Overcome challenges with God's help

Repeated attempts to reform, discipline and make humanity conform to the Rule of Law have not resulted in success. Yet out of compassion, there is one Supreme Authority who, without getting vexed, continues his endeavour. That extraordinary force is God as He alone is concerned about the spiritual progress of men. He guides them and protects them through His message. There are bound to be challenges in man's life but they should be surmounted with God's help instead of getting upset, just as one who has to perforce go out during rain dons a rain coat or holds an umberalla for a cover. The Bhagavad Gita serves such a purpose to enable man to tide over problems.

The celestial song of Krishna asks us to live in the presence of God; the Lord's imperative has tremendous redeeming power to boost our lost causes. This sermon urges us to uphold Moral Law. To sermonise is easy, but everyone knows how difficult it is to follow the directives. The Gita emerged after God himself practised the Divine commands. In his incarnation as Rama, the Lord put them into practice and very rarely spelt out the message. As Krishna, he preached what was carried out in His earlier manifestation. The Gita is the essence of the Upanishads served by the Lord to us. The former contains several of "Mantras" which also spread His messages but they have to be handled with extreme care, adopting proper procedure and discipline. The Gita is a hymn in which are hidden the Divine commands and can be rendered as a song by anyone, though the contents have to explained by teachers.

In a discourse, Sri Chinna Sriman Narayana Ramanuja Jeeyar Swami explained how God sustains all His creations from the day they are born, keeping ready the nourishment required for their growth. Men are grieved when they see others possessing articles which they feel they are denied. They will be happy if the articles are lost or spoilt. Thus out of desire and attachment, they make their own lives miserable. What they should cultivate is control of the mind and secondly, not misuse the power of speech gifted to them by God, by taking care not to offend others.

In His various incarnations, God tried to change the attitudes of men but failed. Still without losing hope, He presented the Gita. To ensure that men progressed in their lives, He prescribed the scriptures but people violated them. As Rama, He demonstrated his absolute dependence on righteousness to win the admiration of even an adversary who declared him to be replica of Virtue (Dharma). Krishna in the Gita pinpoints how men should conduct themselves, and lead their lives in accordance with a pattern and procedure.
                                                                    July 5, 1994

Equanimity of mind essential in life

Life is a great mystery. We do not know from where we have come and what will happen the next moment or after here in the world. We see a great variety of inanimate and animate beings in nature and deduce that there must be a superior force which is controlling all the forces of nature. The mystics and the sages have with their intuitive insight perceived this supreme power as the immanent being in all the creation, which the theists call 'God'.

There is only one God, through He is called by different names. How can we know God? The Vedas are the final authority and they are revelations of sages. We can also look for the guidance to the writings of sages like Manu, Yajnavalkya and Parasara, based on their memory of the Vedas. The Bhagavad-Gita also expounds the same truth revealed in Vedas, and it is important because it has been taught by the Lord Himself in one of His incarnations.

What is the reason for the biological variations we see in the world? Why is one child born hale and hearty, while another one deformed? If we analyse such anomalies in nature we have to accept the working of a Law which is the reason for all those, which is responsible for our happiness and sorrow in this life, we can learn to lead our lives in the right way.

The Gita says, "The wise man to whom pain and pleasure are alike, and who is not tormented by these contacts, becomes eligible for immortality". So it enjoins to live amidst the world, detached like a lotus leaf in the water, by developing equanimity of mind and remaining contented with whatever comes our way in life. Both sorrow and happiness must be faced in the same spirit.

In a lecture Sri V.N.Gopala Desikan said, the Gita does not teach that one should renounce everything in life. One has to live in the world within the limits of Dharma, remained detached and contented. To emphasize this, he related that sage Yajnavalkya held Janaka of Mithila in high esteem among his pupils, which the others felt was due to the fact that he was a king. To prove the king's detachment to others, he made one of his disciples tell the king during the class, that Mithila was on fire. Much to the astonishment of everyone, the king remained totally unconcerned and continued with his studies.  The other pupils immediately ran helter skelter forgetting their lessons. Irrespective of one's a station in life, one can remain detached.
                                                                    February 16, 1995

Spiritual seeking intended fort all

Many people mistakenly imagine that spiritual life and study of sacred texts are intended only for a few. When a person says. "I am not an ascetic" he seems to feel that those who have renounced the world are different. It is in this connection that the Lord's massage in Bhagavad Gita is valid. it is a scripture intended fir all, more so for ordinary men. All spiritual practices are intended for everyone in the universe. It tells men how their respective goals. It says, "Let a man raise the self, by the self, and not debase himself".

One of the important lessons taught in the song celestial refers to the manner of developing the power of meditation.

Three factors govern its process: one-pointed ness of mind setting bounds to one's life and to achieve it and thirdly maintaining equanimity or evenness of vision. To achieve them one needs the help of constant practice and detachment. Whatever may be the nature of one's assignment, the mind should concentrate on it. A story is told of a person hit by an arrow. The pain was unbearable and any attempt to remove it would have worsened the pain. It was removed when he was engaged in his prayer as his mind was fixed on God and he did not know what was happening outside.

The Bhagavad Gita points out how when a man is caught in illusion, he will not be able to face the naked fact of his lapse from duty. A Judge may send hundreds of criminals to gallows but when his own son is produced before him, accused of murder, he will hesitate and may sermonise that death penalty is inhuman. His words are born of attachment. Arjuna's behaviour was like that of the Judge.

The Gita, the practical universal gospel, is the most sublime production and is the voice of God, said Swami Vimalananda in a lecture. Krishna whose preaching's are for people 1n the entire world, states that life is a battle wherein the forces of good and evil, the divine and the demoniacal, purity and passion are ceaselessly at war. Mind, the Senses, Jealousy, Pride, Hypocrisy are all man's enemies.

The Divine song embodies in itself a solution to all the pressing problems of man and carries a message of hope, encouragement, cheer and consolation. The contents divinise the entire nature of man. The Gita harmonises the philosophies of action, devotion and knowledge. The three horses of this body-chariot --action, emotion and intellect, should work in perfect harmony. One can find a solution for all doubts. The more one studies the work with devotion and faith, the more one will be obtained deeper knowledge, penetrative insight and clarity of thinking.
                                                                    April 22, 1995