Wednesday 1 November 2017

FLASHES OF LIGHT

1. Shraddhaa is that intense reverential mood seeking perfection.

2. Dharma is not religion and varna is not caste. Let these misconceptions be cleared.

3. Cultural and psychological conditioning holds a vast section of mankind in medieval mindset giving rise to sectarian strife.

4. Either the poisoned environment or a nuclear holocaust will end man's vanity on earth unless the miracle of sanity prevails.

5. Einstein had predicted the endangered environment to be a worse enemy of future man than the nuclear threat.

6. The beast in man yet lives on, suppressed, never eliminated, ready to strike at an unguarded moment and take us back to the forests.

7. There is a power more telling in purity than the strongest impure will can command.

8. It is not good enough to be good, one has to be strong as well.

9. Man's life on earth has been one of continuous creativity. Thus has civilisation been built.

10. Conditioning at birth leads to a lifetime of superstition and they want to add on to it.

11. I eat unto God, I sleep unto Him; I drink unto God, I breathe unto Him. This is the austerity of my Self.

12. The dark clouds gather and there will be dark rain, yet, man does not wake up.

13. Ingrained cowardice is difficult to root out even as valour inborn remains with one.

14. The very language must be virile and culture virile, too, for heroes to be born who will build the nation.

15. The plight of the masses is in their penury, a state thrust unto them by exploitation of the owners of capital.

16. When man demeans himself, he seeks refuge in 'godmen'.

17. Patriotism is one of hourly living, of daily dedication, of lifelong sustenance.

18. When silence becomes dynamic, the highest activity prevails.

19. Tranquillity is the seed-bed of all fruition.

20. One's gathered thoughts resolve into consciousness.

21. Devotion is reverential feeling, not mean subservience.

22. Cosmetic changes aren't enough ; transformation must be from deep within.

23. The idle while away time even as time approaches with its death noose to adorn their necks.

24. Civilisation is built upon ages of labour ; let us not undo it in a moment of sheer folly.

25. Faith has one fanatical pitfall and that is to be avoided for the free flourishing of the human soul.

26. The environment poses the greatest threat. Let us face it fair and square. The lost balance of Nature must be forthwith restored.

27. Destroy vegetation and you destroy life. Afforestation holds the key to life on earth.

28. Ramakrishna is not just a tidal wave of the spiritual ocean, he is the ocean itself. He is the inner reality of existence.

29. The very name 'Ramakrishna' sanctifies. His is the holy touch that never fails to transform dross unto unto purest gold.

30. The days of partitioning the world into the East and the West have gone. It is now time to integrate it. But cultural differences barring the way, it is an onerous task, though not unattainable.

31. The average person's will is very weak. He cannot take up anything worthwhile and finish it to perfection. He, thus, succumbs to to the superior will of unscrupulous politicians.

32. Einstein and Hitler --- what a study in contrast!

33. Pacifism is the only way out in a world of proliferating nuclear arsenal.

34. The freer you are of the shackles of past conditioning, the brighter your future will be.

35. Our country will rise only when time is well-spent by the average citizen in the pursuit of creative activity.

36. Europeans, Arabs and Americans have been especially cruel as they've played with a lot of power without adequate spiritual wisdom.

37. Dissatisfaction is the seed of future peacefulness.

38. Human selfishness is at the root of mass poverty of the world.

39. Vain luxurious living at one end of the social spectrum creates terrible poverty at the other. It is time for humanity to take stock of the situation, else, revolution will resolve matters.

40. If you wish to realise God, beat time. Time beaten, the causal relations will break freeing you.

41. You are held in bondage as in a dream. In the fullness of time the dream will break freeing you.

42. It is a strange dream in which the will asserts its freedom to finally smash the dream.

43. The ancestral line must be honoured for it is the provider of this body where the austerity for freedom is to be performed.

44. Take up one object of study and dedicate your whole attention to it. Concentration perfected, its focus shall shift unto higher ends till your very soul becomes your subject of study. Then shall illumination be, then shall freedom come.

45. Truth has a rectilinear propagation to it unto freedom where lies its very essence. Be ever truthful.

46. The mighty do not realise that it is cowardice that prompts them to use force against the weak. Valour ever restrains itself to the task of protection of the weak.

47. Look to the worth of the word, not the assumption wrought in infatuation about its progenitor by your self-demeaning mind. Principle, not personality is the watchword.

48. Principle, not personality is the watchword.

49. This world, they say, is a comedy of errors. Oh, what a tragedy it seems though! But when freedom comes, comedy it seems indeed.

50. I cannot imagine where I would be had Ramakrishna not been born. In what dark dungeon of despair would I dwell till the end came.

51. Now Ramakrishna is, so there is life, there is light, there is joy, there is freedom.

52. The mind is not to be confused with the Self for the mind is changeable, not the Self. The mind dwells within the realm of relativity, not the Self which ever abides as the transcendent absolute reality.

53. Body-consciousness is this world of phenomenal dreams.

54. From the rational standpoint this universe falls, yet, how real it seems in its persistent relativity.

55. A cannonball of the Spirit Ramakrishna fired unto humanity. It exploded as Vivekananda transforming it to its very depths.

56. Love is a great power. Few comprehend it beyond the delight of the emotion quickened. Yet, it potently can transform the individual, evolving him even unto godhead.

57. Centuries of misrule results in revolution. Then there is no hope for the monarchy. The people's will overruns all.

58. There is a seamless transition in Nature as evolutionary transformation takes place. A graded movement, gradual, slow, seems to be the evolutionary mode.

59. The elements work in the exactitude of bondage fraught with a terrible fear, but the child of light works in bliss, fearless in the perfection of freedom.

60. In a decision between the head and the heart ever follow the heart but never the fanatical death-wielding devil called raw emotion.

61. Evolution is through a nocturnal tunnel unto the aspired dawn of freedom.

62. It is an eternal infinite Life phased out in alternate bands of little lives and deaths.

63. The huge losses of life may only be compensated in a return to terrestrial living in a fresher incarnation. Else, it is such a terrible waste.

64. The critical faculty must be developed in our people for them to live lives of freedom. Indiscriminate subservience to authority have well-nigh ruined the possibilities of a nation whose inheritance, ironically, is the vibrant idea of spiritual freedom.

65. The effective fusion of individuality and collective living holds the key to the flourishing of future civilisation.

66. Revolution releases the fury of a suppressed people gone berserk owing to the frenzy of the times and the absence of a rudder to control them. Evolution is, thus, a better way to reform society but then, who listens to the voice of sanity when calmer times prevail? They keep on exploiting the masses till the time comes when it is a case of no return and barbarism replaces the ideals revolution has fought for. Indiscriminate carnage of innocents becomes the order of the day as chaos reigns everywhere, leaders in-fight and the breakdown of system releases the forces of anarchy giving way to terror. By the time a semblance of sanity returns, countless victims have been sacrificed at the altar of liberty which flees the terrain as tyranny replaces revolutionary triumph and fouls the fruit of freedom.

67. The life of the soul is in abstinence from contact with the senses.

68. There comes a time when the weary soul wishes to rest but is too tired even to do so, for even that entails labouring on to rest.

69. In this violent world of man where every word is an arrow aimed at an adversary, peaceful is he who seeks refuge in his soul.

70. Violence seem to be ingrained in man, the legacy of his long confinement in the animal body when a violent survival was the key.

71. Of what avail is a human birth if the life thereof is to be spent in chasing trivial dreams? Pursue a golden ideal in life.

72. My life it seems a gift from God to be rightly used in fulfilling Him. For us the charge to spread the word that He is with us here.

73. The delight of the senses must not drag us into the mire of this material world in  a manner that the way to godhead is barred.

74. How far infatuation chases this earthly dream, even unto the man of renunciation!

75. Ramakrishna belongs to the whole world and not to India alone. The Sanatan Dharma is universal in character with no localised boundaries.

76. The will tempered by reason and illumined by wisdom must guide humanity, not dictators, megalomaniac and power-drunk.

77. How long must man dwell in the fantasy of the imaginary God while the real God suffers everywhere?

78. Not a copper must be spent in building statues, even of the holiest of icons, while the masses daily starve.

79. It is a long night ahead, the summit is nowhere to be seen and we must trudge on through the dense dark of uncharted terrain.

80. Cry till thy tears be poesy.

81. Infinity is not to be caught in dimensions but in the transcendence thereof.

82. While there is time, let us work lest we lament when the guns have cooled.

83. Between the word and the truth it symbolises there is such a gulf.

84. Spirituality has nothing to do with cowardice. The brave alone are fit for realisation of the Self.

85. Running away from the struggle of the times to take refuge beyond the borders is akin to betrayal of the cause of freedom.

86. Those that sacrificed their all for freedom are far higher spiritual beings than he who ran away and from distance preached.

87. The love of this little self has little to do with spirituality. Obliteration of the small self, its very oblivion is its substance.

88. The love of self ruins all spiritual potential. It is the love of the Self that regains it. The beggar gone, the Emperor reveals.

89. Unconcern for the people results in revolution gruesome in the long run. The French Revolution serves to testify this.

90. The wise clarify the air on one side, the unwise sully it. This duality carries on through endless cycles and this is Maya.

91. Do not spread the vile contagion of disease through indiscriminate mixing when ill. Quarantine yourself.

92. One cannot talk to a person who is looking elsewhere. What glory, I wonder, is in such distraction, habitual and deliberate?

93. Rest when your body needs it ; do not overwork to ill-health.

94. Intelligence is the cerebral safeguard against precipitation into crude error. Civilisation springs forth from such intelligence.

95. In this lonesome world we seek solace in the company of reflections of our own selves who we call 'others'.

96. It took revolution to end privilege. Else, the privileged would scarce give up control. But capitalism has engendered fresh privilege.

97. Starving men understand the philosophy of bread better than metaphysics. It is dangerous to deprive the masses for good.

98. The whole world is hungry for love. There is such an agony in the human heart. Material comfort cannot satisfy this emptiness.

99. Is not the life of a poor peasant as valuable as that of a rich aristocrat? Is not life fundamentally sacred?

100. The corrupt clergy and the aristocracy sucked the lifeblood of the French people till revolution sought its revenge bloodier still.

101. Swami Bhuteshananda had said," We do not want revolution. We want evolution."

102. That the poor in India are spiritual enough to bear the miseries of life does not mean they have to be given a death-deal in life.

103. This life is an unceasing battle ending in the inevitability of death. Yet, there is a way out, they say, and it is to wage war on Maya.

104. What is civilisation if it cannot provide for all and must cater only to the privilege of a few to enjoy life at the cost of all?

105. Life's a brief flicker of intermittent hope and despair ending in the tragedy of death. We must look beyond to seek freedom.

106. Ages of exploitation and torture of the masses have built the civilisation we so vaunt of, yet, the masses starve and suffer. Why?

107. Why must any of public money be misspent in building statues even of prophets while their living selves suffer in the masses?

108. Responsible men do not misspend money on statues, cold and dead. They save it to give life to living men daily dying everywhere.

109. I am the conscience of my people, so saith the Lord. Behold the Lord arises among the multitude in their might unfurled.

110. The rate at which we are progressing falls short of the rate at which we ought to. The result could be cataclysmic.

111. The blood of royalty is indeed blue. Else, royals would not have so carelessly spilled the red blood of their poor subjects.

112. How can the prosperous pray for mercy when they show no mercy in exploiting all for their life's pleasures?

113. Once the ire of the masses has been quickened, retribution of a violent kind follows. Knowing this, capitalists, beware!

114. As people's awareness unfolds through the proliferation of education, the days of rampant exploitation will be at an end. Educate!

115. Th events of life are threaded in memory. Some are life-transforming, some deflecting from its main course, others inconsequential.

116. Materialism pays its price in the end. It brings forth anarchy and the doom of a people with it. Then springs spirituality.

117. Can force hold the masses for long, be it imperial or ideological? Is freedom not the precondition for growth?

118. When materialism gains ground in the name of revolution, decay of human values comes in its wake and terror replaces freedom.

119. When men rejoice over revolution that has gone berserk in seeking violent vengeance over the 'enemy', they show their animal nature.

120. The Bolshevik Revolution was a barbaric revolution that set in unprecedented tyranny the world over for near a century.

121. Dictatorship of the proletariat or the dictatorship of the Party, of the Central Committee, of the Politburo and of the General Secretary?

122. Wickedness and evil cannot be condoned in the name of revolution. Barbarism must not replace barbarism. Civilisation must set in.

123. The overhauling of a repressive State machinery and replacement by a benign one is scarce accomplished in a sudden revolution.

124. So long there is oppression on earth where the multitude suffer, there will be revolution to replace the existing order.

125. Unless there is sufficient manifestation of humanity in people, no revolution will succeed in bringing about human good.

126. The powers that exploit leave no room for evolution of the masses under the conditions that be. Then revolution lets itself loose.

127. So long as egotism persists in the human soul, human suffering shall never cease.

128. In this age of declining culture let us look to the geniuses of the past to seek fresh insight into what culture is all about.

129. In this age of mass mediocrity and rampant commercialisation of culture the finer elements that compose culture are being lost.

130. Rare comes a singer whose voice catches the notes where they dwell in their habitual glory. All bypass the notes when they sing.

131. Why perform before the audience before you have honed your skills over decades? Why sing this awful off-note lyrical nonsense?

132. The system should be such it will disallow mediocrity into eminence. Only then will the standard of excellence rise in the arts.

133. Nivedita hated cowardice. In celebrating her sesquicentenary let us manifest this attribute of valour and be men of substance.

134. The absolute dedication of an Irishwoman to the cause of India should make us rethink our position on our motherland.

135. We are yet to wake up to the phenomenon that Margaret Elizabeth Noble was. Swamiji understood and dedicated her to India.

136. Nivedita's personality was as complex as it was profound and it will take the passage of centuries before she is fully comprehended.

137. Nivedita's greatest contribution to humanity was in her interpretation of the inner workings of her master's mind.

138. Nivedita's seminal work for womanhood was the seed out of which sprang the Sri Sarada Math. But behind it lay the Mother's power.

139. The precipitous decline of culture is the characteristic of this age of the proletariat.

140. The mediocrity of followers so often mars the message of the Master.The principle is lost in the personality.

No comments:

Post a Comment