The world is a free and active creation of Shiva Dr Bikram Lamba Recently the festival of Shivratri was celebrated by followers of Hinduism the world over. This festical is dedicated to seek the blessings of Lord Shiva. The term ‘Shiv’ means ‘auspicious’ and the ‘source of all bliss’. The eight attributes of Shiv are: self-existence, purity, self-knowledge, omniscience, boundless benevolence, omnipotence, bliss, and absence of malaise, that is, defilement and impurities. Anugraha, compassion is his nature and love is his being. In the Mahabharat, when Yudhishtir asks Bhishm Pitamah about the greatness of Shiv, the latter replies, “No less a person than Krishn, Vishnu, can describe the greatness of Shiv”. And when Krishn is asked, he says it is impossible to describe all the qualities of Shiv, because he is the most mysterious of the trinity of Hinduism. He has infinite names and forms. So much so that in the Srimad Bhagavatam, even Radha is said to be an incarnation of Shiv himself. Shivastotravali, 2:19-20, describes Shiv as the essence of Dakshinachara, the right-handed path, as well as Vamachara, the left-handed path. He belongs to every tradition, and to no tradition. It asserts that Shiv can be worshipped in any manner, in any place, in whatever form. The reason for the infinite names and forms of Shiv is traced in Vijnana Bhairav, v:116, to the fact that “wherever the mind goes, whether outside or within, there is Shiv. There is no place without him. He is self-proved, beginningless, primal, the ultimate in all respects and present in everything”. According to the 10th century mystic, philosopher and aesthetician, Abhinavagupta, Shiv reveals himself “in lakhs, crores, ten crores of endless future bhava manifestations and absorptions to be brought about by maya, and thus he appears in those very forms — tatharupam eva bahvati”. Shiv is almighty, all-pervading, omnipresent, and omniscient. He is shuddha samvit, pure consciousness, and exists in the very electric charges pulsating in the nucleus of even the smallest atom of matter. Fritjof Capra in his The Tao of Physics comparing the dance of Shiv with the dance of subatomic particles inter alia says, “The bubble chamber photographs of interacting particles, which bear testimony to the continual rhythm of creation and destruction in the universe, are visual images of the dance of Shiv equalling those of Indian artists in beauty and significance”. The creative and destructive powers of Shiv are described by the historian of Indian art, Ananda Coomaraswamy, as “poetry but nonetheless science”. Shiv uniformly pervades all that exists, irrespective of whether it is material or immaterial, perceptible or imperceptible. He is both immanent and transcendent in the universe. The universe is his manifestation. It is within himself because “all the thirty-six tattvas, principles, categories, ranging from Shiv to Prithvi is within him. There is nothing outside of him”. Lalleshwari describes the omnipresence of Shiv in Lall Vaakh 1 thus: “Shiv is present everywhere”. Just as omnipresence is a characteristic of Shiv, kriya, activity, is also part of his integral nature. It is he who, as Abhinavagupta says in the Tantraloka, 8.82, “creates the bondage, and he who releases a jiva from it”. So much so that jnana, knowledge, and kriya, action, become synonyms. They are the two modes of the same reality — consciousness. Shiv, the pure consciousness, enjoys positive as well as negative freedom. He is ‘free from’ all constraints on his actions, and ‘free to’ act or not to act. Shiv is perfect and is not required to indulge in kriya because of some external or internal compulsion, or to fill some lacuna. He acts out of his inherent nature and iccha, free will. As a result, the world is seen as a free and active creation of Shiv. The process which results in the creation of the world is not wilfully done, it is instant and spontaneous. Hence, it is neither mechanical nor determined. It has no purpose; it is lila, play, done for its own sake. (Dr. Bikram Lamba, deemed human encyclopaedia, is well known political and business strategist who has been advisor to 3 Prime Ministers and two Presidents.  He has authored 8 books, over 7000 articles, and has two YouTube Channels and a podcast channel. He can be contacted at torconsult@rogers.com)