Lalithasahasranamam 2
There is some substantial ground to be covered before discussing the sacred names of the Mother. But the first name “Sreematha” fascinates me.
A few reasons that comes to the mind
1. Everywhere in this earth where human beings live, whatever religion, region, or language is followed, a child born, the living human being’s first introduction to this earth, first feels its connection with the human being from whose body it got separated. At the same moment it feels the pang of separation from that body too. So the child celebrates its birth and at the same moment laments its severance from the umbilical connection, sharing both jubilation and the pangs of separation with its mother. The first word that voluntarily erupts out of the Childs’s vocal chords and forms by the simple joining of the upper lip with the lower one is “Ma” and we find to our surprise that in almost all languages, that “Ma” is the basic component of the word denoting mother.. maatha, mother, mater, amma, amba, ammai, maa, mam, mammy, mom, mommy, mamen, everything is mother..
Sure it is the first word that erupted first from the lips of every human being that took birth on this earth..
2 There was a stage in the growth of human beings, where there was no religion, language, no idea of human relations, no idea about God. The man of that age looked at everything around him with fear, with awe, with uncertainty and even with suspicion. He was baffled by the unpredictability of all things that happened around him. Nothing could be said for sure. If he had met an animal which he could expect to kill next day for food and somehow marked its location, and went back to the same spot next day and could not find the prey any more, he did not know whether he should feel sorry, or whether he should cry in desperation. He did not know what to do. But his first lesson in life was that the behavior of nature around him was beyond his control. Clouds gathered, lightning struck the earth, rains poured in torrents, all beyond his control. He saw the sun rise and set. He saw the moon wax and wane. He did not have any say in the behavior of the cloud or rain or the sun or the moon. He saw plants grow, flower, bear fruits, and die or got burnt in wildfire as summer season came. He saw plants grow again with rains. He saw his own fellow beings die without any predictability, and he also saw his own images emerging from the womb of his womenfolk. All these happening made him believe that there was some power completely beyond his knowledge and control which regulated the rhythm of nature and also caused the birth and creation of all things animate and inanimate and also the destruction of living things. ..
He did not have any knowledge even about the process as to how he was born. He was not perhaps aware that human foetus formed in the womb of a woman through the male-female interaction. He saw that the abdomen of the females of his group started swelling, and was afraid that it was a disease. But when after some time, the womb expanded and a little living being in the same shape but in miniature form as the human being was thrown out and that small one started breathing and suckling by itself he was filled with awe and a lot of respect for the apparent source of the little being..
The human being in his innocence connected a great power in nature with the growth of trees and animals and other living beings. He saw the same creation process replicated from the belly of a female. So the natural inference for him was that the female being represented the supreme power which represented the creation, maintenance, and destruction.. srushti, sthithi and samhaaram of all that is present in the universe.
So he identified the Divine being with the females. The women, all the women in this world. That alone can be the first interpretation for calling the Supreme being as Maatha.. The mother.. This definition is proved without any reference to any creed or scripture. It is simply the product of innocent reasoning.. And therefore it is truth, and absolute truth.
