Posted on: 24 May 2021
[Ms. Bhanu Samykya asked: Pādanamaskāraṃ Swāmi, You said that mother in this life may become wife of her son in the next life. If the same souls are changing relationships in each birth, then why should the souls follow legitimacy in each birth? Kindly enlighten us about the importance of legitimacy in every birth. Please forgive me if there is any wrong in my question or in my way of presenting it. -At Your Divine Lotus Feet, Bhanu Samykya.]
Swāmi Replied:- An actor and an actress acted in old cinema as hero and heroine (husband and wife). The hero retains physical youth for a long time and the heroine becomes old shortly due to delivering the children. It is said that delivery of a child is the end of the youth (Prasūtāntaṃ hi yauvanam…). Hence, in a latest new cinema, the same old hero acts as hero or husband whereas the same old heroine acts in the role of mother of the same hero. In the old cinema, she was a wife to the hero and in the latest cinema, the same heroine is in the role of mother of the hero. The heroine acting as mother in this new cinema can’t act as wife remembering her acting in the old cinema. If she acts like that, spectators will throw stones on the cinema screen. Such unjust and illegitimate action in the new cinema is the biggest crime even in the view of a small kid-spectator. Relationships are between the roles and not between the actors. When Sages laughed after seeing King Janaka sitting with his queen-wife, Janaka asked the reason for the laughter of Sages. The Sages did not reply but on long insistence of Janaka, told that the present queen was the mother of Janaka in the previous birth! Even Sage Aṣṭāvakra told the same in some other occasion also. This shows that the relationship between the roles is temporary and hence, unreal.
Śaṇkara told that which is temporary must be unreal also (Yadanityaṃ tat kṛtakaṃ hi loke…). The relationship between hero and heroine as husband and wife did not exist before shooting and also will not exist after shooting. The relationship existed in the present time of shooting only and hence, it is temporary. A temporary thing is always unreal if analysed deeply. This relationship of husband and wife between the hero and heroine is also not real during the shooting time also. Hence, truth exists in all the three times (past, present and future) whereas the false thought to be temporary does not exist at all in all the three times. Even though this relationship is actually unreal to a realised soul, for the sake of the unreal world containing ordinary unrealised souls, this unreal relationship is real. Real is real for real. Unreal is also real for unreal. Hence, following the norms of absolutely unreal and relatively real world, the souls must follow the norms of the relatively real world and shall not jump into the absolute reality of God before which the relatively real world becomes really the unreal world.