Maheshwara Sutra is an epithet of the divine masculine energy of Shiva. This is a part of the Shaiva Siddhanta tradition and is believed to contain the essence of Shiva’s teachings on the nature of reality, the role of the individual in the universe, and the path to spiritual liberation.
The Maheshwara Sutra and the Sounds of Creation are the Original Yoga of Sound, vibrational medicine, and sound healing. They create the very structure of creation itself. The Maheshwara Sutra is an entire healing system from Vedic times returning to earth now as a pathway into embodiment and transcendence through sound, vibrational medicine, and inner tantra.
The Maheshwara Sutra contains the 42 sounds of the new creation and the matrix of the divine-human blueprint. Each sound unfolds the universal creative process, from the quantum field and the witness to the Big Bang or Big Light to the elements, the subtle bodies, the trinity of the mind, sexuality, chakras, pranas (life force energies), and all other elements of creation.
The Maheshwara Sutra is Shiva’s blueprint of creation in 42 sound keys that create 42 vibrational shifts within you. As these vibrations are sounded in different parts of you, it allows you to access the matrix of the divine-human blueprint within you. This can be profoundly opening and healing, activating all the parts of yourself step by step, taking you into deep meditations, openings, and communion with the Self.
The eternal union of Shakti with Shiva is indicated by the letter ‘i’ in the word Shiva. Take it away from the word, and it changes into shava (lifeless corpse). This unique philosophy demonstrates that the order of the Sanskrit alphabet like a, i, u, has a definite link with the process of creation. This is why when the great Mahadev Shiva appeared in his dancing Nataraja form before Panini (Sanskrit grammarian), who wanted to know the secret of grammar, the first sound that came out of his damaru (pellet drum) and gave the seeds of the entire creation.
The first three letters a, i, and u are said to be the three vertices of the basic triangle of the universe. Of these, the letter ‘a’ represents the ultimate reality beyond which nothing exists. But, left to itself, this letter is not capable of creating anything unless desire arises in it. This desire is indicated by the second letter ‘i’. These two letters, when combined, sprout the first sign of creation given by the third vowel ‘u’. Now, the first vowel ‘a’, in order to have the desire for creation, has to split itself into two ‘a’, which gives the letter ‘a’, the symbol of delight. Thus, the first of the fourteen Maheshwara Sutra expresses the delight of self-expression in creation. Again, as per grammar rules, the Sanskrit letter ‘a’ joined with ‘i’ yields the letter ‘e’, which is the root of all existence.
Hence the letter ‘e’ is looked upon in the tantras as a root letter procreating the phenomenal world.
Another notable feature in the Maheshwara Sutra is that the starting letter ‘a’ in the first sutra and that in the fourteenth sutra ‘ha’ together constitute the entire gamut of our existence, as it begins with the first vowel ‘a’ in the alphabet and ends with the last consonant of the alphabet, ‘ha’; and these two poles, when joined by the point represented by ‘m’, makes it aham, ‘I’.
In the tantric context the word ‘aham’ represents the whole world of living beings. Like the cardinal sentence in Vedanta, ‘aham brahmasmi’; I am Brahman’, the two words ‘aham’ and ‘idam’ in the tantric context represent the eternal relation between the individual soul and Shiva. It also means the elimination of the difference between the knower and the known, the enjoyer and the enjoyed.
Adi Shankaracharya also says in the introduction to his commentary on the Brahma Sutra that the physical world consists of the infinite variety of relationships between the two words ‘aham’ and ‘idam’, ‘I’ and ‘this’: ‘A natural human behavior based on self-identification in the form of “I am this” or “This is mine”.
