The preceptor takes the novice into his womb

I am in the hospital waiting for Prema Madhuri's operation to be finished. One week ago, she fell and fractured her hip. She tried to wait it out but the pain was too great and finally we went for the X-ray. We were told almost immediately to get to an emergency room and get it fixed. So finally on Friday we took a taxi to Sacre Coeur hospital in Montreal and after a rather long and uncomfortable wait on an emergency room stretcher, the orthopedic surgeon was able to get to her and operate.

I have been with her the whole time, and indeed for the whole week I have been acting as her nurse to the best of my ability. I know that I have said a lot of pious words about love -- many of them are quoted here and over the past few weeks. At some point I came to the conclusion that prema prayojana meant a certain human culture that requires sacrifice that goes beyond the academic. But looking at them all I have to admit that they are theory and not so much practice. 

The Hindu scriptures generally promote renunciation -- even in today's primary quotes the brahmacharya of a student of the Veda has been lauded. Romantic love is not given primacy of place in the spiritual texts of India. Indeed, it is mocked as foolishness. There is much on this blog about romantic love and I don't think that a coherent presentation has ever been fully achieved. 

Finding myself back in Canada with Prema Madhuri after a long absence and various adventures, I am being forced to make sacrifices and even atonement for the sins committed in the search for romantic love. I feel very much that I am undergoing certain correctives for my education and edification. For one thing I have to express amazement that Prema Madhuri was so ready to give me a place in her life after such a long absence. This makes the statement below about "exclusivity" that much more poignant. 

I am also amazed at her great moral strength. Despite what must have been intense pain, she did not take any of the painkillers she was prescribed. She has a great dislike for hospitals and any kind of intervention in her body, so it was very difficult for her to accept the need of surgical intervention. She believes strongly in an organic vegan diet and so abhors any kind of foreign chemicals entering the temple of her body. But eventually she realized that she couldn't risk the potential problems that not getting it done would entail. So here we are, experiencing socialist medicine first hand. (May 29, 2022)

FB memories from this date.

2016

Doing a final proof on Swami Veda's translation of Sanat-sujatiya, which I worked on a few years ago when he was still physically present. It is an interesting work, very jnani, and Maharaj's translation is not facile. I will pick out a few verses here and there to provoke thought.

ācārya yonim iha ye praviśya

bhūtvā garbhaṁ brahmacaryaṁ caranti |

ihaiva te śāstrakārā bhavanti

prahāya dehaṁ paramaṁ yānti yogam ||

[4.5] Those who enter the womb of the preceptor becoming, as it were, a foetus, and observe brahmacharya, become the authors of scriptures. After casting off this body they go to the supreme truth, the supreme yoga.

[Footnote] Hymn to Brahmacharya, Atharva-veda 11.5.3: 

ācārya upanayamāno brahmacāriṇaṁ kṛṇute garbham antaḥ| 

taṁ rātrīs tisra udare bibharti taṁ jātaṁ draṣṭum abhisaṁyanti devāḥ ||

“The preceptor, bringing [the novice] brahmacharin close unto himself, takes him into his womb. Three nights does he bear him in the womb. The celestials come [down] to see him [thus] born.”

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The real Mayavadi is one who calls love an illusion.

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Love can be experienced without reciprocation, but it is in reciprocation that it attains its full strength and potential. It is then both sādhana and the sādhya.

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Relish the beauty and power of exclusivity. There is no substitute.

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Love conquers all. It is best unmixed with jnana or karma.

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2010

What's on my mind? They are widening the road around Govardhan. As if it wasn't bad enough already.