Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna Lecture 029 on 16-February-2021

Full Transcript(Not Corrected)

OM JANANIM SHARADAM DEVIM RAMAKRISHNAM JAGAD GURAM BHADA PADME TAYO SHRITVA PRANAM AMI MUHUR MUHUR In our last class we have been studying all the directions our ancient scriptures have given us how to progress in spiritual life. Following their direction, every avatar constantly emphasizes those duties prescribed in the scriptures to be followed. And in the Karma Yoga book of Swami Vivekananda, he had selected some of these duties. We have been discussing about them. And in our last class, we have come to that particular very special duty. Every child owes to his or her parents. This is called Pitru Rina. Every Hindu, according to Dharmashastra, is born with five debts. Rishi Rina, Deva Rina, Pitru Rina, Nri Rina, Bhuta Rina. So among them, parents, every incarnation of God set an example how parents have to be looked after. What is the psychology behind it? What is spiritual life? Converting one's life into spiritual vision. What is spiritual vision? Spirituality is another name for divinity. Divinity is another name for God. Spiritual life is to see God everywhere, in everything, at all times. Whatever other things we do, whether it is puja, rituals, study of scriptures, pilgrimages, prayers, worship of Guru, of deities, whatever, the ultimate purpose is to see God in everything, all the time. See Brahman everywhere. This has been so pithily expressed. Asuktehe Amrutehe Kaalam Nayet Brahma Chintaya Asuktehe – until one falls asleep. Amrutehe – until this body drops off. Kaalam Nayet. Nayet Kaalam – time must be used. In what? Brahma Chintaya – in the thought of God. Practice the presence of God. As we go on practicing all these things, our inner vision opens up, our mind gets transformed into consciousness and whatever is done through the medium of that consciousness cannot but only experience consciousness. So slowly the goal is to transcend these gross limitations, transform them into subtle limitations, still subtler limitations, subtlest limitation, that means go on seeing the Mola Karana, the real cause out of which everything is made and what is everything is made up of? Only Brahman, pure consciousness. This is such a tremendous discovery, seeing parents as God and then seeing one's Guru as God is actually not a strange process, not a miraculous process but it is seeing things as they are. Seeing God is not an extraordinary achievement. Non-seeing God is a most extraordinary achievement. Somehow we have achieved that, we have succeeded in not seeing God, looking at God all the time. Just as a man sees a poisonous serpent in a harmless piece of rope, now that process has to be reversed and in every scripture this has been emphasised, specially in Hindu scriptures. So last time we have been discussing about Sri Ramakrishna's extraordinary devotion to his parents. His father passed away very early but the father led such a life, both father and mother, but especially the father. He was truthful to the very core. Sathyena panthavidate devayanaha The way to higher worlds is only paved with truth. One who doesn't observe truthfulness can never reach truth which is God. Shudhiram never deviated. Of course we know very little about Shudhiram, how he respected his own parents but we can guess by looking at his character. If he was so truthful, he must have got some inspiration from somebody and most likely that would be from his parents. Sri Ramakrishna derived his inspiration from his father and what about Chandramani Devi? She was an embodiment of simplicity. She never knew what is called duplicity. She never knew what is called thinking one thing in the mind and expressing it in another way. To such an extent she had nothing to hide. One of the ways to find out whether a person is or whether we ourselves are filled with duplicity is we do not wish anyone to know our thoughts. Even we do not wish to know ourselves also. Self-deception has become an expert. We have become very experts in self-deception and that is what is called mental disease. It is nothing but not recognizing, not cognizing what is the real problem which is we are our own problem and so the solution also we are only the solution to our problem which is ourselves. So anybody who can be so simple that even at the cost of being ridiculed by other people, she is to express and then Kshudiram said you do not go on telling whatever is there in your mind. You do not need to deceive anybody but you do not need to express also because other people will never understand. First they will consider you are mad then they might even take advantage of you. Such was the mother and she could never sleep without sharing what she has. First she would go on enquiring whether anybody has eaten and only when she was satisfied she would sit down to eat. These are very natural things that had come to them. Now why am I talking about all these things? Because these are the duties of parents towards their children. We are talking about children's duties towards parents but we also have to talk parents duties towards the children and most of the troubles, problems we are facing today especially mental problems is because the parents at least contribute a great deal towards the problems of the children and such numbers are ever on increase. So Sri Ramakrishna even though he was a monk and a monk as we all know is excluded from every type of obligation. There is in fact only one obligation if at all on part of the monks. One obligation is that they will have to strive to attain God. A sanyasi automatically is not a man of God. Some people take on to sanyasa so that it becomes easier for them that one particular lifestyle is very favourable for the realisation of God. That's why sanyasins are divided into Vivedesha sanyasins and Vidvat sanyasins. Vivedesha means the desire to realise God. Vidvat means some they have realised. Vivedesha sanyasins by going through hard austerities sadhana, spiritual sadhana have realised God and then they become shining examples like Ramana Maharshi etc. not to speak of the direct disciples of Sri Ramakrishna. They are called Vidvat sanyasins but they also have a duty. It is not for the Purvashrama people but what is their duty? Adhyayana and Adhyapana. They will have to study scriptures and they will have to teach. Why should they study? A realised soul need not study anything but then it is imposed upon him that is his duty and how do we understand it? As a striving sanyasin it is absolutely necessary to study scriptures for two reasons. One reason is so that it will be helpful in their own sadhana but another important reason is these striving sanyasins, their mind when it is completely occupied with the scriptural study, reasoning, meditating, deeply pondering will keep them completely away from lower consciousness, lower thoughts, objects of temptations etc. and that's why my Guru Devyathri Shanti used to say cultivate your intellect. Will it give God realization? Not necessarily but what does it give? Protection from temptations of the world and if a sanyasin doesn't study, there is another reason, important reason. He has to explain. Supposing the person has not studied but he is striving or he has become a realised soul and naturally people will be gravitated towards them. There is an invisible law that as soon as a person realises God or becomes perfect in any field of life and students, the sadhakas, seekers of that particular field whether it is music, science, poetry, sculpture, anything you name it, of course spirituality, they gravitate. That's why as soon as Ramakrishna used to succeed in any particular sadhana, sadhakas, aspirants treading that particular path used to be attracted unbeknown to themselves to Dakshineshwar. Why? Because that is the law God implements. You are seeking me and you are treading this path and here is a person who knows everything about that path. Just now he became a siddha, perfect in that path. So they used to come like that. We can even say his own guru Totapuri came more to learn than to teach. So that is the reason adhyayanaad, adhyapanad, duties are there. Everybody in this world has their own duties and that is how God protects dharma, establishes dharma, propagates dharma, all is a travel towards God himself. So we have been seeing even though Ramakrishna was a sanyasi par excellence, in fact many people, millions worship him as an incarnation of God. But we do not insist, we are not fanatical. Everybody should accept Ramakrishna as an incarnation of God. Even if you take him as a great saint, that's more than sufficient. From his life we can learn very many lessons. So that's what we are trying to do through this study of the gospel of Sri Ramakrishna. So here we are, Sri Ramakrishna, I already told how he used to go every day, enquire after his mother, after making prostrations. A sanyasi is free from all these prostrations. I sometimes jokingly tell people, especially elderly people, whose body has become a little more non-cooperative, stiff, so you should progress in devotion. Until now you are having bending devotion and now you must progress into unbending devotion and I also joke, after 60 you are tax free. You don't need to show all these external things but inside you must have that reverence. Whether a person deserves or not, we must show respect because even the most wicked person, in him also the divine mother vibrates. It is only the divine mother actually who is playing in the form of that evil. So this is not directly related to our discussion in a way but why did divine mother create evil people? So that people can distinguish what is evil and what is good and establish themselves as good people. If there are no temptations, believe me, there would be no saints. If there are no evil people, we will not know who is a good person. So this is how the world play, Leela, Brahmanda. Leela is going on since beginningless time. Okay, coming back, Hiram Krishna used to prostrate and I also mentioned, throughout her life he served her and after her passing away he wanted to offer Shraddha Anjali, Shraddha. He could not do it, he cannot do it as a sannyasin but at least he wanted to offer water. Water also slipped away from his fingers. That is what he was told, Galitahastha. So I want to show how in the past every saint practically, whether we know about them or not, had observed this and taught it also to others. Swami Vivekananda, you know that was a big family and Swamiji was specially born as one of the Saptarshis, seven Rishis. One of them was brought down by Sairam Krishna as a helper in the establishment of Dharma. Even today we do not have any capacity to measure what Swami Vivekananda contributed. He used to sometimes express about himself and said, had there been another Vivekananda he would have known, understood what this Vivekananda had done. Such a great soul, he had to renounce the world at a very early age especially under very straitened circumstances. Narendra Nath's father had passed away and in those days, just you imagine, every month 1000 rupees used to be spent for family expenses. Not that it was expensive time, there was in those days five to seven rupees was more than adequate for most of the households. In those days, Vishwanath Dutta's family used to spend nearly 1000 rupees. All of a sudden his father passed away, income had stopped, relatives, all of them turned deadly enemies, they started taking away whatever they could. They wanted in fact to throw away the family of Vishwanath Dutta, Bhuvaneshwari Devi and others. Those were the times when an ordinary young man, he would strive his best to secure some job. The funny thing was, I will share with you some of these funny things. Later on Swami Vivekananda, that word comes very often through my mouth. Narendra Nath, he understood the family situation and many days so that his portion of the food can be eaten by others. He used to tell a lie, I have been invited by my rich friends and then sometimes he would come back completely starving. Remember, a young man who used to resile and with very good appetite, extremely good appetite, he used to come back and lest others should come to know he had not in fact eaten anything, he would chew a betel leaf. This betel leaf is chewed usually after a feast. So his family people think he has eaten nicely, so naturally they will not feel guilty. That was the condition and then the people who would have been glad to fall at his father's feet now closed all their doors towards this family, especially Narendra Nath and then somehow for a short time he secured a job as a school teacher in one of the schools of Eshwar Chandra Vidya Sagar and look at the fun, the other teachers had become jealous of him. Somehow instinctively they understood we are far inferior to him. Instead of acknowledging, instead of coming and learning from him, they turned as one enemy against him and then they incited the children that this new teacher has no capacity to teach. The man who was very shortly, in another two three years, was to become one of the Jagat Gurus, greatest teachers of the world, not only in spirituality but in every conceivable subject and these boys have complained to a founder of that school Vidya Sagar and Vidya Sagar was constrained to dismiss him. So such were the conditions and yet he had to live because that was his mission. He understood instinctively albeit unconsciously that I have a mission to fulfil. So he became a monk and his youngest brother Bhupendranath Dutta accuses him of deserting them at the most needed times in his book. It's very interesting. Swami Vivekananda was considered as the greatest holy person India had produced but his youngest brother turned a communist and he wrote of course very nice book but very critical of Swami Vivekananda that is the Patriot Prophet Swami Vivekananda and it's a very interesting study. So he accuses this man, my eldest brother ran away instead of taking responsibility and looking after all of us because we were very young, he had deserted the family. This is completely baseless accusation because throughout his life Swami Vivekananda loved his mother so much that he looked after her to the best of his ability and this hidden story few people know. Swami Vivekananda secretly writes to his disciples, the Raja of Khetri Ajit Singh that your majesty you are coming from the Rajasthan kings I have only one regret in life when I had to support my mother then I had to come away for reasons I cannot explain to you but I beg you that you see that you send at least 100 rupees so long as she is alive. My mother had suffered enough not on one occasion but on innumerable occasions Swami Vivekananda tells it. This is the story of Swami Vivekananda the emperor of Advaita who used to say this world is nothing but on a practical side such a tremendous immeasurable love for his mother. Had his father been there he would have been all right. There was a funny incident when his father was alive Narendranath was perceptive enough to know his father was wasting money on several of his useless and poisonous relatives and one day this young Narendranath confronted his father and said what have you left for us because you have spent thrift and you are spending everything and then the answer came the father instead of answering took the young Narendranath by his hand led him in front of a huge mirror made him stand in front of the mirror and said this is what I am leaving you that means you the man I have trained you I have taught you I have myself lived the life and if I have learned anything that your manliness that is what the most invaluable treasure the character of a person that's what I am leaving to you that's what he meant now I will narrate another incident Swami Akhandanandaji he was wandering in North India he happened to live for some time somewhere in North India in the house of a Ayurvedic Viraj Pandit and it I do not know how it happened there the old mother and father are treated worse than servants and Swami Akhandanandaji was shocked he called this shop and then he said don't you know whatever Dharma Shastras teach one's parents must be looked upon as none other than God himself and then as a result that Ayurvedic doctor had become completely changed and then from next morning he used to first thing after getting up he will bow down to his mother place one rupee in her hand and then any wants are there he would fulfill and his family strangely never liked it and the root cause of all this was Swami Akhandananda therefore they wanted to do away with him to kill him that was a very interesting incident in the life of Swami Akhandananda but I will narrate share with you another one how deeply even in the remotest villages Hindus were influenced by these teachings of the scriptures of course most people were illiterate never studied the scriptures but through the stories they hear through Hari Kathas through dramas and through narratives by village Pandits etc of Mahabharata of Ramayana we know Rama went to the forest just to see to see that his father would not be called a liar because he gave these boons to his stepmother Kaikeyi for the sake of fulfilling of course we know Dasharatha had passed away and the life of Rama's mother was very miserable but then he had to do the Dharma so Akhandanandaji he was wandering and once he was wandering in Himalayas and there he came across a cave and this sorry that was another story he came he went to a village and there was a poor lady perhaps a widow and she had several children and he took shelter at night there and the lady was very pious lady she gave him food showed him a corner of the house and then he went to bed next morning he was still tired he was supposed to spend only one night there and then depart from there but his body was not in a state to travel so he he asked mother I want to spend one more day here will you give me permission she said yes my son you stay as many days as you want we are all working people so early morning we prepare food we eat something here is your portion of the breakfast and we leave some food for noon also and when you are hungry you eat it so then he asked her I am a stranger do you trust me and how do you know that I am not going to bundle all your utensils etc and run away and the reply is a most wonderful reply she said my son we have been taught from the very beginning that every sadhu is to be looked after as a God as if God himself has come in the form of the Atithi not to speak of ordinary Atithi but a monk a sanyasi so we we have no reason to we will not disbelieve we will not lose our faith we will not suspect and then she narrated what happened a few months earlier another sadhu came exactly like that requested to be allowed to stay for a few days and by that time these people came back he bundled whatever he could lay his hands upon and disappeared so this incident happened after that fake sadhu had stolen everything she said that we it is not our duty to look after who is fake and who is real we don't know but we will do our dharma if a sanyasi doesn't do his dharma well God will deal with them it's not none of our business such wonderful experiences Swami Akhandanand had all the time so that shows how much it whatever duties we have been prescribed by the scriptures is for our own good and without discharging them we will never be able to progress in spiritual life then of course Chaitanya Mahaprabhu we know he was one of the greatest devotees of God many consider him as a incarnation of love incarnation of God Sri Ramakrishna used to consider him as an incarnation of love but at the same time Sri Ramakrishna's guru Bhairavi Brahman used to look upon Sri Ramakrishna as a combination of Chaitanya and Nithyananda two in one she had several visions also verifying that one in fact Sri Ramakrishna himself had a vision of the Chaitanya and his brother brother means spiritual brother Nithyananda in a way disciple also as entering into his body as in a as a mystical figures so this Chaitanya Mahaprabhu he understood his mission in life and by the time he became one of the maddest lovers of Krishna he wanted to renounce the world later on he said I am born to be a sannyasi only a sannyasi can teach others he was in fact married twice and I think I narrated his the story of his wife Vishnupriya so this Chaitanya Mahaprabhu's mother was a widow Shichidevi in fact his eldest elder brother Vishwambar had also become a sannyasin and never again seen but Shichidevi was naturally tremendously attached so Chaitanya Mahaprabhu Nimoy he went and said mother I want to become a monk and she broke down and said I will not allow you my son how can I bear my both my sons becoming sannyasin then he said mother this is my duty allotted by God to me there is no way for me I cannot give a householder's life if you insist upon it I am going to die give me permission but I will promise you I will be living near you you will come and visit me every year several months and if you don't give permission I have no option but to disappear from your side but he only upon obtaining his mother's permission he left but he started staying at Puri so that from Shichidevi's Navadvipa it was not so difficult to travel to Puri every year she used to come so long as she was capable of doing it his devotion to his mother he would not allow any woman to touch him on the contrary only Shichidevi his own mother could serve him food and he would fall at her feet even though he was also a sannyasin he also belonged to Yankaracharya's Darshanami Sampradaya Keshava Teertha that was the guru of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu such was his devotion to his own mother then we see this Namadeva how much he was devoted to his own parents but then he also say Ramana Maharshi Ramana Maharshi did not want any woman to stay there but when his mother came he had no words and she slowly she started establishing a big household he warned her but who would listen but what can he do and at the end when she passed away he shed tears before her passing away Ramana Maharshi took her head on his lap put his one hand on her head another hand on her heart and then until she attained Mukti he did not leave her that's what Shankaracharya had done when his mother remembered him he went there gave Mukti to her and then came what a marvelous examples and finally I am going to tell about Bhakta Pundalika we all know the story I am sure most of you know but I will tell you very briefly this Bhakta Pundalika was a son of a Brahmana parents he was very devoted and then the parents as usual got him married and his wife became a little bit difficult person and she went on changing her husband's mind and he became completely as the story goes and as we know Hindu tales cannot always be verified but anyway he turned to be absolutely uncaring of his parents and then a big change had come later on he became blind and somebody told him the one you have neglected serving your parents the only way is that you serve your parents and that is the way to progress in spiritual life finally in the Karma Yoga itself Swami Vivekananda gives the story of the virtuous butcher from Mahabharata how did he become such a great soul only by serving his parents so all these wonderful stories are not meant for entertainment but the highest truths are inculcated through these stories now what I wanted to emphasize here is what is the psychology in spiritual life of serving one's parents pitru rina one can never get get rid of one's debts to one's own parents of course as I was mentioning parents also have the greatest responsibility not only to provide the children with nice food nice facilities nice education nice dress and spending crores of rupees on their marriages wherever they could that is not the only one but the most important thing is imparting our spiritual culture by living the life themselves if any parent however loving they are however caring they are if they fail in giving spiritual culture but only give them physical things or even intellectual things they are failing thoroughly in their duties naturally a question that comes is now what happens if the children have not got good samskaras that is none of our business our business is to lead ourselves what we preach and then tell the children or anybody who would like to listen not to people who we should never force these teachings to on other people but especially we have our duty towards our own children because we should be examples living example they learn more in life from observing us than from hearing what comes from our mouths so we have dealt with very important part of one's duties what is the overall picture spiritual progress is possible only in human life and human life progresses in through varna stages and life stage jati dharma and varna dharma ashrama dharma jati dharma means depending upon the qualities we may be born as shudras or vaisyas or kshatriyas or brahmanas this is nothing to do with ordinary understanding one of the qualities if tamas is dominates it is shudra it is a bit less rajas is more vaisya rajas is more sattva is more than other two qualities it's called kshatriya more sattva guna supported of course by vraja guna and tamo guna is called brahmana you we have to appreciate how our ancient rishis have studied psychology so much could penetrate and then divide people into this categories later on the evil of categorizing this forecast by birth has come but bhagavan krishna beautifully clarifies and says guna karma vibhagayo chatur varna maya srishtam guna karma vibhagayo by the dominant guna as well as a type of activities we choose we can choose certain type of activities and there is a limited freedom there not complete freedom but limited freedom in that limited freedom if we can choose something which will slowly take us to higher guna then that is our duty to do it anyway progress whether for prayers or shreyas for worldly happiness or spiritual progress both are possible only by using this opportunity given us through this body and mind and in this world by discharging our duties and this is an important point we must always keep in mind there is nothing called only i sit and i pray that is possible only when a person has reached the highest quantity of sattva guna which in other words is a sanyasi but until we reach that state we have to develop this sattva guna and reduce rajo guna and tamo guna and this is called spiritual progress and this is possible only by the proper discharge of our respective duties so now swami vekananda briefly tells even so is a householder's duty to his wife always let us keep if this is the husband's duty towards the wife it is also the wife's duty towards the husband as i mentioned earlier why did sri ramakrishna marry most people marry because they have they suffer from kama is a very common thing like animals when we get certain age chemical factory starts production of this that is nature's arrangement most people marry for several reasons one reason is of course main reason the biological urge to propagate oneself but the another reason is man wants a constant companion so long as this life lasts many most people cannot bear loneliness and that's one reason the people most people get married of course in those earlier days people were much more having faith in scriptures in religion so they used to adjust love each other now looking upon this modern civilization whose only goal seems to be as much squeeze as much sense pleasure as possible this is the only goal of life is unfortunately this is the impact of the modern western civilization rather than our ancient civilization even in the west also the ancient times they had these high ideals for example in bible that divorce was is never allowed because marriages are made in heaven and that is not a superstitious idea the psychology behind it is that through this both of you become co-pilgrims and went there your way to god that was the main thrust of that teaching let me read now from swamiji's selection from maha nirvana tantra no man should scold his wife and he must always maintain her as if she were his own mother and even when he is in the greatest difficulties and troubles he must never show anger to his wife and this is what with let us keep this teaching in mind and look at sriram krishna's life and holy mother's life you will see what we are talking about sriram krishna never look down insulted because insulting can be done suffering can be given not even by opening the mouth by looking down that's what usually most people used to do in the middle ages etc the whatever be the husband a wife must be a chaste wife and this these rascals this is some of these dharmashastra karthas they have killed millions of women all in the name of religion they made slaves of these women whether it is in india in the west a woman is looked upon as an desirable object of sense pleasure never in the sense of a very valuable human being created by god for the purpose of progress in spiritual life hindu dharmashastra tells us a jiva is born as a woman not because of some papa done by her but because a woman's body is most suitable for the expression of certain type of devotion to god for example why did srirama ask the rishis in the dandakaranya next incarnation i will be born as krishna and all of you will take birth as women not for the pleasure of krishna not for this because he could look down upon them or boss over them because the highest expression of paravati in the attitude of a the lover and the beloved is possible only in a woman's body biologically it is the most suitable body another way i can express it is that i prefer my mother to my father however loving my father might have been would have been but the incomparable love that any mother can give to her child that cannot never be compared to anybody's love next to god's love some way kananda used to say the greatest we find is the love of the mother for her child even today in this wretched days that we are living in this fact remains ever shining every mother she when she looks at the at her child children she is a transformed woman she becomes like a devi so but these dharmashastra karthas they have murdered people what you may be thinking what is the swami talking about i am referring only to one particular custom sati how many thousands of women had to burn themselves upon the fire of their husbands however wretched rascals the husband must might have been and it is all created all pandits they have risen and supported it even pandit raghunath who had written this dharmashastra he quotes learned quotations from earlier scriptures supporting this sati the act of burning oneself wherein in the vedas do we ever get these things only swami vekananda knew about it and then he felt so much misery said unless the masses and the women are risen up it is not possible for india to rise at all where women are neglected it is there in our manu smriti when where women are neglected disrespected the gods will be displeased with them and these people will go to the direst hell suffering on earth and suffering after death also but what did we the men turn all these things into this horrible history is very painful even to recollect now look at siram krishna the latest incarnation of god how did why did he marry to show the adarsha resta jivan he loved her she loved him and when she was in need he supported her when he was in need she supported him both of them are complementary nobody is superior nobody is inferior this is beautifully told through that story of the virtuous butcher a loving wife serving her husband had become spiritually much greater than brahmana ascetic these are the lessons our mahabharata ramayana they want to show us who dares to point out at sita and say she is in any way inferior to the divine mother but very few people everybody talks about only rama very few people talk about sita very many people talk about hanuman the greatest character in the whole of ramayana swami vivekananda used to go into ecstasy and say that the ideal for the modern india is hanuman why he was a perfect combination of jnana bhakti karma and yoga ever ready to do the bidding of his master and serving the world and that's why he is called chiranjeevi that's why swami vivekananda recommends worship hanuman take his name in fact once he referred i was hanuman in my past birth that was what swami vivekananda said i carried the message of rama to the grieving sita in ravana at that time i had to cross the ocean by flying but in this incarnation by the grace of rama i comfortably crossed the ocean pacific ocean by traveling in the very ship produced by their very demons ravana suras that's what he said anyway coming back so if we study the life of sairam krishna and holy mother exclusively from the viewpoint of how they lived an ideal husband and wife life then we have a lot of points to get now even more important point i am showing it even though it it is to be discussed later on every wife accepting for his for her husband becomes a loving mother to the whole humanity and that is why sairam krishna kept holy mother and said i am leaving you behind for establishing divine motherhood divine motherhood doesn't mean only divine mother will will manifest divine motherhood every woman accepting her relationship with her husband must become a divine mother not even an ordinary mother that means what is divine mother every mother naturally loves her own children or at best even people belonging to her children's children and to her closer her her family's children etc etc but only a divine being can love a poor child etc etc the most wonderful example tears come to my eyes whenever i meditate upon this incident there was a disciple of sairam krishna his name was swami shivanandaji he became the second president of the ramakrishna order and his parents didn't have a male child for a long time and then they prayed to lord taraknath shiva and as a result this boy was born his name was they named him after that taraknath tarak and then the the father was a great tantrika sadhaka he met sairam krishna several times sairam krishna had bestowed his grace upon him also then this taraknath's mother she gave birth to this boy and then what happened that family was earning sufficient amount of money and so they took i do not know exactly about 12 or 15 orphan boys now what is the speciality in this incident the speciality was that taraknath's mother never made the slightest distinction between her son tarak and then the other orphan children he whatever she used to cook she used to serve keeping looking upon her own son as one of the orphan sons and then the neighbors the relatives must immediately it was a glaring fact and they remarked what is this this is your own son you are treating him exactly like the others orphans that means you should have looked down upon them which is ram krishna later on turned into the greatest ideology of india shiva jiva shiva not orphans not poor people not helpless people but looking upon and rendering service upon everybody as lord shiva himself lord himself god himself and taraknath's mother used to practice it so her reply was for me every child is lord shiva only they are all my children though not born through my womb and that was a matter of surprise even ridiculous to many of his relatives now i'm telling she has become a divine mother chandramani devi had become a divine mother and we know how holy mother had become a divine mother for everybody not only to good people even to sinful people also how she gave shelter to everybody she never looked down anybody because divine mother cannot afford to look down upon anybody she may be serving people she may be helping them she may be looking after them but mentally looking down has never come to holy mother everyone is my own child so swami Vivekananda goes on no man should scold his wife and he must always maintain her as if she were his own mother and even when he is in the greatest difficulties and troubles he must not show anger to his wife this particular teaching he must always maintain her as if she were his own mother and literally ramakrishna worshipped holy mother's feet how did he look upon her once she asked how do you look upon me and she said he said he replied that the mother who is in the temple mother kali and the mother who gave me birth i look upon you exactly as the same mother ma anandamayi ma anandamayi then swamiji goes on he who thinks of another woman besides his wife if he touches her even with his mind that man goes to dark hell and literally these are all truths before woman he must not talk improper language never brag of his powers he must not say i have done this and i have done that the householder must always please his wife with money cloths love faith and words like nectar and never do anything to disturb her that man who has succeeded in getting the love of a chaste wife has succeeded in his religion and has all the virtues before we go further we will i will stop here but what was the reaction judgment of holy mother sharada devi towards ramakrishna she gave an unqualified certificate i am fortunate to have a husband who never even heard to me with flowers and sriram krishna not only looked upon her in spiritual vision of course as the divine mother but he never neglected her he provided her with food all his money he kept so that he knew after his passing away this money will come for her maintenance he gave explicit instructions where she should stay and what should be her attitude towards life and what what was her duty allotted by the divine mother in this life that is to establish a divine motherhood and this is what we are talking everywhere the end result of every duty properly discharged is divine fatherhood divine motherhood divine brotherhood divine sisterhood in other words slowly transforming our mind so that it becomes pure consciousness and that which is pure consciousness will only perceive pure consciousness everywhere so this is the beautiful thoughts ideals presented to us in ramayana in mahabharata in srimad bhagavatam and they are nothing but the highest upanishadic teachings given to us in the form of very sweet swallowable homeopathy pills in the form of stories allegories parables etc these beautiful topics we will discuss with every time i have to tell you that i will be reinforcing these talks with a lot of incidents or stories like that so you just if you have never heard please go through the story of bhakta pundalika because of him only the modern pandarapura had come into existence giving peace solace and right guidance for millions of devotees in india and of course some people in the west also may sri ramakrishna holy mother and swami vekananda bless us all