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“Your cold blood cannot be worked into a fever; your veins are full of ice water; but mine are boiling, and the sight of such chillness makes them dance.” ― Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights
One of the lovers of Krishna was his foster mother, Yashoda. Initially, he was a son but as he grew so did her love. He grew up fast and no mother can handle the growth of anyone like that for very long. Her love grew as well.
Between 0.51 to 2.28 of this video from a very special program on Krishna called “LEELA: The Path of the Playful” conducted in 2006, is a clip that has gone viral. Cut cleverly and without context.
All of Sadhguru’s work was allowed to be made public a couple of years back and someone took it without context and shared it.
This was the day (Day 5 of the program) when Sadhguru took the participants through the experience of "Blue." Why was Krishna considered Blue? Part of that experience was to understand how he related to everyone and how others related to him.
This mischievously cut clip comes as the #FreeTNTemples movement is becoming very big. Ever since Sadhguru stepped up his support for freeing the temples in Tamil Nadu, the movement reached every nook and corner - not just in Tamil Nadu but the country!
#PeopleHaveSpoken along with #FreeTNTemples, the hashtags that have attracted global following for a month, was trending at the top nationwide on Twitter. More than 3 crore people have supported the #FreeTNTemples campaign both online and on-ground. (Source)
It is not just this video but some folks dressed like some sanyasis also tried to suggest in other videos that whatever Sadhguru says is “plagiarized.”
For even a moderately intelligent person interested in the spiritual heritage of India, this is nonsensical because every book and enlightened being have said more or less similar things in different words.
Today I wanted to address one of the two topics that are used by those who find “Hindu Activists” easy to incite in order to get back at Sadhguru because he is ruining their unscrupulous businesses or religious enterprises.
On the spiritual path, Sadhana is the key. Purusharth. Self-effort.
This was the message from Sage Vashishta to Shri Ram when he was being taken through the enlightenment process.
The problem with the Hindu activist community at large is that they are working out of “passion” and less based on their Sadhana.
Very little can be gained out of that.
Even lesser so when one works out of hate and not from self-contemplation.
Today, I wanted to discuss the episode of targeting Sadhguru, not because he is my Guru, but because the lesson we need is critical to the future of Dharma.
Swami Dayananda Saraswati, the founder of Arya Samaj, was a great scholar. His Satyartha-Prakash has been treasured by many. It impacted many. His critique of Islam and Christianity in that book is unparalleled.
Yet, he approached it with logic and less with Sadhana. Something that he turned around and let loose on his own tradition as well.
In the end, he was able to accomplish what no Islamic bigot had ever achieved in Indian history. Took the murtis (idols) out of the temples. No Arya Samaj temple can have a murti.
What even Aurangzeb could never accomplish, Swami Dayanand did!
Murtis are not sculptures. They are not even idols. They are manifestations of life energy by a Yogi or a spiritual lineage. Without Prana Prathishta (establishment of life force), there is no murti.
These murtis resonate at a certain level of consciousness for a certain purpose. It is not meant to go and propitiate. Propitiating is an act of deviousness, not devotion.
William Tiller, scientist at Stanford has done experiments on using meditation to infuse certain energies in materials and use them to do chemical experiments. Read about it and power of murtis here Why do Hindus do Idol Worship? A Scientific and Spiritual exploration
The science of temples comes from a particular set of scriptures called Agamas - which are one component of the Shrutis - scriptures that originated from the Divine and have been shared by those who have experienced it via Sadhana - spiritual self-effort. With the help of Mantras (sounds put together to impact form and vibrations), Yantras (detailed geometric calculations and forms), and Tantras (overall construct of how to receive the energy of a particular devata or quality of consciousness). Tantra decides all the associated rules of who should go and in what state, and after what practices. All this is decided in the context of the consecrated energy of that Yantra! It is not a social statement but based on an understanding of the impact of the underlying energy of that place.
It was the work of hundreds of generations of yogis.
Yet, Swami Dayanand Saraswati destroyed all of that because of his experience of seeing a mouse eating the offering laddu in front of a murti by saying “If this god cannot save his own offering what use is he?”
Logically, if one used the Islamic understanding of what a temple would be for, it may have been a correct way of looking at things. But what was done by Yogis and woven into the fabric of India was not religion or gods. But Dharma. Dharma is not belief.
It is seeking.
And tools to push one to that point of seeking.
What is most disturbing is that Swamiji’s argument was eerily similar to that of every Islamic invader who broke the temples - “if the god is so powerful, why can’t it save itself?”
Except temples were never about the “god”, but you.
You have been told - “Be not become”. “Live in the moment”. “Be a witness”. “Be involved fully”. “Give yourself to god”. yaddy-yadda.
Have you been able to do that?
Why not?
Because that state is not intellectually attained. It is not a mental exercise. It is a level of consciousness that one realizes himself to.
That is why Yogis understood that slogans and sermons get one nowhere.
“Love thy neighbor” - right? And those who repeated it went ahead and wiped out all the freaking natives of at least three continents!!! Love? Sure!
Slogans, edicts, statements, sermons, words, and books are useless. No book, no word, no slogan is ever larger than the reader. What you get is what your mind interprets. Not what the writer wrote. That is why there are as many “commentaries” on even one book (in some religions) as there are commentators. The rest, who don’t comment, make up their own shit.
Because every book is limited by the reader.
Spirituality’s aim is not intellectual rearrangement. Or running on a treadmill. But evolution. Into something truly transformative.
That was missed by Swamiji.
If someone like him could have so utterly destroyed the basis of dharma, imagine the havoc that those who have read two chapters of Bhagwad Gita, without contemplation, can unleash?!
That is most of the “Hindu activists.”
But we have not addressed the clip.
Let us look at what was discussed.
In Bhagwad Gita (12.13/14) Krishna explains Bhakti.
अद्वेष्टा सर्वभूतानां मैत्र: करुण एव च |
निर्ममो निरहङ्कार: समदु:खसुख: क्षमी || 13||
सन्तुष्ट: सततं योगी यतात्मा दृढनिश्चय: |
मय्यर्पितमनोबुद्धिर्यो मद्भक्त: स मे प्रिय: || 14||
One word that intrigues me is निर्मम. This word denotes lack of ममता and ममत्व. ममता is also the love that mother has.
Why is lack of ममत्व one of the components of bhakti?
Because it comes from the root मम. Which means self - not spiritual but physical self. Being based in self - that is ममता
Words like प्रेम and प्रिय come from affection and more importantly sweetness of one’s self.
There is a difference.
Mother’s love includes the son in herself. It possesses. Even when a mother gives herself completely, she gives herself by including the other.
The love of the Gopis went the other way round. They submitted to merge within Krishna.
Not physically. Not emotionally. For, then everyone could have been a Gopi or one with whom Krishna did his Raas. The experience of bliss of oneness.
There is a reason why no social logic can explain how Ram and Sita worked, specifically when she went off to the forest when pregnant. Only when one were to approach their “love” as an outward manifestation of inherent one-ness that they were, that one can see that Ram’s actions were on himself, for Sita was no different - experientially - from him.
When Krishna grew (evolved) or at least demonstrated his being, he grew from a loving child to the manifestation of the cosmos. Something that Yashoda experienced in one of his pranks.
At that time, one cannot remain a mother. One seeks inclusion. The love then is not that of a physical or emotional lover. But of a speck who has realized the immensity of the experience one is faced with.
So yes, Yashoda’s approach would have changed. From nurturing to submission.
The inclusion into the infinity that Krishna represented was not a trivial experience. It was what even those who were such infinite manifestations themselves craved to experience too. (Why is Shiva worshipped as a Gopi in Vrindavan)
For, Krishna’s experience came with a sweetness that no other dimension offered.
Anyone who has experienced even a few moments of even emotional love can relate to this in a small way. When you get into a zone sitting all alone in wilderness, on a beach or a vast mountain - with someone whom you are completely given to. Does it feel that the distinction is no more there?
Even sitting alone hugging your dog, personification of absolute love, in moments when no one else is there can take you to that “zone.”
Love for Krishna had nothing to do with the physical or emotional. But with the experience of the infinite. With a generous dash of sweetness thrown in.
That day when Sadhguru took the participants through the experience of Blue, it was not an experience of a color. But the completeness that the hue represented in terms of Krishna’s consciousness / energy. In that state, the words may have been the pegs to hold on to with mind, but Sadhguru was there sharing something else.
A glimpse of the infinite. With a dash of sweetness.
New CJI: Supreme Court Justice Nutalapati Venkata Ramana has been appointed as the next Chief Justice of India (CJI) by President Ram Nath Kovind. He will take the oath of office on 24 April. "The President of India, in the exercise of the powers conferred by clause (2) of Article 124 of the Constitution of India, appointed Justice Nuthalapati Venkata Ramana, Judge of the Supreme Court, to be the Chief Justice of India," the Law Ministry said on Tuesday (6 April). (Source)
Threat to Shah-Yogi: The Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) in Mumbai received a threat mail a few days ago naming Union home minister Amit Shah and UP CM Yogi Adityanath and the security force has informed the agencies concerned, said CRPF sources. "We have forwarded the email to the concerned agencies of Maharashtra and the Centre. They are working on it and we will work as per their instructions," said Kuldiep Singh, CRPF DGP (Source)
Flexible Drone: Researchers at the International Institute of Information Technology (IIIT) in Hyderabad have unveiled a working prototype of a flexible drone that changes its shape to fit the size of the package to be lifted. Suraj Bonagiri, a researcher from the Robotics Research Centre in his research on the mechanism behind a reconfigurable quadcopter, highlighted limitations of existing delivery drones and proposed a novel design. (Source)
Chinese Digital Currency: The Chinese government is minting cash digitally, in a re-imagination of money that could shake a pillar of American power. It might seem the money is already virtual, as credit cards and payment apps such as Apple Pay in the U.S. and WeChat in China eliminate the need for bills or coins. But those are just ways to move money electronically. China is turning legal tender itself into computer code. China’s version of a digital currency is controlled by its central bank, which will issue the new electronic money. It is expected to give China’s government vast new tools to monitor both its economy and its people. By design, the digital yuan will negate one of bitcoin’s major draws: anonymity for the user. Beijing is also positioning the digital yuan for international use and designing it to be untethered to the global financial system, where the U.S. dollar has been king since World War II. China is embracing digitization in many forms, including money, in a bid to gain more centralized control while getting a head start on technologies of the future that it regards as up for grabs. (Source)
Vatican’s Resurrection Fetish: The Vatican has been digging a secret tunnel in Jerusalem in order to exhume King David's DNA and resurrect the Messiah, a rabbi has claimed. The Regavim Movement, a group dedicated to the protection of Israel's national resources, filed a petition against the Jerusalem Municipality last week demanding they take action against the tunnel. Rabbi Daniel Asor of the Yanar Institute claims it was built to allow members of the Church of the Dormition to exhume the remains of King David (the King of Israel who killed the giant Goliath), who is believed to have been buried in Mt Zion. Asor has also alleged that the church is acting on instructions from the Vatican, which he says has a plan to collect DNA samples from King David's bones. The Vatican will then use his DNA to clone an entirely new human, who they will then attempt to fool the world into believing is the returned Messiah. (Source)
Very few commentators on social media and TV who are fluent in Hindi and have a charming way to put things profoundly yet humorously. Ajeet Bharati is special. Love his oration and style. He has roasted Modi too, which I haven’t watched. This art has long vanished specifically in Hindi. So I watch him.
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