“Ishtabhrity”: What & Why
.. And old disciple approached Thakur in 1957. He knelt and between sobs
he said, "Thakur, your mercy saved my life…." Thakur waited until the
regained some control and then inquired what had happened.
"I was walking down Bowbazar Street in Calcutta
and the rain came. I rushed under an overhanging balcony. And then...,"
he wiped tears from his eyes "then I heard the voice...your voice in
my ear : ‘Get out ! Get out !’ and I went back in the rain. I'd only
gone twenty yards…” sob “...when the building....” sob “...crumbled
down and buried twelve people under it…” he broke down again,
Finally, “all Merciful...”
“—not
my mercy,” Thakur interrupted, “your mercy. Doing that morning offering
every day has been giving a daily nudge to your urge for existence.
After all these years, your urge for existence is stronger then your
urge for comfort. The urge for comfort took you under the balcony ; your
urge for existence, feeling threatened, pushed you back in the rain.
Any overpowering urge develops its own intuition--a drunkard or drug
addict intuitively recognizes another. So I say : it was your mercy. I
love your existence sincerely. Because you love me, you’ve grown to love
your existence.”
[ Ref: ‘Ocean In a Tea-cup’: by Ray Hauserman ]
"I
think," Thakur began, "that by offering something materially every day
to your Lord, energy is created. An attitude to fulfill Him is gradually
induced. This makes Him prominent and inexorably adjusts the passions
and desires towards a unified harmony and understanding. It helps to
establish a relationship between your deeds and thoughts with your
feeling of love. That's why I feel this daily, witling oblation or istobhrity unites individual effort with divine grace."
"How?"
"I
feel that individual effort is the motor-nerve part," Thakur explained
"That is, you feel a great self-satisfaction through this expansion,
Another thing, evolution is inevitable if there is a genuine urge. But,
urge without action or action without urge is not enough to attain the
state of grace. If there be no urge for unity behind your activity, you
only wade . . . you can neither soak your own mind nor the mind of
others. But, when you daily offer food or money gained through your own
effort for the maintenance of your Lord, the thought of Him Whom you
serve and fulfill through the sweat of your brow arises automatically.
In your heart, He becomes your very own. Just see how deep is the love
of the mother who serves her children through her own labour and pain.
This is why I believe that Isobhritty nurtures
practically a man's devotion to his Lord. The Lord becomes the Centre
and unconsciously Stimulates the man to relate everything he does with
the Lord, thus bringing integration to all. If there be the number ' 1
', the value goes on increasing as you add numbers to it... even
zeroes."
"But,
Thakur, how on earth can such a practice be maintained daily," the
young woman's voice was filled with disbelief. "...continued day after
day, month after month, year after year ..."
Thakur
smiled and said, "If you start with the same attitude you have toward
your daily food, then it is possible. Generally, we don't know from
where that food will come a month, a year or ten years hence. But,
because of that, we don't stop eating, just begin it now. Then start
planning how you can do it each day. Remember, the primary thing is not
the food nor the money for the Lord . . . neither is it the amount. The
vital point is the directed, practical manifestation of the urge to love
and to give to Him out of that love. That is, we cannot feel happy
without giving to Him . .without feeding Him. This feeling creates
energy within that makes one abler and abler. So I call it the prime
mover of existence."
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