Swami Shivapadananda on desire

SWAMI SHIVAPADANANDA

DAILY READINGS

From Mother Radha's recordings of Swamiji

607

 
 

[Swamiji continues speaking on the Ramayana]

At another time, Punjikastala (who later became Hanumanji's mother, Anjani) was the attendant of Lord Brahma. One day she became very lustful on seeing the maid in the flower garden; and when she returned from there she started throwing lustful looks at Brahma and kissed him. Brahma became very annoyed because Brahma is Brahmadev who believes in brahmacharya [sense control or celibacy]. Lord Brahma was very disappointed with his servant and he cursed her saying, 'Go down to Earth because you have lustful feelings. In the realms of the gods lust is not supposed to manifest. Go to the place where you can satisfy your lustful feelings. Go to Earth where you will be born in the tribe of the Vanaras [an Aboriginal people].' And then she pleaded, 'Lord I made a mistake. What can I do?' Then he said out of love, 'Do not worry. There is a great work to be accomplished through you. After you have given birth to a child you will come back to heaven. Your curse will be destroyed.' So because of her foolishness she came down to Earth.

Now this may seem very awkward that she was cursed; but even here on Earth if you do the wrong thing on the roads the police will arrest you and put you in jail, in confinement. Similarly the confinement of the body with all its different senses was given to Punjikastala.

So she was born as Anjani and was married to Kesari, a member of the Vanara tribe, but she had no children. Now an important part of Indian culture and religion is that the partners in marriage want to have a child, they have this desire. If they fail to have a child they go directly to God Himself for help. So they started worshipping Lord Shiva. They started doing tapasya [austerities] and after many years Lord Shiva manifested in the kingdom of Dasaratha. And when a special yajna [ritual worship ceremony] was being performed the fire, agni [the name of the god of fire], manifested and gave out payasam, sweet rice. Dasaratha took the sweet rice and gave each of his wives a little.

Now at this time there was a kite [a bird] that was also cursed. (The whole of the Ramayana is full of curses or destiny. In doing the wrong thing you will be corrected. If you had not done the wrong thing you would not have taken birth, you would be in God, with God Himself). [To be continued]

1) Care should be taken by the reader to
understand and take Swamiji's words in these postings, in context. Every
teaching or instruction that he gave was specific to the people who were with
Swamiji at the time. 2) Mouse-over the words highlighted in red in the
posting for further explanation or links.

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Sri Ramakrishna, Sri Sarada Devi, Swami Vivekananda, Swami Nischalananda Puri, Swami Shivapadananda

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Reference websites (please mouse-over
the name to connect): Ramakrishna Math and Mission, Ramakrishna Centre of SA, Ramakrishna Centre of Southern Africa,
Ramakrishna Dham, Swami Shivapadananda 2