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1. Significant
events in His Spiritual life
Significant events in Baba's Spiritual life are as follows:
* Birth: 7th July, 1920 at Manasa, Madhya Pradesh, at 7.10 a.m.
* The first Vision (Darshan) of His Guru, Shri Anantanand
Saish: 9th February 1956.
* Shri Guru giving the Gurumantra: 15th February 1956.
* Shri Guru naming Baba as 'Bhaktaraj': 16th February 1956.
* Shri Guru giving up His body: 12th December 1957.
* Mahanirvana (giving up of His body) at Indore, Madhya Pradesh,
at 2.45 a.m.: 17th November 1995.
2. Holy songs
(Bhajanas)
Singing holy songs was Baba's (H.H. Bhaktaraj
Maharaj was fondly addressed as Baba by His devotees) favorite form
of relaxation. In fact, Baba is identified with Holy songs, and
Holy songs remind one of Baba. As a disciple, singing Holy songs
was His Spiritual practice as well as Service unto the Guru,
i.e., Satseva. Standing before His Guru, He would sing Holy
songs for hours together. After reaching the level of a Guru, His
Holy songs became a medium of teaching and guiding His disciples
in becoming one with the Spiritual consciousness (Chaitanya).
Detailed information about Baba's Holy songs is given in the book
Bhajanamruta : A composition by Saint Bhaktaraj.
3. Travel
In these modern times, it is doubtful
whether there is any other Saint like Baba, who has traveled millions
of kilometers. Every second or third day Baba visited a new village
or town. The motive of His travel was to provide the disciples maximum
contact with the Guru, which is essential for their progress. Due
to worldly responsibilities disciples could not go to visit Baba
regularly. Hence Baba visited them Himself. Another reason for these
travels was that instead of the disciples having to spend their
time and money in traveling from Dhule, Jalgaon, Nasik, Pune, Bombay
and other cities to meet Baba, all of them from a particular city
could meet Him when He came to these places. Thus, they automatically
got the benefit of His Darshan (seeing Him), His company (Satsang)
and service unto Him (Satseva).
4. A festival
of serving food (Bhandara)
Since food is considered to be one of
the superior kinds of offerings, Baba organized Bhandaras at thousands
of places. This helped develop closer ties amongst disciples. Detailed
information about Bhandaras is given in our book Saint Bhaktaraj
: Biography, chapter 12.
5. Baba : An image
of Spiritual love (Priti)
Just as sugar is characterized by its
sweetness, Baba's chief characteristic was His loving nature. He
loved for the sake of loving, without any expectations. Often He
was seen tucking His devotees into blankets or serving food to one
visiting Him at any odd time. Because of this loving nature He liked
having people around Him all the time. When there is no one around
Him, He got restless; as whom would He then shower His love upon!
Devotees, too, were attracted towards Him because of this very singular
quality Priti.
6. The best Guru
Baba taught His disciples verbally as well
as non-verbally (i.e., through Spiritual experiences - Anubhutis).
Many a times, however, when Baba spoke, one did not understand what
He was teaching because the mind would become blank, that is, one
would go into a meditative state. Hence, Baba did not merely teach
Spirituality or ask someone to do Spiritual practice, He saw to
it that Spiritual practice, i.e., chanting, got done by the disciple.
How Baba played the role of a Guru is described in the book Saint
Bhaktaraj : Biography.
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Importance of Repeating The Lord's
Name (Chanting)
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| There
are millions of impressions in the subconscious mind and
to erase even a single one takes a long time. Hence, by
following observances and regulations (Yama-Niyama),
a considerable period of time would elapse in overcoming
the tendencies of the subconscious mind. It is more important
to make efforts continuously to become one with God (Purusha),
instead of trying to erase these impressions, which arise
from Prakruti.
This is precisely what can be achieved by chanting. The
mind, intellect, subconscious mind, etc., are all constituents
of Prakruti and these function according to their own
characteristics. Instead of wasting spiritual practice
(sadhana) in opposing them, one would reach the goal faster
if the spiritual practice is utilized to progress towards
the God-principle (Purushatattva), i.e., to become one
with the Name (of God) that one chants. |
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- H.H. Bhaktaraj Maharaj
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|| GURUKRUPAYOGA
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