Posted on: 29 Jul 2020
[Shri Balaji asked: Namaste Swami! Kindly clarify on the following incident in Sai Satcharitra:
“A devotee of the Divine Mother, Shri Kakaji, was troubled by worldly circumstances and did not have peace of mind for a long time. On praying to the Goddess, She directs him to meet Sai Baba. By mistake, Kakaji goes to the Trymbakeshwar temple of Lord Śiva, thinking that Lord Śiva is the ‘Baba’ mentioned by the Goddess. He does a lot of prayers there, but without relief to his problems. Then the Goddess corrects him and directs him to meet Sai Baba in Shirdi. Kakaji goes to Shirdi, meets Sai Baba and finally gets the peace of mind which was missing in his life for many years.”
The Divine Mother, Lord Śiva and Sai Baba are all the same God. But for learning divine knowledge, living together with Him and serving Him practically, Sai Baba was most relevant and most convenient for devotees. But in the above incident, even for peace of mind and relief from worldly problems, the Goddess wanted the devotee to approach only Sai Baba. From the above incident, can we say that even for worldly problems, the Human Incarnation is the reigning Deity on earth? This is in addition to the great fortunes of receiving knowledge from Him, living with Him and practically serving Him that devotees get from Him. Sincerely, Balaji.]
Swami replied: A Human Incarnation like Krishna, Sai Baba etc., is the most relevant form of God for a human being living on earth. An Energetic Incarnation like Viṣṇu, Śiva etc., is most relevant to energetic beings living in the upper world. God descends on earth in a human medium for the sake of uplifting human beings. The same God also simultaneously remains in an energetic medium for the sake of energetic beings. The God in any Incarnation is one and the same. Only His body (medium) might either be human or energetic. When a person changes his clothes, does the person also change? The body is like the external dress, as per the Gītā (Vāsāṃsi…).
Human beings are souls present in human bodies. There is a foolish repulsion between human beings due to their common human bodies or common media. The cause for this repulsion is the ego and jealousy present in every person. The foolish human being feels this common media repulsion in the case of the Human Incarnation of God also. As a result, the soul in a human medium fails to recognize and surrender to the God who is also present in human medium on this earth. The villagers of Brindāvanam did not recognise Krishna as a Human Incarnation of God, due to the same problem. This problem is not limited to souls in a human body, but it equally applies to souls in energetic bodies in the upper world. For the same reason, the energetic being, Indra, could not recognize God Śiva as an Energetic Incarnation of God and lifted his weapon to wound God Śiva in the Śiva Loka. Energetic beings not only neglect the Energetic Incarnation due to the repulsion between common media, but they also do not care about the Human Incarnation since they think of human beings as lower beings. Indra neglected both God Śiva, the Energetic Incarnation in the upper world and God Krishna, the Human Incarnation on Earth.
Human beings neglect the Human Incarnation due to the repulsion between common media, but they at least care for the Energetic Incarnation. This is because human beings think that energetic beings are superior to human beings. But unfortunately, Energetic Incarnations of God are not seen by humans because they are irrelevant to human beings living in this material world called Earth. The same human beings, after leaving their human bodies in death, take up energetic bodies to become energetic beings. Then, in the upper world, they neglect the Energetic Incarnation, which is again due to the repulsion between common media. Thus, souls incur a permanent loss since (1) they neglect the Human Incarnation while they are on Earth in human bodies, (2) they care only for Energetic Incarnations, which are not seen on Earth and (3) after their death on Earth and after becoming energetic beings, they continue to feel the repulsion of common media for Energetic Incarnations in the upper world. In general, the soul neglects something when it is before its eyes and craves for the same thing when it is far from the eyes (Parokṣapriyāḥ…—Veda). Poet Kalidāsa says that when an elephant is before the eyes of such a person, he says that it is not an elephant. Then after the elephant goes away, he studies its footprints and confirms that it was an elephant (Yathā gajo neti…)! All this analysis shows that the most easily approachable form of God on Earth for human beings is only the Human Incarnation. This was the intention of the Goddess in guiding Kakaji to Sai Baba.
There is a great difficulty in approaching an Energetic Incarnation of God. The devotee has to first see the Energetic Incarnation, before the Energetic Incarnation can preach spiritual knowledge to the devotee. Then, as a result of the preaching of the Energetic Incarnation, the devotee will have to develop devotion, which will finally have to be put into practice, in order to please God. The problem is that in this sequence of steps, the first step itself takes the time of an entire human lifespan. The devotee has to perform severe lifelong penance to even get a vision of the Energetic Incarnation. Then, where is the time left to complete the other steps? The Energetic Incarnation takes a very long time to appear because the same God is already available as a Human Incarnation on the earth. God wants the devotee to realize his error in approaching the Energtic Incarnation, when the Human Incarnation is easily available for human beings. So, God’s delay in appearing in energetic form before a human devotee is due to the fault of the devotee and not due to the fault of God. God has already appeared in human form on earth and to get His vision, the devotee does not have to waste even a single minute on doing penance!
People are fond of the Energetic Incarnation due to two reasons. (1) The first is that they have rejected the Human Incarnation due to the repulsion between common media, which in turn is due to their ego and jealousy. (2) The second reason is that it is economically convenient to worship the Energetic Incarnation, either through a representative model like an image or statue or even without any representative form of God, in an open place. The economic convenience is that the offering of food and other things made to the Energetic Incarnation remains only a mental offering. It is not actually consumed by God, so, we can consume it ourselves! If we offer it to the Human Incarnation, the Human Incarnation will actually consume the offered food! This second reason is hidden in our mind. It makes us want to offer the food to God and at the same time, we do not want God to consume it. It means, we want to get the benefit of practically offering food to God, without incurring the financial loss involved in practically offering it!
Some people mock at people offering food to the images and statues of Energetic Incarnations of God saying “Why are you offering food, when God is not eating it?” I say to them that the day God starts eating the offered food, from the next day onwards, no one will ever offer any food to God! It is only because the offered food is not being eaten by God, that people are offering it to Him every day! Of course, if this angle of economic convenience is absent from the heart of a devotee, then even such mental offering of food can be beneficial since it will at least increase the devotee’s theoretical devotion to God.
Keywords:
| Shri Datta Swami | For solving worldly problems, should devotees pray to the Human Incarnation of God or to Energetic Forms and Idols? | Shiva Vishnu Gita Vaasaamsi Parokshapriyaah Yathaa gajo neti