Renunciation

Bhakthi and the attitude of surrender that is its final fruits will give you great courage to meet any emergency; such courage is what is called Renunciation. The story of Mohajith is a good example of this highest type of detachment.

Mohajith, the Prince, went to a Sage in the forest and sought guidance in the spiritual path. The sage asked him whether he had conquered attachment as his name indicated. The Prince said that not only he, but every one in his kingdom had! So the Sage started to test the truth of this claim.

The sage took the Prince’s robes, soaked them in blood and hastened to the Palace Gate with the gruesome story of the murder of the Prince by some ruffians in the jungle. The maid whom he met refused to hurry with the news to the Royal apartments because she said, “He was born, he died; what is the special urgency of this news that I should interrupt my regular routine and run to the King and Queen?”

When at last he got an audience and was able to communicate the sad news to the father, he sat unruffled, whispering to himself, “The bird flew off the tree on which it had alighted to take rest.” The Raani too was unmoved. She told the sage that this Earth is a caravanserai, where men come and stay for the night and when dawn breaks, one by one, they tramp their different ways. Kith and kin are the words we use for the attachment to the travellers cultivated in the caravanserai during the short term of acquaintance.

The wife of the “dead” Prince was also unaffected; she said, “Husband and wife are like two pieces of wood drifting down a flooded river; they float near each other for some time and when some current comes between, they are parted: each must move on to the sea at its own rate and in its own time. There is no need to grieve over the parting of the two; it is in the very nature of Nature that it should be so.”

The sage was overjoyed to see this steady and sincere Vairaagya (dispassion) in the rulers and the ruled. He came back to the forest and told the Prince that while he was away, a hostile army had invaded his Kingdom and slain the entire royal family and captured his Kingdom and enslaved his subjects. He took the news calmly and said, “All this is bubble, impermanent, flimsy. Let it go the way of the bubble. Guide me to reach the Infinite, the Imperishable.”

Such courage comes out of the Grace of the Lord; it needs generations of learning and struggle. Meanwhile, you must start with the first step, the cleansing of the mind and the cultivation of virtue. Even if you do not start with that step, at least do not laugh at those who do, and discourage them. Do at least this much!