Fwd: the best friend

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Ananthanarayanan Vaidyanathan <kvananthanarayanan@gmail.com>
Date: Wed, May 12, 2010 at 5:49 AM
Subject: Re: the best friend
To: iyer venkatraman <venkat0357@gmail.com>

dear Venkat, the pandavas relied heavily on Dharma, It is recorded in Bharatha that the Kauravas consulted Sahadeva for the auspicious time to start the war so that they will be victorious.. And truthful to his study the youngest Pandava gave the correct muhurtham also. Krishna ( who had no preconceived notions on Dharma because He is the Dharma Artha Kama and Moksha) had to turn the wheel of time to turn the table in favour of Pandavas.. My dear friend, the virtue and vice are relative.. We are born and brought up to imbibe certain values which are sweet to us. The Asura of vedas becomes Ahura Mazda, the powerful God of Zend avesta of Parsis.
That is the reason why upanishads said and Mahabharatham reiterated... Nihitham guhaayam... the secrets of life are enclosed in a dark cave... the cave is defined as so many thing by so many in our spiritual lore.. Yes, let us follow the path brightened by our learned ancestors. One thing is sure, there is nothing left in spirituality for us to create...we can at best discover...and each discovery only reveals how ignorant we are. (धर्मस्य तत्त्वं निहतं गुहायां महाजनाः येन गतः स पन्था dharmasya tattvaṁ nihataṁ guhāyāṁ mahājanāḥ yena gataḥ sa panthā)
May krishna bless you
KVA

On Wed, May 12, 2010 at 5:16 AM, iyer venkatraman <venkat0357@gmail.com> wrote:

Yes Dr. Infinity,

Yaksha Prashna in Mahabharata covers the essential Philosophy of life and was sort of bhagavat gita for Yudhistra ! in catechismic format, A soul steeped in Dharma answers every question equanimity and from the field of extreme Wisdom-nothing could be more enlightening. What is not there in the Mahabharata cannot be found anywhere, Every character is a particular view-point of life -every level of consciousness is covered and under different circumstances-The Lord is unbiased even when he agrees to be Arjuna's Charioteer for he offers himself to both the Kauravas and the Pandavas - Similarly both ends of the scale are there for us to choose from- where and with what we align determines our life-i.e. the choices we make every moment of our life decides our course and therefore further choices too-truly its one long journey-

Happy experiencing

Yours Spiritually

venkat

On Wed, May 12, 2010 at 3:58 AM, Ananthanarayanan Vaidyanathan <kvananthanarayanan@gmail.com> wrote:

यक्षः
किंस्विद् आत्मा मनुष्यस्य किंस्विद् दैवकृतः सखा।
उपजीवनं किंस्विदस्य किंस्विदस्य परायणम्॥

युधिष्टिरः
पुत्र आत्मा मनुष्यस्य भार्या दैवकृता सखा।
उपजीवनं तु पर्जन्यो दानं अस्य परायणं॥

yakṣaḥ
kiṁsvid ātmā manuṣyasya kiṁsvid daivakṛtaḥ sakhā|
upajīvanaṁ kiṁsvidasya kiṁsvidasya parāyaṇam||
yudhiṣṭiraḥ
putra ātmā manuṣyasya bhāryā daivakṛtā sakhā|
upajīvanaṁ tu parjanyo dānaṁ asya parāyaṇaṁ|

यक्षप्रश्नं महाभारतं वनपर्वम्
yakṣapraśnaṁ mahābhārataṁ vanaparvam


The Yaksha asked,-
'What is the soul of man
Who is that friend bestowed on man by the gods?
What is man's chief support?
And what also is his chief refuge?

Yudhishthira answered,--'
The son is a man's soul:
the wife is the friend bestowed on man by the gods;
the clouds are his chief support;
and gift is his chief refuge.
It is the cardinal concept of Indian life that one's son is just the external growth of oneself, to be loved, to be possessed, to be trained and to be cherished as one would do for himself. The srutis say, when a son is born, while performing his samskaras, we have to tell him that you are born as a part of myself..aatma vai putra naamasi.. (here again gender is not important...it applies to the daughter also... ) . The best friend ordained by God himself for any man is his wife. Good or bad, learned or imbecile the man is, the poor woman always keeps his company. (The feminists may have a different view, but in our country the vast majority is like that. For the support of ones livelihood in this earth, the clouds that pour the nectar of pure water to sustain the earth and the life on it, is the most important factor. A man gains sustenance in the nether world by making bounteous gifts to the needy in this world and there for it is his refuge. Sometimes gift come as a refuge for the poor on this earth when it is recieved by the needy. The circumstances leading to the dialogue between Yaksha and Yudistira is already explained earlier.