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Chapter 9
THE SOVEREIGN SCIENCE OF SERVICE TO HUMANITY: YOGA OF SURRENDER
42. The Easy Way
6. The saints who had overflowing compassion for the masses therefore came forward assertively and said, “Let us extract the essence of the Vedas and give it to the whole world.” That is why Saint Tukaram said, ‘वेद अनंत बोलिला। अर्थ इतुकाचि साधिला ।’—‘There are innumerable teachings in the Vedas. But all that boils down to this.’ To what? To the Name of the Lord. That is the essence of the Vedas. The saints proclaimed that the Lord’s Name can lead one to moksha. The door to moksha was thus thrown wide open to all—to the women and the children, the workers and the peasants, the weak and the ignorant, the sick and the handicapped. Moksha that lay locked up in the Vedas was brought within the reach of everybody, thanks to the Lord Himself. A simple and easy way became available. Why cannot one’s ordinary day-to-day life, what one does as swadharma, one’s acts of service be infused with the spirit of yajna? Where is the need for other complicated and elaborated yajnas? Let your daily work itself be a yajna—let it be sacrificial in nature. 7. This is the royal way. ‘यानास्थाय नरो राजन्! न प्रमाद्येत कहिंचित्। धावत्रिमील्य वा नेत्रे न स्खलेन्न पतेदिह॥ ।।’—Even if you run on this road with closed eyes, there is no risk of stumbling or falling. The other way is like a sharpened razor’s edge: क्षुरस्य धारा निशिता दुरत्यया।The Vedic way is sharper than a sword’s edge and is thus extremely arduous. The way of devotion, the way of surrender and service to the Lord is easy. An engineer designs a road to the hill-top in such a way that we have no feeling of having climbed such a height till we reach the top. Therein lies his skill. This royal way too is designed with such skill. By this way one can reach God, while remaining where one is, through performing one’s swadharma. |
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