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Easwaramma Day |
Homage to Easwaramma - The Chosen
Mother
Photo:
Mother Easwaramma
This work is homage to Mother Easwaramma the source of Love,
Strength and Pillar for the women-folk of our country.
EASWARAMMA-THE CHOSEN MOTHER - book is a befitting tribute
to the life of Easwaramma whom Bhagawan Sri Satya Sai Baba the God
incarnated chose to be His Mother. It provides rare glimpses into her
psyche; her curiosity, compassion and wonder. She was tenderhearted
and pious and like an earnest sadhak, had to trudge along the inner
path that leads from Maya to the Master.
This short narrative of the earthly life of Easwaramma ('God's
Mother') pictures lucidly her expanding awareness, and delineates
hesitations, hazards and hopes that she had to encounter.
Naturally simple, meek and modest, she always stepped back from
publicity, admiration and adoration. As Mother of the global family of
Sai, her love had to be all-enveloping and unconditional.
When we review the life of the Mother of the Avatar, we find
ourselves progressing through curiosity, expectations, compassion and
wonder and landing in appreciation, admiration and adoration.
Easwaramma was allotted the well-nigh-impossible task of expanding her
awareness beyond the ring of hills, beyond the barricade of tradition
and taboo and the wall of custom and caste. Burdened with the
prestigious and pardonable pride of the most precious motherhood a
woman could aspire to, she could not inspite of consistent effort
jettison the homage she attracted from all the continents. Even while
in this predicament, she, like any other earnest sadhak anxious to win
His Grace, had to trudge along the inner path that leads from
multiplicity to unity, from dispersion to concentration and meditation,
from egoism to detachment, from passion to serenity, from unconcern to
the love that cares and shares, from Maya to the Master.
And, all this journey while busy as mother and grandmother in the
Raju family as well as in the fast multiplying multi-lingual,
multi-racial, multi-cradle, global family of Sai. As Mother, her love
had to be all enveloping, all protective and unconditional. It was
mainly through the teachings and Grace of Baba that she succeeded in
this assignment of expanding and deepening her love. Baba, in His
elucidation of Dharma, has revealed that woman represents the
concretization of God's beneficence. She has a natural aptitude for
spiritual endeavor, being endowed with fortitude, meekness and modesty.
She is intelligent and vigilant. She has an innate sense of honor and
loyalty to virtue. Easwaramma, as the closet devotee of Sai, was aided
by Him to uplift herself to the heights marked out for the ideal
woman.
Swami has often declared that this Sai Avatar descended because the
saints and sadhu of all lands prayed for His arrival. "I chose the
mother who was to experience my closeness during gestation. The Avatar
alone has this freedom of choice. In other cases, karma determines the
time and place, the group and the grade," He had said. The mother is
the first recipient of the Avatar's Grace. The father, who protects
and nourishes the mother, is rewarded with the fame bestowed on his
name. When Pedda Venkappa Raju threw off his mortal coil in 1963,
Swami wrote a note for the sake of those who lamented the loss of the
'father'. It was published in the "Sanathana Sarathi". "Well, you say
that he was a blessed soul since he passed away in the fullness of
years without falling ill and incomplete possession of his memory and
consciousness. It was not thus alone that he was blessed. These are
mere signs and pointers. On the day that he could be known as the 'father'
of the Manifestation, on the say that this Manifestation allowed it to
be known that he was his 'son', that very day, he was blessed and his
life was rendered holy and sanctified. This good fortune can be won by
only one individual, in one entire age (Yuga). It is beyond the reach
of others."
EASWARAMMA- the love with which she treated the women
blossomed wider as she watched Swami healing the stricken. He showered
Compassion on them and applied vibhuti profusely on their brows.
Easwaramma decided that she would not condemn or ridicule any women on
the basis of her apparent faults or failings for they were only, she
knew, the symptoms of maladjustment or neglect or persecution and
poverty.
The Mother thus became more than their own mother to an
ever-increasing number of women in distress. She was a friend with a
burnished mind. Contemplating the Mother among those who were rescued
by Swami, the publisher likes to repeat Rabindranath's exclamatory
poem on Women:
'Women! You are blest!
You have your home, your household work-
In the midst of it you keep a little gap
Through which you hear the cry of the weak.
You bring your offering of service,
And pour out your love,
Your patience is endless-
Their helplessness calls out your mercy.
The devotees discovered in her a never falling source of strength
and wisdom. They sought her out more and more often and honored her as
the Mother, assigning her distinct roles during festivals and holy
days. Easwaramma did not yield as soon as the women surrounded her and
pleaded that she should guide them or bless them. But how long could
she keep them at bay? On holy days dedicated to the worship of
Varalakshmi (the Goddess of Wealth ready to grant boons) or Gowri (the
Fair Consort of Siva, mother of Ganesh), she had to accept the first
offering of homage from every women who needed her. During the nine
days of Navarathri, the Festival of the Mother, she was honored for
the first three days as Durga (the smoothener of the path, the
provider of safety and security of Her children), in the next three
days as Lakshmi (the provider of food, clothing and shelter, status,
power and renown) and on the last three as Saraswathi (the Teacher who
implants the yearning for learning and for liberation, for material
skill and moral strength).
"We women must learn more about the world," she
sighed. Swami had left Africa after addressing a Guru Poornima meeting
there in the morning and had arrived in Bombay in time of the Guru
Poornima celebration at Dharmakshetra in the evening, and so it
happened!
The Guru heard the cry of the Mother on behalf of her daughters.
Within a week of His landing on the soil of India, he inaugurated the
Sri Sathya Sai Arts and Science College for Women at Anantapur, the
Headquarters of the District to which Puttaparthi belonged. "Swami,
you have done the right thing! Women must be as well educated as
men. When one animal is bold and alert and the other is cowardly and
blind, how can the cart to which they are yoked move forward?"
She commented. Lakshmidevamma, the Headmistress of the Girls' High
School, Anantapur, told her that Swami had promised this College a
year ago when He had presided over the High School Day. "I find that
the girls who complete their high school have now to go to distant
colleges at Tirupati and Kurnool," He had said, "I shall therefore
establish a college right here very soon." And so, the girls of
Anantapur got a college, a college dedicated to the realization of the
universal and constructive ideals of Sathya Sai Baba.
The Mother, it must be conceded, was the foremost pupil of the 'son'.
She was an exemplary housewife and an unquestioning conformist in the
observance of vows, vigils and fasts declared as obligatory in the
Hindu calendar. She delighted in visiting holy places, bathing in holy
rivers and offering worship at shrines. And like the high cast women
of Puttaparthi and other villages, she was loyal to the lawmakers who
laid down the dos and don'ts, which should govern daily living and
social relationships.
Woman has been extolled in ancient scriptures as well as classical
poetry as grihalakshmi, the Goddess of Prosperity in the Home. She is
the Dharmapathni, the Companion of the Husband in the fulfillment of
the Duties and Rights of wedded life as a householder.
The Puranas and Sastras stress the role of women as mother and
extol the mothers, who instilled high ideals in the minds of the
children of the land. The Vedas speak of Maitreyi and Gargi, as great
scholars and spiritual heroines. Gargi was revered in the assembly of
Vedic pundits for her mastery of the abstruse problems of the
spiritual voyage into the heights of self-realization. In historical
times, we have the mother of Sivaji who fed him on the epics and
Puranas, and brought him up, as a brave representative of the best in
Hindu culture.
What a great inspiration is this Bharathi for all of you! Our
Puranas and Sastras, the Upanishads, the Vedas, the lives of the
saints and seers of this land contain hundreds of such incidents which
serve as beacons to light your path, Lean about them and derive
benefit from them. This has always been our Divine Lord Baba's message
to the women.
With
this homage to the MOTHER EASWARAMMA I offer this work at the Divine
Lotus Feet of the UNIVERSAL MOTHER SAI on this auspicious day 19th
November 2002 on the occasion of Women's Day. Seek His Blessings to
accept this compilation of His Mission to be hosted on
www.s.a.i.info.
Source and courtesy:
http://www.s-a-i.info/ |