Talks Excerpt 604. Swamiji conducts a Sri Hanuman Katha and Jhanda ceremony with ashram brahmacharis.
From Mother Radha’s recordings of Swamiji.
[After reciting the Hanuman Chalisa, Swamiji prayed:]
O Hanumanji, how must I boast with you, about you? Because of bhakti you gave up your human form; you preferred a monkey’s form. But these people here are giving up bhakti; they prefer a nice form, a beautiful form. That is the difference between you and them.
[After Hanumanji’s Arati Swamiji said]
At home in your own shrine, do not feel ashamed. Just go ahead and say whatever comes into your heart, with whatever kind of praise comes into your heart, as long as it is uplifting. The poets have written these words in the Hanuman arati but they have not necessarily said what your heart wants to say. You can say your own prayer. Hanumanji does not care to hear the same things over and over: Om jai jagadish hare etc. By now he knows that he is Jagadisha, Lord of the universe. You tell him what you want to tell him. Let it be a sincere prayer from the heart.
[Swamiji prays to Hanumanji after the Jhanda Ceremony].
You are the Lord of the whole universe. Even in a dream you did not think of getting married. O Lord, even in dream-state you are always serving your Atman called Sri Rama. Lord, may this jhanda that we are putting here today bring that same purity to these Ramakrishna Ashramas.
Wherever the Ashram is, may all people come there. May you somehow impel them to be truthful brahmacharis and brahmacharinis [female brahmacharis]. May you, like ten thousand thunderbolts, protect the sadhus as you promised. May you always be the destroyer of asuras and adharmas, and ever be the beloved of Sri Rama.
We do not know about these five people’s past births but we know in this birth they have kept brahmacharya. Therefore we ask you, Lord, to accept this jhanda, this jhanda of the highest sattvic quality, this jhanda of brahmacharya, and this jhanda of the karma yogi’s rajasic qualities, to do God’s work. Tamas was not in you. May tamas go where tamas is needed. May these five people that are holding you, get bhakti to your lotus feet. Hanumanji, these are brahmacharis who are offering you a jhanda here if you will accept it.
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These recordings or the excerpts from them, were made from the early 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.