SWAMI CHINMAYANANDA (1916-1993), FOUNDER OF CHINMAYA MISSION
A sannyasin of great spiritual attainment came to the outskirts of a village in India. He was camped under a tree for the night when suddenly a villager came running to him, screaming, "The stone! The stone! Give me the precious stone!" "Which stone?" asked the sannyasin. "Last night, Lord Siva appeared before me in a dream, " said the villager, "and told me that if I went to the outskirts of the village at nightfall, I would find a sannyasin who would give me a stone which would make me rich for the rest of my life." The sannyasin rummaged through his knapsack and took out a stone. "Probably he talked about this, " he said, extending the stone to the villager. "I found it lying on the path in the forest a few days ago. Take it, I give it to you," offered the sannyasin with all simplicity. The villager looked at the stone in amazement it was an enormous diamond. He took the diamond and went away quickly. All that night he tossed in his bed and could not sleep. The next day at dawn he woke up the sannyasin, returned the gem and asked, "Give me the inner wealth which has made it possible for you to part with this diamond so easily."
What extracts from the Vedas I have read fall on me like the light of a higher and purer luminary, which describes a loftier course through purer stratum. It rises on me like the full moon after the stars have come out, wading through some far stratum in the sky. Henry David Thoreau (1817-1862), American author, poet and philosopher
Look at the man who walks on a tight rope. He is performing various tricks, but his mind is only on the rope. So also, we may be doing various things, but our minds must be on God." Sri Sri Sri Sivaratnapuri Tiruchi Mahaswamigal, founder of Kailasa Ashram, Bangalore
If you don't learn from your mistakes, there's no sense making them. Anonymous
The root of all bliss is God. And to forget God is the root of all problems. His Divine Holiness, Pramukh Swami Maharaj, spiritual head of Bochasanwasi Shree Akshar Puroshottam Swaminarayan Sanstha
When we engage every moment without the cares and fears of the beyond, we are able to harness the spirit of sadhana, and every moment is filled with Divinity. Swamini Mayatitananda Saraswati, spiritual head of Wise Earth Monastery and Mother Om Mission, Candler, North Carolina
Q: How many Vedantins does it take to change a light bulb? A: Three one to change it, one to not change it and one to both change and not change it.
Devotion must not be like the flood of the rainy season in which all get washed away. Devotion should be like the river that retains water even in the hottest season. Saint Kabir (1440-1518)
The phaomnneil pweor of the hmuan mnid: Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a total mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe. Amzanig! Mybae the Hunidsim Tdoay sfatf can sotp slpel ckchenig?
The writers of the Indian philosophies will survive when the British dominion in India shall long have ceased to exist, and when the sources which it yielded of wealth and power are lost to remembrances. Lord Warren Hastings (1754-1826), the first governor general of British India
It is the unique and all-encompassing nature of Hinduism that one devotee may be worshiping Ganesha while his friend worships Subramaniam or Vishnu, and yet both honor the other's choice and feel no sense of conflict. The profound understanding and universal acceptance that are unique in Hinduism are reflected in this faculty for accommodating different approaches to the Divine, allowing for different names and forms of God to be worshiped side by side within the temple walls. Satguru Sivaya Subramuniyaswami (1927-2001), founder of Hinduism Today
DID YOU KNOW
One of bharat's little known but long lasting contributions to the Western world was the export of a thick cotton cloth known as dungaree, which was sold at a market near the Dongarii Fort in Mumbai in the sixteenth century. Portuguese and Genoan sailors used this durable, blue, broad cloth, dyed with indigo, for their bellbottom sailing pants, and it soon became popular with farmers and others. Dungaree made its way through Europe and moved across the Atlantic to America in the late eighteenth century, where it wove its way into popular varieties of work clothes such as overalls. In 1873, a German immigrant in San Francisco by the name of Levi Strauss, along with Jacob Davis, a Nevada tailor, patented "waist overalls." These denim pants which have pockets and button flies reinforced with metal rivets are the most popular clothing product in the world today–blue jeans.
(With Yvette Rosser)
ABSTAINING FROM EATING MEAT
Tirukural 256: If the world did not purchase and consume meat, no none would slaughter and offer meat for sale.
Tirukural 257: When man realizes that meat is the buthchered flesh of another creature, he will abstain from eating it.
Tirukural 258: Insightful souls who have abandined the passion to hurt others will not feed on flesh that life has abandoned.
Tirukural 259: Greater thana thousand ghee offerings consumed in sacrificial fires is not to sacrifice and consume any living creature.