Swami Shivapadananda on Hanuman’s birth

SWAMI SHIVAPADANANDA

DAILY READINGS

From Mother Radha's recordings of Swamiji

608

 

[Swamiji continues on Hanuman's birth]

The kite [bird] had been told that its curse would be destroyed if it could snatch a little bit of this sweet rice from Dasaratha's queen and if it could put it in the rightful place. So just when the queen was looking the other way, the kite flew down, snatched some sweet rice and flew away.

At this very moment, not far from there, Lord Shiva said to Anjani [Hanuman's mother], 'Do you want a son? All right, you will have a son. He will be full of wrath but he will be self-effulgent. Bind your eyes, put your hands out and do tapasya [sacrifice or austerity]. Something will be put into your hands and you must eat it.' So Anjani did this and started saying the Shiva mantra. At that moment the kite that had snatched the sweet rice [payasam or kheer] was flying above her and there was a great storm. The rice fell from its mouth and into Anjani's palms.

She then ate it knowing that the gods were happy. After nine months, as nature would have it, Anjani gave birth to a handsome looking son according to their standards. (You may laugh but every mother knows that her child is the most beautiful child.) Hanumanji, the most handsome child, was born. But wonder of wonders this child was wearing golden ear-rings. It is said that when Vali, Sugriva's brother, heard that Anjani would give birth he tried to abort the child. To do this in the olden days they used to give the five metals: gold, zinc, iron, copper and silver in liquid form, as a medicine. But as Sri Rama's grace would have it, these metals made beautiful ear-rings and so Hanumanji was born with ear-rings. (I do not see why miracles are not possible.) He was also born with a beautiful sacred thread.

But this child, Hanumanji, because he was Lord Shiva's gift, the eleventh avatar, Ekadashrudra, was able to speak at birth. The first thing he said was, 'Ma, ma, I am hungry knowing that I have taken birth.' (Conscious birth, not unconscious birth.) Every child wants to suckle the breast but this one wanted to know, 'What can I eat? What will my future be?' So Anjani said, 'We only live on roots and fruits; we live on everything that is sattvic. Any nice red fruit you find on top of the trees, eat that.'

Anjani went inside to get something to give him. Now the full moon had just set and the baby Hanumanji saw something gold and red coming up; so with one leap he cleared the space between the Earth and the sun. But whilst he was going there he looked to the side and found another big red light which was Ketu. He decided to leave the sun and as he was going to Ketu somebody ran to Indra Bhagavan, the king of the gods, and told him the whole story.

Indra Bhagavan became very excited; he was the king and, though it was not his fault, he had to protect his subjects. So he got on his aircraft, indrajit, and dashed there to see what was wrong. He met Hanumanji on the way and instead of asking him, 'What is the matter? What do you want?' Indra started getting his thunderbolt ready. At this point Hanumanji kicked Indra's vehicle away and this made Indra Bhagavan very angry. He let go his thunderbolt and it hit Hanumanji on the jaw and broke his chin (Hanu means jaw). Hanuman came whirling down to Earth and someone ran to Pavandev [the wind god] to tell him that his son was hurt. (It was Pavandev [the wind god] who gave the kite the power to fly. It was Pavandev again who directed that payasam into the hand of Mother Anjani and by virtue of this he became Hanumanji's father.)

Pavandev then withdrew all the prana [vital universal or life force] from the three worlds and all the gods, goddesses, mankind and creatures started suffocating. As they were about to die Indra Bhagavan, Lord Brahma, Lord Vishnu and Lord Shiva all started pleading with Pavandev. They said, 'Why are you doing this? Why are you withdrawing the prana? Do you see what is happening?' He replied, 'You people nearly killed my son. I want to show you who is the most powerful being. I will teach you all a lesson.'

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