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Gurudeva’s Statement — Attack on America
While Gurudeva never made a big show of piety, those who lived close to him knew of his deep love of God and devotion to Lord Shiva. In his silence he often reminded us of the famed Nandi, whose eye never for a moment swerved from its focus on the Supreme. Every day he would rise early and come to the temple for the morning worship, followed by meditation. He called this our “outer worship/internalized worship.” This to him was the anchor of spiritual life, not only for the monastics but for all his devotees. Gurudeva was generally very forgiving and understanding of the frailties and follies of human life and was willing to help any monk or devotee work through any challenge. But, if he learned some devotee had given up their daily morning puja and meditation, he considered them to have “left the path…. they are with Vishwa Guru Maharaj now.” [i.e.under the guidance of the world of external experiences and their own prarabdha karmas] God Siva first in all things…was his unspoken message to us all.
Today is the first day of Pancha Ganapati and Satguru Bodhinatha Veylanswami stand by the small shrine to Lord Ganesha which we have established in our courtyard…
If you did not tune in yesterday, please do and listen to Bodhinatha’s wonderful 18-minute talk on Affection Detachment.
Announcement:
Because our retreat TAKA pages do not change, most everyone has seen them all. So, we have decided to simply leave up the last day of the phase and not have retreat pages at all. This is the last day of this phase, and our next TAKA pages will appear again on the 24th. Meanwhile have a wonderful Pancha Ganapati celebration. (for those not familiar with this modern Hindu festival, use the search engine and enter
“Pancha Ganapati” festival
Our search engine supports phrases now, so be sure to include the quotes around “Pancha Ganapati”
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picked at random from Gurudeva’s vast audio archives
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This is our exquisite small brass murthi of the Five-Faced image of Lord Ganesha. It is a rare image, but beloved by us all because in Sri Lanka, not far from Gurudeva’s first establishment, the Subramuniya Ashram in Alaveddy, Jaffna, there is the Kumbhalavalai Ganesha temple that has a large Pancha Ganapati in the outer mandapam. It is a very powerful temple and throughout the war pujas have still continued there. We now observe the five-fold sadhana of Pancha Ganapati. On this first day, the 21st, we work to bring through the Yellow Darshan, of harmony in the home and among the immediate family members.
And not to be underestimated in “happiness ratings” are the cookies being baked in the kitchen and goodies the Lambodara Kulam brings to the table at this time of year.
Martinne Anne Thom is here with her husband from Vancouver, Canada. She share with Paramacharya Palansiwami her plans for the documentary she filmed last year in March. She has been giving the film a lot of thought and plans to do more editing before releasing it. It takes on new significance as an important document of the “last moment” of Gurudeva’s presence with us here at the Aadheenam.
Old friends of Sadhaka Jivanandanatha’s father and mother came to the Aadheenam today to visit. Jivananda and the son of this family played together as young boys.
Here is a wonderful overview of our monastery 407 acres of land across the river. This photo is taken from the water tower about 1/2 a mile south of the monastery looking west… Toward the Waialeale mountain range. Durvasa Alahan has harrowed down about half of the fields covered with sugar cane… this is the light brown area. Then in the middle the dark green area is also our land… The Wailua river valley is weaving through the trees, so deep below you cannot see the water flowing from this angle… the monastery is just off to the right of this photo across the river from the land.
Manivelu in Chennai has done a new set of “Saivite Symbols.” This is “Anjalai Mudra” which is the traditional holding of the hands, palms together, just up in front of one’s heart and chest… a traditional posture of devotion during puja and greeting.
More art for the color edition of Dancing with Siva that is in the works: this is the front pieces for this sloka:
How Do We Overcome Life’s Obstacles?
Sloka 86
Just as a small leaf can obscure the sun when held before our eyes, so can the past cloud the present and hide our divinity. With Vedic methods, or tantras, we remove impediments to reveal the ever-present inner light. Aum.
 The Remarkable Vision |
Iraivan Temple Progress Update |
Join this historic undertaking. Please contribute generously. Sponsor a stone today! |
Many are the wonderments and special features of the Iraivan temple. One of these will be the floor which is being carved from red granite. Some 350 stones of various sizes will be required, carved to fit into to a lovely pattern. Here are some pieces in Bangalore, that have been quarried, cut to rectangles and smoothed on one surface.
This is a very beautiful colored stone and will give the temple floor a lovely warm feeling.
Polishing the surface is a slow process of using a flat faced “hatched” chisel that is twisted and turned as it is tapped, slowly leveling the surface.
It is another massive job and beautiful increment to the magical temple. Please help us fulfill Gurudeva’s vision. Contribute generously today! Contact iraivan@hindu.org to choose something to sponsor, large or small.
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Study Gurudeva’s teachings.
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transcription begins
Date: November_01_1998
Title: Training to become Criminals?
Category:
Duration: 6 min., 9 seconds
Date Given: November 01, 1998
Today at Kauai Aadheenam. November 1st. Today is JAZ day. Why do we call it JAZ day? It is because Hinduism Today, our international magazine is put on a JAZ disk, Macintosh computer JAZ disk and sent to the Midwest of the United States to be electronically put on a big press, and Mac-boom-done! The magazine is printed.
It is a happy day here because Bodhinathaswami and Sivanadiyar Nilakantha have returned from a two-month tour of Singapore, Malaysia, Mauritius and India. They had a wonderful time. We greeted them warmly, with drums rolling, bringing them right into the core of our monastery, which is our Kadavul Hindu Temple.
A lot of visitors have been coming lately, almost every day. We see beautiful families from India, who live in the United States. Doctors, financiers, many very important people on temple management boards. We have another nice e-mail from New Zealand.
In New Zealand, we formed a group about four years ago to build a Hindu Temple. Well now, four years later they say in their e-mail, “Yes, we are ready to build a Hindu Temple and you promised to send us Lord Ganesha to install”. I wrote to them today again on e-mail and said, “We are ready to send you Lord Ganesha,” and we ordered it from India. Five-hundred pound, beautifully carved icon of the deity, Ganesha, the Lord of Dharma.
A nice interview today with Kauai Television, who tell me they want to interview me in a talk show. I said, “Yes”.
They said, “Well, we will write down all the questions and you can figure out all of your answers.”
I said, “I’m used to doing TV interviews, just give me the questions. Whatever they are, I’ll give you the answers”.
So we had a nice talk. Showed them the beautiful 51-acre monastery.
Well now, Halloween has come and gone. Did you get your windows broken? Did those little devils do something to you that they shouldn’t have? Why are we training the children to be criminals? Extortionists? Plunderers?
Give it some thought, talk to your friends. Be a missionary for righteousness. This is outside of religion. You don’t have to be religious or even know of a religion to know what is right and what is wrong. Is it right for children to be taught to destroy people’s property? To extort money or candy from them at such a young age? It is not.
All of you who are out there, of the ‘New Age’, you have some work to do with the young people. You have to be an example for the young people. Otherwise, there is no New Age. Everything will go on in the old age until you make a difference. You can make a difference. You are beautiful souls. Many New Age people are not Hindu people, not Buddhist people. But they take a little bit from each of the religions of the world. Many have come to visit us to see our 700- hundred pound, perfectly formed, multi-million year old crystal. They look at it in awe, but that’s not enough.
You must return and make a difference in your community. Make a difference in your community. Talk to everyone about Halloween and what it teaches the children. Make observations and carry forward what is right. Don’t carry what’s wrong, forward.
I don’t know how I got on that subject again! We have been editing, word after word after word, of the new entries of ‘Merging With Siva’, the new book that is coming out the early part of 1999. It is ‘Merging with Siva’, 1400 pages. We have been going over all of the new entries of the Glossary, meticulously. So, I really didn’t plan what to say to each and every one of you. But again, I don’t think we can be too lenient in our thoughts of how children are trained in today’s world, if we are going to expect a better world tomorrow.
Well, I’ll be seeing you tomorrow, and the next day. We have a retreat for two days to reflect on what we did and what we are going to do. Love and blessings to each and every one of you in Cyberspace. We are very happy you visited the Ashram today.
transcription ends
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Innersearch postponed
Due to the horrific tragedies of September 11th, Himalayan Academy has indefinitely postponed the Canadian Innersearch scheduled to leave next July. Please be assured, we will re-schedule the Innersearch, but only when the present insecurity around the world settles down. Until then, if you are planning to go on a future Innersearch program, continue to set aside a little income each month in a special fund. |
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From Our Gurus' Teachings
Archives are now available through 2001. Light colored days have no posts. 1998-2001 coming later.
