Esoterics of Worship, Part One
Author: Satguru Bodhinatha Veylanswami
Description: Description: Lord Gaṇeśa is the first God a Hindu comes to know. Gaṇeśa brings order into the devotee's life, settling him into the correct and proper flow of his dharma, suited to the maturity of his soul. Therefore, what we do in life reflects the maturity of our soul. Each subsequent life we keep challenging the soul and keep maturing it. Gaṇeśa, the gatekeeper, comes to provide access to the other Gods. We come to love the Gods of Hinduism in a natural way, to be guided by them and to depend on them more than we depend on ourselves. Getting rid of resistance, to be able to flow with the river of life, is what prapatti is all about. Prapatti is freedom. This truly is free will. True free will, dharmic will, is divine and guided by the superconscious. "Master Course Trilogy, Merging with Siva" Lessons 134-135.
Transcription:
Good morning everyone. And this morning we are starting "Merging with Siva" chapter twenty which is entitled: “The Esoterics of Worship.” It is from the 1978 period.
Lesson 134
"Lord Ganesha, The Gatekeeper
"Lord Gaṇeśa is the first God a Hindu comes to know. As the Lord of Categories, His first objective is to bring order into the devotee’s life, to settle him into the correct and proper flow of his dharma—the pattern of duties, responsibilities and expectations suited to the maturity of his soul. (That's a very unusual statement, you just don't see it anywhere else; that's unusual but it's talking about the maturity of the soul. And that's a theme that Gurudeva has in "The Master Course" the maturity of the soul. What is it saying? It's saying that, except for monks of course, what we do in life ideally reflects the maturity of our soul. And each subsequent life our matures is more, our soul is more mature. Therefore, each subsequent life we have the ability to do something that has greater duties, responsibilities and expectations. In that way we keep challenging the soul and keep maturing it.) As the Lord of Obstacles, He deftly wields His noose and mace, dislodging impediments and holding avenues open until the individual is set in a good pattern, one that will fulfill his spiritual needs rather than frustrate them.
"Always remember that Gaṇeśa does not move swiftly. He is the elephant God, and His gait is slow and measured. As the God of the instinctive-intellectual mind, His darshans are carried on the slower currents of mind, and so His response to our prayers is usually not overnight or sudden and electric, but more deliberate and gradual. Yet, our patience is rewarded, for His work is thorough and powerful, of matchless force, persisting until our lives and minds adjust and our prayer has become reality. Lord Gaṇeśa is also known as the Gatekeeper. Access to all the other Gods comes through Him. It is not that He would want to keep anyone from another God, but He prepares you to meet them and makes the meeting an auspicious one. This preparation can mean lifetimes. There is no hurry. It is not a race. Gaṇeśa will faithfully bar access to those who do not merit a divine audience and an ensuing relationship with the other Deities whose darshans are faster. Should a devotee gain unearned access and invoke the powers of other Deities before all preparations were concluded, karma would accelerate beyond the individual’s control. Worship of Lord Gaṇeśa, however, may begin at any time.
"Gaṇeśa is the ubiquitous God. There are more shrines, altars and temples for Lord Gaṇeśa than for any other God. Gaṇeśa bhakti is the most spontaneous worship and the simplest to perform. It requires little ritual. Just the ringing of a small bell at the outset of a project before His picture or the burning of camphor or the offering of a flower is enough to invoke His presence and protection. Throughout India and Sri Lanka, there are small, unadorned shrines to Gaṇapati under shaded trees, along country roads, at bus terminals, along footpaths and in the city streets. His blessings are indeed everywhere. Helping Gaṇeśa, whose powers of mind outreach the most advanced computers we can conceive, are His gaṇas, or devonic helpers. These ministering spirits collect the prayers of those in need, ferret out and procure the necessary information and bring it before Lord Gaṇeśa’s wisdom.
"As we come closer to the wonderful Gods of Hinduism, we come to love them in a natural way, to be guided by them and to depend on them more than we depend on ourselves. The exuberant enthusiasm so prevalent in the West, of holding to an existential independence and expressing an autonomous will to wield the direction of our lives, loses its fascination as we mature within the steady radiance of these Gods and begin to realize the divine purpose of our Earthly sojourn.
"One might ask how the Hindu can become so involved in the love of the Gods that he is beholden to their will? Similarly, one might ask how does anyone become so involved and in love with his mother and father, trusting their guidance and protection, that he is beholden to them? It works the same way. Where you find the Hindu family close to one another and happy, you find them close to the Gods.
Where they are not close, and live in a fractured or broken home, the Gods will unfortunately have been exiled from their lives. They will not be invoked, and perhaps not even believed in."
Lesson 135
"Your Will and the Gods' Will (Plural Gods)
"Someone once asked, “They say true bhakti is giving your whole will, your whole being, to God. If you do that, aren’t you making yourself completely passive?” Many think that the ultimate devotion, called prapatti in Sanskrit, means giving up their willpower, their independence and their judgment for an attitude of “Now you direct me, for I no longer can direct myself, because I no longer have free will. I gave it all away.” This is a good argument against prapatti, to be sure, but a gross misinterpretation of the word, which is the very bedrock of spirituality. This is not the meaning of prapatti at all. Not at all. I shall give an example. People who are employed by others work with full energy and vigor, utilizing all their skills on the job, day after day after day, year after year after year. They give of their talents and energies freely, but they do hold back some of the energies and fight within themselves. This is called resistance. That resistance is what they have to offer on the altar of purification. Getting rid of resistance, to be able to flow with the river of life, is what prapatti is all about. Prapatti is freedom. This truly is free will. Free will is not an obstinate will, an opposite force invoked for the preservation of the personal ego. This is willfulness, not free will. Free will is total, intelligent cooperation, total merging of the individual mind with that of another, or of a group. Those who only in appearance are cooperative, good employees rarely show their resistance. They hold it within, and day after day, year after year, it begins tearing them apart. Stress builds up that no remedy can cure. In religious life, we must have prapatti twenty-four hours a day, which means getting rid of our resistance. There are various forms of free will. There is free will of the ego, or the instinctive mind, there is free will of the intellect that has been educated in dharma, and there is free will of the intuition.
"For many, free will is an expression of the little ego, which often entangles them more in the world of māyā. For me, true free will means the dharmic will that is divine and guided by the superconscious. In reality, only this kind of will makes you free. Hindus with Western education, or who were raised and taught in Christian schools, whether they have accepted the alien religion or not, find it very difficult to acknowledge within their own being the existence of the Gods, because the West primarily emphasizes the external, and the East emphasizes the internal. Thoroughly immersing oneself in the external world severs man’s awareness from his psychic ability to perceive that which is beyond the sight of his two eyes.
"You might ask how you can love something you cannot see. Yet, the Gods can be and are seen by mature souls through an inner perception they have awakened. This psychic awakening is the first initiation into religion. Every Hindu devotee can sense the Gods, even if he cannot yet inwardly see them. This is possible through the subtle feeling nature. He can feel the presence of the Gods within the temple, and he can indirectly see their influence in his life."
Thank you very much. Wonderful day.
[End of transcript.]