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Avadhuta Gita (Devanagari: अवधूत गीता, IAST:Avadhūta Gītā) is a Sanskrit text ofHinduism whose title means "Song of the free soul".[1] The text's poetry is based on the principles ofAdvaita andDvaita schools ofHindu philosophy.[2][3][4][5]
The text is attributed toDattatreya,[6] and extant manuscripts have been dated to approximately the 9th or 10th century CE. It consists of 289shlokas (metered verses), divided into eight chapters.[1] The first seven chapters are the text's oldest layer, and the eighth chapter is likely a later interpolation.[7] It may have been composed in the deccan states of India, probablyMaharashtra.[8]Avadhuta Gita has been one of the most important texts of theNatha Yogi tradition of Hinduism.[8]
Abhayananda states, "The actual date of authorship of theAvadhut Gita is unknown, but, judging by its terminology and style, it appears to have been written, not in the millennia prior to the Current Era, as legend would have it, but sometime around the 9th or 10th centuries of our Current Era. This does not, of course, preclude the possibility of an oral transmission to that point in time."[9]
The title of the text,Avadhuta means "liberated soul", whileGita means song.[2] The text describes the nature and the state of a person who is spiritually free and liberated.[2][10]
The text is also known asAvadhuta Grantha,Dattatreya Gita,Datta Gita Yoga Shastra andVedanta Sara.[11]
Shiva is the soul within
I am thus the pure Shiva,
devoid of all doubt.
O beloved friend,
how shall I bow to my own Self,
in my Self?
TheAvadhuta Gita is structured in 8 chapters, wherein Dattatreya—the symbol of the highestyogi and monastic life—describes as the divine master and example, the journey of self-realization, thereafter the nature and state of a person who lives in his soul's truth.[14][15]
Dattatreya asserts in the text, that the self-realized person is "by nature, the formless, all pervasive Self".[2][16] He is in the state ofsama-rasya orsamata, which is where there are no differences between anything or anyone, neither one own's body or another person's, neither class nor gender, neither human being nor other living beings, between the abstract and the empirical universe, all is one interconnected reality, it is the unification of the One and the Beyond.[17][15] His universe, all of the universe, is within hisAtman (soul).[17] "There is never any you and I", states verse 6.22.[18]
The chapters discuss 'contemplation', states Rigopoulos, as well as "sahaja amṛitam" 'nectar of naturalness'.[19] Some of its teachings have been compared to theBhagavad Gita.[19] The term Sahaja, that became important in both Hindu and Buddhist tantric traditions, means "transcendent Reality, or Absolute". It is equated toSunya (void) in Buddhism, envisioned as a kind of "unlocated paradise", states Rigopoulos. In Hinduism, it is the interior Guru within the person, the Sadashiva, the all pervading ultimate Reality (Brahman) that is the Atman (Self) within.[20]
The text has been influential on theNath tradition of Hinduism, states Rigopoulos, and its teachings form a foundation of theirSama-rasya doctrine:
The transcendental reality is revealed [by Avadhuta Gita] as the Universe. In other words, the difference between what is Formless and what has Form disappears forever, and it is co-eternal with the vision of the Universe inAtman.
— Gopinath Kaviraj, Quoted by Antonio Rigopoulos[22]
Passages of the text are found in numerous Hindu texts, such as in the widely translatedBhagavata Purana, which is the most popular Purana, where verses 8.2 to 8.4 of Avadhuta Gita appear as verses 11.11.29-11.11.31 as one example. The text'snirguni Brahman ideas influenced the poetry ofKabir, states Rigopoulos.[23]
Vivekananda (1863–1902) held theAvadhuta Gita in esteem and he translated aspects of it in the following talk he gave on July 28, 1895, transcribed by his disciple Waldo:
"He who has filled the universe, He who is Self in self, how shall I salute Him!" To know the Atman as my nature is both knowledge and realisation. "I am He, there is not the least doubt of it." "No thought, no word, no deed, creates a bondage for me. I am beyond the senses, I am knowledge and bliss." There is neither existence nor non-existence, all is Atman. Shake off all ideas of relativity; shake off all superstitions; let caste and birth and Devas and all else vanish. Why talk of being and becoming? Give up talking of dualism and Advaitism! When were you two, that you talk of two or one? The universe is this Holy One and He alone. Talk not of Yoga to make you pure; you are pure by your very nature. None can teach you.[24]
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