Passage 9

Tap any word for its meaning.

In plain words

If our bhāva is pure, rāga and tāla both join in well. Even as we divide the mind, enmity starts there. So here we must not divide; we must divine. When we divide like this, a great deal changes. So as not to divide, we must simply widen our feeling. In a cloth many threads come together. When you take each one separately, you can snap it with two fingers. But when all the threads come together, how strong they are! So if we divide our feelings over rāga, over tāla, over pitch, over the audience, it becomes weak in every way.

Picture the Named within your heart. Utter the Name. Only when the Named you have pictured joins with the Name you utter does this gladness called Ānanda arise. Saṅkīrtana must make the hearts of all forget themselves. It must enchant them. So this saṅkīrtana is the very thing that enchants, makes us forget and carries us across. Through such saṅkīrtana we must fill the whole world with a holy atmosphere. Whatever kind of people breathe the air in that atmosphere, Ānanda must grow in their hearts. The thought of the Name is the very thing that brings in such Ānanda and gives it. What use is a Name of God that cannot give such Ānanda? That is, it must be joined with oneness. It must show the oneness in the many. That is why:

Eternal Ānanda, giver of supreme happiness, absolute, the very form of Jñāna, beyond the pairs of opposites, like the sky, the goal of Tat tvam asi and the like, one, eternal, spotless, unmoving, the witness of all minds, beyond bhāva, free of the three guṇas ….

We utter such a Name, a Name that enchants oneness, makes us forget the body and merges into the world; and today, for 24 hours, they have named it Akhaṇḍa Bhajan. But this is not Akhaṇḍa Bhajan; it is only khaṇḍa bhajan. Though in the community it is only khaṇḍa bhajan, we must shape it into Akhaṇḍa Bhajan in our lives. The whole divine world is filled with fire, sun and moon. The bījākṣara of this fire, sun and moon is this Rāma mantra. So this fire burns sins to ashes. The sun wipes out the darkness of Ajñāna. The coolness of the moon cools our burning. So this Name of Rāma is what drives away sin, Ajñāna and burning. The very root cause of our birth is burning and sin. The root cause of these two is Ajñāna. So if Ajñāna is to be wiped out, the light of this sun is most essential. We must develop the light of Buddhi. Taking the Name as our support, we must make life fruitful, with the goal of reaching the Named.