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Teachings From Dakshinamurti Stotram Of Adi Shankaracharya

Dakshinamurti Stotram Of Adi Shankaracharya not only pays respect to Dakshinamurti, the Universal Guru form of Shiva, but only delineates the fundamental teachings of Vedanta.

The whole world is found to exist entirely in the mind like a city’s image reflected in a mirror. It appears outside, like a dream, through the power of maya. But, by the grace of the guru, it is perceived as the everlasting and non-dual self, on the dawn of knowledge.

Like a magician or a mighty yogi, Dakshinamurti projects outside this infinite universe by the sheer power of his will. Prior to this projection, it was potentially present like a tree in seed; by the power of time and space, imagined through maya, it appears to be many and multiform.

The unreal universe appears real due to ignorance. He graciously teaches those who surrender to him the import of the “great saying” of Upanishad, tat tvam asi (thou art that); this immediate knowledge of Brahman puts an end to the cycle of births and deaths.

His light alone looms through the five senses. That alone brings in the state of knowing characterized by the awareness “I know”.

Misguided men look upon their body breath, senses and the mind as ‘I’. The grace of the guru dispels the mighty illusion caused by the play of maya.

On awakening from deep slumber one says “It was I who slept”. In the absence of the sense activities in deep sleep, this awareness of ‘I’ still exists.

In all the various states of the body, like infancy, and of the mind, like waking and so on, he exists, shines and reveals himself by sign of knowledge, jnana mudra.

By the power of his maya, the world is experience in all the states in all variations as cause-effect, master-servant, teacher-disciple and so on.

The moving and unmoving universe is but the manifestation of his subtle and unmanifest eight-fold form. By this grace these disappear with the realization that “Nothing exists except the Brahman.”