Maha Yoga - The Sage of Arunachala, #5

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Thus it happened that immediately after this great

Event, in the intervals when his mind was not wholly

absorbed in the Natural State, it began to feel a need of some

object to take hold of. The only object that was acceptable

was God, in Whose love the sixty-three Saints had found

their highest happiness.

 

So Ramana began to frequent the temple oftener than

before. And there, in the presence of God, he would stand,

while floods of tears streamed from his eyes — such tears as

can flow only from the eyes of the most ardent of devotees. It

is ever the earnest prayer of all devotees that they may have

such profound devotion as this; for they consider that a copious

flow of tears is a manifestation of the highest devotion, which

itself is the fruit of divine grace. We can understand this

manifestation in Ramana only if we suppose that in a previous

life he had been such a great devotee. Also these floods of

tears might have, in this case, fulfilled some divine purpose;

for the tears of divine love are purifying and those that shed

them are exalted thereby; the vehicles of consciousness are

thereby transformed. So we may presume that in this way the

body and the mind of Ramana underwent changes which made

them worthy to serve as the abode of a great Teacher, a

Messenger of God.

 

Along with these manifestations there was also at the

time an acute sensation of heat in the body. All these

manifestations continued until the Sage arrived at

Tiruvannamalai and found himself in the Presence in the

temple there. We are told of a similar sensation of heat in the

case of Sri Ramakrishna.

 

We saw that as a student Ramana was annoyingly

backward. Now he became worse than ever; for he was

frequently lapsing into that mysterious state which he had

won by his effortless quest of the real Self; when he was out

of it, he had not the least inclination for studies. His elders

could not understand what it was that had occurred to the

boy. They had always been inclined to be angry with him for

his aversion to study; and now they were provoked more than

ever. His elder brother, who was himself a student then, was

greatly irritated by these new ways of his. One day, about six

weeks after his first experience of the Egoless State, the brother

saw him going into it, when he ought to have been learning

his lessons; this provoked a stinging remark from the elder

one: “What is the use of these things (books and other things

that belong to a student) to one that is thus?”

 

The words went home. But the effect they produced was

not what the speaker intended. At the time the boy just smiled

and resumed his book. But inwardly he began to think: “Yes,

he is right. What is the use of books and school for me now?”

Immediately the idea took shape in his mind that he must

leave his home and go and live far away, unknown to those

that claimed him as their own.

He had learned before this that his beloved

‘Arunachala’is the same as Tiruvannamalai, a well-known

place of pilgrimage. He had learned this from a relative;

the latter on returning from a pilgrimage had told him in

answer to his question that he had been to ‘Arunachala’.

This was a great surprise for the lad, who had never

imagined that Arunachala was a place on this earth; the

relative then explained to him that Arunachala is only

another name for Tiruvannamalai

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taken from MAHA YOGA, by WHO