Sunday, February 16, 2014

Swami Vivekananda





Narendranath dutta was born to a Hindu couple in Kolkata . His father was a attorney in court and mother was a devout housewife .
He was listening to stories from Ramayan and Mahabarath from his mother during his childhood and are the major reasons for his awakend life.
He was deeply observing the lives of people around him and was trying to understand the different tags given to them. He conducted various experiments to understand this view and failing in all of them .
He once tried hokkas that were designed for a Kshatriya , a Muslim a Brahmin and did not feel any difference among them expect the color and shape of the container in which they are served .
At a young age he enters Brahma samaj and was shaped in ideas like formless god and depreciating idol worship .
He stumbled up on a question which led him in the search of knowledge .
"What is God, can I see God" .
He asked this question to every one he meat, every one he admired . None of them were able to give him a convincing answer, Once his cousins advised him to meet Ramakrishna Paramahamsa . Narendranath initially thought "should I meet that stupid priest and an idiotic follower of Kali" but later decided to meet Ramakrishna and give it a try.
Narendranath goes to Dakshineshwar to meet Ramakrishna, repeats his question and was stunned by the respond he got.
"Yes you can see god just the way I see you , you can talk to god just the way I talk to you. Spend some time with me".
Thought he was not initially accepting Ramakrishna's ideology because of his influence from Brahma samaj , he started liking him as a person and frequently visited Dakshineshwar .
Narendranath likes this idea of Ramakrishna  very much " try to see the truth from all angles" .
His fathers sudden death made a lot of financial tragedies in his life , he goes to Ramakrishna and requests him to get some money from Kali for his financial problem , for this Ramakrishna replies that he had never asked Kali for such favours before , he recomends narendranath to speak to Kali himself and get this favour done .
Ramakrishna takes him to the temple , shows the door and asks him to get in and request maa Kali for money , narendranath goes in and sees Kali and was stunned and requested her for wisdom and returned , Ramakrishna asked him to try again and the same story continues thrice , only then Narendranath realized his stupidity .
Ramakrishna developed a throat cancer and died in 1885. After his death , admirars od Ramakrishna stopped financial support to the decipals and were soon feel on streets as they were unable to pay the rent. Some returned home and few joined hands with Narendranath and converted a  dilapidated house to a moneastry which soon became Ramakrishna mutt and thus the society for the betterment of man kind  was born . The core ideologies of the mission was "for one's own salvation , and for the welfare of the society" .
The deciples in the mutt were begging on the streets for food and were eating rotten food , this was never a problem to them as they we're on a mission.
Narender traveled across india , saw the rich history of india carved on stones of temples , in the stories of civilians and also witnessed the rich culture . On the other hand he saw people spending lives  on streets , starving till death  while the other class of society spending lavishly for their comfart , promoting slavery . He spent sleepless nights thinking all these by sitting next to people people begging for a aana .
He meets the kings of different states and had a series of arguments with them and make them understand that " kings are only a security to the money of god , they have to spend only for the benefit of citizens , Thr gods children .
Once Maharaja Mangal Singh meat Vivekananda and informs that their ansistors had built big temples where people blindly come and worship god , but he is no more interested in these foolish idol worships and wants to stop this culture. Nagendra showed Mangal Singh a painted on the wall and asks him about it and the king replies that it wa of his brave father , Narender asks the king to spit on that painting telling its just a painting with no flush and blood of his father, king was not able to do it and this incident made the world understand the real meaning of idol worship .
Soon Kings across india stated becoming his deciples and the maharaja Ajit sing gave him the name VIVEKANANDA as the world know him today .
Swami continued his journey and reaches the southern tip of india "Kanyakumari" and worships the virgin god kanyakumari and hits the tip of india . He sees a rock at the middle of the ocean , swims across the ocean for over 200m and reaches the rock , he claims to the top and meditated for some time . The entire india and its past and present came to his mind . The rich culture and heritage , the poor and the improper distribution  of power and resources in the society .
Without a strong agenda he started travelling out of the country , spends some time in  Singapore , japan and finally ends up in to United States . He with the little money in his pocket becomes a guest to a harward profession who soon became a deciple , he referred him to the famous religious confarence that was about to happen in Chicago , this stage gave him an opportunity to prove his command over hinduism and also helped the west in understanding and appraiciating hinduism . 
His speach was weighed and was rated as one of the best in the conference .
Once in the conference he saw Bhagawadgeetha kept at the bottom of the religious books pile and quotes " Hinduism is the foundation of all religion" , on hearing to this comment they moved it to the middle of the pile , swamy says "Hindutva unites religions and binds them together " when it was moved to the top he says  " This is the devine religion".
Saints of other religion were finding it very hard to arguee with swamy but yet they wanted to arguee so that they get answers to there age old unanswered questions.
Swamy spends fair amount of time in the States , moved to different cities , gave tons of speeches , inspired people , established Ramakrishna mutt , wrote books full of wisdom and finally moves to europe and does the same .
In his journey once a foreign deciple asked swamy to marry her so that she can give birth to yet another Vivekananda and present it to the world , For that swamy comments  it to be a  long and uncertain process , instead asked her to accept his as her child right away and present It to the world . Lady did not have anything to argued with and bows to swamys suggestion.
He finally arrives back to india and receives an unexpected massive welcome which was celebrates more like a festival in respect to a hero who broadcasted hindutva like never before .
He then stays in india , continues his teachings and inspiring people .On the other hand his health conditions starts degrading with his foreign deciples exhaustive request he agrees to go back to the west and take some treatment but that did not do any better , the degradation process continued and he returns to india.
One fine day he served his students by serving them food , with water to wash their hands and with thoughts to provoke their mind and finally returns to his bed and closes his eyes for one last time.

Wednesday, February 5, 2014

Adi Shankaracharya

Adi Shankaracharya



"This world is full of injustice , something has to be done with it" is what he always dreamt of .
Being brought up in a Brahman family , after his fathers death he accepts brahmanathva by his choice and starts searching for the eternal truth .
Early in his life he defeated the fear of death and understood the immortality sole (which is the core ideology of Sanathana Dharma). His stay on this planet from here after was to build up on this ideology .
With his mother's acceptance he takes up sanyasathva at a very young age   and started marching to the north of india to meet Govidapada whom he believed would direct him in his mission .
On this journey  he meat a lot of thinkers and got to know  that vedas are getting farther and farther away from peoples life and soon we would forget it . He wanted to know what is Vedanta and if it has substance then he must spread it .
When he meat Govinda  at the banks of the river Narmada , Sankaracharya  falls to his feet and says " I have come to your feet to understand the reason for existence".
Govinda reply " with this mortal body how can you cross the ocean of samsara sagara and understand eternity " .
Shankaracharya replys " my body is mortal but atma is immortal ".
Astonished by this answer from a small kid govida accepts him as a student and helps with what ever he can .
Govinda shows him the Veda scripts that were lying and dying from a long time and explains his strive to atleast store them but regrates his inability to broadcast them .
Shankaracharya spends years understanding them and comes up with a summary of all those he had read and calls is "Advitha"
Advitha literally means " nothing second " . The core philosophy is that Atman (self's immortal sole) and Brahman (universal creator) can be united when enlightened by a proper education(Veda).
Criticism started to his work and the first among them was with his statement
"Sarvam Brahmyethyaha " In which he says all are Brahman .
But it was that point of time in india when fast castism was already rooted and people had started inheriting cast by birth from parents. Also a tag was attached to brahmin as upper cast and were hindering their counter parts "The kshudras" .
The Varna padathi was a system that was brought in with the philosophy " Not more than one power in the world ( knowledge, weapons, money,land) shall go to an individual so as to build a healthy society " . Also what weapon one wants to practice and use was a choice one has to make with his self consciousness and belief during his education , this weapon was not inherited by birth. But later with greed and ego this system was converted to castism .
But shankaracharya stood by his statemement "Sarvam Brahmyethyaha " and defeated many scholars in a war of thoughts and helped them to understand and accept this and his other philosophy. 
He continued his journey and spread advida to the length and breadth of the country and created 4 shakthi peeta at four corners of india ( first one being the sringeri mutt) .
Last days of his mortal body was spent in the great  Himalayas . But his soul as being immortal is still with us and striving for the betterment of humanity