pUjaa

[Sankaran Jayanarayanan]

Ramakrishnan Balasubramanian <ramakris at EROLS.COM> wrote:

>Sankaran Jayanarayanan wrote:
>
>> OK. My question is when the intention was good and the circumstances
>> made following the rules impossible. Would praayashchitta help in
such a
>> case?
>
>I am busy with work currently. I'll give a brief summary of my
>understanding.
>

Thanks for your reply.

>1. Suppose I have the honorable intention of building a bridge to help
>some people in a remote village. Should I make sure I have the proper
>qualification in Civil Engineering or assume that the elementary
>engineering mechanics from Shames (?), I did in my freshman year is
>enough and start building it instead? Suppose the bridge collapses
>killing a number of people, can I justify myself by saying that I had
>"good" intentions?
>

That's a good example!

[..]

>3. Prayaschitta is only to account for the small errors which may have
>occured _AFTER_ making a genuine effort to learn.

Yes. This only means that praayashchitta ought to apply in the case I
mentioned above, since all possible effort was made, but consider the
situation when the person performing the puujaa finds that his father is
in critical condition in the hospital and needs his (the son's)
attention. I should think that the puujaa *will* have to be
discontinued. Performing the puujaa knowing that this would indirectly
be the cause of a death is far worse, IMO.

[..]

>In fact, well intentioned fools are more dangerous
>than the ill-intentioned ones!
>

Yes.

>Handwaving statements about the grace of the Lord, etc are of no use.
>The "Dialogues with the Guru" pp. 145-159, "True Devotion", are useful
>in this context. H.H chandrasheshara bhAratI says: "True devotion lies
>in carrying out His dictates implicitly. To disobey Him in action and
to
>profess allegiance in words is blasphemy. It is not bhakti. By bhakti
is
>meant single pointed devotion UNIFORMLY expressed in mind, speech and
>body." (page 151, emphasis mine).

Thanks for the above quote.

>Rama.
>

-Kartik

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>From  Wed Jul  8 20:40:53 1998
Message-Id: <WED.8.JUL.1998.204053.0530.>
Date: Wed, 8 Jul 1998 20:40:53 +0530
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To: List for advaita vedanta as taught by Shri Shankara
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From: Kamal Kothari <kamal at HOMEINDIA.COM>
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Subject: Guru Purnima
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Greetings to all on the auspicious occassion of Guru Purnima (Thursday
9th July).

Kamal
--
Kamal Kothari
E-Mail : kamal at homeindia.com     http://www.homeindia.com
"The worst is not... So long as we can say, "This is the worst."
(Shakespeare in "King Lear")