Monday, February 3, 2020
Sunday, February 2, 2020
Sri Brahmachaithanya Pravachan - Feb.2
Nama Alone can Rectify Thinking
In a last effort to avert the impending internecine war between the Kauravas and Pandavas, Lord Shri krishna Himself approached Duryodhana, the eldest of the Kauravas and pleaded for the grant of a token kingdom of just five villages to the five Pandavas. Duryodhana replied, "Intellectually, I accept the logic and justice of the demand, but the inclinations of my mind refuse to accept it. As you are the Lord Omnipotent, just metamorphose my mind, and the very root cause of dispute will vanish." This could not be done, however, and a bloody war did follow. Similarly, Ravana too could not be brought to reason. This shows that even a divine incarnation cannot rectify evil dispositions of the mind. It is only the Lord's name that can achieve this. The dire circumstances of the present age therefore call for recourse to nama with singleness of heart.
Suppose a man develops some trouble in a limb, say, the leg, and the doctor advises amputation, to obviate possible future danger to his life. Would it not be wise to sacrifice the limb for the safety of life? Similarly, constant awareness of God should be considered the main function of human life, and other activities subordinated to it; for, such other activities without that awareness would lead to miserable disappointment and frustration in the end.
The root cause of human misery is, not that things do not shape up as we want them to, but, rather, we desire them to be different from what God, in His infinite wisdom, has ordered.
A cat, having caught a mouse, toys with it for some time before finally killing and eating it up. Exactly likewise do time and death play with us humans, beguiling us with false hopes but callously passing on beyond our limited span of life. We should very clearly recognize this, beware of being deluded and misled by such false hopes, and should understand that living in constant awareness of God alone makes life worthwhile and gainful.
The pundits pride themselves on their erudition, discuss abstract, abstruse matters, and profess to guide others; but they all really labour under a delusion, forgetting that top priority should be assigned to maintaining constant awareness of God.
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Saturday, February 1, 2020
Sri Brahmachaithanya Pravachan-Feb.1.
Nama-smarana Eradicates the "Body-Am-I" Belief
Nama-smarana is the only means whereby one can realise one's true self. There is a spark of the divine in all creation. However, human being alone, of all creations, is capable of realising it, because he is the only being endowed with the faculty of logical reasoning and inference.
Initially aware of his high lineage, jeeva gradually degrades himself. At birth, he helds the conviction "I am He, the Divine Being." Then he lapses into "I belong to Him." Finally, when his fall is complete, he goes to the extent of denying even His existence. This is the result of the increasing hold of the body-consciousness, the "body-am-I" feeling, culminating in the firm belief that he is nothing but the body.
Even so, however, man sometimes speaks as if he knows the truth. For instance, if a friend dies, a man says, "Gone, alas, is my friend", although he may be present before the dead body. This means that his friendship did not relate to the friend's body but with the spirit or soul that had departed. Curiously enough he completely overlooks this in thinking of his own body and other living persons. This happens because, evidently he forgets the eternal, imperishable soul part, and body-consciousness has taken complete possession of him.
The obvious remedy for redemption from this situation is retracing the steps. The first thing to do, then, is to disabuse the mind of the idea 'I am the body,' and to rekindle the awareness that 'I am, in reality, a part of the eternal Cosmic Spirit.' Finally, one should realize the identity between the individual spirit and the Cosmic Spirit or Brahman. This can be achieved by constantly reminding oneself of the Cosmic Spirit, from whom the individual spirit came and to whom one really belongs. Nama is the easiest and most effective such reminder. Constant repetition of nama will awaken and maintain the knowledge and realization of the true self.
The spiritual destination is not difficult to reach if one follows the correct path. It is as simple as untying a knot, provided one knows which end of the string is to be pulled; if we pull the wrong end, however, the knot turns into a tangle. Since the Cosmic Spirit is nirguna, I can only realize it if I likewise become nirguna; and this I can achieve only by shedding the 'body-am-I' belief.
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