ruupak maalaa: 1

|| shrii viShNave namaH ||

|| shrii gaNeshaay namaH ||

A word about the series

The series features a dialogue between two persons -- an instructor and a listener. This series will use ruupak-alankaar or metaphors. The metaphors will contain reference to existing stories within our splendid collection of texts like purana. The series, as intended right now, will contain thirty-two stories. Each story is a pearl and the whole series will thus form a garland -- Metaphor Garland or ruupak maalaa.

Pada 1



Glossary

Madhur - Sweet; Lalit - artistic; buddhi - wisdom; bala - strength; shubha - auspicious; dhana - wealth; rasanaa - tongue; hari - all pervading one; bhava - world; vaaraNa - absolver; vaaraya - request to absolve; moha - passion; kari - elephant.

Listener: I have heard that God is formless, then how can God be sweet or artistic? Why is God beyond strength and wisdom? How does God showers wealth and auspiciousness in our lives? Why is God beyond the scope of tongue or narration? Why should we continuously bow to Hari? Why is He called as absolver of this world? And, most importantly, why is passion being called as elephant?

Instructor: Beautiful! These questions are just beautiful, for persons ask questions related to God only when they become lucky. Let me answer your queries one by one; listen attentively.

God is indeed formless, but since He decided to make this world with qualities, He incarnates to preserve the order in this Universe. During His incarnation, He appears with all these qualities and pleases everyone around Him. That is why He is called as sweet and artistic.

Since God has created this universe and qualities within it, He cannot be subjected to them. For this reason, He is beyond wisdom, strength, or the scope of narration. With words, we can only narrate what lies within our universe. Thus the existence of God is beyond our words.

This universe is reciprocative in nature: whatever goes must come back. We should continuously bow to Hari out of love and devotion for Him. Even though He is beyond this world and the qualities, He respects the reciprocativity of the world and becomes a captive of His devotee.

Hear the concept of moksha. A soul is born again and again till it achieves moksha -- unification with the God. After attaining moksha, the soul is not born again and is saved from the pain of life. Many will argue with you that life is fun; however, don't forget that life in a body is not an eternal state while moksha is. If people find pleasure away from God, they must re-think about their opinion. God bestows moksha to us and hence is called as the Absolver.

Finally, in ancient time an elephant attained moksha by God's mercy. That is why, as a metaphor, passion is referred as an elephant.

Listener: This was simply superb! I am really very happy. Please! Pretty please! Tell me the story of the elephant and how he attained moksha.

(to be continued)