Uniqueness of Sri Bhagavan

When we are in love, we are possessed by it, we are obsessed with it. We don’t choose to love, we are taken by storm, we are swept off our feet. The heart rules the head when we are in love. Reason melts away when we are in love. When we are in love, we seek the company of the person we love. There is joy even at the mention of the name of the person we love. When we are in love, we are not ‘me-centered’, we are ‘other-centered’. Love is an infatuation, a madness, a joyous madness. We are acted upon rather than act when in love. Love comes into being unawares. We don’t plan it, we don’t move gradually towards it. We fall in love.

Sri Bhagavan has not said even once that he loved Arunachala. He says that Arunachala created a passion for Him and appeals to Him “to robe him with His love.” “Out of my house you enticed me, into the chamber of my heart you entered, and then little by little, you revealed the many mansions of your house, your infinite freedom, O Arunachala.” [v.97]

“You asked me, did you not, to come to you? Very well. I have come. Now, it is your responsibility to look after me, O Arunachala.” [v.94]

“You aimed at me and sped the arrow of your grace and now you are devouring me alive, O Arunachala.” [v.92]

“Who was it that, unknown to all, stupefied me and robbed me of my senses, O Arunachala?” [v.89]

“My Arunachala, you have driven out of me the evil spirit of worldliness and possessed me so that I can never shake you off, and have made me indifferent to the world.” [v.71]

“You made me give up my craze for the world and made me crazy for you, O Arunachala. Now give me the medicine to cure every kind of madness.” [v.66]

“In my loveless heart you planted love of you, O Arunachala. Now do not betray me.” [v.60]

“Wealth benignant, holy grace that came to me unsought, dispel my mind’s bewilderment, O Arunachala.” [v.49]

“Unless you join me, O Arunachala, this body will melt away in a river of tears and I shall die.” [v.34]

“Remove this cloth, expose me naked and then clothe me with your loving grace, O Arunachala.” [v.30]

“As snow in water melts, let me dissolve as love in you who is all love, O Arunachala.” [v.101]

In all these verses in Aksharamanamalai, Sri Bhagavan begs for the love of Arunachala. He wants Arunachala to make him love Arunachala. He wants to be chosen as he can’t choose. Drawn by Arunachala, Sri Bhagavan went to Arunachala. He never left Tiruvannamalai even for a single day. He was in the company of the Beloved all the time. The company of the person one loves gives joy. Sri Bhagavan never asked for anything. The only thing he prayed for was that he should always love Arunachala. In the seventh stanza of The Necklace of Nine Gems, Sri Bhagavan, addressing Arunachala says: “Do what you will, my Darling, but grant me a flood of Love for Your Lotus Feet.”

We can’t love God. Only He can make us love Him. Only He can make us think of Him. We can only pray that He grant us the flood of Love. In that flood, our individuality will be washed away. Our sense of ‘me’ and ‘mine’ will be gone. We can’t drive out our ego. It must be drowned in His flood of Love.