BEWARE OF FALSE PROPHETS ... 1

It is easy to say that one is practising spiritual disciplines but in the absence of strict continence such practice is but a sham. The foundation of spiritual life is the adherence of the strictest code of physical and psychological purity. Spiritual life entails a heavy expenditure of energy because the mind is naturally geared for outward pursuits and to turn it inward requires a psychological exertion which is impossible to achieve without conserving each and every ounce of energy at one's disposal. Chastity is, thus, the bedrock of spirituality. The energy otherwise dissipated in frivolous sensual pursuits, when conserved and sent inward, raises the system to finer levels whereby subtler truths of nature become apparent whose end-point is the perception of the Self of man. The vital force within man, saved and sublimated, sends the soul careering to higher energy levels where its essential divinity is revealed. But all these are easier said than done. A few words, a motley collection of catchy phrases, some quotes and aphorisms, stray instances of pseudo-reporting of divine realisations by quack gurus (spiritual preceptors) --- these do not make up the substance of genuine spirituality. The true children of the Lord do not advertise on television channels their realisations nor do they fabricate instant stress-busting recipes for the multitude, themselves masquerading as messiahs of men. The glorious ones of God lead silent lives steeped deep in the nectarine bliss of godliness which like the fragrance of springtime flora flows spontaneous from their surcharged beings and transforms many a fortunate one into gods among men. Such are the incarnations of divinity that ought to be followed and not the charlatans posing to be votaries of truth. But truth is ever mixed with untruth in this world of delusion and counterfeits confer with commoners seducing them to their malefic ends and so deluding the fools into self-oblivion for God knows how long! The Hindu scriptures being open-ended, these defrauders among men pass off during their lifetime as illumined personalities and are venerated by millions who in their stupendous ignorance are duped into gullible giving of devotion to these dubious double-dealers and so they forge fresh chains of bondage to the already heavy shackles that bind them to this world of despair and death. Who will open the eyes of men who have chosen to sleep in the wakeful state? Who will smash the delusive dreams of deliberate dolts? Swami Vivekananda had visited planet earth to wake people up. Some did. Others are in hibernation. Till then let the miracle-mongers make money and live in 'palaces of peace', let the stress-busters fake stress away while not talking of the fundamental questions of life like relinquishing desires as the secure means of ridding life of stress and let the belly-twisters tie bells round the necks of their foolish flock and wring them dry while ringing the common commotion. Those that will daydream will find alleyways to untruth at any rate. They form the bulk of the believers and none can take the scales off their eyes easily for instinctive ignorance persists for a while and only the sublimity of eventual inspiration dispels the dark. The Vedanta waits in the wings till then as Maya rules the world of men with her dubious designs ever spreading the web that careers men to their doom after their brief hour of apparent triumph on the stage of this earth.

NETAJI REVISITED ... 1

When the titans met at the crossroads of history --- one only wishes Nehru would have had the character to co-operate with Bose and the whole scenario of independent India would have been so different. But, alas! that was not to be and we pay the price for it. The fact that so much we have lost and so much more stand to lose even today, does not seem to awake us from our slumber, entrenched as we are, a nation in age-old stupor, a torpidity which will eventually destroy us unless we recognise the seminal contributions of our valiant ones like Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose and his leonine followers, the soldiers of our first national army, the I.N.A. Bose was betrayed by Gandhi at Tripuri, then opposed at every step in his victorious military advance towards the borders of India by counter-propaganda by Nehru and finally, in the worst act of perfidy by the then Prime minister of India, he was allowed to rot in a Siberian gulag when the least initiative by Nehru could have brought back the hero home. Such are the imperatives of political friendship to which Bose was an alien and had to necessarily pay the price of.

KARMA YOGA REVISITED ... 1

We are working our way to our death : now let us work our way to our liberation. Death stalks this earth everywhere ; everywhere is its domain. It spares nor prince nor pauper. Emperors die and empires die, worms die and the cosmos dies. There is no permanence in life save the ever-recurring cycle of impermanence. But there is a way out of this vicious cycle. We may work our way to the centre of this terrible wheel of causality for the centre moves not nor the axis of rotation. But every step is fraught with Maya --- deception, delusion, death. Each moment dies so that the next be born. Out of the womb of Maya is born phenomena and into the womb dissolves the same. Magic, mystery, myth!

DEWDROPS 21-25

21. God is universal love.

22. All love is sweet for it proceeds from the Lord.

23. Love is the panacea for the world's ills.

24. Gopi-prem is the sublimest manifestation of love and the highest relativistic representation of the Absolute.

25. Great is the one who accepts all and rejects none.

DEWDROPS 11-20

11. Mother's words are the proof, the sanction, the certification of the validity of the words of the Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna as chronicled by M.

12. Truth loaded with love is God.

13. Shraddha is that intense aspirational mood seeking perfection.

14. Eternally at rest, ever in motion---this paradox is God.

15.We must learn to know more,
We must learn to feel more,

We must learn to serve more.

16. Either banish fear or banish the Lord.

17. Seek ye glory, then seek the Lord,
Seek ye love, then seek the Lord,
Seek ye wealth, then seek the Lord,
Seek ye health, then seek the Lord,
Seek ye freedom, then seek the Lord,
Seek ye peace, then seek the Lord.

18. Everywhere His worship is going on,
Here diabolic,there divine.

19. Holy company dispels ignorance in a trice; so, ever seek the association of the pure children of the Lord.

20.The Presence of God is felt in the heart as love.

HRIDPADMA HOTEY 1

Ma er opor nirbhor kora ki eto sohoj Ma? Protiniyoto ahankaar eshe porey. Aamitwo-buddhi na gele ki aar nirbhorotaa ashey? Sob e kora jachchhe nijo ichhay athocho bolchhi mukhe je sob e Ma er kripay hochhe. Eto paakhi pora shekhano buli, er satyataa kothay? Ashole Ma er naamke Shikhandi kore ahongsarbasya sattwaati kaaj chaliye jay atmosharthocharitarthohetu. Sarbakarma sampaadoney Ma ke asroy kore jini cholen ekanta Tnar jantraswarup hoye, tini e bolte paren je Ma er icchay jagat cholchhe, tnar byaktigato jeebonti o cholechhe Ma er kripay. Protiti nishwas proshwashey Ma er smaran, Ma er naam jop, emonki ajopaa jop hoye cholbe tnar, antarey anander phalgudhara probahito hobe, hridayey robe utsaho, uddipona o apaar prem sarba jeeber proti.

Jeeboner ghaat protighaate jokhon jarjarito, tokhon Matrikror bhinna aar sthan kothay? Athocho sob e ghotchhe Ma ke bhule thakar jonyo, ghatanagulo sob noy, tader protikriyar katha hochchhe. Ghatana ghatey anadisutra karmasringkhal ke kendra kore jar modhye nihito thake nijo nijo karma sanskaargulio. Ey oti gujhya rahasya, bojha bhaar. Tai sharanagati chhara aar upay nei. Jagater ei maharanye karmachakrer abortoney ghurnayoman amra jokhon lakshyabhrashta hoye dishehara hoye jai, jokhon budbuder nyay mone hoy nijeder, jeno antahshaarshunya ek kholoshmatro, tokhon daibokripay jodi aabhyontoreen jogsutrati khnuje payi, taholei jagey antahsthitoh bhaktir phalgudharati jar abolombon sharanaagati.

Ei jagatey kato loker abason kintu sob e toh dudiner. Tobuo ki moho, Ishwarer dike mon karo nei, sob e jagat prapanche mugdho. Jato badoi hok na keu, jatoi protishthito, jodi jagatkey satya mone kore thaken o aashakta jeebon japon koren tobe tini toh baddhajeeb. Aar jodi bhaab-bhakti asroy kore kaaljapon koren, tahole mumukshu, muktir pother pathik.

Asholey ki jano Ma, jeeboney ey pathey keu ashen janmasanskarer dwara abaar keu keu ashen dukkho kashter dwara mahapeeditoh hoye. Jakhon kono dike aar khei paye na manush, jakhon ahangkaarti churna bichurna hoye dnarabar jaygaa thakey na, takhon e 'Hey Ishwar" daak ti swatasphurtabhabe beriye ashe hridayer antasthal hotey. Takhon e jatra shuru hoy gharey pherar.

SOARING IN THE SEVENTIES

Maj Gen Gagandeep Bakshi, what more can one say about the enthusiasm you exhibit in defence of the motherland as you did so well in your days of military service when valiantly you fought for the nation to safeguard its security within and without! You remain an inspiration to so many of us impelling us into patriotic action and you are a tower of strength to the youth as they falteringly channelise their energy along lines of national development and defence. The nation needs to recognise the yeoman service of a septuagenarian ex-serviceman beyond his martial decorations.

It is the passion with which you speak that is the highlight of your personality as every word rings with transparent sincerity and sounds so true, for they are forged in the chambers of your feeling heart where flows the current of national love, pure and simple, valorous and fervent. Swami Vivekananda had once said that very often it is seen those who are innocent in the bloom of their lives, become lying masks of men in their advancing years. How true his words are in this age of terrible pretension and falsity but how utterly inapplicable they are in your case, armed as you are in love for our motherland. The Swami's blessings seem to be on you for you have defied the trend of the age, the temptations of the times and the frailties of failing idealism in the backyard of life's experience. Perhaps this is your martial spirit, innate and self-given, or is it the tempering of the steel of the army-man in training that has lasted you through a lifetime of struggle for the national cause? Whatever it be, India gains from every pulsation of your being geared as it is to her defence against marauders and mercenaries, terrorists and traitorous neighbours. And what blessedness for us that you have been born among us to show us the path of martial courage, sacrifice and zeal in defence of the motherland at an hour of history when our nation feels threatened in its security both from within and without! Souls like you are rare, valorous and virtuous, erudite and emotional, a symphonic blend of head and heart, rooted to the past, yet, ever foraying into the future with childlike enthusiasm so uncharacteristic for your age. Such a one, if I may be permitted a brief dalliance with chauvinism, could have been born only in India, for where else would you find such supernal synthesis of the intellect and the emotion, its edifice rising on the bedrock of an adamantine character rooted to the soil whence sprang the most glorious poesy of the soul.

Maj Gen Gagandeep Bakshi, what remains unsaid, remains in the silent corridors of our selves as we wend our way towards the great ideal of national renaissance guided by the beacon that you are in this dark night of self-delusion that has gripped the minds of millions. We honour a thing when it is dead and gone, and often we do not honour it at all, for appreciation of virtue becomes a virtuous people and not one fallen from grace, honouring one lies in the eye of honour and not one tainted with dishonourable intents galore. Let us value you while you are there with us and not decades hence, posthumously. Let us honour you for you are rightfully honourable and, in so doing, let us set up a precedent for priding in our national glories among which you, Maj Gen Gagandeep Bakshi, occupy pride of place.

Netaji would have been proud of you for the yeoman service you are offering his cause at this late hour of your life in bringing to light the exploits of his liberation army but for whom we would have been in colonial shackles for heaven knows how long. That spirit of the springing tiger which the hero had aspired to quicken in his countrymen has seemingly gripped you for good and it augurs well for the country that gave you birth. More and more of your type, valiant soldiers of the soul, will yet arise out of the womb of the future and reshape the destiny of this nation which is to shower peace and benediction on earth. Jai Hind!

SOARING IN THE SEVENTIES

Maj Gen Gagandeep Bakshi, what more can one say about the enthusiasm you exhibit in defence of the motherland as you did so well in your days of military service when valiantly you fought for the nation to safeguard its security within and without! You remain an inspiration to so many of us impelling us into patriotic action and you are a tower of strength to the youth as they falteringly channelise their energy along lines of national development and defence. The nation needs to recognise the yeoman service of a septuagenarian ex-serviceman beyond his martial decorations.

It is the passion with which you speak that is the highlight of your personality as every word rings with transparent sincerity and sounds so true, for they are forged in the chambers of your feeling heart where flows the current of national love, pure and simple, valorous and fervent. Swami Vivekananda had once said that very often it is seen those who are innocent in the bloom of their lives, become lying masks of men in their advancing years. How true his words are in this age of terrible pretension and falsity but how utterly inapplicable they are in your case, armed as you are in love for our motherland. The Swami's blessings seem to be on you for you have defied the trend of the age, the temptations of the times and the frailties of failing idealism in the backyard of life's experience. Perhaps this is your martial spirit, innate and self-given, or is it the tempering of the steel of the army-man in training that has lasted you through a lifetime of struggle for the national cause? Whatever it be, India gains from every pulsation of your being geared as it is to her defence against marauders and mercenaries, terrorists and traitorous neighbours. And what blessedness for us that you have been born among us to show us the path of martial courage, sacrifice and zeal in defence of the motherland at an hour of history when our nation feels threatened in its security both from within and without! Souls like you are rare, valorous and virtuous, erudite and emotional, a symphonic blend of head and heart, rooted to the past, yet, ever foraying into the future with childlike enthusiasm so uncharacteristic for your age. Such a one, if I may be permitted a brief dalliance with chauvinism, could have been born only in India, for where else would you find such supernal synthesis of the intellect and the emotion, its edifice rising on the bedrock of an adamantine character rooted to the soil whence sprang the most glorious poesy of the soul.

Maj Gen Gagandeep Bakshi, what remains unsaid, remains in the silent corridors of our selves as we wend our way towards the great ideal of national renaissance guided by the beacon that you are in this dark night of self-delusion that has gripped the minds of millions. We honour a thing when it is dead and gone, and often we do not honour it at all, for appreciation of virtue becomes a virtuous people and not one fallen from grace, honouring one lies in the eye of honour and not one tainted with dishonourable intents galore. Let us value you while you are there with us and not decades hence, posthumously. Let us honour you for you are rightfully honourable and, in so doing, let us set up a precedent for priding in our national glories among which you, Maj Gen Gagandeep Bakshi, occupy pride of place.

Netaji would have been proud of you for the yeoman service you are offering his cause at this late hour of your life in bringing to light the exploits of his liberation army but for whom we would have been in colonial shackles for heaven knows how long. That spirit of the springing tiger which the hero had aspired to quicken in his countrymen has seemingly gripped you for good and it augurs well for the country that gave you birth. More and more of your type, valiant soldiers of the soul, will yet arise out of the womb of the future and reshape the destiny of this nation which is to shower peace and benediction on earth. Jai Hind!

STOP THIS SENSELESS SACRIFICE

Animal rights demands that animal slaughter on days of religious festivals be curbed through legal measures. There should be legislation regarding this. There is widespread slaughter of animals in a reprehensible manner which can only awaken the murderous element in man and is totally a baneful influence on the impressionable minds of children. These blossoms of dawn ought to be protected from these nefarious practices and their human sensitivity safeguarded from utter erosion by passing stringent laws that do not allow mass slaughter of animals on days of festivity. A merciful God, if there is one such for the ones invented by barbarous man all seem to delight in these gory spectacles that are intended to appease their insatiable thirst for innocent blood, surely does not crave for the suffering and death of His/Her children and animals are the children of God as well. No parent can wish in his wildest nightmares the death and destruction, the torture and torment of his own child and God, being supremely great, can hardly be ascribed this malevolence which is so utterly undivine, to put it mildly. Has anyone ever cared to consult the kid its opinion about its impending sacrifice on the block? I wish the mother of the kid, the she-goat, is conferred with as well! These are archaic practices rolling down the ages through fear of a malevolent God who is the invention of ancient man groping to find light in a dark primitive world. No amount of rationalisation or scriptural citations may validate this barbaric religious practice which is cruel to the core and in no way may be held to be awakening the higher impulses of love and charity which are the essence of all human virtue. To perpetuate these acts of 'piety' will be to keep nurturing the seeds of violence in the nursery of the human heart. Time it is, indeed, that we get past these notions of divine help and divine retribution over the trivialities of life and concern ourselves more with human issues among which number no less an issue than the senseless killing of animals and, that too, on a mass scale in which all and sundry are made to participate. When such is the state of the human heart which seems devoid of pity by decree of scripture and is so easily induced into acts of cruelty against the dumb creatures of God who can neither understand nor protest against atrocity perpetrated against them, it seems religion in the real sense is a far cry for humanity as of now. What the morrow holds for us is a matter of conjecture but how we deliberate over this issue today shapes our human destiny, for a species that unthinkingly kills other species endangers its very terrestrial existence in the long run. Violence begets violence and cruelty boomerangs upon its perpetrator. So, in all sanity let us desist from being naive about our malevolence and start afresh in our bid to be truly spiritual by treating the creatures of God with respect and love. May the Mother of the universe instil kindly feelings in our heart! May all creatures feel fearless in our presence! May our devotions be devoid of desecration of life which is the gift of God and ought to be regarded as the end of devotion and not its means! May the light dawn on all who revel in animal sacrifice that killing our brethren does not befit us, aspirants as we are for the higher end of the spiritual quest! Jai Ma!

A SAINT'S DIARY ... 3

As I gaze into the future of my people, I wonder how big a price Mother will extract before She delivers strength to Her children here in India when there shall be a semblance of equality not merely of opportunity but of actualised education in the secrets of the science of the Self so that all and sundry will have the spiritual wherewithal to stand up and proclaim with voice of truth that they are divinities here on earth with nothing to fear, that they are the custodians of the spiritual treasures of the Vedas which are their national inheritance, that, more so, they are the spiritual guardians of humanity with a destiny to fulfil and that they have a mission to awaken the dormant divinity in all the peoples of the world so that this earth is a play-field of the Divine and not a war zone spelling the doom of its inhabitants. Such a vision comes through the prism of my consciousness, vastly refracted and dispersed into divergent modes and methods, the elements incongruously combined and ever battling for settlement into order but never quite attaining the harmony they seek. Peace is, thus, a far cry as predator nations prey upon their targets to fulfil their terrestrial goals of consumption even though they entail such a heavy human price. I despair to see humans relate to their physical origins more than to their spiritual roots, feeding ego with the fuel of desire and denying the very basis of their selves, their very existence, in a massive bid towards self-annihilation, a 'harakiri' that knows no end in honour or virtue but that which is a self-denial tending to futility. Such a waste of human resource, such wanton killing of innocence in the bud, such hatred perpetrated by theory and theology, such abysmal abuse of perfidious power sounding the death-knell of humanity by the day, when all these are projected before the vision in an unceasing stream of infertile images, I wonder if humanity has lost its mind in a manner that marauding Maya is finding a reversal an absurd proposition.

Here on the banks of the Ganga with the autumn breeze ushering in cascading streams of the scented breath of God, I can scarce imagine that out there in the deep dark is being perpetrated the grossest violation of virtue and vice is reigning over tormented people with tentacles far outstretched into the nether world where all is dense and dark. My life seems inconsequential as I mutely witness the misery of the masses, the silent suffering of the soul, the pain inflicted on the dumb creatures of God who know not for what sin they suffer the horrors of life and death even as the devout relish the substance of their form in primitive piety. Passivity is the defence of the weak and passivity is perfidy. I find myself culpable of this enormous betrayal of the populace and of the wider blasphemy of being ineffective in preaching the gospel of the divinity of sentience across the wide world such that such stupendous ignorance abounds about the identity of man and his divine focus having been shrouded in the mist of materialism, he is gravitating to his impending doom.

Cross-currents of thoughts and hopes, aspirations and despairs, bliss and sorrow, flit across this frame of mine and beholding the scale of human tragedy being enacted across the globe, I feel responsible to carry forth the message of the Vedanta to as many as I possibly can and so trigger off a movement that will disseminate the seeds of wisdom across the hills and dales of the wide world. As of now, I ponder the possibilities, the potentialities of this lost human race and seek to discover a solution to bring it back on to the divine track whence it has been temporarily displaced by the workings of enigmatic Maya. May Thakur be my guide! May Mother illumine my path! May Swamiji energise my endeavour! Om!        

A SAINT'S DIARY ... 2 ... THE THREE MUSKETEERS

Today, three youngsters came to see me. They seemed to have lost faith in God and right away challenged me to prove the existence of God. I asked them as to whom I should prove the proposition. When they said that it was to them that my proof was to be furnished, I was amused and asked them if it ought not to be first proved that they themselves existed so that I could for sure know that there was after all some recipient of my statement of proof as to God's existence. Now they were in a quandary and, intelligent as they were, understood the implication of my primary demand. They, nonetheless, proceeded to argue as follows:

Youth: Why, sir, to me of course?

I: To you? But I am not sure if you exist although apparently it may seem that I do believe that you do for I am, after all, addressing you, isn't it? But to furnish my proof about the existence of God, well, rationally speaking, ought I not be made convinced that, after all, my opponent exists in the first place?

Youth: Yes, for sure it ought to be and I do exist for you can see me.

I: Now imagine I go away from this place and then I cannot see you. So, as per such reasoning, you do not seem to exist, isn't that so?

Youth: No, but the others out here who will remain will continue to see me and vouch for my existence.

I: Imagine that all your friends are forcibly removed from here or voluntarily for some reason choose to leave this place. Then, for sure, such reasoning makes you non-existent, isn't it?

Youth: But I continue to see myself.

I: Then let me do one thing. Let me call an anaesthetist and he will induce temporary unconsciousness in you. Then you will neither be able to see yourself nor feel yourself. Now, surely, you will admit that there will remain to you no proof of your existence just as there is none every night in deep sleep. Tell me now if you are still convinced that you exist from the rational standpoint or have you started doubting your very existence. You may say that you experience your existence in the waking state but are you not then non-existent in the deep sleep state or in the temporarily unconscious state of which you have no recollection whatsoever when you apparently wake up from it? Strange situation, isn't it, when you cannot prove your own existence beyond any reasonable doubt and, yet, hazard to challenge the existence of God who is existence itself. Now, my dear friend, do you follow that sages and saints have not in vain been spending priceless hours of their lives in search of the one reality behind this ever-shifting dream of phenomena which is insubstantial and a curious mixture of truth and falsity and, therefore, in summation false.

Youth: Sir, you have opened my eyes and have blessed me with a fine understanding that those who argue vainly like us without pondering deeply the questions of life find themselves terribly flawed in perception of this subtlest of realities which devotees lovingly call God. Pranam Maharaj.

I: God bless you, my children. Do not forget what Swami Vivekananda had said about Indians. He had said that however much an Indian may try to be an atheist, he will eventually see that he could not be one, for faith in God runs deep in the psyche of the nation and this is founded not on superstition but on the realisation of countless sages and saints who have trodden the dust of this holiest of lands on earth, the blessed punyabhumi Bharatvarsha. Now go and try to set yourselves to activating this faith through service to the motherland beholding everyone as God-incarnate. May Sri Ramakrishna bless you all!

The three youngsters prostrated at the shrine of Sri Ramakrishna and took their leave of Thakur, beaming with an unearthly joy that they had, perhaps, not experienced before. Jai Ramakrishna!  

A SAINT'S DIARY ... 1

I feel a great austerity dawning on my soul as I drift into the river of God. I feel a wonderful freedom --- freedom from the cares of the world, freedom from the shackles of life, freedom from the bondage of the body. There is a repose in me far from the hustle of life where no one raises the dust of desire besetting me. I feel a tranquillity that soothes, a transcendence that seems an altered reality and an unearthly peace that settles the warring forces within me to relocate me in the innocence of infancy, of a variant hue, of a higher order. Boundless am I, perfect am I, infinitude is my status among the finities of the world.

This life is a passing dream, a career of inconsequence, a plaything for the soul. Who knows what awaits, who cares to know? Life lingers on awaiting deliverance from the forces that forge it. In the fullness of the season of bloom shall efflorescence be and then the fruition of love for the withering of this world like a tale told in a void that never was. This paradox predominates the plurality of suppositions and must wither away when knowledge dawns of the essence of things. Then the vision clears and the Self is seen as the immutable being, eternal, solitary, the One without a possible second, lonesome beyond repair, the imperishable reality, the ground of all existence, Existence itself.

On the verge of such a shore am I standing while the billows keep lashing against the rocks that guard the citadels of consciousness, the frothy edges of the waves keep kissing the sands of time. I wonder what it is to be free after all this terrestrial dream, this horrible nightmare of a ghoulish existence when every impulse tends towards captivity within the confines of this finite form and lends immeasurable suffering to the soul. What will be the release like, whither am I bound when boundless I am?

The mood of the moment encompasses all of time as I behold the panoramic existence of colour and light through the mist of Maya but yet discern that all this is unreal in eventual terms. I stand gazing on the infinite stretch of the beyond from the interface of life with a drifting appreciation of all that has been and all that may yet perchance for the future is unknown even to the discerning soul till final freedom squashes it all to a point of gravitating end when Maya disappears in a final act of self-delusion and the Self is revealed in all its majesty or perhaps not.

Right now the ripples surface and dissolve in an unceasing stream of quasi-consciousness where truth and untruth play about in the haze of inwardness tending to illumination that waits in the wings of the theatre that life is. I hang on with it, for that which is mine may not be denied me and liberation is the life to be even as bondage drops off forever. Om! 

JEEBON 1

Manushya jeeboney abiram sangram paristhitir shathey, utpeeronkari prokritir biruddhey juddha, bohirprokriti o antarprokriti, ja amader dasatya sringkhaley aboddho rekechhey. Ei utpeeron otikrom korte hobe, ei dasatya dur korte hobe, ei domon hotey nirmukta korte hobe nijeder jodi swiyoswadhinata punoruddhar korte hoy bastuto ja amader sahajato anantasattwaa. Adhikangshoi kintu emonee indriyograhya bishoye emonee neshagrasta je tnara bodh e korte paren na je tnara karmasringkhaley aboddho, poradheen, nirantar karmer ashta pashey aboddho ja hotey mukti duruho. Bhromatmobuddhitey tai amra itostoto bichoron kori kintu dukkha kashto jwara byadhi eraatey pari na. Krome amader jaubaner apaato swadhinata bhoger progolbhotar prayoshchitta korte hoy o prokriti tnar bichaarer saja shonan --- mrityadanda. Jeeboner opor aksmat jabanika patan hoy, ek chhatraakaar jeeboner apurna adhyayer sushamaheen porisamapti. Indriyoporobosh hoye eibhabe, janmo hotey janmantarey cholechhi amra, lokshyoheen satirtha, Mayar dwara prohrito, protarito, tobu amaratwer supto anubhutir dwara anuronito ja amader probuddho kore keerti, jnan o shaktir aasprihar madhyomey kintu nirantar baasonar samudrasaliley sthiti na pay. Atmajnan lupto hoy mohomorichikar indrajaaley o chaturghurnaney jeebon porjudusto hoy budbudsamo ashantasagarey jetha kshanmatro-astitwa pheynil deher. Ehyano astitwa amader, probol propritir hastey bondi kintu jnake baidik Hindura Adyaashaktirupe chinhito korechhen, sarbabastur niyonta jini.

LIFE 1

Human life is a constant battle against circumstances, a veritable war against oppressive Nature, external and internal, holding us down to be her bondmen. This oppression must be overcome, this servility given up, this dominance thwarted as we struggle to regain our lost freedom, our inherent status of infinitude. Most of us are so intoxicated with the wine of fleeting sensory pleasures that we fail to even recognise that we are, after all, in captivity to consequence where the incessant flow of work binds us in fetters with apparently no hope of breaking free. So, in delusion we drift but cannot escape pain, misery, sorrow or disease as we are brought to book for our earlier misadventures into a supposed sensory freedom and handed out the standard penalty of death. Thus, our life's saga ends for the while abruptly and imperfectly, an inharmonious end to a dispersed living. Bound to the senses, in this way, we travel from life to life, pilgrims without purpose, hounded by Maya, haunted by a secret sense of immortality that manifests itself as an aspiration for achievement, knowledge and power but cannot find repose in a sea of ceaseless desires. Knowledge of our spiritual Self is lost in a maze of myriad mirages and we are buffeted by the four winds to live, a bubble in a swirling sea with as much endurance as frothy form permits. Thus, we are, held to ransom by a tyrannous force we call Nature but which the Hindus of Vedic lore identified as the Spirit, the mover of things.

DEWDROPS 1-10

He who shares, cares;
He who cares, shares.

Who loves the most, lives the most,

For all of life is threaded in love.

The cosmos is held in love divine.

A kind word may save a life;

A life saved may save the world.

Sleep covers up consciousness

But divine dreams awake one

To the One within.

The hours of toil

Will be the hours of fruition.

Let us daily die

To infuse life into the masses.

The poor are divinities on earth;

Serving them is the highest worship.

The surface-whirl is Maya.

Dive deeper to behold the beloved.

God is
Where time is not.

WORTH A WHILE

There is a terrible erosion of ideals today all over the world. Materialism has reared its ugly head once more. It is time now to go back to Vivekananda and manifest character to save the world from impending disaster.

The sesquicentennial celebrations of Swamiji may be over but the work carries on. The Ramakrishna Mission is carrying on the welfare activities initiated by it then with the help of funds received from the Government of India on the occasion of the 150th year celebration. Massive projects have been undertaken for the uplift of the people of India in selected zones and need a perpetual inflow of funds for the maintenance of the projects. Devotees of the Mission, do come forward and help the cause along with liberal contributions from your side. It will conduce to the well-being of the nation. Jai Hind! Jai Ramakrishna!