Friday, April 24, 2020

ANIMATE AND INANIMATE

        Last time we talked about the Dnyaneshwar  and his story on him talking to a bull and the Bull talking back to him. This proved that every living thing has a soul . So this one is about  the inanimate things. With the meditation - one can get powers that are called SIDHHI. . These things may sound not possible but there are people who have experienced them . But that is not an easy things to achieve. These re described in PATANJALI SUTRA . So this story will be about that.
     Dnyaneshwar was back at his home  and he  and his siblings were young . One day they were sitting on  fence made out of bricks. In that town there was powerful man, who came to know about the story of Dnyaneshwar making a bull talk the scriptures . So he decided to visit the man himself . He was educated  and also powerful and had  certain powers not seen in average man . He decided to impress Dnyaneshwar by riding on a tiger . So he came to se these children. He was sitting on the tiger.He thought that by riding on tiger he will impress this overnight hero. Dnyaneshwar was sitting on the brick fence. So as he saw the Changdev - that was the name of the person who was approaching the children. Dnyaneshwar while sitting on the fence MADE THE FENCE WALK towards the tiger . Chngdev wanted to show off that he has control over the wild animal like tiger  and Dnyneshwar decided to show that He can control even INANIMATE object like fence .
    There was many stories of Dnyaneshwar who was enlightened  and he had powers to any tricks or show off powers that he had , but he never showed them to impress anyone . This nis the only time that I know that he did . 

Saturday, April 18, 2020

UNIVERSAL SOUL

   In Vedic religion, we believe that we all have same reflection of God  and that is soul. This is very simplified way of explanation  and I know many will not agree. But that is not the object of the story. We think that the God pervades anything and everything. So there is so called God or presence of God in everything in this universe. But more so at animal level. The reincarnation does transients YONI or does go from being in an animal to Human being. This is not so in Abrhamic religions . So this brings me to the story for today.
    In Maharashtra -state in India ,there were several sages that have been well known to the local people , but not to out side of the state. There was great sage or saint named DNYNESHWAR . At very early age he did commentary on Bhagavat Geeta called DNYANESHWARI. It is read by thousands of people . His father had decided to be sanyasi and then he came and then had children . The society would not accept them as legitimate kids. So they had very hard life  and then the parents committed suicide when they were told that only punishment is to commit suicide. Things did not change for the kids  and so they decided to go to Kashi where there was so called Vatican of Hindu religion.There was a big convention of big shots in Hindu religions . So Dnyaneshwar ended uo going to the stage where different big shots were discussing various questions related to the Hindu religion. He told the In-charge of the meeting that all the living things - animals  and human beings have same soul or presence of God , then why they would not accept the children born to parents where father had done Sanyas and then coming back to married state. 
    The big shots on stage laughed  and the moderator of the meeting asked him . 'So according to you the bull walking around has the same soul as human being ?' Dnyashwar answered 'Yes'. So then the moderator asked someone to bring the bull on stage  and asked Dnyaneshwar to have bull chants SCRIPTURES -VEDAS. Everyone in the meeting laughed . Dnyaneshwar looked straight in the eyes of the bull and chanted the Veda and the bull repeated it .No one could believe. Dnyaneshwar was instant celebrity.
     The moral of the story is what I stated in the start of the story. We all have same soul  and the soul goes from one body to another in different lives. But we all know this or believe in it , but do behave accordingly.We don't treat all Human being with respect  and forget about animals. 

Friday, April 10, 2020

ACTION AND INTENTION

     I have talked about the Action and Karma . Every action has reaction or effect or impression.. But then the question comes in as if intention matters even if the action is same ?That brings me to the story for today. I read this story or was told about it many years ago .
     There was a small town in India. There was a woman who lived by herself. She was poor and made some money by stitching clothes for other people. One day at noon she was done with some of her work and decided to take a break and have lunch. She had cooked some food  and so she warmed it . Then there was knock on the door . There was poor beggar at the door .It was summer and the temperature was high and the beggar asked her if she could give him some water  as he was thirsty. She gave him the water and told him that she was to start eating and he wanted to have some lunch . He was hungry and so they shared the food that she had cooked it. At the end of the lunch the beggar blessed her  and said 'You will do same thing over and over again tomorrow. '. She did not understand what it meant . She restarted her work again .
     The next day she woke up  and thought of what to do as work and she had a silk piece of cloth given to her for stitching some clothes. She took it from her small cabinet and started measuring it. As she started measuring it , the cloth continued to grow . She continued to measure  and it would not end . At the end of the day she had thousands of yards of silk cloth.. The story spread in the town as to how a beggar blessed her and she became rich . As it happened there was a rich lady who lived in the same town. As it happened, the beggar had gone to her first and she had thrown him out at high noon and told him that he is young and healthy and he should work rather than begging for food. She did not offer even water. She came to know as to how the poor lady was blessed by the same beggar. She decided to find that beggar out. She found him out and then invited him for lunch . She told him that she was too busy and she apologized to him . She had her servants cook great meal, with lots things  and then offered him food in silver plate.The beggar accepted her invitation and after finishing it blessed her with the same line - You will do same thing entire day , that you start with. The lady was very happy . She could  not sleep as she could not decide if she should start counting 4100 bills or count the pearls hat she had or gold coin etc . She woke up and then got out of bed  and opened the window thinking as to what she was going to do that will make her RICH. She opened the window  and a bumble bee came in . She had to wave her hands to get rid of the bee. As soon as she did this another one came in and then she had to avoid that one biting her ,The third one came in . So whole day she was trying to get rid of the bees. She had number of bites
     The moral of the story is very obvious . But I wanted to state that the ACTION may be same but the INTENTION behind the action does matter . One could pray God for having HIS love  and blessing . and then one could do the same prayer  for getting more money or getting better car or winning lootery , or one could do the prayer  and wish harm for someone else. The first is Satvik GUNA , the second is Rjasic  and last one is Tamasic . The effect will be as per intention and the same action will have different fruits . 

Friday, April 3, 2020

TRUE CHARITY

    This is a story from Mhabharata .Epic of Mahabharata is the story of 2 sets of cousins. This is the largest poetry in the world. There are multiple characters in the story . The Pandawas are 5  and kaurawas are 100 in number. So this is the story when the Pandawas did ASHWAMEDH YADNYA. In this Yadnys a horse goes through various kingdoms  and if any king stops it,that is considered as a challenge for the war .So this horse went through various kingdoms  and finally came back to Hastinapoor , the home for Pandawas . So they were considered conqueror  and victorious . So at the end they did the YADNYA . After the religious ceremony the KING in this case the Dharmaraj donated lots of gifts to many people .He was sitting with his brothers  and Lord Krishna .
   The Pandawas started thinking that they are the greatest in Bharat.But on top of that they GREATEST IN DOING THE CHARITY. . The Krishna was sitting there  and could read the mind  and so he knew that Pandawas were thinking too much of themselves. So he decided to teach them a lesion .
   As the thought was crossing the minds of Pandawas,a otter appeared . The interesting part about the otter was that it had half of it's side Golden and half was black , It came in and directly went to the ashes of the Yadnya . It did not go to the food around . It went in and rolled over in the ashes . and then turned back and looked at the body  and spoke that 'there is no one as charitable as BRAHMAN as KAPOTI.' The Pandawas were shocked  and surprised . Here they had conquered the entire Bharata  and done the biggest Yadnya  and done so much donations and charity and this otter is stating that this Kapoti , that no one has heard about, is the greatest.So  Dharmaraj asked the otter as to who is this Kapoti  and what did he do to be considered greatest."
   The otter answered  and told the story . Many years ago there was a drought and food supple was not great . There lived a Brahmin named Kapoti . He had a wife  and a son and daughter in law. They had not had  any food for 3 days and then he got some corn . So he got it home  and the wife cooked it  and then they divided in to 4 parts  and they sat to start the dinner. At that time there was a knock on the door  and there was guest standing in the door . So he was invited in the house . He stated that he was hungry . So the Brahmin gave him his portion of the food . He was still hungry . So the wife offered her part , He was still still hungry and so the son and then the daughter in law gave him their portions of the food . The guest was happy and he blessed them and left . At that time the otter came in  and there were some grain crumbs on the floor .It rolled in it  and when he looked at his body , the side that had touched the crumbs had become golden in color . All 4 dies due to starvation ,.The otter continued , 'Since then I am going from one place to other , one Yadnya to other in search of something that would make my other side golden too . I had heard about your charity and came with great hope . But I have to leave with great disappointment 'saying so the otter left .

    So the moral of the story is there is a difference in the the charities . When I  donate after I have enjoyed full meals  and having enough in bank for me and my family is different than one which is done by someone when he has barely enough for him and his family or none  . In case of Kapoti the sacrifice was not of meals only but his  and his entire family's life  and that is far superior to the charity done by th Pandawa king .