BHAKTI OR DEVOTION

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BHAKTI OR DEVOTION

 

Posted by: " Uttishthata " uttishthata

Tue Jun 26, 2007 8:03 pm (PST)

 

BHAKTI OR DEVOTION - Swami Vivekananda

 

The second test is that love knows no fear. So long as man thinks of

God as a Being sitting above the clouds, with rewards in one hand and

punishments in the other, there can be no love. Can you frighten one

into love? Does the lamb love the lion? The mouse, the cat? The

slave, the master? Slaves sometimes simulate love, but is it love?

Where do you ever see love in fear? It is always a sham. With love

never comes the idea of fear. Think of a young mother in the street:

if a dog barks at her, she flees in to the nearest house. The next

day she is in the street with her child, and suppose a lion rushes

upon the child, where will be her position? Just at the mouth of the

lion, protecting her child. Love conquered all her fear. So also in

the love of God. Who cares whether God is a rewarder or a punisher?

That is not the thought of a lover. Think of a judge when he comes

home, what does his wife see in him? Not a judge, or a rewarder or

punisher, but her husband, her love. What do his children see in him?

Their loving father, not the punisher or rewarder. So the children of

God never see in Him a punisher or a rewarder. It is only people who

have never tasted of love that fear and quake. Cast off all fear --

though these horrible ideas of God as a punisher or rewarder may have

their use in savage minds. Some men, even the most intellectual, are

spiritual savages, and these ideas may help them. But to men who are

spiritual, men who are approaching religion, in whom spiritual

insight is awakened, such ideas are simply childish, simply foolish.

Such men reject all ideas of fear.

 

The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda Volume 2 [ Page : 48 ]

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QUOTE OF THE DAY:

If you are going to achieve excellence in big things, you develop the

habit in little matters. Excellence is not an exception, it is a

prevailing attitude.

- Colin Powell