Srimadbhagavatham - end of seventh skandha

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Chapters 14 and 15-Duties

of the householder-GrhasThaDharma

 

1.

A house holder should discharge all his duties as an offering to the Lord.

2.

He should serve the great (mahaanthah) and sages.

3.

He should earn only as much as that necessary for maintaining his family and to

perform his duites.

4.He

should do his duties in a detached manner appearing as though attached. (This

implies that detachment is not indifference.)

5.

One who amasses wealth more than what is necessary is a thief.

6.He

should treat all beings like himself.

7.

He should be contented with what he is destined to have and enjoy that

according to the propriety of time and place.

8.

To one who is always filled with happiness born out of contentment nothing

gives sorrow like the thorns and stones on the way do not worry the one who is

wearing footwear.

 

Narada

telling Yudhishtira `santhushtaH kena

vaa raajan varthetha api vaariNaa?', meaning that one who is contented will

live even on water, goes on to say that people lead a dog's life due to their

desire for sensual pleasures.

 

Of

the six enemies of man, the first three , kama

,krodha and lobha are deadly, which the next three, moha, madha and

maathsarya follow as a consequence.

Narada said that when a man is hungry or thirsty all the other desires will go

away and when one is afraid the anger

goes but the lobha, avarice does now leave even by owning the whole world.

Kama

can be conquered by will power, and where there is no kama,

krodha, anger, does not arise. Lobha can be overcome by the perception of evil

in a desired object and moha or illusion goes away by spiritual knowledge,

arrogance, madha, is removed by resorting to holy people, maathsarya , jealousy,

naturally is absent when the avarice is destroyed.

 

The

three kinds of sorrow, aadhibouthika , the one due to other beings, aadhi

dhaivika, due to destiny, aadhyanthika, due to our own body and mind, should be

met with by mercy towards all, equanimity and yoga(control of body and mind)

respectively.

 

Thamas

and rajas, are to be conquered by cultivation sathva which also is to be

conquered for self evolution by equanimity. Ignorance of reality is the sleep

induced by thamas which gives rise to three kinds of dream, namely, vasthubhedha buddhi,, seeing difference

in entities, kriyaa bahdha buddhi,

difference in actions and phala bhedha buddhi, difference in

results.

 

These

three dream states are to be got rid of

by the knowledge of bhaavdhvaitha, kriyaadhvaitha and dhravyaadhvaitha, said

Narada.

 

bhavaadhvaitha means the perception of unity between the cause

and the effect. To the weaver the cloth and the thread or one and the same ,

similarly the clay and the pot to potter and ornament and gold for the

goldsmith. This removes the bhedha buddhi towards one thing and another,

vasthubedhabuddhi.

 

Kriyaadhvaitha consists in offering all actions by body, mind and

speech to the Lord. This removes the sense of agency in a doer which creates

the bhedha buddhi of kriya, action.

 

dhravyaadhavatha- Detachment from the fruit of action which gives

the perception of the difference in the results of the actions of our selves

and that of others.

 

Narada

concluded saying that the householder who thus does his duties with detachment

and devotion offering all his actions to the Lord attains salvation even if he remains in the

worldly life as a grshastHa.

 

Narada

further cited his own story to illustrated that

by service to the holy men one can reach the highest. Before he was born

as the son of a servant woman he was a gandharva named Upabrmhana and lived a

luxurious life, Once the prajapathis called the gandharvas and apsaras to sing

about the leelas of the Lord and Upabramhana sang love songs and was cursed to

become a sudra and therefore he was born to the servant woman when due to his

service to the sages he acquired knowledge and in the next janma he was the

manasaputhra of Brhama and became the devarishi.

 

Then

worshipped by Yudhishtira, Narada took leave of him and Yudhishtira was filled with wonder

hearing from him that Krishna was the

parabrahman.

 

Thus ends the seventh

skandha of Srimadbhagvatham