Shaiva Siddhanta

Southern Indian religious community
that was particularly developed in the
Tamil country, and whose members
are devotees (bhakta) of the god
Shiva. Shaiva Siddhanta is based on a
series of fourteen texts, all completed
by the fourteenth century C.E., in
which the ideas about Shiva found in
Sanskrit texts were reinterpreted in
light of the devotional faith of the
Nayanars. The Nayanars were a group
of sixty-three poet-saints who lived in
southern India in the seventh and
eighth centuries. The most famous
and influential of these interpreters
was the ninth-century poet
Manikkavachakar. Central to Shaiva
Siddhanta is the triad of Shiva as the
“Lord” (pati), human souls held in
bondage (pashu), and the “bonds”
(pasha) holding these souls. Shiva is
conceived as the supreme divinity,
who wields the bonds of maya, or illusion, to keep souls in bondage. Yet he
is also pictured as gracious and loving
to his devotees, a far cry from the
capricious and somewhat dangerous
figure in his earliest mythology. As the
supreme lord, Shiva is the source of all
spiritual illumination and energy, and
also the power through which the
world is created, sustained, and reabsorbed again. Souls are conceived as
different from Shiva, since they are
subject to imperfections, although
here too his power is their
ultimate source. The only path to
liberation is devotion to Shiva,
through whose grace the bonds of
maya can be broken or transcended.
Even after liberation souls remain distinct from Shiva, although they remain
in his presence. For further information see M. Dhavamony, Love of God
According to Saiva Siddhanta, 1971.
See also shaiva and Tamil Nadu.