Golden Lay Verses

Verse 348 (மந்திர வைப்பு)

தமிழ் பாடல்

மனம்வெட்ட வெளியானால் மதி வெறுமைப் பாழானால்

புனமென்னும் பொறிபுலன்கள் போக்குவெறும் போக்காகும்

சினங்குலையும் சிரத்துச்சித் சித்தமெனும் வானத்தே

நனங்குலவும் நமனறியா நாயகியின் நாயகமே

Transliteration

manamvetta veḷiyāṉāl mati veṟumaip pāḻāṉāl

punamennum poṟipulankaḷ pōkkuveṟum pōkkākum

sinangulaiyum sirattuccit cittamenum vāṉattē

nanangulavum namanariyā nāyakiṉ nāyakamē

Literal Translation

If the mind becomes the open expanse (veṭṭa veḷi), if the intellect becomes an empty wasteland,

then the sense-organs and sense-fields called the “farmland” — their going becomes only (empty) going.

Anger collapses; in the “sky” called the head’s cit–cittam (conscious mind/awareness),

nectar gathers; O Lord of the Lady—he whom Yama (Death) does not know (cannot grasp).

Interpretive Translation

When the mind is released into the vast inner space and the discursive intellect is emptied, the sensory powers lose their binding force and their outward run becomes meaningless. With anger dissolved, awareness opens in the cranial “sky” (the upper center), where a dew/nectar-like essence gathers. In that state one becomes beyond the jurisdiction of death—O Śiva, consort (and lord) of the Goddess.

Philosophical Explanation

The verse sketches a Siddhar map of liberation using layered metaphors. “Mind becoming veṭṭa veḷi” indicates the mind no longer clings to forms and instead abides as space-like openness—an inner void that is not mere blankness but a non-grasping clarity. “Mati” (intellect, also the moon) turning into “emptiness/barrenness” suggests the waning of the reflective, measuring faculty that divides experience into subject–object; when this collapses, the “field” of the senses (pori/pulan) loses its usual harvest of desire and aversion, so their movements become “just movement,” no longer producing karmic binding.

The next movement is ethical-psychological and yogic: anger (ciṉam) dissolves as reactivity ends. The line about the “sky” of the head points to the upper inner space (often read as the crown region) where cit/cittam—consciousness and mind—are said to be clarified or perfected. “Nectar gathering” evokes the Siddha–Tantric idea of amṛta (a dew-like essence) associated with the cranial locus: in yoga it can signify bliss and stabilization of awareness; in Siddha registers it can also imply a subtle physiological-alchemical transformation (cooling, preservation, “deathlessness”).

“Yama does not know” can be read in two ways without cancelling either: (1) spiritually, the liberated one is not seized by death because identification with the perishable has ended; (2) yogically/alchemically, a perfected inner state is described as resisting decay, with amṛta functioning as a symbol for conservation of vital essence. The address “Lord of the Lady” keeps the theistic frame (Śiva–Śakti) while simultaneously pointing to an interior union of consciousness (Śiva) and power/energy (Śakti).

Key Concepts

  • veṭṭa veḷi (open expanse / inner void)
  • mati (intellect; also ‘moon’ symbolism)
  • pori–pulan (sense-organs and sense-fields)
  • pratyāhāra / sensory withdrawal (implied)
  • ciṉam (anger) dissolution
  • sirattu (head) as inner ‘sky’ (upper center/crown)
  • cit / cittam (consciousness; mind-as-awareness)
  • amṛta / ‘nectar’ / dew-like essence
  • Yama / death and its transcendence
  • Śiva as ‘nāyakiyin nāyakan’ (lord of the Goddess; Śiva–Śakti unity)

Ambiguities or Multiple Readings

  • “veṭṭa veḷi” can mean the vast open space, the ‘cut-open’ void produced by severing thoughts, or the primordial spaciousness of awareness itself.
  • “mati” may mean ordinary intellect/discrimination, the mind’s ‘moon’ (cool reflective principle), or the subtle lunar energy that is said to wane in higher absorption.
  • “puṉam” (field/farmland) as a name for the senses may imply (a) the body–sense complex where karmic ‘crops’ grow, or (b) the external world taken as a cultivated field of experience.
  • “pōkku veṟum pōkku” can be read as the senses naturally ceasing, or as their activity continuing but becoming non-binding/insubstantial.
  • “cirattuc cit cittam” may mean ‘the head’s consciousness-mind,’ or more technically a perfected state of mind (cittam) established in the cranial center; the compound allows both.
  • “naṉam” is cryptic: it can suggest dew/moisture (hence amṛta), cool bliss, or an auspicious refinement; Siddhar usage often keeps this intentionally multivalent.
  • “Yama does not know” can indicate literal deathlessness in an alchemical sense, or figurative deathlessness as liberation beyond identification; the verse does not force a single choice.
  • “nāyakiyin nāyakan” can denote Śiva as divine consort, the inner Lord of Śakti (kundalinī), or the realized Guru-principle that ‘masters’ the inner energy.