Sanatana dharma Part 8 KR IRS 28424 Hindu dharmaa Kanchi mutt
Philanthropy (HinduDharma: Part 6, Siksa (14 chapters)) [In the chapter entitled, "Sesame and Water: Where do They Go?", the Paramaguru spoke of the debt to be paid to our fathers, our duty to worship Paramesvara as well as to feed the creatures of the earth. He stated that Tiruvalluvar also spoke of the same dharma in his "Kural": "Tenpulattar deivam, virundu, okkal tan enru angu aimbulattaru ombal talai."] Here (in the foregoing quotation) is one good proof that Tiruvalluar respected the authority of the Vedas. Some suggest that he did not belong to the Vedic religion and that he was a Jaina or a Buddhist. And some claim that he transcended all religions. It is also suggested that he openly condemned sacrifices in which animals are killed. In support of their view, they quote a stanza from the Kural.[The Paramaguru's comment on the Kural passage is contained in Chapter 23, Part Five.] Tiruvalluvar who composed his Kural, with its universal appeal, was not an atheist opposed to the Vedic dharma. What he refers to as virundu is the same as the Vedic manusyayajna. 2 Every morning a handful of rice(uncooked) must be set apart for the poor. All the families must do this without fail every day. The rice thus kept must be collected from house to house, from quarter to quarter, cooked offered to the deity of the local temple as naivedya and then distributed among the poor. With the handful of rice set apart for the poor, keep just one paisa also. The paisa collected from each family would be sufficient to buy salt, chilli powder, etc, to mix with the rice to make it more palatable. It would also serve to buy firewood and to pay the rent for the vessels. To carry out such a scheme is to do a great service to the poor - and to the Lord. Charity like this should encourage temple going, not to speak of devotion. Since the food is first offered as naivedya, it would mean that the poor will take it as prasada which will impart them inner purity. 3 Annadhanam or the gift of food is one kind of service of paropakaram. We talk of service to the poor, social service and so on. Today all this is done with much fanfare and publicity. In the past the needy were served naturally, without making any noise. Service comes under "putras- dharma" and it includes digging wells and ponds for the public, feeding the poor, building temples for the spiritual well-being of people, laying our gardens. Excavating wells and ponds has been mentioned first. The importance of this word may be gauged from such remarks in ordinary conversation: "What 's he doing? Digging a well or something? “It is extremely meritorious to excavate pond outside the village to slake the thirst of cattle. All the people in a village must join together without the distinction of poor and rich, high or low - work involving physical effort. It will incidentally contribute to greater social harmony. 4 With education we purify our intelligence, with meditation we cleanse our mind, with sloka or poetry we clarify our speech. How do we purify our body? By exerting ourselves in the service of others. As we keep serving people in this way we will obtain inward purity. When all take part in the work of digging a pond or well, without any differences, without one man feeling superior to another or inferior to him, our ego too will be dug away. More important than the water welling up in the pond is the love welling up from our hearts. No outward show is needed in social service; we must not make an exhibition of our work. Collect pieces of glass scattered on the footpath and keep them away in a safe place; even this service to people and a means of cleansing ourselves. We must try to please the Lord with the very hands and feet that he has given us - we must do so by serving others and by looking upon all as himself. 5 அன்ன சத்திரம் ஆயிரம் வைத்தல் ஆலயம் பதினாயிரம் நாட்டல் அன்ன யாவினும் புண்ணியம் கோடி ஆங்கோர் ஏழைக்கு எழுத்தறிவித்தல் Anna chathiram aayirm vaithal Aalayam pathinayiram naattal Anna yaavinum punniyam kodi Aangor ezhaikku ehutharivithal. (subramanya Bharathi) . 6 All human beings must express their gratitude to their fathers (pitrs) and to the gods- they have a debt to pay their fathers, rites to perform for the gods. We must serve our fellow creatures to the best of our ability and extend hospitality at least to one guest a day. This is Adithya or what Thiruvalluvar calls "virundu", also known as manusyayajna. Then there is Brahma yajna to perform, the word "Brahma" here denoting the Vedas. Brahma yajna means chanting the Vedas and making others chant them. This is a duty carried out by a few on behalf of all. One of the rites common to all is Bhuta yajna, demonstrating our love to all creatures, feeding them etc. Pitryajna, devayajna, manusyayajna, bhutayajana are rites all are duty-bound to perform in one way or. If each individual does his work according to the Vedic dharma and does it in a spirit of dedication to Isvara he may be said to be performing Brahmayajna. Thiruvalluvar has said more or less the same thing as the Vedas say: 7 Tenpulattar, deivam, virundu, okkal, tan enru anguaimbulattaru ombal talai. Tenpulattar are the pitrs, the fathers. All are duty-bound to pay their debt to them. Mother Veda says: "Matr-devo bhava, pitr-devo bhava. " (Be one to whom the mother is a deity. Be one to whom the father is a deity. ) Auvvai, who brings us the essence of the Vedas, observes: Annayum pitavum munnari deivam" [Mother and Father are the deities first known. ] 8 We must treat our parents with respect and do all we can to keep them in comfort. We cannot make sufficient recompense for all the sacrifices they make on our behalf. After they depart from this world we must without fail offer libations to them and perform the sraddha ceremony, all in the sastric manner. Though they ridicule the idea of performing sraddha, even reformers have agreed that we must care for our parents. 9 "The sesame you offer, the water, the balls of rice, the plantains and other items of food remain here," point out the reformists. "Or we see someone removing them before our own eyes, or eating them. You say that the departed parents are born again in this world. If that is true, is it not madness to claim that what is offered here will reach them?" Some of you must be harbouring similar doubts.Let me tell you a story. 10 A certain man had sent his son to college in a distant town. One day the boy woke up to the fact that he had to pay his examination fee in a few days. So he wrote to his father: "Please send such and such a sum by telegraphic money order. " The father was a little perplexed. All the same he went to the telegraph office and handed the clerk at the counter the money that had to be sent to his son. "Please send it by telegraphic money order," he told the clerk. He had thought that the clerk would make holes in the notes, put a length of wire through them and send the whole thing to his son. Moments later the clerk said to the man: "Your son will get your money. It has already been sent. " The villager was again puzzled. He saw the money still in the cash box without the notes strung together. He told the clerk:"My money is still here. You haven't made holes in the notes yet." The clerk assured him: "It will reach your son." Now he turned to his work of sending messages: "Ka-tu-katu-katu." The poor village was still not satisfied. But the money of course reached his son. 11 Offering libations to one's fathers is similar. If this rite is performed according to the sastras, the deities concerned will convey them to those for whom they are meant. If the fathers are reborn as cows the offering made to them will be taken to them in the form of grass or hay. The deities in charge carry out the orders of the Paramatman. So the father of the mother whose sraddha is performed need not personally come to receive the offering. 12 Does not the telegraphic money order reach the addressee? If the addressee resides in a foreign country our currency will not be valid there. If rupees are paid here arrangements are made to pay the money in dollars, pounds of whatever. The things offered to the fathers according to the sastras are conveyed in a form suitable to them. 13 What is important is a sense of gratitude to our fathers and faith in the sastras. At parties a toast is proposed to somebody and all the guests drink or eat to his health. They do so in the belief that by virtue of the mental power the man toasted will become healthy. Sraddha means that which is done in faith. Faith is of the utmost importance. If we do something we must do it according to the rules laid down for it. When you write a letter how do you make sure that it reaches the addressee? "I will write the address as I like. Why should I drop the letter in that letterbox over there? I have a better box at home." would you speak thus? In the state of worklessness, love, devotion, and jnana are not bound by any rules. But when an action has a purpose behind it you have to respect the rules pertaining to it. Love and Sorrow (HinduDharma: Part 13, Nyaya (8 chapters)) 14 The purpose of human birth is to live a life full of love for all. No joy is greater than that of loving others. Amassing wealth, acquiring property, earning fame, bedecking oneself give but transient pleasure, not any sense of fullness. The happiness that permeates our inner being is the happiness of loving others. When we love others we are not conscious of our suffering, the physical exertion we make and the money we spend: indeed the joy of loving gives us a transcendent feeling. A life in which there is no love for others is a life lived in vain. 15 I said that when we love a person we forget our sorrows. But one day, at last, it may be that the object of our love itself becomes the cause of great sorrow. One day the person we love leaves us forever-or one day we will leave him forever. "O he has left me forever"-"O I am leaving him for ever": we lament in this manner. We feel disturbed when we realise that all the happiness that love gave us has at last proved to be a lie and ended in sorrow. "Is the final outcome of love then sorrow? "we ask ourselves in agitation. The greater our love for a person the more intense our grief when he or she is separated from us forever. We may then even wonder whether a life without love, a life of selfishness or a life of insensibility would be better. One leading such a life will not be affected by being separated from the object of his affection. A selfish or self-centred man, however, gathers only sin. Is it not a life lived without joy- a life lived without a sense of fullness- a life lived in vain, a life like that of a log of wood or stone? 16 [The problem then is]: Our love for others ends in sorrow. However, if there is no love there is no meaning in life. What is the solution to this problem? We must create such love as will never change, love that will be enduring. The object of our love must never become separated from us, never desert us. If there were such an object and if we devoted all our love to it we would never be separated from one another- there would be eternal bliss, everlasting fullness. To explain, we must love the One Object that never changes. What is that Object? The Paramatman. The Paramatman will never be separated from us. Even if our life departs it will dissolve in the Paramatman and become one with him. Only that love is everlasting which is dedicated to him. 17 The question arises: If one is to love the Paramatman that never perishes, does it mean that we must not love anyone else, that we must not love others because they will perish one day? If our love for the Supreme Being keeps growing the truth will dawn on us that there is no one or nothing other than He. All those whom we loved, all those who caused us sorrow by being separated from us, they too will seem to us the imperishable Supreme Being. We must learn to look upon the entire universe as the Paramatman and love it as such. Our love then shall never be a cause of sorrow. 18 Even if it be that our love is not such as to embrace the universe with all its creatures as an expression of the Paramatman, we can learn to love with ease all those great men of Atmic qualities as the Paramatman, so also our sadguru who is full of wisdom and grace. Sufficient it would be to love them and surrender to them. Through them the Paramatman will give us his blessings. When someone we love dies we should not grieve for him. We must console ourselves that only the body which was the disguise of the Paramatman has perished, that the one who was in that disguise has become united with the Paramatman. Our love then will be everlasting. We must first learn to have such love for Isvara and for people of goodness, for men of God. Then step by step, we must enlarge it to embrace all creation. In this way the purpose of our life will be fulfilled. 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