THE MASTER'S MISSION ... 1

THE MASTER'S MISSION ... 1

They do not represent Thakur. Truth alone does even as Thakur represents Truth, he being its embodiment in manifest terms and its dissolution in the Absolute.

Institutionalising Truth has its pitfalls. It is even dangerous in cases as in the case of the Catholic Church which had become an organ of mass oppression and exploitation and a reactionary force that resisted civilisational progress. But institutions invariably grow and for interests of survival and associated vested interests become with passing centuries not only a force for good but also a force for evil, for decadence invariably sets in overtime. Thus, from the very outset, from the inception of a spiritual movement, individuals must take it upon themselves to be as much the guardians of the movement as any institution that represents it officially. This will act as a safeguard against the tyranny of the institution, the abuse of the power invested in it by general consent. This is why Swamiji founded both the Ramakrishna Mission and the Ramakrishna Math as complementary wings of a unified movement, hoping for equal participation by the laity and the monastics towards carrying it ahead. But later developments have shown that the laity has proved incapable of the task assigned to them by Swamiji for whatever reason and the monastics belonging to the Ramakrishna Order have taken charge of the entire proceedings of the movement with the laity relegated to a subordinate position and, for all practical purposes, titular occupancy of posts within the administrative set up of the Mission's activities. The monastics can  hardly be blamed for this as the householders have largely failed them in terms of commitment to the Mission. However, this tilted development of the mission of the Master has led to its stranglehold by only one of the two wings founded by Swamiji and has hardly been the way he had wished for its progressive unfolding, and with consequent effects in terms of constricted representation of his original ideas.

Now, where do we go from here? Why? Back to Ramakrishna-Vivekananda. Their original ideas must be studied by one and sundry, by all who claim to be devotees or students of the movement, and must be given shape to in creative terms, in welfare forms over the broadest range of possible influence. Individuals should not feel shy of joining the movement and making it their own. And this they may do while offering formal allegiance to the Ramakrishna Mission or choosing to remain beyond its formal fold. After all the Master's mission is universal and knows no finite territorial boundaries for one to be beyond it. Hence, there is no reason for diffidence in this regard.

Swamiji did not much believe in the monastic system governing a society of primarily householders, although, he understood sannyas to be the ultimate ashram in life and held it to be the climactic point in a person's evolution en  route to Self-realisation. In this regard he differed with the Buddha who had made monasticism the pre-eminent feature of societal life and thus opened the gateway to India's future degeneration and debilitation, for in upsetting the ancient order of varna-structured society, the Buddha had weakened the kshatriya class, and India's defence fell with it. Another weakness induced by the Buddha in the Indian polity was through his failure to keep Sanskrit as the linguistic vehicle of Buddhist scriptural writing even as he preached in the language of the people which was Pali. The decline of Sanskrit spelled the doom of the age-old spiritual culture of the Vedas whose inviolability, incidentally, the Buddha also denied. Thus, owing to the Buddha's emergence in India as the pre-eminent spiritual influence of his age, both the brahmin and the kshatriya varnas suffered immensely with irreparable damage to the country's culture, social structure and defence. These were to be avoided and, hence, Swamiji's emphasis on the resurrected life of the laity with the monastic order which he established as the nucleus for the re-emergence of India as the prime spiritual force in the world. In this he was harmonising the Vedic and the Buddhist traditions and was, thus, helping India arrive eventually at the synthesis of the earlier thesis and antithesis of her development.

Hence is it so pertinent that the householder devotees of Thakur take to understanding their prospective role in ushering in a new age in the name of Thakur as Swamiji had envisaged would in course of time come to pass. It is puerile to think that a grovelling mass of devotees lying physically and psychologically eternally prostrate at the feet of monks can ever achieve it. But it must be achieved by a mass of self-respecting devotees who will be imbued with 'immense idealism and immense practicality' to execute it. It will be puerile to imagine that help will come from any quarter other than from within and from generation of consolidated energy through mutual cooperation and coordinated action. So, onward unto realisation of the grand dream of Swamiji, the sublimest project of Mission Humanity. 

Written by Sugata Bose