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The Advent of Bhakti[devotion]
I think the great revolution in the yogic techniques came about sometime
in the ninth century, or the tenth century, when what is called the
bhakti cult came into being. God should be not looked for, or sought
for power and things like that, but God should be sought with love.
That is why it is called bhakti. A bhakta is one who loves
God, loves Him absolutely, loves only God. Now do not be afraid
when I use the word only, because it does not exclude our normal human,
shall we say, family life, social life. Because the bhakti path
very definitely states that our love belongs to God. It is not a question
of our loving God, you see, because He is the creator, He is the father,
we are His children. The temporal, the worldly love is sort of a duty.
In fact it goes, shall I say, very deep into the subject and says your
heart should be given only to Him, though you can love here. And we
have certain very great personalities of the bhakti marga as
we call it, the way of bhakti, and I am sure some of you have
heard their names, Ramanuja, Chaitanya Mahaprabhu, people like that.
Now it is a funny thing that, because it is the way of love, it has
tended to remain closed. Because, in the Eastern tradition, one does
not talk about love, one does not broadcast one's love. It is supposed
to be a secret of the heart between the lover and the beloved.
That is why not much is known about this bhakti business outside
India. Because if you take the great figures who came out of India and
preached about Indian religion, Hinduism, they invariably spoke of Vedanta
and that is a religious intellectual tradition, the greatest architect
of which was Shankara. Shankara's philosophy is well known. It is often
said that he was, perhaps, the greatest intellectual ever born in India.
People forget that Swami Vivekananda was there much later, in our own
times. And even though Swami Vivekananda achieved what he achieved by
raja yoga, the way of meditation, because his master Shri Ramakrishna
started life as a priest in a temple, worshipped Kali, the divine mother,
there is a certain obscurity between the two paths. And it is assumed
that Swami Vivekananda became a great saint because of his intellect.
On the contrary, if you remember Ramakrishna's life, he was a temple
priest. But by ascetic practices he had gained inner enlightenment and
enormous powers.
It is said he was able to bring the divine mother into his presence
and speak to her, play with her, talk to her. He was very happy with
that, very content. But one day a yogi came and said, "What is
this play that you are indulging in? Is this all that you want? Even
a goddess, to play with her is of no use, it is not going to give you
realisation." Ramakrishna was humble enough to say, "I do
not know what more to do." And, it is said, this master of yoga
took a bit of glass and hit him on the forehead and said, "Meditate
on this point." It was only after that, that Ramakrishna Paramahamsa
was able to meditate, was able to achieve the highest states, which
gave him the title of Paramahamsa. Before that he was also doing the
traditional Hatha yogic practices of asana, pranayama and things like
that.
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