What does Lord Hanuman represent? || Acharya Prashant (2020)

Acharya Prashant

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Transcript

00:00Pranam Acharya ji.

00:09Can I ask what does Hanuman ji represent?

00:13In fact, the audience can contribute to this.

00:20Which virtues does he stand for?

00:26Which all virtues rather.

00:28One each from the different members.

00:33Devotion.

00:34Not merely devotion.

00:35Don't just say devotion.

00:38Devotion is a double edged sword.

00:40Devotion to Ram.

00:44There is nobody who is not devoted, mind you.

00:46But we are devoted to all the nonsensical things.

00:53Devotion to Ram.

00:54Yeah, right.

00:56Now you must ask, what does Ram stand for?

01:01What does Ram stand for?

01:04Yes, and?

01:08Strength.

01:09Well said.

01:10And?

01:11One pointed devotion.

01:12Absolute commitment.

01:14To?

01:17Ram.

01:20We are committed.

01:26It will be difficult to find someone who is not committed.

01:37With all my verbal ammunition, you know, I find it so difficult to convince people who

02:03are already committed and I feel utterly helpless, very helpless.

02:13I try to talk, I try to tell, I see the fellow rushing towards his own destruction, but he

02:24is committed, what do I do?

02:37I feel I am talking to a wall, I cannot penetrate, my words come back to me, it's a very dangerous

02:52word, commitment.

03:01Remain without a centre, remain without an anchor, fly loose, but don't commit yourself

03:16to nonsense and when you commit yourself, your commitment must be like Hanuman's.

03:32I am committed only to Ram, I will not look at anything, I mean, I could have as well

03:44offered Ravan a great deal, Ravan had all the gold in the world, no?

04:01And he would have welcomed Hanuman, cutting a deal with him, he had already seen his prowess,

04:10with a stroke of his fiery tail, he had already once put Lanka to fire, but that's what,

04:21I am not committed to money, I will not be tempted by the one with money, that's Hanuman.

04:31I curse my memory, there is a beautiful one by Kabir Saheb on this and I cannot recall

04:47it, Kabir Sang Sadhu Ke Rukhi Sookhi Khaye, Kheer Khand Bhojan Mile Saakat Sang Na Jaye,

05:11that's commitment.

05:25Yes what else about Hanuman?

05:33Now unless you can look at Hanuman in this way, it's very futile worshipping him, very

05:42futile and that's why religion has come to such a degraded state because we are worshipping

05:51symbols without knowing at all what they stand for.

06:04Anything else about Hanuman, you want to, love, yes of course, and at some point you

06:13will see these things necessarily go together, don't they, love, devotion, strength, commitment,

06:19you can't have one without the other, and that goes with that, commitment, nice, that's

06:37a very important thing, that innocence, almost animal like innocence.

06:49That's a reason he is represented as Vanar.

06:52Now the historic person who would have actually assisted Ram was obviously not a monkey but

07:04the representation is that of a Vanar and there is a great reason behind that.

07:14What you are showing is that here is someone uncorrupted by all social influences just

07:22as animals are.

07:27Animals may not have an enlightened mind but they also don't have a perverted mind.

07:38In that sense and to highlight that aspect, Hanuman is represented as a Vanar, that he

07:49is not a social being, not at all social, he does a lot of things that the society would

07:55probably not look favorably at.

08:00Would you like someone who for example blows away your power station, but that's what Hanuman

08:08does, he goes and gobbles the sun itself.

08:14That's in today's terms akin to a brash teenager blowing up the power plant and all the energy

08:27is gone.

08:28What's the sun?

08:30The source of energy.

08:33So here is a boisterous teenager and what does he do?

08:38Blows up the power plant and the world is without any power or light or heat or some

08:42and he doesn't marry.

08:49Society doesn't quite like that, does it?

08:51By some accounts he did marry, but then you still call him Brahmachari in popular parlance.

09:03Doesn't care for rules, before he puts Lanka to fire, what does he do with all the fruits?

09:10What does he do to the Ashok Vatika?

09:15First of all, he satisfied himself with all the fruits, goes with his physique, so all

09:31those things.

09:34The beautiful combination of lot of virtues, but you have to decode and if you're not deciphering

09:43the symbolism correctly, then you are just misreading the message or not reading the

09:49message at all, just worshipping something very hollow, whereas it really carries a great

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