Guru Dattatreya is a Hindu deity encompassing the trinity of Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva, collectively generally known as Trimurti. The identify Dattatreya may be divided into two phrases – “Datta” (that means given) and “Atreya” referring to the sage Atri, his bodily father.
Numerous Hindu sects worship him in a different way. Within the Nath custom, Dattatreya is acknowledged as an Avatar or incarnation of Shiva and because the Adi-Guru (First Instructor) of the Adinath Sampradaya of the Nathas. Though Dattatreya was at first a “Lord of Yoga” exhibiting distinctly Tantric traits,[1][2] he was tailored and assimilated into the extra devotional (Sanskrit: bhakti) Vaishnavite cults; whereas nonetheless worshiped by thousands and thousands of Hindus, he’s approached extra as a benevolent god than as a instructor of the very best essence of Indian thought. Nonetheless, religious seekers pray to this Supreme Instructor for data of the Absolute Fact. Dattatreya is credited because the creator of the Tripura Rahasya given to Parasurama, a treatise on Advaita Vedanta.
In The Pathless Path to Immortality, Shri Gurudev Mahendranath writes:
Shri Dattatreya was a dropout of an earlier age than the interval when Veda and Tantra merged to grow to be one easy cult. It was males like Dattatreya who helped to make this attainable. Three of his shut disciples had been kings, one an Asura and the opposite two each belonging to the warrior caste. Dattatreya himself was considered an avatar of Maheshwara (Shiva) however later was claimed by Vaishnavites because the avatar of Vishnu. Not such a sectarian declare because it seems; Hindus regard Shiva and Vishnu as the identical or as manifestations of the Absolute taking kind.[5]
Certainly, the Dattatreya Upanisad, which opens proclaiming Dattatreya’s identification with Vishnu, ends with the mantra Om Namah Shivaya, figuring out Datta with Shiva. Within the final portion of the third chapter, Mahesvara (Shiva) alone is alleged to pervade actuality and shine in each coronary heart of man. He alone is in entrance, behind, to the left, to the appropriate, beneath, above, in all places the middle. Lastly, Mahesvara is recognized with Dattatreya, depicting the latter as an Avatar of Shiva.
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