Mother Goddess as Tower of Strength

Oct 23, 2004, 12.00am IST

In Maharashtra, Durga is better known as Bhavani, who inspired Chhatrapati Shivaji to fight oppression. In the song Vande Mataram composed by Bankim Chandra Chatterjee, Mother India is identified with the Mother Goddess, Durga.


The Devi Mahatmyam enunciates our vision of God as mother. She is conceived as Shakti or energy and the whole universe is the expression of that Shakti.

Having created this world from within herself, she preserves it and finally reabsorbs it at the time of final dissolution.

This spiritual truth is sustained by the philosophy that chit shakti, the energy of consciousness, is the ultimate reality behind the universe and that it is masculine-feminine, Brahmn-Maya, Shiva-Shakti and Impersonal-Personal.

The masculine aspect is its quiescent state while the feminine form is the active one.

Shiv-Shakti represents the unity of eternity and time. She is Mahavidya and Mahamaya, supreme know-ledge and illusion, Mahamedha and Mahasmriti, great intellect and sharp memory.

Durga is the primordial source of everything and manifests all the three gunas, sattva (truth, tranquillity), rajas (passion, restlessness) and tamas (darkness, ignorance).


She is the terrible night of periodic cosmic dissolution and the great night of final dissolution.


"I salute again and again that Goddess who abides in all beings as mother." Durga is prakriti, which is two-fold: apara prakriti or ordinary nature which is subject to change and para-prakriti or higher nature which sustains the universe.

As para prakriti she nourishes us all with her bountiful yield. This concept makes a strong case for environmental protection.


There are many accounts of Durga’s origin. In the Skanda-purana, when a demon threatened the world, Parvati, at the instance of Shiva transforms herself into a warrior-goddess and overpowers the demon.


In the Vishnu-purana, with her help Vishnu tackles a demon who is out to kill the infant Krishna. Devi Mahatmyam narrates three of Durga’s cosmic interventions at the behest of the gods.

As Mahamaya (one with the ability to delude) she comes to the aid of Vishnu and deludes the demons, Madhu and Kaitabh, defeating them.


Shumbha and Nishum-bha, the two demons, depu-ted two of their commanders, Chanda and Munda, to kill the goddess when she came to the rescue of the gods in distress.

But both were killed in the conflict. Hence her name Chamunda. Raktabeeja was the next challenge — her task became difficult because from every drop of blood shed by him a thousand more like him arose.

She, therefore, received the blood in her mouth before it fell on the ground and thus the demon was killed. She defeated Shum-bha and Nishumbha also after a fierce battle.

While Chanda and Munda stand for the lower states of egoism and ignorance in a person Raktabeeja represents a more subtle malicious tendency with multiple traits continuing with dogged persistence.
This evil can be eliminated only by going to the root of the problem however arduous the task.

In the Mahishasura episode, the buffalo-demon and his rampaging associates drove away all the gods from heaven. From the conjoined energies of the gods arose the Goddess, the parts of whose body and whose weapons were donated by each individual divinity.

Despite all the deceptive tricks played by the demon he was overpowered by the Devi after a protracted and fierce battle, symbolising the triumph of good over evil.

M N Chatterjee

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Herald the Birth Of a New World

Oct 20, 2004, 12.00am IST
David Bowers.

Few would have believed, when the Bab was born 185 years ago today, that the son of an Iranian merchant would herald the first world religion that would proclaim the equality of gender, the abolishment of slavery and the oneness of the human race. He took on the title "The Bab", which means "gate" in Arabic, to symbo-lise his acting as a gateway leading people from the old era to the new, and as the herald of another messenger of God, Baha'u'llah.



While the teachings of the Bab and Baha'u'llah recognise that we now live in the darkest times the world has ever seen, they are nonetheless optimistic about the ultimate future of the human race. As people everywhere become aware of the inadequacies of fanaticism, materialism, and extreme nationalism to solve the problems of a changing world, the Baha'i teachings point to a new way of life: "We stand on the threshold of an age whose convulsions proclaim alike the death pangs of the old order and the birth pangs of the new."

The appearance of a new religion in the world, signalling a time of great change and upheaval, is not unlike the birth of a human child. Each time a messianic figure comes to a society greatly in need of spiritual rebirth, his message stirs society to the core. His early believers experience great turmoil, followed by obscurity and weakness, and only later emerge in the form of a developed civilisation that can bring undreamt of glory to the human race.

One religious civilisation becomes the mother of the next, and although all religions exist for the same purpose, with the same essence of the faiths that have preceded them, each one represents a unique link in the family of human civilisations as a whole.
The Baha'i teachings say the same: "The whole earth is now in a state of pregnancy" — a world civilisation, divine in origin, is now growing in embryonic form within the body of humankind. The signs of its growth are increasing every day, in the form of more efficient means of communication and travel, more willingness to cross ancient barriers of prejudice, as well as more advanced forms of meeting social needs that were never addressed in previous centuries. Orga-nisations devoted to resol-ving conflict and promoting international peace have appeared, including those that facilitate global medical and scientific collaboration, and enable people from even the poorest of nations to play an important role in the treatment of disease and development of science and industry.


Whereas in the past, tribes, nations and empires have solved their problems through warfare and do-minance, always seeking to advance themselves at the expense of others, the tumult of the modern world is proving that such conflict and segregation must be left behind if the family of humanity is going to survive and prosper. More and more communities are working to develop a new way of living that will at once uphold all that is great and noble about the traditions of the past, while at the same time replacing those barriers to growth, with bonds of unity and cooperation.
Peace-loving people of the world increasingly nurture the embryo of a world civilisation, while those committed to long-standing conflicts and prejudices continue to destroy themselves. But through the Bab's eyes, we might see our own times in a fresh, gloriously optimistic light ... "So fraught with peril, so full of corruption, and yet so pregnant with the promise of a future so bright that no previous age in the annals of mankind can rival its glory."

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Impermanent Nature Of All Phenomena

Oct 30, 2004, 12.00am IST
Suresh Jindal.

Phenomena have no inherent nature. Essential to undertaking the Buddhist soteriological path is the understanding of the Four Seals or Axioms: All conditioned phenomena are impermanent and transitory, all contaminated phenomena are, by nature, suffering, all phenomena are empty of self-existence and Nirvana is true peace.



The disintegrating diamond of the morning dew, the ephemeral rainbow, the swathes of whirling mists against the dusky mountains are all manifest forms of the impermanent nature of phenomena. We directly experience it in the impermanence of our bodily vitality sinking towards the inevitability of death, and in the shifting sands of our mental and emotional states. The aggregates of our feelings, discrimination, ambitions and goals and their accompanying mental states are perpetually unstable and continually disintegrating.

Buddhism posits causality, that resultant manifestations are fruition of causes and conditions, circumstances and environments. Hence all phenomena are 'other-powered' and 'conditioned' by a myriad factors. The same causes and conditions that empower them are also embedded with seeds of their decay and disintegration. All phenomena both external and internal from the stars to our aggregates and mental states, are changing moment to moment, from in-breath to out-breath right up to old age, sickness and death.


Buddha identified three types of suffering. First, suffering of the form-body due to illness, disease, or accident. Second, suffering of change may be seen in the context of the eight-worldly dharmas when fame turns to disgrace, plaudits turn to blame, riches to rags, and mental and emotional happiness gets suffocated by sorrow.


The third is suffering 'other-powered' by our karmic deeds.

We have been continually drowning in the four turbulent rivers of birth, sickness, old age and death. We are
imprisoned by material factors of wants and greed, our feelings, discriminating awareness, ambitions and mental defilement.

Whatever goal we achieve leaves us dissatisfied and craving for more. But the more we grasp at external elements to secure and dignify ourselves the more hollow and unfulfilling they become. The hallucination of positing permanence, solidity and anchors to phenomena that are insubstantial, momentary and transitory begin with the solidification of ego. The ego starts pigeonholing 'others' into friends and enemies; into those who allow the ego to have its dictatorship and those who oppose it. Around itself it builds a prison of claustrophobia, paranoia, competition and speed. Meantime 'I' am always changing; my health is not as robust, my wealth has taken a dent, my child-ren are alienated from me. The 'I' remains as confused and be-wildered and ever-suffocated in the mire of misery and suffering.

The 'I' is not to be found as an independent, self-existing entity. The self that is so cherished, nurtured and
often violently defended against those perceived to be endangering it is nowhere to be found — in space, in the mind or the body. This disconnect, between the hallucination of a permanent 'I' and its ultimate nature, which lacks any and all self-existence, is the deep chasm from which our suffering arises and into which our pleasures are constantly tumbling.
Impermanent phenomena can and do change. Suffering can cease when the causes of its perpetuation and energy cease; when the three poisons of ignorance, attachment and hatred cease feeding and cannibalising on each other. This cessation of afflictive emotions is Nirvana — the state of true peace.

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Seek the Fragrance Within You

Oct 27, 2004, 12.00am IST
Santosh Vallury.

Everytime I look at myself, I find an individual being, cut off from the rest, trudging along on a journey called 'life'. I know I ought to tread the path of dharma or right living, but I also know it requires a great deal of effort and will power.



Unfocused, I continue to trudge aimlessly, and so I feel inadequate in terms of "achievement". I tell myself I should achieve something, but then, achieving more always seems to be in the "future". Without questioning, I keep going, on and on, trying desperately to achieve things in life in the hope of making myself more complete and secure.


Still, I find myself insecure and unhappy — at least, most of the time. In my endeavour to make myself happy in as easy a manner as possible, two things have become very important pursuits in my life, Artha and Kama.

Artha pursuits are those which bring me security economically, emotionally and socially which is why I enjoy my pursuit of wealth, stocks and shares, relationships with family and friends, and a name, title or designation in a job or society.

It makes me feel very secure when I am addressed as "Sir", "Mr..." etc., little realising that titles and honorifics add nothing of true value to one's spiritual evolution or understanding of the Ultimate Truth. I attach myself to my bank balance, investments and designation and take myself to be that alone. When my shares plummet or rise at the stock exchange, my heart beats wildly and I get excited and anxious.


I have all that I could wish for — yet, I feel unaccomplished and unhappy. And at such times I go for another pursuit, Kama, to feel happy and complete, but with no success. I am unable to sustain efforts to follow the path of dharma. I flit from one day to another, through what I call "living" and I try to "eke out" a few "thrilling moments" in my life just like the musk deer.

The musk deer, enchanted by the fragrance of musk, and not knowing its source, keeps running hither and thither, looking for it. It is only when the musk deer is dying that it realises for the first time that the beautiful fragrance was coming from its own body.

We human beings are more fortunate in that guidelines are available to us in the form of the Vedas and other teachings to tell us that the source of happiness lies within. Ancients declared: "Aham Brahma Asmi" — "I am the whole".

I am that very thing which I am trying to be. It is my very seeking that makes me separate from the whole that I already am. This doesn't mean that the Vedas ask us to stop our pursuits in life. They merely show us a way as to how to pursue knowing well that we are already "complete". This, naturally, wipes out the notion of inadequacy and incompleteness centred around the "I" and makes life truly worth living.

For this to happen, the student has to, however, live with a traditional teacher of the Vedas. A learned guru can teach us all about Vedanta, using the Vedas as an instrument with which to discover the Self just as you would use the pramana of a mirror to see your face. The guru only helps you unfold the message to help you grow in your understanding.
In fact, it is only when one understands the message of the Vedas that one can say "I live life". Until then we are only dragging ourselves from one life to another. And that too, only to keep coming back, again and again.


This fact is stated poetically in Shankara's Bhaja Govindam: "Punarapi jana-nam punarapi maranam punarapi janani jathare shayanam."

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The Great Learning Of Confucius

Oct 16, 2004, 12.00am IST
Kailash Vajpeyi.

The development of civilisation, morality and harmony among people is dependent on the interplay of the yin and yang principle. So we go through cosmic cycles, positive or negative. Confucianism analyses how goodness and happiness can be achieved in a particular age. Analects is the source book of the teachings of Confucius, according to whom Jen is the highest of all virtues. It has been translated as love, goodness, benevolence, people to peopleness, kindness, a sublime moral attitude, and a transcendental perfection.



Confucius has suggested various means and methods for the attainment of Jen. Since we are slaves of our own desires, we can attain mastery over self only through self-cultivation. Self-cultivation requires a submissive temperament and one will need to follow the mores of polite society. For this, Confucius uses the term li. Whereas Jen is the by-product of self-denial, it also slowly generates li in human temperament. Li means righteousness, the general principle of the social order, good conduct and good governance. Li is all-pervasive. It covers personal relationships, social rituals, definite attitude towards others, love and respect for the elderly, reverential attitude for weaker section of society, filial piety in children, loyalty among friends, respect for authority and benevolence in rulers.

Confucius uses the term Hsiao for filial piety. Since life itself is generated from parents, Hsiao is also extended towards parents. In old age parents become like children; hence Confucius stresses reverence for parents and filial piety for children. Thus Hsiao does not consist merely of giving them physical care but also good spiritual education. So far as parents are concerned they need our love and respect even after death. The unfulfilled aims and purposes of parents should become the aim of their children. Slowly, one should extend Hsiao outside the family circle till it becomes a universal moral and social virtue.


Confucius uses the term Yi to denote righteousness. It is the recognition of what is right and proper or the capacity to differentiate between good and bad. Whatever is healthy and soul-satisfying, must be promoted by each and every individual. If individual members of a society are true to themselves and have faith in goodness and sincerity, then good governance and a happy social order will be assured.


Li, Hsiao and Yi are all contained in Jen. This concept is believed to make the way to heaven. By constant practice of Jen one learns to appreciate the ideal of perfect goodness. Confucius knew that virtue does not grow in a vacuum, but one should try and apply this method in everyday life. The perfection of personality lies in always acting with reverence and respect for others.


Eight ethical-political terms are described in the Great Learning: "The ancients who wished to preserve the fresh or clear character of the people of the world would first set about ordering their national life. Those who wished to order their national life would first act about regulating their family. Those who wished to regulate their family life would set about cultivating their personal life. Those who wished to cultivate their personal lives would first set about setting their hearts right. Those who wish to set their hearts right would first set about making their wills sincere. Those who wished to make their wills sincere, would first set about achie-ving true knowledge. The achieving of true knowledge depended upon the investigation of things. When things are investigated then true knowledge is achieved."

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Look Beyond Peace And Violence

Oct 13, 2004, 12.00am IST
T S SREENIVASA RAGHAVAN.

Not a day passes without a reference to the need for peace. Still, the booming guns don't fall silent. While peace is discussed because of its absence, war is the subject of debate on acco-unt of its ever-menacing presence. So we need to find answers to two important questions: Can we achieve a lasting peace? Can we shed individual and collective acts of violence?


To find convincing answers, we will have to analyse peace and violence in their totality, both from the point of view of indivi-duals and communities. Atma-shanti is peace within and a soul that is peace-less within can hardly be peaceful outside. The Ribhu Gita is an exposition of advaita by the sage Ribhu to Nidagha, in the Sivarahasya. Ribhu, in fact, holds the individual responsible for everything that is good or bad; and also for everything that is neither good nor bad.

For, what exists is only Brahmn — the eternal state of Supreme Consciousness.

Ribhu says to Nidagha: "I'm of the nature of all activity/ I'm of the nature of the doer of all/ I'm the protector of all/ I'm of the nature of the destroyer of all/ I'm ever the nature that is not anything/ I'm of the nature that is established as myself/ I'm ever of the nature of the undivided Absolute/ Inquire steadfastly into this every day" (14:8).


One could, however, argue that violence is a part of human nature while peace is not...because, the six innate, intertwined, yet pivotal qualities of humankind are desire, anger, greed, delusion, ego and competition. Shanti (peace) is absent whereas its antithesis krodham (anger) is conspicuous by its presence.


Ribhu deals with this question too when he says unto Nidagha: "There's nothing to be discarded as disagreeable/ Nothing to be added as agreeable/ There's neither a master/ Nor any disciple/ There's nothing called knowledge/ Knower or the knowable/ There's no sentience/ Or mindless insentience/ Nothing auspicious/ Or inauspicious for me/ I'm the difference-less Brahmn" (8:20).

By pronouncing that there's nothing to be cherished as agreeable or discarded as disagreeable, Ribhu — the prophet of non-duality — opens our eyes to the fact that everything has to be accepted in its totality: peace or violence, happiness or sorrow, ego or simplicity, natural or unnatural; because their denial or suppression will result in confrontation (10:3).

Our real challenge lies in going beyond discrimination. If we talk about love suppressing hatred, we'd get only a love that's coated with hatred. If we talk about God suppressing the Devil, we'll get only a Devilish God. And, if we talk about peace suppressing violence, we'll get only a violent state of peace.

Like peace and violence, everything in the world is highly indivi-dualistic. If you insist that you'll change only when the whole world does, it'll never happen. Ribhu expresses it better: "Nidagha! As there's nothing apart from your Self/ Consider your Self as yourself/ Experience your Self, and ever enjoy/ The bliss of your Self in yourself/ Become peaceful and immersed/ In an ocean of happiness/ Without any of the least sorrow/ Remain my son as a mass of bliss!"

Neither peace can put the violence down nor violence can mutilate the face of peace. We have to learn to accept...without attachment or detachment. A supreme state of consciousness alone can achieve this. Then we'll discover the harmony that lies beyond peace, beyond violence. But we have to begin with the self. That's why J Krishnamurthy said: “You are the world!”

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For the Living from The Realm of Death

Oct 7, 2004, 12.00am IST
M N CHATTERJEE.

There's this story of a young boy whose dialogue with death is as fascinating as it is exploratory, coursing down the six chapters of the Katha Upanishad. Sage Vajasravasa, to get divine recognition, performed a sacrificial rite which required him to give up all his possessions and pleasures. But he gifted away only those cows which were diseased, old and lame, keeping the good ones for himself. Sensing his folly, his young son Nachiketa asked him, "Father, to whom will you give me?" Finding no response, the son repeated his query. Losing patience, his father burst out, "I give you to death".


Nachiketa took his father seriously. He proceeded to the realm of death. But, Yama, the king of death, was out and returned only after three days. Apologising for having kept his guest waiting so long, he offered Nachiketa three boons. The boy first asked for his father's well-being. Second, he sought the knowledge required to perform fire sacrifice which could open up the path to heaven.

But Yama was taken aback at the third request — Nachiketa wanted to know what happens after death. How could Yama reveal such a profound truth? Yama tried to dissuade the boy from his quest but in vain. Impressed by the boy's devotion to truth, Yama relented and spoke to him of death and the metaphysical speculations on immortality. He dwelt on what is good, sreya, and what is pleasant, preya. While sreya implies whatever leads to true well-being, preya includes short-lived pleasures mainly derived through sense organs. The wise concentrate on the former while the ignorant remain satisfied with the latter and get enmeshed in worldly ties. "They fall, repeatedly, birth after birth, into my jaws", he said.

Yama instructed Nachiketa to know the atman, the self, "the ancient effulgent being, the indwelling spirit, deeply hidden in the lotus of the heart. This is difficult. But the wise, following the path of meditation, know him and are freed alike from pleasure and pain". The self is immortal. One who has realised that the self is separate from the body, the mind and the senses has fully known him and becomes immortal.


Yama reverted to the nature and identity of the atman: Soundless, formless, intangible, undying, eternal, without beginning, without end, immutable, beyond nature, is the self, smaller than the atom, greater than the cosmos, subtler than the subtlest, beyond tarka or logic, beyond cause and effect, luminous and not depending on any reflected light. Knowledge of the atman is unique, the fruitful product of spiritual illumination, truthfulness, detachment and devotion and not of intellectual adroitness. One who is freed from greed realises the glory of the atman. Man is the rider, the body the chariot, the intellect the charioteer and the mind the reins. The senses are the horses and the roads they travel are mazes of desire. Man has to rise above worldly attachments and temptations by a judicious use of the sense organs, self-control and discrimination.
It is necessary to tread the path of yoga, stressed Yama. The one with a steady mind and pure heart reaches the goal and is born no more. Brahmn is the supreme goal, the end of the journey. If one fails to reach it in this life, another birth will follow. The approach to the goal is difficult to tread, like the sharp edge of a razor. One may take the help of the syllable OM which symbolises the supreme Brahmn, the ultimate reality and its utterance is spiritually uplifting. It is sabda Brahmn or Brahmn in the form of sound and is accorded divine reverence.

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Ideal of Simple Living And High Thinking

Oct 2, 2004, 12.00am IST

India needs eco-friendly development. Mahatma Gandhi said that economic development becomes relevant only when it is based on principles of environmental conservation and harmony, and equity with social justice.


Equity has an ethical content in the real world: It would involve sacrifice on the part of the privileged in favour of the less privileged.

Gandhi conceded that a certain degree of physical harmony and comfort is necessary, but above a certain level, it becomes more of a hindrance.


So the ideal of creating an unlimited number of wants and satisfying them seems to be a snare that lures us away from the pursuit of the ideal of plain living and high thinking.

Our happiness really lies in contentment. Gandhi often said that an ounce of practice is worth more than a ton of preaching.

Industrial countries on the fast track will eventually become ecological security risks, because they will not easily give up their present-day unsustainable lifestyles.

In his essay The economic possibilities for our grandchildren, Lord Keynes said in 1930: "For at least another hundred years we must pretend to everyone that fair is foul and foul is fair; for foul is useful and fair is not. Avarice, usury and precaution must be our gods for a little longer still. For only they can lead us out of the tunnel of economic necessity and into daylight."

We need to usher in environmental education with regard to long-range ecological security. Natural, agro and industrial economic systems have to be both conserved and used in a sustainable manner.

There has to be a healthy blend of environmental, social, developmental and economic imperatives.

A sustainable society has faith in science and technology as an instrument of environment-friendly social and economic change - because economic growth should not be at the expense of ecological assets.

We should work in partnership with nature and conserve non-renewable resources and energy and reduce wastage.


We must believe that the earth's resources have to be protected and sustained not only for humankind, but for other species, too, for present and future generations.
We need to share our resources across species as we are all inter-connected as one giant living orga-nism. The guiding principle of economics has to be the meeting of needs, and not greed.


Gandhi said: "The earth provides enough to satisfy every man's needs, but not every man's greed."


This age of consumerism can lead to over-extraction and over-consumption, resulting in pollution and eco-degradation, with serious environmental impact.


Market economy must include both the present and future costs of pollution and eco-degradation to help conserve our collective home.


Using the polluter-pays-principle, the costs must be met by the manu-facturer and/or country concerned for failing to use enviro-friendly technology.


Gandhi said: "Whenever you are in doubt or when the self becomes too much with you, apply the following test: Recall the face of the poorest and weakest man you may have seen and ask yourself if the step you contemplate is going to be of any use to him. Will he gain anything by it? Will it restore him to control over his own life and destiny? In other words, will it lead to swaraj (self-rule) for the hungry and spiritually starving millions? Then you will find your doubts and your self melting away."

( Abridged from TERI's 'Mahatma Gandhi: An Apostle of Applied Human Ecology'. )
T N Khoshoo

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