The Story of Shoorpanakha (Sarga 17-18)

Here we begin from this point:
when a person recognizes their true nature — the Self, the soul — and keeps trying steadily to remain established in it, then their conscious mind gets filled with many noble qualities.

Through the descriptions given by the sages, these qualities of the mind were explained — that Ram’s mind has become desireless, Ram’s mind is absorbed in meditation, one-pointed, and conduct-oriented. We had already discussed many such qualities.

Now further, Ram keeps asking the sages, “Tell me a place where I should stay.”
Every sage says, “Go further, go further.”
He goes to Agastya Rishi; Agastya also says, “Go further, go to Panchavati.”

So why are they all saying “go further, go further”?
We need to understand this.

As long as something remains only at the level of our thought — limited to our mind — it is not complete.
Complete means this: suppose I want to serve someone, and that feeling of service is only in my mind. As long as it stays only in my mind, in reality no one gets any benefit from it. It’s just inside. The real benefit begins only when I come into the field of action and actually do the service.

Exactly this is being indicated here.
All the sages say, “Go further, go further.”
“Go further” means: come down into the field of action.

So Ram comes into Panchavati.

What is Panchavati?

Panchavati means this body made up of our five sense organs and five organs of action.
This body is our field of action, because all our doing happens only through the body.
If we did not have a body, then no matter how elevated the soul may be, it cannot do anything.

So this body-field is very important.
It has been called our pashala.

Pashala means our place of give-and-take, our exchange center.
Give-and-take here means: I want to speak to you, you want to speak to me; this mutual exchange between us happens only through the body.

That is why this body is our pashala, our Panchavati — the body with five senses of knowledge and five organs of action.
And inside this body we have a kind of karanashala — a workshop — from where the whole exchange of consciousness takes place.

The eyes see, the ears hear, the mind thinks, the hands work — so this mutual flow of consciousness happens only through this body.

To explain this even more beautifully, another word was used: Godavari.

Go = that (consciousness),
Da = giving / donation,
So Godavari means: the giving and receiving of consciousness, the exchange of consciousness that happens through this body.

Now in today’s passage we read:
When Ram, Lakshman, and Sita were sitting in Panchavati, Shurpanakha, who was roaming in Dandakaranya, the Dandaka forest, came to them.

She was moving about in Dandak forest.

We’ve understood “Dandak” many times before.
Dandak means dand (punishment) and karak (that which causes it).
What is it that causes punishment?
Our own thinking — the mind.

We have three kinds of karma:

• mental karma (of the mind),
  
  

• verbal karma (of speech),
  
  

• and physical karma (of the body).
  
  

Verbal and physical actions happen later.
The very first karma is mental.

Whatever is sitting in our mental thinking — according to that, we get good or bad results.

If we don’t do any wrong with our hands or feet, don’t speak anything wrong, but in our mind we do it — then in spirituality that mental action is called paap (sin).

And what we do wrongly with our hands, feet, or speech — that is called apradh (offence).

Today’s world gives importance only to apradh (offence); paap (inner sin) has no value nowadays.
But in spirituality, paap has great importance.

So if my mental thinking is impure, unhealthy, then the way I think will either collect paap or punya.
If I think wrong, I gather sin.
If I think good, I gather merit.

So in spirituality, mental karma has enormous importance.

Here it is said:
From Dandak forest, Shurpanakha came — a demoness came out of Dandak forest.
So Dandak forest is our mental thinking.

Now, suppose I have known my real Self.
I have become Ram — I have recognized my true nature and I am, let us say, somewhat established in it.

Even then, deep in my subconscious mind, impressions (sanskars) from many births are lying there.

Just recognizing our true Self, and living a little according to it, does not automatically erase the deep, buried impressions of inner impurities in the subconscious.

To clear those subconscious impressions, Ram still has to work very hard.

As we read the whole story of Ram, we will see exactly this:
Ram keeps moving forward, keeps gathering and strengthening his army; and when that army is fully ready, then going to Lanka he will destroy those impurities.

So Lanka is our subconscious mind, in which the demons are sitting.

Here the point is: the impurities sitting in our subconscious keep rising up from there, every now and then, and come to the level of our conscious mind.

If anger is sitting in the subconscious, it will rise up, come to the conscious mind, and start troubling me.

Now here the issue is not anger, greed, and so on.
Here it says: Shurpanakha the demoness came out.

So who is this demoness Shurpanakha?
We have to understand this.

Look at the word itself — its meaning is hidden within: Shurpanakha.

First, let me give the spiritual name I use for Shurpanakha: Deha Shakti — the power of the body, the pull of body-consciousness.

I have become established in the Self, I have understood that I am not the body — I am the soul, the power that runs the body.
But my old impressions of body-consciousness and vices have not yet ended.

So from there, one such impression — one aspect of this Deha Shakti — rises up and stands at the level of my conscious mind, and tries to overpower me.

This is the demoness: the idea-force of the body, the feeling of body-attachment.

Now, how did this meaning come from the word Shurpanakha?
Let’s look at it.

The word Shurpanakha is made of two parts: Shurp and Nakha.

Take Shurp first.
If we remove the ‘r’ sound, it becomes sup / soop.

Soop means the winnowing fan — supda — that we all have seen in earlier days, used to clean grain.

So the word shurp points to that soopda.

Now what does this soopda have to do with us?

For that we need to go a little into the Vedas.

In the Vedas, two words appear: Aditi and Diti.

The Vedas say:
“Diti hi shurpam, Aditi hi shurpagrahi”
Diti is the shurp (the winnowing fan), and Aditi is the one who holds that fan.

Diti means fragmented consciousness.

We had discussed earlier:
When I take myself to be only the body — “I am this physical form” — that is fragmented consciousness, called Diti.

When I remain in the awareness that “I am the soul, and this is my body; through this body I perform all actions,” that union-awareness of soul and body is unbroken consciousness, called Aditi.

So:

• Aditi = unbroken consciousness (soul–body awareness),
  
  

• Diti = broken / fragmented consciousness (I am only the body).
  
  

The Vedic line says:
Diti is the shurp (the winnowing fan), and Aditi is the one holding that fan.

The soopda cannot clean grain by itself — we all know this.
A person holds it with both hands, shakes it, throws the grain up and down — then the chaff comes forward and is removed, and the good grain remains in the fan.

So shurp = soopda = Diti = our fragmented, body-based consciousness.

Now the word here is Shurpanakha.

Nakha is actually coming from the root nah / naha, whose sense is “to bind, to tie.”

So:
Shurp (body / fragmented consciousness) + naha (to bind)

Shurpanakha means:
that power which binds us to the body.

Who binds us to the body?
Attachment (aasakti).

So Shurpanakha = the power that binds us to the body = body-attachment.

If there is no attachment to the body, then why will I remain tied to body-consciousness?
I will naturally settle in the understanding of my true Self.

And why has this body-attachment (deha-ashakti) come inside me?
Because of ego of the body — Deh-abhimaan.

This body-ego is called Ravana in the Ramayan.

So:

• Deh-abhimaan (body-ego) = Ravana,
  
  

• And the power that keeps working with this body-ego is Deha Shakti = symbolically shown as Ravana’s sister, Shurpanakha.
  
  

So this Deha Shakti, which lives together with Ravana in our subconscious mind, suddenly rises up from the subconscious and comes to the level of the conscious mind.

And what does it do?
It tries to throw its net over Ram.

Ram here is the awareness of the Self — the inner knowing, “I am the conscious soul, the Atma.”

So Deha Shakti comes up from inside and this impurity rises, comes onto the conscious mind, and tries to bind Ram.

But Ram does not get bound.

She tries very hard to capture Ram, to bring him under her control, but fails.

The meaning is:
These Deha Shakti–type impressions rise from within us; but if a person has Self-knowledge, if they have understood their true nature, then this Deha Shakti cannot truly attack or overpower them.

Then what happens?

Ram sends her to Lakshman.

What is Lakshman?
We have already understood: Lakshman is vichar shakti, sankalp shakti — the power of thought and determination that stays with me all the time once I know my true Self.

So Lakshman represents that inner faculty in the Ramayan.

Ram says, “Go to Lakshman.”
Lakshman sends her back, “Go to Ram.”

So this Deha Shakti cannot overpower:

• neither the thought-power / will-power (Lakshman),
  
  

• nor the Self-knowledge (Ram).
  
  

Shurpanakha — Deha Shakti — comes out from inside.
She tries to take Ram and Lakshman under her sway, but she cannot.

Then what does Ram do?

Ram tells Lakshman, “Cut off her nose and ears.”

Now, this does not mean the physical nose and physical ears — Indian culture has never supported this kind of physical act: cutting noses and ears as punishment.

The meaning of cutting nose and ears is:
to make that attachment ineffective,
to take away its influence and power over us.

So here, nose and ears represent the power and impact of attachment.

Attachment (aasakti) is of many kinds.
In the story it is said that Shurpanakha keeps changing her form again and again. She herself says, “I can take on many different forms.”

In exactly the same way, our attachment keeps changing its forms.

See how it changes:

If I’m in body-consciousness, and I have attachment to the body, that attachment appears in all my roles.

For example:
I have a son. I’m attached to my son.
If my son says something that I don’t like, I get hurt.
That means my attachment to my son brings me sorrow.

I’m attached to my wealth and property.
When I’m in body-ego, I’m naturally attached to money.
If someone says, “What will you do collecting so much wealth?” I feel hurt.

I’m attached to my position and prestige.
If someone says something slightly unpleasant about my status or honour, I feel hurt.

So in each of my different roles in life, I carry different kinds of attachments.
And if anyone touches those attachments even a little, I feel pain.

This is how attachment keeps changing form.

We also keep justifying it:

• “Attachment to one’s child is good, isn’t it?
  I’ve given birth, I’ve raised him, I have hopes and expectations — of course I’ll be attached.”
  
  

So we go on justifying attachment.

But that very attachment keeps giving us sorrow.

All these different attachments — to child, to wealth, to status, to nationality, and many other things — arise out of Deha Shakti.

That is what is indicated when it is said:
Shurpanakha keeps taking many forms, very attractive ones, that charm us.

Then it is also said that Shurpanakha is misshapen, ugly, distorted; her ugliness is described in great detail.

Why is she called ugly?
Because attachment throws us into sorrow — it makes our inner life ugly.

At the same time, she is called attractive, and also ugly.

Attachment is ugly because it causes suffering.
But it appears beautiful to us, because in body-consciousness we treat attachment as something good and natural.

So Shurpanakha means:
consciousness tied in attachment — Deha Shakti.

This Deha Shakti lies in our subconscious.
When Ram and Lakshman come to Panchavati — to the field of practical life, the field of action — then we come to see how much work is still left to do.

Ram is now sitting in the field of action, and Deha Shakti has attacked.

This means:
we still need a lot of strengthening.

As the story goes on, many other demons will come and attack. To face those attacks, Ram will need a lot of help — later there will be the stories of Bali, Sugriva, and others.

Now in today’s passage, we also heard about two of Shurpanakha’s brothers: Khara and Dushan.

Khara — from the word itself we understand — represents our harsh, rough thinking (karkash soch).
Dushan means polluted thinking (dushit soch).

So when Deha Shakti attacks from within, along with it our thinking becomes harsh, becomes polluted, and surrounds us, attacks us.

If a person has recognized their true Self and even a little bit settled in that awareness (not fully — Ram is still young here, not yet fully mature), then even in this tender, early stage of Self-awareness, a Deha Shakti–type impurity will rise up and attack.

But in that stage too, we can still overpower it.

So in this episode of Shurpanakha that we read today, I have tried to explain her as a symbol of attachment-bound consciousness — Deha Shakti.