Kashmir, Tamilnadu, Panini, Abhinavagupta, etc.

[Swaminathan Madhuresan]

Reading the postings by Drs. Ganesan and Palaniappan, the
argument that dakSiNAmUrti and Avalokitezvara are NOT to be
related does NOT appear convincing to me.

Look at the postings by Prof. N. Ganesan under the
thread - "Siva and Avalokitezvara. He says

1) daza bhUmikA sUtra (200 AD), the highest, ultimate
state the Bodhisattva reaches is "mahezvara 'siva".

2) The primal spell of Avalokitezvara is Om maNi padme hUm
all over the world. "Jewel in the Lotus" refers to the most famous
"Siva theme - linga-yoni combination.

Regards
Swaminathan Madhuresan

---"N. Ganesan" <naga_ganesan at HOTMAIL.COM> wrote:
>
> DVN Sarma writes:
> >This shows that there is a strong probability that Taranatha's
> >Potala is somewhere in the vicinity of Dhanyakataka. (The
> >submerging of the path under the sea cannot be explained.) ...
>
>   Taranatha is very late. Seventeenth century AD.
>   Even though earlier Chinese texts put Mt. Potalaka
>   in the Malaya mountains, post tenth-century tradition
>   puts the Mountain Potalaka in an island. Hence the
>   sea voyage.
>
>   BTW, you were identifying Potala as Tirupati(tiruvEngaDam)
>   in Indology  before I started my Potalaka posts.
>   What happened to that id.?
>
> DVN Sarma writes:
> >The basic requrement for Potala is that it should be primarily
> >a Buddhist center and for its bonafides it should not
> >invoke proxies like Siva and Daksinamurti.
>
>   Thanks for the summary of your views.
>
>   But, it cannot be supported with available evidence
>   from pre-10th century material in Tamil, Sanskrit
>   and Chinese.
>
>   Few points:
>
>   1) Pl. look at the Avalokitezvara sitting cross-legged
>   in the Mt. Potalaka in BorobudUr GaNDavyUha panels
>   (800 AD). He resembles 'Siva very much. He wears
>   matted hair like 'Siva, holds rosary beads and a
>   kamaNdalam. Exactly like a great yogin. ('Siva mahadeva).
>
>   2) Xuan Zang (or, may be his disciple (cf. Petr Mares'
>   posts)) in 640 AD and Chih-Sheng, Buddhist monk
>   (688-740 AD) who lived in the T'ang dynasty give
>   descriptions of Mt Potalaka in Malaya mountains
>   where the Bodhisattva appears as
>   Avalokitezvara or 'Siva depending on the religious
>   affliation of the devotees.
>
>   3) There is a very long tradition in Tamil telling that
>   'Siva taught Tamil grammar to Agastya, the Malayamuni.
>   In Sanskrit, there is a long traditon that 'Siva taught
>   grammar to Panini (Who inspired Panini, JAOS, 1997).
>   Note that the Sanskrit texts narrating this myth are from
>   South India (eg., Haradatta's padamaJjari, Nandikezvara
>   kArikA, ..) Tamil tradition also has Avalikitezvara teaching
>   Tamil to Agastya. Southern Sanskrit tradition talks of
>   Avalokitezvara inspiring Panini also. These Saivaite
>   and Buddhist claims point to DakSiNAmUrti, the teacher
>   par excellence, under the banyan tree. Classical Tamil texts
>   have this motif. MahabhArata XII talking of "Siva as the
>   Supreme teacher is ONLY from Southern recension (cf. de Jong).
>   Note also that dakSiNAmUrti sculpture is only
>   found in Tamilakam (Of course, there are Nolamba
>   dakSiNAmUrtis in Dharmapuri situated in Tamil Nadu).
>
>   4)Why would the following authorities say the following
>   if there is no connection between 'Siva and Avalokitezvara:
>
> A. C. Soper writes 'Siva has a Buddhist alter ego Avalokitzevara.
> Alexander C. Soper, Literary evidence for early Buddhist art in China,
> Artibus Asiae publishers, 1959
> p.59:
> "; not, I think, by abrupt transition to a rival cult, but because
> 'Siva had probably been accepted for the time being in the
> Cambodian Buddhist pantheon as a Bodhisattva, with attributes similar
> in many ways to those of his Buddhist *alter ego* Avalokitezvara."
>
>  A. L. Basham (The Wonder That was India, p. 308) says, " A further
>  form in which the god is worshipped is known as the "South-facing"
>  (DakSiNAmUrti) (pl. LXVIII); in this aspect he is the universal
>  teacher, depicted in an informal pose, with one foot on the ground
>  and the other on the throne on which he sits, and with one hand
>  raised in a gesture of explanation. This form of ziva
>  perhaps owes something to Buddhist inspiration."
>
> Regards
> N. Ganesan
>

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