GURU VACHAKA KOVAI About Significance Of Sacred Vibhuti (Holy Ash)

1) When the fictitious ego, who has accumulated tendencies from the beginningless past,is burnt by the Fire of Jnana, that Reality which alone remains within is the Sacred Vibhuti.This you should know.

Sadhu Om: Vibhuti represents Self, which alone shines after the ego’s destruction.

2)The Supreme Lord having taken the form of the Guru,lights the Fire of Jnana through His Supreme Speech [Para Vak], proclaiming without words the One Syllable,and thus burns the ego within the pure heart of His disciple. The Vibhuti He gives is the restoration of Self.

Sadhu Om:Vibhuti is prepared by burning cowdung in an airtight oven. In Saiva Siddhanta the jiva is generally known as the ‘cow’,so the cow-dung used here symbolises the jiva’s vasanas, which when burnt to ashes, leave only Self.

3) Those who wear such Vibhuti are unequalled in all respects in this world. Such Vibhuti, which is Reality,the thought-free and wonderful Jnana, is eternal divine wealth.

4) When the insentient ego turns inwards through Self-attention and dies, the Fire of Jnana burns in the Heart and consumes all the three worlds in its blazing red flame, which is the significance of the red kumkum.

Michael James: The three worlds are heaven, earth and the nether regions.

Source: GURU VACHAKA KOVAI The Light of Supreme Truth or THE COLLECTION OF GURU’S SAYINGS translated from original Tamil By Sadhu Om and Michael James

Guru Vachaka Kovai is the biggest collection of Bhagavan’s spoken teachings that was thoroughly checked and revised by him during his lifetime. As such it has a unique place in the Ramana literature.