WHEN THE HUMAN HEART FEELS AND THE HUMAN HAND SERVES ... 2
Swamiji himself had suffered the agony of terrible poverty after the sudden demise of his father and had somehow failed to secure a proper means of livelihood for his family. When all doors were shut on him, he entreated his spiritual master, Sri Ramakrishna, to pray to Mother Kali that he might be relieved of his material misery. But things did not quite work out that way as Swamiji sought from the Divine Mother the five-fold boon of knowledge, devotion, discrimination, dispassion and the uninterrupted vision of the Mother.
In due course of time, after his Master's death, Swamiji renounced home and hearth, leaving his unprotected family to the hazards of grinding poverty and starvation. He rationalised that he had to sacrifice his own ones in order to be the fit carrier of his Master's message for the benefit of greater humanity. The few had to be sacrificed for the common weal, for the larger good of the world. Ramakrishna's message could not be allowed to be lost to posterity for want of a carrier apostle who would be its conduit to the world. So Swamiji rationalised and so he renounced the world.
But even in renunciation grinding poverty did not leave him as he and his brother disciples braved a million hardships of life in the Baranagar Math to set up before future humanity the epic example of leading the life of the Spirit amid desperate material circumstances.
End of Part 2
To be continued...
Written by Sugata Bose
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