Vinai (Karma) and its attachment
Gone is my Paasam and the gain is Your feet; O Lord
Of Bliss abiding at Arullturai (at Vennainallur)!
O Meikandaa who caused me that stood away
From You to come by the conscious beatitude
Of non-separation from You!
What indeed is twyfold Karma? If You say, acts –
Good and bad -, bred by manam, body
And speech constitute iruvinai, these perish
The moment when done and cannot matter.
Like the cause, the effects too are jada.
Yet they fetter. Be pleased to point me –
Your servitor -, the salvific way.
I do deeds no doubt; their results cannot
Assume any form to affect me.
If You say that through my deeds I become
The author of righteousness as well as sin,
I then say that I cannot do any deed at all
If it is not willed by You. It is said Yama
Appraises the deeds and confers on the doer
Reward or punishment; then I contend
The ruler of a realm also does this.
Again, if Yama truly taking note of the deeds
Causes the soul to undergo their consequences
(By way of expiation), then the effects of deeds end.
This is the view voiced forth by some. I say
Yama cannot be the chief that links
The results of deeds with the doer. If it be said
That Yama and the monarch are needed
To cause the visiting of the results of deeds
To their doer by way of rewarding or punishing him,
I ask: “Will not one of them suffice? Why two?”
Apart from these two, You are also there.
Limit there is none for Your mercy. Yet if You
Aver I but undergo the consequences of my deeds
(And thus suffer), I say that the Karmic results
Cannot by themselves attach to me; if they do,
You play no role at all and I cannot
Deem You my Lord-God (since Your mercy is
Of no avail to the wrong-doer).
The honoured dictum avers thus: “What truly is
Cannot go out of existence; what truly is not
Cannot come into existence”. This applies to You too.
If it is said that You but link the Karmic results
With the doer, it is not becoming of Your glory.
Yet, if it is indeed Your mercy that exposes me
To misery, I should know that Your compassion
Is at work.
So teach me to learn clearly of my nexus
With Maya, Karma as well as Karmic bondage,
O Siva, my Lord-God.
Translation: Dr. T. N. Ramachandran,Thanjaavoor ,2003