Famous Painting of Sakuntala

[suchandra]

"So when this girl was born, then Visvamitra thought, "Oh, I was advancing in my spiritual culture, and again I have been entrapped." So he was going out. At the same time his wife Menaka brought this girl before her, and little child is always attractive. She showed that "Oh, you have got such a nice girl, such beautiful girl, and you are going away? No, no. You should take care." So there is a picture, very nice. That is a very famous picture. That Menaka is showing Visvamitra the girl, and the muni is like that, "No more show me." Yes. There is a picture. That is... Then he went away. So there are chances of failure. There are chances of failure. Just like a great sage like Visvamitra Muni, he also failed, failed for the time being. But Krishna says that this failure is not, I mean to say, unsuccessful.

This Sakuntala is supposed to be the most beautiful girl in the world, and she was born by this combination of Visvamitra Muni and Menaka."

(ACBSP - New York, BG 6.40-44, 9-18-1966)

 

Visvamitra Muni left for good when his daughter Sakuntala was born - according present understanding, what happens psychologically to a child growing up without biological father - affective disorders, personality disorders?

In vedic society children of great sages which grew up without their father who left home, seem to have compensated the missing father by taking shelter of Krishna's Lotusfeet or saintly persons.

 

Maharaja Bharata when having left his kingdom

[Kulapavana]

 

"So when this girl was born, then Visvamitra thought, "Oh, I was advancing in my spiritual culture, and again I have been entrapped." So he was going out. At the same time his wife Menaka brought this girl before her, and little child is always attractive. She showed that "Oh, you have got such a nice girl, such beautiful girl, and you are going away? No, no. You should take care." So there is a picture, very nice. That is a very famous picture. That Menaka is showing Visvamitra the girl, and the muni is like that, "No more show me." Yes. There is a picture. "

(ACBSP - New York, BG 6.40-44, 9-18-1966)

 

[theist]

Hmmm... Another fascinating subject from Suchandra, the thought provoker.

[suchandra]

 

Hmmm... Another fascinating subject from Suchandra, the thought provoker.

Well, fascinating is of course the knowledge what the great acaryas reveal to us - as in this case - it is clear that the central point is Visvamitra Muni's situation to get around of the responsibility of raising the result of his sex-life and how he dealt with his downfall. Sakuntala's mother also refused to take care of her daughter when seeing the behaviour of how Visvamitra Muni left for good. Later Sakuntala informed Maharaja Dushmanta that although she never saw or knew her father or mother, Kanva Muni who raised her knew everything about her, and she had heard from him that she was the daughter of Visvamitra and that her mother was Menaka, who had left her in the forest.

Nothing mentioned with even just one word about the implication of that pain inflicted upon a child when abandoned by the parents.

In sum it seems like what we have today with lifelong "healing abandonment wounds" of abandoned children in a 'fatherless' society is nothing but the illusory change of seasons:

 

 

 

matra-sparsas tu kaunteya

sitosna-sukha-duhkha-dah

agamapayino 'nityas

tams titiksasva bharata

 

"O son of Kunti, the nonpermanent appearance of heat and cold, happiness and distress, and their disappearance in due course, are like the appearance and disappearance of winter and summer seasons. They arise from sense perception, O scion of Bharata, and one must learn to tolerate them without being disturbed." (Bg. 2.14)

 

 

 

 

 

[Murali_Mohan_das]

 

Nothing mentioned with even just one word about the implication of that pain inflicted upon a child when abandoned by the parents.

In sum it seems like what we have today with lifelong "healing abandonment wounds" of abandonmed children in a 'fatherless' society is nothing but the illusory change of seasons...

 

My own children haven't seen their birth mother in over a year. I try to remind them that, for the Vaishnava, there are (at least) seven mothers--their birth mother is not the end-all be-all of mothers.

 

I even try to make them realize that *I* may not be around in this body for their entire childhood.

 

Hopefully (and it seems they have), they will take to heart the wisdom that we are not these bodies and that the mundane circumstances in which we find ourselves are the fruits of our own past actions/inaction.

[theist]

It strikes me that the need for the care and love of the birth parents is more deeply wired into the makings of a human being than we often acknowledge.

 

Of course if one is a successful transcendendalist like Sukadeva then it matters not. But how many does that apply to?

[Murali_Mohan_das]

To be fair, in the case of my own children, that attachment to their birth mother is very deep-rooted. They can barely remember anything about her, but they miss her bitterly at times. When they are unhappy, sometimes they actually call out "Mommmy, Mommy!!"

 

It's not easy, but it's my karma as well as theirs.

 

 

It strikes me that the need for the care and love of the birth parents is more deeply wired into the makings of a human being than we often acknowledge.

 

Of course if one is a successful transcendendalist like Sukadeva then it matters not. But how many does that apply to?

[Guruvani]

I don't remember hearing that Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakur or Srila Prabhupada abandoned their babies to seek self-realization.

 

Maybe, because they were already self-realized and didn't need to abandon their babies to be at the mercy of the material nature?

 

There was a quote that used to float around ISKCON, but I don't have the exact reference that Srila Prabhupada said that "anyone who doesn't love babies is a demon".

 

I love babies.

Babies are marvelous.

 

I raised a baby girl by myself without a mother since the baby girl was 2 years old and I loved every minute of it.

 

Yes, I changed diapers, made bottles and took care of my baby girl all by myself since the baby was 2 years old.

[suchandra]

 

I don't remember hearing that Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakur or Srila Prabhupada abandoned their babies to seek self-realization.

 

Maybe, because they were already self-realized and didn't need to abandon their babies to be at the mercy of the material nature?

 

There was a quote that used to float around ISKCON, but I don't have the exact reference that Srila Prabhupada said that "anyone who doesn't love babies is a demon".

 

I love babies.

Babies are marvelous.

 

I raised a baby girl by myself without a mother since the baby girl was 2 years old and I loved every minute of it.

 

Yes, I changed diapers, made bottles and took care of my baby girl all by myself since the baby was 2 years old.

The anguish of a father raising his small kids without their mother and seeing them waking up in the middle of night and crying for their mother can only be understood by someone who experienced the same - others have no access, might even call this sniveling. Seems like the Lord arranges for devotees in such a way so they can use material pain to fully take shelter of Him. When Narada Muni's father left home the little boy Narada surely cried and when soon later his mother was bitten by a really poisonous cobra snake and died terribly right before the child Narada because they couldn't afford a kaviraj, Narada Muni must have been traumatized. Somehow he knew from within, due his past life's spiritual assets that this is the mercy of the Lord to make him fully take shelter of Him only and then the Lord appeared in front of Narada to pacify him. For non-devotees to see devotees made detached from this material world this might sometimes look cruel and they even shudder to think of trying to become devotees of Krishna. But is it possible that conditioned souls become free from material attachment by their own endeavour? Obviously not really, and when carefully reading all those descriptions in sastra how the Lord makes His devotees detached from material attachment the Lord smiles and always invents new and newer disciplines for his devotees to easier advance on the path of bhakti.

 

 

In the association of pure devotees, Narada went on, his eagerness for Krishna consciousness developed, but after they departed, leaving him in the care of his affectionate mother, this eagerness diminished. So when his mother suddenly died, bitten by a snake, he took this as special mercy of the Lord. Prabhupada writes, "Confidential devotees of the Lord see in every step a benedictory direction of the Lord. What is considered to be an odd or difficult moment in the mundane sense is accepted as special mercy of the Lord." Now Narada, although still a boy of only five years, could depend fully on all the hearing and chanting he had done with the sages.

Narada took up the life of a traveling mendicant, and soon he had an amazing experience. He tells Vyasa, "As soon as I began to meditate upon the lotus feet of the Personality of Godhead with my mind transformed in transcendental love, tears rolled down my eyes, and without delay the Personality of Godhead Sri Krishna appeared on the lotus of my heart. The transcendental form of the Lord, as it is, satisfies the mind’s desire and at once erases all mental incongruities. Upon losing that form, I suddenly got up, being perturbed, as is usual when one loses something which is desirable."

So it seems that Narada Muni glimpsed the Lord, but then the Lord went away and it was a great shock for him. Srila Prabhupada describes this in such an appealing way. "For the whole duration of our lives we go see different forms in the material world, but none of them is just apt to satisfy the mind, nor can any one of them vanish all perturbance of the mind. These are the special features of the transcendental form of the Lord, and one who has once seen that form is not satisfied with anything else; no form in the material world can any longer satisfy the seer."

 

Eagerness to Attain Krishna Consciousness

 

http://btg.krishna.com/main.php?id=584

by Satswarupa Dasa Goswami

 

[Murali_Mohan_das]

Good points, Suchandra Prabhu. May we all follow in the example of Narada Muni.

 

Of course, the choice is ours. When misfortune befalls us (whether as an immediate result of our own actions or as a delayed result of past actions), we can become more determined to try and conquer this material realm, we can become dejected and morose, we can become emotionally numb and carry on as automatons, and so many other mundane options.

 

Or, as you suggest, we can realize that this is how it has always been on this mundane plane--some enjoyment, lots of suffering, some enjoyment, lots of suffering--and we can seek to transcend these temporary afflictions by focusing on that which is transcendental.

 

Narada Muni ki jai!

 

 

The anguish of a father raising his small kids without their mother and seeing them waking up in the middle of night and crying for their mother can only be understood by someone who experienced the same - others have no access, might even call this sniveling. Seems like the Lord arranges for devotees in such a way so they can use material pain to fully take shelter of Him. When Narada Muni's father left home the little boy Narada surely cried and when soon later his mother was bitten by a really poisonous cobra snake and died terribly right before the child Narada because they couldn't afford a kaviraj, Narada Muni must have been traumatized. Somehow he knew from within, due his past life's spiritual assets that this is the mercy of the Lord to make him fully take shelter of Him only and then the Lord appeared in front of Narada to pacify him. For non-devotees to see devotees made detached from this material world this might sometimes look cruel and they even shudder to think of trying to become devotees of Krishna. But is it possible that conditioned souls become free from material attachment by their own endeavour? Obviously not really, and when carefully reading all those descriptions in sastra how the Lord makes His devotees detached from material attachment the Lord smiles and always invents new and newer disciplines for his devotees to easier advance on the path of bhakti.