Blog Archives
“Through temple worship, the three worlds become open to one another, and the beings within them are able to communicate. By means of the mystical arts of puja, the worlds act in concert, and prayers are received.” — Gurudeva
Here is Innersearcher Kulapati Mootoosamy Pareatumbee otherwise known as our dear “Moogam” a long time devotee of Gurudeva from Mauritius. This was Moogam’s first trip to India and he says it was his wife, Kulamata Saranamutha, also a student of Gurudeva before they got married, who urged him to take time off from his very successful business life and go to India. He thanks her, saying it was the best time of his whole life.
Moogam developed himself as a master chef in one of Mauritius’s Five Star Hotels, then continued on to catering and training others and finally created his own cooking school and restaurant. When you go to Mauritius don’t miss having a meal at his place: “Pizza and Tandori” Read about it in this article, si vous lirez francaise.
Bodhinatha’s next journey is brief, on the weekend of April 3-4 in the San Francisco Bay Area of northern California. He will visit with Saiva Siddhanta Church members and Himalayan Academy Students.
Bodhinatha’s next journey is brief, on the weekend of April 3-4 in the San Francisco Bay Area of northern California. He will visit with Saiva Siddhanta Church members and Himalayan Academy Students.
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Click for recent TAKA pages with Iraivan Temple progress updates. |
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Vijay, Kaveri and Rohan Warriar visited from Munster, Indiana. Kaveri said it was her dream to always come here.
The Warriar family had a tour of the
grounds and Iraivan temple and later met with Bodhinatha.
Kulapati Easan Katir and Kulamata Sundari are here with their daugher Venita and son Kartikeya. With them are friends — the Sivamani family from Sunnyvale. On the right, a another friend, Shankar, in the back, white kurta, Raja Sivamani, a graduate student of University Berkeley and an internationally known veena player. In front, appa, K. Sivamani originally from Tamil Nadu. In the back, blue striped shirt: Murali another family member. In front in the green sweater Sivamani’s mother-in-law, in the back, center, Sundari Katir and Venita, next to Venita in the blue sari, Mrs. Vijaya Sivamani, in front, is young Kartikeya and behind him Rama Sivamani and Kulapati Easan on the far left.
Dakshinamurthi waits for his devotees.
Mrs. Sivamani walks around the giant murthi…
A few moments of quiet reflection…
Their main purpose of pilgrimage is so that Venita, daughter of Kulapati Easan and Kulamata Sundari Katir, can dance in front of our Kadavul Temple Nataraja deity. It is called “samarpanam”, the final step of her arangetram, debut Bharata Natyam dance performance. She will face the deity while performing the “samarpanam.”
Besides perusing Iraivan Temple and walking around our large Dakshinamurthi, they enjoyed eating betel leaves and the blue/green fruit on the outside of a new crop of rudraksha seeds
 The Remarkable Vision |
Iraivan Temple Progress Update |
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| New Beautiful 2004 Calendar Now Available. Seeing out fast! | ||
Other TAKA pages with recent Iraivan images.
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The silpis at work on the base of the East side Chinna Gopuram of Iraivan.
Pieces of the gopuram… sprinkled with rain.
Sadhaka Adinatha working on a quicktent covering some stones. Our Siddhidata Kulam team is ever busy providing the back up support and logistics management for the Iraivan Temple project.
Taking down the surface of one of the beams in preparation for its hoist aloft.
These beams are massive!
I can take several days to implement one small adjustment required for a perfect fit.
It appears we are removing nearly a half inche of stone here, where the beam will rest on the top of a pillar.
Base stones of the west Chinna Gopuram in place…
Its has been a cool and rainy spring, something the silpis are not used to. But, the plants love it.
Our guests tour the temple site… it’s a chance for the silpis to speak Tamil and share their views on the progress with our guests.
Here we are at the floor level of the temple. On top of this sand, floor stones will be placed. The panels on the pillars are lovely.
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Himalayan Academy Travel Study Programs |
Images from the Recent 2004 Indian OdysseyJanuary 19, 2004 – February 5, 2004 Bangalore, Madurai, Tanjavur, Chennai and |
Innersearcher Joan Parlette, from Boulder, Colorado has been a long time student of Gurudeva’s teachings. This was her first trip to India.
We take you on a trip to Palani Hills and with it offer these words from an article on a fabulous web site that we are featuring on the back page of Hinduism Today in the next issue: http:/kataragama.org Here we are at the entrance to Swami Malai Murugan temple.
This is at Palani Hills down on the streets…
From “The Worship of Lord Muruga”
from The Sivathondan of August-September 2003
and reprinted on the web at
http://kataragama.org/worship-muruga.htm
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“Muruga! Muruga! Om Muruga!” cry out in ecstasy the young and the old, the rich and the poor, the learned and the ignorant, the fashionable and the not-so-fashionable, the saintly and the sinful gathered at Nallur. The cry goes out from the heart though it may not always come out from the month. Such is invariably the scene at all the places sacred to Sri Murugan. Aloofness and reticence, pride and poop, status and position are forgotten and people freely abandon themselves to the bliss of self-forgetfulness and the tenderly loving or wildly intoxicating dwelling on of the glorious aspects of Lord Muruga.”
Climbing to the top:
“Childhood innocence, love, beauty, youth, heroism in war are qualities that hold in thrall the worldly minded, those enamoured of the world of form and name, just as Truth and Wisdom (and bliss from contemplation of these) are the sole aim and reason for existence of those seeking to peer into the Beyond, the Kingdom of Eternity. And yet Sri Muruga combines all these apparently conflicting aims, granting to His devotees what ever gifts they ask of Him. All power and strength are vouch safed to those who pray to Him.”
Reaching the top…
He is the “Su-brahm” – the Self, the Lord of all the seen and unseen world, which draw their life, move and have their being in Him. His is all the power of action, the Kriya Sakti. His are all the desires, (noble and to us ignoble), as evinced through the numerous living entities, the Ichcha Sakti: His seat is all these multi-coloured world of matter, of form His is the lance (the Vel) like wisdom, which pierces through this mountain of colossal ignorance and delusion surrounding us. and destroying the hosts of demons (asuras) that hold us in bondage, finally severing into two the master demon, the sense of a separate personality — the feeling of the I which has ever held us captive, denying us the whole, the all, he is the Lord without a compeer, the Spirit Eternal, the Paramatman whom the poor mind (subtle matter though it be) can never, never comprehend. The mind may take us part of way help in discriminating a little, but stops after a little while, because Spirit alone, rid of separateness through love, can know Spirit. And then there is no knowing or non-knowing. So the sages, their holy utterances and the scriptures tell us.”
Many pilgrims sitting in bliss at the top…
“One thing we know for certain. At these holy places, sacred to Murugan, we are no more bothered above hearing arguments about it and about that.”
Pradakshina before entering….
“We don’t come out by the same door as in we went. We come away with an experience irrefutable by any logic. We know we are possessed by an awareness, which rises above our everyday petty selves.”
The peaceful fulfillment of those who have been walking on foot, some carrying Kavadi, for days and days in the hot sun, having finally reached their destination….
” It is not mass-hysteria, dragging people down to acts of crime or atrocities. It is an electrification on a mass scale, making everyone bigger and larger, making them forget their bodies and the small people around them (perhaps dimly perceived in some and more pronounced in others).”
Innersearchers line up in the queue to pass before the Deity for a moment of darshan….
A certain sense of freedom, wonder and anticipation fills the air….
The monks await their turn…. of course, the Deity is rahasya, secret, no pictures are taken, you must come to know…
“We don’t know how these holy places have always attracted men, making available to common people directly or indirectly their holy thoughts, cleansing their hearts and clarifying their thoughts.”
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Color Trilogy Complete!
We are happy to announce that the new edition of the enormously popular Dancing with Siva is now available in hard back with all new color artwork. It’s truly an amazing and beautiful work, with more art than any of the collection. This completes the fulfillment of the vision that Gurudeva had of his Master Course Trilogy being produced in full color. In addition, Bodhinatha is taking pro-active steps to bring Gurudeva’s teachings out in a new forms that can be broadly disseminated in the mass mind. With this in mind we, are also pleased to announce that the Dancing with Siva pocketbook is also available. Keep the three-pound book in your shrine room, and take the little one with you on the airplane or subway! How little? It’s just 3″ by 4.5″�truly pocket-sized, and just over half an inch thick. Yet it is a full 375 pages, containing ALL of the 155 sutras. Available now at our online store. The complete Trilogy is being offered at a discount. |
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