HUMAN BIRTH
O Lord, it is You, who dances and
sings the song
And also You who claps His hands in
tune with the music.
We humans are only spectators but
think that we act.
Puppets are we, who move with You
who starts the engine and
Who
alone drives. You are the root of everything – the soul of
all souls, the ruler of our hearts.
Through Your unlimited grace
you transform the worst sinner into
a holy man.
The Lord lives in the perpetual
giving of Himself. He made us after His own image that we may be capable of
appreciating His pure love. He watches and awaits us. All our misery here
arises because we forgot our real home and His sweet face, which will await us
on our return. (EX Haranath Tattwa).The All-love longs for the loving company of man and that is why He
became many. The infinite variety of creation has sprung from his infinite
longing for love-reciprocation.
Only in human birth can the Bhakti-way be followed.
He is closer to oneself than oneself , the Atma, Guru, ultimate friend of all
beings.He
is the inmost spirit, is everywhere. There is no place or time where you cannot
commune with him. He manifests himself as the many, as you and me. His nature
is love. The soul is an Amsa, a ray of
you, who are the totality of everything.
The universe and Jivas are asat, having no reality in them .Because you
invest them they come into being. All things other than Atma are delusions.
Lord Krishna said to Uddhava: “ even
those who are in the hellish purgatory Naraka pray for a human body and so do
the dwellers in Swarga, for it is only in a human body that Gnana and Bhakti
can evolve, not with bodies of the
other realms.”Bhakti means to use the body to serve Him, the speech to describe
His glory, to surrender and renounce all desires. We are not alone on the
Bhakti marg. How much comes from the Lord
to help us can be experienced. Truth
is: God is the master of the body and indeed the Lord of all things. He enjoys
the world of the senses which the Antaryamin manifests, projects it into time.
From this enjoyment the Jiva falls into ignorance and thinks that he is the
body, becomes attached to it and suffers the torments of Samsar. (Srimad
Bhagavatam- Navayogis sermon)
Only when in physical body can one
reach the eternal state of Oneness., when in spiritual body in the spirit world
the progress is very slow.Even Devas praise humans and pray to the Lord to be
granted in their next life to be born as a human on earth in India, as the short-lived
human body is a most suitable boat for Jiva to reach the saving coast of the
Samsar ocean.(Bhagavatam) Devas are eager to be born human in Bharata Varsha
for they always say that it is in such a birth that all Purushartas may be
realised. Only by Lord’s grace does a Jiva receive such a birth, such a golden
opportunity to serve the Lord and find eternal liberation and bliss. How
devoutly the Devas yearn for human birth in India and alas how often do the
fortunate ones, who do attain such a birth squander it.”
P.1322: Just as those who are in
Naraka the Swarga-dwellers pray for a human body so that Gyana and Bhakti can
evolve. Be careful here: one must not be overly attached to the human body, for
that will retard the spiritual evolution. A man of discernment understands that
he can find Moksha with his human body and he pursues his final goal avidly
before death overtakes him.
Pagal Haranath,Madhya Lila P.265: the
Lord moves about those who always think of Him alone. Only such thoughts are
good. He consoles in so many ways, invisibly strokes his body, brings excellent
food from Sadhus and Maha-purushas and sais “attain soon puberty, eat all these
things, then I shall make you my queen. I will not go anywhere else.’ Men’s
only glory is that he is born of divine parentage and by right of inheritance
entitled to the wealth of Prema which is the exclusive property of God, his
Father. As soon as Jivas enter the creation they forget about God and
themselves. All of you are approaching the Lord closer and closer and will
continue to do so. The closer man approaches the Lord the lesser are his
deficiencies , he acquires many good qualities.Note well: it is only in a human
body that Jnana and Bhakti can evolve ( Bhagavatam) If a Jiva, born as human
being, does not in some measure tread the path towards his own soul he will
devolve to a bestial state.The method of liberation is Bhakti – there is no
other. With Bhakti Vairagya will certainly come. He will find unity of his
individual spirit with the universal spirit – Paramatman.
The Lord’s love is eternally existing
within everyone, it simply has to be evoked by hearing, chanting. We are
part and parcel of Him. Devotional
service is our eternal life, lying dormant in everyone’s heart. Don’t
forget Him, not even one moment. This is the goal of devotional service.
Lord Kapila said to His mother
Devahuti:”A true Bhakta, be he anyone, one who serves me with no notion of any
difference between himself and God who has renounced all his Karma, his very
body and soul to my care, the one who has no Ego and sees God everywhere and
himself as Lord’s agent.”
Here I quote our Thakur Haranath: The
Lord has taken small portions of the Land of bliss and decked this place out
very beautifully as long as the play lasts. We forget the real thing when we
play big roles in this great drama and consider ourselves as big man. But as
soon as the play is finished we are back to the womb, weep bitterly and beg for
forgiveness for our forgetfulness. When we get a little worldly advancement we even
forget God himself. Lord alone is performing all actions, we are mere
spectators. He undergoes endless sufferings for His Bhaktas even though they don’t
desire it. There is none so kind and full of bliss as He. We exist not for our
own sake but for His sake. From eternal bliss we came and to it we have to return.Man’s
only glory is that he is born of Divine parentage and by right of inheritance
entitled to the wealth of Prema, which is the exclusive property of God, his
father.This comradeship between us has been sustained through many existences
and will persist through future lives. We are connected forever.’’
Lord Brahma said to Priyavrata: “All
of us, even I, are like bullocks in the field with a rope through our noses. We
move only as He decides, who holds the rope end in his hands. We don’t choose
where we are born or anything we do during our lives. We imagine that we exercise
free will but only God decides every moment of our life.
It is only in a human body that
Bhakti can be followed and a human birth is rare. The highest aim is to
surrender to the Lord’s lotos-feet where one finds peace and infinite ecstasy
past telling. He is the only final Beloved, the Dearest, closer to oneself than
oneself. He is Atma, Guru, ultimate friend of all beings. All of us are
enmeshed in Samsar, yet most fortunate to be born with human intelligence. We
are all mortals, born along with the birth of the creation and have not died
yet, nor shall we ever die. Physical death is only casting off the gross
physical body, the Jiva survives in a spirit or mental body.We must look to
the salvation of our souls. The materialistic way only leads to bondage and
ruin. None who is selfish can attain to his soul which is the soul of everyone.
The final goal, the only one, is
surrender to the Lord.
6th May 2018
Ruth
Baur
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