Triveni Journal

1927 | 11,233,916 words

Triveni is a journal dedicated to ancient Indian culture, history, philosophy, art, spirituality, music and all sorts of literature. Triveni was founded at Madras in 1927 and since that time various authors have donated their creativity in the form of articles, covering many aspects of public life....

'The Triple Stream'

...he that laboureth right for love of Me
Shall finally attain! But, if in this
Thy faint heart fails, bring Me thy failure!

-The Song Celestial

‘The Triple Stream’ 1

BITTER AND SWEET

The New Year’s Day is the same for Andhra and Karnataka. Some other provinces celebrate it a week later. To give a foretaste of the sorrow and joy of the coming year, the bitter margosa blossom is mixed with sugar, and this strange dish is taken as the year begins. In the evening, people gather in temple or grove to listen to a recital of the calendar,–the personnel of the cabinet of the planets for the year, the prospects of the crops, the coming of fire and flood, of monsoon and eclipse. For the individual as well as the race, one year is very much like another. There may be just a little variation in the proportions in which pleasure and pain are mixed by Fate; but what matters really is the determination to welcome the bitter with the sweet, to bear in mind that ‘Even this will pass away.’ To the readers of Triveni, we send forth greetings for the New Year.

KRISHNAMURTI’S TALKS

In place of the bi-monthly Star Bulletin, the Star Publishing Trust are issuing, in separate volumes, verbatim reports of Krishnamurti’s talks in various countries. These provide an easy and direct access to his teachings. From early boyhood, Krishnamurti was marked out for an exalted position; every effort was made to give him a superb training to enable him to fulfill his destiny. In every land, devout men and women looked up to him with reverence. His lightest word was recorded; his movements were chronicled with affectionate care; and, as he passed from country to country, he was welcomed as the harbinger of a new era in the religious life of humanity. His sweetness, his utter simplicity, charmed all.

But, in 1929, he surprised his friends by dissolving the Order of the Star. He decided to forego the aid of religious organisations and of admiring interpreters of his message. Year after year, he speaks with increasing earnestness against exploitation by spiritual authority; he stresses the need for living in the ‘Eternal Now’; he pleads for the change from unconsciousness to self-consciousness, from self-consciousness to the liberation from all sense of the separate self. This last, according to him, is the only natural, human state: having struggled with pain towards it, he asserts that others can do likewise. His is the gospel of liberty in the realm of the spirit. In trying to describe his experience, he invents a technique and a nomenclature of his own; but if the reader has not had a glimpse of the vision, all verbal descriptions of it must remain defective. This again means that every one must cut out his own path to Reality. Krishnamurti comes into conflict with established religions, traditions and formulas. He is a valiant fighter in the cause of spiritual freedom,–a living symbol of the eternal search of man for the God within himself.

UDAY SHANKAR IN MADRAS

Uday Shankar’s second visit to Madras has proved an unqualified success. Appreciation of his dance compositions of 1935 from the Pundits who criticised those of 1933, indicates a rapprochement between the artiste and the votaries of Bharata Natya. His efforts to co-ordinate the dance traditions of different parts of India, and weave them into a marvel of beauty and grace, have won the admiration of all art-lovers. With the joyous enthusiasm and abandon of the born artist, he combines the patience of the researcher; and working on old and seemingly worn-out materials, he yet transports his audience into a fairyland of colour and movement. The vision of Uday Shankar as the dancing Siva and as the Player on the Flute will dwell in our memory along-side of the noblest achievements of the artistic genius of India in recent times,–with the music of Seshanna’s Veena, with the Sati of Nandalal Bose, and the Gitanjali of Tagore.

A LANDSCAPE PAINTER

An exhibition of paintings by a single artist–and all of them landscapes–is something unusual. But it is a great advantage to be able to study the technique of a landscape painter from a hundred water-colours spread out in one room. We then learn to appreciate the uniqueness of his interpretation of Nature’s moods, of the play of light on sea and mountain, flower and leaf. Mr. V. V. Bhagiradhi’s array of landscapes at the Gokhale Hall, Madras, attracted quite a large number of visitors last week. He is a gifted painter, with a definite contribution to modern Indian Art. His intense absorption in his work, and the rapidity with which he produces pictures of rare merit, are remarkable. From the mountains and the waterfalls of Jeypore to the shrine of the virgin Goddess of Cape Comorin, he has wandered in search of beauty. His ‘Bhongir Fort,’ ‘Godavari near the Papi Hills,’ and ‘Near Hussain Sagar’ (lent by Mr. S. V. Ramamurty) received warm praise. There is a quality even in his smallest pictures. Pre-eminently a lover of the rocks, Mr. Bhagiradhi is akin to them in his rugged strength and his steadfast fight against adversity. We wish him all success.

THE ASSEMBLY

The disciplined strength of the Congress has made itself felt at every stage of the discussion on the Budget, but so long as the Governor-General has the power of ‘restoration,’ the victories of the Congress cannot bring relief to the tax- payer. When Congressmen sought the suffrage of the electors, they never imagined that they could bring the Government down on its knees. All that they had ever hoped to do was to expose the utter hollowness of the claim of the Government that it governed the country with the willing consent of the people, that in fact it knew the mind–and the needs–of the nation much better than a handful of discontented politicians who filled the prisons just because they found nothing better to do. Here is a Government that can carry on despite defeat after defeat. Opposed to it is the Congress which, undoubtedly commands a majority in the country. Interpellations, adjournment motions, severe criticism of the policy and measures of the Government, sum up the achievements of the Congress; for, all opportunity for the display of constructive statesmanship is cruelly denied to the people’s representatives under the present constitution. Whether, after the present session, the members of the Assembly will tour their constituencies and lead a crusade against the Government of India Bill remains to be seen. Work in the Assembly is but supplementary to wider work in the country. In organising the nation and educating it into a knowledge of its just rights, the experience gathered during the last few months on the floor of the Assembly ought to Prove invaluable.

K. R.

TWO VETERAN SCHOLARS

The first two weeks of March 1935 saw the celebration of two notable events in Madras. The first was the honour done by Tamil-lovers to Mahamahopadhyaya Dakshinatya Kalanidhi, Doctor V. Swaminatha Iyer on his Satabhishekam. Very few scholars can attain to the eminence that Mahamahopadhyaya Swaminatha Iyer occupies in Tamil. His services to the Tamil language and literature are unique. For nearly fifty years, he has devoted himself heart and soul to the publication of classical Tamil literature and of works on grammar. His is the glory of having rescued a major part of the current Tamil classics from neglect, oblivion and ruin. He has furnished a tangible proof of the saying that the surest way to overcome death is to devote oneself strenuously and uninterruptedly to work. His early life and education and his position as Tamil Pundit in the Government colleges at Kumbaconam and at Madras have been helpful to him in his work. He wears lightly the rare honours conferred by the triple sources of honour,–the Government, the University and the public. May he long continue unostentatiously in his noble task with the energy and enthusiasm of youth!

The event of the second week was the farewell given to Mahamahopadhyaya, Prof. S. Kuppuswamy Sastri, M.A. on the eve of his retirement from Government service. Like Swaminatha Iyer, Professor Sastri has proved himself an exceptionally good Acharya. Tamil and the other Indian languages did not find favour with the educational authorities in the days of Swaminatha Iyer’s punditship; and consequently his scholarship had to find scope in editing works and in the training of private pupils. Professor Sastri, on the other hand, found full scope for his scholarship (and for the ripe experience of teaching gained by controlling the Sanskrit colleges at Mylapore and Tiruvadi) in organising and conducting the honours school of Sanskrit at the Presidency College, Madras. ‘Not only has he been a researcher himself, but even more important than that, he has been a potent cause of research in others.’ He had played a very useful part in the activities of the academic bodies, particularly of the Madras, the Mysore, the Andhra and the Annamalai Universities, in the building up of the Government Oriental Manuscripts Library, Madras, in the Madras University Oriental Research Institute and in the Tamil Lexicon. It is hoped that in the leisure of retired life, his ripe wisdom will be devoted to maintaining with augmented glory the reputation for Sanskrit research which Madras has built up under his fostering care and guidance.

1 4th April, 1935 (Telugu New Year’s Day).

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