Guru Purnima Celebrations at Sandipani
On 17th July 2008, to mark the occasion of Guru Purnima, Shri Gijubhai Bharade presented an informative slide show at Sandipani Vidyaniketan on “You too can be amongst the top ten in board and university exams”. More than 2000 students from 46 schools and colleges of Porbandar attended this programme. Speaking on the occasion, Pujya Bhaishri humorously commented: “Had I heard Gujubhai when I was a student then I would have definitely scored high marks. On the other hand, I would not have become a kathakaar.
Pujya Bhaishri said that nowadays, parents and students become very stressed during exams. As a matter of fact, exams should be treated as intellectual festivals. Just like we celebrate festivals like Shitala saptami and Janmashtami, similarly, we should celebrate exams as festivals that test our knowledge and learning. Education should not be just a means of earning a livelihood, but However, life should be transformed into a joyful experience by handling the problems of exams and life with a positive attitude.
also an endeavour for attaining nobility and spiritual growth. Currently, people have lost the joy of living due to competitive stress.
After this programme, all the participating students and teachers were provided lunch.
In the evening, Pujya Bhaishri honoured 60 teachers of the primary schools of Porbandar by presenting them with a shawl, inspirational books and certificates of honour. He then said in his speech, “I enjoy honouring teachers more than being worshipped as a Guru.” He further said, “Today, society lacks trust among people. There are very few centres which we can confidently trust. In such circumstances it is difficult for us to survive as a society. Hence, each and every person will have to cultivate such trust. Putting our trust in someone inspires that person to become noble and trust worthy. The society will have to place trust in teachers and professors. If such trust is reposed upon them, a teacher will behave like a Guru instead of a servant. Of course, it is not the individual that is Guru, the nobility in the individual is Guru. Invoking divinity in the idol of a temple makes the idol luminous. Similarly, by honouring the nobility of the teachers on the eve of Guru purnima, the divinity in them will manifest and illuminate the society.”
Later in the evening a cultural programme of devotional songs of famous saints, folk songs and comedy was presented by Vikram Labadia’s group.
On 18th July, the day of Guru purnima, devotees gathered at Shri Hari Mandir early in the morning. After morning pujaand dhwajarohan the rishikumars of Sandipani collectively recited the Guru Gita. Eliciting the importance of Guru purnima Pujya Bhaishri said that just as the economists remind us that each person is born in our country with a huge debt of foreign money on his head, similarly, according to the scriptures each individual born in our country has three types of obligations on him. These obligations are:
The festival of Guru purnima is celebrated to express our sense of gratitude for these obligations to the rishis, pitras and gods.
Pujya Bhaishri continued to say that each person should have faith in three Gurus. The first is Govind (God). Govind is the whole world’s Guru. Hence we say ‘Krishnam vande jagatgurum’. Our second Guru is our deeksha Guru. Deeksha guru is the one who initiates sadhana in us and imparts the spiritual power in us in the form of a mantra. The god in the temple does not speak to the devotee. He does not provide solutions to questions presented by the devotee. Instead, God responds to our questions through our deeksha Guru. In addition to these two gurus the spiritual endeavourer has a third Guru in the form of Granth Guru, which are the scriptures like the Vedas, the Upanishads, the Ramayan, and the Bhagavad Gita. The divinity that abides in these three gurus never vanishes.
There is nothing greater than Guru and there is no greater mantra than the Guru vaakya (Guru’s ordain). By serving the Guru, we gain the austerity required to attain spiritual knowledge and self realisation.
After this enlightening lecture by Pujya Bhaishri, the assembled devotees offered their individual Guru pujan. This continued till 4pm.
In the evening, a gathering of the different groups of the Vaishvik Sanskruti Parivaar was held. Addressing the assembled representatives and guests, Pujya Bhaishri warned against the progressive commercialisation of our society. He referred to the auctioning of the cricketers and said that such auctioning is ominous; we should seriously introspect about such activities and tendencies.
The two day auspicious occasion was full of divinity.
- rishi rina (the obligation of the seers),
- pitra rina (the obligation of the ancestors), and
- deva rina (the obligation of the gods).
