To swami or not to swami!

[Guest guest]

Usha -

Thank you! I believe also that Amma teaches us to focus on our own spiritual

growth, not on evaluating others', or evaluating whether they're worthy of such

titles. I have plenty to work on without worrying about that!

Blessings,

Achintya

-

DJUM

Ammachi

Thursday, December 20, 2001 8:38 AM

Re: To swami or not to swami!

 

 

Om Namah Shivaya,

 

I have been skimming the posts lately, since much seems to be about Satya Sai

Baba-related dilemmas, and something about Swami Dayamrita... Actually, I

don't even know who Br. Dayamrita is...I'm sure I would if pointed

out....However, I've noticed the swami question swirling, and here's my 2

cents...

 

BTW, for those who wonder..I am one of those non-resident Indians, albeit one

who grew up in India in a spiritually-inclined Malayali family,... One of my

grandmothers was a bona fide, card-carrying sannyasini...yes, new name, ochre

robes, initiation by a fully-realized Sadguru AFTER appropriate period of

years of Brahmacharya, gave away all property and left, lived all the rest of

her life in a very austere, ascetic ashram, no running water, no electricity,

no phone, no contact with outside world (for those who think Amritapuri is a

bare-bones ashram..it is four-star compared to what she lived in from age 72

to 91)... Do I think that qualifies me to speak on this issue more

authoritatively? Not anymore than it gives me a share in her 'tapas', viz.

none.

So much for my credentials, ha, ha... )

 

Don't mean to be flippant, but this discussion by someone of the strict

correctness of the word 'swami' and how it must be applied reminds me of the

ritual-bound Indian Brahmin caste, who at various times had strangleholds on

the Vedantic interpretation of religion...and interpreted the mores MOST

correctly, and look where it got them in the path of Self-Realization... Life

is more fluid than a set of rules, and if a religion doesn't adapt, then it

will self-destruct and destroy those that follow it. The reason Hinduism is

still viable is not because of the Vedas and the scholars maintaining its

'purity', but because it has been constantly refurbished through the

ages...Amma's doing some work on it now! An Adi Shankaracharya comes along

only so rarely (combining extreme scholasticism and self-illumination, and he

broke quite a few Brahminic rules, by the way), meanwhile a million

nit-picking Vedantic scholars come and go. If one focuses on the mores and

rituals, one does well enough, but stays at that level. It's the local, and

Amma is the express...

 

Amma is an extraordinary path to self illumination...she's beyond swami,

bramachari, and the Vedas too. She observes the forms for the sake of her

followers...she doesn't care for herself. She is not a sannyasini,...that's

why she doesn't wear ochre and she doesn't ordain other sannyasis, not

because she can't but she chooses to observe Vedic norm...but sannyasis

follow her as a Guru. So where is the heirarchy here?

 

As someone said (Bala, I think) we may respect the "swamis" as current

examples of surrender. Or not, if that is your choice. We need not review

and approve the spiritual progress of those in Amma's service, but our own.

They may rise, and rise higher, or fall...what good is the anticipation or

evaluation of their state of grace do us? Their success or failure will not

accomplish ours. We are not required to follow them, touch their feet, feed

their egos, become their friends, etc... One doesn't need candles to light

the path when the sun is shining. Let them do what they are told to as best

they might, and I will try to do the same. I fail every single day to do

some or a lot of what I should be doing, ...usually I am not meditating even

as serenely as the guy next to me in the darshan hall,... That's the beauty

of this effort and this constant reaching we are doing...each of us have a

karmic fingerprint more individual than our DNA type...and yet we are trying

to get to the same thing...Amma and those like her are the only absolute

standards...the Sadgurus...measuring by other standards will be incorrect and

limiting, no matter what title they attain.

 

Forgive me if anything I said was not to your liking.

 

Om Namah Shivaya...

Usha

 

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Aum Amriteswarayai Namaha!

Ammachi