The Sacred Duty of Every Man : 6.

-




Before concluding, we shall draw inspiration from some of the sublime, soul-elevating demonstrations of this great quality of love for animals which bygone great ones have given to us.

After all, when everything is said and done, we can get the greatest guidance for our conduct in life from the practical examples of saints and sages. It is the most unfailing guide, and the most inspiring and vital spark which enthuses us to live the life of virtue, of divinity. We have before us the sublime example of the Prince-Incarnate of Compassion, Gautama Buddha.

You know how Buddha gave us the ideal life of conduct towards animals, when he demonstrated his perfect sense of oneness with them by offering himself at the sacrificial post for the sake of the poor goat to be sacrificed in the Yajna of Bimbisara. Then, you have heard about the noble gesture of King Sibi; in order to save the life of a dove, he offered his own body to the vulture which had come in pursuit of the dove. We have yet another sublime example of the great King Dil.


While he is out hunting, he encounters a lion which is about to pounce upon a cow. At once he says: "This should not be victimised by you". The lion says: "I am hungry". He replies: "I am here; I offer myself to you to appease your hunger". This is a lofty example of the feeling we should have towards animals. We have also the practical examples of the saintly beings of Mohammed and Christ. We learn that Mohammed was one of the most compassionate of men; especially he had the softest and tenderest heart for all animals. And, St. Francis was a great lover of animals. To him all animals were like brothers, and their welfare was the thing dear to his heart.

Sri Swami Chidananda

To be continued  ...



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

What is Knowledge : Ch-5 -3.

-
Image
Chapter 5: Maintaining One's Position-3. What are you going to understand when you are trying to understand yourself? Where is the object? And which is the subject there? When I see an object, I say, "I see this. I know this table, this desk, this person, this something that is in front of me"; but I am not in front of me, so I cannot make such statements in regard to my own self. I cannot say, "I am seeing myself"; nor can I say, "I am touching myself". These statements, which usually apply to persons and things outside, do not apply to our own self. Hence, this understanding may not be adequate for the purpose of understanding your own self. All knowledge fails when it becomes a means to the knowledge of one's own self, though it becomes a great success when it is a weapon to know what is not itself. There is this peculiar difficulty which is easy to miss, because of the fact that the only thing that we miss in our daily o...
Read more

What is Knowledge : Ch-4. Part-4.

-
Image
Chapter 4 : Yoga – An Integration of Consciousness. Pat-4. It is only the discriminating consciousness that feels dissatisfied with its present achievements. Ignorance is bliss, and when we know nothing about what lies ahead of us, and we are not even conscious of there being anything at all beyond our possessions and our areas of operation and action, we are kept in a state of This ignorance also brings a sort of joy, because of the disconnection of consciousness from the awareness of there being something beyond itself. So, the ignorant person is happy, and we too are happy, though we know very well that our very physical existence here is not secure. It is a terrible insecurity in which we are placed, and the next moment's fate of our physical existence is not known to any wise man in the world; yet, we are happy. This is an instance of how ignorance can be bliss. However, yoga is that art of awakening the sleeping consciousness of the human individual to...
Read more

VEDANTA FOR BEGINNERS - 23. SWAMI SIVANANDA.

-
Image
  ----------------------------------------- Sunday, January 03, 2021. 08:06. AM. 3. ADHYAROPA OR SUPERIMPOSITION-2. Post-23. -------------------------------------------------- You are in search of a rope. You find one. But in the dark you mistake it to be a snake. You run away from it. You search all other places in the house and fail to find a rope. Your brother brings a light and shows you the rope which you mistook for a snake. You now see the rope. Just as you found the rope in the snake itself, even so, you will see Brahman in the objects of the world themselves. You cannot run away to the mountain-caves in search of Brahman. You have to practise seeing the Lord or Brahman in each and every object around you. When you are able to cognise the Reality underlying the objects, you will no more be deluded. ------------------------- The highly exalted Brahmanishtha-Guru for whom there is no world comes down from his exalted state to teach the disciple. He is even then fully consciou...
Read more