A review by
Mani Velupillai
The Kural, a Tamil classic by Valluvar (circa 200 BC), bears witness to what American Missionary
Dr.M.Winslow (compiler of Tamil-English Dictionary, 1862) meant by his comment:
“It is not perhaps extravagant to say that in its poetic form Tamil is more
polished and exact than Greek, and in both dialects (common and literary) with
its borrowed treasures more copious than Latin. In its fullness and power, it
more resembles English and German than any other living language.”
Many a scholar has
expounded on The Kural, written in
such a profound, versatile and sophisticated Tamil language, to their
respective audience at great length in an effort to do justice to Valluvar. A Path
to Purposeful Living by V.P.Palam, “Based on the Sacred Kural,” consists of
commentaries on the 1,330 couplets authored by Valluvar in verse. One wonders
why V.P.Palam should versify his commentaries on a work authored by Valluvar in
verse. A versified commentary on a work in verse seems unprecedented and
unenviable. It would appear V.P.Palam’s versified commentaries themselves
deserve further commentaries, not in verse but in prose as usual.
The
commentator appears to have been influenced by successive editors of The Kural, who added the honorific Thiru to its author and his work (turning
them into Thiruvalluvar and Thirukural respectively). He tracked
this honorific down to its literal sense of holy
or sacred and treats The Kural as a holy scripture. “Thus
have we received the Bhagavat Gita, the
Tri Pitaka, the Holy Bible and the
Holy Koran…” claims V.P.Palam. ‘In this line of the sacred scriptural
tradition the last, but not the least, is the Sacred Kural’ (commentator’s emphasis). Hence the author of The Kural is not a secular philosopher Valluvar
but a venerable cleric St.Valluvar!
No doubt The Bhagavat Gita and Hinduism fall back
on each other for sustenance. That is, perhaps, the case with The Tri Pitaka and Buddhism, The Bible and Christianity, The Koran and Islam etc. The Kural, however, is not a scripture
which falls back on any religion but simply a Tamil classic of ethics – a code of ethics based on reason
and reality. Perhaps The Kural is
similar to religion purely in ethical terms, but surely not in terms of the
rest of the religious elements of faith, myths and rituals. Couplet 280 is
indicative of Valluvar’s aversion to rites and rituals:
No need of tonsure or long hair
If one but avoids what the world
condemns.
This explains why scholars
of different and rival persuasions, including Fr. Beschi of the Society of
Jesus (1700-1742), G.U.Pope (1820-1908), Francis White Ellis (d.1819), Rev.W.H.Drew, Rev.John Lazarus, Ariel, Graul
and others have been able to identify themselves with The Kural.
To be fair with V.P.Palam and his
predecessors one must admit that Valluvar’s bibliography does include Dharmasastra by Manu, Arthasastra by Kautilya and Kamasutra by Vatsyayana. But Valluvar,
like the Buddha, rejects Manu’s Varnashrama
(casteism) and declares ‘Birth is alike
to all…’ (972) and thunders:
Call them Brahmins who are virtuous
And kind to all that live (30).
P.S.Sundaram (whose
translation of The Kural was
published as a Penguin Classic in 1991) points out ‘Valluvar was no ascetic’. In
allusion to the following couplet he claims, ‘Napoleon, at any rate as First
Consul, would have, we may be sure, won his enthusiastic approval!”:
‘A world conqueror bides his time
Unperturbed’ (485).
P.S.Sundaram adds,
‘It is not the work of a mystic but of a down-to-earth man of the world,
concerned with the home and the community. But while Valluvar is eminently
practical he is no opportunist. He is a statesman not a politician, a realist
who is not a cynic’.
There are 10 chapters (100 couplets) on
warfare, capable of reminding the reader of The
Art of War by Sun-tzu (circa 500
BC). All these stark facts as well as the pithily expressed aphorisms which run
into 133 chapters and 1,330 couplets amount to a code of ethics applicable to
both laymen and statesmen, which bear no resemblance to a typical scripture.
Let’s look at the
very first couplet which refers to an ontological point:
A begins the alphabet
And God, primordial, the world (P.S.Sundaram).
V.P.Palam’s
commentary on the same couplet runs as follows:
‘A’ is the first and fount of sounds and
alphabets all
So too, the first and fount of all
things, large and small-
From the atomic particles whirling in
a round-race
To the mighty galaxies swirling
through far-off space-
That pervade the expanding cosmic
world
Is the Supreme primeval Lord.
One is
amazed at such a prosaic commentary by V.P.Palam, in emulation of
Parimeelazhar, which is avowedly intended to do justice to Valluvar. Tamil
readers who have already read and understood the same couplet in the original
could find this elaborate commentary quite interesting. According to the
commentator himself, “It has been credibly reported that some erudite scholars
of the Tamil Country could deliver a compact discourse, on a single kural of their choice, holding the
attention of a critical audience, even up to an hour without sliding into a
boring monotony of empty verbosity.” No
doubt V.P.Palam is such a scholar. One
could, however, reduce his commentary in his own words to:
A is the first of all alphabets
So is the Supreme primeval Lord of
the cosmic world.
Let’s compare
different interpretations of couplet 336:
Existing yesterday, to-day to nothing hurled
Such greatness owns the transitory
world (G.U.Pope).
“He was here yesterday,” gloats the earth over man,
“Today he is gone” (P.S.Sundaram).
This world possesses the greatness of one
Who yesterday was and to-day is not (W.H.Drew).
But yesterday a man was and to-day he is
not:
That is the wonder of wonders in
this world (V.V.S.Iyer)
Yesterday the good
soul was very much alive, talking to me far into the night
Today he is no more! How on
earth did it suddenly occur?
That, alas, is the Magna
Carta of the world-order, we can never flout
And that is life’s
melancholy irony we all have to accept and endure.
Before Death stares in our
face and delivers the final knock out
Why not we do good, feel
good and be ready to face our Maker?
[Planning long to give a
gift to kith and kin or settle a grouse or debt?
Do it now! Do not wait till
you die or see their death notice in the Internet!]
(V.P.Palam)
While all the above
interpretations including the commentary by V.P.Palam typically and
professionally revolve around the axis of couplet 336, his commentary is liable
to make one wonder if it flies off at a tangent. So one could again reduce
V.P.Palam’s commentary to a couple of lines and in his own words (which
incidentally do not include the ironical use of “Greatness” by Valluvar):
Yesterday the good soul was very
much alive,
Today he is no more!
A Path to Purposeful Living by V.P.Palam, however, is a boon to
young Tamils ensconced in the West, who are more fluent in English than in
Tamil, and to Tamil translators, both amateur and professional, at home and
abroad. Despite the potential eccentricities sparsely embedded in this book its
author has undoubtedly done his best to do justice to Valluvar, to do so with
the utmost passion and cogency.
In emulation of V.P.Palam’s
flair for Latin and Greek terms
one could suggest that, if and when he re-edits his magnum opus in the future, he had better consider the possibility of
inserting each one of the couplets in the original (Tamil) and his translation
into English in addition to his commentary.
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Mani Velupillai 2006/03/20
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