Once more we are celebrating Sri Ramakrishna's birth anniversary. Once more festivities are on as we rejoice over the coming of the Master in our midst. He who is birthless has to assume a human form to conduct his terrestrial play with devotees and at a deeper level to set right the lost balance of of forces in this theatre of human action. One wonders how the Master's birthday may have been celebrated by his family in his boyhood but it is a recorded fact, however, that his disciples and devotees did celebrate it with great devotion at Dakshineswar in his final years on Earth and thereafter even after his passage from the terrestrial domain. The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna gives vivid description of the joyous celebrations of the Master's birthday, how he used to be clad in new attire and how the Temple Garden of Dakshineswar became a veritable mart of joy as devotees through the day sang and danced centering the Master in ecstatic delight and the Master, brimful with bliss, now in outer conscious, now immersed in samadhi, savoured each moment of it like a bonny child. Thus was set the golden tradition of the celebration of the Master's birthday and it continues even today when the Belur Math and its numerous branch centres throughout the world send cascades of spiritual bliss rolling through the consciousness of the multitude and awakening the spiritual potentiality of man. Such a day is today, the 180th birthday of Sri Ramakrishna. We pray to the Master that millions may be drawn to him today for their eternal good and that thousands of souls may be quickened into spiritual consciousness by the gracious touch of this holy day when the Lord did make his advent on Earth 179 years ago.
The significance of Sri Ramakrishna's birth is gradually dawning on man. Two World Wars and countless confrontations of the global powers for political and ideological supremacy in the world have left humanity mauled and scarred with no peace whatsoever. The world is at the crossroads of its development, civilization is suspended over an abyss by a slender thread and humanity is facing the spectre of an eventual doom too soon for comfort. If the world is to survive, it will have to follow the message of Ramakrishna, his universalism, his catholicity, his all-encompassing compassion, his great civilization of spirit. Herein lies the historical significance of Ramakrishna and the importance of stirring up enthusiasm in his name on his birthday so that millions may be pulled into his ambit amidst the gaiety of the day. Swami Vivekananda was strongly in favour of celebration of the Ramakrishna birthday for this very reason. His idea was that even if people took the name of Ramakrishna and remembered him for this one day of the year, his birthday, and participated in the proceedings, cultural and spiritual, at the Ramakrishna monasteries, it would do them a world of good, so strongly was Swamiji convinced of the efficacy of festivity in the name of his divine Master.
Our own devotion found efflorescence on these delightful days in our youth when we frequented Belur Math from morning 7 till evening 7, savouring every bit of the celebration and filling our hearts and minds brimful with spiritual joy. True it is that, today, as we go down memory lane, the chorus of joyous school children marching with the band and singing songs of praise to Thakur strike distant chords so reminiscent of the brightest days of our lives. And we remember how Bharat Maharaj, then 97, came down to listen to the discourse given by Swami Lokeswarananda in the afternoon at 3, a rare occasion indeed for devotees to witness when the gods assembled to hear the Brahmajnani speak. And what a swirling crowd, a veritable sea of devotees, rushed to gather the dust of Swami Lokeswaranandaji's feet after the then Assistant General Secretary of the Ramakrishna Math and Ramakrishna Mission, Swami Atmasthananda, had fallen at the Swami's feet. What a wave it was, a swirling mass of humanity coursing through towards the Swami towering over all of them and blessing them with upraised undulating hands even as he pacified their rising enthusiasm! The scene has remained etched in my memory and all this happened in front of the Main Temple of Sri Ramakrishna as Swami Lokeswaranandaji made his way towards the lecture podium on the lawn beside on this very day, the birth anniversary of Thakur in the year 1985.
Such then is the way Thakur's birthday has gripped my memory, that of early morning procession of school children with their bands, worship, homa, devotional songs, the multitude of devotees lined up for sacramental food (prasad), afternoon plays and spiritual discourses, and the riot of the ochre flushing spiritual emotions in devotees like us. And who can forget the unforgettable fervour of the vesper service as Swamiji's composition 'Khandana bhava bandhana' rolled across the Ganga towards Kashipur and Dakshineswar where the Master had sported in his earthly sojourn just the other day?
This is Belur Math for you, home of the sages, the abode of peace, refuge of devotees and the parlour of God for who else is seated on the thousand-petalled lotus of the sanctum sanctorum of the temple therein but the peerless Paramahamsa, the prophet of the times, the incarnation divine, the source of all beatitude.
Come ye brethren and join in the rush for the divine on this hallowed morn and make your lives a pilgrimage on this heaven of Bharatbhumi (the landmass of India) where the spiritual currents of the universe have met their confluence and an inundation of the world has sprung forth with the ethereal vibrations of the Vedas. May ye all bathe in its cleansing current and rise rejuvenated 'children of immortal bliss'!
Pranam Thakur. Jai Sri Ramakrishna! Jai Ma! Jai Swamiji Maharaj! Jai Ganga Mayee!
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