The Greatest Mantra – Gayatri

The Gayatri mantra is considered the mantra of mantras. It is the most ancient of mantras dating back to the Rig Veda thousands of years old. Today it is recited with most prayers and is considered the gateway to salvation and enlightenment. It is mystical, mysterious and capable of numerous interpretations linking one to the spiritual realms and illumination.

 

 

                                                  THE MANTRA

OM BHUR BHUVA SVAHA

TAT SAVITUR VARENYAM

BHARGO DEVASYA DHIMAHI

DHIYO YO NAH PRACHODAYAT

The interpretation that appeals to me–

 Om  the universal spirit that empowers all creation, the universal essence; Bhur, the physical realm, the body, Earth; Bhuva, the mental realm , the universe; Svaha, the spiritual realm, the soul

That embodiment of the supreme spirit in the shape of the Sun, that enlightens and empowers all life in the created world with its radiance, and which we adore and revere,  worthy of praise and worship anf which permeates all the three realms

That glory love and purity of the divine essence, God, I meditate upon that

May his glory and spirit and effulgence  enlighten , illuminate guide and inspire my mind and spirit.

 

 

DEMON

       

 

                                                A  D  D  I  C  T  I  O  N

 

This demon

Unexorcised, you will find

Deep down in a dungeon behind

Thick locked doors of determination,

In the palace of the mind.

 

There he lies confined

By abstentions chained

By fasts restrained,

With ropes of resolutions we bind

Bolted and padlocked with prayer sublime.

 

Now so shrunk, weakened

That you are led to imagine

He is there no more

But soon he stirs

And you know it is him,

Discreet but alert, calculating,

Disabled but planning

To make you his plaything,

Awaiting his chance

For your mood to swing,

Leaving the  door ajar.

 

Then he creeps out on all fours,

Quickly climbing up your thoughts,

Swinging from their branches

Right into the cockpit of your mind,

Outwitting you he assumes full control,

While  diminished in a slumber. lies the soul.

 

He is now the Master

You his Robot,

He lifts your hand

Towards the prohibited packet

And the bottle you forgot,

The dark drink rises

To thirsty lips,

Your resolution slips

In puffs of smoke.

 

Starved for their content

Which are his only food,

He is now empowered,

He  grows and augments

Feels his power swell

Possessing you.

 

Like when the moon is up and full,

Hairs bristle, talons emerge,

The jaw pulls out painfully,

The serpent eyes dilate,

He is now metamorphosed

Hungry for more, irate,

Full of hulk and bulk.

 

Now Advancing to fever pitch,

lashing his tail about,

Yet another drink, more packs of smoke,

Euphoria, good –

”Well oiled machine” he shouts,

His foot presses the accelerator

His vision narrows menacingly

As the soul shrinks.

 

All encumbrances removed, no hitch

What next, he shrewdly calculates

As you are bewitched

To cross all limits set.

 

His canines are now long and deep

His plaintive squeak becomes a  commanding growl

As he merges with your being

Turning you into his demon

Capable of anything

Hungry for nutrition.

 

One snag though,

‘Alas’ you need rest

The robot suddenly shuts down

Without warning

In automatic mode out of control,

He is caught unawares ,

Sent hurtling back to his dungeon

Even as the soul awakens

To see the havoc wrought

Of dark despair,

Drawing in the healing light

Of deep sleep for repair.

 

But he is far from done

Though disabled

And bides his time,

Will be your companion

Through many life times,

Joint inhabitant with the soul,

Till he is finally overcome

And exorcised,

As your demon you confront.

 

Then its journey done

The soul returns

To where it begun.

 

Credit: wikipedia.com

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Krishna’s Song Celestial

Krishna enlightens Arjun
Credit: International Society For Krishna consciousness – ISKCON

The Krishna of the Hindu epic the Mahabharat is no longer the adolescent, mischievous  romantic who stole the hearts of the village maidens and companions. The Avatar has now assumed kingship and matured into an astute diplomat. He is here engaged in playing the role of mediator between estranged cousins, each representing on the one hand the forces of clarity and on the other ignorance and darkness. When his mediation fails he joins the ranks of clarity and good against those of injustice, arrogance, hauteur, deceit, subterfuge, atrocity, brutality, rape, intemperance, intolerance, wrath and perverted wisdom.

On the battlefield he is the charioteer of the hero Arjun, the embodiment of righteousness and virtue. The image of Arjun, the upright and humble warrior on his chariot with his divine charioteer holding the reins, is etched indelibly in the popular Hindu psyche, with allegorical connotations: Arjun is the individual Soul(Atma). the chariot is his body, the horses are his senses, the charioteer is his conscience, the Universal Essence, the Super-soul (Paramatma), incarnated as the Avatar Krishna. The forces of good and evil are arraigned against each other on the battlefield of earthly existence.

It is in such a setting that Arjun is suddenly overcome by remorse, doubt and confusion ( as we all do from time to time) over the ethics of confronting his cousins in warfare and refuses to fight when the bugles (conches) have already sounded. He begins the dialogue by questioning the Avatar. Through the dialogue emerge Krishna’s seminal discourses on numerous themes, including the myth of creation, the nature of the soul, the attributes of the Universal Essence, reincarnation, the theory of karma, the role of Nature,  righteous action, the purpose of life and the path to liberation and enlightenment.

Below are only presented those verses which explain the nature of the Universal Essence (Brahma), the so called Godhead (Ishwara) and its counterpart the individual Soul (Atma). When Arjun asks his ‘friend’ and mentor the Avatar, time and again in the course of the dialogue, who He may indeed be, Krishna tells him all. The Gita (Song) is composed in exquisite verse in Sanskrit.

                                THE  BHAGAVAD  GITA

                              (THE  SONG  CELESTIAL)

                                          – excerpts –

Arjun, the world is made up of the perishable and the imperishable,

Perishable are living creatures, the imperishable is the Self,

I am beyond both, the Supreme Self 

Pervading the worlds as God.

 

The whole universe of the moving and the unmoving

Are joined together in Me,

The whole universe undivided, yet appearing divided

In its manifold diversity,

Are drawn together as one in Me.

I am therefore the same in all beings,

The imperishable  in the perishable,

He who sees me everywhere and sees all in Me,

He is never lost.

 

I am the same towards all beings, 

For me there are none hateful none dear,

But those who worship Me, I am with them,

And they are with Me.

 

 The one who applies the same measure for all,

For pleasure and for pain, as he applies to himself,

That one is the best of men.

 

I am the origin of all, from me all things evolve.

After an age, all beings return to my nature

And issue forth again with another age.

I animate my Nature and creation occurs under her laws,

Nature produces the moving and the unmoving

Thus the worlds revolve.

 

I am Time, mighty and world consuming.

the supreme Universal Essence,

Neither Being nor Non-Being.

If the light of a thousand suns,

Should suddenly shine in the heavens

It would be like the light of my Being.

 

I am the father of the world, the mother,

The grand-sire, and the friend,

I am the goal, the supporter, the witness, the sanctuary, 

The origin, the dissolution, the foundation

And the seed imperishable.

 

I am the taste in water, the radiance of the sun and the moon,

Manhood in man, the life force,

I am sweet fragrance in the earth, the brilliance of fire,

Austerity of the ascetics, intelligence of the intelligent,

Splendour of the splendid, might of the mighty.

Of secrets I am silence,  I am wisdom of the wise,

Of sciences the science of the Self,

I am glory, fortune, memory and patience,

Of meters I am the beat of the universe,

Of seasons the season of spring, I am victory I am resolution,

I am the goodness of the good.

Of waters I am the ocean, of mountains the Himalayas,

The seed of all existence am I.

 

Whenever there is decay of virtue

And rise of anarchy, I embody Myself.

For the protection of the good,

 Destruction of the wicked

and the establishment of righteousness,

I am born from age to age.

 

I am the Self seated in the hearts of all beings.

An eternal portion of Myself becomes

The eternal souls in the living world

Drawing to itself  Nature’s five senses and the mind.

The soul is neither born nor does it die,

Unborn, eternal, constant and ancient.

When the Soul leaves the body,

It takes along the acquired qualities of a lifetime.

As a man casting off worn out garments, puts on new ones,

So the embodied one, casting off worn out bodies,

enters others that are new.

The Soul is  stable, immovable, everlasting

It is not manifest, is unthinkable,and immutable, a marvel.

 

When the disciplined mind is fixed on the Soul,

Free from distraction of objects and desires,

Like a lamp which does not flicker in a windless place,

Attaining stillness, it beholds the Self

And is filled with joy.

Thus constantly holding the spirit in harmony,

It eventually senses the infinite Universal Essence

And with contact attains bliss.

He then sees himself, the same in all,

 Sees me everywhere and all in Me.

Arjun and Krishna into battle against evil, confusion resolved
Credit ISKCON

                                                             

Surdas’ Poem: ‘Lord Save Me’

Surdas the Indian mystic-poet composed volumes of verse in praise of Krishna, the incarnated blue Avatar of the Universal Essence. One of his most popular songs seeks the Lord’s help and intervention in a moment of adversity.

The poem seeks to recapture a popular Puranic (ancient) myth about the king of elephants, Gajendra, bathing, as elephants love to do, on the banks of the Indus river. But he is caught by a monstrous croc. and slowly dragged to the depths. The elephant calls out to Lord Krishna, whose devotee he is, to come and free him from imminent death by plucking a lotus and holding it aloft as a gesture of supplication and prayer. Krishna hearing the call hastens to his devotee on a golden eagle and saves him. The story is allegorical. The river is material existence, the elephant, the individual soul and the croc., temptation dragging it under. The soul cries out for help to be liberated from the tribulations of its material incarnation and rebirth and duly receives grace. Surdas identifies with the elephant and seeks the Lord’s grace to overcome his failings.

Credit: ISKCON

 

LORD SAVE ME

( Hey Govind rakho sharan ab to jeevan hare )

 

O Lord save me for I am sinking

I came to these waters to quench my thirst

On the banks of the river Indus

But in these waters lurked a crocodile,

My leg in its jaws it has caught,

I thrashed out and with all my might fought

But it has dragged me deep inside,

I am now submerged, right upto my ears and trunk

So I call out to you for help as life ebbs,

Sur says O Lord I beseech you,

Have mercy I am drowning.

The Lord’s mind then filled with the entreaty

Of a sinking elephant’s shouts,

And he swiftly arrived on his great golden eagle

And plucked the drowning elephant out,

At last free of the evil entity,

To be at liberty.      

( the suffix Das means disciple / devotee – the poets name is Sur)

credit: India-Forums

The Soul’s final liberation from reincarnation

(CONTINUED FROM LAST POST)

In the last post we saw that the soul enters a new body after the demise of the previous one. This process of rebirth can go on indefinitely until all Karmic debts and obligations are fully discharged. We may wonder what is the purpose of this exercise. The purpose is the evolution of man on the earthly plane. The Karmic law ensures, by designing a new personality and body that lessons which earlier incarnations failed to learn may well be learnt in the new life. Thus eventually, slowly but inevitably, the process of evolution begins to gather momentum after several false starts and hicups and the shroud that was a thick coarse blanket begins to refine.

The shining spark of divinity within, the soul, is the supreme standard to which the physical entity has to aspire in the course, if neccesary, of hundreds of thousands of life-times. As it begins to approximate the perfection of the ‘indweller and reflect in some measure the divinity within, the shroud gets refined, until in its very last incarnation the personality/body has shed all ego with its attendant grave failings and stands out as a shining, altruistic star totally reflecting the divinity and perfection of the soul within. Such a state would have been achieved by the personality/body of the Buddha in his last incarnation or innumerable other prophets, sages, seers and saints.

Picture of the role or function of a Buddha: to enlighten the path for other people to follow, so they too can cross the stream of samsara and reach Nirvana. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 At this point of enlightenment, the ‘shroud’ finally slips away and there is total identity between the soul and the person in question. Karmic effects have now dissolved, there is no  debt left in the subtle body (‘History’ in the PC now stands deleted) and at this last death, reincarnation ceases with ‘Moksha;, ‘Nirvana’, enlightenment – whatever one calls it and the soul finds ultimate release from the cycle of reincarnation, merging back into the divine source from which it emerged, even as the drop of water that had been thrown up from the ocean by the tidal wave, falls back into the ocean and becomes one with it.