Sai message for the day

[Guest guest]

Swami! Many speak of culture? What is the value of culture?

 

Sai Baba: Culture is very important because your life and its value

depend on it. Culture is a way of life. Culture enables you to

experience divinity in your life. Culture helps one to know unity in

diversity. Without culture, man becomes a demon. He falls down in

stature and ultimately ruins himself.

 

You know that sea water is saline or salty. Human life is like a vast

sea. God's grace is like sunlight that falls on the sea. The seawater

because of the heat of the sun becomes vaporised. This is the vapour

of bliss that settles as clouds in the sky to fall down to the earth

as rain. It is the rain of love. The seawater is salty but the

rainwater is sweet. Why? Where does the difference lie? Seawater is

refined by sunlight. So also, our life must be cultured and refined.

The value of life will then go up. A piece of iron worth less than a

rupee can be made into a beautiful costly watch after it is processed

and refined. This is due to the culture it has undergone. So long as

a boulder remains itself, it is bound to be neglected. But, once it

is in the hands of a sculptor, chiselled and hammered, and shaped

into a beautiful Krishna idol; it starts receiving respect and

worship. Why? It is only culture that makes all the difference. A

boulder, once trodden by everyone underfoot and now in the form of an

idol, occupies a place at the altar in a temple and is worshipped

everyday. This is the value that culture confers.

 

Without culture, one develops a foolish view of life finding

diversity in unity. For example, take a needle. It stitches pieces of

cloth into a garment. The needle stands for culture. But scissors cut

the cloth into pieces. This is the condition in the absence of

culture.