No matter for how long or short duration we stay with Him, we can proudly say that we have spent some moments of our life with such a divine being. We stood in between that source of light and storm. Only such a person can reach to the highest level in life and if the person is not like him then they are nothing else but thorns. Both of them will survive, however that normal life is not the true ‘life’. That person might have some sort of patience, he might have thought process, however such a person can’t live a contented life. I have lived hundred types of lives, I have lived between the householder disciples as well as ascetic disciples too. There were some low level people among the ascetics as well as some great disciples whose name I can still remember, I have some great memories associated with them.
Bhairavananda is one such disciple who used to remain with me for entire twenty four hours a day. He stayed with me for seven years. I can’t recall even a single moment in those seven years that I had turned back and he was not present there. He was always attentive; he used to come to know what I need by just looking into my eyes. Whether I am thirsty, whether I need some rest, whether I wish to lie down, whether I want him to massage my feet or anything else. He used to understand the signals of my eyes. He used to remain awake till the time I was awake and used to sleep only after I slept. And when I used to wake up the next day, he used to arrange everything for me.
He himself got ready before that. I am not sure whether he used to even take a sleep or not. There are several disciples like him. If I will get a chance, I will share my experiences of those disciples by means of a book so that it could serve as a guideline for the future generation disciples. However, I am not sure when will I be able to do it.
Writing a book is not like cutting grass that you take a sickle and start cutting it. One needs mental peace for it and mental peace can only be attained if someone can stand tall in between the thorns and the flower, when someone can take up that challenge that no matter what happen, I will safeguard this flower from the storm. And for that one need forty one disciples who can provide peace to the Guru.
When Krishna got pierced by arrows blood came out of His body too, even when Ram’s body got pierced by Ravan’s arrows, He got more than 108 wounds. That is just a body, what lies within that body is the essence of God, what lies within that body is the essence of Guru, what lies within that body is the essence of a disciple.
What is important is how you have spent your life and how Guru has spent His life. Whether Guru continuously helped you? Whether Guru always talked with love to you? If Guru ever abused you for once? Whether Guru plotted anything against you? Never! So, even you don’t have any authority to do any cheap plotting against Him! Let Him live with peace so that He can script that knowledge which is unparallel, which is divine, which can’t be obtained anywhere else.
Shankaracharya mentioned that a person is a disciple no matter whether he is a businessman, serviceman, or into any other field. You remain a disciple till the time of your death. Disciple means whether you are learning in your life. What you are doing and for whom you are doing? Whether it’s for yourself or the common good? Know it for yourself! If a piece of bread lies on the road then four dogs will start quarreling for that and one of the dog will be able to pick a small piece and will run away. This is what doing for oneself means.
What we did for others is what important is! This fact holds a great significance as to how well we have spent our lives. If the person has spent his life serving Guru, then it is virtue. Disciples are more attentive than Guru. Haridas didn’t know that his disciples are being slaughtered outside. If He would have known it, He would have asked Akbar to kill Him first. However, the disciple didn’t tell Him anything.
And it is Haridas due to whom we are able to listen to the classical music till today. Classical music don’t exist today because of Tansen. Tansen was a servant in Akbar’s court who used to sing just for food. No matter whether he was a great musician, however he fed himself by selling his music. Haridas didn’t sell His music for food. This was the difference between these two people. And due to this reason, no one died for Tansen. Tansen was killed in Afghanistan and it was Akbar who was involved in the death of Tansen. When Akbar found that this Tansen is of no use now, he sent Tansen to battle field with his army and got Tansen slaughtered by his own army. Akbar’s entire character is filled with conspiracies and those who were kings, they used to either increase their virtues or their conspiracies.
Only these two things exist in a person. This is the difference and due to this reason only history has not forgiven Tansen and has placed Haridas on to the highest level. And you will notice that all the great classical musicians always bow down before Haridas prior to playing the music to seek His blessings. It is because His voice still echoes in the surrounding, p eople still worship Him considering a Guru and this is a process to increase virtues within oneself. We must evaluate whether we are a disciple, do we possess the capability to withstand strongest of storms and if not then we are not a disciple, if we can’t sacrifice ourselves then how can we claim to be a disciple?
If we don’t sacrifice ourselves, then how can we become a disciple? It is a possibility that Guru might not be physically present with you in the future, however you will have the presence of that sweet fragrance in your life that we have spent some invaluable time with a great personality. A time that was full of knowledge and consciousness and. However we threw that person in storm and even the best roses wilt under strong storms, its petals fall down, even the best personalities like Ram too get fainted by attack of arrows, even the best personalities like Krishna die by a single arrow. However–Nainam Chidanti Shastraani….it is true that one day this body will collapse, however the soul will never collapse, Krishna’s soul still exist among us, Ram’s soul still exist among us. However, their body is lost and when their body is lost, their voice has also lost.
This Gita is incomplete in itself; the remaining hymns went away with Krishna because we killed Him. A bheel (tribal man) killed Him by his arrow. A low crooked man killed a great personality like Krishna because no one stood like a rock between Krishna and the arrow.
The greatest virtue of life is to safeguard a rose flower that has blossomed within a jungle. It is my duty to safeguard it. It is because that rose will further help to grow another ten roses, another hundred roses. However, if this single rose falls then we will be left with nothing else but thorns. The second word used by Shankaracharya in the hymn is ‘love’. A person whose heart is filled with love can’t do mistakes in life. Love can happen with a single person only and not with ten persons.
You can have sympathy for ten persons, attachment with ten persons, you may be acquainted to forty people but you can’t love all of them. Love can happen only with one personality – either with God or with Guru or with anyone else. However, you will be willing to sacrifice your life for the one you love. A devotee completely offers himself at the feet of Lord, Meera then steps down from the palace on to the road and doesn’t pay any worth to the fact that she is a queen, she tie musical anklets in her feet and starts searching on the road for her lover, for her God, for her husband. She understood that there is conspiracy in the palace; there are fraudsters in the palace.
And she was betrayed – the king sent a cup of poison for her, he sent a poisonous snake within a box and made many other attempts to kill her. Meera said that you can’t harm me with these tricks because a flame of love is lit within my heart and a great personality sits there who won’t let me die, I will even drink this poison and she also drank it. And when she found that this conspiracy has increased too much, she came down on to the road to protect her beloved. She came out because she considered it as her duty to save her beloved. It was not that she came out to dance and sing on the road. She was troubled with the thought that these people are very cunning. They might kill my Krishna, how will I save him? I will even leave the palace to save Him. And she came down. You can think of her situation, she belonged to a royal family in Rajasthan which was considered to be the den of conspiracies, which was full of betrayal and above all Meera was as woman and not a man.
That to the royal queen! And she tied the musical anklet in her feet and came out of the palace just for only one sake and that was to save her lover, to save that Krishna who exists in her heart. Apart from Krishna she had no love towards the royal linage or for her husband or with diamonds and due to this reason only Meera is still alive today. Due to this reason only Soor is still alive, Kabir is alive, Nanak is alive. Nanak left the home with just one aim to fill His heart with love. You can love only a single entity – either with thorns or with roses. You can’t love both of them simultaneously. It entirely depends upon you whether you love thorns or rose flowers.
Shankaracharya mentioned that to take oneself to the great heights in life, one has to bring in the changes right from now. You may either traverse the path of greatness or fall lower on the ground. It is all in your hands to either become a great personality or to become a shrewd man. It is entirely in your hand to become rose or to become thorns in life. What you will become will completely depend on your efforts. You have to evaluate that whom do you love. You don’t put a twig on your coat but a rose flower and if the rose flower will die then what will you place there? A lover expresses his love by means of a rose flower.
He says that I wish to see you smiling similar to the way a rose flower smiles. We don’t give rose flowers to ten people, we don’t worship ten Gods, Meera too didn’t follow ten Gurus in her life, she just said, “Mere To Girdhar Gopal, Doosro Na Koi”….i.e. only Krishna is mine, I don’t know anyone else in life.
There is no second person, I haven’t met with anyone else in life. I have neither seen Krishna, yet I believe that He is there. It is His decision not to meet me, however it is my duty to save Him from these conspirers else they will kill Him. I will even go out of the palace if it is required to save Him. I don’t bother for what people will say about me. I will save Him at all cost. And Meera is still alive today whereas there were thousands of other people, yet we don’t know their names. Only a single woman could survive out of those thousand people, rest all died. Shankaracharya mentioned that if you love God, if you love Guru, then there is nothing other than them in your life.
Panini’s grammar mentions that love means to completely finish one’s identity, to put an end to your own identity. And love can only be done with a great personality. You will become a thorn if you will love a person without any ethics. Shastras have mentioned that such a great personality can be either God or Brahma or Guru. No other personality has been mentioned. Rest all are dummies of wax who take birth, grow and then finally melt down and we stand along with them and will also melt down with time. Will we exist after we die? Will we smile when we are about to die?
What does career mean? You have earned twenty lakhs or you have taken business to great heights doesn’t mean career. Had it been true, then all the people living in Delhi must be having a better career than us. This is not what career mean, there is no greatness in it because if greatness would have been attained by means of big bungalows, then all of them would be great. What lies within their heart? What sort of person they are? Are they trying to attain this greatness by unfair means?
Yes they just showoff, they fool themselves. They consider themselves great by donating twenty thousands in a temple and becoming its head. However, the truth is that the person has not become the head, it is those twenty thousand rupees which he donated has become the head.
People are worshiping them, people are worshiping those twenty thousand rupees. This is nothing else but fooling oneself, this is nothing else but betraying the God. If love exists in your life, if there is a fragrance in your life, then definitely you are a great personality. Love means to completely dissolve your identity, it means to completely eradicate oneself. If love exists in life, then this life has a meaning. Shankaracharya mentioned these words because He traversed on the path of love where He had to bear tremendous pain and sufferings for His Guru. When His Guru was about to die, He ran from Badrinath to see His Guru and didn’t take any rest in between. There used to be no buses or trains at that time! And in the last moments of His Guru’s life , Shankaracharya took His head and placed on His lap and said that I am your disciple Shankar and have arrived now, please don’t leave!
His Guru replied, “Shankar, I didn’t have any person who could stand between me and the storm. Those storms, those thorns have now eventually won over me and now I am going to die.” And after that day, smile never came on the face of Shankaracharya, His lips never had that charm again, He couldn’t write any poems after that, He started to dissolve within this pain and within next eleven months His soul too departed from His body. He stayed away from His Guru for eighteen years. His Guru was in Kerala and when Shankaracharya started His journey to travel across entire India and finally came back to visit Him at the time of His death, it was complete eighteen years. However, His soul never got detached from His Guru’s heart for even a moment in those eighteen years.
The moment Shankaracharya came to know that His Guru is ill, He left everything at that very moment and left for His eight hundred miles journey. And when He placed His Guru’s head on His lap, His Guru said, “What all I had to do is going to remain incomplete now because the storms, the thorns, the darkness have won over me. It is because there was no one like you who can stand in between me and the storm, none of them had that greatness to give their life for me, all of them were selfish. They learned from me and then deserted me. I don’t even wish to speak out their names.” Shankarachary said, “I am here now, you don’t have to worry.”
The Guru replied, “Its too late now. This body has worn out so much that the soul can’t reside in it now. Anything can exist only within strong walls. If the walls fall down, then someone will enter into the premises. The temple can’t remain safe after that. This temple can’t stand now Shankar, it will definitely fall because its walls have fallen.” and those were His last words.
On one side where Shankaracharya’s Guru died, the other side smile departed from Shankaracharya’s face, laughter got away from His life, He didn’t even write a single line after that day in next eleven months. He got so much hurt by this incident and couldn’t cope up with this pain. He started to think that I have removed Buddhism from the entire country, I have written ShankaraBhashya, however I didn’t do anything to save my Guru. He started considering Himself as the worst creature of this entire universe. In His last time He created few hymns out of which four five hymns were those in which He criticized Himself for not defending His Guru, where He called Himself as the most wicked person of this world, He called Himself a sinner, He called Himself a traitor and He considered Himself as the worst person because He didn’t do what He must have done at that time and wasted all His time in doing things that were not required.
In the next edition we will be sharing the remaining part of this divine speech. In the following part we will share what a person needs to do to reach to that divine level in life and why it is possible only under the guidance of a Guru. To be continued..
SadGuruDev Shri KailashChand Shrimali Ji
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