Rama Katha Rasa Vahini - Post 3

Chapter 1

Rama - Prince and Principle

The name 'Rama' is the essence of the Vedas; the Story of Rama is an ocean of Milk, pure and potent. It can be asserted that no poem of equal grandeur and beauty has emerged from other languages or from other countries until this very day; but it has provided inspiration to the poetic imagination of every language and country. It is the greatest treasure inherited by his good fortune by every Indian.

Rama is the guardian deity of the Hindus; the Name is borne by the bodies in which they dwell and the buildings in which those bodies dwell. It can safely be said that there is no Indian who has not imbibed the nectar of Ramakatha, the story of Rama.

The Ramayana, the epic that deals with the story of the Rama Incarnation, is a sacred text that is reverently recited by people with all varieties of equipment, the scholar as well as the ignoramus, the millionaire as well as the pauper. 

The Name that the Ramayana glorifies cleanses all evil; it transforms the sinner; it reveals the Form that the Name represents, the Form that is as charming as the Name itself.

As the sea is the source of all the waters on earth, all beings are born from 'Rama'. A sea sans [without] water is unreal; a being sans [without] 'Rama' is without existence, now or ever. The azure Ocean and the Almighty Lord have much in common.

The Ocean is the abode of the Almighty, as myth and legend proclaim; they describe Him as reclining on the Ocean of Milk. This is the reason behind the title given by Valmiki (son of Prachetas) the great poet who composed the epic, to each canto, Kanda. Kanda means water, an expanse of water.

Contd………..

Commentary by author (by the SAI in the Author)

In the previous post, Swami wrote on Rama thus:-

“Rama is the Indweller in every Body. He is the Atma-Rama, the Rama (Source of Bliss) in every individual. “In first chapter, He wrote, “As the sea is the source of all the waters on earth, all beings are born from 'Rama'. A sea sans [without] water is unreal; a being sans [without] 'Rama' is without existence, now or ever.”

Connecting the two sayings of Swami, what do we learn???

“Rama is the indweller in every body as Atma Rama.”

How the above truth is revealed wonderfully by SAI in the second statement???

A sea without water is unreal and non-existent. 100000 of waves or bubbles may exist in an ocean but they are all non-existent without water.

Howsoever vast an ocean may appear to be, if one takes out water from ocean, what is the identity of ocean???

Exactly in the same manner, the apparent physical existence of all human beings, of all the floras and the faunas, of this entire creation (if taken as ocean in the above example) is BUT PURE EXISTENCE, THE ATMA RAMA.

Love.

Rama Katha Rasa Vahini - Post 2

The Inner Meaning of Ramayana, as revealed by Bhagwan Baba.

RAMA

Rama is the Indweller in every Body. He is the Atma-Rama, the Rama (Source of Bliss) in every individual. His blessings up-surging from that inner Spring can confer Peace and Bliss. He is the very embodiment of Dharma of all the Codes of Morality that hold mankind together in Love and Unity. 

RAMAYANA

The Ramayana, the Rama story, teaches two lessons: the value of detachment and the need to become aware of the Divine in every being. Faith in God and detachment from objective pursuits are the keys for human liberation. Give up sense-objects; you gain Rama. 

SITA

Sita gave up the luxuries of Ayodhya and so, she could be with Rama, in the period of 'exile'. When she cast longing eyes on the golden deer and craved for it, she lost the Presence of Rama. Renunciation leads to joy; attachment brings about grief. Be in the world, but, not of it. 

Sita is Brahmajnana or the Awareness of the Universal Absolute, which the Individual must acquire and regain undergoing travails in the crucible of Life.

DASARATHA

Dasaratha is the representative of the merely physical, with the ten senses. The three Gunas - Sathwa, Rajas and Thamas - are the three Queens. 

OTHER CHARACTERS IN RAMAYANA

The Four Goals of Life - the Purusharthas - are the four Sons. 

Lakshmana is the Intellect; 

Sugriva is Viveka or Discrimination. 

Vali is Despair. Hanuman is the embodiment of Courage. The Bridge is built over the Ocean of Delusion. 

The three Rakshasa chiefs are personifications of the Rajasic (Ravana), Thamasic (Kumbhakarna) and the Sathwic qualities (Vibhishana). 

Make your heart pure and strong, contemplating the grandeur of the Ramayana. Be established in the faith that Rama is the Reality of your existence.

BABA.

Rama Katha Rasa Vahini - POST 1

Dear All,

As usual, as it has been with all the earlier themes, the SAI within commands and this precious treasure "RAMA KATHA RASA VAHINI" happens to be the next theme in this blog post.

As usual and as indispensable, the post starts with extracts from the "introduction" to this Vahini by Late Prof. Kasturi ji.

Love.

PREFACE BY LATE SRI. KASTURI.

Prof. Kasturi with Sri Sathya Sai Baba

The Rama Story, Stream of Sacred Sweetness, has been for millions of men, women and children, for many centuries the perennial source of solace during sorrow, vitality when floored by vacillation, illumination while confounded, inspiration in moments of dejection and guidance while caught in quandaries. 

It is an intensely human drama, where God impersonates as man and gathers around Him, on the vast world-stage, the perfect and the imperfect, the human and the sub-human, the beast and the demon, to confer on us, by precept and example, the boon of Supreme Wisdom. It is a Story that plays its tender fingers on the heart-strings of man, evoking lithe, limpid responses of pathos, pity, exultation, adoration, ecstasy and surrender, rendering us transformed, from the animal and the human, into the Divine which is our core.

No other story in human history has had such profound impact on the mind of man. It transcends the milestones of history and the boundaries of geography. It has shaped and sublimated the habits and attitudes of generations. The Ramayana, the Story of Rama, has become a curative corpuscle in the blood stream of mankind, over vast areas of the globe. It has struck root in the conscience of peoples, prodding and prompting them along the paths of Truth, Righteousness, Peace and Love.

Sai (Isa, God), whose Thought is the Universe, whose Will is Its History, is the Author, Director, Actor, Witness and Appraiser of the Drama that is ever unfolding in Time and Space. He has now deigned to tell us Himself the story of this one epic Act in that Drama, wherein He took on the Rama role. As Rama, Sai instructed, inspired and invigorated, corrected, consoled and comforted His contemporaries in the Treta Age. 

As Sai Rama, He is now engaged in the same task. Therefore, most of what the readers of Sanathana Sarathi perused, month after month, (during these years) with ardor and pleasure, as instalments of this narrative -- The Ramakatharasavahini -- must have appeared to them "contemporary events and experiences", and "direct counsel to them in the context of contemporary problems and difficulties". While reading these pages, readers will often be pleasantly struck by the identity of the Rama of this Story and the Sai Rama they are witnessing.

"Science" has moulded this earth into the compactness and capsularity of a space-ship in which mankind has to live out its destiny. "Sai-ence" is, we know, fast moulding this space-ship into a happy home of Love. 

This book must have been willed by Sai as a paramount panacea for the removal of the ills that obstruct that Universal Love - the morbid itch for sensual pleasure, the mounting irreverence towards parents, teachers, elders, spiritual leaders and guides, the disastrous frivolity and flippancy in social, marital, and familial relationships, the demonic reliance on violence as a means of achieving immoral ends, the all-to-ready adoption of terror and torture as means of gaining personal and group gains, and many more evils besides.

Sai Rama has recapitulated herein, in His own simple, sweet and sustaining style, His own Divine Career, as Rama! What great good fortune, this, to have in our hands, to inscribe on our minds, to imprint on our hearts, this Divine narrative! May we be processes by the study of this Book into efficient and enthusiastic tools for consummating His Mission of moulding mankind into One Family, of making each one of us realize Sai Rama as the Reality, the only Reality that IS.

Sai has declared that He is the same Rama come again, and that He is searching for His erstwhile associates and workers (bantu, as He referred to them in Telugu) in order to allot them roles in His present Mission of resuscitating Righteousness and leading man into the Haven of Peace. Let us pray, while ruminating over the first half of this Story, that we too be allotted roles and may He grant us, as reward, the Vision of that Haven.

Love.