The Holy Mother’s 150 Birthday falls on 22nd December
THE
HOLY MOTHER – A HOMAGE
S. Jagadisan
She is Sri
Ramakrishna’s final word on the ideal of Indian womanhood: Sister Nivedita.
Modern man,
having acquired all the external necessities has yet to find that one cohesive
quality or force of unconditional love without which his life is incomplete or
unhappy: Sarah N. David, A. Vedanta
student from California.
Invocation: On June 5, 1872 (according to another version it was May 25,
1873), an event of tremendous significance in the annals of spirituality took
place at the Kali temple in Dakshineswar in Calcutta. It was a day of special
worship of Kali. Sri Ramakrishna asked his wife Sarada Devi to be seated on the pedestal meant for
the deity, offered her worship (called Shodasi Puja) and
addressed the following invocation. “O Divine Mother, Thou eternal virgin, the
mistress of all powers, and the abode of all beauty, deign to unlock for me the
gate of perfection. Sanctifying the
body and mind of this woman, do thou manifest thyself through her and do what
is auspicious. O Goddess, I prostrate myself before Thee again and again –
before Thee, eternal consort of Siva, the three-eyed, the golden-hued, the
indwelling Spirit in all, the giver of refuge, the auspicious among all
auspicious objects”.
Parentage and Marriage: Sarada Devi, daughter of Ramachandra Mukherjee and
Shyamala Sundari was born on December 22,1853 in the village Jayrambati,
Gadadhar (Sri Ramakrishna’s baptismal name) then a temple priest, was subject
to moods of trance. His odd ways
puzzled everyone. The only way to cure
him of what was considered “mental derangement” and restore him to “normality”
in the accepted sense of the term, was to get him married. Ramakrishna, instead of resisting the
proposal said to his parents, as if divinely inspired “Vain is your search in
this place and that. Go to Jayarambati
and there in the house of Ramachandra Mukherjee, you will find her who is marked
for me”. Sharada Devi was five
and Sri Ramakrishna twenty three when they were married.
Spiritual Counterpart: To be hailed
and revered as the Holy of Divine Mother is given to one in a million. By the worship already referred to, Sri
Ramakrishna elevated an unlettered village girl to that status and made her his
spiritual alter ego or counterpart.
Besides, he laid the foundation for her later involvement in his
spiritual mission. Their marriage was a
spiritual bond free from sensual disturbance.
After their marriage in 1859, Sarada Devi joined Sri Ramakrishna in
1872. He trained her for spiritual as
well as secular work. Her stay with him was punctuated with visits to her
village and his birthplace Kamarkapur.
From January 1885, she nursed him without break till his death in August
1886.
Disciples: Her disciple included
monks and householders. She adapted her
spiritual instruction and counselling to different temperaments and levels of
understanding. Language was no barrier
when she had to communicate with foreign disciples like Sister Nivedita,
Mcleod, Mrs. Ole Bull and Sister Deva Mata.
They basked in the sunshine of her maternal love. Sister Nivedita wrote in one of her letters
to the Holy Mother “Surely, you are the most wonderful thing of God, Sri
Ramakrishna’s chalice of His love for the world. Surely, the most wonderful things of the world are all quiet,
stealing unnoticed into our lives; the air and the sunlight, and the sweetness
of the gardens and the Ganges. These
are the silent things like you”. Sister
Deva Mata, an American disciple of the Ramakrishna Order said “Those who had
the rare blessing of living with the Holy Mother learnt that religion is a
sweet, natural and joyous thing; that purity and holiness were tangible
realities, that the odour of sanctity was literally a sweet perfume overlaying
and destroying the foulness of material selfishness. Compassion, devotion, God union were her very nature; one
scarcely knew that she possessed them.
It was through the soothing benediction of a word or touch that one
sensed their presence. Such lives are
like the river or the lake. The sun may
draw up its waters, but they fill again to refresh the earth. So, these saintly ones in body may be lifted
from our sight, but their holy influence falls back upon us to revive our
fainting hearts, and give us a new spiritual life, a new strength of purpose”.
A Mother to Everyone’s Needs: The Holy Mother had her share of
problems and responsibilities. She had
to suffer social taunt and ridicule.
The members of her family were uncooperative. In spite of the hostile social and domestic environment, she did
not swerve from her appointed duties, her Swadharma. She tendered to her domestic chores, like
sweeping the house, husking paddy, cleaning the utensils, and clearing the
leaves from which visitors (there was no end to their number) had eaten. She kept an open house, which like that of
Goldsmith’s village preacher “was known all the vagrant train”. Her compassion was boundless and embraced
people of all classes and faiths. Saint
or sinner – everyone found in her a mother to their needs. “There may be a bad
son, but never is there a bad mother”, says Adi Sankara. Her reply to the criticism that she was
indulgent to those who had fallen from virtue was “If my child gets covered
with mud or dust, is it not my duty to cleanse him and taken him on my
lap”? When a woman who had led a bad
life went to her in a penitent mood and made a confession, she embraced her
with great warmth and spoke reassuring words “Don’t despair for what you have
done. You will get over all your sinful
tendencies” She did not judge, but reformed all those who sought her
refuge. Such was her maternal solicitude. “To restore faith and courage in the
wavering, to inspire confidence in the weak, to disperse the clouds of despair
and depression, were powers which her personality carried with it”.
(Tapasyananda).
The Last Message: The Holy Mother was a personification of purity, gentleness,
compassion, forgiveness and wisdom. She
reconciled her spiritual ministration with her ordinary duties. She exemplified by what she was and what she
did that the ordinary can become the extraordinary. The Holy Mother shed her body on July 20, 1920. Her last message given to the world through
Mother of Annapurna, one of her devotees, was “If you want peace of mind, do
not find fault with others. Learn to
make the whole world your own. No one
is stranger. The whole world is your
own”.