Blog Archives
April 20, 2001 
It's a quiet day today. Gurudeva goes through his email with Shanmuganathswami, reaching out to devotees around the world from the middle of the Pacific. Every morning he has been speaking to the monks about teaching the Yamas and Niyamas as the foundation principles. A small booklet containing the Yamas and Niyamas, called "Hindu Ethics," has been prepared, drawing from the text of Living with Shiva and this is presented in the temple by the monk on vigil to guests, visitors and pilgrims who come between 9 am and 12 noon.
ANNOUNCEMENT:
For those who downloaded the Nandinatha Sutras eBook. Our first "beta" testers found a few bugs. Most notably the copy function wasn't working properly. This has been fixed. Go to:
/books/ebooks/ to get your updated version.
Our audio man has a new duty, which is to take the afternoon vigil in the temple from 3:00 pm to 6:00 pm on certain days. This means we may not get you a new audio file on that day. So.... this gives you a chance to enjoy a talk from the archives.
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Click to send Gurudeva a spiritual question he will later answer for all to benefit. |
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Date: April_14_2001
Title: Hindu New Year Part 2
Category: Hinduism and Tradition
Duration: 3 min., 29 seconds
Date Given: April 13, 2001
Children are abused, raped, and subjected to incest within the homes. It is quite prevalent in the Hindu community. If they are abused in anyway - slapped, hit, pinched, verbally put down, made to fear the elders - it is the duty of the stewardship of the temple, the trustees of the temple, the elected members of the community to bring in counsellors. It is their duty, in the name of ahimsa, to bring in outside help so that Hinduism has a good name in the world. Ahimsa is the very heart and core of Sanatana Dharma. Ahimsa is not hurting physically, mentally or emotionally.
Young people are on illegal drugs. Counsellors should be brought into the community to warn them of the consequences that they may be facing if they continue with this practice. Hindu communities worldwide will be model communities, if they take care of their own problems. Each temple has only one hundred to two hundred core devotees for the stewardship, the trustees of the temple to work with and clean up the mess within their homes. Clean their hearts and their collective community, of mess such as back-biting, making up stories about one another. All the low minded things that are going on in the temples today, will go on to tomorrow and get worse, unless a stop is put on the situation.
Some of these crimes against dharma, are often crimes within the state or county where the temple exists. If members of the congregation and members of the board of trustees know of these crimes and don't do anything about it, they are the silent participators in the crime and share the bad karma that goes along with it.
I would like to see the stewardship or the trustees or the board of directors of each temple look at themselves in the mirror very closely. If they cannot perform this spiritual function, this religious function, this function of maintaining dharma, they should resign. Let someone who is in more control of themselves, more deeply associated with the Sanatana Dharma take their place.
This new year, we have the planets working with us. The power of the Gods, the cooperation of the devas and Satguru Siva Yogaswami are all working very closely to the earth to make this happen. This is the year of will power, accomplishment, aggressiveness. Let us take advantage of it. As we say, "Happy New Year" to each other, let us say also, "Let us get to work."
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A wonderful family came to join us today... Naren & Sharayu Phanse, with their daughter, Neelu (middle) and her son Sachin. They recently moved from London to California.
This is Lord Ganesha in the Publications building. We worship him first before beginning any worship or spiritual practice.
"Iswara Pujana" or "Worship of God" is one of the Niyamas. Today we had some visitors from California who said they practiced "Ashtanga Yoga." But they didn't even know the meaning of the word "Ashtanga." They were surprised to learn that "Ashtanga Yoga" was not just physical exercises, but the "Eight-Limbed Yoga"
- Yama- Ethical Restraints
- Niyama -- Religious and Spiritual Observances
- Asana -- Yoga Postures
- Pranayama -- Breath Control
- Pratyahara -- Withdrawal of Mind from the Five Senses
- Dharana --Attention and Concentration
- Dhyana -- Meditation
- Samadhi -- Oneness/Realization
These are both independent practices and progessive stages, each one a foundation stone for the next higher stage. So, first things first. Yamas and Niyamas need to be in place in one's life otherwise there will be no fruit to the yoga, no stability, no long term sustained spiritual growth.
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