What is Ati-Ashrama or Ativarnashrama?

Shri Lakshman asked: Padanamaskarams Swami! I have picked up a topic on ativarnashrama or ati-ashrama from the archives of ‘The Mountain Path’ 1991 of Śrī Ramaṇāśramam. I request You to go through the following excerpt:

Under Indian law, the formal adoption of saṃnyāsa means that the saṃnyāsin can be legally regarded as being dead. He loses all rights to his property, which is taken over by his appointed heirs. If he belongs to some of the traditional orders of saṃnyasa, he has no rights to own or acquire property again.....[Click to read detailed question→]

Perumal Swami was a devotee and an attendant to Ramana Maharshi since 1914 and self-styled Sarvadhikari or Manager as he was overseeing everything including the daily needs of the Maharshi. Later on, the Maharshi was joined by His mother and brother at the Skandashram, Perumal Swami started to dislike both of them. After the death of the Mother of Maharshi in 1922, slowly the reins of the management of Ramanasramam started to shift to His brother Chinnaswami, which was opposed by Perumal Swami.

He went to court and filed a suit against Maharshi to stake his claim to the Asramam land and its property. His point of contention was that since the Maharshi was an ascetic or saṃnyasi He could not own any property and had no authority to appoint His brother to manage it (quoting the above law).

Perumal Swami’s complaint ignored two important points.

1. The Maharshi never claimed that He was a saṃnyāsin and never been formally initiated into any order of saṃnyāsins, so He was entitled to own and dispose any property.

2. Perumal Swami had voluntarily relinquished his job as Asramam Manager in 1922 and neither lived nor took part in the management activities.

When the case came for hearing on 15/11/1936 and 05/12/1936, Maharshi had to demonstrate that He belonged to an asrama that permitted its members to own property. Members of the three asramas (brahmacharya, grihastha and vanarprastha) can own property, but in the fourth asrama, i.e. saṃnyāsa owning a property is prohibited. But Maharshi declared that He was in atiasrama which is beyond all asramas.

When the authority for it was questioned by the lawyer, the Maharshi quoted from the well-known scripture Suta Samhita, of Skanda Purana, with Tatparya Dipika by Madhvacharya. The Muktikhanda Part III, 5th Chapter from verses 14 to 30 (text enclosed) of Suta Samhita brings out clearly about the atiasrama state. These verses were reproduced by Swami Sri Vidyaranya Saraswati in Jiva Mukti Viveka also.

Swami I put forth my humble questions to you, please clear my doubts. Could You please explain what this fifth āśrama mentioned in to means? Does an ativarṇāsramī or an ati-aśramī refer to the contemporary Human Incarnation? At your lotus feet, I remain, Lakshman.]

The Incarnation is Beyond Caste and Āśrama

Swami replied: O Learned and Devoted Servants of God! As you thought, it is perfectly correct to treat the Human Incarnation as Ativarṇāśramī or Ati-āśramī. God Dattātreya was questioned by divine sages about His āśrama. He was wearing the saffron cloth and so, He should be treated as a saṃnyāsī. But He had His wife, Anaghā standing by His side and so, He should be treated as a gṛhastha āśramī. He was staying in the forest and so, He should be treated as a vānaprastha āśramī. The sages asked Him to which āśrama He finally belongs. God Dattātreya replied that He belongs to the āśrama, which is beyond the four āśramas and He claimed to be an ati-āśramī. God Dattātreya is the spiritual preacher of God Subrahmaṇya. Śrī Ramana Maharshi was the Human Incarnation of God Subrahmaṇya and His colleague was Kāvyakaṇṭha Gaṇapati Muni, who was the Human Incarnation of God Gaṇapati. Any Incarnation, be it energetic or human, is ultimately the Incarnation of Īśvara or Datta alone. Datta Himself is the first Energetic Incarnation of the unimaginable God, called Parabrahman. The same question was posed to both the preacher, God Dattātreya and the disciple, God Subrahmaṇya who had incarnated as Ramana Maharshi. The reply of both was also one and the same!

There are two phases: (1) The unimaginable phase of Parabrahman and (2) Imaginable phase of the medium through which the unimaginable and invisible God becomes the imaginable Incarnation. In this same second phase, the imaginable but invisible Energetic Incarnation, God Śiva, becomes another imaginable but invisible Energetic Incarnation, God Subrahmanya. Finally, God Subrahmaṇya becomes the imaginable and visible Human Incarnation, Ramana Maharshi. In becoming an Energetic Incarnation or Human Incarnation, there are two stages: (1) The first stage is that of the unimaginable God becoming God Datta, the first Energetic Incarnation. (2) The second stage is God Datta becoming other Incarnations. It includes God Datta becoming God Śiva, God Śiva becoming God Subrahmaṇya and God Subrahmaṇya becoming the Human Incarnation, Ramana Maharshi. Knowing these stages, we can treat Ramana Maharshi to be an Incarnation of God Subrahmaṇya, God Śiva, God Datta (Īśvara) or of the Parabrahman (unimaginable God). The unimaginable God becomes the various Energetic or Human Incarnations only through the first Energetic Incarnation and not directly. The first Energetic Incarnation is called Īśvara, Datta, Nārāyaṇa, Hiraṇyagarbha or the Father of heaven in other religions. Parabrahman becomes Datta in the first stage. In the second stage, Datta becomes the various Energetic Incarnations or He can also directly become a Human Incarnation as in the case of Śrī Narasiṃha Sarasvatī. Alternatively, after Datta becomes the various Energetic Incarnations, the Energetic Incarnations may in turn become Human Incarnations as in the case of Ramana Maharshi. Hence, Ramana Maharshi can be said to be an Incarnation of (1) the Parabrahman (unimaginable God), (2) God Datta (Īśvara), (3) God Śiva and (4) God Subrahmaṇya.

The system of caste (varṇa) and stages in life (āśrama), which is known as the varṇa-āśrama dharma belongs to creation, which is the imaginable phase. The medium of the Incarnation also belongs to this imaginable phase. The material human body of Ramana Maharshi, along with the inert energy associated with the body and the energetic soul (awareness)—all belonged to the imaginable phase. Apart from the inert energy and the energetic soul, the body of of Ramana Maharshi also contained the three energetic bodies and the three energetic souls of God Subrahmaṇya, God Śiva and God Datta. All these four pairs of components of Datta, Śiva, Subrahmaṃya and Ramana belong only to the imaginable phase. In addition to these conponents belonging to the imaginable phase, there also exists the unimaginable phase, called the Parabrahman. The energetic soul of Ramana Maharshi is merged with the energetic souls of God Datta, God Śiva and God Subrahmaṇya. The material body of Ramana Maharshi is merged with the energetic bodies of God Subrahmanya, God Śiva and God Datta. The unimaginable God or Parabrahman is merged with all these energetic souls and energetic bodies, including the material body of Ramana Maharshi. Thus, all the four—Parabrahman, God Datta, God Śiva and God Subrahmanya—are merged in Ramana Maharshi.

While preaching to souls, the soul of Ramana stays merged with the souls of God Datta, God Śiva and God Subrahmanya. In that state, the soul of Ramana is in touch with the imaginable phase or creation and follows the norms of creation. Even in this state, His soul is in touch with Parabrahman indirectly because all the three—God Datta, God Śiva and God Subrahmanya—are merged with the Parabrahman (unimaginable God). As a result of being in indirect touch with the Parabrahman, Ramana could make unimaginable events, called miracles happen. His soul could remain detached from the body while an operation was performed on His hand even without anaesthesia. His detached soul remained in touch with the above-said three Gods. Such a detached soul can also confine itself to staying in direct touch with the unimaginable God. The state when the soul is in direct touch with the unimaginable God is the state of an Ati-āśramī. Being in direct touch with the unimaginable God makes the soul become the unimaginable God, rising above all the states of creation, including both the energetic and the human levels of Incarnations. The mentioned verses related to the Ati-āśramī pertain to this state.

Defeating Exploitation

It becomes necessary for the Incarnation to raise the self to the unimaginable state to defeat the exploitation of cunning people at the pravṛtti level. God Krishna also fought for the property of the Pāṇḍavas to protect justice and during this effort, Krishna revealed this Ati-āśramī state in the Gītā (Naiva tasya kṛtenārtho…). In the excerpt quoted by you, there was a plot to grab Ramana’s justified share of property, by treating Him to be a saṃnyāsī. So, He rejected the claim that He belonged to the saṃnyāsa āśrama by raising His soul to the Ati-āśramī state. His rising to that state served the purpose of defeating the injustice of His cunning opponents and upholding justice. Dhṛtarāṣṭra had also played a similar cunning trick on Dharmarāja by saying that Dharmarāja was very good person and hence, he could live even without a kingdom. He said that Dharmarāja being so humble and good could even live by begging as an ascetic!

Such plots happen in the world based on the wrong concept that spiritual life (nivṛtti) is always isolated from worldly life (pravṛtti). In reality, nivṛtti is present from bottom to top and hence, it is present even in pravṛtti. Since a saṃnyāsī (monk), having renounced the world, is treated to be dead to the world, Buddhists made an elephant chase Śaṅkara. They expected that Śaṅkara, being a saṃnyāsī, would not run away from the ‘unreal’ elephant. As per Śaṅkara’s philosophy, the world is said to be unreal. So, following His own philosophy, they expected that He would not run away from the ‘unreal’ elephant. But Śaṅkara ran swiftly and escaped from the elephant, saying that since the entire world is unreal, not only the elephant, but His running away was also unreal! Śaṅkara, being a Human Incarnation of God, undoubtedly had the divine power to stand against the elephant and make the unreal elephant pass through Him without hurting Him. But, in His philosophy, He had said that every soul is God. If He had stood still before the charging elephant saying “I am God and the elephant is unreal”, all ordinary souls would have also imitated the same behavior. But the ordinary souls, who were not actually God, would certainly have been crushed and killed by the elephant. So, Śaṅkara did what an ordinary soul should do. He ran away from the elephant! Indirectly, He proved that the ordinary soul is not literally God, but that it is a part of the unreal world. For the unreal soul, the rest of the unreal world must certainly be real.

Śaṅkara did say that every ordinary soul is God, but He said it only with the noble intention of turning atheists into theists. An atheist will never accept the idea that God who is separate from him exists. But if you say that the atheist himself is God, he will accept the idea that God exists because he knows that he exists and he himself is God. For the absolute unimaginable God, the world is unreal or relatively real. This explains why God can perform miracles in the world. If the world were an equal absolute reality as God, miracles would never be possible since one absolute reality could not change another absolute reality at will. Only an absolute reality can perform miracles in the world of relative reality. The concept of the unreality of the world applies only from the point of view of God, who is the absolute reality. It does not apply from the point of view of the soul, which is a part of the relative reality called the world.

Every concept stands pure and safe only in its proper context. The same concept is not valid when applied to an irrelevant context. When people try to twist spiritual concepts by applying them to irrelevant contexts, they must be answered by introducing a corrective twist to defeat their false logic. The concept of Ati-āśramī used by Ramana Maharshi is an example of such a corrective twist, which was meant to defeat the false logic of His opponents, who had exploited the concept of saṃnyāsa āśrama.

Keywords:

| Shri Datta Swami | What is Ati-Ashrama or Ativarnashrama? | Ativarnashramii Atiaashramii aashrama Gruhastha aashramii Vaanaprastha Kaavyakantha Anaghaa Subrahmanya Naaraayana Hiranyagarbha Ishvara Dhrutaraashtra Dharmaraaja Naiva tasya krutenaartho Nivrutti Pravrutti Samnyaasi Atiaashramii