Date: September 28 2007
Time: 7:30pm – 9:00pm
Topic: Sanatana Dharma
Venue: Bharatiya Temple, Montgomeryville, PA
Pravachanakarta: Sri Ramanujam Mukundagiri
Montgomeryville in Pennsylvania houses a beautiful and huge temple called the Bharatiya temple. Sri Ramaniujam ji was invited to throw light on Sanatana Dharma by Dr Ramesh Adiraju and Mrs Renuka Adiraju, a devoted and unassuming couple, who are the force behind all the activities in the temple.
This huge temple that has deities for all Gods, celebrates all the festivals in grandeur. Sri Ramuji began his speech by explaining the meaning of ‘Bharatiya’. He said that syllable ‘Bha’ implied Brahman or the supreme or Paramathma or Bhagavan. The word ‘Rathi’ in Sanskrit meant interest. Hence Bharatiya meant the one that is interested in Brahman or the supreme.
Ramuji explained that ‘Sanatana Dharma’ meant the dharma that has been prevalent since time immemorial. He said that the Hindu Dharma is called Sanatana Dharma and that it was not given a specific name because it was the only Dharma that existed at that time. He said, “We call R. Gopalan and S. Gopalan only when there are 2 Gopalans. If there were only one Gopalan, we would not use the initials to address him. Similarly, since there was no other Dharma present at that time, it was not given a specific name.”
Ramuji gave astonishing explanations to the concept of saguna and nirguna (God as form and formless). Scientists have discovered that matter can exist as (exhibit the properties of) particle and as a wave. When matter is seen as a particle it cannot exhibit the properties of wave and vice versa. Ramuji vividly recalled this theory that one would have learnt in school to drive home the fact that all pervading lord who is nameless, formless, omniscient, omnipotent is also in the temples and manifests as Archavatara and also in the form of the Divine Name. The divinity and sanctity of the same Almighty is reflected here also.
Ramuji narrated the scientific studies that were done on the cosmos to gauge the effect of Meditation. He said that a pattern was observed when the experiments were made in an environment where meditation had taken place as opposed to chaos that was observed in an environment with no meditation. He quoted from Vedanta Granta (Scripts) to establish that meditation is nothing but the constant repetition (without a break) of the Divine Names of the Lord which is verily Namakirtan. He re-iterated that Namakirtan is proven to have a positive effect in environment, cosmos and therefore to the people in that surroundings. He gave scientific explanation prove that Namakirtan done in any corner of the world was extremely powerful because it has a positive effect on the cosmos.
The session concluded with all the devotees singing the Mahamantra in unison with Ramuji, who also requested every one to chant the Mahamantra atleast 11 times every morning and evening.
