"Anbe Sivam", means love is god and god is love.

ANBE SIVAM
"Anbe Sivam", means love is god and god is love.
This is the central theme of all great Tamil scriptures of the past.

History behind the above phrase and few other timeless words:

tirumUlar is arguably the most important sage of Tamil Nadu. He originated both the Tamil Siddha movement and the Saiva siddhAnta religious tradition. His 3000 verse tirumantiram is at once a theoretical treatise of Saiva philosophy and a technical guide of tantra yOga. His pervasive influence on the Tamil psyche is evident from the fact that so many axioms of Tamil culture and thought are tirumUlar's sayings! For example

ONRE KULAM, ORUVANE THEVAN

"All humanity is one family, and God is but one!" This universalism, an integral part of the Tamil thought long before tirumUlar, became a central thesis in the religious development of Tamil Nadu after tirumUlar, with tAyumAnavar and rAmalinga aDikaL developing this theme further in later centuries.

YAN PETRA INBAM PERUHA IVVAIYAGAM

"May the whole word experience the bliss that I have attained!" tirumUlar gives the above as the reason for composing tirumantiram. This sense of altruism, too, had a powerful impact on later religious thought of Tamil Nadu. ThAyumAnavar says that he has no wish other than that all humanity attain to happiness.


ANBE SIVAM!

"God is Love! (God and Love are not two, but identical!)" This saying, which permeates Tamil literary and social thought, is a revolutionary statement that departed from the contemporary opinion that love was a means to God (but not God itself, by implication).