The Teachings of the Bhagavadgita : 1.1 - Swami Krishnananda

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Monday, February 06, 2023. 06:28.

Chapter 1 : This Drama of Life - 1.

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Chinmaya Swayambhu Ayyappa Temple

February 4 at 9:47 PM  · 

Ayilyam Day (Aslesha nakshatra/birth star) is an important day for worshiping the divine serpent gods - Nagaraja and Nagayakshi. Ayilyam puja is said to be beneficial especially for those undergoing difficulties due to naga or kala-sarpa dosha and is believed to ward off impediments related to childbirth (santana dosha), improving employment prospects, and alleviating chronic illness and other problems. The main offerings for the serpent deities include Noorum Palum, which is made by mixing rice powder, turmeric powder, milk, tender coconut, and kadaliphala (bananas).  The puja can be offered online every month to invoke the Naga devatas to relieve sorrow and invite health and prosperity.

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When you come to a place like this, you have to re-orientate your minds, to a large extent, to an appreciable extent. There is a specific purpose for which you have come here to this Academy, to this Divine Life Society Ashram. To some of you, the purpose of your coming here and attending these classes may be clear; to some, it may be nebulous – not wholly perspicuous. There is something which this Academy is endeavouring to cater to the minds of people like you. This 'something' which this Ashram, this Academy, is trying to furnish you with, is perhaps what you actually need in life. You may be under the impression that there are thousands of things that you need in life. This is a thorough misconception which has to be removed from the mind – you are not in need of one thousand things in this world. And the difficulties that you face in life are also not caused by one thousand things.

There is a little error in the very way of our thinking into which we have been born, right from our babyhood. Conditions of society, circumstances of family, and the weaknesses of personality, combined together, prevent us from undergoing the necessary educational discipline which is essential for you to know where you really stand in this world. We take generally things for granted – we are sons and daughters of somebody, we are nationals of a particular country, we are working in some office; we have this problem and that difficulty. This is a natural human way of thinking, but a human way of thinking itself is not a remedy for human problems. A human way of thinking, is not a remedy for human problems – is a sentence we ought to underline – because human problems can be tackled only by a power of understanding which is superior to the ordinary human way of thinking. A medicine which is of the same character as an illness may not be able to set right the illness one suffers from. There is a specific influence which the medicine administered into your body exerts upon you, due to which you seem to be recovering from your illness. A friend of the illness you are in cannot be a remedy for the illness. The medical treatment cannot be an associate of the disease; it is a rectifying factor and, therefore, it differs in the function and constitution from the illness you suffer from. The problems of human life are a sort of illness, which cannot be rectified by a purely human way of understanding, as this human way of thinking itself is the cause of human problems. So there is a necessity to lift yourself up from this so-called 'human outlook of life' and visualise the whole of life from a viewpoint or standpoint which is, in a way, superior to what you call 'the human way of thinking'. This art, this science, this system of living is, very very unfortunately, not known to many people in the world because of the fact that most people are sunk in this routine of ordinary thinking, which you usually call 'the human way of thinking', and you know what the human way of thinking is.

Swami Sivananda, the founder of this institution, had a specific mission to hold aloft in life before mankind, which was not merely to teach you what anybody else has taught you, but to awaken you – not merely to sermon, or give a gospel. A sleeping man has to be woken up before anything is taught to him. There is no use of giving you a sermon when you are asleep. The first thing is to awaken you from the dream or the sleep in which you are. When you are able to see things in a better way, you may be told what is essential for you; if you are asleep there is no use of speaking to you. So the role which great men of stature, like Swami Sivananda, played in life seems to be the function of awakening man rather than teaching man in the ordinary sense of the term; and you know very well the importance of waking a person from sleep – it is not in any way less important than giving him a sermon or giving him a teaching of any kind. If you are awake, perhaps you know where things stand and where you are.

So goes this little introduction that I place before you which may brush and burnish your brains. You are here with a deconditioned mind, and not a conditioned mind with which you must have come. You carry your own minds and brains when you come from distant places; that mind, that brain, should now be able to think and organise itself in a new way altogether. This is the humble effort of this academy. It is humble because it is not possible to sweeten the whole ocean with any amount of sugar that we have in this world. However, some sugar can be added into the ocean – that is a great satisfaction. Even a hundred bags of sugar will not sweeten the ocean; a thousand bags, no! However, there is a satisfaction of having performed a duty. One way or the other, the saltwaters may become sweet. So, this saltwater of human life has to be sweetened with the new outlook which is superhuman. Unless you are able to aspire at least for a superhuman level of existence – though you may not be able to place yourself in that condition at once – unless there is at least this longing for that condition which is larger than and deeper than the human level, you will not be able to have peace of mind in this world. The judgment of things is possible only by a person who is superior to the things judged, for which purpose you have to be a little more than an ordinary man.

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 Chinmaya International Foundation (CIF)

Learn to chant Srimad Bhagavatam, the Mahapurana of devotion, dispassion, and knowledge leading to supreme devotion to the Lord and liberation from samsara. Enrol for the webinar on Srimad Bhagavatam Canto 1, facilitated by Brni. Devaki Chaitanya, covering chanting and brief explanations of verses. 

Listen to Brni. Devaki Chaitanya: 

VIDEO : LINK BELOW

Learn to chant Srimad Bhagavatam, the Mahapurana of devotion, dispassion, and knowledge leading to supreme devotion to the Lord

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In this context of the great learning of the art of living, I have been requested by the organisation of this Academy to speak to you something about the most interesting and stimulating message given by the Bhagavadgita, a term which you are all very much familiar with – a great scripture of yoga. You are having many other lessons also on yoga; you have Patanjali's yoga, you have Bhakti yoga, and you have many other sidelights thrown on this great, eluding thing called yoga. This specific theme which I am supposed to place before you is not an easy thing to understand – but it is not impossible to understand. It requires a little exercise of your mind with a discipline of concentration. The Bhagavadgita is a holy text which everybody reads, like the New Testament or the Bible, or the Tripitakas. We have a habit, again which is human to which I alluded just now, of revering, adoring holy texts as deities, worshipping them on our altars, and carrying them on our heads but understanding nothing of what they say. The holy texts are not to be carried on the head merely as deities of worship, though they may be also deities. They are medicines, which you do not merely keep in a cupboard and adore as a holy stuff. It is something which is to be taken in, absorbed into your system and made part and parcel of your very biological, psychological, and rational system of living.

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To be continued

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