கண்ணுக்குக் கண்ணாவான் காட்சியாவான்
காண்பவனும் காண்பதுவு மவனே யாவான்
எண்ணுக்கு ளெண்ணாவா னெண்ண மாவான்
எண்ணுபவ னெண்ணுபொருள் யாவு மாவான்
மண்ணாவான் தண்ணாவான் மாத்தீ யாவான்
வளியாவான் வெளியாவான் வண்ண மாவான்
பெண்ணாவான் ஆணாவான் பேடி யாவான்
பேச்சாவான் பேச்சற்ற பெரியோன் தானே
kaṇṇukkuk kaṇṇāvān kāṭciyāvān
kāṇpavaṉum kāṇpatuvu mavaṉē yāvān
eṇṇukku ḷeṇṇāvā ṉeṇṇa māvān
eṇṇupava ṉeṇṇuporuḷ yāvu māvān
maṇṇāvān taṇṇāvān māttī yāvān
vaḷiyāvān veḷiyāvān vaṇṇa māvān
peṇṇāvān āṇāvān pēṭi yāvān
pēccāvān pēccarra periyōṉ tāṉē.
He is the eye to the eye; he is the very seeing.
The one who sees, and that which is seen—he alone becomes.
Within counting he is the uncountable; he is the counting/thinking itself.
The one who thinks, and every object of thought—he becomes all.
He is earth; he is water; he is fire/transforming heat.
He is air; he is space (the expanse); he is color/form.
He is woman; he is man; he is the third/neutral sex (paeḍi).
He is speech; he is the speechless (beyond speech); he is the Great One indeed.
The Siddhar points to a single Reality that is simultaneously the instrument of perception (the “eye”), the act of knowing (seeing), the knower (seer), and the known (the seen). The same Reality is present as thought and its contents, as the five elements and the qualities that appear through them, and as every gendered form. Yet it also surpasses all categories—remaining finally “speechless,” accessible only in silent direct realization. This all-pervading, all-transcending principle is the Great One.
This verse is a compact non-dual (monistic) declaration expressed in Siddhar idiom. It uses a series of identity-statements (“he is…”) to dissolve the usual subject–object split.
1) Epistemology / yogic insight (seer–seen): “Eye to the eye” and “seeing itself” suggests not merely the physical organ but the witnessing consciousness that makes vision possible. By saying “the seer and the seen are he,” the verse collapses duality: consciousness is not one entity observing another; rather, all experience is a single field where knower, knowing, and known are not ultimately separate.
2) Mind and number (thought–thinker): The “countable/uncountable” pairing points to a paradox: the One appears within measurable multiplicity (numbers, thoughts, categories) yet is itself beyond measure. “Thinker and thought-object are he” extends the same logic to cognition—every mental formation arises within, and is not other than, that underlying Reality.
3) Cosmology / alchemical-physiological mapping (five elements): “Earth, water, fire/heat, air, space” echoes the pañca-bhūta framework used in Siddha medicine, yoga, and alchemy: body, world, and subtle energies are elementally composed. Declaring the One as each element asserts both immanence (present as material reality) and transcendence (not limited to any single element).
4) Qualities and appearance (color/form): “Color/form” can indicate visible manifestation (rūpa), or more broadly “quality/variety” (guṇa-like differentiation). The One is said to be the very differentiations by which multiplicity appears.
5) Gender and completeness: By naming woman, man, and paedi (third/neutral sex), the verse refuses to restrict the Absolute to a single gendered image. It signals totality, inclusivity of all embodied forms, and the inadequacy of gendered theology for the ultimate.
6) Word and the beyond-word: “He is speech” aligns with the idea of sacred sound (mantra, śabda) as a vehicle of manifestation and knowledge. “He is speechless” asserts apophatic transcendence: the Real exceeds language and concepts, known finally through silent realization (mauna, samādhi), not through description.
Overall, the verse balances two poles central to Siddhar philosophy: (a) the Absolute as present in every aspect of body-world-mind, and (b) the Absolute as finally beyond all describable categories. The repeated paradoxes are intentional—meant to force a shift from conceptual understanding to direct knowing.