Summary
In this vachana, Basavanna declares that the Sharana must be a Brahmachari in each of the five senses. He names the ear, skin, eye, tongue, and nose one by one, showing that no single doorway of perception may be left unguarded.
The teaching is direct. Brahmacharya is not confined to one bodily discipline alone. It must govern hearing, touch, sight, taste, speech, and smell. The Sharana must remain inwardly aligned even while the senses function.
Basavanna then gathers the five into one statement: being a Brahmachari in all the five senses, one becomes established in Kudalasangama Deva. The senses are not destroyed, but disciplined and brought under Divine orientation.
The spiritual concern placed before Prabhudeva is therefore complete sensory integration. The Sharana must not be pure in one faculty and scattered in another. All five senses must become steady in Brahmacharya before Kudalasangama Deva.
Imagery & Symbolic Relevance
The first image is the ear. The Sharana must be a Brahmachari in hearing. This means that what is heard should not scatter awareness or draw the seeker into restless outwardness.
The second image is the skin. The Sharana must be a Brahmachari in touch. Contact should not become attachment, possessiveness, or sensory compulsion.
The third image is the eye. The Sharana must be a Brahmachari in seeing. Sight should not become craving, comparison, distraction, or outward loss of awareness.
The fourth image is the tongue. The tongue includes taste and speech. The Sharana must be disciplined in what is tasted and in what is spoken, so that the tongue does not become a doorway of indulgence or false expression.
The fifth image is the nose. Smell too belongs to sensory life. Basavanna includes even this faculty to show that Brahmacharya must extend through the whole field of perception.
The final image is the five senses gathered in Kudalasangama Deva. The teaching is not partial restraint, but total integration. All five senses must be brought into one Divine orientation.
Lingayoga
In Lingayoga, this vachana teaches that realization must enter the sensory field. The senses continue to function, but they must no longer carry awareness away from Kudalasangama Deva.
For Pranalingi Sthala, the point is direct. Life-force and awareness must not be scattered through hearing, touch, sight, taste, speech, and smell. The senses must become disciplined channels rather than openings for dispersion.
The practice-point is clear: remain Brahmachari in all five senses. Let hearing, touch, sight, tongue, and smell be gathered into Kudalasangama Deva, so that the seeker becomes whole rather than fragmented.
Editorial Commentary
Brahmacharya should be understood here in its wider source-context. Basavanna does not speak only of sexual restraint or external discipline. He names all five senses and requires Brahmacharya in each of them. The point is therefore complete sensory discipline: the Sharana must move in Divine awareness through every doorway of perception. This is the radical force of the vachana: Brahmacharya is not partial restraint, but the gathering of the whole sensory life into Kudalasangama Deva.
Related Vachana
Supporting Vachana
Maheshwara Sthala Vachana 46 — The Ten Obstructions and the Consecration of the Senses
Maheshwara Vachana 46 supports this teaching by asking Kudalasangama Deva to remove desire, craving, inertia, falsehood, sense-hunger, crookedness, deceit, anger, pettiness, and illusion, and to make the five senses His devotees. Vachana 1370 carries this concern into Pranalingi Sthala by stating that the Sharana must be a Brahmachari in the ear, skin, eye, tongue, and nose. What Maheshwara Vachana 46 presents as the consecration of the senses becomes, here, the disciplined Brahmacharya of all five senses before Kudalasangama Deva.
Advancing Vachana
Sharana Sthala Vachana 1165 — Without Achara, Nothing Sacred Remains
Sharana Vachana 1165 advances this teaching by making Achara the measure of all sacred life. Without Kriyachara, initiation cannot be received, Linga cannot be rightly worshipped, Jangama cannot be truly recognized, and Padodaka and Prasada cannot be rightly received.
In Vachana 1370, Basavanna teaches that the Sharana must be a Brahmachari in the ear, skin, eye, tongue, and nose, so that all five senses are gathered into Kudalasangama Deva. In Vachana 1165, this matures into Sharana Sthala as uncompromising lived Achara. Sensory discipline is no longer only personal restraint; it becomes the foundation by which Guru, Linga, Jangama, Padodaka, and Prasada remain sacred and effective before Kudalasangama Deva.
