It was Sree Narayana Guru's efforts, along with those of Sree Chattampi Swami, which stemmed mass conversions in the late 1890s and led to the opening up of public spaces, including temples, to all Hindus, regardless of their caste, in Kerala
The Maha Shivratri of 2013 marked the 125th anniversary of a revolutionary consecration rite of a Shivling performed by a non-Brahmin saint in India. The saint, later described to be a ‘scholar of action’ by Romain Rolland, was Sree Narayana Guru. The Guru’s words, deeds and philosophy acted so forcefully amongst the society in Kerala that it ushered a profound cultural renaissance in the increasingly decadent practice of Hindu worship, pock-marked with violent animal sacrifices, absurdly severe untouchability and the resultant societal under-achievement.
Pained at the plight of the vast majority of Hindus slaving under caste supremacy and a resulting exodus due to conversion, the Guru had the foresight to see that temples instilled cleanliness and gave opportunity for education for the untouchables. Born into the then untouchable agrarian caste of Ezhavas, the Guru had himself struggled to gain a Sanskrit education largely from unprejudiced upper caste gurus. He mastered Yoga and performed tantric and yogic perfections with the other great Guru of Kerala in the 19th century — Sree Chattampi Swami. Sree Chattampi was a pioneer in asserting the right of the Shudra to master the Vedas, and he highlighted the meaninglessness of religious conversions.
The Guru’s consecration of a foot-long idol of lord Shiva, fished out of a trench from Neyyar river, near the banks of Aruvippuram in Thiruvananthapuram caused ripples in the orthodoxy at the time. When questioned whether he had the right to consecrate, he quietly replied that “it was our Shiva” which was idolised. His gentle hint that the Shiva principle, central to the Vedic world view, is indivisible and that along with Shakti it made the universe go, silenced his critics.
He went on to consecrate 60 odd temples in the entire State and was farsighted to develop Sanskrit, Malayalam and English schools aside. These schools through the turn of the 20th century educated students who could not access public schools or schools run by Christian missionaries. Along with the parallel pioneering work of the early missionaries, these initiatives ushered the renaissance which made Kerala a front-runner in literacy and education, and resulted in longer lifespan and better public health in the country as a whole. The inclusiveness in Kerala polity with wide participation of the erstwhile untouchables, is also due to the Guru’s pioneering efforts.
Naturally, social historians describe the Guru as the pioneer of Kerala society’s renaissance and leftists as the torch-bearers of rationalism. Even the agnostics in the State consider him to be the touchstone of rational scepticism. Many backward castes like Ezhavas take it to be a matter of intense and sometimes chauvinistic pride, and serious students of modern philosophy believe he was a practitioner of refined Advaita. The Guru’s poetic creations, numbering about 40 renditions in chaste Sanskrit, erudite Tamil and lucid Malayalam (Complete works in English, National Book Trust, 2008), are standing testimony to his height and reach as an exponent of post-Sankara Adavitism or absolute idealism, as it is understood by Western philosophers.
As a pure non-dualist, the Guru advanced Hindu philosophy by intense practice. He was equidistant from all religions. He did not feel the need to, and declined to, commence a new religion — as some of his followers expected him to do. “I am equally inclined to all religions”, he quipped. He did not embrace Buddhism, which many of his followers wanted him to.
He stated that religions mattered so long as they bettered the believer. Many scholars perceived that remark as a subtle answer to Mahatma Gandhi who had met the Guru in Shivagiri, seeking his support against conversion. The Guru pointed out to a mango tree in his orchard when the Mahatma described the Varnashrama dharma as part and parcel of Hinduism. “The leaves and fruits may have different dharma, but squeeze them and you will find the nectar of unitary bliss...” Gandhiji went back and mainstreamed the anti-untouchability movement in the freedom struggle. Gurudev Rabindranath Tagore too visited Narayana Guru and paid fulsome tributes to
his genius.
By 1920s, the Guru had become a living legend. His ashrams in Shivagiri, Alwaye and Aruvippuram were thronged by thousands seeking his blessings and word of consolation in their earthly tidings. When he saw that religious disunity was harming India, he convened a world interfaith conference in Alwaye in 1924 to “make it known than debate and argue”. In his Aruvippuram temple, which attracts hundreds of devotees daily, he embossed the “ideal where mankind thrives in brotherhood sans the divisiveness of caste and religion”. His unitary absolutism would lead him to declare ‘One caste one religion, one God for man’. That became a poignant battle cry of the underprivileged as they worked to bring down social barriers.
India has never been short of renaissance leaders. Swami Vivekananda, Dayanand Saraswati, Iswar Chandra Vidyasagar, Periyar, Sri Ramakrishna — they all worked in a decadent society charred by the monopolisation of worship and knowledge. The significance of the Guru is in taking the Vedic ideal and changing society with it irreversibly and non-violently. Nowhere in the Guru’s work was there scope for a drop of blood or word stemming from hate. He never quarrelled or spoke with passion. As an epitome of kindliness, he generated such faith irrespective of caste status that Kerala accepted his gentle counsel as diktats of an absolutist.
His community today is a leading torchbearer of organised development under the Sree Narayana Dharama Pripalana Yogam which he seeded. Emancipator and spiritualist, advaiti and social activist, poet and yogi, the Guru’s achievement is both unparalleled and unequalled.
It was his effort along with that of Sree Chattampi Swami that stemmed the mass conversions in the late 1890s and led to the opening up of all public spaces, including temples, to all Hindus in Kerala in 1936 by a Royal proclamation. As Chairman Mao once observed while referring to the French Revolution, the impact of that first step is still fuelling the winds of change in the nation. Aruvippuram Consecration was his clarion call for change.
(The writer is an IAS officer and Vice Chancellor of KVAS University, Waynad, in Kerala)