The night of Shiva or the Shivarathri, occurring this month can be understood by contemplating on Shiva as more than just the Personal aspect of God; He is also the Impersonal aspect or the Supreme Brahman.

Swami is likewise understood and worshipped by millions of His devotees in both these aspects. Swami has clearly explained this transcendental nature which is none other than the Shiva of the Vedantists and the Narayana of the Upanishads. He said,

“Brahma, Vishnu and Maheshwara, are like the Heads of three departments in an organization, (Creation, Preservation and Destruction) who report to the Chief, the Transcendental aspect of God or Brahman. You can approach the Chief (Me) directly by the heart to heart connection, by love to love, without having to go through the departmental heads!”

In one of His discourses, Swami made an historic declaration-

“This Divine Manifestation (of Swami) is one where all the names of God, and all the forms of God, ascribed by man to God, through the ages are present in full!”

The first 2 stanzas of the Nirvana Shatakam indicate the “Neti Neti” principle of discrimination as applicable to the Jiva.

“I am not the mind, intellect, thought or ego
Nor the five senses, or the five elements,
Nor the Pranas, or the five sheaths, or the five organs of action.”

The jiva is bound by these limiting adjuncts. Shankara points out that jivahood is a relative state of existence and illusory - maya.

In the next 3 stanzas, Shankara, transcending all thoughts on body-consciousness and concepts of duality, declares most emphatically-  

“I have no duty or purpose, no desire, nor freedom,
no virtue, nor vice, pleasure nor pain,
nor sacred word, pilgrimage, Veda or sacrifice,
nor fear, nor death, nor caste distinction,
no father no mother, no friend or relation,
no master or disciple, etc.”

“This lion cub, who had lost its mother, and was reared by a sheep, would take itself to be a sheep and was very timid, subdued and fearful. It would move about with the sheep, eat grass, etc. One day a full grown lion chanced upon them and all the sheep along with the cub tried to flee. The lion was perplexed to see the cub flee from him. So he caught hold of the cub and asked him as to why he was behaving thus. The cub full of fear and trembling, said ‘Please don’t eat me up.’ The lion out of pity took him to a pond and made him look at his reflection, and said ‘You are a lion. You are one of us. See! You look just like me. Now stop this nonsense and roar like me!’ The cub, still trembling, tried to roar, but could only bleat. After several tries, he roared successfully. He was surprised and happy. He was freed from all fear! He now moved among the lions happily as one of them."

“When Truth is known, where then is this world?”- Adi Shankara. Perceptions which are body and jiva-related, and which appear very real in the waking state, lose their meaning. The world then appears before our eyes as:  

We are thus, not affected, activated or driven by desires and fears for “The thirst of the man in a dream cannot be quenched by the waking state water”. We are free.

The seeker then becomes the Awakened One! He is Non-Dual. He enjoys supreme Bliss. His Heart is One with the Heart of the Universe. He has attained to the state of “Constant Integrated Awareness.”

We can pray to Lord Shiva-Sai to grant us this state of consciousness, most auspiciously on Shivarathri - for it is our birthright.

Salutation to Shiva! Whose glory
Is immeasurable, Who resembles sky
In clearness, to Whom are attributed
The phenomena of all creation,
The preservation and dissolution
Of the universe! May the devotion,
The burning devotion of this my life
Attach itself to Him, to Shiva, Who,
While being Lord of all, transcends Himself.

In whom Lordship is ever established,
Who causes annihilation of delusion,
Whose most surpassing love, made manifest,
Has crowned Him with a Name above all names,
The Name of "Mahadeva", the Great God!
Whose warm embrace, of Love personified,
Displays, within the heart, that all power
Is but a semblance and a passing show.

In which the tempest of the whole past blows,
Past Samskaras, stirring the energies
With violence, like water lashed to waves;
In which the dual consciousness of "I" and "Thou"
Plays on: I salute that mind unstable,
Centered in Shiva, the abode of calm!

Where the ideas of parent and produced,
Purified thoughts and endless varied forms,
Merge in the Real one; where the existence ends
Of such conceptions as "within", "without"--
The wind of modification being stilled--
That Hara I worship, the suppression
Of movements of the mind. Shiva I hail!

From Whom all gloom and darkness have dispersed;
That radiant Light, white, beautiful
As bloom of lotus white is beautiful;
Whose laughter loud sheds knowledge luminous;
Who, by undivided meditation,
Is realized in the self-controlled heart:
May that Lordly Swan of the limpid lake
Of my mind, guard me, prostrate before Him!

Him, the Master-remover of evil,
Who wipes the dark stain of this Iron Age;
Whom Daksha's Daughter gave Her coveted hand;
Who, like the charming water-lily white,
Is beautiful; who is ready ever
To part with life for others' good, whose gaze
Is on the humble fixed; whose neck is blue
With the poison swallowed:
Him, we salute!