Amma's new biography...and naughty visvanathan (he's only two!)

[Guest guest]

Om Amrtesvaryai Namah!!

 

Namaste dear Ones!!

 

i see that i roused up a hornet's nest in defence of Ms Cornell and

her new "authorised" biography....

 

i must say that although i may disagree with many of your viewpoints,

i was most impressed with how lovingly and sweetly, all my sisters and

brothers rapped my little naughty knuckles for being so

"negative"....

 

that alone is a wonderful advertisement for our Darling Ammachi, and

Her world mission...

 

in my somewhat lame defense, i will claim that transitting Mercury

retrograde, (widely conjuncted (8 degrees away) with transitting Rahu,

the confuser) yesterday, in Gemini, my 6th house of enemies,

difficulties, and challenges, as well as extended family, may have had

some influence in the way that i communicated my criticisms, and the

way that they were received by all of you!! Mercury retrograde,(and

especially close to Rahu!) could lead to confused thinking, or

misunderstood communications, or communications which are not put in

an appropriate way....in other words Mercury, the planet representing

thinking mind, retrograde and especially conjunct Rahu, will muck up

the thinking....

So there! he said self-righteously!...all mucked up!~ See???mud all

over my face!

 

i want to apologise if i offended anyone, esp. Ms Cornell, with my

comments....they were my HONEST criticism of both the book, and the

excessively (as i thought!) commercial way of presenting it.

 

i must admit that i did enjoy much of the book itself, many of the

lovely stories had me in tears too...so i am not a complete ogre, dear

ones....it was just the "TONE" that i occasionally had trouble with,

and the occasional factual mistake...such as the Krsna & Arjuna in the

chariot one...i guess i am a stickler for getting one's facts RIGHT,

before putting them in a book that's all...just a little quibble,

which in my own eyes had seriously diminished the value of the book

for me...

 

i knew that it was an MA Center book, and that Amma had blessed it...i

have no trouble with that, although i did question why Amma would feel

the need for yet another biography....you answered my questions very

thoroughly in this regard, both Ms. Cornell, and the rest of my loving

disciplinarian sisters and brothers....

 

i DO believe that EVEN a book which is targetted for the mass audience

should be particularly careful as to its tone, and its accuracy in

widely known facts....the Krsna-Arjuna-Chariot mistake would

immediately put off any students of Lord Sri Krsna, and of the

Gita....and would thus influence their views of the rest of the

book...THAT was my quibble...

the mass audience will include LOTS of folks who DO know what Gita is

about, and who DO know that Lord Krsna is the driver....lots of folks

from India live in America now....and that kind of error will just

make it more difficult to attract those who are devotees of Lord

Krsna...

 

The fact that it is an official imprint of the MA Center, in my view

actually makes it even MORE important that ALL facts should be exactly

right, as written...i'm surprised that it got by the proof-readers and

checkers, as it stood out like a very sore thumb to me immediately i

saw it! (and i am NOT particularly a student of the Gita!, although i

do love Lord Krsna).

 

We are each of us like the little semi-precious pebbles, that Amma has

thrown into the barrel to be polished, and now that Ms. Cornell has

written such a book, and joined the Amma lists (as of May), she has to

expect some of the little bumps and irregularities to be slowly ground

off...by such comments as the ones i made (i suspect the critics

at the big newspapers, if they even read the book and review it, will

have a much more critical view of it than i did!!)...i have nothing

personally against her...i was merely commenting on the STYLE of

presentation and the errors of fact!!...of course the ego doesn't like

to hear these criticisms, but if they are coming, it's for a

reason!!!if only to make the receiver more adorable, after knocking

off a few lumps and polishing the precious stone to a fine

shine....please see my criticisms in that way, just as i see your

criticisms of my criticisms in that way. nothing like a few whacks on

the head to make one humble!!!(speaking for my own bruised ego-self

that is!)

if there is anything of value in the comments, please use whatever you

find helpful...and throw away the rest!

 

actually there was much i did like AS I SAID YESTERDAY IN MY FIRST

LETTER>>>>no one seemed to have noticed that my few quibbles, and lack

of enthusiasm were interspersed with other comments about it being

interesting.

 

it was interesting for example for the author to link Sri Paramahansa

Yoganandaji with Amma as she did....this is a particular zone of

interest for me and i suspect many other devotees, who have come to

Mother thru Sri Paramahansa Yoganandaji....and who may feel that our

Amma is indeed the very Divine Mother to Whom Yoganandaji addressed so

many ardent prayers...and the very Divine Mother Who appeared to him,

with the immortal words:

"Always have i loved thee! Ever shall i love thee!"

 

Nevertheless, my dear ones, my criticisms of errors of fact and the

tone of the writing (at times...not always!)...are still my HONEST

feelings about the book, much as i enjoyed most of it....these

criticisms are given in a constructive tone, that the author might

consider for the future....

 

having read the entire book now, and enjoyed quite a bit of it, i must

say i still prefer Swamiji's biography, just because of the inimitably

sweet way in which it was written, the descriptions of Amma as a

child, the loving words to describe Her, such as "the little

one"...these were all such beautiful touches!! They brought Amma home

to our own hearts! i guess i'm just an old-timer traditionalist or

something like that! Saturn Atmakaraka and Lagnesha may make one quite

"critical", and focussed as well as traditionalist, and

conservative...these are not necessarily entirely "bad", for without

criticism how will we know our errors?...how will we know to refine

our writing techniques?....how will we grow to be adorable?...this IS

an interactive feed-back situation we are in and that's how we learn!!

 

i guess i have been a little too much like those Indian brahmacharis

and swamis who were surprised and somewhat outraged at first that

Mother would allow a relative "stranger" as they saw it, to write such

a book...when i read of their reactions i could TOTALLY understand

it...and sympathise...as i too had a similar one!! (and i am NOT

Indian except in sympathies, and love...(at least in this life!~))

 

That said, my Pranams to the author, Judith Cornell, for all the

incredible amount of work that she must have put into this book...and

for the way that she generally carried it off!! (quibbles

notwithstanding!)...

 

in the Divine Mother's Love,

and in Her Service,

 

as ever,

your own self,

 

visvanathan

 

Om Amrtesvaryai Namah!!

[Guest guest]

In a message dated 6/12/2001 12:29:41 PM Pacific Daylight Time,

kasi_visvanath writes:

 

 

> in my somewhat lame defense, i will claim that transitting Mercury

> retrograde, (widely conjuncted (8 degrees away) with transitting Rahu,

> the confuser) yesterday, in Gemini, my 6th house of enemies,

>

 

yikes! I know that Merc has got me tongue-tied too! Namaste to you dear

brother!

I chuckled at your writings myself, of course, I did not find Ammachi through

Yogananada, I heard of her in the book I was writing of my own dearest

teacher, Almine. She tells a story of meeting Ammachi and being called "Amma!

Amma! Amma!" by her. We shall see if Almine's students rake me over the coals

when my book comes out, I shall certainly try to keep that possibility in

mind, thanks!

love from another little'un

Verdena