Spirituality: Īśvara’s devotee never suffers
By Swami Viditatmananda Saraswati*
Na Me Bhaktaḥ Praṇaśyati – 14
Lord Krishna says, “Na me bhaktaḥ praṇaśyati, my bhakta will never suffer ruin,” meaning that the devotee is always under Lord Krishna’s protection. The devotee will not suffer loss or harm.
Branding an event as ruin or loss is only a perception. Our judgement of an event is based only on very limited knowledge of a short span of time, which we call the present. We do not know what happened in countless past lifetimes and we do not know what will come in the future, so we cannot say that we have adequate knowledge and reasons to brand an event as pleasant or unpleasant, gain or loss. Our judgement is only a perception.
The bhakta’s perception is that everything is always grace. Therefore, he does not perceive any ruin, harm, or loss. The mind must undergo a transformation from being a mind that demands things to happen according to its desires, to being a mind that is happy with whatever happens.
Īśvara knows what he is doing. He is omniscient and all-knowing. He knows the past, present, and future. I might brand what happens in the present as unpleasant or undesirable, but I do not know what effect it will have in the future. I can either judge the result and feel miserable, or I can accept it as īśvara’s judgement and proceed with my life.
This well-known story illustrates that attitude of acceptance: An old man had a young son who caught a wild horse in the forest one day and brought it home. The man’s friends and neighbours congratulated him on his good fortune in acquiring a horse for free. He said, “Whatever God decides is fine.” The next day, as the boy was riding that untrained, wild horse, it threw him off and ran away. The boy was badly injured and confined to bed for six months. The same friends and neighbours consoled the man at the misfortune of his son’s injuries. Again he said, “Whatever God decides is fine.” A few weeks later, his country declared war and all the young men were drafted into the army. Again, the neighbours congratulated the man on his good fortune that his son was still too injured to be drafted, and once again he said, “Whatever God decides is fine.”
Whatever īśvara does is right
Another story, about a king and his minister, also illustrates that ruin is only a perception. The minister was a devotee whose constant refrain was, “Whatever īśvara does is right.” No matter what happened, the minister would repeat this like a parrot. One day, while the minister and king were talking, a servant brought a plate full of ripe mangoes. Despite protests from the servant, the king insisted on cutting the mangos himself. The king had never used a knife to cut mangoes, so in the process, he cut his finger and started bleeding and screaming. As usual, the minister said, “Whatever īśvara does is right.” That was a politically unwise thing to say. The king screamed, “What do you mean this is right?” He ordered that the minister be thrown in prison. As the minister was led away, again he said, “Whatever īśvara does is right.”
In time, this event was forgotten. The king’s finger still had a bandage, but it was more or less healed. One day, the king went hunting in a forest with his retinue. They came across a deer and he wanted to shoot it, but the deer ran away. The king chased after it, following the deer deep into the forest. Eventually, the deer disappeared and the king discovered that he was separated from his retinue and lost in the middle of the forest. Tired and hungry, he fell asleep in the shade of a tree.
He was awakened by the sound of bugles and saw that he was surrounded by many tribal people equipped with bows, arrows, and swords. He asked, “What do you want?” They replied, “We know you are a king. We are taking you with us.” The king was taken to a village deep in the forest where a big fire ritual had been going on for many days. They told him, “Tomorrow is the conclusion of the ceremony when we will offer you into the fire.” When the king asked why, they explained that the region had suffered drought for five years and the priest had recommended a ceremony in which a perfect person is the offering. The priest had prophesied that the person would come. They concluded, “We know that you are a king and therefore we know you are perfect.” The poor king had nothing to say.
The next day, they bathed him, gave him good clothes and ornaments, fed him good food, and brought him to the altar for the sacrifice. All the mantras were chanted and the priest had raised his sword. But before bringing down the sword, the priest shouted “No! Wait, wait! This will not work.” “Why not?” asked the people. The priest answered, “Look, he is not perfect. His finger is cut. That won’t work.” The king breathed a huge sigh of relief and was released.
In fifteen days, the king found his way back to his kingdom, where he invited the whole town to hear the story. In conclusion, he said, “The minister was right when he said that whatever īśvara does is right. Even though my finger was cut, it turned out to be good. I am alive because of that cut alone.” He added, “Call the minister. We must reward him.”
After rewarding the humble minister, the king asked, “When I threw you in prison, you said that whatever īśvara does is right. What is right about being in prison?” The minister replied, “Sir, under normal circumstances, I would have accompanied you when you went hunting and I would have been with you when you chased the deer. Two of us would have been lost and they would have arrested us both. Then, when they found that you were not perfect, who would have been the next to be offered? It’s good that I was in prison.”
The point of the story is that we do not know what effect a current event will have in the time to come. Therefore, we leave it to īśvara. He knows what he is doing. This is called surrender, bhakti.
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*Swami Viditatmananda Saraswati has been teaching Vedānta Prasthānatrayī and Prakaraṇagranthas for the last 40 years in Ahmedabad, Gujarat. Throughout the year, he conducts daily Vedānta discourses, accompanied by retreats, and Jñāna Yajñas on Vedānta in different cities in India and foreign countries.
Jai Shree Krishna 🤗🌷 swamiji
Sheetal