Introductory Text

Avvaiyar, revered as the Mother of Wisdom, has meticulously divided into ten chapters how a person can attain enlightenment. Each part thoroughly infuses complete wisdom, understandable through a proper spiritual guide. Avvaiyar, along with all the revered Siddhars and sages, has passed down the taste and essence of this wisdom.

Can one attain wisdom just by reading about it? Does sugar taste sweet just by saying the word? Similarly, only through experience can one discern whether something is sweet, bitter, wise, or foolish.

Consider how long it takes to cook food and enhance its flavor. How long did it take for all living beings visible in this world to be created? How many evolutionary changes were needed to form these beings? How many biochemical transformations must occur within these beings? Without these processes, divine vision cannot be achieved.

To create your body, a mother and father were necessary. To create parents, Braman was necessary. To create Braman, the Lord was needed. The Lord needed a guru who understood the divine process thoroughly because only a guru truly knows the Lord as He is. I earnestly pray to our spiritual guru, Sri Sri Paramahansa Sundarananda Maharishi, and Mother Sri Bhuvaneshwari, that you all find a true spiritual guru.

Does happiness, wealth, or wisdom come without effort? Humans must strive hard to achieve anything they desire.
Those who strive do not face disgrace; effort leads to divine acts. Undertake the meditation of effort to attain wisdom.

Once you reach the maturity for wisdom, even if the Divine intends, He cannot stop bestowing wisdom upon you. This is a matter of divine timing, Braman’s calculation, and the ultimate cosmic equation of the omnipotent Lord.

Our task is to reach the maturity level needed to attain wisdom. Avvaiyar has generously provided the path to this maturity through her wisdom couplets. We blame the temples, ponds; forests, mountains, caves; and various ashrams for our inability to find time to immerse ourselves in this wisdom, claiming that God is blind to our efforts.

Ket To Enlightenment

“Do not run around searching for me. I am within you. I exist as your life and the essence of life itself. Realize this. Search within yourself. I am nowhere outside of you. When you identify as ‘you,’ I wait every moment for your recognition, constantly observing you. Yet, despite having eyes, you fail to see me,” thus speaks the Divine in both sound and light, but how many of us truly understand and feel this, moved by thought? It would be a miracle if even one or two did. Despite having eyes, you do not see me.

Hidden deep within you as the ultimate truth, the Divine Lord we seek is present, and Avvaiyar has given us the key to unlock this treasure of profound wisdom, urging us to open ourselves with this key.
Enlightenment is universal. So is knowledge. We spread wisdom, but who truly embraces it when it hides itself in illusion?

There is no sight in this world that can be hidden from the eye.
There is no divine power hiding behind the sky from us. If the eye and the sky have seen it, there is no chest of wisdom within us that has not been reached.

Use your eyes to grasp the sky.
With the sky, capture the Divine.
With the Divine, capture the light of Shiva.
With Shiva’s light, grasp wisdom.
With the light of wisdom, capture the light body.
Acquire the light body and become the Divine itself.

How should a guru be? See what the wisdom texts say about the grace of the wisdom guru:
Where is the origin of the word? Where are the three folds?
Where are the gatekeepers? Where is the first fold?
Where is the good conch river? Where is Vaikuntha?
Where does Narayana rest on the banyan leaf?
Where is the suppression of the five elements?

If there are those who can answer, we can worship them as our guru.

Thus, Avvaiyar has shown us the place of the word’s origin, the three folds, the gatekeepers, the first fold, the good conch, the river, Vaikuntha, Mahavishnu resting on the banyan leaf, and the place where the five elements are suppressed, and planted the seed of wisdom within us to show the truth right before our eyes, urging us to learn the eternal education of wisdom. During initiation, the guru will explain these.

Brama Gnana Tapas

The essence of these Avvai Gnana couplets is that everyone should fully acquire the eternal education. The care, compassion, love, nurturing, expectations, and aspirations of a mother can be delightfully discovered in all places throughout these couplets. We can see here that Avvaiyar has liberally provided us with the truth and essence, as expounded by Thirumoolar.


“If the world attains the bliss I have attained by uttering the divine truth that stands beyond the heavens,
The mantra that stays connected to the flesh, reveals a responsive understanding, It is indeed the essence that connects and ultimately captures.” (Thirumandiram 85).

If we need to speak of the divine lotus feet, it is a silent mantra existing within our sensory state, unspoken yet profound. In the core of this unspoken mantra resides the divine mother, and in the head of the divine mother resides Shiva himself. By continuously engaging in Brama Gnana Tapas, touching upon this mantra, we can grasp the Shiva within us, as Thirumoolar has taught us. It is indeed excellent to understand this here.

Since Shiva exists as the unspoken mantra, artists who paint Shiva’s picture always seem to be in a state of meditation. The picture of Shiva tells us that by continually practicing Brama Gnana Tapas, we too can become divine.

Do not seek Shiva outside; he resides within you as the unspoken mantra. If we reach there, capturing him becomes straightforward.
Only three barriers stand in the way of capturing Shiva, known as the three impediments according to the sages: ego, illusion, and the results of past actions.

These are the reasons for the darkness in our eyes. The seed of Brama is the root of illusion; the seed of desire is the root of Vishnu’s realm; the seed of ego is the root of Rudra’s realm. These act as barriers standing like walls at the divine feet, preventing us from accessing divine wealth and powers.

Thus, humans always sink in ignorance, and finally become a corpse without reaching Shiva. Only by untying these three knots can we enter the gateway of wisdom. The only way to do so is through the Brama Gnana Tapas that can be practiced at the divine feet.