Dakshina Moorthy Sthothram Sloka 5

सदाशिव समारम्भाम् शंकराचार्य मध्यमाम्
अस्मद् आचार्य पर्यन्ताम् वंदे गुरु परम्पराम्

In the first four verses Shankacharya had already summarized vedanta. If you study these deeply , you will learn a lot.
In the 3rd and 4th verses he says atma is of the nature of Sat and Chit . (formless-existence-consciousness)
In the 2nd he says all existence arises from atma just as the tree stems from the seed .
In the first verse he relates how existence through manifestations is seen by the atma.


The summary is this. You are existence-consciousness. From you the entire universe has arisen. You were there before the creation and will be there after the creation . You are the jivatma and paramatma much like roles played. If you know this truly , life would not bother you because life is just a passing show in you. So many appearances have come and gone in you. You are not only everything, but all these things have no power of disturbing you. However he says all this power that you have, only becomes useful , if you become aware  of this knowledge. For an ignorant person, this life is a suffering , much like the dreamer who suffers in his dreams without knowing it is a dream.

Ask a layman who he is , the immediate reply would be his body. Ask a slightly educated person, he would say it is a mix of body  and mind , but it is very difficult to point out what the I is . It seems as though it is experienced within, but it is not so clear. So for us , the problem of who we really are is not so well established and nobody worries too much because it is not seen as an important question.
"I have enough problems already  . So i have no time for any philosophical interludes !!" would be the common response.

Among philosophies in ancient india , there were many viewpoints . The charvakas believed that the I is nothing but the material stuff of the body. There are other group of people who believe that I is the prana. ( pranam iti viduhu) and so on. There are other versions which says I am the sense organs ( Indriyani) .

Buddhist philosophers too form various groups based on what they presume the atma is. For some branch it is the same as consciousness, however consciousness itself is changing and fleeting.  Shankaracharya says about this notion as चलां बुद्धिं( fleeting consciousness). To another bunch of Buddhists, atma is the great void or Shunyatha  and so on.

Shankacharya spent a great time arguing with philosophers other than Advaita vedanta and he used to defeat them all in tarkashastra with valid points from own experience. However he found many other philosophers to be vehemently holding onto their theories and perceptions like deluded people who believe in various superstitions.

In the fifth verse Shankacharya is addressing these gang of people who have incorrect understanding of what the atma is ( which is explained in the first four verses). But what he says is little more subtle. What he says is the ignorance of atma is the root cause of suffering. So be it ignorance due to wrong notion or ignorance due to not understanding at all, the suffering is the same.
देहं प्राणमपीन्द्रियाण्यपि चलां बुद्धिं च शून्यं विदुः
स्त्रीबालान्धजडोपमास्त्वहमिति भ्रान्ता भृशं वादिनः ।
मायाशक्तिविलासकल्पितमहाव्यामोहसंहारिणे
तस्मै श्रीगुरुमूर्तये नम इदं श्रीदक्षिणामूर्तये ॥५॥
Deham Praannam-Api-Indriyaanny-Api Calaam Buddhim Ca Shuunyam Viduh
Strii-Baala-Andha-Jaddo(a-U)pamaas-tv[u-]Aham-Iti Bhraantaa Bhrsham Vaadinah |
Maayaa-Shakti-Vilaasa-Kalpita-Mahaa-Vyaamoha-Samhaarinne
Tasmai Shrii-Guru-Muurtaye Nama Idam Shrii-Dakssinnaamuurtaye ||5||

( Some say the atma is the deham, some say it is the prana and for some it is indriyani . Buddhists claim it is a fleeting consciousness or shunyata. Like a naive girl child or a blind person or a dull headed one they vehemently hold on to their viewpoints ( he says भ्रान्ता).
If the inner guru is awakened all these maya of who we are vanishes and truth prevails. I prostrate that guru who is always guiding me)

It is a simple verse, but yet asserts the importance of knowing who we are ( or what atma is ) to be the central point of our studies and life. A misconception is enough to muddle our life into confusion, anger and delusion. The important point is we fail to let go of our misconception like  a madman who holds onto his state of confusion how ever hard we try. Unless we try to kill ( Samhaarinne) this delusion (maayaa), we will continue our state of deluded separate selves.

One of the unique characteristics of vedanta philosophy is that it is not based on any belief system. It does not force you into believing any dogmas or concepts. However as the zen master said , you should always have the beginner's mind .

Dakshina Moorthy Sthothram Sloka 4

सदाशिव समारम्भाम् शंकराचार्य मध्यमाम्
अस्मद् आचार्य पर्यन्ताम् वंदे गुरु परम्पराम्

We looked at the union of jivatma and paramathma in the third verse. We saw that from the stand point of the universe or jagat , the atma is called paramathma, while from the stand point of the individual , it is called the jivatma. Actually there is no distinction between the two as Atma is existence-consciousness. It is just like two different roles you play in life. With respect to your child you are called Father or Mother, with respect to your parent you are called Child. But the real you never changes because of these roles. Both child and parent are the same person only. We can act out our life with the knowledge that we are paramathma are one and the same. No individual exists in the real sense. If I am paramathma , so is everyone and everything. There can never be anything else. The illusion of multitude is a dream which the jagrat avasta imposes on you. See how peaceful you sleep. In that we experience this union with the cosmos (though in a ignorant way). If the union is experienced in a knowledgeable way , there ends our seeking.

In the 4th verse , Shankacharya wants to point out that this atma is ever evident in all your experiences and requires absolutely no effort. Atma jyanam is not an event to be experienced in samadhi or some anubhava  as we all think when we start our spiritual journey. No time lag is there to experience it. Because whatever is self evident can never require any evidence!!!.

 Atma is the nature of consciousness and is always behind all experiences. Suppose i ask you "Are you sure that you exist and are reading this article?". What would be your answer?. You would say "Of course. Yes". Now go deeply into this answer . Don't just assume it . You will see that there are two things here . One is that so many things exist. The blog exists. The computer exists. Your body exists. Your mind exists. The cosmos exists. In short there is existence.
Second. There is consciousness of all this existence. Now the question is .What is the first thing revealed?. If we forget all different things like blogs, universe, your eye etc, we can say there is existence and then the consciousness of it. Only after this existence-consciousness does all the other things come in. In short there is a an adisthanam to the experience on which the particular things are experienced. You can see that even though all the different things are dependent on so many factors this adisthanam to which all the objects are experienced is independent of all . This adisthanam is nothing but the chaitanyam or the light.
If we look at a particular object , say a table, we can say that first comes sense impressions. We feel it , we see it and so on. Behind these sense impressions lies our mind which thinks about the table. So we can say mind illumines the sense impressions. If we look at a video camera we can see that something similar to sense impressions exist , but there is no mind illumining those impressions.
So we can say mind is our first level of illumining principle. It can illumine all sense impressions. It can illumine touch, it can illumine vision and so on. When all sense impressions are illumined by the mind the table comes into existence.
Now let us look at the mind itself. Mind itself exists in various states. Sometimes the mind is peaceful. Sometimes it is tense and agitated and so on. But how do we know this?. What is looking at the mind to determine the state of mind. How do i say " I was tense yesterday". You can see that there must be illumining principle beyond the mind. So we come to the principle of illumining pure consciousness or awareness which illumines the mind , just as the mind illumines the sense impressions. So we can see that the mind is not the actual illumining principle , but awareness or pure consciousness is the ultimate illumining one. Mind has borrowed luminosity from this awareness to lend sentience to the world.

So the purpose of spiritual life is to see this illumining principle so that we know what is real and what is unreal. Nithyanithya vasthu vivekam. We say that blessed by pure awareness, the mind shines its light on the objects, but the source remains un-perturbed  by all. So whenever i see an object i should be reminded of the mind, which in turn should remind me of the awareness which i am. So an object or any experience is actually telling about the illumining principle. So i need to shift my focus from the object itself to the illumining chaitanya or atma. Since it is evident in all experiences , there is no particular experience which would do this revelation.We say in vedanta "tam bhantam anu sarvam bhati" ( Every object is known by the light of the self luminous sun only)

So in every perception the atma is independently evident(bhanam), while the anatma or object is dependently evident(anubhanam). In the mirror and sunlight example we discussed before, we can say the Sun is independently evident when an object is seen, while the object is dependently evident if sun light or mirror is there.
Similar to this example, Shankaracharya uses a pot example in the 4th sloka. The body is assumed to be like a pot and there are 5 holes in the pot. In the center of the pot a bright light exists. The light comes out these 5 holes.5 holes stand for the sense organs. For objects which are illumined by the five beams of light , we can say that the actual illumining principle is the deepam kept inside the pot and not the five beams, We can say even if the pot breaks the chaitanyam remains . For a normal person who is ignorant of the deepam he might think the five beams to be the illumining principle while in reality it is not.

With this let us look at the 4th verse

नानाच्छिद्रघटोदरस्थितमहादीपप्रभा भास्वरं
ज्ञानं यस्य तु चक्षुरादिकरणद्वारा वहिः स्पन्दते ।
जानामीति तमेव भान्तमनुभात्येतत्समस्तं जगत्
तस्मै श्रीगुरुमूर्तये नम इदं श्रीदक्षिणामूर्तये ॥४॥
Naanaac-Chidra-Ghatto[a-U]dara-Sthita-Mahaa-Diipa-Prabhaa Bhaasvaram
Jnyaanam Yasya Tu Cakssur-Aadi-Karanna-Dvaaraa Vahih Spandate |
Jaanaam-Iiti Tam-Eva Bhaantam-Anubhaaty-Etat-Samastam Jagat
Tasmai Shrii-Guru-Muurtaye Nama Idam Shrii-Dakssinnaamuurtaye ||4||

( As the light of the lamp kept in the middle of the pot with many holes shines through the holes, the atma shines through all experiences using sensory impressions.  I know he alone shines in everything in this jagat(Etat samastham jagat). To that supreme illumining principle i offer pranamam)

Just one more point . Just as electricity manifests in a fan as wind and in bulb as light, depending on the medium atma expresses itself differently. Atma is present everywhere and in all , only thing is the medium changes and its manifestation looks different. But the underlying source is the same .