A Mahan about Another Mahan
Sri Shantanandapuri Maharaj is the disciple of Sri Purushottamananda Maharaj, who was the direct disciple of Sri Brahmananda (Raakhal) – who was one of Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa’s prime disciples. All of them are verily Jivan Muktas. Once Sri Shantanandapuri Maharaj visited Chennai. During that time, Sri Sri Swamiji was not in town. Maharaj was taken to the Ashram where all the students chanted at His presence, led by the teachers. Maharaj was extremely pleased with the environ of the Ashram, the divinity of the place, and the lusture in the face of the young patasala students and their teachers. He spoke very highly of these. I happened to be at the Ashram. We were very happy to hear it from him.
Once I happened to visit Kankal, which is a place in Uttar Pradesh. This was quite a few years ago. Sri Sri Swamiji asked me to visit Vashishta Guha which was a place close by Kankal. Vashishta Guha is a place where Sri Shantanandapuri Maharaj, who is a wandering monk, comes and stays for a few months. He had a very huge following in the North.
I was fortunate to stay in the Ashram for a few days. Every time a devotee came to have Sri Shantanandapuri Maharaj’s darshan, Maharaj would introduce me to them and speak very highly of Sri Swamiji and our Ashram.
I imagined that Maharaj was making me feel at home and was being kind to me, and hence these words. But Maharaj truly meant it! One day, I offered to do ‘kainkarya’ cleaning up a room, when Maharaj told me, ‘Do you know who your Guru is? So many gurus may come by in this world. But it is extremely rare to see an Acharya. And your Guru is one! And what He has done till date is not even a miniscule percentage of what He is going to be doing in future!’
I was surprised and baffled beyond words hearing this from Maharaj! Indeed only Jnanis can understand other Jnanis!
Ms. Nirmala Giri, Chennai
(During a telecon Satsang)
My tryst with Ike-2
We live a little away from the coast. However, the effect of the hurricane was not negligible. I could just not catch any sleep that night, thanks to the howling winds of the hurricane. I just held on to the tulsi mala that Sri Swamiji blessed me with and chanted throughout the night. We lost power in our house, but there was very minor damage to our fences, while, we could see so many grave damages to the cars and houses in our neighborhood because of uprooted trees and crashed branches.
As we have a 20 month old, we went to our friend’s who had power. We planned to return to our home in a couple of days. When we came home, we discovered that we still did not have power. We chanted Mahamantra for a few minutes. We had forgotten the keys. So we tried opening the garage door, but without much luck. Then we thought – well, its incorrect to chant with any selfish prayers in mind. Let’s just take it as God’s way and we drove back. In less than 30 minutes, we got a call from our neighbor that power was restored in our house!
This is when more than 80% of Houston was still out of power.
- Sriram Ramanujam & Family
Tomball, TX
My Tryst with Ike-1
By the immense grace of the Sadguru and by the immense grace of Lord Krishna we survived the gory Hurricane Ike.
There was no power on the night of Sep 12, the night of the hurricane. At about 3 am, one of our windows broke, owing to the 110 mph winds that were rattling the city. It was a miracle that even though the glass in one of the windows broke, it fell completely outside of the house! We had one tree uprooted and yet another window damaged. By the grace of God, not much water came inside even after the windows broke.
It is only the limitless Krupa of Lord Krishna that can do this type of miracle!
In fact the grace of the Lord and miracle did not end there – When the Houston Mayor was saying that power will take 2 to 4 weeks and Pearland being closer to Galveston we thought that we will be without the power for a very long time.
However just around 3:30 pm on Sunday (the day after the hurricane) about an half hour before our weekly Maha Mantra Sankirtan time our lights flickered as if the Lord was giving indication that things should okay before the Sankirtan. Shortly after that we got the power! It seemed to us that the Lord facilitates the Sankirtan at any cost!
A day after a major hurricane, we got the power and part of Pearland still doesn’t have power; what to say of the Krupa of Krishna and the Power of the ‘Hare Rama…’ Maha Mantra!
Power of Mahamantra brings electric power (and all other types of so-called powers) so easily – What else should one do? Just Chant, Chant like our Guru Maharaj says!
Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare
Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare
Our koti koti pranam to our Sadguru and Sri Krishna for giving us shelter and giving us opportunity to do Maha Mantra Sankirtan during the wee hours of Ike in complete darkness (since we had lost electricity) with the howling wind giving the tala 
.
The next day we did the Sankirtan in the car for the benefit of the Pearland community (it was a different type of Nagara Sankirtan).
Here are the links for the Sankirtans:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hGL6NCUOETw
- 2 AM Nama during the Hurricane (the tape is very dark because there was not power at that time and we were hunkered down within two feet of each other)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5dPx2D3UUkY – “the Nagara Sankirtan around Pearland, TX.”
– Shri Narayan Dave & Family,
Pearland, TX
Sep 26: Shiva-Vishnu Equality
The Satsang on the 26th was great in all respects. Ramaniji and Aparnaji led the Namakirtan to mark the start of the program. This was followed by introductions.
It was nice to see many new members who had joined the call from different places ranging from New England to Indiana.
Then Sri Narayanaswamyji gave a nice talk on the equality of Lord Shiva and Lord Vishnu.
Although Shiva and Vishnu are one and the same, we tend to distinguish. It is wrong to do so. The great sage of Kanchi, Sri Chandrasekarendra Saraswati Swamiji proclaimed this all through His life.
Just like famous actors and politicians are friends and its only their followers and fans who clash amongst each other, Shiva and Vishnu are truly one and the same. Its only their followers that nurture enmity.
Once Parvathi had a doubt as to who was greater – Shiva or Vishnu. She approached Shiva with this question, and Shiva asked her to go to South India and mediate on the Lord and would find out herself. Goddess Parvathi came down to a place near Tirunelveli and performed penance during the month of ‘Aadi’, popularly known as ‘Aadi Tapas’. She found the Lord as ‘Shankara Narayana’ – the right hand side being Lord Shiva and the hand side being Lord Narayana, thus telling her that both were one and the same. This place is popularly known as ‘Sankaran Koil’Shiva chants the Rama Nama all the time. He also says to his wife Parvati that the sum and substance of all the 1000 Names of Lord Vishnu (Vishnu Sahasranama) is verily Rama Nama:
Srirama rama rameti rame raame manorame |
Sahasranama tattulyam ramanama varanane ||Similarly, Lord Rama worships Shiva at Rameswaram, while planning for the strategy to conquer Ravana. Even today, the Shiva Linga that was worshipped by Sri Rama is being worshipped in Rameswaram.
Great Mahans never distinguish whether one is a Vaishnavite or a Shaivite. They see the true love and devotion in the heart.
Here are some interesting details about the oneness of Shiva and Vishnu:
- Sri Krishna asks Arjuna to meditate on Lord Shiva to obtain Pasupatastra
- The Nataraja temple in Chidambaram has Lord Govindaraja Perumal sannadhi
- The Ekamreswara temple in Kanchipuram has a sanctum for Lord Vishnu
- In Tirukkurungudi, a divya desam of Sri Vaishnavas, there are temples of Mantragirishwara and Kalabairava.
All the great Mahans have said that the Divine Name of Shiva and the Divine Name of Vishnu are one and the same. ‘Om Namo Narayanaya’ – the Ashtakshara is the primary mantra of the Vaishnavites. ‘Ra’ is the key syllable in this Mantra.
‘Om Nama Shivaya’ the Panchakshara is the chief Mantra of the Shaivites. ‘ma’ is the key syllable of this Mantra.
Putting these two key syllables, together, we get ‘Rama’. – By chanting Rama Nama, we verily get all the benefits of chanting the Shiva Nama and the Vishnu Nama.
This was followed by Nama Anubahva. Kishori gave her Nama Anubahva.
‘Special Person’
It was wonderful to hear Kishori narrate this touching incident.
Then the Houston Bhagavata Saptaham was announced. This is supposed to be a 7 day saptaham Katha by our guest Poornimaji during the Thanksgiving weekend.
It starts on the 22nd of November at Sri Radha Krishna Temple, Houston and goes for the next seven days. Sri Narayan Daveji and Sri Sriramji invited one and all to come and join in for this grand function, which is planned to be a yearly reunion of all the devotees of Sri Swamiji.
The satsang closed with Mahamantra prayers. We also performed prayers for a little child in Chicago, during our Nama Sankirtan.
Rama Nama fixed my speech!
Sri Aravind of the Florida satsang spoke the following in one of the telecom satsangs…
‘When I was young, I could not pronounce the word ‘Ra’ very well. I would pronounce it as ‘Tha’ instead. This became a serious problem and I started feeling low in front of others for my inability. My mother encouraged me and asked me to chant the Rama Nama constantly. But do you see the paradox? Rama Nama itself has ‘Ra’! and that was where my problem was! Mom told me not to worry about it, and chant as was possible by me. I continued to chant the Rama Nama regularly, but as ‘thaama’! and It was indeed a miracle that in due course I was able to pronounce Rama!
Even when I could not pronounce Rama correctly, the Lord out of His sheer compassion answered my prayers. I am sure that it is that Rama Nama that gave me darshan of great Avatara Purushas like Maha Swamiji of Kanchi Sri Chandrasekarendra Saraswathi Swamigal, Bhagavan Yogiramsuratkumar and now, our Swamiji.’
Satsang prayers help
Sri Sankar from California narrated this in one of our satsangs….
Our son, Krishna was not feeling well for some time. We have been going to the hospital almost everyday that week; however the doctors could not diagnose the problem. It was a Friday evening and our friend called me and asked if we could perform prayers in the evening telecom satsang. I happily agreed. We were in the hospital when the prayers were on, that Friday evening. All the Bhagavatas on the call sincerely prayed with Mahamantra for my son.
In less than a few minutes of the prayers, to our great surprise, the doctors got the diagnosis! They discovered the problem to be a unique syndrome and started medication for the same. Since then my son has been doing very well. I thank all the Bhagavatas for their prayers.
Sep 12: Onam & The Nava Vidha Bhakti
The satsang started on 12th September with Mrs. Anusha and Mrs. Booma from Dallas leading the Nama Kirtan. All of us got to listen and sing the Mahamantra in a different raga today. As always, it was soothing to the ears and the mind.
It was widely expected that the hurricane Ike will play havoc in the gulf coast and Houston area in a few hours after the satsang. Our Mahamantra Kirtan was focused on prayers for the safety of the residents of the area.
The Kirtan ended with ‘Satguru Natha Maharaj ki Jai!’ and we started off with introductions. About 32 people joined the satsang this day and we had representations from the east coast, the mid-west and the west, with considerably more people joining from the west-coast.
Shri Narayanaswamy of Seattle then gave a wonderful 15 minute discourse on Bhakti, a gist of which is below….
What is the unique aspect of Hindu Religion? According to Kanchi Mahaperiyava – Sri Chandrasekarendra Saraswati Swamiji, it is that there are infinite paths to reach the Supreme.
Out of the various paths, ‘Bhakti Marga’ is one of the easiest. What is Bhakti. Getting closer to the Guru or Bhagavan through devotion and love – that is Bhakti.When it comes to Bhakti, it is broadly stated that there are nine different ways to perform Bhakti. They are the ‘Nava vidha Bhakti’. Let us see the nine different ways, one after another.
The first among them is, “Shravanam” – listening to the Divine Names and glories of God. How long can one listen to the glories of the Lord? Not for a long time. We get bored too soon. But there was a great illustration of this kind of Bhakti – it was verily Hanuman. Hanuman had unflinching devotion for the Lord and always listened to nothing but Rama Nama and Rama Katha.
Another form of Bhakti is ‘Archanam’ – peforming pooja to the Lord by offering flowers. How long can a common man spend in performing pooja? May be an hour, two, or a little more. But there was a great devotee who performed Archana Bhakti and reached Lord through this. ‘Kannapan’ was the name of this person. By virtue of performing ‘Archanam’ to Lord Siva, He eventually attained His feet, and came to be called ‘Kannappa Naayanaar’.
‘Smaranam’ – thinking about the Lord always. Sita Devi was an exemplary illustration of this Smarana Bhakti. She kept thinking of Lord Rama every moment.
‘Vandanam’ is a form of Bhakti which is about prostrating to the Lord. We are supposed to do ‘Namaskaram’ to the Lord by falling at His feet. But what do we do today? We wave our hand, when we go to temples! There was one great soul who attained the Divine by Vandana Bhakti – Vibheeshana.
A distinctive example of ‘Padasevanam’ is that of Bharata, who sacrificed his whole kingdom and served at the feet of Lord Rama. It is said that Bharata’s sacrifice is greater than that of Rama, for, Rama sacrificed the kingdom only for 14 years, but Bharata sacrificed it forever, letting the Padhuka of the Lord rule!
‘Sakhyam’ is friendship. By considering the Lord as your friend, you can get closer to Him. One can see in the Mylapore temple in Chennai, where people tell out their woes to the Divine Mother there, thinking of her as their closest friend. How often do we consider the Lord as our true friend? Who can equal Guha, the hunter, who became Rama’s friend, and attained Him? ‘…Aivar anom’, says Kambar (we were four brothers, now with Guha, we have become 5 brothers, says Rama, in Kamba Ramayana).
‘Dasyam’ is the Bhakti to offer seva to the Lord. Lakshmana performed Dasya Bhakti to the Lord. He woke up before Rama and went to bed after Rama did. At any point in time, Lakshmana was always ready with whatever was needed for Rama. This is Daasya Bhakti.
One of the most difficult forms of Bhakti is ‘Aatma Nivedanam’, offering oneself to the Lord. A superlative example of this kind of Bhakti was that of the bird Jatayu, who gave his life to protect Sita and indicated to Rama, the direction in which Ravana took Sita. Bound by the offering of Jatayu, the Lord Himself performed the last rites for Jatayu!
The final form of Bhakti that we will discuss now is ‘Kirthanam’ – singing the Divine Names of the Lord. This is the simplest of all Bhakti forms. Great saints like Valmiki, Thiyagaraja etc. have attained the Lord by just chanting the Rama Nama. All the sages, down to our Swamiji, have shown us this glorious path.
When Kali Yuga started, a panicked Narada, asked Brahma what the solution to the ills of Kali Yuga was. Brahma gave the great Mantra
Hare Rama Hare Rama Rama Rama Hare Hare
Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna Hare Hare as the one cure for all the ills in this Yuga. By just chanting this Mantra continuously, one can cross this ocean of Samsara in this Kali yuga and reach the Divine Feet of the Lord, with utmost ease.Radhe Krishna!’
Karthik from Cincinnati, on listening to the Jatayu episode – of Rama performing the last rites for the bird, narrated this wonderful piece of experience:
In a place called Cheyyar in Tamil Nadu, Nama Kirtan happens regularly. An old woman travels all the way from a far away town every week to attend the Nama Kirtan in Cheyyar. On one such occasion, Sri Sri Swamiji paid a surprise visit to Cheyyar. On that particular day, no one else had turned up for the Kirtan except for this woman and the hosts. Sri Sri Swamiji was surprised learning that this elderly woman travels such a distance every week for Nama sake. He asked her, ‘What do you wish for?’ The woman replied, ‘I don’t wish for anything great. I just want to have Nama in my lips, at my last breath.’ Sri Sri Swamiji just smiled.
Just a few days later, this woman found herself in a party that set out on a trip to Gaya in North India. During the pilgrimage, one day, she complained of chest pain and when she was in her final stages of her life, she was right at ‘Vishnu Pada’, chanting the Mahamantra. Indeed her prayer was fulfilled!
Ms. Priya from Seattle talked about how the strength of her weekly satsang grew from 4-5 people to a 45 member group within a little over a year. A few take-away ideas for satsang:
- Start the satsang with Mahamantra and end with Mahamantra
- Bhajans and Kirtans
- Slokas, like Vishnu Sahasranama and the like
- A separate children’s satsang time that includes programs based on specific themes (eg. Ganesha during Ganesh Chaturti and so on).
- A short discourse/ lecture on greatness of Rama Nama.
For the news/events section, it was announced that the VanPurushottaman temple Samprokshanam was held in Sri Swamiji’s presence on the 11th of September. A brief about the activities at Smt. Jayanthi Janakiraman Memorial Aagama Prabandha Patashala at Thirunangoor and the Samprokshanams at other temples in Thirunangoor was also given.
If you happen to visit the Kumbakonam / Tanjavur belt or visit Tamil Nadu, do take a day off to visit the 13+ Divya Desams in Tirunangur. It will stay in your memory forever!
Sri Ramaswamy mentioned that this day was auspicious! Yes. It was ‘Onam’ festival (Sravana star) when the Lord took birth as Vamana / Upendra to take King Bali unto Himself. It is indeed an auspicious occasion and everyone felt blessed to be in the satsang on this auspicious occasion, chanting Nama.
With prayers for the safety of Texas residents and other personal prayers, Anushaji and Boomaji closed the satsang with Mahamantra Prayers.
Sep 5: Prayers, faith, sense of humor and more….
The Friday satsang started on a great note as usual.
At 9:30 ET, Sujathaji from California led the Nama Sankirtan prayers. The Nama went on for about 10 minutes after which we had introductions. The regular members were on the call, with increased participants from the West-Coast.
Then Ramaniji from Cerritos, CA, during his talk, narrated a wonderful story….
Ramu was a humble person who rang the bell in the temple. That was the only vocation known to him and he has been doing it devoutly for all his lifetime. One fine morning the temple authorities summoned him. They told him that they no more needed his services, for, with technology advancement, they had upgraded their temple bells with automatic ones.
Ramu felt totally dejected. What would he do henceforth? He knew not another job. How would he earn his living? While he was walking on the road, in utter sorrow, he came across an elderly person who advised that he should perform pooja and offer prayers to Lord Rama and Lord Rama would show him a way.
Ramu was upbeat hearing this. Immediately, he went to the nearby shop, got a beautiful idol of Rama and brought it home. He decorated the idol with the best of dresses, and performed pooja and prayers to the idol every day, without fail, as advised by the elderly gentleman. Two months passed, four, six, eight and ten. Finally, a year had passed and Ramu spent all his savings in offering pooja to Lord Rama. But his financial situation did not change, nor did he get a job.
He felt distressed by the fact that his prayers did not yield fruit. Just then Ramu met yet another elderly person who said, ‘hey! Rama is a deity of the past! Krishna is more powerful. Why don’t you perform pooja to Krishna and worship him? He is certain to yield you good results!’
Ramu was fascinated by this new idea. He, at once, walked into the shop next door and got home the Krishna idol. He enthusiastically performed pooja to the Krishna idol.
One day, as he was lighting the incense sticks in the course of his prayers, something struck him – Lord Rama was also in the form of the idol in the same prayer room and he had decided not to worship Rama. Now if Ramu lighted an incense stick, would not Rama be able to get the scent of it too? ‘My incense sticks are meant only for Krishna. Rama should not smell them!’ he thought. At once, he took a cotton swab and plugged it in the nose of the Rama idol.
The moment Ramu did this, He saw a beautiful person suddenly appearing in front of him. Ramu was stunned to see this glorious form in front of him and questioned who he was. True, it was verily Lord Rama, who was in front of him. Ramu asked, ‘When I worshipped you last year, you did not come. How come you are here now?’. The Lord said, your faith was then limited. Today when you really believed that Rama in the form of the idol could smell the scent from the incense scent, you manifested true faith, and I am here, to grant you any boon that wish!’
Indeed whatever we do, we should do with faith in God!
Where there is faith, there is no fate, it is said. Sometimes it is also said that faith is greater than God Himself. Indeed faith is the greatest wealth that one can possess.
But this faith in God does not come by itself. It is only due to the grace of God that we get staunch faith in God. Pleased with Ramu’s sincere, selfless service to the Lord for all these years, the Lord blessed him with the faith at the right moment. So any small activity you do knowingly or unknowingly towards spirituality and for the sake of God never goes a waste!
Ramani also mentioned about his satsang, where they chant the Nama and one house every week in their apartment complex. An interesting thing mentioned by Ramani was that they follow the ‘bring a new neighbor’ policy. Every host should guarantee that s/he brings at least one new member to the satsang that they host! What a novel way to spread the Divine Name of God!
After this, all of the callers were in for a surprise. We had a special guest from India, who joined the call. Ms. Nirmala Giri, an ardent devotee of Sri Swamiji for the past so many years, came on the call, thanks to Sriramji of Houston, who conferenced her in.
Mrs. Giri gave a quick overview of the Brahmotsav, being the live witness of the event herself. She mentioned how the number of devotees that attend the utsav has swelled up over the past years.
Mrs. Giri spoke shortly on Sri Swamiji’s sense of wit and humor.
Generally it is said that Jnanis possess a wonderful sense of humor. Let me share a few of the incidents which depicts it, in the case of Sri Swamiji.A lady devotee of Sri Swamiji used to brag about her Sadhana. She often imagined that she felt occult internal transformations inside her! One day, she said with a heavy head, ‘Swamiji, I am able to visualize a thousand petal lotus on my head!’
Swamiji almost immediately shot back, ‘Very true! Lotus blooms only in the marshes!’There was yet another devotee who was very proud of her wealth. She used to donate to the mission and had an air that Sri Swamiji’s mission could not survive but for her monetary contributions. She said, ‘Swamiji, even the largest ships have lifeboats!’
Swamiji quickly said, ‘Yes, you are the big ship and I am your lifeboat!’
Aravind added another interesting incident to bring out the wit of Sri Swamiji – ‘the (h)armless Krishna’ – a piece that he read on the Nama Dwaar website.
Then GBji gave an update on the Radha Kalyanam that they performed in the Bay area and Sriram gave an update on the Janmashtami fair.
We concluded with Mahamantra, with special prayers for safety from hurricanes and for the souls of those who lost their lives and were rendered homeless due to the Bihar floods.
