CHAPTER II.
CHAPTER II.
In the course of conversation when the talk was about the Goddess Singhavahini (the Goddess seated upon a lion) worshipped by the Mallick family of Barabazar, he said, "Once I went to see the Goddess. She was staying with a certain family at Chashadhopapara, a district in Calcutta. The house was almost a deserted one. The family had become very poor. In some places there were filth and dirt lying about. In others mosses could be found growing. The cement upon the wall was crumbling down, brickdust and sand dropped slowly from the walls. Other houses belonging to the Mallicks are very neat and clean, but this was not so.
Then turning towards M. he said, "Well, can you explain, why this was the case?"
Unable to explain, M. remained silent.
Sri Râmakrishna: The thing is, every one must reap the fruit of his past actions. We should believe in the law of inherited tendencies,1 etc.
The Divine Presence in Images.
"One thing I saw in that deserted house;" resumed he, turning towards M., "the face of the Goddess was beaming with glory. We should believe in the Divine Presence infilling the Images of the Deity."
"I went to Vishnupura," continued he. "The Raja has several fine temples. In one of the temples there is the Image named Mrinmayi. A big tank is before the temple."
(To M.) 'But how is it that I smelt in the tank water the spices that females used to perfume their hair? I did not know that they offered such spices to the Goddess when they went to worship Her. When near the tank and I had not seen Her Image I saw Her Divine Form up to Her Waist in the water, and in Samadhi. The Mother of the Universe appeared to me in Samadhi in the form of Mrinmayi.'
The Problem of Evil and Devotees.
By this time other devotees arrived. The talk then turned on the Kabul War, and the civil war that came after. One of the devotees gave the news that Yakub Khan had been deposed from the throne. He said, 'Sir, Yakub Khan is a great devotee!'
Sri Râmakrishna: Well, pleasure and pain, happiness and misery, are things that one cannot separate from the body. We read in Kabi Kankan's "Chandi" that Kalubira, a great devotee, was shut up in jail. They placed a heavy stone upon his breast. But Kalu was a highly-favoured child of the Mother of the universe!
1 Law of Karma.
The fact is, pleasure and pain, happiness and misery, come with the body.
How great a devotee was Srimanta! How fondly did the Divine Mother love his mother Khullana! But what an amount of trouble he had to go through! They took him to the scaffold to be executed.
A woodman—a great devotee—was fortunate enough to see the Divine Mother; and She loved, and showed Her kindness towards him very much but he had to go on with the business of the wood-cutter all the same. He must sell the firewood to get his livelihood.
It does not follow that a devoted lover of God must be very well-off in the world. He is rich in spirit though he may be poor in worldly things. Devaki in prison saw God in the form of a human being holding conch-shell, disc, mace and lotus in His four hands. But she with all her God-vision could not get out of the prison.
M.: Get out of the prison! It seems to me that she should have got out of her body, too, that being the source of all her troubles.
Master: The thing is, the body is the fruit of one's past actions; so a man must bear with it, as long as his actions are not cleared. A blind man taking a bath in the holy water of the Ganges gets all his sins washed off. But his blindness keeps on all the same. It is the fruit of his actions in his past life.
M.: 'The shaft that has gone out of the bow must run out its race.' One has ceased to have any hold on such a shaft.
Master: The body may be happy or miserable. But the true devotee is all the time rich in spirit—rich in Knowledge and in the love of the Lord.
Take for instance the Pandavas. How many dangers and difficulties had they to face! What privations and trials to go through! But amidst all these they never lost their love and devotion to God. Can you find others equally wise and devoted to God?