saved Kashmiri culture from
being eroded and bruised. Her clarion call to
assimilate human values in thoie dark days won for
her the esteem and acclaim of Hindus and Muslims
alike and the edge of ruthless proselytisation got
blunted. It was no mean achievement on her part in
uniting the lost children of one God, when every
effort was being made to segregate them from each
other. Her message was so universal and appealing
that the tallest of Muslim Reshis of Kashmir
Sheikh Noor -ud -Din Noorani made her his ideal
and expressed what he owed to her in these words:-
<verses>
"That Lalla of
Padmpur (Pampur) was fortunate enough in gulping
the ambrosial nectarine draughts; thereby she won
our adoration as an incarnation of immortal
Divinity. Benevolent God, grant me also such a
boon."
Lalla's message couched
in quartrains called 'Vaks' is very simple and
straight bereft of any curves or terseness. It is
actually an exhortation to man to indulge in
self-cognition. It is a readymade manual on self-
education and consequent self-consciousness.
<verses>
"I felt fatigued by
imessant self-search, thinking that no body could
partake of that hidden perceptive knowledge; I,
ultimately got immersed into it and could find
admission to the Divine-bar; therein the goblets
are full to the brim, but none possesses the nerve
to drink these."
Mental drill is preamble
to self- consciousness. At that pinnacle of self-
discipline mind gets tamed automatically
effortlessly:-
<verses>
"The steed of mind
gallops through the sky, encompassing this whole
universe. During the twinkling of an eye it can
traverse millions of miles. He, who is proficient
enough to put it on rails by controlling its
reins, check its wayward demeanour by clipping its
wings in the shape of mastering his own inhalation
and exhalation can attain the stage of self-
cognition."
Worship, in the words of
Lalla connotes self- introspection. It has nothing
to do with external paraphernalia:-
<verses>
"Mind is the
flower-seller and faith the flowers. Worship
should be undertaken with the offerings of mental
equipoise. Shiva is to be given a bath of tears.
Incantations are to be recited in silence, without
making a show of these. In this way only
self-consciousness can be awakened from
within."
According to Lalleshwari
a realizer has to hammer out his mental attitude
on these lines:-
<verses>
"He, who considers
his own self and others as alike, abjures
distinction between 'I' and 'you', He, who treats
days and nights alike; is undisturbed by pleasure
or pain. He, whose mind is bereft of duality,
whose heart beats for all alike; only such a
realizer can perceive the highest of
preceptors-Shiva."
But, that shiva is within
the self of the realizer, as inseparable from it
as the smell from the flower. Immanence is self
and transcendence is super-self-shiva in the
language of Kashmiri monistic Shaivacharyas:-
<verses>
"Why do you beat
your breast for nothing ? If you possess
unwavering intelligence, you shall have to seek
Him from within, Shiva is seated there and
searching Him from outside will be of no avail. Do
believe my word, baked with self-
perception."
Withont beating about the
bush, it can be safely asserted that Lalleshwari's
forte was Kashmiri Shaivism. This concept of
Kashmirian philosophy actually revolutionized the
age-long attitudes of man, more so of the
Brahmins. It advocates a caste-less society as
also abhorrs Kitchen-puritanism. Hindu society
ailing through its own defective approach,
justified such a kind of major operation for
instilling evergreen health into its rusty veins.
Shaiva scholars of Kashmir diagnosed the disease
rightly and prescribed such an elixir for its
longevity which defied the time with its
nihilistic redclaws. Had not this philosophy of
life been at hand to the Kashmiris at that dismal
hour of history, no Hindu worth the name, would
have survived in the Land of 'Kashyapa', alien
culture would have made an easy morsel of him.
Lalla's Vaks, are actually a Kashmiri rendering of
shiva sutras; When this philosophy was born, no
such predicament was there, as was faced by
Lalleshwari in her own times later on. At best,
shaivas had to contend with the Buddhists, whose
attitude was also home-spun and not foreign in any
way; Hence, Lalla had to reclaim the lost faith of
her brethren, provide a viable alternative to the
enticements an alien faith was offering to the
people at large; and at the same time, in
performing this double duty, she had to be always
cross-fingered, not invite the wrath of the
rulers. It definitely goes to her credit that
while discharging her mission, she did not make a
single enemy out of the other camp. To crown all,
her message did cut through the man-made barriers
of religions, Hindus as well as Muslims became her
votaries with equal gusto. Her appeal was
humanistic and not sectarian. Her approach was of
positive affirmation and not of negative
abjuration; consequently it multiplied her
friends. Her ingenuity in steering safe between
the two antagonistic factions is unsurpassed. She
was instrumental in replacing call to steel by
call to human conscience, consequently changing
sourness to sweetness:-
<verses>
"We, human beings,
did live in the past and we alone will be in the
future also. From ancient times to the present, we
have activised this world. Just like rising and
setting of the sun, a usual routine, the immanent
Shiva (jiva) will never be relieved of birth and
death."
Lalleshwari did not
preach any hard and fast religion, she even
disdained ritual. She projected a way of life
quite in harmony with our cultural traditions, in
which a happy amalgam was made of what was good in
Buddhism, Hinduism and even Islam;-
<verses>
"That
transcendental-self may assume the names of
Shiva, Visnu, Buddha or Brahma; I am concerned
only With their efficacy in cutting asunder my
worldly affections, which might be accomplished by
any one of these."
Therefore, it follows
from this, that she was not dogmatic or rigid
either. She welcomed the healthy wafts of wind
coming from any direction whatsoever, anointing
her body and soul with chaste Divinity. She always
kept the windows of her mind open, rejecting what
was mundane and assimilating the sublime:-
<verses>
"The Super- Lord is
supervising His shop with personal care. All the
aspirants are eager to take away wares of their
liking. Whatever, you would elect to buy, does not
admit of any intermediary; It is to be earned by
your own effort, since the shop is devoid of any hindrance
and even a watch is not kept over
it."
This is the acme of
Lalla's message. Man has been exhorted to seek his
own self front within, without any external aids.
Self-effort is precursor of self- education
finally culminating in self-consciousness - Shiva
- as she calls it.
As long as the silvery
bellows of the Vitasta maintain their rejuvenating
rhythm, as long as the virgin snow on the
Himalayan heights retains its unblemished
splendour and stature, the exquisite 'Vaks' of
Lalleshwari soaked to the full in the inherent
values of Kashmiri culture and human understanding
will go on, unimpeded of course, in providing
dignity to man to recognize his own self and not
to run after deluding shadows; since the culture
of a land never dies, the message of Lalla
portraying meaningfully the humanistic attitudes
ingrained in our culture, will never grow stale.
Its fragrance and flavour are evergreen.
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