Srih:
The need for guidance is
strongly felt in todays society right from Youngsters to elders in pursuit of
their respective materialistic and spiritual goals of life. Even the highly
intelligent and knowledgeable Arjuna was perplexed on the performance of his
duties. People fail to realize the temporary nature of their material pursuits
and thus drown themselves in the ocean of anxiety and fleeting material
pleasures.
We observe in our general
lives the great distress and separation a mother feels for her son who is away
abroad although another son is with her; similarly the Supreme Lord Narayana
being the Supreme Father and Mother of all living entities feels great
separation for his jivatmas residing in the other side of Viraja Nadhi in
Samsara Mandala although he is being served with all devotion and opulence by
unlimited eternally liberated souls(Nitya Suris) in Sri Vaikuntha. This is
confirmed in the Vishnu Suktha i.e “tad visnoh paramam padam sada
pasyanti surayah”. If a normal
father and mother who is related to us for few
years can have so much
attachment to their children; one can hardly imagine the unlimited affection
the Supreme Lord can have for his jivatmas who are eternally related to him as
his part and parcels. This is confirmed in the Bhagavad Gita “mamai
vamso jiva loke jiva
bhuta sanatana” i.e every living being is a part and parcel of the Supreme
Lord Narayana i.e Shariram of the Supreme Lord. When someone harms any part of
our body we immediately experience pain as it is a part of my own body;
similarly as all jivatmas are his own shariram; the Supreme Lord experiences
severe pain and anxiety seeing them suffer in the samsara which is an ocean of
birth and death. Thus out of his natural affection for his children (jivatmas); he
takes several endeavors’ to reclaim the fallen atmas from the deep and
dangerous ocean of samsara marked with repeated birth and deaths. He first
decided to create Vedas, which is in the form of instruction for the mankind,
taking help of which anyone can attain the goal of moksha. Unfortunately on
account of its extreme complexity there were hardly any to attain him. He then
decided to himself reincarnate and practice what he himself preached to set an
example for the common men to attain him, however this was in vain as only
vidwans and rishis could recognize him and follow his path. As a last endeavor
he decided to empower certain jivatmas with his shakthi so that they could make
some difference in the lives of common men by their own example just like an
hunter catches an elephant using an
another elephant. Thus arose galaxies of acharyas in our Sanatana Dharma fold
who not only preached the esoteric philosophies with its meanings from the
Veda- Vedantam to the common men but who also practiced what they preached in
their daily lives thus establishing a wonderful Role Model for the common men
to follow.
The word Guru means one who
is heavy in Knowledge. He is competent to destroy the ajñāna of his disciple by his instructions. The Supreme Lord
Krishna in his Gita stresses the importance of Guru and the necessity to
surrender ourselves to him i.e “tad viddhi pranipatena pariprasnena sevaya
upadeksyanti te jnanam jnaninas tattva-darsinah”. The Srimad Bhagavatham 11.17.27 says “acaryam
mam vijaniyam navamanyeta karhicit na martya-buddhyasuyeta sarva-deva-mayo
guruh:” i.e. An Acharya is a direct representative of the Supreme
Lord and non-different from him, he is an embodiment of all the devas as his
life is dedicated to the mission of the Supreme Lord to establish Dharma all
over the world. Thus he must not be envied by the common men either in their
mind, words, action or deeds. He is an embodiment of mercy of the Supreme Lord
as he acts as a media to understand the spiritual truths hidden in the Vedas.
The common men on account of the defects of their materialistic sense organs do
not have the capacity to either perceive or understand the absolute truth by
their own mental speculation as bhagavan and the spiritual subject matters are
transcendental i.e above the influence of the 3 Gunas i.e. Sattva, Rajas
and Tamas. Thus it is confirmed in the Mundaka Upanishad 1.2.12 “ tad-vijnanartham
sa gurum evabhigachhet samit panih srotriyam brahma nistham” i.e “ In order
to learn the transcendental science, one must approacha guru in the disciplic
succession who is fixed in the absolute truth. The Vana Parva 313.117 of the
Mahabharatha states “ dharmasya tattvam nihitam guhayam mahajano yena gatah
sa panthah “ It is very difficult to understand the science of the Supreme
unless one learns under the footsteps of acharyas in diciplic succession.“.
Bhagavat Gita confirms “evam parampara praptam..” i.e “ This Supreme
science was thus received through the chain of disciplic succession “ . Also as
confirmed by Adi Sankaracharya “Narayana paro avyakthat”. The nature of
the Supreme Lord as being superior to the Prakrthi is also confirmed in the
Srimad Bhagavatham which is the essence of all the Puranas i.e “namasye puruṣaḿ tvādyam. īśvaraḿ prakṛteḥ
param “ . Its
confirmed in the Upanishads “ tamasah: parasthat “ i.e “ The supreme
Lord is transcendental to the Prakrthi Mandala. Thus as Bhagavan is superior to
the ordinary conditional souls, is there any possibility for the jivatmas to
realize and attain him? ; as bhagavan stresses in Gita : “ janma karma ca me
divyam evam yo vetti tattvatah: “ i.e “One who understands in truth the
nature of my appearance and actions; upon leaving this body does not take birth
again but attains the Supreme abode of the Lord. Also Upanishads confirm “
tattva jnanat moksha labah: ajnanat samsarah:” i.e “ One who realizes the
Truth attains Moksha and the others take repeated births in Samsara. “ . Thus
in answer to this; the Upanishads reply “ yasya deve para bhakthir yatha
deve tatha gurou “ i.e “ Only unto
those who has unflinching faith and Bhakthi unto both Guru and Bhagavan; unto
him all the imports of the vedic literatures are automatically revealed. The Mundaka Upanishad(3.2.3) states “ nayam
atma pravacanena labhyo na medhaya na bahuna srutena” i.e “ One cannot become self realized by ordinary
mundane academic education neither by ones own intelligence but by only the
causeless mercy of the Supreme Absolute truth. This mercy is obtained via the
medium of an acharyas.
Thus the importance of
acharyas/ vaishnavas who are the torchbearers of vedic knowledge is deeply
stressed and elaborated in all the vedic literatures. Now we shall study some
of their unique qualities which what makes them very dear to the Supreme Lord
Sri Hari with the light of some of their pastimes mentioned in the Guru
Parampara
