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Salute to the Rising
Sun. Thus, we too shall
rise! Surya Namaskara is a powerful practice that is a
vinyasa, or flowing, continuous breath related movement that
can be performed either methodically or in a rapid fire
pace. Of course, within the practice, there can be an
alternating of the pacing, as well, inclusions of other asanas or
postures, even individually adaptive within the framework
of this pure structure. These variations distribute
and enhance dynamic equilibrium and movement within a wider
array of the body's matrix.
Please note the next few images
and readings also relate to the awakening of
the consciouness which is liken to an arising, i.e.,
the rising sun.
KRISHNAMACHARYA -THE
LEGEND
Tirumalai Krishnamacharya, born 1888. is regarded,
without a doubt, one of the more inspiring yogis influencing
contemporary yoga. In our time, his teachings have become highly
popularized through his renowned students, who can be deemed as
esteemed masters themselves: TKV Desikachar, BKS Iyengar, Pattabhi
Jois and Indira Devi.
T. Krishnamacharya, a direct descendant of Nathamuni, a
ninth century yogi, began his formal education at the age of six, at
the Parakala Math in Mysore. It is said his thirst for knowledge
inspired him to extensively travel learning every aspect of Vedic
traditions from the best teachers in India. He was an
illuminati of an inspired lineage, easily mastering the
Ayurveda and the Sanskrit schools of philosophical learning in
India. At age twenty-eight, he journeyed to Lake Manasarovar
at the foot of Mt.Kailash, in the Himalayas, to learn from
Yoga Adept, Rama Mohana Brahmachari. After seven and a half
years, at the command of his guru, he left Manasarovar to share his
wisdom with and for the benefit of society at large.
Noted master of several disciplines, Krishnamacharya was
offered prestigious academic positions in higher institutes of
learning, as well in the courts of kings, but chose to
teach yoga, in order to honor the promise he made to his Beloved
Guru.
On numerous occasions he demonstrated for the world's
view, the magnificence and power potential of yoga. He
revealed, conveyed, evidenced, and transmitted the quality required
for the renewal of vitality and health, for the world,
through yoga. Krishnamacharya evinced even more the
astounding qualifications of yoga, when he demonstrated
the conscious control of internal automatic bodily
functions. His practical application of yogic scientific
methods, used to stop his heart beat for over two minutes, is a
notable example. Yet, the most significant contribution to
the world for vitality and health, is the adaptive aspect
of yoga to the individual, enhancing the practical application of
yoga for all persons. Krishnamacharya was so well versed and
inner aligned in the heart with the Divine Plan and the
world's ensuing archetypal patterns, mythologies, principles and
philosophy, he was enabled to fine tune the expression and
instruction of yoga for everyday life, rather than just for the
ascetic or monastic lifestyle.
T. Krishnamacharya insisted, that in the Spirit of Yoga,
techniques must be evolved to suit the needs of the
individual at the given moment. This represents, indeed, the
yoga of yoga Krishnamacharya lived for and continued to teach
until his transition.
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PHARAOH AMENHOTEP IV, AKHNATON
See historical data and beautiful artwork protraying
this mystically and spritually evolved young Pharoah Akhnaton,
whom courageously defied the times and uprooted
polytheism for monothesism centered around the One God,
Aton, of the Great Solar Disc, the Sun: click image below or review http://www.crystalinks.com/akhenaten.html
AKHANTON'S
HYMN TO THE
SUN
Thy
dawning is beautiful in the horizon of the sky,
O living
Aton, Beginning of life!
When thou risest in the Eastern horizon,
Thou fillest every land with thy beauty.
Thou art
beautiful, great, glittering, high above every land,
Thy
rays, they encompass the lands, even all that thou hast made.
Thou art Ra, and thou carriest them all away captive;
Thou bindest them by thy love.
Though thou art far
away, thy rays are upon the earth;
Though thou art on
high, thy footprints are the day.
When thou
settest in the western horizon of the sky,
The earth is in
darkness like the dead;
They sleep in their chambers,
Their heads
are wrapped up,
Their nostrils are stopped,
And none
seeth the other,
While all their things are stolen
Which are under their heads,
And they know it not.
Every lion cometh forth from his den,
All serpents,
they Sting.
Darkness ...
The world is in silence,
He that
made them resteth in his horizon.
Bright is the earth when thou risest in
the horizon.
When thou shinest as Aton by day
Thou drivest away the
darkness.
When thou sendest forth thy rays,
The Two
Lands (Egypt) are in daily festivity,
Awake and standing
upon their feet
When thou hast raised them up.
Their
limbs bathed, they take their clothing,
Their arms
uplifted in adoration to thy dawning.
(Then) in all the
world they do their work.
All
cattle rest upon their pasturage,
The trees and the
plants flourish,
The birds flutter in their marshes,
Their
wings uplifted in adoration to thee.
All the sheep dance
upon their feet,
All winged things fly,
They live when
thou hast shone upon them.
The barques sail up-stream and
down-stream alike.
Every highway is open because thou
dawnest.
The fish in the river leap up before thee.
Thy rays are in the midst of the great green sea.
Creator of the germ in woman,
Maker of seed
in man,
Giving life to the son in the body of his
mother,
Soothing him that he may not weep,
Nurse
(even) in the womb,
Giver of breath to animate every one
that he maketh!
When he cometh forth from the body ... on
the day of his birth,
Thou openest his mouth in speech,
Thou suppliest his necessities.
When the fledgling in the egg chirps in the
shell,
Thou
givest him breath therein to preserve him
alive.
When thou hast
brought him together
To (the point of) bursting it in the
egg,
He cometh forth from the egg
To chirp with all
his might.
He goeth about upon his two feet
When he
hath come forth therefrom.
How
manifold are thy works!
They are hidden from before (us),
O sole God, whose powers no other possesseth.
Thou didst create the earth
according to thy heart
While thou wast
alone:
Men, all cattle
large and small,
All that are upon the earth,
That go
about upon their feet;
(All) that are on high,
That
fly with their wings.
The foreign countries, Syria and
Kush,
The land of Egypt;
Thou settest every man into
his place,
Every one has his possessions,
And his days
are reckoned.
Their tongues are diverse in speech,
Their forms likewise and their skins are distinguished.
(For) thou makest different the strangers.
Thou
makest the Nile in the Nether World,
Thou bringest it as thou
desirest,
To
preserve alive the people.
For thou hast made them for
thyself,
The lord of them all, resting among them;
Thou lord of every land, who risest for them,
Thou Sun
of day, great in majesty.
All the distant countries,
Thou makest (also) their life,
Thou hast set a Nile in
the sky;
When it falleth for them,
It maketh waves
upon the mountains,
Like the great green sea,
Watering
the fields in their towns.
How excellent
are thy designs, O lord of eternity!
There is a Nile in
the sky for the strangers
And for the cattle of every
country that go upon their feet.
(But) the Nile, it cometh
from the Nether World for Egypt.
Thy rays
nourish every garden;
When thou risest they live,
They
grow by thee.
Thou makest the seasons
In order to
create all thy work:
Winter to bring them coolness,
And heat they they may taste thee.
Thou
didst make the distant sky to rise therein,
In order to behold all that
thou hast made,
Thou
alone, shining in thy form as living Aton,
Dawning,
glittering, going afar and returning.
Thou makest millions
of forms
Through thyself alone;
Cities, towns, and
tribes, highways and rivers.
All eyes see thee before
them,
For thou
art Aton of the day over the earth.
Thou art in my heart,
There is no other that knoweth thee
Save thy
son Akhnaton.
Thou has made him wise
In thy designs
and in thy might.
The world is in thy hand,
Even as
thou hast made them.
When thou hast risen they live,
When thou settest, they die;
For thou art length of
life of thyself,
Men live through thee,
While (their)
eyes are on thy beauty
Until thou settest.
All labour
is put away
When thou settest in the west.
Thou didst establish the world,
And raise
them up for thy son,
Who came forth from thy limbs,
The King of
Upper and Lower Egypt,
Living in Truth, Lord of the Two
Lands,
Nefer-khrpru-Ra, Wan-Ra (Akhnaton),
Son of Ra,
living in Truth, lord of diadems,
Akhnaton, whose life is
long;
(And for) the chief royal wife, his beloved,
Mistress of the Two Lands, Nefer-nefru-Aton, Nofretete,
Living and flourishing for ever and
ever. |
Translated by J. H.
Breasted, in Development of Religion and Thought in Ancient
Egypt, Chicago, 1912, pp.
324-328.
return to
akhnaton
FLAME IN CHALICE by
Nicholas Roerich
(1874-1947)
PART IV
TO THE HUNTER ENTERING THE FOREST
TO THE HUNTER
ENTERING THE
FOREST
Did Roerich
give it?
Accept it.
Did A-Lal-Ming, Shri Ishvara, give it?
Accept it.
I am with him.
At the hour of sunrise I shall find thee
awake already,
O hunter!
Armed with thy net thou wilt enter
the forest.
Thou hast prepared thyself.
Thou art laved and
alert.
Thy garments hamper thee not.
Girded up are thy loins
And thy thoughts are free.
Yes, thou hast prepared thyself
And bidden farewell to the master of the house.
Thou, O
hunter, hast come to love the forest
And by thy hunting wilt
bring good unto thy clan.
Thou art ready to blow thy horn.
Thou hast marked down for thyself a noble quarry
And hast
not feared the weight thereof.
Blessings! Blessings! O thou who
hast entered!
Are thy nets strong?
Hast thou strengthened
them with prolonged labor?
Hast thou tried them with testing
blows?
Art thou gleesome?
And should thy laughter scare part
of the quarry, fear not.
But clash not thy weapons
Nor call
loudly on the huntsmen.
Ah! Shouldst thou be unskillful,
From a hunter thou shalt be made a beater
And even the
huntsman will be thy master.
Gather knowledge.
Watch thy trail.
Why dost thou
look around thee?
Under the red stone lies the red serpent
And the green moss hides the green viper.
But its sting is
all-fatal.
From thy childhood thou hast been told of serpents
and scorpions—
A whole teaching of fear!
Many of the
chirping and hissing will fly after thee
And a rustle will creep
by thy path
And howling will pierce thine ear.
Worms grow
into whales
And the mole becomes the tiger.
But thou knowest
the essence, O hunter!
All this is not thine.
Thine is the
quarry!
Hasten! Delay not, O thou who hast entered!
Waste
not thy nets on the jackal.
The quarry is known to the hunter.
It seems to thee that thou wast wise yesterday
Yet thou
knowest not who laid the circles of stones
On the outskirts of
forests.
What do they mean?
And for whom is the sign of
warning on the towering pine? Thou dost not even know who filled
with skulls the ravine
Into which thou didst cast thy glance.
But even shouldst thou be in danger,
Go not down into the
ravine nor hide behind a tree.
Thy ways are without number and
the foe has but one.
From the pursued become thou the attacker.
How strong are the accusers
And how weak the defenders of
self!
Defense of self leave to others.
Do thou
attack.
For thou knowest wherefore thou hast come forth
And why thou hast not feared the forest.
O sacred and terrible
and blessed forest,
Let the hunter pass through thee!
Hold
him not back.
Hide not the ways and the trail.
And terrify
him not.
For I know that thou art many-voiced
But I have
heard thy voices
And my hunter will take his quarry.
And
thou, O hunter, know thine own quarry.
Believe not those who
call thee
Nor turn unto those who would counsel.
Thou, only
thou, knowest thy quarry
And wilt not choose a small quarry.
And wilt not be detained by the shadows.
Who doubts is
already the enemy's prey.
Who gives way to musing loses his
nets.
And he who has lost them turns backward dismayed.
But thou, O
hunter, go forward!
All that is left behind is not for
thee
And thou knowest
this as well as do I.
For thou knowest all
And canst
remember all things.
Thou knowest of wisdom,
Thou hast heard
of courage,
Thou knowest of finding,
And through the ravine
thou passest to mount to the hill.
And the flowers of the ravine
are not thy flowers
And not for thee is the brook in the hollow.
Sparkling waterfalls wilt thou find
And springs shall
refresh thee
And before thee shall blossom the heather of
happiness.
But it blosoms only on heights
And the best
hunting will not be at the foot of the hill
But thy quarry will
flee over the crest.
And flaming in the skies, rising over the
summit
It will come to a stand
And will look around it.
Then do thou not delay:
This hour is thine.
Thou and thy quarry will be on
the heights
And neither thou nor the quarry will desire to go
down to the hollow.
This
is thine hour.
But when throwing thy net thou knowest
That
thou art not a victor—
Thou hast taken only thine own.
Nor
thyself count a victor
For all are victors, though they remember
it not.
I have brought thee to the broad rivers
And to the
boundless lakes
And I have shown thee the ocean.
He who has
seen the infinite will not be lost in the finite,
For there is
no infinite forest
And one may go round any morass, O hunter!
Together we have woven thy nets,
Together we have sought the
huntsmen,
Together we have chosen the places best for hunting,
Together we have avoided danger,
Together we have made sure
our way.
Without Me thou
wouldst not have known the ocean;
Without thee I should not know
the joy of thy winning hunt.
I love thee, my hunter!
And I
shall give thy quarry to the Sons of Light.
And even shouldst thou
err—
Shouldst thou for a time descend into the hollow,
Shouldst thou even look back upon the skulls,
Shouldst thou
by laughter drive away a part of the quarry—
Yet I know that
thou goest unweariably for the hunt,
That thou art not
discouraged and wilt not lose thy way.
Thou knowest how to find
thy trail by the sun
And how to turn to the road guided by
whirlwinds.
But who set it afire—the sun?
And who drove it
here—the whirlwind?
But I speak to thee out of the sphere of the
sun—
I, thy Friend,
thy Teacher, Companion on thy way.
Let the huntsmen and the leaders of the beaters be
friends
And after the chase, resting on the hill,
Call unto
thee the huntsmen and leaders of the beaters.
Tell them how thou
didst go unto the hill
And why the hunter must not lurk in
ravines,
And how on the crest thou didst meet thy quarry
And
how thou knowest that this quarry is thine.
And how one must
leave aside all smaller prey
For he who trails it, with it will
remain.
Tell them also how the hunter bears on him all the signs
of the hunting
And how he alone knows his art and his quarry.
Tell not of the hunting to those who know not the quarry.
In
the hour of trouble, in the hour of darkness,
They will engage
themselves as beaters
And in the reeds take part in the hunting.
But, O hunter, recognize the huntsmen;
Drink water with them
by the fire of rest.
Discern, O insightful one!
And having
finished thy hunting
Mend thy nets and plan a new hunt.
Be
not alarmed; seek not to alarm.
For shouldst thou alarm, a still
greater fear will turn upon thee.
Plan simply.
For all is simple.
All is
beautiful.
Beautiful is that which is planned.
All fear
shalt thou conquer by thine unconquerable essence.
But shouldst thou
begin to tremble, then defeated
And reduced to naught,
Neither crying aloud nor keeping silence,
Having lost
consciousness of time, place and life,
Thou wilt lose the
remnant of thy will.
Whither then wilt thou flee?
But should
any of the exhausted leaders warn thee
against the hunting, Hear
them not, O my hunter! Demeanors of the will are these whose shield
is a doubt.
What will their hunting be?
And what will they
bring to their clans?
An empty net again?
Again unfulfilled
desires?
Lost are they, as is lost their precious time.
The
hunter exists for the hunting.
Hearken not to the hours of
weariness.
In these hours thou art not the hunter.
Thou art
the quarry!
The whirlwind will pass:
Do thou be silent.
And again thou shalt take thy horn
Without being late; fear
not that thou wilt be late
And when overtaking, turn not
backward.
All that is comprehensible is incomprehensible.
Where is the limit to miracles?
And one last enjoinment, O my hunter!
If on the
first day of the hunting
Thou shouldst not come upon the quarry,
Grieve not—
To thee is already destined the quarry!
He
who knows—searches.
He who wins knowledge—achieves.
He who
has found—is amazed at the ease of the capture.
He who has
seized—sings hymns of
attainment.
Rejoice!
Rejoice! Rejoice!
O thrice-called hunter.
return to flame-in-chalice
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