14 Nov 2017
Shri Durga Prasad asked: While Shankara made His mother to agree for His renunciation (Samnyaasa) through the drama of the crocodile, Sri Ragahvendra Swami took the same renunciation even against the consent of His wife. How to correlate both these?
Swami replied: As per the ancient tradition and scripture, the permission of mother is only required and hence Shankara made such play to get permission from His mother as per the scripture and tradition. The mother or father is to be served in her/his old age. But, the main point is that the bond with God is greater than any family bond. If the mother of Shankara didn’t agree in that play, He would have quit the house like Raghavendra Swami. Both these are quitting the house for the sake of propagation of spiritual knowledge in the time when proper conveyance was not available and one has to walk from one place to other place. Hence, the association of family becomes hindrance for God’s work in such context. The Veda says that as soon as one is detached from the family-bonds due to the attachment to God, one shall quit the house for propagation of knowledge and devotion in God’s work (yadahareva virajet tadahareva pravrajet). Here, the attachment to family-bonds refers to the real mental fascination and not to the physical association with the family. One can live in the family getting detached from the fascination of the family bonds in the mind secretly so that the family is also not hurt. There is no better soul of renunciation than Gopikas, who never left their houses since their mental detachment from family was real, which was attained by the mental attachment to God.
The work of God is important, which needs the mental detachment from the fascination to family and not the physical detachment from the family. In the propagation work of God, in those days, the physical detachment from family was essential in the cases of Shankara, Raghavendra Swami etc., in view of the absence of conveyance and necessity to go to various places for propagation by walk only. The concepts change externally as the time changes developing several new factors. Once, such mental detachment is attained, staying with family doesn’t disturb the God’s work especially in these days when conveyance is so much developed and the propagation can be done through computer. You have to understand the concepts with reference to the circumstances of the time. Even the philosophies of the divine preachers changed according the then available external atmosphere of their times. The mental attachment to God is the real strength in God’s work and not the physical detachment from the family. The mental attachment to God spontaneously weakens the mental attachment to family for which physical detachment to family is not necessary. For this concept, Gopikas are the best example, who reached the highest grace of God while staying in their houses only.
When you are working on the computer, the work done by you is evaluated and not whether you have done the work in the office or at your home. If this is the truth even in the materialistic work, same truth shall be in the spiritual work done through the computer. The same work done by a saint leaving the house in olden days is done by you in these days using the computer while staying in the house itself! Imagine, if the mother of Shankara and wife of Raghavendra Swami are also spiritual aspirants, all the above difficulties would have not come since both the ladies would have accompanied as helpers in the program! The single item evaluated is the work and sacrifice done by you in the service of God and not the place where the service is done!
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