You might get the darshan of gracious appearance of Lord Vishnu on bed of snake in Vaishnava temples. This posture of Lord Vishnu is referred as “anantha sayanam”. Annatha sayanam is the Sanskrit word which can be meant as sleeping on snake.
The sculptures of Lord Vishnu’s anantha sayanam shows sleeping posture, as body facing right hand side, stretching the leg straight and keeping the right hand as pillow, with eyelids closing the 3/4th of eye. We can quote many puranas, for explaning this posture, however it is not necessary as of now.
But, from my point of view, Lord Vishnu’s anantha sayana posture has connection with yoga nidra of Siththalogy. Agathiyar’s poem from “Agathiyar poorana soothiram 216” came as the reason behind my above explanation. Agathiyar explains the poem as follows;
புனிதமாய் உறங்கவென்றால் வலக்கை மேலே
punithamaai urangavenraal valakkai maelae
பூட்டாகக் கால்நீட்டிப் பூரணத்தை நோக்கி
poottaakak kaalneettip pooranaththai noakki
அனிதமாய்க் கேசரத்தில் மனதை வைத்து
anithamaaik kaesaraththil manathai vaiththu
அப்பனே லலாடத்டதே தூங்க வேணும்
appanae lalaadaththaey thuunga vaenum
மனிதனாய்ப் பிறந்தாக்கால் சாகாக் கல்வி
manithanaaip piranthaakkaal saakaak kalvi
வாசிக்குட் சிவமோடு வாழ்க்கை சேர்வான்
vaasikkut sivamoadu vaazhkkai saervaan
செனிதமாஞ்ச் சண்டாளாப் பிறவியோர்கள்
senithamaanj sandaalaap piraviyoarkal
சித்திறந்து செனிப்பார்கள் செகத்தில்தானே
siththiranthu senippaarkal sekaththilthaanae
- அகத்தியர் (Agathiyar)
Agathiyar deciphered the posture of “yoga nidra” as follows; head should be supported by right hand and slanting the body in the right hand side with ¾ parts of eyes in closed state focusing the eyeball in pooranam and position the mind in kaesaram and then sleep.
Moreover, every born human must learn and excel in eternal vaasi yokarma.
The terms vaasi yoga, unifiying with ultimate etc. may kindle your thga and must be unified with divine ultimate. Those who are not practicing it have to re-born everytime and should suffer for their oughts regarding kundalini yoga, samadhi satge etc. The above said yoga nidr is also for those who practicing above said yogas.
Now, let us come to Lord Vishnu. The snake as umbrella posture of Vishnu’s yoga nidra may indicate the rising kundalini energy similar to snake which rises to thuriyam chakra which blooms and gives high blissful state, which can be correlated to incredible yoga nidra of vaasi yoga.
However, the above axplanation is not finaI. I will be really happy and eager to hear more discussions regarding this aspect from interested readers.
Original – www.siththarkal.com
Translated by Lalithambika Rajasekaran
