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Sloka 115 from Dancing with Siva
What Is the Home Shrine's Significance?
Every Saivite maintains a home shrine. It is the most beautiful room in the house, an extension of the temple, the abode for Deities and devas, and a holy refuge for daily worship and meditation. Aum Namah Sivaya.
Bhashya
Every Saivite home centers around the home shrine, a special room set aside and maintained to create a temple-like atmosphere in which we conduct puja, read scripture, perform sadhana, meditate, sing bhajana and do japa. Here the presence of the Gods is always felt, and we remember them especially morning and evening and before meals, which we offer to them before we partake. Worship traditionally begins before dawn, with the simple act of dedication for the coming day. After a bath, morning puja is performed which includes the repetition of the Gayatri or other mantras and is followed by sadhanas given by one's guru. The form of home worship, atmartha puja, is simple: the Deities are invoked and offerings are made. After the final arati, or offering of the light, we supplicate them to bestow their grace on us, our family and all devotees. Evening devotionals include a simple arati, bhajana, meditation and reading of scripture, which carries one to lofty celestial realms during sleep. The Agamas affirm, "Worship of one's chosen Linga by anyone in their own home for divine protection is called atmartha puja." Aum Namah Sivaya.
Lesson 270 from Living with Siva
Finding Personal Peace
An individual can find total peace within himself, not through meditation alone--though peaceful actions must follow introspection--not through drugs, not through psychology or psychiatry, but through control. Peace is the natural state of the mind. It is there, inside, to be discovered in meditation and then radiated out to others. How do we bring individuals to this point? Let them go for one year without experiencing confusion in their thinking, covetousness of another's goods, even the urge to be hurtful to solve a problem, and not experiencing fear, anger or jealousy. After that year, they will be very peaceful persons. This is because of the soul knowledge they will have gained in overcoming these base instinctive forces, which will release their consciousness to the natural peace of the higher mind. If the educational system promotes it in every community, the greatest potential for peace will be achieved. The educational system is controlled by the adults, so they have to come to terms with the fact that they must not be hurtful, physically, mentally or emotionally, and they must accept the basic principles of the Sanatana Dharma: all-pervasive energy, cause and effect, and coming back in a physical birth until all scores are settled. Once the adults accomplish this, these basic principles of life will naturally be passed on to the next generation. But the fact is that even though mature souls may have achieved peace, others are coming up through the instinctive nature. In a complete humanity, there are always those of higher consciousness and those of lower consciousness. At this time on the planet it is the intrinsic duty of higher-consciousness people to be more self-assertive, let their voices be heard and take up the banner in a heroic way, join committees, enter government, while at the same time maintaining the peace within their own home and holding a benign reverence for all living beings. As the vibration of planet Earth changes, the mood of the people will change. Ahimsa begins in the home, in the bedroom, in the kitchen, in the garden, in the living room. When himsa, harmfulness, arises in the home, it must be settled before sleep, or else those vrittis, those waves of the mind, which were disturbed by the creation of the situation will go to seed, to erupt at a later time in life. We cannot expect the children to control themselves if the parents do not control themselves. Those who attain a personal peace by controlling their instinctive nature become the spiritual leaders of human society. People who do become these leaders retroactively control the masses because of their spirit, their soul force--not because of their mind force, their cleverness, their deceptions, their political power, their money or contacts. They are the people in the higher consciousness who control lower consciousness by lifting up the masses, as parents are supposed to uplift their children. Achieving a nonviolent world would simply mean that all individuals have to somehow or other reconcile their differences enough that the stress those differences produce can no longer take over their mind, body and emotions, causing them to perform injurious acts. Again, this would begin in the home. Peaceful homes breed gentle people. Gentle people follow ahimsa. Furthermore, the belief structure of each individual must allow for the acceptance of the eternal truths--returning to flesh to reabsorb back the karmic energies released in a previous life, and of course, the belief in the existence of an all-pervading power. As long as our beliefs are dualistic, we will continue to generate antagonism, and that will erupt here and there in violence. At an international and national level, we must become more tolerant. Religious leaders and their congregations need to learn and teach tolerance for everyone and everything, and for other faiths. First this must be taught to the religious leaders themselves, the ministers, rabbis, imams, rishis, swamis, acharyas, bhikkus, sants and priests. Tolerance and intolerance are basic attitudes found in our belief systems. These are things that one can learn. In our various nations, in the United Nations and other world organizations we can promote laws which recognize and take action against crimes of violence. The world must as a body come to the conclusion that such crimes are totally unacceptable. To abhor violence is a state of higher consciousness.
Sutra 270 of the Nandinatha Sutras
The Quest For Monastic Candidates
All my devotees search for souls ripe to enter the monastery, realizing that the core of my Saiva Church is its Saiva Siddhanta Yoga Order, and many old souls are being born to perpetuate our lineage. Aum Namah Sivaya.
Lesson 270 from Merging with Siva
The Way of The Bachelor
Of course, not all are necessarily able to set forth with perfect clarity in life. Thus, both the renunciate and householder communities accept singles who are not selfish and self-indulgent, who gather together into their respective home-like environments, sharing finance, food and worship. It is in Hindu culture the way of the unmarried devotees, who, whether woman or man, wears white and abjures the family dharma while not necessarily joining an ashram, wandering as a sadhu or following any monastic regimen. This is not a formal path, but it is a spiritual lifestyle which if successfully fulfilled is an alternative for those who cannot follow one of the two traditional paths. Singles who succeed in living harmoniously with one or more like-minded individuals may be considered worthy to enter ashrams in association with a guru and under the authority of a rigorous discipline greater than they could provide for themselves. This might be called the way of the spiritual bachelor or spinster--the brahmachari or brahmacharini. These are humble men and women, often under simple vows, who are not following the traditional renunciate path, but don't intend to marry and so remain celibate and dedicate themselves to serving God, Gods, guru and humanity. Among them are those who are still deciding between the two paths, even at a later age. It usually does not include those whose spouse has passed on or who have suffered a divorce, as they are considered still a spouse, nor others whose heavy karmas would disallow them from entering a traditional order for one or more reasons. This life of bachelor or spinster can, when strictly and sincerely followed, be a joyous and useful life in service to dharma and fulfillment of spiritual goals. This is provided that devotees do not isolate themselves but eagerly and persistently serve the family community and the renunciate community with dedicated, cooperative effort, and get along one with another in harmony, love and trust, in the spirit of true Sivathondu, service to Siva, never alienating themselves from others, but stepping forward as best they can to serve selflessly and wholeheartedly. The positive cooperation of their untiring energies is truly recognized in all three worlds. There is another group that has no path, who neither marry nor follow the path of discipline and who are self-indulgent, unwilling to live with others and benefit from hastening their karmas through interaction, so that this puts many of their karmas on hold for another life. These souls think they are making spiritual progress, but they are, in fact, making new unwholesome karmas through a selfish lifestyle of noncommitment and unexamined egocentricities. They fail to realize or accept that interaction with others, whether householders or monastics, is needed to bring up quickly the karmas to be resolved in this birth and perhaps the next, and that avoidance of others offers no stimulus for progress. Such single men and women may delude themselves into thinking they are sadhus, mendicants, yogis or mystics, but in actuality they have invented their own routines which are not in harmony with the sadhu path of strictness and tradition. Following a self-chosen, self-defined path, they answer up to no one and, therefore, deal with the clever avoidance syndrome. They are considered to be like children by both the renunciate and the householder. Both groups constantly work to set aright these obstinate, unruly seekers, to bring them into a lifestyle of unselfish behavior, of interaction with others, encouraging them to replace egocentric patterns and preferences with the higher qualities of selfless service, group involvement and, above all, prapatti, humility, total surrender to the Divine within the temple and themselves. They are encouraged to overcome anger, back-biting, fear, jealousy, overt intellectual knowing, and talkativeness with the sadhana of silence, mauna, to bring forth the humility needed to make spiritual progress in this life. Many, however, are sincerely committed to noncommitment. Strange as it may seem, these unguided souls use up their allotted time for guidance and then beg for more. Those who walk on neither of the two paths are a daily burden to both the householder and the sannyasin.
