20 Jul 2020
[Several devotees came to Swami on the auspicious occasion of Guru Purnima on 5th July 2020. Swamiji gave the following discourse. He also answered many questions posed by devotees.]
O Learned and Devoted Servants of God! There are three components in the preaching of spiritual knowledge: (1) The preacher of knowledge, (2) the quality of the knowledge and (3) the receivers of the knowledge.
Every human being is a receiver and is authorized to hear any topic of the spiritual knowledge and hence, this component is not very important. The first two components are very very important. The knowledge should be formulated by the Satguru, who is the incarnation of God. Such formulated knowledge should be propagated by the disciples of the Satguru and the disciples propagating the spiritual knowledge of the Satguru are called Gurus. While learning the knowledge from the Satguru, the receiver is called śiṣya. We must carefully distinguish a Guru from the Satguru. A Guru should propagate the knowledge of the Satguru without introducing his or her own concepts, which are likely to be wrong due to the limitations of human knowledge. The Guru can enlighten the concept of the Satguru in detail with elaborate explanations, but should not deviate from the concept and change the original concept.
The GPS (global positioning system) in a car gives the proper directions to reach your destination and it is like the Satguru. While travelling on that correct path, the headlights of the car or the torchlight in a person’s hand, shows the way ahead clearly, once the journey on the right way has already commenced. The torchlight or the headlight does not tell you whether the chosen way is proper or not. The GPS also shows light, in the sense that Satguru not only formulates the concepts, but also preaches the concepts like a Guru. During the propagation, the Guru should not meddle with the concepts of the knowledge. The knowledge-food is already cooked by the Satguru-cook. The Guru is only catering the food that is already prepared by the Satguru-cook. The caterer should not add some salt or chilli powder or some lemon juice, due to which, the served item might get spoiled.
When the Guru preaches only the knowledge established by the Satguru, without any adulteration from his side, Guru Purnima exactly becomes Satguru Purnima. Satguru is the Guru of the Guru and this is mentioned in the 108 names of God Datta as “Gurorgurutarāya namaḥ”. Any human being, on hearing the knowledge from the Satguru can propagate it for the welfare of the entire world. The difference between the disciple and the Guru is very narrow. Every human being has the natural tendency of showing off oneself before others. Each person has the itch for fame (kīrti kaṇḍūti). Due to that itch for fame, the Guru tries to show off his intelligence before others. He desires the fame of being known as a great preacher. The danger with this is that, if the concept is wrong, several innocent disciples will follow the wrong path and proceed on it forever. Such a Guru will fall into hell, as long as this creation continues. Creation is never ending and hence, the Guru is punished in hell forever. Hence, this Guru Purnima is very important for all the Gurus propagating spiritual knowledge.
Next, the quality of the propagated spiritual knowledge is very very important. So, any adulteration which spoils the followers in future is very dangerous to the Guru, who has polluted the true interpretation given by the Satguru with his own misinterpretation. For example, precious food like ghee should actually be burnt in the hunger-fire of the stomach. The hunger-fire is the divine fire called Vaiśvānarāgni that is to be worshipped in the sacrifice (Ahaṃ vaiśvānaro bhūtvā—Gita). The physical fire is only used to cook the food with ghee. Ghee, as it is mentioned in the scriptures, does not mean pure ghee, but it means food fried in ghee. This is a figure of speech known as lakṣaṇāvṛtti in Sanskrit. This is the real concept of the Satguru. But a false Guru modified this concept and established a false tradition of burning pure ghee in the physical fire! This false tradition has continued for generations and today, everybody is following it.
Similarly, upanayanam means becoming close to God. It does not mean the mere ritual in which the three threads are put on the child. Gāyatrī is the name of a Vedic meter and a specific verse in that meter was misinterpreted to be the Gāyatrī. Further, this misinterpreted Gāyatrī was confined only to the males of the three so-called upper castes. This misinterpretation and wrong practice has defamed God, whereby God is thought to be partial to certain castes and the male gender. Actually, Gāyatrī means the best mode of praying, which is by singing the prayer to God. This mode of praying to God takes a person close to God (upanayanam). Song (Sāma Veda) is better than poetry (Ṛg Veda) and poetry is better than prose (Yajur Veda). This real interpretation makes Gāyatrī universal and any soul can become close to God through the singing of sweet songs for God, in any known language, irrespective of caste, gender, religion, region etc. God is omniscient and knows all languages. He only gives importance to the sincere feeling and the follow up action (Bhāvagrāhī Janārdanaḥ).
Hence, one should realize the importance of the true concepts of true spiritual knowledge established by the Satguru and should be careful about the misinterpretations given by various false Gurus. The entire confusion in the spiritual path created by the false Gurus must be carefully analyzed by every spiritual aspirant.
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| Shri Datta Swami | Message on Guru Purnima Day | Gurorgurutaraayanamah Kiirtikanduuti Vaishwaanaraagni Aham vaishwaanaro bhuutva lakshanaavrutti Gayatri Bhaavagraahii Janaardanah
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