To whom are you devoted - God or dog? || Acharya Prashant, on Sri Ramakrishna (2017)
Video Information: 32nd Advait Learning Camp, 28.5.17, Jim Corbett National Park, Uttarakhand, India
Context:
~ What is devotion?
~ How to devote oneself to god?
~ How to be free?
Music Credits: Milind Date
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Context:
Quote: "A disciple once asked Sri Ramakrishna how he was to conquer lust; for though he was passing his days
in religious contemplation, evil thoughts were arising in his mind from time to time. To him the Master
said: "There was a man who had a pet dog. He used to caress it, carry it about in his arms, play with it and
kiss it. A wise man, seeing this foolish behaviour of his, warned him not to lavish such affection on a dog.
For it was, after all, an irrational brute, and might bite him one day. The owner took the warning to heart
and putting away the dog from his arms, resolved never again to fondle or caress it. But the animal could
not at first understand the change in his master, and would run to him frequently to be taken up and
caressed. Beaten several times, the dog at last ceased to trouble his master any more. Such indeed is your
condition. The dog that you have been cherishing so long in your bosom will not easily leave you, though
you may wish to be rid of it. However, there is no harm in it. Do not caress the dog any more, but give it
a good beating whenever it approaches you to be fondled, and in course of time you will be altogether free from its importunities."
~ Sri Ramakrishna
Context:
~ What is devotion?
~ How to devote oneself to god?
~ How to be free?
Music Credits: Milind Date
~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Context:
Quote: "A disciple once asked Sri Ramakrishna how he was to conquer lust; for though he was passing his days
in religious contemplation, evil thoughts were arising in his mind from time to time. To him the Master
said: "There was a man who had a pet dog. He used to caress it, carry it about in his arms, play with it and
kiss it. A wise man, seeing this foolish behaviour of his, warned him not to lavish such affection on a dog.
For it was, after all, an irrational brute, and might bite him one day. The owner took the warning to heart
and putting away the dog from his arms, resolved never again to fondle or caress it. But the animal could
not at first understand the change in his master, and would run to him frequently to be taken up and
caressed. Beaten several times, the dog at last ceased to trouble his master any more. Such indeed is your
condition. The dog that you have been cherishing so long in your bosom will not easily leave you, though
you may wish to be rid of it. However, there is no harm in it. Do not caress the dog any more, but give it
a good beating whenever it approaches you to be fondled, and in course of time you will be altogether free from its importunities."
~ Sri Ramakrishna
Category
ЁЯЫая╕П
LifestyleTranscript
00:00 [Music]
00:12 [Music]
00:36 A disciple once asked Sri Ramakrishna
00:39 how he was to conquer lust.
00:41 For though he was passing his days in religious contemplation,
00:44 evil thoughts were arising in his mind from time to time.
00:48 To this, to him, the master said,
00:52 "There was a man who had a pet dog.
00:54 He used to caress it, carry it in about his arms,
00:59 play with it and kiss it.
01:01 A wise man, seeing this foolish behavior of his,
01:04 warned him not to lavish such affection on a dog.
01:08 For it was, after all, an irrational brute and might bite him one day.
01:12 The owner took the warning to heart
01:14 and putting away the dog from his arms,
01:16 resolved never again to fondle or caress it.
01:18 But the animal could not at first understand the change in his master
01:22 and would run to him, frequently to be taken up and caressed.
01:25 Beaten several times, the dog at last ceased to trouble his master anymore.
01:29 Such indeed is your condition.
01:31 The dog that you have been cherishing so long in your bosom
01:34 will not easily leave you,
01:36 though you may wish to be rid of it.
01:38 However, there is no harm in it.
01:40 Do not caress the dog anymore,
01:42 but give it a good beating whenever it approaches you to be fondled.
01:45 And in course of time, you will be altogether free from its importunities."
01:50 Take the dog as a symbol.
02:05 Do not be gross enough to start beating up dogs.
02:12 The dog is a symbol of all that
02:23 which need not be given your affection, love and devotion.
02:30 The dog is a symbol of misplaced devotion.
02:45 Devoted we all are.
02:48 The question is to whom are we devoted?
02:51 To God or to dog?
02:55 The story here means just that your love yourself is precious.
03:05 Ego is to be offered only to the truth.
03:16 That which you are can be sacrificed only to its rightful master.
03:27 Your love must be firstly reserved for the first one.
03:37 You take the offerings and what do you do with the offerings?
03:43 You offer them to the Lord.
03:46 When you go to a temple, are you not carrying sweets and coconut and such things?
03:52 What do you do with that stuff?
03:55 You offer it first to the Lord.
04:00 Those sweets and coconut are your love.
04:05 The offering of your very self,
04:10 the offering of your ego,
04:15 you take it and you offer it to the Lord
04:20 and then you offer it to everybody else.
04:22 It is not as if the Lord keeps all your sweets to himself.
04:27 Does he do that?
04:29 Does he do that?
04:32 You carry an entire box of sweets.
04:35 You offer it to the deity.
04:37 Does the deity extend its hand and keep all the sweets?
04:44 What does the deity do?
04:46 The deity says, fine, I am alright.
04:48 I am pleased just by your sentiment.
04:51 You have offered these to me.
04:54 I have understood that you are devoted.
04:57 Now go and distribute this to the world.
05:01 Such must be your love.
05:03 It must firstly go to God.
05:09 And when it goes to God, God is really in no need of love.
05:13 God is already full.
05:16 So God is pleased just by your offering.
05:19 He says, great.
05:22 Now that you have shown it to me, give it to the entire world.
05:26 That is why the religious man is full of love for the whole world.
05:29 He distributes his love to the world as prasad.
05:34 Are you getting it?
05:38 But what is impertinent is if you do not offer it first to the Lord and instead offer it
05:47 to this and that.
05:51 Even if you have to offer food to yourself, offer it first to God.
05:58 That is why it used to be a custom in India to offer the bhog to God before you take the first bite.
06:13 So here goes the offering to the Lord and now that he has accepted it, I will allow
06:18 myself to take the first morsel.
06:22 First for the first.
06:26 First for the first.
06:28 Are you getting it?
06:30 Now do not give that to the world which is reserved for the first.
06:38 That is what this story indicates.
06:41 Offer your highest love not to dogs but to God.
06:49 Are you getting it?
06:52 And if you offer your highest love to dogs, the result might be that one day the same
06:59 dog might bite you.
07:06 In fact, your love for the world is sanctified when it flows firstly through God.
07:16 Even if you want to love your husband or your wife, love God first.
07:22 Let God be the medium through which you love your wife.
07:29 Let God be the medium through which you love your husband.
07:32 You are offering your love firstly to God and then through God your love is flowing
07:39 to anybody else.
07:42 Many a times I go back to that poem by Hafez where he says true love involves three, the
07:55 two human beings or the two sentient beings or the two carnal beings and God.
08:05 In this triangle who is at the vertex, who is at the apex?
08:12 Who?
08:13 God.
08:14 So the woman must first go and offer her love to God and then God says great now that you
08:20 have offered it to me, give it to your husband.
08:25 If God is not there in the relationship, if the relationship is not a triangle, then the
08:30 relationship has no depth, no value, the relationship is going to crumble.
08:36 Are you getting it?
08:42 The mistake that this man was making was that there was no third one in the relationship.
08:49 The third one that I am calling as third is actually the first.
08:56 Getting it?
08:58 Ramakrishna also used to love animals.
09:00 Do not be misled.
09:01 Do not start assuming that Ramakrishna was an animal beater or a dog beater.
09:07 Ramakrishna would love animals but he would love Kali first.
09:12 Are you getting it?
09:17 First love God and then as the Prasad of God love everybody else, love the entire world.
09:29 Love truth first, not the flesh.
09:40 Here you stand in front of me as a man.
09:43 I do not love your flesh, I do not love your voice, I do not love your features, your height
09:49 or your build.
09:50 I love the truth that shines from inside you and if you shun that truth, I love you no more.
09:57 Are you getting it?
10:01 Your flesh comes second, your heart comes first.
10:04 The day you become heartless, you are nobody for me.
10:09 So I love the heart first, the flesh follows the heart.
10:14 The dog follows God.
10:16 The flesh is dog, the heart is God.
10:23 I love your heart, not your body.
10:27 It's not that I hate your body but the body must follow the heart.
10:32 If the heart is there, the body is beautiful.
10:34 The day you lose touch with the heart, I just don't care for your body.
10:42 That is called being in a relationship of three.
10:46 Me, your flesh and the master of the flesh, these three.
10:54 There are two types of egos, one ripe and the other unripe.
10:58 Everything is mine, whatever I see or feel or hear, nay even this body itself is not
11:03 mine.
11:04 I am always eternal, free and all-knowing.
11:08 Such ideas arise from the ripe ego.
11:12 So Ramakrishna is differentiating between two types of egos and against the ripe ego,
11:17 he is telling us of the ideas associated with it.
11:22 This is my house, this is my child, this is my wife, this is my body.
11:27 Egos of this kind are the manifestation of the unripe ego.
11:32 What is the ripe ego?
11:33 What is the unripe ego?
11:36 The characteristic of anything unripe is that it is attached to its physical parents.
11:45 Have you ever seen an unripe fruit?
11:47 To what is it attached?
11:49 To the tree.
11:50 The tree is the physical parent of the fruit.
11:55 If you are attached to your physical parents and physical parents give to you the body,
12:01 physical parents give to you the world.
12:04 If you are attached to your flesh, to your past, the parents symbolize the past as well.
12:10 If you are attached to the flesh, to the past, to the family, to the world, then you are
12:15 called unripe.
12:17 Like the unripe fruit that keeps clinging to the branch.
12:22 And what is the quality of anything ripe?
12:25 It leaves the flesh, it leaves the physical source it came from.
12:32 Is that clear?
12:34 You are unripe as long as you are attached.
12:37 You are ripe the day you leave the physical place you came from.
12:45 Clear?
12:50 Snakes are venomous reptiles.
12:51 If you try to catch them, you are sure to be bitten.
12:54 But to the man who has learnt the art of snake charming by the use of magnetized dust, it
12:59 is not a very difficult affair to catch them.
13:01 He can play even with seven of them twisted together and coiled around his neck.
13:06 And then goes the explanation.
13:08 Similarly, a man of realization is immune from the dangers of worldly life.
13:14 If you are one with the master of the dogs, would the dogs bite you?
13:30 Clear?
13:33 Then the dogs would come and circle around you and dance.
13:37 Then the dogs would in fact protect you from dangers.
13:46 Just as Ramakrishnan says that the man who has learnt the art of snake charming can have
13:52 seven snakes twisted together and put around his neck and still nothing would happen to
13:58 him.
13:59 Still he would be comfortable.
14:01 Similarly, you can even invite all the temptations and dangers of the world if you are firstly
14:09 someone who is devoted to the master of the world.
14:19 I will go back to the dogs.
14:22 Let there be seven dogs in a house.
14:24 What do they do to strangers?
14:27 What do they do to strangers?
14:30 Not only do they bark, if a stranger tries to trespass, the stranger is likely to be
14:36 bitten as well.
14:37 Is that not so?
14:38 And what do those dogs do to the baby of the house?
14:44 What do they do?
14:45 They play with the baby of the house.
14:51 The world is that dog.
14:54 If you are in the good books of the lord of the dogs, then the dogs are going to play
15:02 with you and protect you.
15:05 But if you are a stranger to the lord of the house, then the dogs will, the same dogs will
15:13 bark at you and bite you and chase you away.
15:17 So the behaviour of the dogs towards you depends on your relationship with the master of the
15:24 dogs.
15:26 What is your relationship with Shiv?
15:28 That will be the relationship of the world to you.
15:32 Now if the world is always found chasing you away and biting you, what does it tell about
15:40 your relationship with Shiv?
15:42 You have no relationship with Shiv, you are a stranger.
15:45 Or you are a thief trying to break into the house, trying to smuggle into the house.
15:50 That too you do.
15:53 Shiv is not giving me peace directly.
15:57 So I will break into the house and steal away peace.
16:02 These are the people who try means and methods.
16:06 These are the people who try clever ways.
16:08 These are the people who engage in various kinds of tricks.
16:14 This yoga, that yoga, this tantra, that tantra.
16:19 Instead of humbly and directly going and offering themselves to Shiv, they try all kinds of
16:25 means and methods.
16:27 They say if you practice this kind of Kundalini thing, you will get Shiv.
16:33 As if Shiv is hiding somewhere, as if Shiv is saying take this route and come to me.
16:39 These are the people who try to break into the house, sneak into the house.
16:47 They want something from the owner of the house but they do not want to pay the right
16:52 price.
16:53 Instead they want to take it by stealth.
16:56 So they try various kinds of methods, tricks.
17:01 What do the dogs do to such thieves?
17:05 In the dead of the night, the thief is trying to smuggle into the house.
17:10 What will the dogs do?
17:12 The thief will be torn apart.
17:18 Such is the fate of those who try clever tricks with God.
17:25 Do this Jap, do that Tap.
17:29 Here you wear this anklet and before tomorrow morning you will be realized.
17:36 You must drink the waters of that holy pond.
17:41 You must climb up that great mountain.
17:45 You must go to that Babaji and Babaji will offer you certain whatever.
18:00 And the dogs will jump at you and then you will say, "Oh the world is such an evil place.
18:09 After all I was trying to get close to Shiv.
18:15 Was that my fault?"
18:17 You are not trying to get close to Shiv.
18:19 You are trying to steal into Shiva s mansion.
18:22 That is not allowed.
18:24 You must take only the direct route and the direct route is that of humility and surrender.
18:31 There is no other direct route.
18:40 How do you enter the temple?
18:41 Through the back route?
18:42 Through a tunnel?
18:43 Do you use a parachute to drop from the skies?
18:51 You enter through the highway.
18:53 The temple has a very broad gate.
18:59 It lets in all the devotees.
19:02 You don't need to jump over the fence.
19:10 Do not try clever tricks and tactics.
19:14 If you go to a place like Rishikesh today, you have all the tricksters there, all kinds
19:20 of tricks and tactics.
19:24 One of them will tell you that if you raise your legs high enough and put them on your
19:28 head or coil them around your neck, you will immediately have God realization.
19:44 Be direct, be humble.
19:46 That is the only way.
19:48 Look at your life and live rightly.
19:51 That is the only way.
19:56 Naam hai jap mein, naam hai tap mein, na kaave kailash mein.
20:15 Na teerath mein, na moorath mein.
20:19 No tricks, no tactics, no places.
20:21 Please do not try to find me anywhere.
20:27 I am only where I am.
20:30 Mook ko kaha dhunde re bande?
20:41 Main shwason ki shwas mein, kahein Kabir suno bhai sadho, main toh hoon vishwas mein.
21:07 The dogs will tell you about them.
21:11 You keep trying all your meditation techniques, the dogs will tell you the worth of those
21:20 techniques.
21:21 God Bless.