Silambam — the Murugan-Agastya Dhanurved

Pick up a सिलम्बम् कम्बु and the first thing you learn is that it is not just another random stick.

It has a weight and a balance that a cut length of bamboo does not have. It is chosen and seasoned deliberately — a straight, uniform cane or bamboo of a particular heft, cut, treated with oils, shaped and hardened over fire, and then tested by striking it on the surface of still or running water. The sound and recoil tell the Asan what a measurement cannot. The kambu is selected the way a musical instrument is selected.

That one detail tells us what kind of vidyā Silambam is. A practice does not arrive at such a test casually. It does so because generations of gurus have observed the cane, the hand, the water and the strike, and have preserved what works.

Silambam is the Chola-Pandya stream of Dhanurveda as expounded by Agastya Maharshi and his Siddha disciples. Its representative weapon is the Nedu Kambu, the great staff derived from the classical Vel of Vel-Murugan Karthikeya Swami. It is not random lessons scattered here and there, not a gimmick and not a one-off invention. It is a continuous knowledge-system extending across immense reaches of kāla and deśa. It exchanged with the many lands ruled by the Chola and Pandya houses, receiving and giving through every encounter, yet never surrendering its own svarūpa.

It carries a thousand styles, differing by Asan, community and place, and remains coherently one—not despite that multiplicity, but through it. One Asan may begin where another ends; one community living in Kurinji mountains develops as per their ecology, environment and battle strategy in that geography, one paramparā may count, name or arrange a sutru differently from the next; the same movement may cross a hill, river or language and return under another name & form. To the eye looking from outside, this can appear distributed, chaotic, contradictory and esoteric. To the shishya who has entered through guru-paramparā, the foot finds the same ground, the force follows a familiar path and the apparent contradictions reveal different decisions made within one grammar.

Silambam is practical enough to stop an attack and transcendental enough to become worship; simple enough to place in a child's hands and deep enough to spend multiple lifetimes and still be learning. Like Bharat, it is bewildering when reduced to a diagram and completely natural when lived from within. What appears impossible to organise from outside becomes, from inside, coherent, easy and finally the only way the movement could have been. It is one of the most beautiful expressions of the great river called धनुर्वेद.

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The many branches of one tree

In the sixteenth century, Paranjothi Munivar, composing the Thiruvilayadal Puranam, described not only the art but the building in which it was practised — the सिलम्बकूडम्.

The Tamil encyclopaedia Kalai Kalanjiyam, in the passage quoted by A. Arunachalam in Silambam, remembers this as a mature staff-defence art: the Silambakoodam is not a modern label placed on an old practice, but the living hall in which its people met, trained and fought.

Silambam fencing, or Kolu Vilayattu, was practiced in ancient Gymnasium[s] called Garadi Koodam in Andhra Pradesh. Silambam is called kalari in present-day Kerala (a state of Bharat with great contribution to Sanatan Dharma). 'Kalari' means 'silambamkoodam', or open space specially set apart for training martial arts. 'Payat' means teaching or instructing martial arts through specific exercises. Hence kalari payat means teaching of martial arts. — A. Arunachalam, Silambam, quoting Dr. David Manvel

The Andhra name for Ayudh Kala is Garadi Koodam. A koodam is a hall. The Silambakoodam is the hall in which the whole Silambam vidyā is taught. Travel north and west and the same institution continues under the local tongue: the गरडि माने of Karnataka, the गरडि कूडम् of Andhra, the कलरि of Kerala, and the अखाड़ा farther north and west. The regional arts bear their own names — Karra Saamu, Paika Akhada, Mardani Khel, Lathi Khel — because languages, lands and guru-paramparās differ. There are many forms which name it with Lathi or Sothi in U.P. and Punjab, Bihar and Bengal (Lathi khel).

Staff Fencing [is] being practiced in almost all regions of this vast democratic country, India. In Maharashtra state, staff fencing is popularly known as 'Lathi', whereas the same is called 'Dhal Lakadi' in Gujarat state, 'Karra Saamu' in Andhra state, 'Lati Lakadi' in Bengal state, 'Dhanta Varisai' in Mysore state, 'Nedu vadi' [in] Kerala state, and Silambam in Tamil Nadu state. — A. Arunachalam, Silambam, quoting Dr. David Manvel

Many names from the Himalaya to Kanyakumari, many highly developed local styles, and one Bharatiya tree. In the Dakshin its longest and most luxuriant branch grows in the country whose iṣṭa-deva, Vel Murugan Swamy, carries the Vel as his own primary āyudha.

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The name is the representative, not the whole

धनुर्वेद is not merely धनुर्-विद्या. In its bṛhat meaning it is not confined to the bow. Its own chapters contain the पाश and खड्ग, लगुड and गदा, मुसल, परशु and तोमर. They also contain बाहुयुद्ध, the unarmed body, counted as a complete division beside the weapons. The bow lends the vidyā its name because it is the representative āyudha; it does not exhaust the vidyā.

Silambam is formed on the same principle. The नेडु कम्बु is its representative āyudha but colloquially now termed as Silambam. The other weapons such as Gada, Podi-kuchi (short sticks), Vel, Vaal, the नियुद्ध (bare hand) and the श्रम-अभ्यास that builds the practitioner all live inside the name. Silambakoodam is not the hall of one staff. It is the place where the entire practice unfolds.

One āyudha can stand for the rest because the same movement-grammar runs through them: the same निलई, the same (काल पाडम) footwork, the same turning of the waist and shoulders, the same rotational paths for generating and receiving force. This is why the kambu that enters a beginner's hands early teaches the other āyudh flow just as aptly.

It works as music does. A khadga does not resemble a kambu, and the empty hand holds no weapon at all; yet the trained body recognises the same sentence passing through each. The seven स्वर remain the same whichever instrument one takes up, and tāla remains tāla. The modality changes as per instrument; the music does not. The āyudha can disappear and the grammar still speaks.

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Who taught it: Murugan, Agastya and the Dhanurveda gurus

Mahadeva is the Ādiguru of Dhanurveda. The vidyā coming from Shiva is taught through the great lines of विश्वामित्र, वसिष्ठ, जमदग्नि and परशुराम, अगस्त्य, भरद्वाज and द्रोण. The formless Shiva takes many forms, and his vidyā manifests with the distinct beauty of each guru-paramparā.

Agastya Maharshi and Bhagavan Parashurama established the great southern streams. Vel Murugan Swamy, Mahadeva's own son and Devasenapati, is the guru and supreme practitioner of Silambam. Agastya carried the vidyā through his Siddha disciples; Murugan gave its warrior-form, its Vel and its living centre. Their lines are not ornamental names attached afterwards. They explain why Silambam joins āyudha, niyuddha, prāṇa, marma, medicine, mantra and worship within a single discipline. Vashishtha, Vishwamitra and Agastya Maharishi all guided Shri Ram in Ayudh, Niyudh and Dharmashastra. Bhagwan Parashuram was the Guru of warriors like Bhishma Pitamah. It is the same vidya the same Vel that Maharana Pratap sitting on his Chetak raised bravely at Islamic Invaders and protected Dharma, the same rotational moves with which Maratha wielded their DandPatta to protect this Dharm Bhoomi from barbarians, the same Pichua in silambam art that Guru Gobind Sigh ji asked every Hindu who is ready to fight for Dharma to keep, the same tactics of Silambam and Vel that Marutha Bandhu, Kumili and the Velu-Nachiyar protected the lands of Shivagangai from cunning missionary and looting forces of west, the same musal or Karlakattai that Gopa-Gwale used against the Duryodhana army in Virat Yudha was again used by the brave lady Onake Obavva in the same manner to kill the Adham in Kaliyuga. The Dhanurved and the Dharma Shastra span the large lands of Dharma and vast spans of many Yuga.

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When śastra meets śāstra: Vettu and the Dhanurveda text

The Agnipurana, in its chapter on the लगुड — the daṇḍa or staff — gives the decisive strike in two verses:

करेणादाय लगुडं दक्षिणाङ्गुलकं नवम् । उद्याम्य घातयेद् यस्य नाशस्तेन शिशोर्दृढम् ॥ ११ ॥ उभाभ्यां सहस्ताभ्यां कुर्यात् तस्य निपातनम् ॥ १२ ॥

— अग्निपुराण २५१.११–१२

Udyāmya — the laguda rises. One hand learns its path; both hands gather and bring it down. On the Silambam floor the same raised, straight, descending blow is वेट्टु, the hard hit; at the head it is तलै-वेट्टु. It is the principal lethal strike of the Silambam art, which is still taught in same fervor as described in Agni-Puranam, same method too that receive it from Guru and then make powerful through countless repetitions.

The same Dhanurveda section discusses stances / sthan or asan before it teaches the Ayudh and Niyudh:

बाह्याङ्गुलिस्थितौ पादौ स्तब्धजानुबलावुभौ । त्रिवितस्त्यन्तरात्स्थानमेतद् वैशाखमुच्यते ॥ १० ॥

हंसपङ्क्त्याकृती समे दृश्येते यत्र जानुनी । चतुर्वितस्तिविच्छिन्ने तदेतन् मण्डलं स्मृतम् ॥ ११ ॥

हलाकृतिमयं यत्तु स्तब्धजानूरु दक्षिणम् । वितस्त्येकं विस्तारे तद् आलीढं प्रकीर्तितम् ॥ १२ ॥

— अग्निपुराण, धनुर्वेद-प्रकरण २४९.१०–१२

The beginner settles into Vaiśākha to practice the Silambam and Karlakattai sutrus. The feet widen into Maṇḍala (Kundan in Silambam), and Kuthu-Varisai finds its low, stable centre. But the main position which is also known as warrior pose in Yogasanas due to its central role in Dhanurveda is Alidh. One leg at the front and bent, other straight at the back. Also, known as Vandi Nilai in our practice, Pavitra in other regional streams, and the warrior posture preserved in Yoga Asanas.

Aṅgula and vitasti keep the measure within the yodha's own body. The Asan adjusts a foot, opens a knee and settles the weight until the śloka stands visibly upon the floor. What was recited as measure becomes balance, pressure and readiness; after enough abhyāsa the shishya can no longer say where the remembered verse ends and the stance begins. The same stances apply in different Ayudh including archery. Many of the stances are related to the Itihasa Garud, Swastik, Vamana and many of the Varisai tell the divine tales as we flow from one stance to the other.

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Itihāsa in movement: animal forms, nilais and public performance

Silambam has always lived before the community as well as inside the training hall. It is displayed before the chapparam at temple festivals, in marriage processions and village celebrations, accompanied by music. The same movement that can break an attack can delight an assembly; the same kambu that measures dangerous distance turns before the devatā as an offering. The display begins with prayer because the whole practice is prayer: the yodha bows, receives the space and allows vidyā to move through the body without vanity.

Its technical vocabulary remembers the devatās and Itihāsa in movement. Kuthu-Varisai lessons embody deeds of Shri Vishnu. Nilais include Nataraja Nilai, Vamana Nilai and Garuda Nilai. Sutrus remember Ganapati, Nandi, Kubera and the Digpālas. These are not decorative labels. The name tells the shishya the quality of the movement — balance, expansion, descent, guardianship, direction and bhāva.

The animal forms work in the same way. Silambam moves through the Monkey Sweep, Snake's Glide, Lion's Stare, Frog's Leap and Eagle's Swoop, with river-like transitions binding them together. On the western coast, in the Dharmaranya country of Gujarat, the Mallapurana classifies its mallas through Gaja, Simha, Vrisha and Mriga and gives each body, temperament and fighting-method its proper place. Simha carries explosive speed and the leap; Vrisha bears weight and stands firm; Mriga survives through alertness and quick movement; Gaja joins mass, prāṇa and enduring strength.

The animal is not an imitation pasted onto combat. It is a way of seeing a complete movement-quality and then placing it in the body. This is why a Silambam performance can tell Itihāsa, invoke a devatā, delight an assembly and still remain exact warrior-training. Now let us move to how the training is structured in Shastra and exactly same practiced in practice after countless years.

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The four stages of training

Vasiṣṭha Dhanurveda gives the whole pedagogy before giving the techniques:

तत्र चतुष्टयपादात्मको धनुर्वेदः । यस्य प्रथमे पादे दीक्षाप्रकारः । द्वितीये संग्रहः तृतीये सिद्धप्रयोगाः चतुर्थे प्रयोगविधयः ॥ २ ॥

— वसिष्ठ धनुर्वेद संहिता १.२

Dīkṣā → Saṅgraha → Siddhaprayoga → Prayogavidhi. The Silambam shishya enters through the guru, gathers the lessons in the body, ripens each movement through abhyāsa and only then opens its prayoga.

In dīkṣā, the shishya enters through the guru, receives the foundation and repeats without trying to reduce every motion to words. A beginner watches the Asan's feet, breath, rhythm and line, then moves as the Asan moves. The Asan may utter one correction while the watching body receives a hundred relations that speech would break apart. Thousands of repetitions stored in the guru's body begin to pass directly into the shishya's body; what cannot yet be explained can already be imitated, and what is faithfully imitated can one day be known from within.

In saṅgraha, the lessons are retained and gathered. Long sequences, corrections, oral instructions, observation, śravaṇa and manana settle the movements in memory and chitta. In siddhaprayoga, the same movement becomes clean, stable, swift and ready. Only then does prayogavidhi open its layers — Jodi practice, entry, counter, marma, restraint and combat use.

This is why the beginner is not hurried toward a dramatic application. Dīkṣā without repetition does not enter the chitta; application without siddhi does not survive contact.

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First the body: MeiPadam, TaraiPadam, Svara and Srama

A. Arunachalam gives a precise standard for the body Silambam requires:

Without getting any undue strain in one or both hands, one must be able either to feint or move the head, shoulder, hip and the portion below the waist at a time — or not to shake the above four parts — and thus maintain the whole body without any motion at another time, so as to cut, defend, thrust and sweep with marksmanship, skill, speed, and agility.

— A. Arunachalam, Silambam

MeiPadam begins by separating what ordinarily moves together so that the whole body may later move as one. The shoulder learns to turn while the hip stays quiet; the waist releases force while the head remains placed; then all four portions reunite for cut, defence, thrust and sweep. It teaches stillness inside movement and movement held ready inside stillness. Mei is the body and padam the lesson: the body learns to obey before it is asked to fight.

The warning without undue strain is equally exact. Vasiṣṭha describes the suitable practice-bow as:

निजबाहुबलोन्मानात् किञ्चिदूनं शुभं धनुः ॥ ३० ॥

— वसिष्ठ धनुर्वेद संहिता १.३०

The Asan therefore places in the beginner's hand a load slightly below the measure of his arm-strength. The Mallapurana calls this मात्राशक्ति, the power of right measure, and keeps the yodha between the two losses: excessive labour on one side and abandonment of labour on the other. Enough weight to transform the body; enough measure to preserve its rhythm.

The first physical training is therefore śrama-abhyāsa: MeiPadam's free body-lessons, TaraiPadam's work upon the ground, Kaal-Padam, ukki the squat, thullu the spring, and karla the rotation of a weighted club.

“The warming-up is essential and requires great suppleness — each movement repeated several times, facing north, east, south and west, till perfect loosening is achieved.”

— A. Arunachalam, Silambam

Mallapurāṇa places Bhramaṇikā, Śvāsa-preraṇikābhyāsa, Āsthādanaka, Kuṇḍakāvartana, Goṇitaka and Gadābhyāsa among its sixteen śramas before naming Raṅgaśrama, the encounter itself (Mallapurāṇa ११.१–४२). Arunachalam's four-direction loosening carries that krama into Silambam: first make every part free and obedient, then place the āyudha—and finally the opponent—before it.

Karlakattai itself appears twice in this order. As śrama, its rotations condition the grip, shoulders, spine, breath and chitta early. As gada or āyudha, its combat-karma arrive much later. One implement serves two stages of the vidyā, and the guru never confuses them.

MeiPadam is not merely the external shape of the body. Each movement is joined to rhythmic breathing — Kshatriya Pranayama — because muscular strength without prāṇa cannot become enduring warrior-strength. Breath gives the movement its rhythm, the eye its steadiness and the chitta its wakefulness.

Vasiṣṭha Dhanurveda makes Svara Shastra part of victory itself:

जीवेन शस्त्रं बध्नीयाज्जीवेनैव विकासयेत् । जीवेन प्रक्षिपेच्छस्त्रं युद्धे जयति सर्वदा ॥ २९ ॥

— वसिष्ठ धनुर्वेद संहिता ३.२९

The breath binds the weapon, opens it and releases it. The quietest and least visible part of the act becomes the carrier of its most visible force. Kambu, hand and nāḍī cease to be three separate things; the strike travels upon the living current called jīva. The spectator hears the kambu cut the air; the practitioner feels that the sound began earlier, where breath turned inside the body.

This is why svara-abhyāsa runs beside śrama-abhyāsa from the first morning. Inhale and exhale are not decoration placed upon a finished technique; they are part of how the technique is learned. Victory first becomes possible within the pūrṇa-sattva-stha mind — steady in its own complete strength — before it appears on the field.

Vishvamitra shows the same order on the bank of the Sarayu. Though he possesses the divine astras and is taking Shri Rama toward battle, the first vidyā he gives is Balā and Atibalā:

मन्त्रग्रामं गृहाण त्वं बलामतिबलां तथा । न श्रमो न ज्वरो वा ते न रूपस्य विपर्ययः ॥ १३ ॥

— वाल्मीकि रामायण, बालकाण्ड २२.१३

Balā and Atibalā guard Shri Rama from fatigue, fever and the dimming of bodily lustre. Breath, endurance, wakefulness and bodily integrity enter before the astras because they are already Dhanurveda, not preparation outside it.

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From the kambu to Kuthu-Varisai

Niyuddha — in Tamil, Kuthu-Varisai — belongs within Silambam exactly as Bāhuyuddha belongs within Dhanurveda. Vasiṣṭha counts seven forms of yuddha and ends with the unarmed body in the same breath as the bow, chakra, kunta, khadga, churika and gada.

Kuthu-Varisai is itself a representative name. Kuthu names the punch, the muṣṭi, while the vidyā contains the whole unarmed field: idi, the elbow; udai, the kick; vettu, the open-hand cut; pidi, the grip; pottu, the placing and attack; Muṣṭi-Yuddha and Malla-Yuddha. When the weapon is lost or the distance collapses, the yodha's own body remains the final āyudha.

The same nilais, turns, weight-transfers and breath learned with the kambu now appear without it. The representative instrument has done its work: it has taught the grammar from which the empty hand can speak.

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The vidyā flows

Bodhidharma of India, the founder of Zen Buddhism, taught the Chinese this art as Shaolin Boxing. It then passed on to Japan to blossom into the art of the empty hand — Karate… Bodhidharma had introduced the bare-hand fighting techniques called Verum Kai Adimuraigal, which are still practised in Tirunelveli and Kanyakumari.

— A. Arunachalam, Silambam

On the same eastern passage, Arunachalam quotes François Gautier writing in The Hindu:

“Shaolin Boxing and Zen Buddhism travelled from China to Japan, landing in Okinawa, where Kalari-payat became the art of empty hands — Karate.”

— François Gautier, The Hindu, 12 May 1985, quoted in A. Arunachalam, Silambam

Verum Kai, the empty hand, sails east with Bodhidharma. In China it flowers at Shaolin; in Japan its name becomes Karate, 空手, the empty hand once more. In Tirunelveli and Kanyakumari the same niyuddha field continues as Kuthu-Varisai.

The river of knowledge was never one-directional. The lands now placed outside Bharat were connected through vaṃśa, movement, estrangement and return. To understand the western flow, we have to first understand how our distant brothers and sisters on the western side are connected with the same root.

Iran took the name of the people, Aryans. The word Iran means the land of the Aryas. The Persian language, the Persian religion, and the Persian political system all bear a Vedic signature so unmistakable. Persia’s ancient name was Elam, a variation of Ila, the Sanskrit sacred land. The Germanic and Slavic pulse moved overland from the ninth millennium BC. They carried the sky-father Dyaius, who became Tyr in Scandinavia, Zeus in Greece, Deus in Rome. The Italo-Celtic pulse moved by sea from the seventh millennium. The Greeks came in the same window. Zeus is Dyaius. When Alexander crossed the Hindu Kush he met people at Nysa claiming descent from Dionysus. Some of their heroes, they said, had come this way. Vedic Dyaius daylight-sky god *Dyēus, and is cognate with the Greek Διας – Zeus Patēr, or Dei-pátrous, and Latin Jupiter (from Old Latin Dies piter Djous patēr). The oldest surviving Irish text, the Book of Invasions, records a tribe called the Erainn, from Arya, arriving from the south by sea and making their way inland to the sacred Hill of Tara. Danu is the Rig Veda mother goddess of the flowing waters. Her name is written into the geography of half of Eurasia. The Danube. The Dniester. The Dnieper. The Don. The Donau. Greek Demeter. Northern Greeks once called themselves the Dannuni. In Ireland, the pre-Christian pantheon called itself the Tuatha de Danaan. Children of Danu. — Nick Collins, Maritime Trade History

The phased immigration from Bharat is well recorded in all of our Shastra. Yayāti gave the directions of the earth to his five sons — Yadu and Turvasu by Devayānī, and Druhyu, Anu and Puru by Sharmiṣṭhā. The Viṣṇupurāṇa remembers the Yavanas through this Chandra Vamsha line. Generations later, when Sagara defeated the Shakas, Yavanas, Kambojas, Paradas and Pahlavas and prepared to end them, they went to Vasiṣṭha. The Brahmarṣi restrained the king; their lives were preserved but their customs changed.

The same Vasiṣṭha gives us the Dhanurveda Saṃhitā quoted throughout this lesson. His Ṛgvedic line also preserves the Dāśarājña with names such as Turvaśa, Druhyu, Anu, Puru, Tritsu, Matsya, Bhṛgu, Paktha, Bhalānasa, Alina, Viṣāṇin and Shiva. The Rishi names the peoples, transmits the weapon-vidyā and restrains the king's weapon when destruction exceeds Dharma.

At Besnagar near Vidisha, the same civilisational field stands in stone. Heliodorus, son of Dion, a native of Taxila and ambassador of the Yavana king Antialcidas, raised a Garuda-dhvaja to Vāsudeva, Devadeva and called himself a Bhāgavata. Upon its other face he placed three amṛta-pada:

दम — self-restraint · त्याग — relinquishment · अप्रमाद — unbroken vigilance

These are also the virtues as illustrated in our Dharma Shastra. Dama governs force. Tyāga removes selfish possession of vidyā. Apramāda is the attention that cannot lapse while an āyudha is in motion. The pillar still stands.

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Phalaśruti: what the practice gives

A renowned Tamil classic, the Padhaartha Gunasindhaamani, places Silambam in a complete warrior curriculum:

Silambam mudhal malyudhdham; yaanai aetram, kudhirai aetram; dhesi, nadai kollin; vaadham pōm, vaayu pōm, kabam pōm; thulangu pasi undaagum.

— पदार्थ गुणसिन्धामणि, quoted in A. Arunachalam, Silambam

Silambam leads into Malla-Yuddha, then into battles fought mounted on the elephant and the horse. Vāta settles, cold and kapha depart, agni brightens and hunger becomes clear. The warrior curriculum ripens into the language of Ayurveda because it has been training the whole person from the beginning.

Another Silambam song begins with ukki, the squat, and promises that through daily practice the shoulders and legs will become established. The training-order and its fruit are joined: what the song promises is produced by what the student actually repeats. But remember these are narrow, short sighted checkpoints in the big expanse of DharmaShastra.

The Mallapurana states the goals that one gets by practicing Dhanurveda arts as follows:

सर्वकामप्रदा ह्येषा सर्वलोकाभिमोहिनी । अनया साध्यते धर्मः कामः सम्यगवाप्यते ॥ १५ ॥ मोक्षोऽपि प्राप्यतेऽभ्यासात् मदभ्यस्ता पुरा यतैः । ममाङ्गसंस्थितां विद्यां धारयिष्यन्ति भूतले ॥ १६ ॥

— मल्लपुराण २.१५–१६

The body ripens into a bearer of all four puruṣārthas. Dharma is accomplished; artha is sustained; kāma is rightly obtained; mokṣa opens through abhyāsa, as it did for the yatis who practised this vidyā in earlier times.

Such victory requires a body whose every dhātu has ripened through abhyāsa:

प्रधानं सर्वविद्यानां यया वृत्तिर्न जायते । पच्यते सर्वधातुश्च मल्लविद्याविधारणात् ॥ १२ ॥

— मल्लपुराण २.१२

Rasa, rakta, māṃsa, meda, asthi, majjā and shukra mature as Malla-Vidyā is held in the body. These are not incidental health-benefits around the edge of the subject. This is the body Dharma requires the yodha to build.

Let us see the आत्यान्तिक or ultimate goal from Shiva Dhanurved Samhita:

हिताय गोब्राह्मणसाधुवेदसंरक्षणाय च यजुर्वेदाथर्व सम्मितां संहिताम्। ब्राह्मणार्थे गवार्थे वा स्त्रीणां बालवधेषु च। प्राणात्यामपरो यस्तु सवै मोक्षमवान्पुयात्। ६६

The protection of cow, brahmin, dharmik people, women and kids is the aim of Upaveda of yajurveda i.e. Dhanurveda. Thus, walking this path one leads to Moksha. *- शिव धनुर्वेद *

Moksha is synonymous to ultimate fearlessness, even from death and thus walking as per Dharma. This is same as a quality of a true warrior as exemplified by Shri Ram to Maharana to Ahom Kings to normal Bharatiye like Gokula Jaat, Alluri Sita Ram Raju and countless more.

This is the phalaśruti of the Murugan-Agastya stream: victory of Dharma over Adharma, a body and prāṇa prepared to carry that victory, and a vidyā transmitted through reverence, measure and relentless practice. It is why the kambu is still placed in a five-year-old's hands on an akhara floor and why the same lesson continues to deepen in the hands of an Asan.

The staff selected like a musical instrument becomes the instrument upon which a whole life of Dharma and of Dhanurveda can be played.

योगः कर्मसु कौशलम् ।

— श्रीमद्भगवद्गीता २.५०