As per Hinduism, every person is born with multiple types of debts in life. Throughout the, one must find ways to repay those debts.
One of these debts is known as the ancestral debt, or Pitra Rin. Pitra Paksha is the time when everyone gets an opportunity to repay towards their ancestors. The Vedic texts also state that three generations of ancestors from every family tree resides in an in-between realm called Pitriloka after death. For 16 days each year, during Pitru Paksha, the God of death, Yamraj frees the ancestors to accept offerings from their descendants. According to the Gita & the Vedas, offerings made to the departed souls during Pitru Paksha bring peace to their souls and helps them reach their divine destination.
If we look at the current era, a householder’s life remains troubled by one issue or another. We generally feel happy & content when the troubles get resolved. However, there are few challenges which keep on arising before us time & again. Continuously facing these troubles makes the entire family unhappy & distressed. It is not an exaggeration to say that such a situation is very common in most of the households. However, no one knows the real reason behind so many hurdles in life. People just curse their fortune & continue to struggle with their lives.
The truth is various situations like happiness, joy, challenges, sufferings etc. are all driven by the karmas done by us & our ancestors. Thus, sorrow & pain are nothing but fruitification of the bad karmas of our ancestors & is also called as Pitra Dosha. On the other hand, good karmas of our ancestors & their blessings brings all sorts of success, happiness & piousness in life.
A child takes birth due to the contribution of both mother & father & they are the one who fulfill all the needs in our daily lives. Due to this reason, our ancient texts mentioned that mother, father & ancestors should be paid reverence prior to worshiping any God or Goddess. This small story from the life of Lord Ganesha shows the greatness of parents in the life of a child.
Once Lord Ganesha & Lord Karthikeya ended up finding a unique fruit in the forest & grabbed it together. They refused to share it with each other & started quarreling for it. When they reached Mount Kailash & presented this problem to Shiva & Parvati, Shiva provided a solution. He understood the significance of the fruit as the fruit is known to grant immortality & extensive knowledge when eaten by the rightful bearer. To choose who gets it, Lord Shiva proposed a challenge. He asked Ganesha & Karthikeya to make 3 rounds of the world & whoever would do so first & return to Mount Kailash, would get the fruit.
Karthikeya immediately jumped onto his peacock & flew speedily to complete three revolutions across the Earth. Lord Ganesha knew his rat couldn’t fly so he thought for a moment & then started walking around Shiva & Parvati & completed three circles around them. When asked by Shiva, Ganesha replied that Shiva had asked them to circumvent their world. And for Ganesha, his parents were more than the world, they were the entire universe. Looking at His child’s devotion towards them, Lord Shiva declared Lord Ganesha the winner. The universe continues to progress at its pace. The living beings during their lives perform various tasks as per their consciousness during their lifetime & then finally merges in God. Blood, flesh, fluids of our ancestors exist in our body throughout our life. This means that our existence is directly related to our ancestors. Thus, we can make a quick progress in our life if our ancestors remain pleased upon us. It is also clearly mentioned in various Purans that an offspring gets blessed with full life, completeness, power, fame, happiness, wealth, knowledge and a lot of pious things in life if the ancestors are pleased with him.
It is a specialty of human beings to offer gratitude towards our ancestors. Sanatan Dharma included this process with complete reverence. Various processes were created to appease the departed souls & were later termed as Shraadha. Shraadha-Tarpan is done for deceased relatives & this activity relieves them from Preta form. Once relieved, these ancestors get pleased with their family members & then only addition of new member in family, wealth, name, fame & prosperity can come into their family’s house.
Due to a lack of time & scarcity of emotional connect with the ancestors, a person finds oneself incapable to perform the Shraadha. However, it is a bitter truth that the household which lacks spiritualism, which doesn’t perform sacred rituals, where Guru, God and Pitras are not worshiped; such a household remains filled with quarrels, problems, and diseases.
The essence of Shraaddha has been lost a long time ago and there is a lot of misunderstanding about it in the society. People today just consider their dead family members as spirits whereas Pitra form is an entirely different form which is both pious & superior to human beings. They have been considered equivalent to Gods, Sages, Kinnars etc. Pitras are even considered to be equivalent to Lord Brahma and it has been mentioned in texts that even Brahma tries to satisfy the Pitras.
One common doubt that remains in the mind is what if our ancestors would have already taken a rebirth, how come they are going to receive the benefits of the Shraaddha procedures. The answer to this query is that the Pitra form is divided into nine parts & the collection of all of them is called as Pious Pitra.
Dead people are considered to exist in Matrya Pitra & it is the Pious Pitra form which is capable to pass on the benefits of the Shraaddha procedures to both the ancestors – who have not taken a rebirth & those who have already taken a rebirth.
Liberate the unsatisfied souls
On every Amavyasya, the deceased souls arrive on earth to accept the offerings, however, during the period of Pitrapaksha, they remain at the door of their offspring for the entire two weeks. If these ancestors are not offered any Tarpan during the Pitrapaksha, they continue to wait till Sun doesn’t move into the Scorpio sign & they continue to suffer tremendously during this period. At the end of this duration, they leave back dejected, which has a very bad effect on the household. One more point to mention here is not all the departed souls enter into the spiritual plane & remain in a strange state of dissatisfaction. Those who enter the spiritual plane (Pret Lok) & don’t get any Tarpan during this period can bring a havoc on the family.
Our complete life is controlled by different types of energies & we don’t have any control over them. This is the reason why a person is not able to live a life that he or she wishes to live. One can’t be put into the category of a happy person if he or she is rich. There might be several shortcomings in the life of such a person, he or she might be suffering from various diseases. Can’t this be possible that the way we keep our Lives under our full control, we can keep our life under such a control? Wherever or whenever we wish, we can turn our life into that direction. And above all, we can identify who are the persons who care for us, who are those who are envy of us & are planning to harm us & how to destroy their evil plans.
Ancestors hold enormous power because they are not tied within this body. They are true form of energy & siddhis. When favorable, they can tell about the issues a person is going to face in near future, they can guide onto a path which has less or no troubles, they can help up to perform those tasks which can bring success & fame in our life. They can create a magnetic aura around us. They can bring harmony in our life. Nothing is impossible for them; only thing that is required is to appease them.
A mother & father play important roles in a child’s life, both emotionally & physically. They provide love, support, guidance, & role models for their children.
They are responsible for nurturing, protecting, & raising their children, helping them to develop into healthy & responsible human being. We are in this world because of our parents & thus it is of utmost importance that we perform Shradha for our mother & father. Not to overlook, our grandparents are also the reason why we exist in this world & they also deserve due respect from us.
The ninth day of the Pitrapaksha can be used to satisfy the departed souls of mother, grandmother & great grandmother. The eleventh day should be used to satisfy father, grandfather & great grandfather. Sarva Pitra Amavasya is designated to all those ancestors or family members who died an unnatural death. This is a myth that Shraaddha should be performed just for mother & father. Shraadha is a mean by which we can show our gratitude towards our ancestors & these days are great days to obtain their blessings.
SadGurudev Kailash Shrimali Ji will be initiating the disciples to help their ancestors get relieved from their pains & sufferings & in a way help the disciples to live a life that is free of unnecessary troubles. Disciples should perform Tarpan for their ancestors during these days & get initiated with PitraDosh Nivaran Diksha for helping the troubled souls.
It is mandatory to obtain Guru Diksha from Revered Gurudev before performing any Sadhana or taking any other Diksha. Please contact Kailash Siddhashram, Jodhpur through Email , Whatsapp, Phone or Submit Request to obtain consecrated-energized and mantra-sanctified Sadhana material and further guidance,
