[Prev][Next][Index][Thread]
Maanasa bhajare guru charanam
*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*
Sai Ram
*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*%*
When I was at Uravakonda studying in the High School, you know
I came away one day and threw off my books and declared that I
have My work waiting for Me. The Telugu Pundit described the
incident of that evening to you all in his speech. Well, that day
when I came out publicly as Sai Baba, that first song I taught
the gathering in the garden to which I went from the Telugu
Pundit's house was:
"Maanasa bhajare guru charanam
Dusthara bhava sagara tharanam"
I called on all those suffering in the endless round of birth and
death to worship the Feet of the Guru, the Guru that was
announcing Himself, who had come again for taking upon Himself
the burden of those who find refuge in Him. That was the very
first Message of Mine to Humanity. "Maanasa bhajare." "Worship
in the mind!" I do not need your flower garlands and fruits,
things that you get for an anna or two; they are not genuinely
yours. Give Me something that is yours, something which is clean
and fragrant with the perfume of virtue and innocence, and washed
in the tears of repentance! Garlands and fruits you bring as
items in the show, as an exhibition of your devotion; poorer
devotees who cannot afford to bring them are humiliated and they
feel sorry that they are helpless; they cannot demonstrate their
devotion in the grand way which you are doing it. Install the Lord
in your heart and offer Him the fruits of your actions and the
flowers of your inner thoughts and feelings. That is the worship
I like most, the devotion I appreciate most.
In shops, things are kept in separate packets and each one
specializes in some particular article or sets of articles. But
in an Exhibition, hundreds of shops join to make all varieties
of things available and there is a great deal of window-dressing,
arrangement and display. I have been all these days generally
giving individual advice. Like the packets available in shops and
giving answers to individual questions. This 'speech' today is
a new experience for you. I am addressing a gathering today; but
even though it may be new to you, for Me it is not new. I have
given advice to large gatherings before, though not in this
Appearance. Whenever Nirakara becomes Sakara, it has to fulfill
the Mission and it does so in various ways. But the one purpose,
the re-education of Man persists, whatever the yuga or the era.
The first sixteen years of this Life have been, as I have often
told you, the period when Balaleela predominated and the next
sixteen is being spent mostly in Mahimas in order to give
Santhosha to this generation. Santhosha or joy and contentment
are short-lived sensations; you have to catch that mood and make
it a permanent possession: Ananda or bliss. After the thirty
second year, you will see Me active more and more in the task of
Upadesa or Teaching erring humanity and in directing the World
along the path of Sathya, Dharma, Santhi and Prema.
Not that I am determined to exclude Leela and Mahima from My
Activity after that. I only mean that re-establishing Dharma,
correcting the crookedness of the human mind and guiding humanity
back to the Sanathana Dharma will be My Task thereafter.
Do not be led away by doubt and vain argument; do not question
how and whether I can do all this. The cowherds of Brindavan also
doubted whether the little boy who grew in their midst could lift
Govardhanagiri and hold it aloft! The thing needed is Faith, and
yet more Faith.
Once Krishna and Arjuna were going together along the open road.
Seeing a bird in the sky, Krishna asked Arjuna, "Is that a dove"?
He replied, "Yes, it is a dove". He asked Arjuna, "Is it an
eagle"? Arjuna replied promptly, "Yes, it is an eagle". "No,
Arjuna, it looks like a crow to Me. Is it not a crow ?" asked
Krishna. Arjuna replied, "I am sorry, it is a crow beyond doubt".
Krishna laughed and chided him for his agreeing to whatever
suggestion was given. But Arjuna said, "For me, your Words are
far more weighty than the evidence of my eyes; you can make it
a crow, a dove or an eagle and when you say it is a crow, it must
be one". Implicit faith is the secret of spiritual success.
The Lord loves, not the Bhaktha but his Bhakthi, remember. The
Lord's Grace is like rain, pure water, falling equally
everywhere; but its taste gets changed according to the soil
through which it flows. So also the Lord's words are sweet to
some, bitter to others. The Lord's ways are mysterious; He
blessed Vidura with the words, 'Be destroyed' and Dussasana with
the words, 'Live for a thousand years'. He meant that Vidura's
'I' will be destroyed and that the wicked Dussasana will have to
suffer the ills and tribulations of this world for ten centuries.
You do not know the real reasons behind the actions of the Lord.
You cannot understand the motives of other men who are almost
like you in everything, actuated by the same motives and having
the same likes and dislikes! But yet, how easily you discover the
motives of One who is far, far above the level of Man! How glibly
you talk and judge of something that is as strange to you as
atmosphere to a fish!
There are four types of persons: the 'dead', who deny the Lord
and declare that they alone exist, independent free,
self-regulating and self-directed; the 'sick', who call upon the
Lord when some calamity befalls them or when they feel
temporarily deserted by the usual sources of succour; the 'dull',
who know that God is eternal companion and watchman, but who
remember it only off and on when the idea is potent and powerful;
and lastly the 'healthy', who have steady belief in the Lord and
who live in His Comforting Creative Presence always.
You proceed from 'death' to 'life' and from 'illness to 'health'
by the experience of the buffetings of the World. The World is
a very essential part of the curriculum of man; through the agony
of search is born the infant Wisdom. The pains are worthwhile;
they indicate the birth of new Life. From Asanthi you get
Prasanthi, from Prasanthi, Prakanthi; and from Prakanthi,
Paramjyothi. It is like the alternatings of night and day, this
recurrence of joy and grief. Night and day are twin sisters, both
are necessary to increase the fertility of the soil, to activate
and refresh Life. They are like summer and winter. There are some
who ask Me, 'Baba! Make this summer less hot! But in the heat of
summer the Earth takes in the needed energy from the Sun, so that
when the rains come, she may yield a plentiful harvest. 'Cold'
and 'Heat' are both in the Plan of God and yours is only to know
this and treat both as valuable. Thorny plants and thornless
plants are both there in nature; the wise man knows the value of
both: he plants the thornless one and surrounds it with the
thorny ones, so that what he fosters is left unharmed. Activity
can save, as well as kill; it is like the cat which bites; it
bites the kitten in order to carry it in its mouth to a place of
safety; it bites the rat in order to kill and eat. Become the
kitten; and Work will rescue you like a loving Mother. Become a
rat; and you are lost.
God draws the Individual towards itself; it is the nature of both
to have this affinity, for they are the same. They are like the
iron and the magnet. But if the iron is rusty and covered with
layers of dirt, the magnet is unable to attract. Remove the
impediment; that is all you have to do; that is all you have to
do. Shine forth in your real nature and the Lord will draw you
into His Bosom. Trials and tribulations are the means by which
this cleansing is done. That is why Kunthi prayed to Krishna,
"Give us always grief, so that we may never forget Thee". They
are like the dietary and other restrictions that the doctor
prescribes to supplement the effect of the drug of Namasmarana.
Sai is Sarvajanapriya and so any name which gives you joy, you
can take up. Tastes differ according to temperament and the
character one has earned by generations of activity as a living
being in this world. The proprietor of a coffee house goes to the
nearby druggist for a pill to ward off his headache, and the
druggist when he gets a headache goes to the coffee house for a
cup of coffee which he thinks will cure him. Men are like that;
loko bhinna ruchih. The Jnani says, 'Sarvam Brahma mayam;' God
is All; another, a Yogi, says all is Energy; a third, who is a
Bhaktha, says all is the play of Bhagavan. Each according to his
taste and according to his progress in spiritual Sadhana. Do not
hurry or ridicule them, for they are all pilgrims trudging along
the same road.
Sadhana is most required to control the mind and the desires
after which it runs. If you find that you are not able to
succeed, do not give up the Sadhana but do it more vigorously,
for it is the subject in which you did not get passing marks that
requires special study, doesn't it? Sadhana means inner
cleanliness as well as external cleanliness. You do not feel
refreshed if you wear unwashed clothes after your bath, do you?
Nor do you feel refreshed if you wear washed clothes, but skip
the bath. Both are needed, the Bahya and the Bhava, the external
as well as the internal.
Children believe your words when you say that the policeman will
catch them or the ghost will beat them. They are full of Fear,
Fortitude and Faith! But having grown old and stuffed your heads
with all kinds of doctrines and dogmas and theories and
arguments, you have now to use your Viveka and discover God the
hard way. This I will tell you, there is no escaping it; all
creatures have to reach God some day or other, by the long route
or by the short route.
Sri Sathya Sai Baba
Prasanthi Nilayam, Vijayadasami, 1953
http://www.inside-info.co.uk/BABA/bon.htm
*+*
--
*%*%*%*%**%*%*%*%**%*%*%*%**%*%*%*%**%*%*%*%**%*%*%*%**%*%*%*%**%*%*%*%*
Prajnana, constant integrated awareness, cannot be acquired from books. It
has to be got through self-examination and self-correction.-Sathya Sai Baba
*%*%*%*%**%*%*%*%**%*%*%*%**%*%*%*%**%*%*%*%**%*%*%*%**%*%*%*%**%*%*%*%*
