The Africans Who Mapped the Universe: Tirumular

“Love is Shiva.” With those words, a sage of South India placed God not in the sky but in the human heart, and declared the body itself a temple.

Tirumular stands first in most lists of the eighteen Tamil Siddhars. Tradition says he was a yogi from the north who entered the body of a dead cowherd named Mulan and sat beneath a sacred tree, composing the Tirumantiram: some three thousand verses that became the tenth book of the Tamil Saiva canon.

In Book 3 of The Africans Who Mapped the Universe, Ajarn Shaman Shu and Shri Surya Nuranyana Swamikal open this great “Book of the Body and God.” Throughout, they keep what history shows, what tradition holds, and what the author argues clearly apart.

Inside you will discover:

• The cowherd legend: the story of Tirumular and the long scholarly debate over when the Tirumantiram was written
• Love Is Shiva: the heart of his teaching, and why the body is the temple
• Ashtanga in Tamil: the eight limbs of yoga in one of their oldest Tamil forms
• Breath and the conquest of time: the Siddha science of prana, meditation, grace and the guru
• Mantra and Yantra: sacred sound and sacred diagram
• Divine Union: the states of the soul on its journey to Shiva
• The African question: an honest look at the evidence for and against the series thesis

Drawing on the original Tamil text, public-domain translations and modern scholarship, and including a Legend vs. History Ledger, a glossary, and gentle practice pages, this is an accessible guide to one of the world’s great spiritual scriptures.

Educational only. Contains no recipes, preparations or doses.

About the Author
Robert S. Shumake, publishing as Ajarn Shaman Shu, has lived two lives in one — the builder and the priest — and his books are where the two meet. He rose from a Ford factory floor to become founding president and CEO of Inheritance Capital Group, a Black Enterprise-ranked private equity firm, served as honorary consul for Botswana and Tanzania, and founded Inheritance Media Group, owner of more than 300 publications produced by an AI-run newsroom. In spirit, each tradition that initiated him gave him a name: Buddhist Ajarn in the Theravada and Vajrayana lines, Oluwo Jolaoso Osainbola in Ifá, and Shri Surya Narayana Swamikal in the Tamil Siddha line. He is the founder of Soul Tribes International Ministries and of Buddha Digital Temple and its universities — Orisha University, Buddha University, and Shiva University. He authored Detroit’s Proposal E, the 2021 ballot initiative that decriminalized entheogenic plants in Detroit, and is the author of more than 140 published books and 86+ DOI-registered academic publications. His philosophy: the Double Bottom Line — make a profit, and make a difference. Robertshumake.biz