Lesson 363 – Living with Śiva

Posted on by Himalayan Academy
Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

Ministers Are Needed

There are many professions that emerged in India during the Rāj: the profession of the attorney, the profession of the engineer, the profession of the modern businessman, the scientist and more. However, the most respected profession, that of religious minister, was not allowed to develop. Under the British rule the profession of the religious ministers was not made popular. Why? We can assume it would have made Hinduism strong and its people self-sufficient. It would have increased its self-respect. Slowly the Anglican Christian government drew devotees away from the temple and philosopher, and teachers away from the religion into the secular world. Slowly they drew the women out of the homes into jobs, and the priests out of the temples into better-paying professions.

A law student has no authority in the courts. He cannot approach the judge. He can sit in the courtroom and listen. But as soon as he passes his bar examination, he gains authority. He can then wield his authority in the courts. There is a parallel to this in religion. The average follower does not have religious authority, but the appointed or ordained minister has been given authority by all the members and other ministers. The Muslims have ministers with authority, the Buddhists have priests with great authority, and so do the Christians. They all have their churches, temples and houses of worship where the ministers and priests do their work. The modern church system is a social, economical, cultural and religious structure. A minister of a church or of a Muslim mosque, Buddhist temple or Jewish synagogue has a certain well-defined authority and can effectively help the members of his congregation, much more so than can the ordinary person.

The modern church system gives authority to well-educated people, to the most devout and committed people, to perform their ministry. Once Hindu men or women have this kind of authority, it is possible to approach the president of a country, the Pope in Rome or any other important person in government as representatives of the religion. They can freely communicate with other religious leaders: a Muslim imam, a Christian minister, a Buddhist priest on an equal basis. They can lecture around the world and do much more than they could before being ordained. This is because they have been given the authority by their congregation and other clergy persons. Hindus of all sects need their religious leaders in every country to serve the community, to teach and represent the religion at local and international venues, to stand strong for Hinduism on equal footing with all major religions of the world. Hindus need their religious leaders to perform the rites of passage, to manage the temples, to counsel and console, to uphold family values, to stop the suicides, to stop the divorces, to stop the murders, to stop the wife and child abuse, so that the community is strong and stable.

NANDINATHA SŪTRA 363: NEVER DEMEANING OTHERS
My sannyāsins who are āchāryas nurture each devotee equally. They never make others their servants, order them about, shout at them, snap their fingers, clap their hands, nor strike or demean them at any time. Aum.

Lesson 363 – Merging with Śiva

Posted on by Himalayan Academy
Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

The Blossoming Of Devotion

For those in kriyā, dar­shan is not only the physical sight of the stone image in the temple. It is also an inner communion, a receiving of the blessings and the messages and the rays of Second and Third World beings, who are actual conscious entities and whose consciousness is canalized through the sacred image by esoteric temple practices. This is a deeper perception of the dar­shan of the Deity. Other forms of religious expression naturally come forth for the devotee in this stage of un­fold­ment, such as attending pūjās regularly, chanting, undertaking pilgrimages to temples and holy places and studying the scriptures.

Midpoint in this stage of development of the soul, the devotee may psychically experience an aspect of God that he has been worshiping in the temple. He may see the Deity in a dream or have a vision of Him during a quiet period when he is sitting with his eyes closed after a pūjā. After this experience, he centers his life fully around God and learns to psychically attune himself to His dar­shan, His will. Once he fully understands his religion, if he has sufficient means he may express his eagerness to serve through building a temple, or participation in such a project. Indeed, this is the great culmination of kriyā. It is through the devotees in the kriyā, or bhakti yoga, stage of the un­fold­ment of the soul that we have all over the world today magnificent Hindu temples, built by people who have performed well, who have controlled their thoughts and actions, who have understood the laws of karma and the penalties of wrong action. They have avoided wrong action not out of fear, but because they have evolved into performing right action. Having released themselves from the dense fog of the instinctive mind, they can now build temples of great beauty which reflect the beauties they have discovered within themselves in their personal communion with God, who to them is not an awesome master who might punish and discipline, but a loving father.

As he matures in kriyā, the devotee unfolds a more and more intense love of God, to the point that he may well shed joyful tears during intense moments of worship. When that love is constant from day to day, when it is strong enough that he is capable of surrendering his individual will to God’s Cosmic Will, then kriyā or bhakti yoga has reached its zenith. This giving up of his own will is a slow process as he unwinds the last remaining strands of his external will from the instinctive mind. His will was born of intellectual concepts, and these concepts, too, he releases unto God, feeling within his inmost being that he knows little of the grand mysteries of existence, an admission he could not make earlier. He realizes that he receives his inspiration, his energy, his very life, from God.

At this stage of kriyā the devotee learns patience. He learns to wait for the proper timing of things in his life. He is in no hurry. He is willing to wait for another life, or for many more lives. There is no urgency. He trusts God and trusts the path he is on. He settles down, and his life comes into a balance. He observes that he is in an evolutionary process along with thousands and millions of others. He embraces other devotees with renewed love and appreciation. He patterns his life in such a way that the temple is the hub of his culture, his religious activity and observance, his very thinking. From the temple or his home shrine, he goes forth to spend his days in the world, and to the temple or shrine he returns from the world. His life comes and goes from that sacred place.

In the stages of charyā and kriyā, the deep-seated impurities of the mind are cleansed as past karmas are resolved and a foundation laid for the third stage on the divine path, that of yoga. Yoga is a very advanced science. It cannot be sustained except by the soul that has unfolded into the fullness of charyā and kriyā and maintains the qualities of service and devotion as meditation is pursued. The devotee who has served God well now embarks upon finding union with God in his sanctum within. He remains enveloped in the dar­shan of the personal Lord he carefully cultivated during charyā and kriyā, and on the power of that dar­shan he is drawn within by the Primal Soul Himself to rarefied states of consciousness and the stillness of meditation.

Lesson 362 – Dancing with Śiva

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Recording: Gurudeva’s real voice

What Is Sin? How Can We Atone for It?

ŚLOKA 52
Sin is the intentional transgression of divine law. There is no inherent or “original” sin. Neither is there mortal sin by which the soul is forever lost. Through sādhana, worship and austerities, sins can be atoned for. Aum.

BHĀSHYA
What men term sin, the wise call ignorance. Man’s true na­ture is not sullied by sin. Sin is related only to the lower, in­­stinctive intellectual nature as a transgression of dharma. Still, sin is real and to be avoided, for our wrong­ful ac­tions return to us as sorrow through the law of karma. Sin is terminable, and its effects may be com­pensated for by penance, or prāyaśchitta, and good deeds which settle the karmic debt. The young soul, less in tune with his soul nature, is inclined toward sin; the old soul seldom transgresses divine law. Sins are the crippling distortions of intellect bound in emotion. When we sin, we take the ener­gy and distort it to our in­stinctive favor. When we are unjust and mean, hateful and holding re­sent­ments year after year and no one but ourselves knows of our in­trigue and corruption, we suffer. As the soul evolves, it even­tually feels the great burden of faults and mis­deeds and wishes to atone. Pen­ance is performed, and the soul seeks absolution from society and beseeches God’s ex­onerating grace. The Vedas say, “Loose me from my sin as from a bond that binds me. May my life swell the stream of your river of Right.” Aum Namaḥ Śivāya.

Lesson 362 – Living with Śiva

Posted on by Himalayan Academy
Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

A Crisis Of Identity

This confusion about Hinduism, what it is and is not and who is a Hindu and who is not, occurs in San Francisco, New York, Chennai, Mumbai, New Delhi and in London. It is mainly in the larger cities in India, the United States and Europe that people are not upholding the Sanātana Dharma anymore and are surrendering it, the most precious thing in their life, to adopt an ecumenical philosophy. The sad thing is that no one is objecting. Yes, no one is objecting. It doesn’t seem to bother anybody at all. No one bothers when a Hindu denies his religious heritage in order to be accepted into a place of employment, or while working with fellow employees. No one bothers when that same Hindu returns home and performs pūjā in the closet shrine among the shoes. The shrine is in the closet so the door can be quickly closed in case non-Hindu visitors arrive. Isn’t this terrible?

But these same Hindus expect their sons and daughters to believe in the religion that they are publicly denouncing. They expect their sons and daughters to worship in the closet shrine they hide at home. The children today just will not accept this deception. Modern education teaches people to think for themselves. They will soon reject Hinduism and maybe their parents, too. Yes, youth do reject it, and they are rejecting it more and more each year that this deceptive attitude continues on the part of the elders. Having rejected their Hinduism, the young people are not adopting another religion. What then are they doing? They are living as nonreligious people.

When the pressures of mechanized industrial society get too difficult for them, when they need God and need the strength of their childhood faith, they will have no place to turn—not even to their parents. They may even seek escape in committing suicide, by hanging themselves, poisoning themselves. It’s happening now, happening more and more as the years go by. And now divorce is widespread among Hindus. The elders sit in judgment and proclaim, “Divorce is wrong. Therefore, you shouldn’t get a divorce. You are breaking the rules by getting a divorce.” Too many elders have already broken the rules by not standing strong for their religion, and they are not listened to. Our fellow Hindus should not be harshly judged and cast out when things go wrong in their life. The elders should offer gentle advice and help in as many ways as possible to make up for any wrong that has been done. When the younger generation fails, the elders must share their strength with them to make them succeed, drawing on the wisdom of Sanātana Dharma.

But it is never too late to stand strong for Hinduism. Hindu societies have to provide marriage counselors, people who go to the homes and counsel the couples before the relationship comes to the point of planning for divorce. Yes, we must provide professionally trained men and women to help a troubled couple before they go to the attorney, and others who can counsel our troubled youth, our elderly and our poor. Every Hindu who needs help must be able to find it somewhere within his own religion. Who can provide that help? The elders can and must.

NANDINATHA SŪTRA 362: TAKING RESPONSIBILITY FOR CHURCH KARMAS
My sannyāsins who are āchāryas realize that they are not beyond the laws of the land, but must work within them, even to the point of apologizing should misconduct occur on the part of Saiva Siddhanta Church. Aum.

Lesson 362 – Merging with Śiva

Posted on by Himalayan Academy
Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

Service, Worship Understanding

The sequential pattern of evolution is experienced by each individual in a microcosmic sense in each lifetime. Even if they have been experienced in a previous life, the lessons contained in each stage are, in a sense, relearned in childhood. If we have previously learned them, then they will be quickly mastered. But if we have not learned these lessons in another life, we draw to ourselves in this life the experiences that we need to do so. This knowledge is an inheritance that comes along with the physical body. In other words, experiences from other lives affect the patterns of experience in this life. With basic inherited knowledge, the soul develops an intellectual mind through the good graces of its own personal karma and destiny, provided his intellectual mind is in accordance and in harmony with the precepts of his religion. If not, he has problems. Those problems can be overcome, but they are problems while they are being overcome. If his beliefs are not in harmony with his religion, that conflict can stagnate and congest his natural advancement and must be resolved before he can move on to the second stage.

In the stage of charyā, similar to karma yoga, the devotee naturally awakens a desire to work for the sake of work, to serve for the sake of service. He does this in his daily life and through helping in the temple in practical ways—through sweeping the marble floors, polishing the brass oil lamps, weaving fragrant garlands for the pūjās, helping other devotees in their lives, and in general through a humble and unseen kind of service. This humble service is itself a means to break the stagnant congestion of erroneous beliefs. Worship during the charyā stage is entirely external, yet it is entirely meaningful to the devotee. In charyā the devotee looks upon the stone image in the temple sanctum with his physical eyes, and to him dar­shan of the Deity is the physical sight of the stone image of God.

As the devotee unfolds into the next stage, of kriyā or bhakti yoga, he will want to worship and serve in the temple in more internalized ways. He will seek to understand why a stone image is a stone image, why stone images are needed at all. He will begin to think about the purpose of worship, the meaning of worship, the experience of worship. He will wonder to himself about the ancient customs and protocol and why these customs are followed in his community. He will delve into the scriptures, learning and studying about his religion. Singing the sacred hymns, chanting the names of the Lord and performing japa will become an important part of his devotion, which is partly internal and partly external. Devotion will well up from the recesses of his soul as he purifies himself. His heart begins to open as he evolves out of the instinctive mind into a spiritualized intellect, an intellect that is developed from within himself. His instinctive nature is subsiding, and his intellectual nature is emerging as he comes into a full understanding of the laws of karma. As his intellect controls the instinctive mind, he understands for the first time the cause and effect, the action and reaction, of his physical and mental activities.

Kriyā blossoms into its fullness when there arises in his heart a desire, a strong desire, to know and experience God, to penetrate into the realms of consciousness and reality beyond the physical plane revealed by his grosser senses. He expresses this desire through continued worship in the very special environment of the Hindu temple or his home shrine. He worships the personal aspect of God, and his attitude is no longer one of fear, of a servant to a master, as it was in charyā. In kriyā he looks upon God as a dutiful son to his father. He perceives that God is his personal Lord, concerned for the welfare of mankind, and he approaches God in a human, personal way. He wants to serve God not because he fears the consequences of being an infidel, but because he wants to be in harmony with a higher reality which he reveres, to be attuned to the dar­shan of the Deity.