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00:00Azarji Namaskar. My name is Veshra Ajatikari. I'm from Nepal. And I want to ask you a question
00:11on Shraddha ceremony. Shraddha. Shraddha ceremony. If death is merely a transition
00:24or form within the universe, as you have just explained, what is the most meaningful way to
00:33remember a loved one who has passed? Is the traditional Hindu Shraddha ceremony still
00:41relevant in this context or is there a more authentic approach? Please help me understand.
00:48The best way to remember and honor the ones you have loved as your ancestors is by becoming
01:08what they were destined to become. I'll talk in a very worldly and practical way.
01:23If you have kids, if you have grandkids and if you claim you are truly loving, you'd probably
01:34want them to be much better than you. That often does not materialize. But that is the
01:43ideal. My kid should do better than me. My kid should do better than me. And that is what
01:53is supposed to please the parents. That remains an utopia. Fine. I understand. But in an ideal
02:01sense, the kid should become better than me and that would please the parents. What is the epitome
02:08of betterment? That which Shri Krishna calls as your niyate, liberation. So that is the greatest
02:21form of love that the parents can have for the kid. Let the kid be liberated. And when I say parents,
02:32that's an umbrella term to cover all your ancestors. All your ancestors. We are calling them as parents.
02:41They would want you to do much better than they did. Correct. Being parents, we want you to do much
02:49better than we did. That's the expectation. That's the hope. That's what parents often live for.
02:57Let the kid do better than how we are doing. So then what is the tribute that the kid can offer
03:07to all the parents, the entire chain of ancestors. Do much better than them. That is Shad.
03:22They have bequeathed a responsibility. And what is the responsibility? What is the ultimate responsibility
03:32of existence? Liberation. Liberation. And that is the greatest respect you can offer them.
03:44I am trying
03:49to complete your unfinished agenda. You were born to be liberated.
03:56That yet remains unfinished. I will do what you could not. And that will make you happy. Because isn't
04:08that what you always wanted from me? To do better than you? You wanted me to do better than you?
04:18You did what you could. Now I will do what I can. And thanks to you, probably I can do better than you.
04:25It is probably only because of you that I can do better than you. Are you getting it? Now, that brings us
04:33to a very interesting point. Because liberation, Shubhankar. Liberation. Liberation is not just individual.
04:47Whatsoever is individual is ego. We know that. There is nothing called individual liberation. There can be
04:57individual hunger and that is ego. The entire world might be separating. You might still be in sorrow. All that is ego.
05:04So, when you talk of completing the agenda of the past by working towards your liberation,
05:15then that liberation has to be all-inclusive. That includes then the entire universe, at least the entire
05:22planet. That includes compassion for everything that can suffer or suffers. And that too becomes very
05:34justified and very obvious when you realize that every being here is actually your ancestor.
05:43Aren't we all coming, all sentient beings, aren't we all coming from the single parent cell
05:59that became all sentient beings?
06:00And therefore, when you are talking of your ancestors, does that also not include all the birds and
06:11animals and all the blades of grass that have ever lived and perished?
06:19Which basically then implies that when you are working for your liberation, you have to work for the
06:24liberation of the entire planet. I am saying planet because we do not know the rest of the universe
06:31as of now. Are you kidding? Your lineage, your pedigree, your inheritance is not one particular line
06:44separated from rest of existence. We often say, you know, he comes in my line, he comes in my
06:53lineage. But it is not a line, it is a web. It is not a one-dimensional line, it is a three-dimensional
07:01web that we come from. And therefore, we are all brothers and sisters in that sense. We are all coming
07:09from the same parent. Hence, we are brothers and sisters. Hence, we have to work for the entire planet.
07:17And that is what is tribute. That is what Shraddha should mean. Realizing your true ancestry
07:27and working for all your brothers and sisters. Because if we are coming from the same parent,
07:32can the parent be happy if my brothers and sisters are suffering?
07:37I have three siblings. I have three siblings. I have three siblings and they are all suffering.
07:46And I want to please my parents. How do I please my parents? By helping my siblings.
07:53That should be the meaning of Shraddha. The entire existence is my siblings.
07:59Can my parents be happy if my brothers and sisters are suffering? Is that possible in your family? No,
08:06not possible. So, if you want to please your parents, help your siblings. How do you help your siblings?
08:13First, by liberating yourself of ignorance. So, these two things. Liberate yourself of ignorance
08:20and help the entire planet. That should be the meaning of Shraddha.
08:23Shraddha. Instead, Shraddha has become an entire elaborate ceremony of superstition.
08:35This, that and souls are floating in some other universe and they come down and they are hungry
08:45and they are this and they are a stock of crows and sparrows and all kinds of crude superstition.
09:00That is not at all to be called as religious. Your belief systems
09:06should not be honored with the label of religion.
09:18Your superstitions should not be sanctified with the tag of religion.
09:29You just call them as your personal belief system. You are entitled to that. Fine.
09:33I believe that. But do not call that as religion. That is not religion.
09:39Religion is self-discovery to be liberated from bondage. That is religion. All else is nonsense.
09:46Nonsense in the name of religion. Grand nonsense.
09:53But nevertheless, just nonsense.
10:03This idea that there are souls floating somewhere are against the very grain of all religiosity.
10:19The Bhagavad Gita especially makes it very clear there is no soul floating anywhere.
10:23In fact, the Bhagavad Gita is an entire argument just against the concept of souls.
10:29Arjun comes up with the argument of souls in chapter 1 itself. Arjun says, you know,
10:35my parents and all our ancestors, the great ones who passed away,
10:39they will be in trouble if I accept to fight this war. Arjun's argument in chapter 1 of Bhagavad Gita.
10:52The souls are there and they accept the food and water and tributes only according to certain procedures.
11:00And the procedures mandate that the offspring should be of pure varna.
11:21If the offspring
11:25is hybrid
11:27mixed varna becomes varna sankar, then the great forefathers will refuse to accept the offering.
11:39And if they do that, then they return hungry and thirsty and a great curse will fall on the kingdom.
11:47Arjun's argument.
11:51And why will the varna sankar be born?
11:54Because if this war actually does happen, all the men will be killed, all the kshatriya men.
12:00Therefore, all the kshatriya women will go and mate with non-kshatriya people, men.
12:07And kshatriya women
12:10with non-kshatriya varna's
12:12will produce varna sankars and those varna sankars
12:15will offend the souls of our forefathers.
12:21Therefore, Krishna, I will not fight.
12:24That is the argument the Bhagavad Gita begins with.
12:27And then the 17 chapters are just to invalidate this argument.
12:33But look at the crudeness of the irony.
12:37Bhagavad Gita itself is used to justify the soul.
12:42They say, you know, it is in the Bhagavad Gita that Shri Krishna is talking
12:46of the transmigration of the soul.
12:48No, no, no.
12:51You are totally misinterpreting the Gita.
12:54It is Arjun who is talking of the soul and such nonsense.
12:57Sri Krishna is very clear. There is the Atma, which is the Parmarthic truth.
13:05And there is Prakrati, which is the Vyavaric truth.
13:09There is nothing called Jivatma.
13:13Atma is the highest truth and the Atma does not engage in anything.
13:17Atma is the name of the greatest disengagement.
13:21Greatest disinterest.
13:27Greatest apathy.
13:32Atma is just a witness.
13:33Does not participate in anything.
13:36Does not enter a body.
13:37Does not leave a body.
13:38Is never born, never dies.
13:41Is infinite.
13:42Cannot be contained in anything.
13:45How can it transmigrate?
13:46Atma has nothing to do with Prakrati.
13:52Your body is Prakrati.
13:54Atma by definition is that which does not engage with Prakrati.
13:59So that is the highest truth, Atma.
14:02And then there is the Vyavaric truth.
14:05The Prakrati.
14:06The body is Prakrati.
14:07Body comes out of the soil, falls into the soil.
14:10There is nothing called the soul.
14:11All the behaviors that you find displayed by the body are behaviors of the soil.
14:17Yes, it is the soil that talks.
14:19It hurts the ego.
14:22Is the soil that talks?
14:23Yes, it is the soil that talks through the body.
14:25Nothing else.
14:26There is no talker inside.
14:29We believe that there is the body.
14:31And then there is somebody inside the body who is talking.
14:33No, it is the body that talks.
14:35It is the body that feels.
14:37No, but you know, there must be somebody.
14:39My emotions, they are the emotions of the soil, sir.
14:43It hurts you to accept that.
14:46But come on, grow up, man up, show some courage.
14:54But my love, yes, it is just chemicals coming from the soil.
15:01One molecule of the soil falling in attraction of another molecule.
15:05It is soil that loves.
15:09What you call as love is a very soiled thing.
15:13Therefore.
15:20No, but you know, tell me if it is only the body
15:24and there is no soul, then how does death happen?
15:27Surely something pops out of the body in the moment of death.
15:31No, sir.
15:33Just as a rusted old iron bridge crumbles one particular day.
15:40That's all.
15:42And death is not a particular
15:46moment.
15:47It's a constant happening.
15:56How did the bridge collapse?
15:59Gradually and then suddenly.
16:04It was always happening.
16:07How did the bank collapse?
16:09Gradually and then suddenly.
16:12A man collapses just as a bank does.
16:20You have always been in a process of gradual collapse.
16:23And then one day you just fall.
16:25Just like a rusted old bridge.
16:28Has it suddenly rusted?
16:29It has always been rusting, rusting, rusting, rusting, rusting, rusting.
16:32And one day it falls.
16:33That is death.
16:34It is a very chemical thing.
16:35It is a very soily thing.
16:37There is nothing to involve the soul here.
16:42Soil, not soul.
16:46Soil, not soul.
16:48That's the human being.
16:52No, but something must be going out of the body when we die.
16:55Does something go out of the bridge when it collapses?
16:59When the bridge collapses, does something go out of the bridge?
17:02No, it just collapses.
17:03Similarly,
17:03When the iron turns into iron oxide, rust, does it retain its old properties?
17:13No.
17:14Similarly, when your body collapses, it does not retain its old properties.
17:19What are the old properties?
17:21Speech is a property of the body.
17:25Hot is a property of the body.
17:27Intellect is a property of the body.
17:29Just as a rusted bridge loses its old properties.
17:34Similarly, a dead body loses its old properties.
17:37It will not talk anymore.
17:41It was a property of the body.
17:46Are you getting it?
17:47Shraddha must be a time to realize these things.
17:51And that is the greatest tribute you can pay to your ancestors.
17:56I am doing what you are destined to do.
18:02Mankind is on a journey.
18:04We know the journey of evolution.
18:06Frederick Nietzsche talked of the Superman.
18:11He said, we are still evolving and we will one day become the Superman.
18:15Darwin took us backwards.
18:16He said, you know, you are coming from the monkey.
18:19Nietzsche took us forward and he said, you must go on and become the Superman.
18:24So, the entire journey is from the monkey to the Superman, from Darwin to Nietzsche.
18:33You have to complete that journey.
18:36Let Shraddha be repurposed to become a reminder of the remaining journey.
18:45Shraddha must be a time to reinvigorate and re-intensify your efforts towards challenging your bondages.
19:02Shraddha is not all the nonsense that is peddled in the name of rituals.
19:13What I am saying is not some modern thought.
19:19What I am saying is pure core Vedanta.
19:22It is just that we never bothered to really understand what our scriptures are saying.
19:33We were so afraid and so egoistic that we superimposed our personal belief on our scriptures.
19:40Let that change.
19:49Else we will keep suffering.
19:50Thank you, that's it.
20:04Thank you, that's it.
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