Teachings of Swami Vivekananda Relevant to Modern Era.
Thursday, 2 July 2015
Tuesday, 30 June 2015
Monday, 29 June 2015
Collection of Photos of Pilgrimage to Gangotri, Gomukh, Chirwasa, Bhojwasa, Tapowan -2015 (June).
Pilgrimage Photos Set 1 - 2015 (Click Here)
Collection of Photos of Pilgrimage to Gangotri, Gomukh, Chirwasa, Bhojwasa, Tapowan -2015 (June).
Monday, 25 May 2015
Sunday, 24 May 2015
Friday, 22 May 2015
Wednesday, 20 May 2015
Tuesday, 19 May 2015
Sunday, 17 May 2015
Saturday, 16 May 2015
Friday, 15 May 2015
Thursday, 14 May 2015
Monday, 11 May 2015
Meeting with Hon'ble Minister Shri Sripad Naik, Minister - AYUSH (Independent Charge)
 |
| Shri Shripad Naik and Me. |
 |
Today, I am grateful to Shri Shripad Naik, Hon'ble Minister of State (Independent Charge of AYUSH) Health Ministry Govt. of India. RKM Ranchi Secretary Swami Buddhadevanandaji Maharaj is keen to initiate AYUSH project for the benefit of tribals of Jharkhand.
I request all facebook friends to go through the above said links, study the ideas behind different project and help propagating the ideas. You can also pass the links to proposed interested persons of your locality so that larger populace can be made aware of new developments.
Once again I thank Hon'ble Minister. I presented him Swami Vivekananda's Picture, the books viz. Letters of Swami Vivekananda, Talk with Swami Vivekananda, Way to Success etc.
Sunday, 10 May 2015
Thursday, 7 May 2015
Wednesday, 6 May 2015
Tuesday, 5 May 2015
10 Principles for Peace of Mind
10 Principles for Peace of Mind
Life is long and full of challenges. Most of those challenges are internal, and depends on how WE choose to accept and interpert them. Our lives can go on very different paths, depending on what we do and how we look at what happens to us along the way. Here are 10 points of advice that if followed, will guarantee a better life, one that brings with it true peace of mind.
1. Do Not Interfere In Others’ Business Unless Asked
Most of us create our own problems by interfering too often in others’ affairs. We do so because somehow we have convinced ourselves that our way is the best way, our logic is the perfect logic and those who do not conform to our thinking must be criticized and steered in the right direction, our direction. No two human beings can think or act in exactly the same way. Mind your own business and you will keep your peace.
2. Forgive And Forget
This is the most powerful aid when it comes peace of mind. We often develop ill feelings inside our heart for the person who insults us or harms us. We nurture grievances. This in turn results in loss of sleep, development of stomach ulcers, and high blood pressure. This insult or injury was done once, but nourishing of grievance goes on forever by constantly remembering it. Get over this bad habit. Life is too short to waste on such trifles. Forgive, forget, and march on. Love flourishes with giving and forgiving.
3. Do Not Crave Recognition
This world is full of selfish people. They seldom praise anybody without selfish motives. They may praise you today because you are in power, but as soon as you are powerless, they will forget your achievement and will start finding faults in you. Their recognition is not worth the aggravation. Do your duties ethically and sincerely.
4. Do Not succumb to envy and jealousy
We all have experienced how envy can disturb our peace of mind. You know that you work harder than your colleagues at the office, but sometimes they get promotions; you do not. You started a business several years ago, but you are not as successful as your neighbor whose business is only one year old. There are several examples like these in everyday life. Should you envy? No. Remember everybody’s life is shaped by his/her destiny, which has now become his/her reality. Nothing will be gained by blaming others for your misfortune. Jealousy will not get you anywhere, it will only take away your peace of mind.
5. Change Yourself According To The Environment
If you try to change the environment single-handedly, chances are you will fail. Instead, change yourself to suit your environment. As you do this, even the environment, which has been unfriendly to you, will mysteriously change and seem more congenial and harmonious with your goals.
6. Endure What Cannot Be Cured
This is the best way to turn a disadvantage into an advantage. Every day we face numerous inconveniences, ailments, irritations, and accidents that are beyond our control. If we cannot control them or change them, we must learn to put up with these things. We must learn to endure them cheerfully. Believe in yourself and you will gain in terms of patience, inner strength and will power.
7. Do Not Bite Off More Than You Can Chew
This maxim needs to be remembered constantly. We often tend to take more responsibilities than we are capable of carrying out. This is done to satisfy our ego. Know your limitations. Why take on additional loads that may create more worries? You cannot gain peace of mind by expanding your external activities. Reduce your material engagements and spend time in prayer, introspection and meditation. This will reduce those thoughts in your mind that make you restless. An uncluttered mind will produce greater feelings of peace.
8. Meditate Regularly
Meditation calms the mind and gets rid of disturbing thoughts. This is the highest state of peace of mind. Try it yourself. If you meditate earnestly for half an hour everyday, your mind will tend to become peaceful during the remaining twenty three and a half hours. Your mind will not be as easily disturbed as it was before. You would benefit by gradually increasing the period of daily meditation. You may think that this will interfere with your daily work. On the contrary, this will increase your efficiency and you will be able to produce better results in less time.
9. Never Leave The Mind Vacant
An empty mind is the devil’s workshop. All evil actions start in the vacant mind. Keep your mind occupied in something positive, something worthwhile. Actively follow a hobby. Do something that holds your interest. You must decide what you value more: money or peace of mind. Your hobby, like social work or charity work, may not always earn you more money, but you will have a sense of fulfillment and achievement.
10. Do Not Procrastinate And Never Regret
Do not waste time in protracted wondering ”Should I or shouldn’t I?” Days, weeks, months, and years can be wasted in that futile mental debating. You can never plan enough because you can never anticipate all future happenings. Value your time and do the things that need to be done. It does not matter if you fail the first time. You can learn from your mistakes and succeed the next time. Sitting back and worrying will lead to nothing. Learn from your mistakes, but do not brood over the past.
DO NOT REGRET. Whatever happened was destined to happen only that way. Why cry over spilled milk?
Monday, 4 May 2015
Sunday, 3 May 2015
Saturday, 2 May 2015
Thursday, 30 April 2015
Nepal Relief By Ramakrishna Mission, Belur Math.
"In the wake of the recent devastating earthquake affecting Nepal and some parts of India, the Ramakrishna Mission decided to undertake primary relief in the affected areas.
(a) Our Kathmandu centre served cooked food to 750 people who have taken shelter in nearby areas. Apart from this, the centre has so far distributed the following items to the affected people:
(i) 100 kg rice, 20 kg dal (lentils), 5 kg salt, 5 litres edible oil, 3 kg sugar, 3 packets of chocolates and 30 packets of biscuits among 130 children of Aravindo Orphanage at Thankot in Kathmandu,
(ii) 700 kg chira, 700 bottles of drinking water and 500 packets of biscuits at Sako, a village 20 km from Kathmandu, and
(iii) 400 packets of chira, 500 bottles of drinking water and 500 packets of biscuits at Sankarpur Nagarpalika, a remote area in upper hills, 40 km from Kathmandu.
(b) Lucknow centre distributed chira (rice flakes), sugar, candles and matchboxes to the victims in Narayanipur area of Nepal and provided medical relief to the quake-stricken patients.
(c) Darjeeling and Patna centres have made a survey at Sindhuli (Nepal) and Raxaul (Bihar) areas and are initiating steps to start primary relief work there.
Detailed reports are awaited".
(a) Our Kathmandu centre served cooked food to 750 people who have taken shelter in nearby areas. Apart from this, the centre has so far distributed the following items to the affected people:
(i) 100 kg rice, 20 kg dal (lentils), 5 kg salt, 5 litres edible oil, 3 kg sugar, 3 packets of chocolates and 30 packets of biscuits among 130 children of Aravindo Orphanage at Thankot in Kathmandu,
(ii) 700 kg chira, 700 bottles of drinking water and 500 packets of biscuits at Sako, a village 20 km from Kathmandu, and
(iii) 400 packets of chira, 500 bottles of drinking water and 500 packets of biscuits at Sankarpur Nagarpalika, a remote area in upper hills, 40 km from Kathmandu.
(b) Lucknow centre distributed chira (rice flakes), sugar, candles and matchboxes to the victims in Narayanipur area of Nepal and provided medical relief to the quake-stricken patients.
(c) Darjeeling and Patna centres have made a survey at Sindhuli (Nepal) and Raxaul (Bihar) areas and are initiating steps to start primary relief work there.
Detailed reports are awaited".
Wednesday, 29 April 2015
A Letter to Rev. Shashi Maharaj (Swami Ramakrishnananda) From Swami Vivekananda.
CWCD – 6/310
1895
Dear Shashi,
. . . I am quite in agreement with what Sarada
is doing, but it is not necessary to preach
that Ramakrishna Paramahamsa was an
Incarnation, and things of that sort. He came to do good to the world; not to
trumpet his own name -- you must always remember this. Disciples pay their
whole attention to the preservation of their master's name and throw overboard
his teachings; and sectarianism etc., are the result. Alasinga writes of Charu;
but I do not recollect him. Write all about him and convey him my thanks. Write
in detail about all; I have no time to spare for idle gossip. . . . Try to give
up ceremonials. They are not meant for Sannyasins; and one must work only so
long as one does not attain to illumination. . . . I have nothing to do with
sectarianism, or party - forming and playing the frog - in - the - well,
whatever else I may do. . . . It is impossible to preach the catholic ideas of
Ramakrishna Paramahamsa and form sects at the same time. . . . Only one kind of
work I understand, and that is doing good to others; all else is doing evil. I
therefore prostrate myself before the Lord Buddha. . . . I am a Vedantist;
Sachchidananda -- Existence - Knowledge - Bliss Absolute -- is my God. I
scarcely find any other God than the majestic form of my own Self. By the word
"Incarnation" are meant those who have attained that Brahmanhood, in
other words, the Jivanmuktas -- those who have realised this freedom in this
very life. I do not find any speciality in Incarnations: all beings from Brahma
down to a clump of grass will attain to liberation - in - life in course of
time, and our duty lies in helping all to reach that state. This help is called
religion; the rest is irreligion. This help is work; the rest is evil - doing
-- I see nothing else. Other kinds of work, for example, the Vaidika or the
Tantrika, may produce results; but resorting to them is simply waste of life,
for that purity which is the goal of work is realisable only through doing good
to others. Through works such as sacrifices etc., one may get enjoyments, but
it is impossible to have the purity of soul. . . . Everything exists already in
the Self of all beings. He who asserts he is free, shall be free. He who says
he is bound, bound he shall remain. To me, the thought of oneself as low and
humble is a sin and ignorance. "[(Sanskrit)]-- this Atman is not to be
attained by one who is weak." "[(Sanskrit)]-- if you say Brahman is ,
existence will be the result; if you say Brahman is not , non - existent It
shall verily become." He who always thinks of himself as weak will never
become strong, but he who knows himself to be a lion, "[(Sanskrit)]--
rushes out from the world's meshes, as a lion from its cage." Another
point, it was no new truth that Ramakrishna Paramahamsa came to preach, though
his advent brought the old truths to light. In other words, he was the
embodiment of all the past religious thoughts of India. His life alone made me
understand what the Shastras really meant, and the whole plan and scope of the
old Shastras.
Missionaries and others could not do much
against me in this country. Through the Lord's grace the people here like me
greatly and are not to be tricked by the opinions of any particular class. They
appreciate my ideas in a manner my own countrymen cannot do, and are not selfish.
I mean, when it comes to practical work they will give up jealousy and all
those ideas of self - sufficiency. Then all of them agree and act under the
direction of a capable man. That is what makes them so great. But then they are
a nation of Mammon - worshippers. Money comes before everything. People of our
country are very liberal in pecuniary matters, but not so much these people.
Every home has a miser. It is almost a religion here. But they fall into the
clutches of the priests when they do something bad, and then buy their passage
to heaven with money. These things are the same in every country --
priestcraft. I can say nothing as to whether I shall go back to India and when.
There also I shall have to lead a wandering life as I do here; but here
thousands of people listen to and understand my lectures, and these thousands
are benefited. But can you say the same thing about India? . . . I am perfectly
at one with what Sarada is doing. A thousand thanks to him. . . . In Madras and
Bombay I have lots of men who are after my heart. They are learned and
understand everything. Moreover they are kind - hearted and can therefore
appreciate the philanthropic spirit. . . . I have printed neither books nor
anything of the kind. I simply go on lecturing tours. . . . When I take a
retrospective view of my past life, I feel no remorse. From country to country
I have travelled teaching something, however little, to people, and in exchange
for that have partaken of their slices of bread. If I had found I had done no
work, but simply supported myself by imposing upon people, I would have
committed suicide today. Why do those who think themselves unfit to teach their
fellow - beings, wear the teacher's garb and earn their bread by cheating them?
Is not that a deadly sin? . . .
Yours etc.,
Vivekananda
Tuesday, 10 March 2015
Monday, 9 March 2015
Sunday, 8 March 2015
"The more, therefore, the Hindus study the past..." - Swami Vivekananda.
CWCD 4/320
REPLY TO THE ADDRESS OF THE MAHARAJA
OF KHETRI
India--The
Land Of Religion
During the residence of the Swamiji in
America, the following Address from the Maharaja of Khetri (Rajputana), dated
March 4th, 1895, was received by him:
My dear Swamiji,
As the head of this Durbar (a formal stately
assemblage) held today for this special purpose, I have much pleasure in
conveying to you, in my own name and that of my subjects, the heartfelt thanks
of this State for your worthy representation of Hinduism at the Parliament of
Religions, held at Chicago, in America.
I do not think the general principles of
Hinduism could be expressed more accurately and clearly in English than what
you have done, with all the restrictions imposed by the very natural
shortcomings of language itself.
The influence of your speech and behaviour in
foreign lands has not only spread admiration among men of different countries
and different religions, but has also served to familiarise you with them, to
help in the furtherance of your unselfish cause. This is very highly and
inexpressibly appreciated by us all, and we should feel to be failing in our
duty, were I not to write to you formally at least these few lines, expressing
our sincere gratitude for all the trouble you have taken in going to foreign
countries, and to expound in the American Parliament of Religions the truths of
our ancient religion which we ever hold so dear. It is certainly applicable to the
pride of India that it has been fortunate in possessing the privilege of having
secured so able a representative as yourself.
Thanks are also due to those noble souls whose
efforts succeeded in organising the Parliament of Religions, and who accorded
to you a very enthusiastic reception. As you were quite a foreigner in that
continent, their kind treatment of you is due to their love of the several
qualifications you possess, and this speaks highly of their noble nature.
I herewith enclose twenty printed copies of
this letter, and have to request that, keeping this one with yourself, you will
kindly distribute the other copies among your friends.
With best regards,
I remain,
Yours very sincerely,
RAJA AJIT SINGH BAHADUR OF KHETRI
The Swamiji sent the following reply:
"Whenever virtue subsides, and wickedness
raises its head, I manifest Myself to restore the glory of religion"-- are
the words, O noble Prince, of the Eternal One in the holy Gita, striking the
keynote of the pulsating ebb and flow of the spiritual energy in the universe.
These changes are manifesting themselves again
and again in rhythms peculiar to themselves, and like every other tremendous
change, though affecting, more or less, every particle within their sphere of
action, they show their effects more intensely upon those particles which are
naturally susceptible to their power.
As in a universal sense, the primal state is a
state of sameness of the qualitative forces -- a disturbance of this
equilibrium and all succeeding struggles to regain it, composing what we call
the manifestation of nature, this universe, which state of things remains as
long as the primitive sameness is not reached -- so, in a restricted sense on our own
earth, differentiation and its inevitable counterpart, this struggle towards
homogeneity, must remain as long as the human race shall remain as such,
creating strongly marked peculiarities between ethnic divisions, sub - races
and even down to individuals in all parts of the world.
In this world of impartial division and
balance, therefore, each nation represents, as it were, a wonderful dynamo for
the storage and distribution of a particular species of energy, and amidst all
other possessions that particular property shines forth as the special
characteristic of that race. And as any upheaval in any particular part
of human nature, though affecting others more or less, stirs to its very depth
that nation of which it is a special characteristic, and from which as a centre
it generally starts, so any commotion in the religious world is sure to produce
momentous changes in India, that land which again and again has had to furnish
the centre of the wide - spread religious upheavals; for, above all, India is
the land of religion.
Each man calls that alone real which helps him
to realise his ideal. To the worldly - minded, everything that can be converted
into money is real, that which cannot be so converted is unreal. To the man of
a domineering spirit, anything that will conduce to his ambition of ruling over
his fellow men is real -- the rest is naught; and man finds nothing in that
which does not echo back the heartbeats of his special love in life.
Those whose only aim is to barter the energies of
life for gold, or name, or any other enjoyment; those to whom the tramp of
embattled cohorts is the only manifestation of power; those to whom the
enjoyments of the senses are the only bliss that life can give -- to these,
India will ever appear as an immense desert whose every blast is deadly to the
development of life, as it is known by them.
But to those whose thirst for life has been
quenched forever by drinking from the stream of immortality that flowers from
far away beyond the world of the senses, whose souls have cast away -- as a serpent
its slough -- the three - fold bondages of lust, gold, and fame, who, from
their height of calmness, look with love and compassion upon the petty quarrels
and jealousies and fights for little gilded puff - balls, filled with dust,
called "enjoyment" by those under a sense - bondage; to those whose
accumulated force of past good deeds has caused the scales of ignorance to fall
off from their eyes, making them see through the vanity of name and form -- to
such wheresoever they be, India, the motherland and eternal mine of
spirituality, stands transfigured, a beacon of hope to everyone in search of
Him who is the only real Existence in a universe of vanishing shadows.
The majority of mankind can only understand power
when it is presented to them in a concrete form, fitted to their perceptions.
To them, the rush and excitement of war, with its power and spell, is something
very tangible, and any manifestation of life that does not come like a
whirlwind, bearing down everything before it, is to them as death. And India,
for centuries at the feet of foreign conquerors, without any idea or hope of
resistance, without the least solidarity among its masses, without the least
idea of patriotism, must needs appear to such, as a land of rotten bones, a
lifeless putrescent mass.
It is sad -- the fittest alone survive. How is it,
then, that this most unfitted of all races, according to commonly accepted
ideas, could bear the most awful misfortunes that ever befall a race, and yet
not show the least signs of decay? How is it that, while the multiplying powers
of the so - called vigorous and active races are dwindling every day, the
immoral (?) Hindu shows a power of increase beyond them all? Great laurels are
due, no doubt, to those who can deluge the world with blood at a moment's
notice; great indeed is the glory of those who, to keep up a population of a
few millions in plenty, have to starve half the population of the earth, but is
no credit due to those who can keep hundreds of millions in peace and plenty, without
snatching the bread from the mouth of anyone else? Is there no power displayed
in bringing up and guiding the destinies of countless millions of human beings,
through hundreds of centuries, without the least violence to others?
The mythologists of all ancient races supply
us with fables of heroes whose life was concentrated in a certain small portion
of their bodies, and until that was touched they remained invulnerable. It
seems as if each nation also has such a peculiar centre of life, and so long as
that remains untouched, no amount of misery and misfortune can destroy it.
In religion lies the vitality of India, and so long
as the Hindu race do not forget the great inheritance of their forefathers,
there is no power on earth to destroy them.
Nowadays
everybody blames those who constantly look back to their past. It is said that
so much looking back to the past is the cause of all India's woes. To me, on
the contrary, it seems that the opposite is true. So long as they forgot the
past, the Hindu nation remained in a state of stupor; and as soon as they have
begun to look into their past, there is on every side a fresh manifestation of
life. It is out of this past that the future has to be molded; this past will
become the future.
The more, therefore, the Hindus study the
past, the more glorious will be their future, and whoever tries to bring the
past to the door of everyone, is a great benefactor to his nation. The
degeneration of India came not because the laws and customs of the ancients
were bad, but because they were not allowed to be carried to their legitimate
conclusions.
Every
critical student knows that the social laws of India have always been subject
to great periodic changes. At their inception, these laws were the embodiment
of a gigantic plan, which was to unfold itself slowly through time. The great
seers of ancient India saw so far ahead of their time that the world has to
wait centuries yet to appreciate their wisdom, and it is this very inability on
the part of their own descendants to appreciate the full scope of this
wonderful plan that is the one and only cause of the degeneration of India.
Ancient India had for centuries been the
battlefield for the ambitious projects of two of her foremost classes -- the
Brahmins and the Kshatriyas.
On the other hand, the priesthood stood
between the lawless social tyranny of the princes over the masses, whom the
Kshatriyas declared to be their legal food. On the other hand, the Kshatriya
power was the one potent force which struggled with any success against the
spiritual tyranny of the priesthood and the ever - increasing chain of
ceremonials which they were forging to bind down the people with.
The tug of
war began in the earliest periods of the history of our race, and throughout
the Shrutis it can be distinctly traced. A momentary lull came when Shri
Krishna, leading the faction of Kshatriya power and of Jnana, showed the way to
reconciliation. The result was the teachings of the Gita -- the essence of
philosophy, of liberality, of religion. Yet the causes were there, and the
effect must follow.
The ambition of these two classes to be the
masters of the poor and ignorant was there, and the strife once more became
fierce. The meagre literature that has come down to us from that period brings
to us but faint echoes of that mighty past strife, but at last it broke out as
a victory for the Kshatriyas, a victory for Jnana, for liberty -- and
ceremonial had to go down, much of it for ever. This upheaval was what is known
as the Buddhistic reformation. On the religious side, it represented freedom
from ceremonial; on the political side, overthrow of the priesthood by the
Kshatriyas.
It is a
significant fact that the two greatest men ancient India produced, were both
Kshatriyas -- Krishna and Buddha -- and still more significant is the fact that
both of these God - men threw open the door of knowledge to everyone,
irrespective of birth or sex.
In spite of its wonderful moral strength,
Buddhism was extremely iconoclastic; and much of its force being spent in
merely negative attempts, it had to die out in the land of its birth, and what
remained of it became full of superstitions and ceremonials, a hundred times
cruder than those it was intended to suppress. Although it partially succeeded
in putting down the animal sacrifices of the Vedas, it filled the land with
temples, images, symbols, and bones of saints.
Above all, in the medley of Aryans, Mongols,
and aborigines which it created, it unconsciously led the way to some of the
hideous Vamacharas. This was especially the reason why this travesty of the
teaching of the great Master had to be driven out of India by Shri Shankara and
his band of Sannyasins.
Thus even the current of life, set in motion
by the greatest soul that ever wore a human form, the Bhagavan Buddha himself,
became a miasmic pool, and India had to wait for centuries until Shankara
arose, followed in quick succession by Ramanuja and Madhva.
By this time, an entirely new chapter had
opened in the history of India. The ancient Kshatriyas and the Brahmins had
disappeared. The land between the Himalayas and the Vindhyas, the home of the
Aryas, the land which gave birth to Krishna and Buddha, the cradle of great
Rajarshis and Brahmarshis, became silent, and from the very farther end of the
Indian Peninsula, from races alien in speech and form, from families claiming
descent from the ancient Brahmins, came the reaction against the corrupted
Buddhism.
What had become of the Brahmins and Kshatriyas
of Aryavarta? They had entirely disappeared, except here and there a few
mongrel clans claiming to be Brahmins and Kshatriyas, and in spite of their
inflated, self - laudatory assertions that the whole world ought to learn from
[Sanskrit], they had to sit in sackcloth and ashes, in all humility, to learn
at the feet of the Southerners. The result was the bringing back of the Vedas
to India -- a revival of Vedanta, such as India never before had seen; even the
householders began to study the Aranyakas.
In the Buddhistic movement, the Kshatriyas
were the real leaders, and whole masses of them become Buddhists. In the zeal
of reform and conversion, the popular dialects had been almost exclusively
cultivated to the neglect of Sanskrit, and the larger portion of Kshatriyas had
become disjointed from the Vedic literature and Sanskrit learning. Thus this
wave of reform, which came from the South, benefited to a certain extent the
priesthood, and the priests only. For the rest of India's millions, it forged
more chains than they had ever known before.
The Kshatriyas had always been the backbone of
India, so also they had been the supporters of science and liberty, and their
voices had rung out again and again to clear the land from superstitions; and
throughout the history of India they ever formed the invulnerable barrier to
aggressive priestly tyranny.
When the greater part of their number sank
into ignorance, and another portion mixed their blood with savages from Central
Asia and lent their swords to establish the rules of priests in India, her cup
became full to the brim, and down sank the land of Bharata, not to rise again,
until the Kshatriya rouses himself, and making himself free, strikes the chains
from the feet of the rest. Priestcraft is the bane of India. Can man degrade
his brother, and himself escape degradation?
Know, Rajaji, the greatest of all truths,
discovered by your ancestors, is that the universe is one. Can one injure
anyone without injuring himself? The mass of Brahmin and Kshatriya tyranny has recoiled
upon their own heads with compound interest; and a thousand years of slavery
and degradation is what the inexorable law of Karma is visiting upon them.
This is what one of your ancestors said: "Even
in this life, they have conquered relativity whose mind is fixed in
sameness"-- one who is believed to be God incarnate. We all believe it.
Are his words then vain and without meaning? If not, and we know they are not,
any attempt against this perfect equality of all creation, irrespective of birth,
sex, or even qualification, is a terrible mistake, and no one can be saved
until he has attained to this idea of sameness.
Follow, therefore, noble Prince, the teachings
of the Vedanta, not as explained by this or that commentator, but as the Lord
within you understands them. Above all, follow this great doctrine of sameness
in all things, through all beings, seeing the same God in all.
This is the way to freedom; inequality, the
way to bondage. No man and no nation can attempt to gain physical freedom
without physical equality, nor mental freedom without mental equality.
Ignorance, inequality, and desire are the
three causes of human misery, and each follows the other in inevitable union.
Why should a man think himself above any other man, or even an animal? It is
the same throughout:
[Sanskrit]
--"Thou art the man, Thou the woman, Thou
art the young man, Thou the young woman."
Many will say, "That is all right for the
Sannyasins, but we are householders." No doubt, a householder having many
other duties to perform, cannot as fully attain to this sameness; yet this
should be also their ideal, for it is the ideal of all societies, of all
mankind, all animals, and all nature, to attain to this sameness. But alas!
they think inequality is the way to attain equality, as if they could come to
right by doing wrong!
This is the bane of human nature, the curse upon
mankind, the root of all misery -- this inequality. This is the source of all
bondage, physical, mental, and spiritual.
[Sanskrit]--"Since seeing the Lord
equally existent everywhere, he injures not Self by self, and so goes to the
Highest Goal" (Gita, XIII. 28). This one saying contains, in a few words,
the universal way to salvation.
You, Rajputs, have been the glories of ancient
India. With your degradation came national decay, and India can only be raised
if the descendants of the Kshatriyas co - operate with the descendants of the
Brahmins, not to share the spoils of pelf and power, but to help the weak, to
enlighten the ignorant, and to restore the lost glory of the holy land of their
forefathers.
And who can say but that the time is
propitious? Once more the wheel is turning up, once more vibrations have been
set in motion from India, which are destined at no distant day to reach the
farthest limits of the earth. One voice has spoken, whose echoes are rolling on
and gathering strength every day, a voice even mightier than those which have
preceded it, for it is the summation for them all. Once more the voice that
spoke to the sages on the banks of the Sarasvati, the voice whose echoes
reverberated from peak to peak of the "Father of Mountains", and
descended upon the plains through Krishna, Buddha, and Chaitanya in all -
carrying floods, has spoken again. Once more the doors have opened. Enter ye
into the realms of light, the gates have been opened wide once more.
And you, my beloved Prince -- you the scion of
a race who are the living pillars upon which rests the religion eternal, its
sworn defenders and helpers, the descendants of Rama and Krishna, will you
remain outside? I know, this cannot be. Yours, I am sure, will be the first
hand that will be stretched forth to help religion once more. And when I think
of you, Raja Ajit Singh, one in whom the well - known scientific attainments of
your house have been joined to a purity of character of which a saint ought to
be proud, to an unbounded love for humanity, I cannot help believing in the
glorious renaissance of the religion eternal, when such hands are willing to
rebuild it again.
May the blessings of Ramakrishna be on you and
yours for ever and ever, and that you may live long for the good of many, and
for the spread of truth is the constant prayer of --
Vivekananda.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)