Facets of Spirituality

by Swami Krishnananda

Compiled by S. Bhagyalakshmi

May 1979: Part 4

A visitor: The gods in my country are represented like the ancient Rishis, in the ordinary clothes of men. But Hindu gods have very complicated dresses—snakes and all kinds of weapons—so difficult to worship.

Swamiji: Hindu gods are not Brahmins. They are Kshatriyas, they have got weapons, and Brahmins are asked to worship them! And the gods are all householders. Hindu gods are not Brahmacharis or Sannyasis. This is also an interesting thing. Every god has a wife, even two. All this is something more than sociology.

Visitor: Which is the correct way of worshipping God? Which is the right method? Should food be offered to God?

Swamiji: Anything that is offered is called food. What is it that sustains the soul? Tell me.

Visitor: The body is sustained by food.

Swamiji: The body is sustained by food, and what is it that sustains the soul?

Visitor: The soul is sustained by the body. The body is a disease of the soul.

Swamiji: Swami Sivananda used to joke [pointing to clothes—the dhoti and the upper wrap] this is a bondage put upon the sore, a carbuncle that has grown on the soul. Every day you clean this carbuncle, put medicine and bandage it [laughter.] The soul is sustained by God, by the Supreme Being, by God Himself. The body can be sustained by a cup of tea and food, but the food of the soul is God Himself; it cannot be satisfied with anything less. It wants only that. And so it goes on crying, and until that is got it won't become quiet. And though body can be satisfied with little things, the soul cannot be satisfied with anything but God. Only when it comes in contact with God, it loses itself. And when it has contacted Him and has realised it, it feels happy then and only then.

Another visitor: We offer food—pindam, etc., during those ten days of mourning to the departed soul. How does that affect the departed soul?

Swamiji: Yes, it will affect the soul, just as you send a money order to someone and the money reaches him. Although it is not actually the cash that is sent from your place to the other place, it is the intention that is conveyed to the other end. And even the kind of currency sent need not be the same; you may send it in rupees and it can be paid to the receiver in any other currency.

Visitor: But the soul does not require any food, etc.?

Swamiji: No, no! The soul has not reached God yet. It is in a helpless condition as it cannot act. So it requires some external help. If that soul has reached God, then your pindam has no meaning. It does not want anything. But you cannot take it like that. It is implied that he is hanging in some realms and so, maybe, his meritorious karmas are perhaps not sufficient to sustain him. So you add on your prayers, charities, your danam, etc. If I get some good from somebody, it might be because of the prayer someone has offered on my behalf. Goodwill and sympathy, or rather a telepathic communication that you establish in whatever place, in whichever realm the soul exists, will reach it by a vibration which is set up in the Cosmos by your mantras, by your feelings, etc. It does not mean that your pindam, i.e., the same food, will go there. Like the money order, the intimation is given there and whatever amount is necessary is paid in its own currency to the addressee there.

Visitor: So then, the pindam and the like help the soul to go to God?

Swamiji: That is a more difficult thing. It cannot reach God like that. Your pindam and all that cannot reach God. But it is a lesser help that you are rendering. The soul has got sufferings of various kinds because of demerits that it has accrued. So, it may take a rebirth or it may have other kinds of agencies, and all these are natural things. Who is perfect? So you render help so that you may also be helped by others. Whatever help you give to others will be given back to you as a kind of mutual return help, as sympathy and love.

An ashramite: We can pray for their rebirth also?

Swamiji: You need not say any prayers for that. They will take rebirth anyhow without your praying for that.

Ashramite: "Please grant that a good rebirth"—cannot you pray like that?

Swamiji: That is again a kind of help you are giving to the soul by offering your prayers to God. You are appealing to the Supreme Master, don't put him in prison, and so on. You are appealing. You are advocating. You are a counsel on the part of the soul and you are pleading before the Judge, the Supreme Being—don't punish him unnecessarily and commit him to prison.

Ashramite: Is that a foolish act or is it a part of the prayer we may offer?

Swamiji: Why do you say it is a foolish act? It is a great charitable feeling.

Visitor: You are pleading for that soul?

Swamiji: Yes, yes. Perhaps you will also be pleaded for by somebody because you have done some good deeds. Somebody will help you. Law works like that. It is natural. When offering pindam, generally the only the head of the family is counted [laughs] in the prayer for the departed ones, and after a few years some new persons will be added to the prayer and then the earliest ones are omitted.

Vis.: If that soul has already left the world as time passes, is it still in Pitriloka or in other lokas?

Swamiji: You cannot say that. How can you know? It depends upon his karmas. He may be in Pitriloka or Swargaloka—anywhere. But it does not matter where he is. As far as your charitable deeds are concerned, it will reach him wherever he is.

Ashramite: Swamiji, if the soul has already taken birth—is it not the wrong address?

Swamiji: No, no! It will reach him. Your mind will tell you where he is. The vibrations you set up—you have got a picture of that person in your mind and before the inner eyes, so wherever the soul is, that force will go and touch it in any world, even if he is reborn. He may be sitting near you here, and it will have some benefit. You may not know it works. But it will work.

Ashramite: And I wouldn't know that it has worked on this person next to me.

Swamiji: Nor will he know that you have helped.

Visitor: Some Rishi curses—like the one which cursed Ahalya to become a stone—have had great potency. How does a curse work? Ahalya is also released from the curse conditionally. How?

Swamiji: It is a force that is working. It is his mind that is working there. His mind goes and impinges upon the person with such a force that whatever the thought, it immediately materialises in that personality. It is a force of his mind's thought.

Visitor: I thought that perhaps it is prediction that is going to come true.

Swamiji: Prediction by whom?

Visitor: By the person who curses.

Swamiji: That way, everything is predicted by God. It is said that when the universe is created, everything is determined by Him. That is a cosmic a view of things that you are taking. But normally, relatively thinking, it is this man's thought that is working. But why is he made to think like that? That is a different thing. Why has he the impulse to curse others? Who is prompting him? Then you are going behind the causes which lie behind causes. That is too much. But we are thinking of the immediate cause. The immediate cause is his intention to do something and effect that particular experience in that person, and that is a blessing or a curse. It is the materialisation of the thought of the person who expresses it.

Ashramite: Blessings do not seem to have their effects as quickly as curses have.

Swamiji: It only shows that your power to hate is greater than your power to love. That is all (laughs). That is why that quick effect. Otherwise, if your love is as intense, it will work—why not? After all, it is your thought that works. But our love is niggardly and our hate very powerful. The love of Savitri for Satyavan, her husband, was such that she defeated the Lord of Death himself! And it is not any inferior to the curse. It is much more powerful. Such a terrific force of thought she had that she would not budge until she attained her goal. The story is not an ordinary one. It is love that wins the blessing at once.

Visitor: Dasaratha was very happy when he was cursed with putrasoka (grief caused by separation from his son) because the curse implied that he would get a son, and that was his greatest desire. The curse did not impress itself as forcibly on his mind.

Swamiji: Yes. Dasaratha was happy because without a putra (son), he could not have experienced putrasoka. So he knew he would get a putra. That is why he was very happy. "After all, I will have children," he said to himself. Otherwise, how could this curse work? [Laughs] Very interesting!

Ashramite: A blessing in disguise!

Swamiji: A blessed curse! My grandmother used to tell a story.

A householder was eating his luncheon served by his wife. The vegetable she had prepared was very tasty and it was his favourite. So he said to his wife: “Keep some for the night. I like it.”

Just then laughter was heard from the outer verandah where visitors, until invited in, waited. The husband said, “Go and see. Some visitors are waiting.”

So the wife went and greeted the guests by doing them obeisance. This is the Indian tradition. Greeting her in return, as is traditional, they blessed the lady: “Dirgha sumangali bhava” (May your husband live eternally!)

The husband had his meal, and came outside to greet the guests. Greetings over, he asked them, “I heard you laughing. What was the matter?”

They replied, “We are Yama Dutas, messengers of the Lord of Death.”

In those days, long, long ago, my grandmother used to say the Yama Dutas came visibly, in person, to take people to the world of Death and stand before Lord Yama. So these two guests who had been sitting in the outer verandah while the husband was eating were Yama Dutas, who said, “We have come to take you with us to Lord Yama just now, and you were telling your wife to keep some food for the night. You won't be here in the evening. We are taking you just now to Yamaloka. So we laughed, amused as we were at your saying that.”

The husband was taken aback. And he called out to his wife and reported the matter to her.

The wife was an intelligent and quick-witted woman, and she said to the Yama Dutas, “How can you take my husband away now? Just now when I greeted you, you blessed me, saying, 'Dirgha sumangali bhava'. How can you go back on your word now?"

This was a sort of bombshell to the messengers. They woke up to the situation. They had made a mistake. They had pronounced that blessing in a traditional way, mechanically, so to say.

When they reported the story to Lord Yama, he said, “You foolish fellows, you should not have spoken to them. All this blunder has been caused only because you were visible to the mortals. From now on, do not be visible to the moral world. Go in an invisible form and do your work.”

Thus it is, my grandmother would conclude the story, that nowadays the Yama Dutas are invisible to the mortal world. [Laughs.]

These are all interesting stories. But some creatures, such as dogs, sense it. When death comes, they say that dogs howl and whine because they become aware of the approach of death. And vultures, days before the corpse is actually to come, sit waiting, perched upon a tree. That is why they say, “Oh, it is a bad omen, the vultures are seen sitting!” They seem to sense the vibrations set up in the vicinity.

Visitor: A dog accompanied Dharmaputra, and he would not enter heaven without the dog if it was not allowed in.

Swamiji: It was Lord Yama Dharmaraja himself that was following Dharmaputra, to test him if his generosity would prevail unto the very last. There were three tests for Dharmaputra (Yudhishthira). Once at the lake of poison where the Yaksha, pleased with Yudhisthira's answers to his queries, asked the latter to ask for the life of any one of the brothers who had died as a result of their failure to answer his queries. Yudhishthira asked for Nakula to be restored to life. The Yaksha said, “Why do you ask for that brother's life? Bhima and Arjuna are better people. You should ask one of their lives back.” To this, Yudhishthira replied, “We three are the sons of Kunti, while Nakula is the son of our other mother, Madri. Now that I am alive my mother will be happy. And if Nakula too were to return alive to his mother, she would also be happy.” When Yudhishthira passed the test, the Yaksha revived all the brothers. The third test was in hell. Nothing but suffering everywhere. His brothers were there too. And Yudhishthira, after he had seen his brothers there, was asked to go to heaven. But he refused to go. “If my brothers are suffering in hell, how can I go to heaven alone? I too will stay here until they also go with me to heaven.” And any amount of pleading that while his own karma would allow him only a glimpse of hell, those of his brothers were such that they had to stay there long, would not change Yudhishthira's mind. Thus he passed the third test also. And all the five of the Pandavas went to heaven.