dakshiNA-mUrti ashTakaM - The Hymn to the Guru of all Gurus: page 13

Verse No.7

bAlyAdishvapi jAgrathAdishu tathA sarvAs-vavasthAs-vapi
vyAvRttAs-vanuvartamanam-ahamityantah-sphurantaM sadA /
svAtmAnaM prakaTI karoti bhajatAM yo mudrayA bhadrayA
tasmai SrI-guru-mUrtaye nama idaM SrI-dakshiNA-mUrtaye //

KUZHAVI-MUN-NANAVU MUNNAK-KURU PAL-LAVATTAI YELLAM
CUZHALINUN-KALANDIRUNDE SOLIKKUM-MAGAMA-NALUM
KAZHAL-VIZHUVORK-KAR TANNAIK-KATTUVAN CIR-KURIPPAR-
RAZHAL-VIZHIK-KURUVAM-ANDAD-DAKSHINA-MURTTI PORRI

To Him, who, by means of the beatific hand-mudra, manifests to His devotees His own Self, that, for ever, shines within as 'I' continuously in all the various states such as infancy, etc., such as waking, etc., to Him of the form of the Guru,(who has the eye of the fire of wisdom) the blessed dakshinA-mUrti, is this prostration.

Verses 7, 8 and 9 talk about the Light in us that makes us see. Whoever was there before I went to sleep and whatever I am after I woke up from sleep, -- the two are the same and it is the same 'Me' that was also having the experience of sleep during my deep sleep; this insight is called pratyabhijnA. Whatever stage of life and in whatever state of awareness we are, the concept of 'I' is the single truth that survives as the continuing thread; that is the Self. It is that which remains when all that we call 'mine' is removed from what we usually, in the mundane world of activity, refer to as 'I'. To recognize this no effort need be made, says Sankara in another context: we have only to dispel our beginningless ignorance. The tragedy here says he, is that the differentiations are nothing but names and forms stipulated by ignorance and this has misled our discretion and intellect the consequence being

atyanta-prasiddham suvijneyam Asanna-taram Atmabhutam-api
aprasiddham durvijneyam atidUram anyad-iva pratibhAti avivekinAm //
What is most explicit in us looks implicit,
what is well-known to us appears unknowable,
what is nearest to us seems distant,
what is our own self turns out to be
something other than ourselves.

That this Self is the same as the Transcendental Reality, brahman, is what is shown by the Preceptor's 'cin-mudrA' - the handpose showing the union of the index finger and the thumb. The index finger represents the 'thou' of 'That Thou art' and the thumb represents the 'that' of the same Grand Pronouncement. Observe that we naturally point to the person opposite to us by the index finger and point to ourselves by the thumb. The identification of the two by the handpose uniting the two fingers is just the teaching of the Grand Pronouncement. That the 'thou' is Consciousness can be logically arrived at. That the 'that' is also Consciousness also appeals to our reason. That the two things identified by intellectual reasoning as Consciousness are actually the same Consciousness is however impossible to reason out. That last step in the enlightenment needs the declaration of the vedas and the prompting of the guru. That is exactly what the cin-mudra shows and says.