14 Aug 2016
Shri Pavan asked: There are verses praying God to avoid death or to sanction easy death without agony. Please give your analysis on this important topic of death about which everybody fears.
Swami replied: The Vedic hymn called as Mrutyunjaya mantra or Apamrutyumantra (Triambakam yajamahe…) refers to the protection from untimely death only and not from the death in the old age since the Gita says that every living being born must face the death one day or other (Jaatasyahi dhruvo…). The untimely death must be avoided because the precious human life given by God is very much useful to do effort to attain the grace of God. This means that the sole purpose of human life is not to eat, drink and waste the lifetime in the illusion of worldly bonds, which are just temporary and limited to this birth only. If you have forgotten this main point, which is forgetting God, you are already dead as said by sage Sanatsujata to king Dhritarashtra (Pramaadaakhyo mrutyuhu…). In the light of this main point only, you have to understand the two points referred by you. Untimely death makes the spiritual effort incomplete in the middle and hence to be avoided for which only God is prayed. The desire for avoiding the agony in the last time is also for the main spiritual purpose only. The Gita says that if one leaves this body while remembering God, he will certainly reach God (Tyajatyante…). If the agony appears in the last span of time, the mind gets disturbed and cannot remember God. If you remembered God throughout your lifetime, then only, you will get the memory of God in the last time. If you are soaked in salt, chilies and tamarind like a piece of mango fruit, you will get those tastes only, which entered you during long time of soaking. Such mango pickle can’t become sweet suddenly in the end. If you have remembered God, pleased Him by your theoretical devotion followed by practical sacrifice and service, then only God will come to your memory in the last minute so that you will reach God after death. Reaching God means reaching the energetic incarnation of God in the uppermost world after death and also reaching the same God in human form on the earth to join His service again in the next birth. By this reach in both ways, the devotee is in constant association with God. This is called as eternal stay with God in His abode (Shaashvata brahmaloka nivasa siddhyartham) which is told by the priests in the rituals done after death. Wherever God stays, that is His abode. God stays in the uppermost world (Brahmaloka) in energetic form and the same God in human form stays in the earth also simultaneously so that even such place of the earth in which the human incarnation exists is also a simultaneous abode of God (Brahmaloka). Thus the soul can reach Brahmaloka not only after death but also can stay in Brahmaloka in the earth while it is living, provided the soul recognizes human incarnation as God defeating its ego and jealousy. The soul filled with ego and jealousy can neither recognize human incarnation here since it is also in human body, nor can recognize the energetic incarnation in the uppermost world since it is also in the same energetic body. The principle of repulsion between common media applies here and there so that the soul loses God in its life as well as after the death. This is eternal loss (Mahati vinashtih… Veda).
Generally, young people sympathize old people. Old people sympathize the oldest person suffering on the death bed. The oldest person suffering on the death bed sympathizes the dead person. Such sympathy is a serious sin because the sympathized person suffers. Every human being is made of the fundamental material called jealousy. When you sympathize somebody, the sympathized person feels that the sympathizing person is with some profit and he/she is in some loss. This difference kindles jealousy and the sympathized person starts suffering more! The sympathizing person is unaware that he/she is also going to the same state of sympathized person shortly! The young person is the bread in plate that exists before the deity of death sitting for meals. The old person is the bread in the hand of the death, going to be eaten shortly. The oldest person on the death bed is the bread in the mouth of the deity of death being eaten by teeth. The dead person is the bread swallowed by death already after churning with teeth. The youngster in plate, the old in hand, the oldest in the mouth and the dead swallowed already make a moving queue in the cycle. The grandfather died or already swallowed is reborn as the grandson in the same family standing as youngster in the plate. The youngster existed in the plate sometime back is either in the hand or in the mouth of death. The sympathized person is reborn as youngster and starts sympathizing the old or oldest person. This is the cycle of birth and death. Even though the sympathized person expresses happiness towards the visitor, who came to hospital and sympathized him, such external happiness is short living only. Later on, the deep grief based on jealousy that is born from sympathy from others becomes horrible. Even coming to the other side, the sympathizing person is ignorant and foolish due to his/her ignorance of the future state going to approach him/her shortly!
It is said that death is a matter of pleasure and life is a matter of sympathy or grief. Death is the natural state of freedom and life is the unnatural state of force or lack of freedom (Maranam prakrutih…Vikrutirjeevitam…). This has a beautiful scientific explanation. The five elements in the body are bound by force with forced discipline, which lacks freedom or randomness or entropy or better said as free energy. The five elements in the body are like the imprisoned people without natural freedom, who are always trying to go out into free natural state. Disease coming to this body, often, indicates the effort of these five elements to separate and go into free state or randomness, which is said that DS is always positive for the spontaneity of the process. For any spontaneous process DG is always negative, which means that the free energy is always lowered in a process taking place spontaneously. Lower the state of free energy, more will be stability and peace. Free energy means the extra energy (after deducting for the functioning of various systems in the body) available to do some work, which generally is sin only. Thus, death is a spontaneous process by which the five elements in the body go to higher state of randomness or lower state of free energy. Life is a process of decreasing the freedom and increasing the free energy by lowering peace and stability of the soul since the associated body always influences the soul. It is like the jailer feeling happy on the release of prisoners (death) and feeling unhappy for imprisonment of people (life). Hence, a scholar feels happy in the death like in the occasion of a country getting freedom!
If a soul is remembering God in the last time, it should be appreciated by all. If a soul remembers only worldly affairs in the last minute, it should be sympathized in the real sense. God in human form always preached that you should enjoy the agony on the death bed like Lord Krishna remaining with smiling face in the last minutes also. Every human incarnation preached this that one should not worry about the suffering on death bed for a short time and one should worry about the long stay in the hell after the death. When Jesus was carrying on the cross, devotees standing on both sides were weeping. Jesus stopped and told that they should not weep for Him and instead, they should weep for themselves and for their children! What is the meaning of this message? This means that Jesus is going to suffer the crucifixion for just few hours only and after death He is going to enjoy the eternal bliss sitting on the lap of His father in the heaven. If we analyze true fate of those devotees sympathizing Jesus, the actual sympathy is reverse! Those devotees may have happy death, which is for a very short span of time only. But, these devotees and their future generations are going to fall in the liquid fire of hell forever after their short happy deaths. Almost every human incarnation underwent lot of agony in the death time to preach the devotees not to worry about very short span of death but to worry about the long span of suffering in the hell! Shri Satya Sai Baba suffered a lot on death bed for one month. Shri Shirdi Sai Baba suffered a lot during death by transferring TB of His ardent devotee onto Him. Jesus suffered a lot on the cross. Lord Krishna suffered a lot since the hunter shot His foot with arrow and constant bleeding took place till death. Therefore, the matter is not about the short suffering or short happiness of the death, but it matters much about the long span of time in which the soul is going to hell or heaven.
Death is implemented only on the order of God. The Veda says that the deity of death is running in performing the duty due to fear from God (Mrutyuh dhaavati panchamah). It is just like sealing a factory on the order of the Government after which all the machines in the factory stop functioning since the supply of current is cut off. Similarly, on the order of God this body gets sealed and supply of inert energy from digestive system to various systems is cut off like stopping the transformer of a factory. It is a very very simple process without even a trace of complication. If you are in the service of God, God can extend your life to any extent of time. The extension of time can be also infinite as in the case of Hanuman so that He became eternal forever (Chiranjeevi). If a person is found useless without doing any trace of divine service except eating, drinking and respiring, the life of such a human being can be stopped by premature death. It is not correct to say that the longevity is fixed to the accuracy of last minute! The longevity can be extended or shortened by good or bad deeds and is never a fixed quantum. The ethical scripture (Dharma Shastra) says that your longevity will be extended if you serve old people. The same scripture says that your longevity is shortened if you sleep after sunrise since the precious morning is meant for praying God.
Your grandfather Shri CBK Murthy was the beginning pillar of the propagation work of spiritual knowledge radiated by Lord Datta through this human medium named as Venugopala Krishnamurthy. In fact, your grandfather only gave this name ‘Datta Swami’ to this human medium of Lord Dattatreya. He is very old and is the bread being eaten by the mouth of the deity of death. Even today, he is only saying the name of Lord Datta always. He is chanting the three names repeatedly, which are Guru Datta, Shri Datta and Prabhu Datta as initiated by Me. Guru Datta means preacher of spiritual knowledge or Lord Brahma, the author of the Veda or the spiritual knowledge. The second name is Shri Datta, which indicates the name of God Vishnu because Shri means Goddess Shri Mahalakshmi, the wife of God Vishnu. The third name is Prabhu Datta, which stands for Lord Shiva called as Lord or Eeswara or Prabhu. Datta is the internal unified form doing creation, rule and destruction of this world. The unimaginable God exists in this energetic incarnation forever, which is His permanent address.
The constant memory of Lord Datta in the last phase of life indicates that your grandfather is going to catch the future human incarnation of God Datta in the next life also. Service given by God is fortunate opportunity for your prosperity here as well as there. Don’t think that God is in need of your service and that God cannot do His work. Don’t think that you alone happen to be the sole servant for God to work since even angels will be praying God to give such opportunity, who can do the work in a fraction of second using their miraculous powers. God is not giving the opportunity to them since the angels are already uplifted souls and you have to be uplifted. The work of God itself is payment of the salary for the work. If you do the work giving topmost priority and without any aspiration for fruit in return, God will keep you on His head. Shri Manikyaprabhu, while sitting in a big gathering of devotees called a lady devotee taking bath in the bathroom. That lady gave top most priority to Lord Datta (Manikyaprabhu) and came running without cloth! Your grandfather is going to have such rare fortune to associate with Lord Datta in the future human incarnation also. Thus, he is a blessed soul and should be taken as an example by every devotee here. Sometimes, he phones at 1 AM, 2 AM etc., in which time people will be in deep sleep. Every time, when your grandfather is going to phone, Lord Datta awakes this Datta Swami, who will be ready to respond to the phone! None of you should feel pained about him since all of you have to be pained about yourselves and your future generations only and take top most care in doing the service of God, which pays you one crore times more if the fruit in return is not aspired. Even if the fruit is aspired the payment in return is going to be hundred times.
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