New Learning, Fresh Beginning

The day after Navaratri, Vijayadashami, also called Dussehra, signifies removal of ignorance and welcoming of knowledge

You and I, our real nature is absolute bliss and knowledge. We try to reach these states with the help of mind and intellect. But the mind constantly gravitates to sense objects for sensual pleasures and the intellect seeks knowledge from the external world.

By such extroverted pursuits, we get involved more and more in the world of objects and accumulate desires which veil the divinity in us.

Masters in ancient times knew that we have to turn our attention inward to gain the state of absolute bliss and knowledge, which we foolishly seek in the external world. So, they introduced rituals and festivals to remind us of our supreme goal and ideal. One such is the ten-day festival that concludes with Dussehra. Everyone spends time in prayer, devotion and study of shastras, and every house assumes the sanctity of a temple. The ten days are divided into three stages, each of three days respectively, for invocation, and the tenth day is called Vijayadashmi. In the first three days, Goddess Kali, Durga, is invoked. In the next three days Lakshmi is worshipped, and the following three days are dedicated to Saraswati. On Vijayadashami day, a bonfire is made of the replica of a demon. Such festivals contain in them the very path and technique by which we can reach divinity.

Dussehra indicates, as the word suggests, dasa-papa-hara, or liquidation of the ten sins attributed to the ten sense organs through which the mind contacts and gains knowledge of the phenomenal world, and reacts to the stimuli received from the world of objects. Overcoming the ten sins signifies the end of mind, that is, end of the world of plurality. One becomes rooted in the transcendental experience.

First, invocation of Durga. She is described in Puranic literature as the ‘Terrible Power’ that vanquished and killed demons who terrorised devoted seekers. Similarly, in our bosom there are destructive monsters of desire, passion, lust, greed, and so on, which need to be overcome before we can successfully see spiritual unfoldment. Hence, the Mother is invoked and by doing so, we invoke our own power that lies dormant within, to discover and destroy the negative forces lurking in our bosom.

The next stage is to practise the positive aspects of sadhana through Lakshmi puja for the next three days. She is the goddess of aishwarya, prosperity which is not to be understood in the narrow sense of material wealth and possessions alone, but as including the divine wealth of love, kindness, devotion, patience, endurance, charity, ahimsa and the like.

With the cultivation of divine traits, the seeker is fully qualified and becomes an adhikari for philosophical study, contemplation and meditation. The invocation of Saraswati, goddess of knowledge, is the last and final stage in our spiritual evolution. Just as she creates music and melody from her well-tuned veena, one can manifest divinity and harmony with a well-integrated mind, by study of shastras, constant reflection and meditation. On Vijayadashami day, the demon is burnt down, indicating transcendence of ego, when we attain vijaya, great victory, over our sense life and revel in the ecstatic experience of transcendental Reality.

Swamiji is the founder of Chinmaya Mission ■

In pic: 'Durga slaying the demon Mahishasura' by traditional artists of Raghurajpur crafts village, Odisha