Hari
OM
Application - that is what 'Workings-days' are about!
The text under study is BHAJA GOVINDAM, song of despair of time-wasting, by Sri Adi Shankaraachaarya.
There
is no denying the fact that the institution of 'home' (family bonds etc) are a
beneficial influence upon us and can help to eliminate some of the basic
selfish ego-centricity that mankind is prone to…
ka
te kaNta kSte puÇ:
s<sarae=ymtIv
ivicÇ>,
kSy
Tv< k> kut Aayat>
tÅv<
icNty tidh æat>.8.
Kaa
te kaantaa kaste putraH
Samsaaroyamtiiva
vichitraH,
Kasya
tvam kaH kut aayaataH
Tattvam
chintaya tadiha bhraataH ||8||
Who is your wife? who is your son?
Supremely wonderful indeed is this samsaara;
Of whom are you? From where have you come?
O brother, think of that Truth here.
The
family, though, even at their best are limited; they are not an end in
themselves. Living together in mutual love and respect as a couple, growing
into parenthood, each have much to learn from the other. If there is a true
spirit of togetherness and shared coping, it is a wonderful thing; but in
truth, most grow into such unhealthy states of attachment that resentments are
the result. Jealousies arise and 'love' is contorted into a sorry shadow of its
truth. The Hindu shaastras declare that a man and woman must live in a spirit
of togetherness - but also that there be space
between the two… no clinging or dependency.
Families
provide a grindstone for our personalities, but are not in themselves our
destination. Life is to be lived with a degree of detachment, but family is
to be held as the valuable place of learning which leads us to this.
The
essential message of this verse, then, is that philosophy is provided so that
we can move beyond the mundanities and not become bound by the externals. As
long as we are in the material form, certainly we must engage in material
matters, but as human beings we are also granted the opportunity, via our
intellect, to rise above the material; to make intelligent enquiry into our
condition and as to the true purpose of this life… indeed we can begin our
philosophical enquiry by asking these simple questions of ourselves and
grasping our proper relationship with wife, with son, with daughter, with life.
If we are seeking and absorbing the answers which come properly, we will find
that everything of the material world, including this very body, mind and intellect
with which we "I"dentify, are nothing but clay, all the same material
in different combinations of elements, and that the "I" which is
seeking is something separate from these.
That
then starts to become our destination, the Truth of Self.
The
guru of this heroic song appeals again to the listener… acknowledges a
relationship through that Self, by addressing the listener as 'brother' (it
could equally be 'sister')… stop wasting time getting bogged down in nonsense,
get real about The Real!!!
