Sai Inspires - 29th January 2006 from Prashanti Nilayam

[Guest guest]

SAIRAM.

 

MESSAGE FROM H2H, RADIO SAI E-JOURNAL TEAM, PRASANTHI NILAYAM BEING FORWARDED....

 

SWAMI BLESS US ALL

 

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Dear Reader,

 

Loving Sairam from the Heart2Heart Team.

 

How should we use our words? Swami tells us today.

Scroll down to read the weekend special.

 

Sai Inspires - 29th January 2006

There should not be any flaw or defect in your words. You have to see to it

that you always tell the truth. Some people think that in times of difficulty

they can modify the truth. They may even feel that it is necessary to tell

untruth sometimes. But in difficult situations, you can develop sufficient

cleverness to keep silent, instead of telling either truth or untruth. If you

tell the truth, tell it clearly and sweetly. Do not tell truth in an unkind

way, or tell untruth to endear yourself. In some circumstances you may have to

be very careful. You should know how to use words without hurting people.

- Divine Discourse on the Gita, Sep 1984.

You cannot always oblige but you can speak obligingly. - Baba

 

Loving Sai Ram and greetings from Prashanti Nilayam. Tomorrow is 30th January,

the anniversary of the death of Mahatma Gandhi. Gandhi often said that he

wanted to live till 120 but he died much before that, not due to natural causes

but due to assassination. Gandhi preached and practiced non-violence, peace and

love; but ironically, he died on account of the anger and hate in the mind of

the assassin. Gandhi is remembered for many things but today, we would like to

dwell briefly upon a few aspects most important for our times.

 

 

If there is anything that stands above everything else in the personality of

Gandhi, it is his firm commitment to Sathya and Dharma. Where these two were

concerned, Gandhi took no orders from anyone except his Conscience. As Swami

often reminds us, Conscience is our true Master. Even recently, Swami was

telling a couple of people from overseas, “People worship my Form but that is

not enough; God is Inside and they should listen to His voice which is always

speaking and giving good advice.”

 

Getting back to Gandhi, one might ask: “We all have Conscience; God is in all of

us; then how come we are not able to do what Gandhi did?” This is a question we

really ought to be asking ourselves all the time, especially when Swami often

tells that we are very deficient when it comes to following His teachings. The

answer to the question we have posed is simple: Gandhi practiced many of the

things that Swami teaches even though he never met Swami and had never even

seen Him – remember Gandhi died on 30th January 1948, when very few people in

this country knew about Swami. We, on the other hand, pride ourselves in

listening and reading Swami’s Discourses, but avoid practice.

 

Gandhi took God seriously, indeed far more seriously than most of us do, and

that is what made him so very different. Now what are those things that Gandhi

did that gave him such towering Inner strength? Firstly, he was always chanting

the Name of the Lord so much so he literally died with God’s Name on his lips.

Next, he tried his best to remain true to his Conscience, indeed even in

politics. Chanting the Name and being true to one’s Conscience are precisely

the things that Swami wants from all of us; yet we consistently deny exactly

those two to Swami whereas Gandhi gave just Him that; and that is because he

really loved God.

 

Gandhi was called Mahatma; what does that mean? All of us are embodiments of the

Divine Atma, as Swami often reminds us; but Gandhi made that embodiment come

ALIVE, and that is why he was called Mahatma, which means a great Atma. Gandhi

was not born a Mahatma but by strictly adhering to the command of God, he

became one.

 

Swami often talks of bookish knowledge and practical knowledge. Gandhi is a good

example of a man who translated bookish knowledge into brilliant practical

knowledge. And this is something we should pay careful attention to. Today, if

anyone were to say that Sathya and Dharma are very essential in national and

international politics, people would dismiss that person as a bloody fool.

Gandhi showed, however, that indeed even politics must be pursued keeping in

mind all the time, what we call human values.

 

When Gandhi launched the famous Sathyagraha [non-violent,civildisobedience]

movement as a part of the freedom struggle in India, he made it very clear that

the struggle would be non-violent. However, some misguided people let their

passions run away and burnt a Police Station, which resulted in the death of

many Policemen. Gandhi was stunned; he did not expect this. Promptly he

suspended the Sathyagraha, publicly declared that he had made a huge mistake –

a Himalayan blunder as he called it – and then went on a fast to purify

himself.

 

In August 1947, the British partitioned the subcontinent into two countries,

India and Pakistan. All the assets of British India were divided between these

two new countries – the railways, the Central Bank [calledtheReserveBank], and

so on. It so happened that as a part of this division, India had to pay

Pakistan 550 million rupees [or 55 crores as we would say in India].

Immediately after partition, there was an armed conflict between the two

countries and on that basis, India withheld the 55 crores. Gandhi criticised

that action as being morally incorrect; the word having been given, must be

kept, politics or no politics. Such was the respect that Gandhi commanded, that

the Government of India yielded and did precisely what Gandhi advised.

 

Gandhi started off as like most of us, as an ordinary person. He was not a

scholar of the scriptures, the Vedas and the Upanishads. But one thing he knew

– in life, Truth and Righteousness are always of paramount importance. And he

resolved that never would he compromise on these, even if it meant death. That

is what firm faith is all about. In other words, Gandhi demonstrated beyond

doubt that with firm faith and deep love for God, one can develop so much

self-confidence that one can face any adverse situation.

 

It is no surprise that Gandhi attracted and continues to attract admirers and

even followers. Speaking on the occasion of Nelson Mandela’s 85th Birthday,

President Clinton said that in politics he admired no one more than Gandhi.

Martin Luther King never saw Gandhi but he showed that Gandhi’s principle of

non-violence works even in modern times. And, in his own way, Nelson Mandela

too demonstrated that non-violence is superior to violence.

 

These are days when people tend to dismiss Sathya and Dharma rather quickly,

claiming that they won’t work in the age of globalisation. This is a myth and

it is tragic that such falsehood is being actively peddled amongst the

gullible.

 

If we concede that it is God who has created the Universe of which we are a

part, and that God is Sathya, Dharma and Prema, then we too must have those

genes of basic values. If we have come from the Creator, how can we not have at

least some of the “Divine genes”? Under the circumstances, to deny Sathya and

Dharma is to deny ourselves as well as God. Nothing could be more foolish.

 

Today’s generation might tend to dismiss Gandhi but, as Einstein said of him,

centuries hence people would wonder whether such a man did really walk on

earth.

 

When Swami talks of values like Prema, Ahimsa etc., we nod our heads and clap

but later dismiss them as irrelevant for this age. That is not true; as long as

there are humans on earth, values are a MUST, and instead of dismissing them

because we are too weak to follow them, we must take courage from the shining

example of Gandhi and try to emulate him, in at least a small measure, by

listening to our Conscience, for example.

 

Well, what do you think? Why don’t you write to us and tell us?

 

Jai Sai Ram.

 

 

With Love and Regards,

"Heart2Heart"

RadioSai's e-Journal Team,

In Sai Service.

 

 

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