hunger - post 2

[Guest guest]

Dear sri vaishnava perunthagaiyeer,

 

Continuing the discussions / study on the hunger, we saw five levels of hunger

[needs] and 5 paasurams expressing how the hunger [need] gets satisfied. Now let

us see one more dimension of the hunger. Just suggest what way this hunger

[need] can be classified or can be placed in which of the 5 category we

discussed.

 

aayiram kaNNudai indhiranaarukku enRu aayaar vizhaveduppa

paasana nalla bandigaLaal pugappeidha adhanai ellaam

pOi irundhu angu oru boodha vadivu koNdu un magan inRu nangaai

maayan adhanai ellaam muRRavaari vaLaiththu uNdirundhaan pOlum

10 -7- 7 thirumangai aazhvaar in periya thirumozhi

 

See here - the food is prepared for some body. That food was offered to some

body else. The third person eats all that food. Fourth person observes these and

complains to the third person's mother that your son had eaten even though he is

a child [at that stage] all those large quantities of food.

 

What kind of hunger is this? What kind of need or what a way to satisfy? Perhaps

the answer lies in that one word - available in the fourth line - "maayan". Oh

krishNa - what can we say more.

 

When you want some food to eat, someone arrives at your door with food in his or

her hand. But he throws the food at your head, or dashes it in front of you

insultingly. Will you eat that food? I hope the answer will be a definite 'NO'

from all without exception.

 

For there are 3 ways or types of satisfying the hunger is presented now.

1. First type - The food may not be delicious, but because you are very hungry

you gobble it up. Thus and then you feel satisfied.

2. Second type - You are not actually hungry, but the item is your favorite

one, as well item is deliciously prepared and courteously served to you. You

still eat it because of the taste.

3. Third type - You are really hungry. Also the food is deliciously prepared

according to the rules of purity, delicacy, also offered to the lord and then

served to you as prasaadham. While serving a motherly love is added and with a

lot of respect also. You naturally have a go at that food [or prasaadham] with

all relish.

 

Life should not be lived inconsistently, chaotically, or blindly and for the

sake of food. It should be disciplined in such a way that the neutralization of

the hunger - energy through satisfaction can result in a more evolved state of

life. The result of an evolved state of life is the rise of another type of

hunger, the hunger of the mind.

 

Since human beings are not just bodies, there is another dimension to it. Along

with the body, the mind, intellect, heart, and soul also exist. For physical

health, first the real physical hunger has to be recognized. This real hunger

has to be fed by right food, full of nourishment, with appropriate vitamins.

More important than this, it should be sathvic.

 

In the same way for psychological health, the hunger of the mind and intellect

have to be satisfied with materials produced by those who have attained a

reasonably good level of god realization or saakshaathkaaram in their life. [i

feel the lists through which you read this mail serve that purpose in a good

measure to provide these materials from realized souls].

 

If you don't have hunger of the mind, you are not actually healthy. It was the

goal of the life and the realized souls were working hard for it. This is like

sattvic food for the mind. If you do not relish such literary materials from

these minds, then, can you be considered psychologically healthy? How one

relishes the food offered with love and respect, similarly this wanting of 'love

and respect' is also the reflection of a healthy state of 'hunger' of the mind.

Enlightenment is the perfection of psychological health.

 

Now we will see a point of hunger connected with hanumaan. Sri Hanuman as a

child leaps into space, conceiving the rising sun to be a beautiful, palatable

fruit. That shows the childish hunger, that natural instinct of a vaanaraa to

think of a 'fruit', jump for it with its physical mite. But same hanumaan became

wiser and his hunger for knowledge became great and finally he is remembered for

his hunger of the soul - that food called raama kathaa or raama naamam.

 

yathra yathra raghunaathha keerthanam

thathra thathra krutham hasthaka anjalim

baashpa vaari pari poorNa lOchanam

maaruthim namatha raakshaasa anthakam

 

meaning: where all raama's naama is being sung [or told or spoken], there

maaruthi [the enemy of raakshasaas] [or] who annihilated raakshaasaas, stands

bowing to raamaa with folded hands in anjali mudhra, eyes completely filled with

tears.

 

Please recall sukhi evvaro raama naama sukhi evvarO of sri thyaagaraaja giving

answer in krithi geethaarthamu as hanuman is the sukhi - satisfying his hunger

with raama naamam.

 

seethaapathi charaNaambujamulu idukonna

vaathaathmajuniki baaga thelusuraa

 

seethaapathi - the husband of seethaa

charaNaambujamulu - the lotus feet

idukonna - keeping or having

vaatha aathmajuniki - the son of vaayu or wind god

baaga thelusuraa - knows very well

 

meaning: The son of wind god [that vaayu puthran hanumaan] knows very well, who

has the lotus feet of seethaa's husband, the great raamaa in his mind always.

 

Please have the hunger to relish raama and eat that food again in the form of

raama.

 

Dhasan

 

Vasudevan m.g.