Vastu Purusha Mandala - Some thoughts

The book on “Space and Place: The Perspective of Experience” by Yi-Fu Tuan, is such an amazing book, that I realized certain answers to questions that were in my mind for nearly a decade. To quote an ancient quote from an Indian Seer, “Knowledge is revealed” – because It is always there, whether you are aware of It or not. Similarly, you can say that by the grace of that Energy from which we are a part of, I came to understand a few fundamental things which I am very happy to share.

The topic of today’s discussion is regarding the meaning of Vaastu Purusha Mandala (VPM) and what kind of World View it represents. What does it mean and why is it coded in some peculiar language that seems irrelevant today? What is to be learnt from it and how relevant can it be in today’s time (which means today’s rational World View)? These are some of the questions I am attempting to answer – revelation of knowledge is always an on-going process. So these observations are to be taken as one of the pauses in the journey – a reflection. It may be right or wrong, but at least as of now, this is what I think It is…..

Vaastu Purusha Mandala represents a ‘World View’, which is different from the contemporary period to which our thoughts belong. That World View is an attempt of man’s expression to define a mythical cosmological space and man’s relation to it. Such attempts of expressing a mythical cosmic space are not at all unique to India – they have been done in all parts of the physical world by all traditional societies sharing a general attitude of reverence to the cosmic forces.  However, the description of the mythical cosmic space obviously differs since it is specific to that particular culture and the geography of place. These ideas were formed by man’s experiences in dealing with his immediate environment and by using the term environment, I mean what did man think when he saw the sun, moon, or felt the heat and cold, or felt the roaring winds, or the thrashing rains or the ferocious fire or the monstrous animals or the beautiful stars and the rainbow or the substances he ate and thereby fell ill or gained strength or saw his fellow beings grow from toddlers to infants to oldies. What did he conceive? What were his thoughts when such experiences to mankind were still new? That conception and his relation to the environment is portrayed in different ways, one of which is VPM.

In order to understand what was envisioned by the people of those times, one should note that I am referring to the attitude of the ‘Mind’ which is pre-scientific – which is NOT so rationally oriented in ways, we normally associate our workings with nowadays. In fact, it is only by reading and understanding such thoughts contained in the earlier times that we are able to reflect how much our Mind has changed through centuries and because of it, our comprehension of Reality around us. Whether this change has been for the better or worse should not be a topic of debate, because each type of Mind (which represents a context) is trying to understand or make sense of Reality around it. Therefore, one cannot compare one type of Mind with other, since it will constitute comparing oranges with apples, which is essentially pointless to me. Oranges are oranges and they have to be enjoyed like that. Similarly, apples are apples for all their worth. Everything has its own place and one need not always compare one thing with the other.

So, let me again attempt to explain (by our present rational minds), what does a pre-scientific mind feel like (and by using the word ‘pre’, please do not make the mistake of associating it as primitive or undeveloped).

Consider for a while, that you don’t know where the shining yellow heavenly body “went” after dipping down far away into the horizon. You felt the darkness around you suddenly…it was difficult for you to make your way back to your cave, if you happen to be in a densely packed jungle. Then you felt the cold, you heard some sounds coming just behind you – sounds that were not pleasant to hear and you knew by instinct that you must either take shelter or run. You started to run, you hit a stone, fell down. You could sense that the sound is following you from behind. But just as that ‘something’ could pounce on you, you hid behind some thorny bush that guarded you against the calamity of your existence. Then you saw the faint cool light of another heavenly body assisting you to find your way to your cave. Everything around you is now dead silent – no chirping, no barking or running of deer – it makes you feel something. You want this dreadful experience to go away. After some moments (which you cannot tell in terms of ‘hours’ or ‘minutes’ or ‘days), you again see the yellow shining body peeping its head from the horizon – but now in completely opposite direction. Wow! That’s a great relief! Seriously! You can sense the change in air quality, it has started to get warm and comfortable, you see the flying creatures chirping merrily, everything around you getting up or setting forward to do their own business – the four legged creatures running after tiny creatures, things running hither and tither…up the trees, swinging between the trees, things gliding across the blue skies and so on. You are filled with ‘hope’ and some new energy. You feel elated. Immediate concerns of survival force you to now embark on a mission of hunting. What do you have now here? Some pointed object that you used last time for hunting? Some kind of weed that will assist you in tying the prey and other things that you can select from your immediate surrounding friends – which are plants, stones, leaves….In short anything that assists your survival is your friend or a good Force and anything that threatens your existence is an enemy or an evil Force. The same shining yellow body is now giving off so much brightness and heat that it is really beating on you. Why is it doing so? Why cannot it give constant warmth? O! That terrible heat has now caused devastating fire in the dry bushes! Stop! Stop! It is spoiling my food – the food that I must have for my survival – there go the shrubs and those animals….But I can’t control it! Such a menacing Force! Dreadful! Why is this shining yellow body playing so wild tricks? I must tell it not to do so. I must pacify it. I must say to it to have mercy on me and be my friend. I must, therefore, ‘pray’. It will listen to me, if I give it something, if I am a good boy. What does it require? I like this deer. Obviously, It must also be liking the deer’s taste and the reason why It is so angry with me is because I didn’t offer It any food, just as I want food to survive. If It doesn’t have food, how can I expect It to remain calm? And that is the reason that It is always angry and It can magically start some fire and destroy all of us! I must, therefore, offer some food to It! I must, therefore, sacrifice my deer to it…..

This was an attempt to present our relation with nature – with the ‘Sun’, the ‘Moon’ the ‘Fire’, the recurring seasons, the heat, cold, trees, animals, shrubs  - virtually everything. Man was forced to relate everything to his survival, his dependence on those Forces and those Powers and then he tried to define his relation with them, so they could listen to his requests and guide his survival. These Forces (they could be your friends or foes), were therefore believed to affect everything you did. The success of every action from waking up, to hunting/ cooking, walking, running, sleeping, feeding, clothing, harvesting was (and even now is) dependent on these Friends. Man therefore, looked at his environment NOT in a way that we see it today. For him, he did not know what the green pigment chlorophyll is – he knew that sometimes when he ate certain leafy things, they were kind enough to give him strength or at other times completely sapped vital energy from him. Every ‘object’ that he saw was not perceived as a physical object, but having some kind of a Force to affect him…it had a personality of its own. The basis of your survival was dependent on the delicate balance of these Forces of nature (or the ‘Yin’ and ‘Yan’ in Chinese).

Thus the most important things that affected man were symbolised in different systems – such as the Vastu Purusha Mandala. Having established the ‘attitude’ of looking at this Vastu Purusha Mandala, we now come to the point of exploring what it has to say to us –

1. Anthropomorphism of the natural Forces which are believed to affect your survival. Each conceived Force has been personified (it has been given a personality depending on how it behaved or interacted with you) and it has been given a ‘place’, a ‘home’ or a location in the diagram, just as you have your own place to stay. Thus you have the Sun Force or the Moon Force or Wind Force, Agni or the Fire Force, the planetary Forces and other Forces constituting the cosmos.  The ‘positions’ of these Forces in the diagram are not to be confused with the actual geographical positions in space. The locations are only symbolic and intended to just state the presence of forces and their possible inter-connections.

2. However, some locations do correspond to actual movements of the Forces relative to where you are located – for example, the Sun might have been situated in the East or the Wind Force is located in the South West part of the diagram – which corresponds with the general way in which winds in India flow. (It is interesting to be stated here, that the same forces occupy different positions in other ‘Mandala’ invented by other cultures – say the Salteaux Indians of North America. They locate the fiercely cold winds to the North of their Mandala and the friendly warm wind to the South side of the diagram. They have fables to articulate that there is always a war between these two winds but the South Wind always wins. By this, they mean to say that the ‘summer’ always shines on them after the cold dark winter. Consider the Chinese diagram. Close to the east edge is the Blue dragon, which stand for the colour of vegetation and the elemental wood. It occupies the direction of the rising sun and symbolises the spring. To the south is the red phoenix of summer – the fire with Sun at its zenith. North side is the winter’s darkness, cold, and from which new beginnings or the new cycle must start). So, the positions of the Forces are relative to your experience and your position on the globe.

3. The VPM also has a base of astronomy, wherein it is possible to locate the positions of stars and other heavenly bodies such as the planets, sun and the moon in a given point of time during the day. Why was this important to these people? All human actions are dependent on these bodies. If there’s no sun, there’s no life. Think of agriculture. It is dependent on seasons, which in turn are the result of Sun’s movements across the sky. So, you must know the correct time to sow and harvest the crop to get maximum output. So you must know at what position of the sun you should begin the agricultural cycle. Or, for more practical needs, you must have a good weather to perform a fire sacrifice (or a Yadnya). You can’t afford to have strong winds or incessant rains in the middle of performance of Yadnya. So again, ‘timing’ of starting the fire ritual is important. This way, all aspects came to have a proper time to start or undertake – be they agriculture or building a home (for you required a cooperation of these forces to help you build your home without the disturbance of strong winds, or rains etc.) or marrying or anything. This is a concept that demonstrates dependence on Nature and introduces a concept of doing a particular task at the right time. It will also be very clear from this, why certain things seem so irrelevant today. By rationality and technology, we are no longer dependent on Forces to the extent we were before. Houses, marriages, events can be planned as per our logical managing techniques. We care less about the Sun and the moon since we have the privilege of staying in HVAC controlled indoor environments and most of us have food made ready for us without having to see where the fields are and what kind of effort is required to yield a good crop. We have leather jackets, woollen socks to keep us comfy during winter and have umbrellas so we can walk undisturbed by the menacing Sun or the roaring rains. Our sense of time (and therefore space) has been altered to such as extent that we have begun to take most things for granted – the rising and setting of the Sun doesn’t generate any animated excitement. We already know what’s going to come the next day, we already know that the Sun also has a time limit, we know that the earth revolves and therefore these planets are located in that manner. We know how the universe looks physically – so our conceptions of Reality have changed since our Mind has changed. We treat each entity as a separate object. It is distinct. I am distinct. It has no relation with me and vice versa. The Sun, moon, stars, pigs, leaves, mountains, lakes – they are just objects – just like our wall clocks or a shoe unit. You are least concerned of their existence and this defines our present relation with our environment.

4. The central position in the VPM is called the ‘Brahma’ or Pure Energy. The centre doesn’t mean the physical centre but the symbolic centre of all existence. Everything is made of this vital Force. Again, it is upto the individual now, to comprehend this Reality. This Reality cannot be understood by a rational Mind.

Thus, in a nutshell, VPM is a mentally constructed relation of man to cosmic space or his environment. It the way in which, we had felt the Universe, before another layer of scientifically defined physical Universe came into picture.

So, how is this relevant today? Since our Mind has changed, some of those concepts depending on earlier Mind look perhaps irrelevant and have to be interpreted in today’s world. Our present state of mind has led us to question our dependence on Nature. Is there any need to realise our dependence on Nature in times where we have everything available in plenty? This is a question each of us has to explore.

Similarly, if these Forces are no longer required to be appeased by performance of any Yadnya, but can be commanded by proper and logical placements of rooms, windows, HVACs etc., should you remain adamant in strictly adhering to the rules of VPM? Think.

I believe, the essence is that we are Nature in microcosm. What exists out there, also exists within us. Destruction of Nature is a mirror of our own destruction. The lesson of interdependence remains constant throughout ages – Pre scientific or scientific are ways of interpreting the interdependence. Once you realize this, you will automatically arrange your architectural spaces or plan your events so as to benefit your existence and the surrounding environment in turn.