Blog Archives
February 18, 2004
Tonight is the great night of Siva and the last day of our phase. We wish you all a profound deepening of your spiritual life on this most sacred day of the year.
"Mahasivaratri is the night before the new-moon day in February-March. We observe it both as a discipline and a festivity, keeping a strict fast and all-night vigil, meditating, intoning Siva's 1,008 names, singing His praise, chanting Shri Rudram, bathing the Sivalinga and being near the vairagis as they strive to realize Parasiva. "
--Gurudeva.
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It is interesting that today we are having Mahasivaratri and also today we are showing you the few photos we have from Chidambaram, the great citadel of Saivism. Here is Bodhinatha at the end of the evening of rites at Chidambaram, February 2nd, on Innersearch.
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End of Phase Notice
This is the last day of this phase
And this edition of TAKA will remain posted
Until Sun 1, Dvitya Tithi, Feb 21st.
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A big surprise today... it was a regular tour day, in the middle of February... no special holidays, but 150 people came!
A traveling "World Friends" group from Canada came with 50 participants... another travel group came with 20 people, then we had also the growing group of tourists who are seeing a notice in the local guide to Kauai booklet.
Among them a few Hindus as well.
A few devotees have arrived for this evening's celebrations. Here they are making garlands in the temple.
"In the stage of charya, similar to karma yoga, the devotee naturally awakens a desire to work for the sake of work, to serve for the sake of service. He does this in his daily life and through helping in the temple in practical ways--through sweeping the marble floors, polishing the brass oil lamps, weaving fragrant garlands for the pujas, helping other devotees in their lives, and in general through a humble and unseen kind of service....." -- Dancing with Siva
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Himalayan Academy Travel Study Programs |
2004 Indian OdysseyJanuary 19, 2004 - February 5, 2004 |
Here we are back in India on that very busy Day 18 of Innersearch, on the move now late in the afternoon to the holy shrine of Chidambaram. We even had lunch on the bus...
Nere is L. Nellaiappan, our Liason Officer in India and one of the trustees of San Marga Trust in India. He did great service in preparation for Innersearch. Thank you Nellaiappan from all of us!
A chariot in the town of Chidambaram.... where we are only stopping for about 5 hours... for evening ceremonies and puja.
The Dikshitars greet Bodhinatha ceremoniously at the temple entrance.
As usual, no photos were allowed in the temple. These were taken at the end of all the events outside...
What happened? Well, we entered the temple and the Innersearch group sat through a dynamic kumbha homa performed by the Dikshitar priests...
During the homa, several important vows, vratas, initiations and samskaras were performed.
Here pictured: Brahmacharini Barathy Sockanathan, who took lifetime vows of brahmacharya during the ceremonies.
Puvaneswary Roberts from the Netherlands received her Samaya Diksha initiation into the homa also, receiving directly from the lips of the Satguru, the sacred mantra for her personal japa and meditation.
Several entered the Saivite Hindu Religion: Dasan, Shakti and Chudika Mahadevan from California received their Namakarana Samskara, as did Satya Subramuniyam from Brazil.
Here is Ananta Nataraja Dikshitar who has been "our" dikshitar priest at Chidambaram for many decades. He had just put on Bodhinatha's head the traditional Aadheenam Kartar Mala that was a gift from us to Bodhinatha.
This was considered an important occasion -- the first time visit of Bodhinatha as the head of Kauai Aadheenam to the pre-eminent shrine of Lord Siva.
The rest of the evening is hard to describe.
Spiritually alive! is all we can say. Devika Ajaya danced before Nataraja... the priests performed a long and powerful abhishekam to the small crystal Sivalingam and we were all showered with inner power and grace. The bells of Chidambaram ring in our heads, even today.
Then, as the temple was closing, we all piled back into the bus again. Dinner on the bus and a late night drive to Pondicherry saw 90 Innersearchers go to bed tired but filled to the brim!
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