M. S. Nagarajan - Reminescences

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M. S. Nagarajan

 

Sri Bhagavan had a unique method of expounding

profound truths with illustrations taken from everyday life. His

words were never premeditated but came spontaneously, they

were also apt, as the following incident will show.

 

It was in 1932, I think, when I was in charge of the daily

puja at the Mother’s shrine, that a devotee known as P.W.D.

Ramaswami Iyer arranged for a special food offering of sarkarai

pongal (a kind of rice-pudding) and vadai (a small round cake of

blackgram fried in oil).They were to be offered at the time of the

ushah puja (puja conducted before day break in the month of

Margasira (December-January).

 

I had many things to do and there was no one to help me.

So I got up very early, at about half past three,

and after taking my bath in the Pali Tirtham, removed

the old flowers from the shrine, swept and cleaned the floor and

lit two fires, over one of which I placed the pot of rice for the

pongal and over the other the pan of oil for the vadai. I then sat

down to grind the black gram which I had soaked in water

previously. By the time the dough was ready, the oil was sufficiently

hot. I had not actually prepared vadais previously at any time.

 

But I took some dough and tried to spread it out on the leaf in

the form of a neat round vadai as I had seen others do, but it

would not come out properly. I tried again and again but it was

of no use. I then got annoyed and threw the dough in disgust

back into the vessel. The next moment I noticed some movement

behind me. When I turned round I saw, to my consternation,

Sri Bhagavan standing behind me and watching my efforts to

make vadai. I was naturally agitated but he said quietly, “It doesn’t

matter. You have added too much water while grinding the black

gram. Now make round balls of the dough and fry them. They

will then be bondas!” I did accordingly.

 

When the bondas were served to the devotees at breakfast,

as usual, Ramaswami Iyer said to me angrily, “Look here. Did I

not ask you to prepare vadai? Then why have you made bondas?”

 

I was afraid to say anything and so merely looked at Sri

Bhagavan who immediately turned to Ramaswami Iyer and said,

“What does it matter? If the cakes are flat and circular they are

vadais, if spherical, bondas. The stuff is the same and the taste is

the same. Only names and forms are different. Eat the prasadam

(food offered to a deity) and don’t make a fuss.” Everyone was

astonished at the ready and apt reply of Sri Bhagavan.

 

Ramaswami Iyer could not contain his joy! He exclaimed,

“Wonderful, Wonderful!” Later in the day, when he saw me, he

said, “I say, you are a lucky fellow. Sri Bhagavan himself is

supporting you.”

 

The world consists of names and forms. These are naturally

many, but what lies behind them is one and the same. Names

and forms are not real although we think that they are. Brahman

which underlies them is real, but we forget it. What wisdom lay

in Sri Bhagavan’s words!

 

( from THE SILENT POWER)