Event: Swami Swatmananda ji's, Study class visit
Date: July 7, 11.30 am
Topic: What is the place of Sagun Bhakti (specially ritualism) in Adwait Vedant, given that it's thrust is that BRAHMAN, the nameless, formless alone exists.
Attendees: 55 members from 3 classes of Sevika Vinita ji Asrani and 2 classes of Sevika Aditi ji Agarwalla
Reported by: Namrata Agarwala
The satsang began with the welcoming of Swami Swatmananda ji with the Purna Kumbh, chanted by Aditi & Namrata Agarwalla. The Invocation prayers and Guru Stotram were chanted by Rama Tantia & Meenal Roopchand .
Swami ji began the session with a quiz in which the attendees had to answer 25 questions, with either a 'yes' or a 'no'. The purpose of the quiz was for us to see for ourselves, if we indeed needed an altar of surrender, or we were able to focus upon and essentially see ourselves as Nirgun Nirakar Brahman, even without Bhakti towards the Lord. The results, instantly cleared many of our doubts. Swamiji further explained that Vedant was not opposed to Bhakti. Nor is Bhakti opposed to the principles of Vedanta. Both are required to reach Self Realisation.
We need rituals and devotion, to remove the obstacles of the 6 impurities (mala) of our mind. Vikshepa can only be removed through Upasana. Further, the veil of avarna will only go with Gyaan Tapa.
If we only depend on intellectual gathering of knowledge, attachment to the body will never go.
Pooja helps us to bring all the senses together and become single pointed. Daily rituals help us to strengthen our bond with the Lord. A feeling of gratitude and surrender grows. We begin focusing on what we can GIVE rather than TAKE from the Lord. It helps us to transform Jada (Murti) into Chaitanya (Pure Consciousness). Through the Sankalp taken at the beginning of a Pooja, we get connected to the entire cosmos. The whole confusion as to why we need rituals, was thus totally cleared by Swamiji, in a simple yet extremely insightful talk.
The session ended with a Vote of thanks, by Seema Mittal.
We paid homage to Pujya Gurudev with the Chinmaya Aarti, sung by Vibha Mittal and Reena Rajpal. The Mission pledge was taken by all present, led by Ayesha Kumar & Anahita Mody. The session ended with the concluding prayers chanted by Sneh Todi & Digi Engineer.
