Site menu |
|
Login form |
|
Search |
|
Our poll |
|
Statistics |
Total online: 1 Guests: 1 Users: 0 |
|
Welcome, Guest · RSS |
2024-04-24, 11:43 PM |
|
Chapter
19: The
Prayers of Hanumân and
Nârada and the Glories of Bhârata-varsha
(1) S'rî S'uka said: 'In the land of Kimpurusha the supreme and greatest
devotee Hanumân delighting in service at His feet is together
with the people always engaged there
in worship of the Supreme
Lord Râmacandra, the
Original Personality who as the elder
brother
of
Lakshmana
is
so
pleasing
to
Sîtâ. (2) Together
with
Ârshthishena
[the
leader
of
Kimpurusha]
attentively
listening to the stories about his most
auspicious
master and Lordship being chanted by a company of Gandharvas, he
[Hanumân] himself prays this:
(3) 'Oh
my Lord, my obeisances unto You, the Sweet Lord discussed in the
scriptures. All my respects for You who possess all the good
qualities one also finds with the advanced devotees. My reverence for
You as the One
who is in control of His senses and is always remembered and
worshiped by the people of all places. My salutations unto You as the
touchstone of quality for any seeker of truth. I bow before You, the
great
personality and godhead of the brahmins, the King of Kings. (4)
Let
me worship Him, the absolutely pure, supreme truth, that one measure
for understanding the world who by His spiritual potency vanquishes the
influence of the modes of nature. He is the inner peace of wisdom to be
attained when one, beyond name and form, is free from ego. (5)
Incarnated as
a human being He was not only there
as the Almighty One to kill the demon [Râvana], but also as the
One
instructing the mortals of this material world. For what other reason would there
have been all the misery of Sîtâ's being
separated from Him, the Supreme Lord, but to [offer the opportunity to] serve the
One satisfied within, the original spiritual soul? (6) In
truth He, the Supreme Soul and best friend of the ones self-realized,
is never attached to whatever within the three worlds. He is the
Supreme Lord
Vâsudeva who in fact never suffered from being separated from His
wife Sîtâ or could be disturbed by [what happened with]
Lakshmana [His
brother
and eternal associate]. (7) It
is not one's
birth, one's
fortune, one's eloquence, one's wit or one's physique that creates the
satisfaction of
the greatest One, for the brother of Lakshmana even accepted for His
friends us the forest dwellers who miss all these qualities. (8)
Therefore, being enlightened or not, a beast or
a human being, anyone who's of the soul should worship Râma,
the foremost one who is so easy to please, the Lord who appeared as a
human
being and thus led the inhabitants of Kosala [Ayodhyâ,
northern India] back to heaven.'
(9) The Supreme Lord also present in the land of
Bhârata is
till the end of the millennium [*] known
there as Nara-Nârâyana. He whose glories are inconceivable
shows His causeless mercy there to those who aspire self-realization
and
practice austerities which are conducive to the religion, the spiritual
knowledge, the detachment, the yogic mastery, the control over the
senses and the freedom from false ego. (10)
The practice of
analytic yoga on how one should understand the Personality of God as
formulated by the Lord
[Kapila, see 3.28 & 29], was instructed to Sâvarni Manu by
the fortunate Nârada, who together with the followers of the
system of status orientations [the varnâs'rama system,
see B.G. 4: 13]
living
in the land of Bhârata
[India] with great ecstatic love serves the Lord while he chants this: (11)
'My
respectful
obeisances unto You oh Lord, oh master of the senses and freedom
from attachment in person, my respects unto You who are the only asset
of a person living in [voluntary] poverty. You
Nara-Nârâyana, are the most
exalted one of all the wise, the supreme spiritual master of all the paramahamsas
[the swanlike realized masters] and the original person of the
self-realized; again and again I thus offer You my reverential homage.' (12)
And he sings
thereto: 'You are the doer overseeing
this
cosmic creation, the One who is not attached to being the master, nor
do You, although You appear as a human being, suffer from hunger,
thirst and fatigue. Nor is the vision of You, who are the seer of
everything, ever polluted by the material qualities. I offer You, the
unattached and pure, profound witness, my respects. (13) Having
forsaken
one's
identification
with
the
body,
one
must,
at
the end of
one's time [of living], with a devotional attitude
concentrate one's mind upon You
who are transcendental to the material qualities. This forsaking constitutes
the perfection of the practice of yoga as explained by the almighty
Lord Brahmâ. (14) A person driven
by desire thinks in fear about
the present and future of his children, wife and wealth, but anyone who
knows about the hopelessness of this vehicle of time, considers such endeavors only a waste of time
because the body is lost in the end. (15)
Therefore our master, oh Lord in the beyond, I pray that
we by dint of the [bhakti] yoga unto You very soon may forsake this
fixed notion of
'I' and 'mine' about the banality of this vehicle of time, this
illusory reality of Yours wich is so difficult to overcome, so
that we
may realize our original nature.'
(16) Also in this land of Bhârata there are
many mountains and rivers. There are mountains like the Malaya, Mangala-prastha,
Mainâka,
Trikûtha,
Rishabha, Kûthaka, Kollaka, Sahya, Devagiri, Rishyamûka,
S'rî-s'aila, Venkatha, Mahendra, Vâridhâra, Vindhya,
S'uktimân, Rikshagiri, Pâriyâtra, Drona,
Citrakûtha, Govardhana, Raivataka, Kakubha, Nîla,
Gokâmukha, Indrakîla and Kâmagiri, as well as hundreds and
thousands of other peaks with innumerable big and small rivers
streaming down their slopes. (17-18) The minds of the
residents of Bhârata find
purification by all these waters by
touching [and bathing in] them or just mentioning their name. The big
rivers are the Candravasâ,
Tâmraparnî,
Avathodâ,
Kritamâlâ,
Vaihâyasî,
Kâverî,
Venî,
Payasvinî,
S'arkarâvartâ,
Tungabhadrâ,
Krishnâvenyâ,
Bhîmarathî,
Godâvarî,
Nirvindhyâ,
Payoshnî, Tâpî, Revâ, Surasâ,
Narmadâ, Carmanvatî, Sindhu [the present Indus], the two
main rivers the Andha and the Sona, the Mahânadî,
Vedasmriti, Rishikulyâ, Trisâmâ, Kaus'ikî,
Mandâkinî, Yamunâ, Sarasvatî,
Drishadvatî, Gomatî, Sarayû, Rodhasvatî,
Saptavatî, Sushomâ, S'atadrû,
Candrabhâgâ, Marudvridhâ, Vitastâ, Asiknî
and the Vis'vâ. (19) In this tract of
land the people, who took birth there out of goodness, passion
['redness'] or ignorance, lead a divine, human or hellish life
according to the karma they acquired. Thus there are as a consequence
of what one did in the past for each soul many goals demarcated in the
sense of different [varnâs'rama]
castes
[or
status
orientation
groups]
who
all
[individually]
may lead
to the path of liberation. (20) By
performing devotional service for
the Fortunate One, the soul of all living beings - who is free from all
attachment, cannot be expressed in words and who depends on no one -,
by serving the Supersoul Vâsudeva free from ulterior motives and
in
bhakti-yoga doing that what belongs to all the different goals [of
status], one can thus associating with the people [with devotees] of
the Supreme Personality of Godhead, cut with the cause of the bond of
ignorance.
(21) This is what the demigods
chant: 'Oh, what kind of pious deeds have these people
performed or what blessing has the Lord Himself pronounced being
pleased
with them, that they obtained a birth in the land of
Bhârata-varsha, a birth favorable for serving Lord Mukunda that
is
our aspiration? (22) What's
the
use
of
being
engaged
in
difficult
rituals, austerities,
vows, charitable deeds
or achieving the heavenly kingdom when one due to an excessive
sensuality has lost the remembrance of the lotus feet
of Lord Nârâyana? (23) Of
greater
value than achieving a position in life that lasts endlessly and leads
to repeated births, is to be born in the land of Bhârata for a
life of
only hundred years. That is so because they who, as a mortal for
such a short time being
engaged, know to fix their mind attentively [on His feet] in full detachment [thus actually know to
value life itself and then] achieve the Lord's abode where
there is no fear.
(24) Those
places - even those inhabited by the
gods - where there is not the sweet
stream of talks about Vaikunthha, nor the devotees are found who,
always engaged
in His service, take to His shelter, nor the performance takes place of those
sacrifices for the Lord that are true festivals, are places not to be
frequented. (25) Those
souls who having achieved a
human birth, with all the knowledge they have, their capacity of
engaging in action and with all means at their disposition, despite of
these attainments not endeavor for the elevation of not returning to
this life again, will fall, just like birds [returning from their
migration], back into bondage. (26)
They are by their
faith divided in their
performance
of the rituals. With the oblations offered to the ruling deity
reciting mantras according to the proper method, the One God is
separately
addressed with different names. He, complete in Himself, accepts that
most happily because He is the bestower of all benedictions in person
[B.G. 7:
19-25]. (27) Even
though He grants that
what man prayed for, He [with the majority] is not the bestower of
benedictions one asks for time and
again [B.G. 7:
3], for He personally, even unasked, grants to those engaged in His
service the lotus flower of His
feet that put an end to all desires. (28)
If there [after our heavenly pleasures] remains any merit from our
perfect sacrifices, conscientious formulations and good deeds, then
bless us with a birth in the land of Bhârata, the land that
inspires us to remember the
Lord of that place from where, through the devotees, all good fortune
expands.'
(29-30) S'rî S'uka continued:
'To the continent known as Jambûdvîpa oh King [the
Eurasian
continent,
see 5.1: 32], there
are also, as some learned scholars describe
it, eight smaller dvîpas [subsections or provinces] which
were formed by the digging all around in the earth of the sons of
Mahârâja Sagara [the Indian part or Bhârata-varsha]
when they tried to retrieve their lost horse of sacrifice [see 9.8]. They carry the following names: Svarnaprastha,
Candras'ukla,
Âvartana,
Ramanaka,
Mandara-harina,
Pâñcajanya, Simhala and Lankâ. (31)
I have thus explained to you the divisions
of the lands of Jambûdvîpa oh best of the descendants of
Bharata, just as they have been explained to me.'
|
|