DEIVATHIN KURAL # 160 (Vol #3) Dated 09 Dec 2009.

DEIVATHIN KURAL # 160 (Vol #3) Dated 09 Dec 2009.
(These e-mails are translations of talks given by Periyaval of Kanchi Kamakoti Peetam, over a period of some 60 years while he was the pontiff in the earlier part of the last century. These have been published by Vanadi Padippagam, Chennai, in seven volumes of a thousand pages each as Deivathin Kural. To day we are proceeding from the middle of page No 735 of Vol 3 of the Tamil original. The readers are reminded that herein 'man/he' includes 'woman/she' too, mostly. These e-mails are all available at http://Advaitam. blogspot. com constantly updated.)

21. Instead of focussing all our efforts in visiting holy places, yaaga, japa, dhyana, pooja, bhajan and such activities. we are not keeping good health, falling sick all the time, causing others to worry about us and spend their time and resources in taking care of us! contrary to contributing to others welfare, we are a liability on others. If the body is not healthy enough, how to visit the ‘chaar dhaam’, the four major religious destinations located in the four corners of this vast country of many sacred rivers and temple towns, that is India? When we are physically unwell or handicapped, how can we do pooja or japa or concentrate our minds on godly divine thoughts? Our fever and throat pain, eye trouble, tooth ache and such things will never let us get away from, ‘deha aatma buddhi’!

22. Thus for remembering God, we need to keep this body well nurtured and rid of diseases. For that purpose, we need to make use of preventive medicines and cure ourselves when we are ill. For this reason, we need to follow all the restrictions on diet and abide with the rules of health and hygiene. For all this there has to be separate set of rules, regulations, procedures, medicines and their application, which is all contained in what is known as Ayur Veda.

23. It is not enough to reduce the discomfort of the diseases, but we have live a wholesome innings of life. Ayur Veda shows us the way for this. The body is essential to be able to do all the things that have to be done, to off set the existing back log of demerits we have accumulated over many life times, I said. Before this present body dies, we have to do away with three types of scum, namely ‘Aanava malam’ borne out of pride, ‘Karmika malam’ out of wrong actions and ‘Maya malam’ out of mistaken notions and identity, as propounded by the teachers of Saiva Siddhanta. If you wonder as to why not do all that in our next birth, great thinkers have already thought of such a possibility and answered that, “ippiravi tappinaal eppiravi vaaykkumo“, meaning ‘we do not know as to what would we be born as in our next life!’ Evidently, in your next life if you are born as anything other than a human being, you have every chance of further increasing your ‘Karma Sanchita’ bag of tricks! (KTSV adds:- I have read elsewhere that even the whole pantheon of Gods will have to be born as a human being before their cycle of life and births comes to an end. Though in Ramana Ashram there is a Samadhi each for a cow, a dog, a deer and a peacock. Each one of them died at Ramana’s hands receiving his blessing touch. Did they attain to Kaivalya directly or did they have to go through another life time as a human being? Who can say?)

24. To continue with Periyaval’s discourse. So we can never be certain about what our next life has in store for us. Even if we are born as a human being, we never can know as to whether the set of circumstances would be suitable for spiritual progress, in terms of, the right bent of mind, power, energy, occasion and opportunity. So in this life itself, once such a idea has come into our minds, we must make immediate sustained efforts to get the ‘chitta shuddhi’ and through that ‘jeevan mukti’! Gita 5.23 says, “shaknoteehaiva ya: sodum praak shareera vimokshanaat I kaama krododbhavam vegam sa yukta: sa sukhee nara: II”.

25. He who is able while still here (in this world) to withstand, before the liberation from this body, the impulse born out of this desire and anger, --he is a yogi, he is a happy man. Desire and anger are powerful enemies of peace. It is very difficult to annihilate them. You will have to make very strong efforts to destroy these enemies. While still here when you can He says, ‘saknoti iha eva’ . Before dropping this body, ‘praak sareera vimokshanaat’ , when you are capable of controlling your these tendencies, do it -- is the message! The person who does it, he is the Yogi, he is the winner of real happiness!

26. For the removal of Kaama and Krodha, desire and anger, i.e., for your attaining ‘chitta shuddhi’, are all the religious rituals, nitya karma anushtaanaa-s, yaagaa-s, yagna-s, pooja-s, japa, dhyana, aavaahana and so on. Before this body drops, using this very body as a tool, by doing all these Karma-s, if we come to the stage of ‘na punya, na paapa, na kaama, na krodha, na moha, na aascharya’, then without any more balance -- yet to be experienced karma phala, this life form which has been all this time under the mistake belief of a separate identity -- remerges in the Para brhmam irrevocably!

27. No more births. No more life forms to be assumed. Short of this, if we die, we do not know if we are going to be born as a cow or a goat! So, till desire and anger is overcome, till all the dirt from our minds are wiped clean, we have to make an effort to retain the body and retain it in as good a condition as humanly possible! It is alright if we are to die despite our such efforts. That is beyond our control. We should not be found lacking in our efforts, while that is in our control to do so!

28. Some people may still ask, “when death is not in our control, what is the use of our trying to extend our life with physical fitness, as far as possible?”. For them my answer is this. Come to think of it, why only death, everything is very much under God’s will only! There is virtually nothing under our control. Marriage, education, profession, achievements, losses, gains, name, fame, ridicule, disdain and every thing is in His control only. We do understand that we have no independence or self will of our own at all. But we somehow are under the illusion that we have some independence to exercise our self will as though! In one way, it is true also that after all the effect of Karma is our own making. While we have no control over many things, we have one choice under all circumstances. That is, we can always opt to do such things as to reduce our load of back log of sins. For that we can opt to do as many acts of help and service to others, while still alive in this life. For this purpose, we may try and keep ourselves and this body, in as good a physical condition as possible. For this, we are duty bound to keep ourselves in perfect physical trim! For this reason many Great Rishis have made life time contribution of what is collectively known as Ayur Veda.

29. It is clearly stated in the Ayur Vedam that ‘treatment is not to be given to a Non-believer’! It may sound as a very cruel direction. But such an injunction itself is out of real compassion for the agnostic. Only when we are suffering from a disease, we may be ready to think on the following lines. "If it is true that there is a God, let him save me from this agony. I will later live the life of a believer if I am cured of this disease." We do read about how when Koon Pandyan became an agnostic, Appar cured him of his deformity in the spinal cord as well as his fever, by praying to Siva and applying the sacred ashes, on the Pandya King's body! We have also read about many who returned to the fold of believers, after their disease was cured by the power of the divine. This is not only a historical fact. Many people even to day are making a turn about after praying to Vekatachalapathy Balaji or Guruvayur Appan or Sabarimalai Ayyappan. We do come across many who turn devotees of God on the benevolent interceding on their behalf, by some or the other Mahatma even today.

30. This one man coming back to the fold of believers in God, may motivate many in the right direction. May be even if it is too late to save him, he may be born as a believer in his next life. Also by chance the agnostic is too strong in his agnosticism, then by not being treated, he will be given an opportunity to reduce his load of Paapa, by suffering through the illness! On the other hand, to treat him despite his being a non-believer will be tantamount to perpetuating his sins of non-belief and cause many others to go astray! So the direction that an agnostic may not be treated by Ayur Veda, is with kindness and compassion to him and others only!

(To be Continued.)

Sambhomahadeva.