Breaking Fear, Secrecy, and Prejudice: Guruji’s Vision of an Open Śrī Vidyā

 

Guruji and Amma during the Prathista of Sahasrakshi, Devipuram, 1990.

(from "The Goddess and the Guru"):

“Sri Vidya means ‘sacred learning,’” Guruji explained during a talk in mid-1980s, in a fairly early explanation of his approach. “It is a large body of rituals held secret for ages, restricted only to priests because of the immense powers that the learning unfolds with practice. The idea [of the tradition’s secrecy] was that destructive powers should not be made available to minds lacking discipline and compassion.”

These “destructive powers” involved pure śakti, the uncontrolled energy believed to be at play in the direct worship of the Goddess—as opposed to the “safer,” more modulated energy involved in approaching her indirectly as the subordinate consort of a male god. It was (and still widely is) believed that “goddesses bear a seemly, auspicious demeanor when they are subjected to the will of their husbands or consorts—that is, when they serve within the [socially and cosmically safe and predictable] structures that their spouses provide.” Direct worship of the Goddess, by contrast, meant invoking dangerous “powers of illusion, natural forces, and energy in a pure form, beyond the control of any governing, restraining structure.”

As a result, the practice of Sri Vidya came to be seen as “fraught with danger.” Indeed, it was popularly believed “that the worship of Śrī-chakra is elaborate, complex and hazardous, and very few people would venture to undertake it,” as one scholar-practitioner noted in the 1980s. Another scholar of the period observed, “Even today, the Dravidian-speaking sections of southern India give evidence—through puberty rites, menstrual taboos, and widow restrictions—of greater concern for controlling and containing female powers than do the Indo-Aryan linguistic regions of the north.”

These human “female restrictions” were both implicitly and explicitly extended to the Divine Feminine—with the result that direct worship of the Mother Goddess came to be considered a risky undertaking best confined to temples and solitary ascetics. Since any inadvertent ritual error or innocent mispronunciation of a mantra could invite disaster, even devout householders avoided Sri Vidya practice at home.

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This then was the social and religious context within which Guruji first began promulgating his comparatively radical philosophy of openness and inclusion. “There was so much fear of worshiping the Mother in those days,” his sister Suryalakshmi recalled. “Not just fear of performing rituals like Sri Chakra Puja; people were scared to even read a hymn like the Sri Lalita Sahasranama. They were afraid it would cause disruption in their lives.”

Without ridiculing or dismissing these deeply ingrained superstitions, Guruji argued that they were based on social prejudice and chauvinism, not spiritual truth. “Guru Dattatreya was given to Atri, a sage, and his wife Anasuya,”¹³¹ he said, “which indicates that one can be a householder and still do sadhana. He was openly ritualistic and a great Tantric. He taught the worship of Shakti to people from all classes. His system was called Kaula,¹³² meaning ‘total’—internal as well as external worship.”

Accordingly, Guruji’s teachings in Vizag during this period display repeated reassurances and deep compassion toward his students, especially women. He went out of his way to assure them that the Divine Mother would never seek to harm them, that they were all her children and she sought only to love and protect them. “People used to stream in throughout the day to listen to him,” Sundari Amma recalled. “He would sweep away their fear and apprehension, and awaken within them new enthusiasm, devotion and faith.”

For example, just before Guruji left for Africa, Sundari Amma’s mother told him she was worried her daughter was practicing Sri Vidya in his absence. “What if something goes amiss in the pujas or mantra japa while you are away?” she asked him. Guruji took the elder woman’s hands in his own and replied, “Dear lady, do not worry about your daughter. If she makes any mistakes I will absorb them and give over to her whatever merits she receives. The Divine Mother’s grace is with us, so what do we have to fear?”

Noted Sundari Amma, “This image of the guru offering my mother abhaya—absolving her from fear—holds a special place in my heart.”

Suryalakshmi added, “He taught people as a satguru¹³³—as ‘one who dispels the darkness’—that the Goddess is a gentle mother, loving, kind, doting, and compassionate. He taught them that it was okay to read and recite her hymns and prayers, to keep a Sri Chakra in their home, to do puja to Rajarajeswari, Kali, Saraswati—to all of these goddesses and more.”

Guruji gradually instilled confidence in his followers that anyone could pray to the Divine Mother—whenever, wherever and however they wished. And in time, with his encouragement and Amma’s example, more and more women (and men) began actively participating in his pujas and recitations. Before long, many were independently organizing and leading recitations, prayers, rituals and other homages to the Goddess on their own.