COMMENTS GALORE ... 106

COMMENTS GALORE ... 106

Sugata Bose @Govind Raj : You mean you were there during the days of the Khilafat Movement?

Sugata Bose @

Sugata Bose @

Sugata Bose @

বেশ, বেশ !

বেশ, বেশ !

●●●●●●●●

বক্তৃতার মাঝে কথায় কথায় হাততালি দেওয়া লঘুচিত্ততার লক্ষণ | এ ত' হামেশা হচ্ছে | এটি এখন জাতিয় চরিত্র | দেশ এ'রকম হালকা লোকে ভরে গেছে | গম্ভীরাত্মার বড়ই অভাব, অভাব গভীর চিন্তাশীল ব্যক্তির | 

সাধুরাও দেখি আজকাল নববৈদান্তিক নৃত্যে রত | এর আগে বৈষ্ণব সংকীর্তনের নৃত্যে অভ্যস্ত ছিলাম | ইদানিং নববৈদান্তিক জ্ঞানমিশ্র দোদুল্যমান 'রমণীয়' নৃত্যে নয়ন ধৌত হচ্ছে | জগতের এত গুরুগম্ভীর সমস্যার এই ত' সহজ সমাধান | বক্তৃতায় মারো তালি, রাজনীতিতে দিনরাত চুরি আর মারামারি, আধ্যাত্মিকতায় রমণীসুলভ নৃত্যগীতের ছড়াছড়ি | বেশ, বেশ ! স্বামীজী বোধ হয় পৌরুষ ধারণ ও প্রদর্শন এবং বৌদ্ধিক বিকাশ ও চিন্তাশীলতা বিষয়ে এমনই মত পোষণ করেছিলেন | নাকি শ্লেষাত্মক বাক্যবিন্যাসে সত্যভ্রষ্ট হলাম ? যাই হ'ক, এখন নাচার পালা | যত পারো নাচো, নাচাও, ভুলে থাকো, ভুলিয়ে দাও জগতের বড় বড় সমস্যাগুলির কথা | এই ত' গুরুতর, থুরি, গুরুতম শিক্ষা | 

রচনা : সুগত বোস (Sugata Bose)

SWAMI NIRMALANANDA (TULSI MAHARAJ), THE 17TH DIRECT DISCIPLE OF SRI RAMAKRISHNA ... 1

SWAMI NIRMALANANDA (TULSI MAHARAJ), THE 17TH DIRECT DISCIPLE OF SRI RAMAKRISHNA ... 1

Among the direct disciples of Sri Ramakrishna Swami Nirmalananda (Tulsi Maharaj) was a prominent member. Following in the footsteps of Swami Ramakrishnananda (Shashi Maharaj), his (Tulsi Maharaj's) tireless exertion set afoot the Ramakrishna Movement in Southern India and spread it far and wide. A true karmayogi established in unflinching devotion to his great Master, Sri Ramakrishna, and to his venerable brother disciple, Swami Vivekananda, who considered his beloved Tulsi an ideal monk, Swami Nirmalananda today is a forgotten monk thanks to his name having been deleted by Belur Math from the list of direct disciples of Thakur. This is indeed unfortunate as despite the sad wrangling over management of the Bangalore Ashrama which was being duly managed by Tulsi Maharaj under the express wish of Swami Brahmānanda who had legally authorised him (Tulsi Maharaj) to act on his (Swami Brahmānanda's) behalf in Southern India but which under altered circumstances unfortunately led to litigation by Belur Math against Tulsi Maharaj, the latter was and remains in truth Thakur's direct disciple, a holy member of His holy entourage of earthly companions this time. That Tulsi Maharaj should be reinstated in the pantheon of Thakur's direct disciples was the lifelong mission of one his dedicated disciples, Sri Brahma Gopal Dutt, whose umpteen attempts in this regard were not considered favourably by Belur Math. He published a book providing the details of the Bangalore controversy and allied materials called 'SWAMI NIRMALANANDA (TULSI MAHARAJ) -- A direct disciple of SRI RAMAKRISHNA : A focus on facts and facets'. This book provides all the evidence and proof of the fact that Swami Nirmalananda was a direct disciple of Thakur. A must read for all.

Written by Sugata Bose

PPESY : MARCH PAST

MARCH PAST

The world is split 

Between the right

And the left.

Left cancels right

And right cancels left

As we march ahead.

Left right left right

Left right left...

Downward march...

Left right left...

Let's see what is left

As we march down and down

And reach Tumbletown.

Left right left.

Composed by Sugata Bose

MESSAGES GALORE ... 130

MESSAGES GALORE ... 130

1. 

একদিন নবদ্বীপে হড় তর্ক হইল,

কি, তৈলাধার পাত্র না পাত্রাধার তৈল ?

For once in Navadvīp there was great verbal toil,

Doth the oil hold the cup or the cup hold the oil?

2. Celebrated by the masses, mediocrity shines dull.

3. One's average consciousness must be spiritual. 

4. Simplicity of soul is conducive to spiritual progress, not crookedness of heart. Simplicity, rectitude, they come in one's last earthly life. 

5. Hurt your Guru and pay the price. Law of Karma.

6. If there is a sin on earth, it is to lose faith in oneself. From it follows weakness that sins repeatedly. Hence, build up self-belief and be strong.

7. The life of an individual is in his compassion.

8. Words come freely to me from Mother who is the only authoress of all manifestation. We claim credit for Her compositions. This indeed is plagiarism.

9. Humanity is hardly human. Violence vitiates life.

10. Today's victor will be tomorrow's vanquished. 

11. When rogues rule, the rule of law is no more.

12. Transnational capitalism drives premeditated wars.

13. The fifth vice, Mada (arrogance), is a killer. It destroys the possessor. The Long March has but begun. History will resolve issues as yet.

14. Politeness is the first attribute of a gentleman.

15. Ones's greatest friend and one's greatest enemy both abide in one's home. The home is the heart of all good and of all evil. And the heart is home, too.

16. The impolite become impoverished.

17. The evildoer is always a first class liar.

18. Do not fall for propaganda. Study a subject well.

19. Which nation has the right to inflict death on children?

20. Do not believe in wartime propaganda. Watch contrary news channels, read contrary versions and intelligently form your views.

21. It is not good to disrespect, insult or displease the Guru in any way.

22. গুরুকে অসম্মান, অপমান, অপ্রসন্ন করা শুভ নয় |

23. Leaders lead less, lie more. The result is that the led, the lied to are laid low.

24. The best way to raise one's failing nation is to use military might to lower other rising ones. It is a toxic way though.

25. A nation that is largely intellectualy dead cannot hope to be a world power despite apparent advances in GDP.

26. Neglect the Guru and pay the price. Law of Karma.

27. Neglect parents/children and pay the price later. 

28. Neglect of Guru is a most serious mistake. It retards spiritual growth.

29. No good chasing wild material goose. Ignorance!

30. They who neglect the Guru fall from divine grace.

31. One must revere one's earthly mother to get the grace of the Divine Mother.

32. The udder gives milk, the rudder guides. The Guru is both and much more.

33. Intelligent is the one who sits at the feet of the Guru and learns.

34. Foolish is the one who insults the Guru.

35. To think of the Guru as human is productive of no spiritual good. The Guru is God. God has become the Guru to lead the disciple to the Truth.

36. A Brahmajnāni is a fully realised soul but the Avatār is infinitely greater. He is God Himself in the guise of a human being.

37. The ideal of work is detached attachment---attachment to the means of work but detachment to its end.

38. Learn to be original thinkers. Be creative.

39. War is messing up the world. Peace will not be able to restore it easily.

40. The disciple should be such that the Guru will be saying, 

"You are the best,

Far above the rest."

41. Should life lead me somewhere, may it lead me to people who value relations above material work.

42. Work is work so long it is unselfish. The moment selfishness creeps in, it becomes a source of evil.

43. গুরুর প্রতি দুর্ব্যবহারে শিষ্যের/শিষ্যার ক্ষতি হয় | তাই তা কদাপি করা উচিত নয় | গুরু ঈশ্বর | তাঁকে সেইমত সম্মান, শ্রদ্ধা করা কাম্য |

44. গুরুকে অগ্রাহ্য করা গর্হিত অপরাধ |

45. Disregarding the Guru is a grave offence.

46. Shishupāl was forgiven by Krishna a hundred insults before the Sudarshan Chakra beheaded him.

47. যত সব খারাপ লোক রাজনীতি করে | তাই দেশের এই দুরবস্থা |

48. 'The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna' offers solutions to life's problems. Read it and shape your life in line with the teachings of Sri Ramakrishna. 

49. Do not destroy what you have not built. War is wicked. It is the crime of the mighty against the weak. Organised mass violence cannot be condoned.

50. Rushing to resist the Norwester? Well, good luck!

51. Sudden onset of what ought to have happened on the eve of the Ides of March if Shakespeare says it right.

52. Ideological divides should not be so deep as to make human beings behave like brutes towards perceived enemies. Civilisation then is in peril.

53. Your loss is also my loss. This is humanity. 

54. Nations are no longer secure under international law. No such law in practice exists. Only titular, nominal existence. UN is powerless to protect.

55. Security lies in self-dependence.

56. Leaders ought to have balance of mind. Else, they throw the world into chaos. Sanity is necessary for governance. Selfish impulsiveness is for movies.

57. Devoted ones will react to all my updates. This is the litmus test.

58. Those that ignore noble thoughts aren't devotees.

59. Work engages all. God is workfree.

60. Busy? Busy with what? Mundane stuff? Is that all there is to life, a material preoccupation? Is human life of no better worth, of no greater value?

61. Small hearts cannot be devotees. It is the big heart that finds God. All crookedness must go and the soul cleansed of lowliness. The pure alone see.

62. Let not work rule you. Rule over work. But do not rule it out. Work freely, not like a slave.

63. From dawn to dusk you labour like a slave. Is this life? Work in freedom. Work like a master. Always work but never be busy. Give up this business of busyness.

64. Like breath is while you work, so let freedom be while you work. Never be so busy as you pose to be. Pretence can be seen through by God.

65. Make not thy Guru a member of thy Etcetera Club.

66. 

Was the sea free of salt once? 

Will it ever be free again? 

Will the waves cease? 

Will the turbulence ease? 

Will the water rise, never to rain again?

67. 

Photographs of old---

Have they all been sold?

Had I but so told

That they'd be valued in gold,

Sure sans being cajoled,

Well packed and rolled,

They'd have been bowled

Over and across the cold

To warm my heart, to enfold

My vision fair that'll behold

In rapturous joy to unfold.

68. Impossible to realise God without simplicity.

69. Man celebrating death of man. Humanity indeed!

70. 

Pray,

Something say.

Not in poesy though.

In prose thou mayest write more.

I wait to see the shore.

71. 

My words are sweet

But I am sour.

Passeth the hour, 

I lose all power 

In chasing wild dreams

That'll enervate it seems.

So here I stop,

This skip, jump and hop. 

72. Karma is recoiling. Karma will recoil. None will escape, nor now nor on the morrow. Cause sorrow today. Suffer tomorrow.

73. The sheet is being balanced. All debts will be recovered. None will be written off. History will avenge injustice. The sheet will be balanced. 

74. Heartlessness cannot be condoned in the name of natural justice. Nature also knows mercy.

75. Brave are the weak who dare to stand up to the tyranny of the mighty. 

76. Cowards support the tyrant.

77. Men quote scriptire when they are bereft of original thinking. Scriptures were written by men of original thought.

78. Ideologically based humanity is no humanity. Same with theological humanity. Both are divisive, hence not human in the truest sense.

79. Is God formless? Yes. Is God with form? Yes. Is God immanent? Yes. Is God transcendent? Yes. God is the alpha and the omega of existence. God is the manifest and the unmanifest. God is all that is and all that is not. God is the summation of all positives and all negatives. God is the Shūnya, the Void. God is the Pūrna, the Whole. God is God. 🕉

80. Life is so fractured. There is no continuity of communication. It is a stupid broken dream that hurts only to heal, heals only to hurt, endlessly.

81. Cunning and might used to dominate the world is not civilisation. It is barbarism cloaked in its garb.

82. If between two breaths there is a large gap, death results. So with relations. Constancy of communication is the key to sustenance of souls.

83. 

84. 

85. 

DREAM NO MORE ... 1 [EDITED]

DREAM NO MORE ... 1 [EDITED]

The surface mind is an illusion. Consciousness is deep. It is an integrated being within. It does all the work and dispenses the fruits to itself. The prism of Maya refracts the rays of the Sun of Truth along variant paths, producing the optical spectrum the phenomenal universe is. We are the trapped beams of light, dispersed into flora and fauna, the radiant hues of the Bright One that knows no dimming nor darkening like our lot is here, lost on Earth. The Ocean waveless lies beyond cognition of the faculties that the senses provide. Supersensory is the Truth percolating through sensory modes. The vast universe is the play-field of the Divine, the realm of primeval ignorance, Maya's dream. The infinite trapped in the finite --- how preposterous a proposition, how impossible the event! And yet, the impossible is made possible, and this is Maya. Souls we are but are duped into believing we are bodies. Unstructured free beings we are but find ourselves hopelessly bound in mortal coil crushed by the wheel of Fortune. Worst of all, so deep is the inebriation that few realise that they are caught in a nightmare, that they are wakeful dreamers and that life is but a passing dream of no substance whatsoever save the opportunity to break through the network of Maya and emerge mighty lions that have overcome this dreaded delusion.

Ordinary folks, let us leave them aside for a while. Even men of genius are souls trapped, however tall their creative stature, however pretentious their philosophical posturing. The whole world is in bondage. We are bond-slaves of Nature at her beck and call. Dare we say we are free citizens of the world when the world holds us in terrible bondage? Sense-bound, sense-clad, sense-duped creatures, dare we assume to dictate terms to Nature when She holds us at Her mercy at will? No, such pretensions will not work. Hypocritical stances must be shed if we are to emerge into real freedom far beyond the domain of the senses, beyond this very universe which is but the shadow of the Divine. We must assert our real nature if we are to be free. The cross linkages of Maya we must break through, not by force, for the very reaction of it will hold, but by deft dealing with the wiles of the Enchantress Divine, by advancement through the maze of Maya along the freedom routes which are the exit paths in this intricate network of the Cosmic Web.

This world is a numeral construct delineated along coordinate axes whose intersection is the Origin of life, the focal point of phenomena, yet transcending it, for the Origin exists in principle, never in phenomena which revolve round it. It is not a hypothesis, it is the Reality, not a concept but the core, the substance behind this Ancient Poem, the dream of the One that knows not a second, the One Eternal Being, alone, alone through all eternity without hope of company from any, for none else is but the One that is. And yet the multiplicity abounds, but for whom? Not for the Ancient One but for the many. The many 'exist' for the many for a long but limited time, stretching across vast but limited space, a continuum that is self-manifesting and self-dissolving in cyclical order without beginning or end. To this realm of ignorance belongs the mind whose construct this all is and which is self-constructed. The Self remains beyond, everfree, Consciousness Absolute, Existence Absolute and Bliss Absolute, ever a Unity and never the Trinity that dreams it all. Infinite is the dreamer dreaming finite dreams, to quote Vivekananda with a variance.

So, dream no more. What value do you attach to this momentary motion called terrestrial life that does not in essence derive from your infinite Self? So, smash the dream. Let bonds go and with it bondage. Let all earthly affections dissolve in the Brahman which is the source of all love. May all that you receive and all that you renounce find fulfilment in oblation to the Cosmic sacrificial fire that devours it all to light up the night sky, the screen of this dualistic delusion that hides the Radiant One! May your souls purged of all earthly dross stand revealed as the luminous beads of the Rosary Resplendent whose orbits about the Cosmic Core keep the universe in its cascading rhythms! May you all merge in your final fall into the shoreless sea of radiance whence there is no return! May all souls dissolve in the One that is the Self of all! Om Tat Sat Om!

Written by Sugata Bose

WHERE THE OWL HOOTS NOT NOR THE COCK CROWS ... IN THE DEPTH OF THE MIDNIGHT HOUR [EDITED]

WHERE THE OWL HOOTS NOT NOR THE COCK CROWS ... IN THE DEPTH OF THE MIDNIGHT HOUR [EDITED]

When past the mid-night hour, the screen shifts a little, I behold the stillness of a reality behind the facade of unceasing change. Silent, calm, unruffled stillness without a whirl or a bubble, deep conscious existence. Unconnected, parallel background reality that defies description save in tranquil memory. And yet the page opens in the depth of consciousness in the deep of the nocturnal hour. What a silent revelation! What profundity of perception, integrated, total! Seems then I am alone since eternity without possibility of company. Clear perception of an integrated ethereal space where there is not a dot nor mark, plain wholesomeness, how to express in tangible changeable terms that which is the Beyond. This phenomenal universe then melts away revealing that which is the stillness of Truth. When I now try to express, oh, how language deflects the intended meaning and covers it up all! Perhaps, it may only be kindled in sympathetic souls, the purport of this verbal intent of a consciousness and an existence so unlike this manifold world, so separate, as if hanging alone by itself, self-brooding, consciousness turned back upon itself, unsplit, yet fully conscious, unanalytic, yet knowing, a strange unitary understanding, seamless, total. There no thoughts reach for they have been resolved into their integral base and have so lost their very entity. It is a timeless zone or, should I say, a realm where the flow of time is so faint that the ordinary dissolves and the Real is perceived through the fine mist of Maya. But it is a revealing mist, distorting Reality, true, but removing the grotesque facade that external Nature is, moving and mystifying. The revelation is but incomplete, yet, it is a powerful indicator of the deeper status of things till at the deepest there is a strange disconnect, a quantum leap, so to say, into the realm of the Infinite.

Reality is not what it seems. Reality is fundamentally different from the appearance we call Phenomena. But it is hidden or, should I say, obscured from vision by incessant flow of thoughts which are the derivatives of integral consciousness that transcends this ceaseless fractured flow. Neurobiologists may disagree with these affirmations of mine, dumping them as so many misinterpretations of psychic phenomena capable of neural explanation, hallucinations of the heated brain, the scientifically untrained mind's superstitious averment and I hold their thesis in high regard knowing that they are the product of the best minds over a great period of scientific evolution but I still cannot subscribe to their summary dismissals of these claims of the divine without adequate scrutiny or the right means and methods of doing so. For this is a terrain that lies, as of now, beyond the domain of the physical sciences and therefore demands investigation using the right tools. Even as distant celestial bodies are explored through the telescope, even as miniscule matter is investigated using the microscope, so must these perceptions of the human mind at an altitude be investigated using, if I may coin a term, the 'introscope'. By 'introscope' I mean the introspective analytical mind that sifts the spiritual grain from the material chaff and arrives at spiritual realization. Sages and saints down the ages have vouched for their spiritual experiences and these were men of character whose lives were blemishless and based on truth and who brought about beneficent changes in human society giving civilization purpose and meaning beyond the mundane. But age-old religious affirmations, codified creeds and archaic spiritual myths are all breaking down under the sledgehammer blows of reason and it is right that they should seek their quick cremation in the fire of scientific knowledge. Like the fire of the Inquisition which burnt saint and savant alike, let not, however, this time over, a second such fire be lit which shall consume the best of human culture in the form of its brightest discoveries of the Self of man and the ground of phenomena. Let reason go as far as it can but let reason temper reason and let not wild assertions of over-zealous scientists be misconstrued as the findings of reason for men, scientific or otherwise, are so often perverse in their denunciations and carry personal agenda, preconceptions and prejudices so very delusive that arrogance of material knowledge abrogates sublime realizations of the Spirit even as Church power annulled scientific truths in the Dark Ages.

So it is that while so-called spiritual assertions of the bygone ages may have been in error in many places and, indeed, ancient myths about gods and goddesses are very much so if absorbed literally despite protestations about their so-called historicity and allegorical implications ever shifting in interpretation, though, in the light of the findings of modern science to which these upholders of archaic myths resort to to fulfil their bogus philosophy, and in this I am not particularizing any specific religious tradition but am generally reporting about religious tradition down the ages worldwide, it is equally true that much of mythology contains germs of the sublime truths of life and the transcendence beyond and the evolving culture of man which to discard wholesale in the name of surface reason will be as primitive an act as the most heinous crimes of the burning down of the ancient library of Alexandria and the destruction of civilization by tyrants down the ages. Science is an attempt of the human mind to grapple with the puzzle of existence by empirical means while religion is the same endeavour to unravel the mystery of existence by the exploration of the mind itself through introspection. Religion and science are not antagonistic in their mission. Rather, they are the complementary aspects of the unified quest of man to arrive at a fundamental understanding of Reality. As such, mutual respect can foster a more holistic approach towards the comprehension of the riddle of existence than mutual denunciation can. Great truths of the subjective world have been discovered by sages and saints and equally grand truths of objective reality have been discovered by scientists and these truths, though seemingly contradictory often, are but interpretations from two different standpoints of a single Reality that is not partitioned as men have through their divisive modes reduced them to. Nature is whole and integrated, free of the trappings of the human mind in its present state of evolution and sees no conflict between the spiritual and the material for essentially they are the same, the finer and the grosser states of a unified entity. These artificial distinctions of the subjective and the objective world are constructs of the human mind and have no bearing on the functioning of Nature beyond the deflections caused by the conscious mind in the observation of particle behaviour and therefore have their domain strictly confined within the spectrum of consciousness, thereby leaving the vast field of the superconscious and the subconscious as uncharted zones over which presumptuous pronouncements cannot be passed off as rationalization. Since this is the scenario, it stands to reason to have camaraderie of spirit rather than ideological acrimony if humanity is to arrive at comprehension of the core truth which is the harmony of all forces and therefore is to be approached in a harmonious way, if at all.

Revelations abound in millions of lives in greater or smaller degree and this keeps the cycle of life turning. Discoveries are not the domain solely of scientists but each soul is a conduit of the divine and may perceive truth in whatever miniscule form even in the thoroughfare of life and much more so if one is devoted to the pursuit of truth. All these are cultural enhancements and conglomerate to build civilization. Harmony is the key and is ever the basis for advancement of humanity towards final fruition in the discovery of the underlying oneness of things, be it be approached from the material scientific standpoint or from the spiritual standpoint for it is oneness that all are seeking however unconsciously they may do so. When Einstein explored the universe, he did so to find out the ultimate basis of phenomena, The Unified Field Theory that would explain it all. Today's cosmologists are attempting to find The Theory of Everything in their bid to unravel the cosmic mystery and harmonize the apparently contradictory theories of Relativity and Quantum Mechanics. The concept of the 'singularity' in astrophysics, the black hole, the Big Bang and the Big Crunch are all portentous of human knowledge steadily advancing towards the discovery of the oneness of existence, a fact which the Vedic Rishis ages ago had discovered through their introspective vision, the Self which is the ground of all that exists. Atman = Brahman was the equation they discovered and in trumpet voice declared before the wide world. The forests retreats of the Rishis and their Himalayan caves resonated to the celestial vibration of Om which is the first manifestation of the unmanifest Reality. The waters of the Ganga, the Sindhu and the Saraswati carried along their current the sublime message of the Upanishads, the symphony of the soul. The One had dispersed into the many and the many were rushing on to oneness. The dewdrops had split up the sun rays into the rainbow colours and the colours were conspiring to resolve into their unitary solar status.

All through Nature this game is on, the One manifesting as the many and the manifold tending to resolve into the One. This contrary phenomenon in Nature, the disintegrating mode and the integrating mode, the tendency to fly apart and the reverse tendency to gravitate inward keeps the universe oscillating from cycle to cycle. These contrary modes work in opposition to each other and thereby bring about the grand interplay of cosmic forces and create the ripple we call life. So let science and religion co-exist as comrades-in-arms as humans battle to demystify creation and discover the basis of life.

And yet in the dark deep of the cosmos a voice beckons us ushering us on to some unknown end. Whither do we rush on? Wherefrom the voice comes? Is it from deep within us? And yet, the screen shifts, the curtain lifts a little revealing a stillness that is tranquil, a silence that is conscious. Who are we? I wonder, I wonder.

 Written by Sugata Bose