1.3. An Authorless Masterpiece

The preface or prologue of a book is called as “Payiram” in Tamil. In those days, there wasn’t a library or a digital catalogue to categorize books according to the subject. So the preface naturally became an important part of any book, as it gave an overview about the contents. This allowed a reader to spend her/his time wisely. The reader need not read the entire book to realize that it doesn’t fit with her area of interest.

There are certain rules to write a preface for any book. As per Nanool and Tholkappiyam (ancient books on Tamil Grammar) a preface should contain, at the least (a) the name of the author (b) the place or the conference where the book made its debut (c) the name of the chairperson under whose leadership the book made its debut, and so on. There were also criteria to decide who was qualified to write the preface. All books in Tamil literature have a Payiram in accordance to these criteria.

Thirukkural also contains a section on Payiram with 4 topics but none of them contain the required elements of the Payiram. Thiruvalluvar breaks all the rules. Interestingly, he does not even put down his name as the author of the book.

Will I (or you) ever write a book that will stand good for thousands of years and leave my name out of it? We write books to make a name for us, don’t we?! We live in a time where people don’t hesitate to steal others’ ideas and publish as their own. But, Thiruvalluvar wrote this incredible book and left his name out of it. Why ?

He didn’t mention his name because he believed that the concepts of Aram, which is what Thirukkural is about, did not belong to him. To take ownership of the book would mean the rules were his original ideas and that would amount to telling a lie. So he leaves his name out of the Masterpiece.

We have to admire the truthfulness of the poet. We should understand that he was a man who was bound by Aram. Thiruvalluvar did not create these rules of life. His job was merely to observe from nature and record them in writing. He is not the origin of Aram. Aram existed even before Thiruvalluvar wrote about it.

Let’s take this example: A child runs to play in rain while his mother warns, “if you play in the rain you will catch a fever”. The child does not listen and plays in the rain and catches a fever. Does that mean that he caught a fever because his mother said so? No, he caught a fever because he played in the rain. His mother knew this from her experience and observation. It is not her rule. Whether she observed or not, such a rule always existed in nature.

But why should he take the effort to write this book? What was the need to tell Aram for everyone? Is it so important?

However wealthy, intelligent  and clever a person might me, a peaceful and happy life can only be had by someone who lives in the path of Aram. There can be no peaceful life for the rest.

We are living in a world, where we believe that anything is possible using our intelligence. We can become favorites of influential people, speak lies, and be dishonest and somehow climb the ladder of success, it doesn’t matter how. Our ancestors tell us that being street smart can get us all up to a certain height, but time will not preserve us and we will NOT be able to live in peace. Only by living in harmony with nature, will time preserve us.

When we lie under the sky on a full moon night, with the moon and the stars above us, we realize that there is some order in nature. So many planets and  galaxies are around us, but they are all following a certain order.  If suddenly one planet removes itself from the orbit, and spins off course, the entire Universe would collapse. We are sitting here and reading this page in peace only because some order is existing in creation, whether we realize it or not.

A fish has boundaries, that is, it can thrive well in water. A bird has its boundaries and as long as it respects that boundary, it can live beautifully. The same logic goes for a flower or deep sea creatures. A deep sea creature cannot survive in shallow water and a flower dies if it is separated from the plant. As long as creation operates within its specified boundary, there is harmony.

If all these living beings (living beings with 1 sense to 5 senses) have such an order in nature, what about us, a creature with 6 senses? Do we have such an order? Is it possible to live however we please and still have a peaceful life? It’s something to think about.

If every other creation around us is able to maintain equilibrium with each other and exist in harmony, then there probably exists some order by which we, who are an equal part of creation, should live our lives, in order to live in harmony with creation. Such an order that applies to our individual lives is called as Aram or Dharmam.

These rules of Aram existed in nature, long before Thiruvalluvar wrote about it. He is only an observer and so he did not record his name as the author of his work.