I am not this — I am That
Nirvāṇaṣaṭkam — Śivo'ham
Nirvana Shatakam, verse 1 · Composed by Adi Shankaracharya
मनो बुद्ध्यहङ्कारचित्तानि नाहं न च श्रोत्रजिह्वे न च घ्राणनेत्रे । न च व्योम भूमिर्न तेजो न वायुः चिदानन्दरूपः शिवोऽहं शिवोऽहम् ॥
mano buddhy-ahaṅkāra-cittāni nāhaṃ na ca śrotra-jihve na ca ghrāṇa-netre na ca vyoma bhūmir na tejo na vāyuḥ cid-ānanda-rūpaḥ śivo 'haṃ śivo 'ham
Word by word
- mano buddhi ahaṅkāra cittāni
- mind, intellect, ego, memory
- na aham
- I am not
- śrotra-jihve ghrāṇa-netre
- ears and tongue, nose and eyes
- vyoma bhūmiḥ tejaḥ vāyuḥ
- space, earth, fire, air
- cid-ānanda-rūpaḥ
- whose nature is consciousness and bliss
- śivaḥ aham
- I am Shiva
Where it comes from
The Nirvana Shatakam — six verses on liberation — was composed by Adi Shankaracharya, the eighth-century teacher who revived Advaita Vedanta. The story goes that a wandering seeker asked the young Shankara the simplest question there is: who are you? Instead of a name, a caste, or a village, the boy answered with these verses, each one ending shivo'ham, shivo'ham: I am Shiva, I am Shiva.
What it means
The method of the hymn is subtraction. It takes everything you would normally answer the question with — mind, senses, body, the five elements themselves — and sets each aside: not this, not this. What cannot be set aside, because it is doing the seeing, is chid-ananda, consciousness and bliss. The refrain is not a boast. Shivo'ham does not mean my ego is God; it means what I truly am was never the ego at all.
Reflections
Be careful with this verse; it is often misread in both directions. It does not say the mind and body are worthless — they are instruments, and instruments are honoured in this tradition. It says you are the one holding them. The error it corrects is mistaking the tools for the craftsman.
The refrain doubles — shivo'ham, shivo'ham — the way one repeats something newly realized, testing the weight of it. Once for the understanding, once for the wonder. Chant the whole shatakam and the refrain returns twelve times, and each return lands a little deeper.
This is the boldest sentence our tradition lets a person say, and it earns it through the subtractions that come first. You cannot skip to the refrain. Strip away what you are not, honestly, and what remains says itself.
