[18-04-2014] Hindu religion is actually in the top most place
among all the religions of the world since it is the only religion that deals
with the subject of God (Nivrutti) to the extreme depth. Unfortunately, this
religion is now in the bottom most place. The reason is that today the rituals
performed in Hindu religion are waste since the essence is lost. The essential packed
precious item is neglected and the unnecessary waste packing material is given
importance. If you understand this point, you will also appreciate the
universality of the rituals with respect to the packed precious item, which is
one and the same even though the packing covers are different.
Let us understand this concept with the
help of the ritual performed in Hindu religion after departure of the soul. These
rituals are done up to 13 days and sometimes 15 days. The essence of this
ritual performed in all these days consists of two parts; the major part is doing
prayers to God with devotion and minor part is doing donation to the deserving
devotees. This essence is universal in all the religions of humanity. This
essence alone gives the fruit. Since this fruitful essence is seen everywhere
in the world, God is impartial for spreading this essence to all the humanity without
any partiality to any religion and region. God has given this precious item to
all the human beings, who are His children. The language of the prayer to God
and the procedure in respecting the devotees during the process of donation
differ from one religion to the other, which are only the packing covers. If a
specific packing cover followed in one religion is a real essence and the
precious item, God become partial since that is not universal in all the
religions. God becomes unjust and criminal for not spreading this to all the
humanity. The prayer read in Sanskrit and the materials like dry grass, water,
black sesame seeds etc are not universal since the same is not seen in the
ritual of every religion. In the place of such, prayers to God in their
language (Bible, Quran etc) and other procedures using different materials are
seen.
In Hindu religion the language of the prayer to God is Sanskrit, which is unfortunately not known
to any Hindu. In the olden days Sanskrit was mother tongue and hence these
prayers were written in Sanskrit in that time. Today, the meaning of the prayer
is not known even to the reader (Priest) and not to speak of the doer and other
people associated in the ritual. The prayers are generally from Veda and the
meaning of the word Veda is knowledge. The devotion comes only after having the
knowledge by knowing the meaning of the prayer. Therefore, there is no sense of
devotion in any person participating in the ritual. The main aim of the ritual
is only to pray God with devotion. Thus the main part is lost. Due to this, the
minor part is also lost because in the absence of real devotion nobody in the
ritual is a devotee. In such case, your donation to them in terms of food or
cloth or money etc becomes waste. In such ritual even a devotee outside is
becoming non-devotee and undeserving of the donation. If the ritual is
performed in the right spirit, even a non-devotee outside is becoming devotee
and deserving in such ritual. Thus in the present rituals of Hinduism both
major and minor parts of the essence are totally lost.
In
such a ritual, the doer feels that the main aim is to give food to the departed
soul through the dining devotees. This concept is not true in the real sense. This
concept is introduced only to force the greedy devotees to perform the ritual. Except
this one aim, there is nothing truth in this point. The departed soul has four
ways of journey. The first type of souls goes to the abode of God called Brahma
Loka and for such person there is no need of this ritual (Nahi tena pathaa
tanutyajah tanayaavarjitapindakamkshinah). The second type of souls goes to Heaven
and the divine nectar is its food due to which there is no need of this ritual
(Ubhe teertvaa ashanaayaapipaase). The divine nectar (Amrutam) is also the
immortal energy, which is the basic substratum of all the forms of universe. It
is not the form of matter, which is not immortal. The third type of souls goes
to the world of moon or Pitru Loka and takes the rays of moon as food and hence
there is no need of this ritual for this type also (Nirvishtasaaraam pitrubhih
himaamshoh). The fourth types of souls go to hell for which food and water are
not allowed due to severe punishment given and hence there is no need of this
ritual (Jaayasva mriyasva).
When the soul leaves this materialistic body, it is
enclosed by the energetic body. For energetic body, energy alone can be the
food and not this materialistic food. Therefore, feeding the departed soul is
not at all the aim since it is not true. The aim of the ritual is only to pray
God to protect the departed soul and give food to the devotees assisting the
prayer. The departed soul is expected to be protected since the property of the
departed soul is spent in such ritual and due to such donation the departed
soul can be blessed with good fruit. The scriptures also say that the main aim
of this ritual is only to protect the welfare of the doer since by such prayer
and donation the doer is always blessed by the fruit of a good deed. The doer
and the departed soul are blessed because the money of the doer is spent and the
property of the departed soul is gained by the doer. Thus, ultimately it becomes
a joint financial transaction and hence the fruit is coming to both. If the
doer is not performing such ritual, the scripture says that the doer will get
bad effect.
The aim of the scripture is only to promote the performance of the
ritual by the doer controlling the greediness and not any other intention. The
doer, who was not giving proper food to the alive parents may also be forced to
do these rituals for this fear only, which is the bad effect in not performing
the ritual. This point is exploited by the priests for their self benefit of
getting money from the doer even though this point is mentioned in the
scripture for the sake of the greedy doers. If the doer is regularly praying God and
performing some donation to the deserving devotees, such ritual is not
essential. Hence, such ritual is not performed by and not performed for- the
realised soul (Samnyaasin).
The present priests in Hindu religion
are not deserving for any donation. This is the worst state of Hindu religion because
the priest in any religion is considered to be the leader and head in the
spiritual path. The deserving qualifications mentioned by Veda for the receiver
of the donations are: 1) he should be a Shrotriya meaning that he should know
the true meaning of Veda and should propagate it to others. The meaning of the
word Brahmana is also the same since the word Brahma here means the meaning of
Veda as Veda itself means knowledge (Brahma nayati iti). 2) he should not
aspire for the wealth of others (Akaamahatasya). Both these qualifications are
absent in the present priests. Donation is a double edged knife. If you perform
it to the deserving acceptor, you will receive good result. If you perform it
to undeserving acceptor, you will receive bad result. In the place of bad
result, if no result exists at least, it is tolerable since it becomes only
wastage. But it is not so. Hence you must concentrate on the analysis of
identifying the deserving acceptors from the undeserving acceptors as said in
Veda (Samvidaa deyam), which says that you should analyse before donation. The
first qualification exists only in God. The second qualification exists in few
sacred souls and due to the presence of such souls only on this earth, the
earth still exists.
Generally people give importance to place and time and not
to the deservingness of the acceptor (Deshe kalecha patrecha- Gita). The place,
time and deservingness of the acceptor are in the ascending order of importance,
which is unfortunately reversed now. They do hurry donation because of the
place and time. They like to finish the donation before the end of the day of
Shivaratri and before returning from Benaras. They should do deep analysis and
take long time to identify the deserving acceptor. Once the deserving acceptor
is attained, you should perform the donation immediately and such place is
Benaras and such day is the Shivaratri. You can even postpone this ritual to
some other day if the proper acceptor is not available. You are postponing this
ritual for small reasons like eclipse etc., and neglecting this important main
aspect.
Lord Krishna donated only once in His life, which is the case of
Kuchela. Both the qualifications exist only with Lord Krishna and for a
completely perfect donation, He has to donate to Himself! Therefore, He was
doing long analysis for the deserving soul having atleast the second
qualification perfectly. He was analysing the mind of Kuchela till he reaches
his village in the return journey to see whether Kuchela develops any
aspiration for His wealth. In fact, Kuchela borrowed a little quantity of
parched rice from the neighbour and is expected to return it back after coming
from Krishna. His wife instructed him so. But, Krishna did not give anything
while Kuchela was returning and more over consumed major portion of the parched
rice. In spite of this, Kuchela never aspired anything from Krishna, who is the
Lord of Lakshmi, the universal wealth. Such acid tests generally fail any soul.
The
priests of Hindu religion should aim at the state of Kuchela. They should not aspire
for anything from anybody. They should conduct
the rituals feeling that they are already paid for getting a lucky chance by participating
in the ritual, which is a prayer to God, the result of which is not only
blessing to the doer from God but also to the priest. The donation comes
from anybody by the will of God. The donation is based on the capacity (Shakti)
and the faith towards the acceptor (Bhakti). The priest should not fix a rate
common to poor and rich like a business man in the market. He should keep the
capacity of the donor also in his view. The donor may have full capacity but if
the faith towards the acceptor is less, the donation to the acceptor is also
less. This also should not be criticised by the acceptor since the less faith
to the acceptor is always due to the defects observed in the acceptor. The
acceptor-priest should always think that God is giving the donation and the
evaluation of acceptors by God is always correct. Therefore, the priests should
not aspire for anything from anybody and should have faith in God, the real
donor.
The priest should also learn the meaning of Veda and explain it to all
the people. He should not waste his time in practicing the blind recitation of
the scripture. There is no need of recitation without seeing book. He can see
the book and should explain the meaning properly to develop the devotion. The
priests of other religions read from their books only. If the priest is able to
recite also without the book, it means he is well experienced in performing the
rituals and is remembering the scripture due to frequent participations in the
rituals. This is only the aim of the statement that a priest without book is
better due to long experience (Tathaa likhitapaathakah). It only denotes the
appreciation for the experience, which is not a mandatory. There, the
instruction that the priest should know the meaning of Veda is also given
(Anarthajnah) and this is mandatory because the very meaning of the word Veda
is knowledge and this point is repeatedly mentioned (Adhyetavyo jneyashcha).
Therefore,
one need not be worried about the present looting rates of the priests
regarding this ritual. He can perform the prayers to God in his own mother
tongue without any priest and can call the best available deserving devotees
for the possible donation from his side. In such way, I declare with all guarantee
that such a person has performed this ritual in the real way because the basic
universal essence of the ritual is performed neglecting the meaningless packing
cover. I also declare with all guarantee that a doer performing this ritual
neglecting the universal essence and caring for the unnecessary packing
material is not performing this ritual at all and also will be punished in the
hell for the donation to undeserving acceptors. Shankara alone performed this
ritual for His departed mother when every priest boycotted Him denying the
co-operation and such ritual performed by Him was really fruitful since He
prayed God with full devotion.
We
are not denying the performance of any ritual but only recommending to perform
the ritual with full analysis that brings the realization of true essence of
the ritual (Jnaatvaa kurveeta karmaani – Gita). If the essence is lost, the
total performance of the ritual is not only waste but also a sin.
At the lotus feet of Shri Datta Swami
-Prasad
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