The Shaiva Agamas

01Twenty-eight from five faces

The Shaiva Siddhanta tradition holds that Sadashiva taught the Agamas from his five faces, Sadyojata, Vamadeva, Aghora, Tatpurusha and Ishana. The first ten, from Kamika to Suprabheda, are the Shivabheda; the next eighteen, from Vijaya to Vatula, the Rudrabheda. Tirumular's Tirumantiram in Tamil speaks of the twenty-eight Agamas, and in the temples of Tamil Nadu the Kamika and the Karana are the ones most often followed.

02Beside the Veda

For a Shaiva Siddhanti the Veda and the Agama come from the same mouth. Both are Shiva's word; the Veda is the teaching for all, the Agama the special teaching for those who have taken diksha, and Tirumular's Tirumantiram says so in Tamil. The Agamas never set themselves against the Veda. They take its fire rites into the temple, add the mantras of Shiva's five faces, and give the householder a daily puja he can perform at home before a small Linga. A Shivacharya at Madurai chants Vedic Rudram and Agamic mantras in the same service without any sense of crossing a line.

03Pati, pashu, pasha

The vidya pada rests on three eternal realities. Pati is Shiva, the Lord. Pashu is the soul, countless in number, bound since beginningless time. Pasha is the bond, which the Siddhanta counts as three malas: anava, the root impurity that dims the soul's knowing; karma; and maya, from which body and world are made. The Mrigendra Agama says the Lord gathered this "great tantra of three padarthas and four padas" into a single sutra and then taught it at length. Shiva's work is fivefold: creation, preservation, dissolution, concealment and release. The last is grace, and it comes to the soul through diksha given by a guru in whom Shiva acts.

04How an Agama is taught

Each Agama tells how it came down. The Mrigendra opens with the rishis at their tapas, led by Bharadvaja, when Indra appears before them in shining form and offers a boon. They ask for Shiva-jnana. Indra tells them it descended from Maheshvara through the lords of mantra, that it is called Kamika because it grants every wish, and that he received it from Shiva himself; he then gives them its essence in sutras. In the same way every text names its line, from Sadashiva through the lords of mantra down to the rishis. A temple priest who opens his Agama is reading, for him, words spoken first from one of Sadashiva's five faces.

05Four padas

A complete Agama has four padas. Vidya pada teaches the three realities, pati (Shiva), pashu (the soul) and pasha (the bonds). Kriya pada gives ritual: choosing the site, laying the temple plan, carving the images, consecration, the daily pujas and the festivals. Yoga pada teaches meditation. Charya pada gives the devotee's conduct. In practice the kriya pada fills most of the pages, and it is what a Shivacharya consults before a kumbhabhishekam.

06From site to kumbhabhishekam

The kriya pada of the Kamika runs from karshana, the ritual ploughing of the chosen ground, to pratishtha, the consecration. The site is tested by its soil and smell, the plan is laid on the vastu-purusha mandala, and seeds are sown in pots (ankurarpana) before every major rite as a sign of fruitfulness. The Linga, the pitha and every image are measured in the Agama's own units. At the consecration the deity is invited into the Linga through mantra, nyasa and the homa. Because worship can lose its strength over time, the Agamas prescribe a renewal, and Tamil temples hold a fresh kumbhabhishekam roughly every twelve years.

07Alive in the temples

At Madurai, Thanjavur, Tiruvannamalai and hundreds of other temples, the six daily pujas, from the dawn ushatkala to the night ardhajama, follow Agamic procedure. The priests are Adi Shaivas, hereditary Shivacharyas initiated in the Agamas. The French Institute of Pondicherry has been editing Agama manuscripts since the 1950s, and its collection of Shaiva manuscripts is listed in UNESCO's Memory of the World Register.

08Commentators and manuals

Sadyojyoti, the earliest Siddhanta theologian whose works survive, wrote in Kashmir on the Svayambhuva and Raurava Agamas. Bhatta Narayanakantha commented on the Mrigendra, and his son Bhatta Ramakantha on the Kirana and the Matanga. In the south the work became practical. Somashambhu's paddhati and Aghorashiva's Kriyakramadyotika, written at Chidambaram in the twelfth century, set out the order of each rite step by step, and priests still learn from them. In Tamil, Meykandar's Shivajnanabodham, twelve sutras that tradition draws from the Raurava Agama, became the root text of Shaiva Siddhanta philosophy, and Umapati Shivacharya of Chidambaram wrote eight of the fourteen Meykanda Shastras.

09Hymns inside the rite

Walk into a Tamil Shiva temple at the evening puja and you hear two languages. The Shivacharya performs the Agamic rite in Sanskrit; when the lamps are waved, an oduvar sings a Tevaram hymn of Sambandar or Appar in Tamil. The Agamas made room for this. Their festival chapters prescribe music, dance and the reading of sacred songs before the deity, and the great Chola temples endowed singers for the Tiruppadiyam alongside Vedic reciters. Under the Agamas the temple is a place where Shiva is served as a king is served: woken, bathed, fed, adorned, taken out in procession and put to rest each night.

What it contains

1. 1
   The ten Shivabheda Agamas

   Kamika, Yogaja, Chintya, Karana, Ajita, Dipta, Sukshma, Sahasra, Amshumat and Suprabheda. They are held to have been taught by Shiva to the Shiva-class lords of mantra, beginning with Pranava. The Kamika and the Karana guide most Tamil temples.

2. 2
   The eighteen Rudrabheda Agamas

   From Vijaya to Vatula, including Raurava, Makuta, Kirana, Parameshvara and Chandrajnana. They were received by the Rudra-class lords of mantra. The commentators wrote most on the Kirana and the Raurava, and tradition draws the twelve sutras of the Tamil Shivajnanabodham from the Raurava.

3. 3
   Upagamas

   Each principal Agama has subsidiary Agamas, 207 in all by the traditional count. The Mrigendra, which survives with its commentary, is counted an Upagama of the Kamika. Many of the others are known only by name or in fragments.

4. 4
   Vidya and Yoga padas

   Pati, pashu and pasha, and the inner worship of Shiva. The vidya pada sets out the thirty-six tattvas from Shiva down to earth and the way grace frees the soul. The yoga pada teaches the limbs of meditation, from pranayama to samadhi, in Shaiva form.

5. 5
   Kriya and Charya padas

   Temple building, consecration, daily and festival puja, initiation (diksha) and conduct. The kriya pada is by far the longest part of most Agamas. The charya pada gives the rules of life for the initiated, their observances and their prayashchittas.

6. 6
   Paddhatis

   Manuals drawn from the Agamas, such as Aghorashiva's paddhati, used by priests in daily practice. Somashambhu's paddhati is the other great one. They arrange the scattered rules of many Agamas into one order of worship.

Famous verses

त्रिपदार्थं चतुष्पादं महातन्त्रं जगत्पतिः । सूत्रेणैकेन संहृत्य प्राह विस्तरशः पुनः ॥

The Lord of the world gathered the great Tantra of three realities and four padas into a single sutra, and then taught it again at length.Mrigendra Agama, Vidyapada 2.2

जगज्जन्मस्थितिध्वंसतिरोभावविमुक्तयः । कृत्यं सकारकफलं ज्ञेयमस्यैतदेव हि ॥

The birth of the world, its preservation, its dissolution, concealment and liberation: know that these, with their means and their fruits, are his work.Mrigendra Agama, Vidyapada 2.3

पशुपाशपतिज्ञानविचारप्रतिपादकम् । क्रियाचर्यासमोपेतं योगभूतिभरावहम् ॥

It sets out the inquiry into the soul, the bond and the Lord; it is furnished with ritual and conduct, and brings the full fruit of yoga.Kirana Agama 1.13