DO NOT WASTE USEFUL MATERIALS IN IDOL WORSHIP

Serve Incarnation or Devotee or Poor in God’s Name
O Learned and Devoted Servants of God,[April 25, 2012] Worship to God in human form can be digested only by human beings, who have completely conquered their ego and jealousy. Devotees of highest level can only reach this level of maturity of divine knowledge. Most of the human beings cannot reach this level and therefore, only energetic forms of God are prescribed for them. But, energetic forms are not available on the earth to receive the service of the devotees because such forms are prescribed only for the upper worlds in which souls in energetic bodies live. Therefore, only inert photos and statues of such energetic forms are served by most of the devotees in this world. Even photos and statues of past human incarnations are not inconvenient because such photos and statues are not alive human forms. As far as the inert statue or photo is concerned, it is immaterial whether it represents the energetic form of God like Vishnu or past human incarnation like Rama. In any case, only the non-living material is being served. Service of such inert materials is waste because the service rendered by the devotee is not received and experienced by the inert material. But, there is no other way to develop the devotion to God in the case of ordinary human devotees.

The alive human form is not acceptable and the alive energetic form is not available. Only inert photos and statues representing the alive energetic forms or past human forms are the inevitable way left over. Serving such inert statues and photos is not to be condemned because such service develops the devotion of the devotee. But, one should be careful to see that there is no wastage of useful materials in serving such photos and statues. You can wash such photos and statues by water since plenty of water is available. You can use flowers to decorate the photos and statues since such decoration develops the attraction of the devotee towards God. You can put a light before the statue or photo provided there is darkness. It is not wastage since light is required in the darkness even otherwise in the absence of statue or photo. But, burning the oil for the lights in the day time is condemned. The oil is also food material, which can be used to pacify the hunger of hungry living beings. You can use perfumes because such perfumes create a pleasant atmosphere, which can be enjoyed by the people sitting near the photo or statue.

Wastage of milk, etc. in bathing the statue is not necessary. Instead, you can offer the milk to the statue and use it to pacify the hunger of hungry living beings. Ignorant people pour the milk in the abode of the snake, which becomes waste. You can donate anything to the poor people in the name of God so that the donation is associated with the development of devotion. When you save the life of a hungry person or remove the tensions by donations, you are saving the life and giving peace so that the poor person may worship God in future. Therefore, donation to a poor person in the name of God is always appreciable. Donation to a devotee is also good because God lives in the devotees as per the Bhakti Sutra of Sage Narada (Tanmayaahite). God lives in the human incarnation and also lives in the devotees. Therefore, service to devotees, is as good as service to human incarnation. Service to poor people in the name of God also pleases God because you are helping them to develop their devotion in their future stabilized lifetimes. Hence, service to human incarnation, service to devotees and service to poor in the name of God are appreciable since God is pleased by such service.

At the lotus feet of Shri Datta Swami

-Durgaprasad

Neutrality to Happy & Misery is not Yoga, but enjoying Happiness & Misery is Yoga

O Learned and Devoted Servants of God, [April 14, 2012] The bliss of God is said to be continuous without any interruption. This means that God is in continuous state of joy derived from continuous enjoyment. The Veda says that God created this universe for the sake of enjoyment through entertainment. This creation contains both happiness and misery altering continuously. The creation is completely in the hand of God. If God enjoys only the happy scenes, God could have created this creation with continuous happy scenes only. Anything continuous leads to boring, which is the misery. Therefore, misery is inevitable even if the happiness is continuous. Hence, the creation contains alternating happiness and misery. Hence, the deduced concept is that God enjoys both happiness and misery and therefore, His joy is continuous.

People pray God to remove misery and give happiness. People do not know that the continuous happiness bores and becomes misery. Lack of the true knowledge in this concept is the only reason for such prayers. This is the path of majority. The path of the so called scholars is Yoga, which means the path of forced neutrality in happiness and misery. If you say that the equality of neutrality in both happiness and misery is Yoga, which is the state of God, it is wrong. God need not create happiness and misery and try to be neutral in both without enjoying anything. In such case, God could have created only the neutral scenes continuously without happiness and misery. In such continuous neutral scenes, God can be neutral without any effort. Unnecessary effort is required to be neutral in happy and miserable scenes. For the soul, the creation is not in its hand. Hence, the soul has to put the effort to be neutral in both misery and happiness. But, in the case of God, He need not be neutral by putting effort since God can create the continuous neutral scenes only.
 

 Enjoying Happiness & Misery is Yoga

Lord Krishna enjoyed the praise of Dharmaraja and His enjoyment is indicated by the smile on His face. Immediately, Shishupala scolded Him continuously. Lord Krishna kept the same smiling face indicating that He enjoys the misery also equally. Therefore, the equality of enjoyment in both happiness and misery is Yoga. Yoga does not mean the equality of forced neutrality in both happiness and misery. If neutrality is Yoga, the Lord could have kept neutral with silent peaceful face indicating His detachment from both happiness and misery. Therefore, the Yoga preached in the Gita as the equality is the equality in enjoyment in both and not the equality in neutrality in both. The Gita is generated by the Lord Krishna. The real interpretation of the Gita can be found out from the practical life of Lord Krishna. Without verifying the theory of the Gita in the practical life of the Lord, scholars are fighting with their theoretical interpretations of the Gita.

If you can enjoy equally happiness and misery, you can attribute yourself to be God, which is the Advaita as preached by Shankara. You need not worry about the power of creation, rule and destruction of the creation in intervals by God in this context because it becomes irrelevant. The reason is that the ultimate aim of creation, control and destruction in the interval is only the process of enjoyment of the creation. The Veda says that God created this universe because He was bored. Hence, the ultimate goal of God is only to enjoy the creation and not to exhibit His power of creation, control and destruction of the universe. A person harvested sugarcane and mirch. He crushed the sugarcane and prepared the juice. Similarly, he crushed the mirch and created the hot dish called chutney. There are two cups of sweet juice and two plates of hot chutney. One cup and one plate are enjoyed by that person. He is drinking the sweet juice and tasting the hot chutney now and then in the intervals. He is enjoying both continuously. Any single dish bores if enjoyed continuously. That person offered another cup of juice and another plate of chutney to you. If you can enjoy the sweet cup and the hot plate similar to that person, you are totally equal to that person. The labor put by that person in harvesting sugarcane and mirch and the labor put by that person in preparing juice and chutney are irrelevant in this context. All the labor is aiming only at the final enjoyment of the juice and chutney. Since the ultimate aim is equal in both the persons, both are equal. Similarly, the labor put by God in creating, controlling and destroying this creation now and then, is ultimately aimed at the final continuous enjoyment of the creation only. If you enjoy the creation continuously like God, you have totally become God and the power of creation etc., goes into the labor only, which is irrelevant. The Gita says that we should enjoy even the death, which is the climax of the misery and this is found in the practical life of the Lord. He was with smiling face even though the blood was flowing continuously when His foot was hit by the arrow.
 

Human Being takes Hidden Negative Side
You must realize the positive side of everything to enjoy it. Everything has positive and negative side. The greediness has both positive and negative sides. Due to greediness if you eat less, your health is maintained. This is the positive side. The negative side of the same greediness is not giving food to a deserving person. Similarly, charity has both positive and negative sides. The positive side of charity is to donate to a deserving person. The negative side of the charity is not to donate to a deserving person. God created everything with the positive side only. You are taking the hidden negative side of everything and blaming God for creating negative items in this world.

Ego is the most dangerous disease, which can spoil even the human incarnation. Both Parashurama and Rama were human incarnations. You can treat the human incarnation as God and this is Advaita (Monism). In fact, God lives in the human being and therefore, the reality is Dwaita (Dualism) only. As long as human incarnation realizes the Dwaita, God maintains Advaita. Rama always told that He is an ordinary human being and thus, maintained Dwaita throughout His life. Hence, Rama was always treated as God and Advaita was maintained by God throughout His life. When Parashurama thought that he has killed all the devils, God separated from him and he was insulted in the hands of Rama, which is the exhibition of Dwaita by God. Therefore, ego can spoil even the human incarnation and hence, one should be very careful about the ego till the last minute of his life.

At lotus feet of Shri Datta Swami

-Durgaprasad

Ambition to become GOD?

O Learned and Devoted Servants of God,
[March 23, 2012 Telugu New Year Day] God created this world and controls it. The soul can neither create nor control the world. God also destroys this world and the soul cannot do it. Therefore, the creation, ruling and destruction of the world can be done by God only and the soul is a total failure in these three aspects. The soul wants to become equal to God and such an ambition is called as Monism or Advaita. But, the soul is not equal to God in any aspect. God created this world for His entertainment. This world contains both happiness and misery. This means that God is enjoying both happiness and misery. Both happiness and misery give entertainment to God. The Veda says that God created this world for His entertainment. If the soul can also enjoy happiness and misery like God, at least in the aspect of entertainment, the soul can become equal to God and Monism can be achieved at least in this one aspect of entertainment. But alas!, the soul fails even this aspect. The soul does not want misery and tension. The soul wants continuous happiness throughout the life. But, the poor soul does not know that anything continuous including happiness bores. Boring is also misery. Therefore, misery is inevitable. I do not understand, how the soul aspires for Advaita, when it fails even in the aspect of entertainment.

You can neither procure the food material nor cook the food. At least if you are equal to the person in eating the cooked food, you can be equal to him at least in the aspect of eating the food. The person cooked both sweet and hot dishes and is eating both the dishes with full joy and entertainment. You are eating only sweet dishes and refusing the hot dishes. How can you be equal to Him if you are not equal to Him at least in eating the food? Some people doubt the point of enjoyment in misery. They argue that misery gives pain and how to get joy in it? It is not impossible. You only lack the art of enjoying the misery. When a beautiful young lady embraces a small boy, the boy feels uncomfortable and is pained. It is misery for him. But, a young man gets immense pleasure in the same embracement. The lady and embracement are one and the same in both the cases. The boy does not know the taste of enjoying the embracement of the beautiful young lady. The young man has the taste of enjoyment of the same embracement. Therefore, the lack of talent in tasting the enjoyment of misery is the reason. God and the realized soul have the taste of enjoyment of misery. An ignorant person does not have the taste of enjoyment of the misery like the child.

Some people develop the philosophy of becoming immune to both happiness and misery. This is utter foolishness. In such case, God could have created this world with routine situations only without happiness and misery. The temperature of the world must have been maintained at the room temperature throughout the year. There is no need of summer and winter. Therefore, God is enjoying both summer and winter and hence, God created both summer and winter. Therefore, such philosophy to become immune to both happiness and misery is wrong. The prasadam (offering to God) of this Telugu New Year day preaches this concept. It is made of sweet and sour materials. It represents the creation and the human life. Both creation and human life are mixtures of happiness and misery. God enjoys the creation and you must enjoy the human life. If you enjoy happiness and misery in equal level, such equal level is called as Yoga. Equality lies in the enjoyment of both different dishes. Equality does not lie in the common immunity to both dishes. If you refuse the misery and appreciate only happiness, you are insulting God.

You have gone to some house for taking food. Suppose the house lady serves both sweet and hot dishes in the meals. If you like sweet dishes only and refuse the hot dishes, the house lady is insulted. If you enjoy both the dishes, the house lady is pleased. Similarly, if you refuse misery, you are insulting God because God is the creator of the misery in this world. If you enjoy both happiness and misery, God is pleased with you. He treats you equal to Him because you are enjoying both like Him.

At lotus feet of Shri Datta Swami

-Durgaprasad

Samatvam yoga uchyate…Gita

[February 11, 2012; Message taken from discourses of Shri Datta Swami] The lives of human incarnations of God are always filled with intensive scenes of pleasure and sorrow. It is just like the plate of meals containing intensive sweet and intensive hot dishes. The intensity of the sweetness and the intensity of the hotness give climax of enjoyment. When the dish is intensively sweet or intensively hot, your enjoyment will always reach the climax. The Gita says that equality is yoga (Samatvam yoga uchyate…). The interpretation of the word ‘equality’ is misunderstood by the scholars. Some interpret that the sweet and hot dishes are equal. This is meaningless because only a mad fellow can say like that. Sweet is sweet and hot is hot. Some other scholars say that your feeling in eating the dishes must become equal so that you are not mentally enjoying both. This is also foolish interpretation because only the tongue of a diseased person becomes inert without grasping the tastes of both the dishes in different ways. For him, the tastes of both the dishes become equal. Therefore, in this interpretation, the tastes of both the dishes become equal. Both these interpretations are totally wrong since the practical experience contradicts such views. Neither the dishes are equal, nor are the tastes of the dishes equal. Such equality is not really yoga. It is only forced misinterpreted yoga. The real yoga is the equality in the enjoyment of the different tastes of both the different dishes.

 

The dishes are different and the tastes are different. The tastes are not changed during enjoyment. But, finally, the resulting state of enjoyment is one and the same. If you think that enjoyment lies only in tasting sweet dishes, you are just a child with ignorance only. The adult enjoys the hot dishes also in the same manner. In fact, most of our daily meals do not contain sweet dishes. Most of the food is hot and sour only. The sweet dishes are occasionally introduced during the times of rare festivals only. Therefore, the enjoyment of the adults is mainly from hot dishes only. But, unfortunately, the human being always craves for happy situations only and is reluctant to unhappy situations. His attitude in the daily meals is just reversed in his attitude towards life. If you see the life of the human incarnation, most of It is filled with unhappy situations only. That is the natural status of a human being in the enjoyment of daily meals, but, the same human being becomes reverse in his attitude towards the unhappy situations of the life. God created this universe with pleasant and unpleasant phenomena. He enjoys both in alternative way. Any continuous enjoyment leads to boring and therefore, both are equally important and required alternatively to maintain continuous enjoyment. If you can achieve this state of continuous enjoyment from both pleasure and sorrow, you will become equal to God and this is the concept of Advaita of Shankara. But, remember that you are not equal to God in other aspects like creation, control and destruction of the creation.

A producer and peon can enjoy the cinema equally. This does not bring the total equality between them. In producing, controlling and withdrawing the cinema, the producer is totally powerful, whereas the peon is zero. However, this difference is irrelevant in talking about the equality in enjoyment of the running cinema. Such irrelevance is denoted by the word Mithya by Shankara. Irrelevance means negation and absence of other angles, while considering a particular angle. The other angles like creation, control and destruction are unnecessary as far as the enjoyment of creation is concerned because the ultimate purpose is only the enjoyment of creation. If you slip now and then from such continuous state of enjoyment, it is called as Savikalpa Samadhi, which means the state with intervals here and there. If you are in the state of continuous enjoyment like God, it is Nirvikalpa Samadhi, which means the continuous state of enjoyment without any rupture. Such continuous state is finally tested at the time of death. If you stand in the state of enjoyment during death also i.e., if you can enjoy the death also, it is perfect yoga fully certified (Sthitvaasyaa mantakalepi… Gita).

At the lotus feet of Shri Dattaswami

-Durgaprasad

How the physical pain received by a person can be enjoyed?

[Q] Shri Anil asked, ‘Several people are asking that how the physical pain received by a person can be enjoyed?’ This question is with reference to the New year message given by Swami for 2012.

Swami replied: There are several illustrations to prove that the physical pain can be also enjoyed. In boxing, when the opponent embraces you strongly, you feel unhappy because such a situation leads to your defeat. But, when you are embraced by a beautiful girl, you feel more happiness and the degree of your happiness is proportional to the strength of the embracement!. Therefore, the physical pain in one situation is unhappy, whereas the same physical pain in another situation leads to happiness. Even when you eat the hot dish, your tongue is burning due to the vigor of chillies and your eyes are showering the tears. All these symptoms are the indication of unhappiness only. But still you enjoy the happiness in eating the hot dish. Therefore, you cannot link the enjoyment with mere external material. Ofcourse, the external material gives rise to the feeling and the feeling may be pleasant or unpleasant depending on one factor, which is that whether the external material is interacted continuously or not. If you are interacting with any item or situation of the creation continuously, you become unhappy. Even the embracement of the beautiful girl becomes unpleasant, if such embracement continues without gap. If you are exposed to the heat for a long time you feel happiness in cold as in the case of the Indian. If you are exposed to cold for a long time you feel happiness in the warmness and heat as in the case of a foreigner. Hence the process of enjoyment depends on the alternating interaction with the external items or situations in this world. Hence, any continuous interaction with the same item or situation gives unhappiness, whereas the change in the interaction gives happiness. 

God is the Father of the souls and hence arranges the life cycles of the souls with alternating pleasant and unpleasant scenes. Even though you have done sins continuously for some long span of time and good deeds continuously in another long span of time, God does not arrange the life cycles with the continuous misery and continuous happiness proportionally in corresponding long spans of time. God neglects this continuous span of time and arranges the life cycle in such a way so that every life cycle is fixed with alternating fruits of sins and good deeds. The re-arrangement of the good and bad fruits in alternating fashion by drawing good and bad fruits from both these span is done by God, who is omnipotent. You may expect God to cancel all the sins due to His omnipotent nature. If it is done like that, you will not enjoy since continuity of anything leads to misery. Hence even in such case, misery is inevitable. Therefore, if you do not pray God for removing the miseries, God has already arranged the life cycles in best way to give you continuous enjoyment. You are praying God to remove the difficulties, which are the fruits of your bad deeds. The law of justice does not accept the cancellation of the fruit of any deed. Hence, due to your prayers the difficulties are postponed to later births by God along with compounded interest. You also pray God to give continuous happiness. For this God, draws the good fruits from the future births with reduced interest to the present life cycle. Due to such continuous enjoyment of good fruits, you are again bored with misery. Hence, you are totally foolish in disturbing the already designed life cycles of God. As a result of this foolishness your future births will be full of continuous miseries. The continuity of the misery gives you unhappiness just like the continuity of happiness. Therefore, pray God always attracted by your love to His divine personality and not for disturbing the already best designed life cycles by God due to His paternal affection. Therefore, you will be continuously happy by enjoying the alternating pleasant and unpleasant scenes of life and by not asking anything from God.

Shri Anil asked Swami, ‘How to help the foolish people who are caught by such continuous troubles in their life from birth to death?’

Swami replied: If such people happen to do some good deeds, the good fruits of such good actions will be immediately introduced to give a break in the continuous suffering. God is always positive and tries to help His children even if there is a trace of possibility. But, remember one thing, that God will not do anything by your simple continuous praise in prayers. Unless some good deed exists, His hands are tightened. When Draupadi cried praying Lord Krishna for help, the Lord immediately verified her account book to see whether there is any credit of her good deed. The Lord found such credit which was infinitely multiplied by Him into infinite number of saris. The infinite multiplication can be done by God provided there is some basic credit from your side. Hence, you should always believe in practical philosophy than continuous begging and weeping before God through prayers. The practical philosophy can be according to your level and you need not worry about its magnitude since God can multiply it to the required extent. But, the extent of practical philosophy should not be below your capability imagining that God will multiply to any extent. The realization of all these concepts is called as Jnana Yoga or knowledge. The praise of God through prayers without any aspiration in return is called as Bhakti Yoga or Devotion. The implementation of the practical sacrifice is called as Karma Yoga or action, which alone is the fundamental basis for God to bless you.

In any case, the practical sacrifice should be without any aspiration in return. Draupadi sacrificed a piece of her valuable sari to bind the wound of the finger of the Lord without any aspiration in return. Even when she cried for help, she never thought about it since she did it without any expectation in return. Practical service to the society without the name of God gives you temporary heaven. The same service in the name of God brings the grace of God so that when you are ripened, God comes down in the human form to receive your service directly. If you are serving the humanity in the name of God, you will render the service to God in human form even if you don’t recognize Him. Serving the humanity removes the inherent repulsion to a co-human being due to ego and jealousy. Service to all the living beings is the basis since it is the starting stepping stone by which the service to inert statues and photos is stopped. Such service to inert objects is waste since the service is not received by the receiver. However, even such service is inevitable in the case of beginners, who are unable to eradicate their ego and jealousy towards living beings and especially to the human form of life.

At lotus feet of Shri Dattaswami

-Durgaprasad

Karma, Jnana Yoga and Karma Yoga

90% of Veda describes the process of preparing food from materials and this is called as Dravya Yajna or karma Yajna. Only 10% involves the process of analysis of spiritual knowledge as Upanishads and this is called as Jnana Yajna. Veda gives importance to karma. But, in Gita Lord said that jnana is better than karma (Shreyaan…). How to resolve this contradiction?

First, you must differentiate karma and karma yoga. In both, the process of involvement of materials is one and the same. Preparation of food is common in both. But, in karma, the prepared food is eaten by yourself, your family members, relatives and friends. In karma yoga, the prepared food is practically sacrificed to God. I mention the word ‘practical sacrifice to God’ here because the intellectual people started sacrificing food theoretically to God by offering to God through the posture of moving the hand and then the practical sacrifice is done to themselves only. This is an intellectual interpretation to get the fruit without the actual action. The Advaita philosophers have gone to the climax and offer the food to themselves theoretically also since they themselves are assumed as God by themselves. The meaning of pancha ahutis (pranaya svaaha … etc.) before taking food is offering of food to themselves assuming themselves as God. Such actions fall under karma only and not under karma yoga. Karma yoga means sacrifice of materials like food etc., practically to God. The conversion of karma to karma yoga can be achieved only through jnana yoga, which is the analysis to find out the truth. Therefore, what Gita says is that jnana yoga is better than karma. What Veda says is that karma yoga is better than jnana yoga and hence gives more stress on karma yoga than jnana yoga. If you think that karma and karma yoga are one and the same, this contradiction will come. In karma yoga also, the karma, which is the processing of the materials is present and by this you should not mistake karma yoga as karma. Gita says that both scholar and ignorant person do the same karma. But, since the karma (action) of the scholars is not selfish, it becomes karmayoga, whereas the same karma of the ignorant person remains as karma only since it is selfish (saktaah….). In Veda the 90% description is about karma yoga and not about karma. Yajna or sacrifice involves the processing of materials for the sake of practical sacrifice to God. When God is unimaginable how practical sacrifice is possible?. Based on this point, intellectuals try to escape from the practical sacrifice to God. They say ‘Is God directly receiving the materials?.’ This is only an excuse to cover up their selfishness.

In fact, the basic point that God is unimaginable and hence does not receive your service and sacrifice directly is really serious. Based on this, people started criticizing the exploitation done in the name of God. But, the careful analysis shows that the tradition is not blind. There are two types of service to God. The first type is called as “ Prateeka Upasanam”, which means the service to a representative model for God. But the model should be alive and deserving. Hence, service to statues and photos is not wise since the materials are wasted. But, this becomes inevitable in the case of a beginner. The methods involve defects in the stage of beginners ( Sarvarambha hi…Gita). Hence, the model can be selected from living entities. If you select a devotee for this purpose, God is always pleased that His devotee is served. Even if you serve God directly, the ultimate is only pleasing the God. Hence, you need not differentiate a devotee from the Human incarnation in doing the service. According to sage Narada, God lives in devotees also apart from human incarnations (Tanmayah….). In such case, service to devotees also becomes direct service to God. The worship to Hanuman is as good as worship to Rama. Therefore, select the available best devotee for your service. The Human incarnation is always not available for every one. The second type of worship is called as “sakshat upasanam”, which means direct worship of God through contemporary human incarnation. Veda and Gita say that God enters the creation through human form       ( Tadevanu Pravishat, Manushim Tanum…). The advita philosophers gave a trickish interpretation that God enters the creation in every human form. In such case, he himself being one of the human beings is God. Hence, self eating also becomes offering to God. You can never fool God since He is omniscient. All this means that you can serve God directly through practical sacrifice. Such practical sacrifice to a deserving devotee or human incarnation is called as Yajna, which is the karma yoga. Hence, there is  no contradiction between Gita and Veda since both say that knowledge (Jnana) is better than selfish action (karma) and the action involving sacrifice to God (karma yoga) is better than knowledge.

If you are serving the needy without the involvement of God, it is social service which is also good. But, it gives only a temporary heaven and not the abode of God (ksheene punye… Gita). You can help the needy to bring peace in their lives by solving their problems like hunger etc. but subsequently impart divine knowledge on them and transform them into devotees. Such social service pleases God and is also called as Yajna.

(Taken from Discourses of Shri Dattaswami)

At the lotus feet of Shri Dattaswami

-Prasad

Wishing a happy new year??? Read this.

[January 01, 2012, Message taken from Discourses of Shri Dattaswami]
O Learned and Devoted Servants of God,

The human being is reluctant to miseries and enjoys the happy situation. The human being can be compared to an ignorant child, who enjoys the sweets only and is reluctant to chillies. Hence, such a human being is ignorant. The grown up adult enjoys both sweets and chillies in the meals. Similarly, a realized soul enjoys both happy situation and miseries in the life. Therefore, it is only ignorance, which is the inability of art of enjoyment. God created this world with happiness and misery. People enjoy the cinema, which contains both pleasant scenes and tragic scenes. Similarly, people enjoy both sweet dishes and hot dishes in the meals. People enjoy the day and night. People enjoy the hot summer and the cold winter. The whole life and creation is full of alternating happiness and misery. If a person can enjoy both happy times and miseries in the life, he is equal to God. You may say that God enjoys the creation from outside. God also enters the creation in the form of human incarnation and enjoys both pleasant times and miseries in the life span. We see this truth in the life history of Rama and Krishna. Therefore, if you always crave for happiness only and reject miseries, it is unnatural and also ignorance of a child. The knowledge of the Gita preaches that you should enjoy even a top most misery, which is the time of death.

If you enjoy both miseries and happy situations, you are in a continuous state of enjoyment. You think that continuous enjoyment comes only through continuous times of happiness in the life. It is not correct. You get bored if you are served only with sweet dishes in the meals. Boring is misery. Therefore, misery is inevitable like summer after winter and winter after summer. The Indians denote happiness through cooling. The foreigners represent happiness through warming, which is heat. Therefore, the happiness to one is misery to the other. What is the reason? The foreigner is mainly exposed to winter, which bores him. Therefore, for a foreigner, the heat is happiness. The Indian is mainly exposed to summer and therefore, cool atmosphere is happiness to him. This is a practical proof that the enjoyment is not confined to happy scene or tragic scene only. This also proves that you can enjoy both happiness and misery. Therefore, it is ignorance to ask God for removal of misery and sanction of continuous happiness. Happiness should lie in the process of enjoyment. Whether it is misery or happiness, you will find real happiness in the process of enjoyment of both. The happiness neither lies in the sweet dish nor in the hot dish. The happiness lies in the process of eating the dish, which may be hot or sweet. If this secret of life is known, you will never pray God for removal of problems and tensions. You will enjoy the problems and tensions and hence, there is nothing to pray God for something. Your prayer to God must be due to your attraction to Him for His excellent personality. Your praise of God must be based on your love for His divine personality. But, today we find most of the people praying God for sanction of continuous sweet dishes. Therefore, the desire for something gets smashed if you know the secret of this concept. Hence, there is no meaning in wishing somebody for a happy new year because continuous happiness bores and leads to misery only. The aspiration for continuous happiness through out the year is based on foolishness and ignorance.

On the New Year, you must pray God thinking His divine personality and get attracted for His divine quality. You must at least achieve one of His basic qualities, which is enjoying both happy scenes and tragic scenes in the creation. On the Telugu New Year day, people generally take sweets and sour items mixed as offering of God (Prasadam), which shows the same concept of enjoyment of both happy and tragic movements in the life. This is the divine knowledge in nutshell present in all the divine scriptures of all religions. This is essence of the Gita preached by Lord Krishna. He enjoyed continuously in His life and even in the last situation, when He was shot dead by a hunter. This is essence to be learnt and practiced by every human being in this world. This is message of Lord Dattatreya to this entire humanity on the eve of this New Year 2012.

At lotus feet of Shri Dattaswami

-Durgaprasad

GOD HATES WEEPING AND BEGGING

(Taken from Discourses of His Holiness Shri Datta Swami)
O Learned and Devoted Servants of God,
[December 03, 2011] The devotee interested in the spiritual line should study more about the successful devotees. The study of God is not so important as the study of the personality of a true devotee. You should concentrate more on Prahlada, who could succeed in pleasing the Lord and your concentration on Lord Narasimha is not so important. You should always examine the personality of Hanuman in the spiritual line because God is extensively pleased with Him, which can be seen in the awarded fruit. Hanuman is made the future creator of this universe and this is the highest fruit, which means that God is extensively pleased with Him. Hanuman is famous for His courage and dignity. He never wept and begged before God. If you are a true devotee, you need not weep or beg before God. If you have money in your pocket, you will go to the market of vegetables and purchase the vegetables with courage, confidence and dignity since you are going to pay the proper price. When you do not have money in your pocket, you will weep and beg before the seller of vegetables for donation of one or two vegetables at least. Therefore, if you weep and beg God for His grace, it means that you do not have the real devotion in your heart to pay the exact price of the grace of God. You know that your devotion is not true. Therefore, you are resorting to weeping and begging for God’s grace.

You think that at least you can get a little grace of God freely without paying any amount of actual price. When Draupadi cried begging the Lord for clothes, the Lord was not moved by her cry and begging. The Lord immediately checked her account book to see whether there is any credit in it that can be drawn along with its interest. The Lord observed one practical sacrifice of Draupadi for the sake of the Lord done previously as the credit in her account. Once the finger of Krishna was cut by the blade of a sugarcane. All the wives ran to the different sides of the house for a piece of cloth to be used as the bandage for the wound. But, Draupadi immediately tore the edge of her costly sari and the resultant piece of cloth was used as the bandage. Generally, women are fond of jewels and saris. Due to this reason, the wives of Krishna could not do that act. That piece of cloth sacrificed for the Lord was multiplied as thousands of saris because the rate of interest of the bank of God is infinite since the wealth in it is infinite. If this service was done to a human being, hardly two or three saris could have been supplied. Hence, the Lord could have supplied those saris even if Draupadi did not weep. Even if she was silent leaving everything to God, this miracle should have been done. The reason for the miracle is not her weeping and begging. The reason is her practical sacrifice to God especially the human incarnation. You may have faith in God but it is very difficult to recognize the human incarnation and maintain continuous faith in It. It has been the worst practice in all the religions since devotees everywhere developed different talents and techniques in the art of weeping and begging. Some devotees should be awarded Padma Vibhushan for developing new trends in weeping and begging before God! God hates you if you weep and beg anything from Him because you are aware of your false devotion to Him. Your real devotion is towards yourself, your wife, your children, your parents, your relatives and your friends only.

You know the truth of your false devotion and now you are trying to cheat God by your art of weeping and different discovered sentences, poems and songs of begging. It is a double crime. Hence, do not beg and weep before God. Be always brave and dignified before God like Hanuman. When you know that you do not deserve due to your false devotion, then also you maintain the dignified way before God. In such case, it is only one crime, which can be also rectified in course of time by developing true devotion. You need not ask God for anything even in your mind. If there is some credit of your true devotion in your account proved by practical sacrifice, the reward will come from God spontaneously in the required situation. Generally, people try to worship God in the times of difficulties. The omniscient God knows that your intensity of the worship is generated by the ambition for the solution of your problem and that it is not generated by the true love to God. You should not intensify the worship in the time of problems. You can fool the people but not the omniscient God. You should maintain the same intensity of worship in all the times without linking it to benefits and solutions of problems. Such true devotion will be credited to the account. When Draupadi tore her sari and sacrificed for the Lord, then she was in happy situation. Therefore, your sacrifice is valid if it is done in the happy moment when there is no need for the help of God. At any cost, you should stop weeping and begging before God and learn the constant courage of Hanuman.

 Identify True Path irrespective of Personal Liking
Another important worst aspect of a devotee is to decide the possible way for him as the only real way to God. His way may be lowest in quality but in his argument, such way becomes highest since he can travel in that way only. All other ways, which may be of far higher quality, are not at all the ways as per his argument since he cannot follow such ways.

I will give an example. Let us take the case of a greedy person. He cannot sacrifice even a single paisa or penny for the sake of God and therefore, he criticizes that money cannot purchase God. He will argue that the devotees, who  sacrifice their bonds with money for the sake of God as the foolish people trying to purchase God by money. Even though such devotees are far higher than him in sacrificing the most valuable money for the sake of God, he will not tolerate them because he cannot sacrifice money for the sake of God. The possible way for him is to recite prayers and to do different worships involving rigid religious customs. He will say that such religious customs only please God. In fact, such a devotee is the lowest since he cannot do any practical sacrifice and he is only theoretical. God appreciates only the practical sacrifice. God gave thousands of saris to Draupadi as a reward for her practical sacrifice especially to God. God did not reward her for her different forms of worship and different prayers recited. The human psychology is to raise the status of the path that is possible to him and to degrade all other paths, which are impossible for him. This is stupidity plated with ego and jealousy. One should search for the real path to please God and try to follow it slowly if not today, after sometime later on. The constant effort will lead to the success one day or other. Instead of doing effort for such practical way, people try to give importance to theoretical ways, which are nothing but expressions of devotion through words, mind and intelligence only. Since, they are experts and talented in such stupid theoretical and religious ways, they try to give highest status to such ways since they can follow such ways only. By such behavior, they may get false satisfaction in following the true path to please God, but they utterly fail in reality. A false thing does not become true by arguments and propaganda. Truth is always truth whether all the people in this universe accept or not. This is also another type of behavior of devotees to be rectified.

At the lotus feet of Swami
-Prasad

Karma Chakra and divine administration

O Learned and Devoted Servants of God,

(Message taken from Divine discourses of Shri Datta Swami)

[November 05, 2011] The Gita says that you should totally surrender to God (Tvameva Sharanam…). After your prayer and worship to God, you need not ask Him for anything even in the mind because He is omniscient. You are treating Him as an ordinary human being having limited knowledge. You should follow this principle even in the case of human incarnation. The external human form misleads you to think that He is an ordinary human being. But, when you worship the photos and statues of energetic forms like Vishnu, etc., you should have the sense of omniscient God. The human form in the photo and statue may again mislead you. But, there are some devotees, who believe that God is formless and omnipresent. They do prayers sitting in open space. I expected them at least to have the sense of omniscient God. To My surprise, I find even them expressing their desires. This type of behavior proves that the God prayed by you is limited and not omniscient. Such God cannot be omnipotent also. In such case, how can such God respond to your prayers and answer through His omnipotent miraculous power? In your prayers, you praise the God as omniscient, omnipotent and omnipresent. But, at the end of the prayer, your behavior contradicts all the above adjectives of God. Actually, you are a limited human being and do not know what is really good for you.

Most of the boons asked by you are only harmful to you. The omniscient God knows what is really good for you in the long run. With your limited knowledge, you do not know the multi-dimensional network of your past deeds. Such network is very complicated to understand as said in the Gita (Gahanaa Karmano Gatih…). The results of your past deeds come to you in a particular order that is convenient to you. The periods alter generally, which can be known from astrology (Jyotisha Shastra). A period may be bad for some horoscope, but, some sub-periods in that period are good, which serve as recreation intervals in a long bad period. Similarly, in a long good period, the sub-periods of bad planets also come to become intervals for change. The continuous good also bores like eating sweets continuously. This is the reason for the nine planets to rotate through their sub-periods in a long good or bad period. Therefore, God has arranged the incidents in your life in the best convenient manner for you. Hence, you must allow the incidents of your life to take place in their own natural way, which were set up by God. The fundamental role should not be forgotten, which is that, you must enjoy the good or bad results of your past deeds. Cancellation is impossible under any circumstances. Due to your insisting prayers and worship, God postpones the bad results. But, you have to enjoy them with compounded interest in the future. Don’t be clever to argue that God is not omnipotent if He cannot cancel a result. This process of inevitable enjoyment of the results of the deeds is established by God only. If He contradicts His own procedure, He becomes a bad administrator. God is always the best administrator. Your ignorance of this network and procedures of God makes you think that God cancelled your bad result in the case of its postponement.

Inconvenient Punishment only Transforms
Another way to help you due to your prayers and worship is to select the most convenient way of the punishment. Each sin has a list of alternative punishments. If you pull the chain in the train without reason, you should go to the jail for six months or pay thousand rupees as fine. For a rich business man, the convenient way is to pay the fine and not sitting in the jail for six months and losing all his business. Similarly, for a beggar, the convenient way is to sit in the jail getting free food since he cannot pay the heavy fine. If both worshipped God, the favour from God is to fine the businessman and to put the beggar in the prison. Otherwise, the real punishment will be to put the business man in the jail and to fine the beggar. The inconvenient punishment is only the real punishment because it only transforms the soul through suffering to some extent at least. Therefore, the sin does not end with the convenient punishments. The balance of the sin will give the inconvenient punishment in future with compound interest. If the business man is favoured with fine, he will repeat the sin again and again paying the fine again and again. Similarly, if the beggar is favoured with prison, he will repeat the sin again and again to continuously stay in the jail and get food throughout the life. Hence, the inconvenient punishment is necessary to transform the sin. If God feels that your transformation, which was delayed from a long time, is essential by that time, He may allow the inconvenient punishment in your case in spite of your prayers. The ignorance and illness should not be delayed for long since they become incurable after long time. In such case, you will misunderstand God for His silence to your prayers. It is like the decision on surgery of the doctor in spite of the protests from the patient. Therefore, do not ask God for anything and meddle with the best way of already set up system of deeds for you. God says that the devotee tries to interfere with the already set up cycle of deeds and he is a useless stupid (Evam Pravartitam Chakram – Gita).
 

Preach Knowledge with Command from God
There is only one way for the cancellation of all your bad results. Such way will be clear to you if you know the real aim of the punishment. The real aim of the punishment is only to permanently transform you. The permanent transformation comes only through the true knowledge. The truth in the knowledge has the power of transformation. If the knowledge of a preacher is unable to transform you, such knowledge is not true. If you are partially transformed, such knowledge is partially true. Sometimes the total transformation comes, but it stays for a temporary period only. In such case, the defect does not lie with the knowledge but with you only. The knowledge should be heard and discussed or debated continuously, by which the knowledge gets intensified and becomes fire to bring permanent transformation in you. Hence, the Gita speaks about the knowledge - fire (Jnanaagnih…). Therefore, you must take up the propagation of knowledge after hearing it, which involves continuous discussions and debates with others. Hence, the benefit of propagation is more for you than others. But, you should hear the right knowledge from right person. Otherwise, the wrong knowledge not only harms others but you also due to intensification through propagation. Hence, Shri Paramahamsa told that you should not become a preacher of spiritual knowledge unless you have command form God. Therefore, all your sins get smashed, if you are permanently transformed through knowledge. Hence, Shankara gave top most importance to knowledge. However, in the absence of knowledge, the punishment brings temporary transformation. Hence, something is better than nothing. The temporary transformation is thus possible in two ways.
1)    The first way is to hear the right knowledge avoiding its propagation.
2)    The second way is to undergo the punishment for the sin.
The permanent transformation is possible by hearing the right knowledge and subsequent participation in its propagation since the right knowledge is the top most path. The main purpose of God coming in human form is only to preach this right knowledge (Satyam Jnaanam – Veda). The ignorant people preach wrong knowledge and scholars of the Scripture affected by misinterpretations, preach partially correct knowledge. In their case, the Scriptural knowledge is correct, but the misinterpreted knowledge from wrong commentaries is wrong. The scholars learning the right knowledge from the Scripture with right interpretations from the human incarnation can alone preach the right knowledge in the society.
Some people say that if the punishment given in the hell is in their memory, they will not repeat the sin. This is not correct because the thief punished in the police station becomes good for sometime, but, again steals due to the environment and circumstances. He remembers the punishment, but, still the circumstantial influence overcomes it. All the previous lives and the stay in the hell are forgotten by the soul due to the will of God only because God wants to give a fresh mind to the soul in the new life. The punishment in the hell has its temporary effect in the sub-conscious state due to which only, the children behave good and pure in their childhood. As they grow, they are influenced by the external environment and the internal hidden thoughts (Smaskaras), which were temporarily suppressed by the punishments in the hell. With the strength of the environmental influence, these hidden ideas become strong and project directing the actions of the soul in the new life.

At lotus feet of Swami

-Durgaprasad

Crimes on Girls and Dowry

Message taken from divine discourse of His Holiness Datta Swami:

The reason for naxalism is the silent economic looting of poor people by rich people.

Everywhere, the looting of money exists, which is not only business and politics. The economic looting takes place either openly or silently. The father-in-law and husband loot the share of the property of the girl in the form of dowry. The father and brother loot the share of the property of the same girl silently. We have brought section 498 to control the open looting. Even though the acts of 1950s established the right of the property of the girl, the implementation exists nowhere. The wonderful thing is that the father and brother of the girl charge the father-in-law and the husband as looters. When you point out somebody with your finger, the fatty thumb points out at you. Both sides of the girl loot her property in the pretext that the female is always a dependant and cannot protect her share of property. The Veda says that Manu has given his property to his children (manuh putrebhyah…). The word putra here means children irrespective of sex. The words putra, bhrata and pita mean children, brothers and sisters and parents respectively. Unfortunately, these three words are often misinterpreted in the sense of males only. Suppose the share of the girl in her paternal property is Rs 3. Re 1 is looted by father-in-law and husband in the name of dowry. The second rupee is spent in her marriage to satisfy the ego of father and father-in-law to perform the function in the grand way to please their friends and relatives. Thus, the second rupee is jointly looted by both father and father-in-law. The third rupee is swallowed by the father to divert it to his son. The girl is thus economically looted in total by the entire society. She is made to have a psychological feeling that she is always economically dependent either on her father or on her father-in-law and husband. The dowry system is a joint corruption of the father and father-in-law. The father is giving Re 1 to father-in-law in order to save Re 1 for his son. The scripture says that the father-in-law and the husband should not touch the money of the bride (stri vitta madhamaadham…). In the same verse, the scripture also warns the father and brother by saying that the money of the sister should not be touched (adhamam bhraatru vittamcha…). The scripture is a double edged knife warning both sides to protect the share of the property of the girl. The father of the girl should adopt justice in the case of his daughter and also should preach this concept to the father of his daughter-in-law. He should not think that he is the looser in the case of his daughter and gainer in the case of his daughter-in-law because the share is important and not the magnitude of the share. There is no question of profit and loss, when you do not look in the angle of the magnitude of the share. You must think that you are just following the justice, which is the command of God through the scripture. If this concept is followed by every individual in the society, the present crimes on the girl will naturally subside.

Traditional practice is also built up in a special way to feel that daughter is an outsider and the son belongs to the family. In order to accomplish this, the surname and gotram of the girl are changed after the marriage. The surname and gotram give the address of genetic characteristics of an individual, which can never change. If you keep the mango fruit in the basket of bananas, the mango will not become banana fruit. This change is only apparent (gauna) and not real (mukhya). When you keep your child in the house of your friend, you say that the child is their child. Really, the child never becomes their child. Similarly, when the daughter is sent to other’s house, you change her surname and gotram so that they feel that the girl belongs to their line of dynasty. Thus, this change is only apparent and not real. Therefore, the child born to a couple gets both surnames and both gotras. Hence, the child should not marry in future in both gotras. You may be called by one surname and gotram. The other surname and the other gotram remains silent. Suppose you have a long name. People call you by a part of your mane only for convenience. It does not mean that the other part of the name is vanished. Therefore, the daughter of maternal uncle is sister and the daughter of the sister is also daughter. Marrying both is against the sanction of ethical scriptures. This aspect is exploited to feel that the girl is an outsider.

The parents are also threatened by the son that if entire property is not given to him, he will not perform the rituals after death. This is again exploitation of misunderstanding only. Actually, the soul after death enters energetic body and has no connection with the food fed to the priest after death. The soul after death goes in two paths as said in the Gita (shukla Krishna gatee…). In the first path, the soul goes to the abode of God and in this path, the soul does not require the food given to priest in the annual ceremony (nahi tena pathaa tanutyajah tanayaavarjita panda kaamshinah…). In the second path, the soul either goes to heaven or Pitru Loka or hell. In heaven, there is no need of food and water (ubheteertvaa…). In Pitru Loka, the food is the light of moon (nirvishta saaraam pitrubhih…). In hell, the soul is tortured with hunger and thirst and no food and drink are allowed (jaayaswa mriyaswa...). In all these four paths, the soul is covered by energetic body, which does not require any matter as food. Energetic body requires energy only as food. This does not mean that you should not give food to a deserving priest. If you give food to any deserving person in the name of the departed soul, the soul is certainly blessed. Giving food to a deserving person need not be done with specific tradition only. In such case, such specific tradition does not exist in all the countries of the world. There cannot be universality of a specific tradition, which does not exist everywhere in the universe. If you stress on the specific tradition, the universality is disturbed and God becomes partial for giving such tradition to a limited part of the world only. The essence of the ritual is giving food to any deserving person. This essence is universal and is being practiced everywhere in the world. Therefore, even the daughter can give food, clothes and subscription (dakshina) to a deserving person in the name of her departed parents. Such act becomes equal to the ceremony conducted by the son in a specific tradition.

The essence of the ritual is important and the tradition has no significance. The doubt comes about the ancient saying that if you do not perform the ceremony, the departed parents suffer with hunger. This is called as artha vaada, which means a lie proposed to achieve some good purpose. A greedy person may not sacrifice food to a deserving person unless the fear (that his departed parents suffer with hunger) does not exist. This is created for a good purpose, which is exploited by the son, to demand the entire property. A lie is not wrong if it serves good purpose. The mother feeds her child saying that the moon comes down if the child eats the food. The mother has told a lie for good purpose only and hence, it is not wrong. Charvaaka criticized that how the departed soul can get the food if the priest is fed? He told that in such case, the father sitting in the upstairs should get his food that is given to somebody else in the down stairs. This criticism of Charvaaka is not completely correct. The departed soul does not get the food since it is in the energetic body. But, the fact is twisted to inculcate the sacrifice in a greedy person. Charvaaka has not understood the whole background. Of course, we should condemn the exploitation of this by somebody.

The economic suppression of women is the reason for the poverty of the country because the deity of wealth, Shree Maha Lakshmi is also a woman. This is the reason for the revolt of women against the males. Similarly, when the poor people are exploited and are looted by the rich business people and politicians due to their blind love to their families, the poor people revolt. This is the background of naxalism, which is the cause for the birth of naxalists, who want to transform the society through riffles. But, such transformation is not real and permanent. Knowledge is the most powerful riffle and the preacher of the knowledge is the most powerful naxalite.

At lotus feet of Swami

-Prasad