(Sri Ramakrishna explains dvaita bhakti to Brahmo Samaj, who believed in only formless aspect of God and denounced Idol worship)
It was about four o'clock in the afternoon when Sri Ramakrishna arrived in Calcutta to attend the annual festival of the Brahmo Samaj, which was to be celebrated at Manilal Mallick's house. Besides M. and other devotees of the Sri Ramakrishna, Vijay Goswami and a number of Brahmos were present. Elaborate arrangements had been made to make the occasion a success. Vijay was to conduct the worship.
The kathak recited the life of Prahlada from the Purana. Its substance was as follows: Hiranyakasipu, Prahlada's father, was king of the demons. He bore great malice toward God and put his own son through endless tortures for leading a religious life. Afflicted by his father, Prahlada prayed to God, "O God, please give my father holy inclinations."
At these words the Sri Ramakrishna wept. He went into an ecstatic mood. Afterwards he began to talk to the devotees.
Sri Ramakrishna: "Bhakti is the only essential thing. One obtains love of God by constantly chanting His name and singing His glories. Ah! What a devotee Shivanath is! He is soaked in the love of God, like a cheese-cake in svrup.
"One should not think, 'My religion alone is the right path and other religions are false.' God can be realized by means of all paths. It is enough to have sincere yearning for God. Infinite are the paths and infinite the opinions.
"Let me tell you one thing. God can be seen. The Vedas say that God is beyond mind and speech. The meaning of this is that God is unknown to the mind attached to worldly objects. Vaishnavcharan (A noted devotee of the Vaishnava sect and an admirer of Sri Ramakrishna.) used to say, 'God is known by the mind and intellect that are pure.' Therefore it is necessary to seek the company of holy men, practise prayer, and listen to the instruction of the guru. These purify the mind. Then one sees God. Dirt can be removed from water by a purifying agent. Then one sees one's reflection in it. One cannot see one's face in a mirror if the mirror is covered with dirt.
"After the purification of the heart one obtains divine love. Then one sees God, through His grace. One can teach others if one receives that command from God after seeing Him. Before that one should not 'lecture'. There is a song that says:
You have set up no image here,
Within the shrine, O fool!
Blowing the conch, you simply make
Confusion worse confounded.
"You should first cleanse the shrine of your heart. Then you should install the Deity and arrange worship. As yet nothing has been done. What can you achieve by blowing the conch-shell (The conch-shell is blown during the temple service.) and simply making a loud noise?"
Source: Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna
6 comments:
I had read this before . the feeling that I had then and now is same. That what is the incentive to pursue God ?? Especially when he does not show any marked inclination or care for his devotees .
Most would respond saying that he blesses thru bestowing knowledge, wisdom, making one stronger , that one has to pay for past karma and so on. None of these cuts much ice with me. And so it would be others .
Unless there is evidence , demonstrable proof that there is clear distinction , merit in being righteous , devout , faithful, good , kind , pure - there will be not many takers for God and irreverence , hooliganism, self indulgence, obnoxious tendencies will permeate and grow
Namaste,
I understand. It is because of rajasa and tamasa guNa that we have these feelings and we feel that God is far far away from us. The spiritual way is to make extrovert mind introvert. First step is to be of helping nature. It gives us satisfaction after helping others. Donating money or necessary material also helps our heart to open up. I feel this is the beginning of spiritual journey, though it does not have the word 'God' in it.
While stepping forward for first time, one has to take a little risk. An e.g. might be better to understand.
A person (D) asks a tutor to teach him swimming.
Coach (G) says jump in water
D: How can I jump in water? I dont know to swim. First teach me to swim and than I will jump in water
G: First jump into water and than only I can teach you to swim
... :)
The reality around is different.
the world has gone beyond karma, equity, sin, peity, justice.
evil has outsmarted God atleast for the present. Helping others is thankless. So why take a risk in doing something which is not only thankless but also could backfire. ??
i am speaking strictly per my experience. And to me my experience is more reliable than scriptures whose tenets are getting smashed to smithreens every passing moment.
you have written an article on vegetarianism today, the world is today dominated by those that eat non veg and have been extremely violent . The evil ones thrive , my question still remains why would one choose to be good, non violent, vegetarian, turn towards God , cultivate faith, kindness if it does not earn any distinction nor manifest in any positive outcome ??
i am being aggressive and questioning as unless the basic incentive , reward for being good is addressed , people would prefer to be hypocrites, smart, expedient.
taking your own example what happens when people notice that D jumps and sinks and G is unable to help ???
Namaste,
Please have faith. We do not do things to earn respect. The problem is our education system. Being veg, etc is like a catalyst. It is like a good quality sound system, but it is of any use if it has no cassette inside it. You may have top quality car, but there is no driver, is it of any use? We will have to understand that all these help us progress in spirituality. But do want to spend some time for God? what is the benefit of chanting God's name?, etc are many questions which needs to be addressed. Until we are convinced that spiritual life is a better option, we will not have any interest.
Today, most people only follow customs, and do not want or care about it's core i.e. spirituality. It is like snake has gone only it's zig zag foot prints are only left. If moksha or spiritual progress is not the goal, then our traditional system is more like a cage.
We will have to train our mind to be a good servant, cultivate good qualities in children. This happens at grass root level, in kG class. But todays education is based on rot reading. There is no character building. IT is machine making and not men making.
Suppose I get 95 %, but my mind is destructive, and you get 90 % but your mind is constructive, who will get the admission first?
All people are not heartless, they do remember those who help others. Maybe you have passed through a bad phase.
Reward for being good will benefit us only and not others. Our hearts will open up, we will have habit of tolerance and let go, Let go helps us maintain our mental composure. Mind is very important and no institute trains our mind. It is only in spirituality that mind is trained as spirituality is direct dealing with mind. IT is in japa that one knows that it is mind that is causing the bondage and it is mind alone that is responsible to freedom and finding a way out.
When mind is peaceful, it can stay quite for sometime, even physical body is in harmony. Most of the dis-eases are of mental or emotional origin. First we create a sinful action and then when fruit of this action comes, we react to it in a negative way. We are responsible for our current suffering. If we develop this approach then we will learn to look within ourselves than finding faults in others.
IF mind is agitated, it looses all energy. IF mind is too active, one may not be able to sleep properly. Stress, tension, etc develops and after 15-20 years, it will accumulate and then burst open. Then the diseases which originate because of emotional garbage that we had inside us cannot be cured there is no permanent cure for high BP, hyper tension, breakdown due to stress, diabetes.
Other dis-eases which are caused due to climate change, etc can be healed fast. Peaceful mind helps ourselves to keep calm in testing times. If you accept everyone 'as it is' and accept the situation, 50 % problem is solved. sAttvika mind will think positively. So it is necessary to increase sattva guNa as much as possible.
Violence is a weakness and not strength. You cant digest that which is not expected by you and so you react violently either mentally or physically.
A person abuses you, you do not hit back but gulp down and stay calm. Another person cannot take the abuse and reacts immediately. Whose mind is weak? Later person, right? Former can tolerate his insult, while later cant. So his mind will get exited. So if Mr x has weak mind, all I have to do is to ignite a spark, a little abuse or even keeping things untidy will spoil his/her mood. Some people cant see things untidy spread over table or bed. So all you do is keep a pencil on bed and ... :) See the mind is so weak. Why would you dance to others tunes? and how to come out of it?
This is a big topic, may be some day I will write on it. But short answer is to train mind to be calm, tolerate, and later learn to let go, bless all those who have hurt you. It will bring immediate peace if done sincerely.
Try this auto-suggestion
http://indiaspirituality.blogspot.in/2009/02/autosuggestion-for-relaxation.html
Aum
Thanks for the response, but it does not cut ice ( with me).
If I have to forget, forgive and let go - then why should I take a stand in the first place ? I might as well be a renunciate like a ramana or a Ramakrishna . But when I have the ability and wisdom to discriminate then should I not be pursuing the right consistently ?? And when in doing the right things one suffers setbacks, looses repeatedly then it also considerably weakens the equation for righteousness. I can take ( and have taken ) setbacks in stride with grace - but then this is a connected world , for every setback I endure - evil gains , becomes stronger, powerful, relevant and goes on to dictate, determine the outcomes and evolution of the world and all living beings . and thence my moot question - how would one conjure faith in an unresponsive , indifferent Godhead - when there is no incentive ???
Mind control one can do , and cultivate equanimity - but then it does mean that God is indifferent and thence irrelevant . so thence the increasing irreverence in this world in these times. Humans therefore prefer narrow selfishness and spineless expediency as it helps them atleast win that moment rather than suffer loss due to honesty, integrity, faith, kindness and erode more.
Personally, I have come to terms to life by being a nihilist. I believe in nothing. I am convinced that God exists but he is so huge, infinite - we just do not matter, cannot matter . so we are pretty much on our own. Pretty bland gloomy inference but if life gives one lemons one will have to settle for lemonades !!!
Namaste,
No one is stopping you from using your brain :). Do what is necessary. Incidences often produce cracks in our heart-temple. So it is necessary to repair them too. Just like we daily clean our home and ourselves too :). Now if you argue that after all I am going to be dirty, then why take a bath daily? what should I reply
You may be a nihilist, but you can be a good human being. Being good is good :)
**taking your own example what happens when people notice that D jumps and sinks and G is unable to help ???
Too much of doubt and negative thinking does not help.
You can never ever ever learn how to swim. Should should have faith. Life is calculated risk. We all live in uncertainity upon just one thing - Faith. A person starting a new business, investing in real estate, in stock market, , mutual funds, etc, are all calculated risk.
Kashmiri Pandits are living like refuges. 1000s of temples were destroyed by Mughals. So then one can say that for 1000 years, God cannot save his own temple, how can he save me. So by today, all Hindu-s must be nihilists. Right?
I gave you what reward you will get by being good in my last reply, showing you benefits of tolerance and let go.
You may argue, have a quarrel with other, but in the night, it is time to introspect. How are you going to keep a check upon yourself? Is it not necessary to keep a check our yourself and keep under control? What is the way?
Let the world be dominated by barbarians. So what? Does this give you license to what they are doing.
In an argument and in psychological game, stronger mind wins.
All want to walk on the easy path. Ravan had golden palace. Rama had to live in exile for 14 years and his life was struggle. Pandavas had to struggle and Duryodhana wanted everything from pandavas. If mind is weak, it will give up to evil thoughts and do evil deeds. One needs to have a strong mind so we this world becomes a better place and we live a good place for our future generation. For this we must start thinking positive.
Thinking negative (nirASAvAdI) is not going anyone to help. There are good people too.
Deterioration is the nature of time and so our scriptures are getting lost and less and less people follow it as days pass by. This is the truth, but how will you react to it. By joining 'majority' and abandon scriptures, or by joining 'minority' who strive to preserve them?
Even I had too many negative experiences in life. Due to my broken hand, I could not practice in my 12th grade. Since then, I have never ever been able to complete any question paper 100 %. It's just 60-70 %. I could not practice maths , because I could not write, so I read the answers to maths problems and got just 2- months before board exams. So you see, my dreams got smashed. I have just shared one experience. There are many.
But I didnt loose faith in God.
Only weak mind give up into situation and keep cursing others.
** The evil ones thrive , my question still remains why would one choose to be good, non violent, vegetarian, turn towards God , cultivate faith, kindness if it does not earn any distinction nor manifest in any positive outcome ??
It will ... have patience. ( I already gave you reply, that your health will not deteriorate, you will be physically and mentally healthy). I didnt told you to be a chicken. Fight, but not with a black heart, but because it is necessary.
If from the beginning, we keep doubting, then we cannot breath freely.
Hari OM
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