Guru Poornima
This Guru-poornima of today, which coincides with a red lunar eclipse reflects a different full moon (poornima). It is a red moon!!
Amongst the ancient Rishis and gurus of India, the re-affirmation & re-establishment of the essential fundamentals of Vedic knowledge drawn down thru a parampara of saints and gurus, was by Adi-Sankara. The Vedic way prescribed the four Varna-Aashramaas, namely Brahma-charyam, Gaarhyastyam, Vana-prastham & Sannyaasam. Adi-Sankara debated throughout to establish Vedic way of life. However, in his lovely life of 32 years, it seems to me that he transgressed thru the four Aashrams in the opposite order, i.e., from Sannyaasam to Vanaprastham, to Gaarhastyam, to Brahmacharyam.
So as to say, that when he was hardly eight years of age, he renounced the world after obtaining permission from his mother for his Sannyaasam, thereby relieving himself from the crocodile that caught him at the now famous crocodile ghat (Mutala-kkadavu = in Malayalam, may be translated also as, three headed/staged transgression!! or in Sanskrit, crocodile is known as a makara; मकरः = म {not} + करः {do / perform} i.e., caught in a river bank, bereft of work, non-performance, or in other words, inertia) at Kaladi in Kerala; thereafter, performed Vanaprastham - travelled the length and breadth of India, not just once, but more than once, debated with the greatest scholars, established study centers at pivotal places; thereafter during the course of debates entered Gaarhastyam, unconventionally transmigrating into the body of a King and in the end, set in to the path of ultimate devotion, set up and prescribed temples all over India writing & reciting the many haloed poems of his, attributing to Brahma, Shiva, Vishnu & Devi, treading the path of Brahma-charyam and then climbing up the steps of ultimate knowledge (Sarvajna peethom), before his Samadhi at the age of just 32.
That in short was a progress from renunciation (Sannyasi) to dolls (idols / Vigrahas) - as we may call it.
Whereas, his knowledge and logic was exquisite & without parallels, and confirming to scientific discoveries & truths that even today, there hasn't been any other philosophy capable enough to surpass the depth and universality of the understanding set forth by him, be it thru scientific pursuit or thru interpretations by Orthodox faiths.
The temples that he setup are testimony to the fact that he realized that, though in the abstract level, the concept of universality can be spoken thru Prajnaanam Brahma, Aham brahmaasmi, Tat-twamAsi, & Ayamaatmaa Brahma, uncovered by the Upanishads of Rg, Yajur, Saama, Atharva Vedas, in the common parlance, people can be lead more easily to absolute truth, thru Idols of wood or stone, those gullible or otherwise. And that, just as an architect's presentation, the 'Saguna' stone model of the Absolute, happens to become easily understandable to majority of humans, than the abstract 'Nirguna' definitions by the Vedas or the Upanishads. That might seem defying the very ideology that he professed, but in reality, he showed us that he does not, and none should, have any fundamentalistic assertion onto alternate understanding of Brahman or upon the practice or the worship of the same. (While for a mathematician, it may be akin to the assumption of the unknown variable as x, and finally the value of that x is found. Needles to say, that once found, the x loses it's significance)
Therefore those gurus are adorable and respectable, who care for the universal jnaana and understanding.
Hence, my humble salutations to the great gurus!!!
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