freinds, last week thiruvaduthurai saivasiddantham class was held at chidambaram. it was a concluding session of the two year course on Saivasiddhantham. thiru.vellaivaranam gave a 3 hour marathon lecture on the 14 pandara sastrams. it was very good. the adheenam has come with a complete book on the whole 14 pandarasastrams. these 14 books were by and large not known to general public. they were written between 15th century to 17th century by the pontiffs of the mutt. these books have some of the later developments in SS studies.
thiru.vellaivaranam(72) is a former tamil teacher of porayar arts college. now gives classes for the mutt programmes all over tamil nadu. he along with thiru k.vaidyanathan and s.kunchithapatham are doing a great service in the SS studies.
after sivagnanamamunivar(18th century) and arumuganavalar(19th century) there were very little progress in SS literature. the mutt and its two year saivasiddhantha programmes are by and large only activity in tamil nadu on the philosophical aspects of SS. however how many people really understand the philosophy remains questionable.
saiva siddhantham does not end with 12 thirumurais. actually that is only a beginning. the 14 sandhansastrams, 14 pandarasastrams are treasure troves deeper aspects of SS. some of the modern psychoanalytic and hermeneutic trends in psychology were in fact well developed in chidambaram by 11th century itself. the object relation schools, phenomenology, existentialsm were the core of SS.
unfortunately these aspects are not known to most people. the periya puranam is very popular as does the thevaram and thiruvasagam. but the true SS is in thirumandhiram which was based on the siva agamas. the siva agamas are 28 and they are lost. the gnana kanda portion were translated by thiruvaduthurai in 18th century and it is now available only ther in olaisuvadees.
i wish philosophical aspects of SS FLOURISH AMONG EDUCATED CIRCLES IN TAMILCOUNTRY GANDHI CHIDAMBARAM