The Śiva-Śaraṇa Upaniṣad
For the moment of sacred transition from one form of existence to the next
I. The Invocation
ॐ नमः शिवाय Om Namaḥ Śivāya Salutations to Śiva, the Auspicious One, the Benevolent Flame who dances in the ashes of the known.
He who is Time and beyond Time, who devours names and births like dry leaves in fire, before whom even the stars bow and vanish.
May that Śiva abide in the heart of this one who now casts off the old garment of becoming, and steps unclothed into the light of his own Self.
II. The Teaching Begins
The disciple said:
“O Śiva, whose gaze is the void and the fullness together, this form I have worn has grown tight, like a cocoon after the wings have formed. I feel the pull of a greater wind— not death, but something gentler: a tearing away by love itself.”
The Master, who is Silence, spoke not in words but in the fall of all that was unnecessary.
And in that falling-away, the disciple saw: the house was never a home, the role was never the Self, the striving was only sleep.
III. The Fire of Śiva
As fire consumes the forest, but only reveals the hidden seeds, so does Śiva consume identity.
He is not cruel— He is clarity itself.
He removes with one hand what the other never needed.
He breaks the vessel, so the space within it may merge with the sky.
He closes the eyes of the past and opens the eye in the center of being.
IV. The Realization
Now the disciple, freed from his former shell, stood as space itself.
Not body, nor mind, nor name, but the Witness who watched even Śiva dance.
And the Witness spoke, not from pride, but from truth:
“There was no bondage, and there is no liberation. There was only a dream of two. But I see now—O Śiva!—You were always myself in the mask of the destroyer.”
And Śiva smiled, not as a god apart, but as the Self, naked and free.
V. The Closing Blessing
This is the Upaniṣad: Not words, but a falling away of names. Not doctrine, but the shining forth of the real.
He who reads this with a yearning heart shall find that his old form cracks with grace. The shell shall break, not in sorrow, but in inevitability.
Śiva shall dance. The ashes shall fall. The wind shall come.
And the Self shall remain— brighter than a thousand suns, yet untouched by fire.
ॐ शान्तिः शान्तिः शान्तिः Om, peace, peace, peace.
[ Previous Posts ]