Swamiji speaks on Gayatri mantras, devotion and prasad. Disc 141 track 7.
To listen to Swamiji speaking, please fully open the clip and then click below.
[Dear Devotee, This is as faithful an excerpt/transcript as can be managed from this often unclear audio clip. But this is a very accurate gist/sense and verbatim transcript of what is clearly audible. Despite best efforts, artificial intelligence ‘trimming’ of echo etc. the recording and background noise just don’t allow for better extraction. Our apologies].
The clip starts with what sounds like Swamiji recounting a conversation between his pre-monastic self and Gurudev [Swami Nischalananda Puri – Swamiji’s beloved guru]. Swamiji was evidently saying to Gurudev: I am a worshipper of Lord Shiva. I’m meditating on Shiva, and these people are singing ‘Hare Rama’ as the opening prayer [invocation at satsang], and I don’t know how to fit [reconcile] that [with my deity]. He [Gurudev] said, ‘You are a fool, that Supreme Being is neither Rama nor Shiva. So, think that Shiva’s name is [also] Rama and Krishna.’ For the first time says Swamiji, it struck me in my mind, ‘Can this be so?’ And when I started practising it, I found that the love in me increased fifty times more! Before that, when they said ‘Hare Rama, Hare Krishna’ I used to think of Rama or Krishna. And the same thing slowly, slowly [gradually], it led me to Ramakrishna and even beyond this. Because God is not [just] this, too. He’s beyond this. And thus, from that point of view, you find that you can accept any worship – and when I say any worship – please believe me, worship is only the worship of the power of God. The power and God are not two separate things. They are one and the same thing.
But [also] why it worked with me is because I had faith in what my guru was saying. His own love put the faith in me. So even in that [insight/understanding] I take no [personal] pride.
So any name a man sings [is valid] – someone told [said to] me, ‘If I call God ‘Shivapada’, will he listen?’ I said, ‘He’ll have to listen.’ Why should you not call him that? Call him Shivapada! [But] Don’t call him Shivapada and think of me [this Swami, this body]. Think of him [God]. That’s the difference!
Swamiji tells a story of an unwell man who was calling out, ‘Narayana!, Narayana’. Another man thought he was calling his son [named Narayana]. But, says Swamiji, forget it, he wasn’t calling his son. He told [called out] Narayan, but you must remember he was sick, he was semi-conscious. He was calling on Satchidananda. So if you give your child the name of your Ishta Devata, or related [connected to] to your Ishta Devata, it’ll be easier for you to think of God. And you’ll [also] keep thinking the child is God.
Swamiji switching topic gears: In meditation you are giving to the deity called sleep [tongue in cheek comment]. It’s always a struggle, a constant effort to reach God. So consciously your mind will run [outward] and consciously you will bring it [back] to God. It’s a struggle. It goes [wandering], bring it back, it goes, bring it [back]. When it comes [to deep concentration] truly you won’t be there to say ‘it’s true’. When you come back [from that state] you won’t know what to say it was like. The Buddhists call it ‘the void’.
Whatever you wish [for], you’ll get. So if you’re too lazy to do sadhana [spiritual practise], next birth you’ll get a birth where you don’t have to do sadhana at all. [Inaudible follow up comment].
[In chanting a mantra to the deity] you’re asking the deity to compel your mind or impel your mind towards his [God’s] lotus feet. Swamiji chants the Sri Hanuman Gayatri mantra.
|| ॐ आञ्जनेयाय विद्महे वायुपुत्राय धीमहि।
तन्नो हनुमत् प्रचोदयात् ||
Om Anjaneyaya Vidmahe Vayuputraya Dhimahi।
Tanno Hanumat Prachodayat॥
Swamiji interprets the mantra: ‘May he who is the son of Vayuputra, who is the son of [goddess] Anjani, may he, who I call Hanuman, compel my mind or make my mind remain fixed on his lotus feet.’ Then, when you do that Gayatri first or to your deity, when you do the mantra, it will have an effect. Because now you’ve told it what to do with your mind. Get it?
If you do Ramakrishna’s mantra, you do Ramakrishna’s gayatri. It doesn’t mean you must say ‘Om bhur bhuva swaha’ [the traditional Gayatri mantra. That’s the highest one, Om bhur bhuva swaha, because it’s [both] personal and impersonal. For your deity it becomes personal.
I used to actually get jealous. I used to get so jealous that Mira [bai] can love her deity so much. What is wrong with me? Why can I not love my Shiva? There’s something wrong with me. It used to burn me like fire. But yet it increased love towards my deity. Though I was thinking about Krishna, it still increased my love towards Shiva. But that is what God does. No matter what deity you’re worshipping, according to the [Bhagavad] Gita, it increases your faith for that particular deity.
Don’t be asking me to convert as [some] Christians or Muslims would do. Nay! It increases your love for your deity. I shouldn’t hate the man for loving his deity. I should think, ‘What is wrong with me, that I can’t love my deity like that?’ You see the idea?
You see, Ramakrishna Bhagavan had to manifest some power to show that he’s God. Mother [Holy Mother Sri Sarada Devi] just cooked food and gave it to people to eat. That is actually the greatest thing that Mother has done. That through food, she transformed people! That is how you learn the greatest lesson. And through her we see the power of prasad [food that has been offered to God and is now sacramental]. Through her we see the power of prasad. When a goddess gives you prasad, it transforms you. Like if I give you a fruit, you take it with the attitude of prasad, not [just] an orange. The devotees who came there [to the Kali temple at Dakshineswar] they ate that. Though they did not know it was prasad. But it started having an effect on their nature, and thieves turned out to be good people. Then only they thought, ‘Aah! Where could this thing [change] have come from?’ Then they remembered that kind of love, that Mother gave them through the food.
Prasad is a great thing. Don’t treat it [badly] as prasad. You know, we Hindus have got a very bad habit. We give children more prasad than they can eat. And they drop it everywhere. That’s a big curse. Thousands or billions of births you have to take for that. The Hindus have got this bad habit of taking the flowers [that have been offered to the deity – and throwing them] out. And throwing it anywhere, where it goes under the feet. After offering it to your deity!
You know what happened when Durvasa took a garland of flowers from Vishnu Bhagavan? Story HERE.] Durvasa was one of the Rishis. He took the garland and saw Indra [the king of the gods] coming on his elephant, he took the garland with love and gave it to Indra. Indra took the garland, thinking, ‘Oh my elephant is very good’, and put it on the elephant. And the elephant – being an animal – broke the garland [when bees buzzed the flowers] and trampled it under his feet. Then, Durvasa cursed Indra, ‘You will lose all your kingdom. You fool! That was prasad from Lord Vishnu. From around Vishnu’s neck, he gave it as prasad. I lovingly gave it to you as prasad. You took it and foolishly put it on an animal.’ So you people who are worshipping God at home, watch those flowers [and what you do with them].
[Clearly relating an incident when being asked a question by someone.] I looked at him and he said, ‘You love God?’ I said: I know that he loves me. As much as I wanted to tell him, ‘Maharaj I love him’. I’ll tell you one thing, ‘As much love as he’s given me, I’m loving [him with that]. As much as he’s given me love, only so much I love him. [Rest is inaudible].
[The clip ends with Swamiji commenting on Raja [King] Parikshit. I can’t find a reference, so don’t have context on what incident Swamiji was referring to.] Something about ‘Mother Earth and the body is also earth, giving a cow away means taking earth and giving back to God as his own power. Energy in that form returning back to God. That’s what the scriptures depicted. This body is earth. Energies, pranas, are his.’
The free-to-read, 396 page Flipbook version of Swamiji’s biography is available by clicking HERE.
These recordings were made from the 1970s onward, by Mother Radha, a close devotee of Swamiji’s and edited for uploading here by our gurubhai and her son, Brother Tim. Please be mindful that what Swamiji was saying may have been specific to an individual or a group of people with him, at the time.