Poetic Rendering
The pot shudders at the serpent’s bite;
I tremble at the venom of my own tongue.
I fear the sticky sweetness of home’s affections,
and the snares of comfort that bind unseen.
But greater than fire,
greater than serpent or storm,
is the danger of coveting another’s spouse, another’s wealth
a trap that coils around the soul itself.
Even mighty Ravanalearned, powerful, Shiva’s own devotee
was undone by such desires.
Save me, O Kudalasangama,
from the serpents that rise within.
Basavanna maps a spiritual hierarchy of dangers, moving from outer threats to the deepest inner poisons:
- Physical fear – like a pot fearing a serpent’s strike.
- Verbal and emotional harm – the destructive power of one’s own tongue.
- Attachment to home and domestic comforts – subtle bonds that impede freedom.
- The gravest danger – coveting another’s spouse or wealth.
This last one, Basavanna says, is not merely a moral transgression but a spiritual poison.
It binds the soul in moha (delusion), inflames ego-driven desire, and destroys discernment.
To illustrate, he invokes Ravana, whose immense learning, mastery, and devotion to Shiva did not save him because his inner serpents of lust, pride, and possessiveness devoured him from within.
The Teaching
• External dangers can be avoided.
• Emotional dangers can be restrained.
• But desires rooted in coveting what is not ours shatter the foundation of spiritual life.
Thus Basavanna prays:“ Protect me not from the outside world, but from the serpents hidden in my own heart.”A powerful reminder that the true battlefield of spirituality is inner, not outer.
Spiritual Context
Core Spiritual Principle: Spiritual progress requires a reorientation of fear. The seeker must learn to fear inner bondage (pasha) more than outer hardship. The most toxic bondage arises from parasvaha and paradravya abhila shade sire for another’s spouse and wealth as these desires violently reinforce the illusions of separateness, ownership, and fulfillment through acquisition.
Cosmic Reality Perspective: In the non-dual Shivayoga view, all is Shiva. To covet “another’s” is to profoundly misunderstand reality, creating a painful contradiction within consciousness. The desire objectifies a manifestation of the Divine (the spouse, the wealth) as a separate commodity for personal consumption, thereby strengthening maya (illusion) and ahamkara (ego). This is the true “venom” that paralyzes the soul’s movement toward unity.
Historical Reality (Anubhava Mantapa Context): This vachana served as ethical bedrock for the Sharana community’s social revolution. In 12th-century Kalyana, caste society was structured around hereditary claims to power, property, and women. Basavanna’s warning directly undermined this structure by identifying the desire to claim what is not rightfully one’s own as the prime spiritual danger, not the violation of caste law. It protected the community from internal corruptionless, gossip, material jealousy which could destroy their solidarity more surely than external persecution.
Interpretation
1.”The pot shudders at the serpent’s bite; I tremble at the venom of my own tongue.” The pot represents the embodied self (deha). The shift from fearing an external serpent to fearing one’s own tongue marks the transition to spiritual maturity. The “tongue” represents uncontrolled speech (vak), which can create vak-karma (karma of speech)lies, gossip, harshnessthat binds and isolates.
2.”I fear the sticky sweetness of home’s affections, and the snares of comfort that bind unseen.” This identifies moha (delusion/attachment) in its most respectable form. The “home” (samsara) is not evil, but its “sticky sweetness” can lull the seeker into spiritual complacency, making the gentle bonds of comfort more dangerous than overt adversity.
3.”Greater than fire, greater than serpent or storm, is the danger of coveting another’s spouse, another’s wealth a trap that coils around the soul itself.” This names the apex predators of the inner wilderness. Coveting (abhilasha) another’s spouse is desire (kama) that violates the sacred trust of relationship and objectifies a person. Coveting wealth (lobha) is the endless hunger for external validation. Both “coil around the soul” because they use the soul’s own energy to bind it; they are pasha (nooses) woven from the self’s misguided longing.
4.”Even mighty Ravana… was undone by such desires.” Ravana is the archetype of the accomplished being ruined by unmastered desire. His scholarship, power, and even his devotion to Shiva were rendered null by the serpent of lust for Sita. This illustrates that spiritual attainments are not armor against these inner poisons; only constant vigilance (apramada) is.
Practical Implications: One must cultivate discernment-based fear. Regularly contemplate: “What do I truly fear? Do I fear insult more than insincerity? Poverty more than covetousness? Loneliness more than binding attachment?” Re-calibrate your fears to align with what truly endangers liberation.
The Cosmic Reality
Anga (Human Dimension): The human as a habitat. The body-mind complex is not just a vessel but an ecosystem that can host both benevolent and venomous creatures (thoughts, desires). Spiritual practice is ecosystem management identifying and neutralizing invasive, poisonous species.
Linga (Divine Principle): Koodalasangamadeva as the sunlight of awareness. The Linga’s light does not kill the serpents but exposes them, revealing their true nature and allowing the seeker to avoid their strike. The Linga is also the herbal antidote the remembrance (smriti) that neutralizes venom when applied promptly.
Jangama (Dynamic Interaction): The dance of vigilance and refuge. It is the continuous movement: sensing the rustle of desire (Jangama as awareness), recoiling toward the Linga (Jangama as surrender), and receiving the discernment to walk carefully thereafter (Jangama as guidance).
Shata Sthala
Primary Sthala: MAHESHWARA. This vachana is a field manual for the Maheshwara stage. The “serpents” are the specific anarthas (unwanted attachments) that must be burnt away by the fire of discipline (tapas). The Maheshwara’s work is to develop such acute sensitivity that they fear the subtle stirring of covetousness more than any worldly loss.
Supporting Sthala: BHAKTA. The Bhakta is learning the forms of devotion. This vachana warns that devotion built on a foundation of unaddressed covetousness or harmful speech is like building a temple on a nest of vipersit will inevitably collapse. It directs the Bhakta to purify the ground of their heart first.
Practical Integration
Arivu (Awareness Practices): Practice the “Inner Serpent Scan.” In meditation, calmly review your mind. When a desire arises, don’t suppress it. Instead, ask: “Does this desire seek to possess what is not mine? Does it coil around another’s being or property?” Just this clear seeing (darshan) begins to dissolve the venom.
Achara (Personal Discipline): Adopt a vow of contentment (santosha) and non-coveting (aparigraha). When you find yourself comparing or desiring what another has, consciously pivot to gratitude for what the Linga has provided you. Practice celebrating others’ good fortune as a spiritual exercise.
Kayaka (Sacred Action): Ensure your livelihood does not feed on the “coveting” of others. Avoid professions that exploit desire or create envy. Let your work generate genuine value, not manufactured want.
Dasoha (Communal Offering): Actively share and celebrate the successes and possessions of others in your community. This practice of collective joy (mudita) is the direct antidote to the poison of covetousness. It reinforces the truth that another’s blessing is the community’s blessing.
Modern Application
The attention economy is an engine for cultivating covetousness. Social media is a curated gallery of “another’s spouse, another’s wealth” (lifestyle, relationships, success), triggering endless cycles of envy and dissatisfaction. Consumer capitalism depends on the very desire Basavanna calls the most dangerous.
Practice digital austerity and intentional obscurity. Consume media that inspires creation, not comparison. Cultivate a private life rich in inner experience, invisible to the social gaze. Support economic models based on sufficiency and sharing, not on stimulating infinite desire. Reframe ambition: aspire to be, not to have; to give, not to acquire.
Essence
Fear not the snake in the grass outside,
But the coiled hunger that grows deep inside.
The tongue’s quick fire, the home’s soft chain,
Are dangers mastered with will and pain.
But the eye that looks on another’s life,
And whispers, “That should be mine,” in strife
That is the venom no mortal survives,
That traps the soul where no light arrives.
O Kudalasangama, be my sight,
To fear this shadow more than the night.
This vachana maps the psycho-energetic topology of bondage. Each “serpent” represents a specific frequency of contraction in the consciousness field. The “pot fearing a strike” is fear at the physical frequency. “Coveting another’s spouse/wealth” is desire at the identity frequencyit seeks to consume an external object to patch a perceived hole in the self’s boundary. This creates a severe energetic entanglement: the self’s quantum field becomes dependent on and distorted by the perceived possession of another’s field. This entanglement is the “coil around the soul”a parasitic energy pattern that feeds on the soul’s light while constricting its expansion. Ravana’s story illustrates that a being can have a vast, powerful energy field (learning, power, devotion), but if a single, intense entanglement of desire remains, it becomes a fatal attractor, collapsing the entire system.
Imagine your mind is a clear pool. A stone thrown in (an insult) causes ripples, but the pool clears. Mud stirred from the bottom (anger, gossip) clouds it, but it settles. A waterweed taking root (attachment to comfort) can be pulled. But pouring a permanent dye into the pool (covetousness) changes its very nature the water is now colored, everything seen through it is distorted, and it cannot simply settle clear. Basavanna says: guard your pool’s source (the Linga) and be vigilant about what you allow into it. The most dangerous contaminant is the belief that adding color from someone else’s pool will improve your own.
We are neurologically wired for comparison and desire they were survival tools. Spirituality asks us to transcend this wiring. This vachana speaks to the acute pain of “scarcity consciousness” the feeling that another’s gain is our loss. The liberation it offers is the profound shift to “abundance consciousness,” where the universe is not a zero-sum game. It confronts our deepest social anxiety: being less than, having less than. The prayer to be saved from inner serpents is ultimately a prayer for the courage to find completeness within, so we can look upon the world with wonder, not want.
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