WHO IS A TRUE GURU and WHO IS A TRUE SEEKER---6

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Hari OM

The Sastras insist upon (i) surrender to, (ii) faith in and (iii) love for Guru as the hallmark of a true sadhaka. The modern mind can not understand the Guru-sishya relationship. Even with all the prescribed qualifications if a seeker were to reach the feet of a perfect Master, the transferred knowledge can not take root in the seeker unless the seeker himself is ready to strive along the path. A Guru can only explain truths and give sufficient logic to give the seeker the intellectual conviction. These ideas are, at best, prescriptions for certain values of life which can not yield any benefit unless they are taken up and made a part of the entire scheme of evolution. The major part of the work depends on the

seeker`s own efforts to rehabilitate himself. Thus a sadhaka should try to live the deep significances of the precepts of the Guru. A true seeker is not one who stops with making a thorough and complete study of the scriptures and surrendering to his Master but one who lifts himself from the mire of his inner weaknesses only by dint of sustained self-effort.

 

 

Sastras call for Samyag darsana in a true seeker. It means perception of the world as it is, in perfect detachment (Vairagya)and discrimination(Viveka). Through study, following of

Sastraic instructions, practices of self-control (sama and dama) and various spiritual sadhanas undertaken, one can expect to develop the subtlety of one`s inner instruments for experiencing the world as it is, uncoloured by any personal prejudices,attachments or hatreds. Incidentally, Darsana in Sanskrit also means "philosophy" and therefore , the term can also be interpreted as the vision of the world through the eye of philosophy. When one views life from this angle and with a right mode of perception, slowly and steadily the seeker gains the state of what the Bhagavad Gita calls as Yogaruda . " When a man is not attached to sense-objects or to actions and has renounced all thoughts, then he is said to have attained to Yoga", asserts the Gita. Establishment in yoga according to Gita calls for a state of living in which the seeker`s mind is neither wandering into the sense-objects,nor is gurgling out towards its desire. "When desires are not rising, murmering thoughts can not arise and when thoughts do not rise, there will be complete cessation of actions", says Bagawan Ramana Maharishi. When through study,

satsang and intelligent thinking, we come to observe life and its happenings with the right attitude and intellectual pose, we automatically get established in Yoga. In its right sense, yoga is only that state of mind in which the mind having recognised its weaknesses attunes itself to a greater and more perfect ideal which the intellect has shown it. Any attempt of the mind to rise from the low values of its present existence to a healthier and diviner scheme of living is Yoga. To get established in Yoga is to make it a habit to strive sincerely to rise above one`s known weaknesses in order to attain the ideal. Thus a true sadhaka is one who is established in 'Yoga'.

(to be continued)

G.Balasubramanian