The glorious Indian tradition extols the role of three important people in our life as follows:
“Matru Devo Bhava
Pitru Devo Bhava
Aacharya Devo Bhava”
Which translated into English means that one should revere our Mother, Father and the Guru as equivalents to Devas. Deva comes from the root word “Dyu” which means LIGHT. So, deva is a being of light or effulgence. So, one who spreads the light of love, light of personality and the light of wisdom are none other than our Mother, Father and the Guru respectively. But, one may ask, let them be equivalent to a Deva, but why should we revere? Even in a normal mundane life, we see people respecting each other and thus opening a door way for the exchange of ideas and lifestyles. If one were egoistic, introvert and do not respect his fellow mate, then he wouldn’t get any opportunity to learn anything new in life (learning is evolutionary characteristic of human life, which is the basis of present state of grand intellectual era). So, if just for a random person, we are respecting and trying to exchange the ideas, why not do the same with our own progenitors and educators?
In the following passages, one should remember that mother, father and guru are “aspects” or roles assumed by someone and doesn’t imply any gender restrictions i.e. for example for those who have no mother, father takes up the role of a mother in addition to his father’s role. Thus, here I would like to explore how these three roles influences one’s life and also why and how one should train themselves to be fit for the specific role and then I would conclude with how the impact of these three roles would be on a grand scale.
Mother is the first person from whom a child gets his physical as well mental nourishment. Some traditions believe that, even when in the form of a foetus inside the womb of a mother, it acquires few characteristic traits depending on the mental states of the pregnant woman. Even in everyday life, we see children mimicking the elders rather than adhering to their threats and warnings. This aspect of mimicking in kids is not to be neglected as, this is where the first seed of character is sown in a child. As, mother is the first person to be most of the time with the kid (owing to the needs of the baby), her behaviour forms the foundation stone for the kid. If the mother is caring, patient and ever effulgent with love, the child will also acquire the same traits in seed form to be sprouted in future. So, if one wants her child to be “Good”, one needs to be good first. Only then, will the child be good.
Not only that, but a mother’s touch will be very influential in mental planes of the child. Did you ever wonder irrespective of one’s age, why we always want the company of a mother, her pat and her consoling voice, whenever we are in trouble? It is the initial bond that we have with mother that works as a magic lotion to our wounded mind. So, when a mother is always with the growing child, teaching him the discrimination between good and bad, talking about his wondrous dreams and encouraging him to be a hero by exemplifying from the epics, the child’s foundation becomes stronger and his character gets shaped in the lines of positivity. But for all this, mother has to sacrifice her personal interests and hence the art of growing a child rests upon how well the sacrifice is done. Because this is a sacrifice and by definition, sacrifice means to do something without expecting anything in return, a mother’s sacrifice becomes a Yajna. So, the child’s future is sown by the sacrifice of mother’s free will for a greater cause and hence she is equivalent to a Deva or a God of effulgence. If such mothers were to exist in a large number, who would shape the characters of every child born on this land, the near future will be a wondrous time having a whole generation of goodness and kindness.
Every child is afraid of his/her father when some mischievous thing is done by them. But this act itself suggests that a father is something like a projection of their inner conscience. Thus, a father becomes a guiding light in the development of a person from his childhood state to that of an adolescence. He also forms a role-model for a developing child. All the characteristics of responsibility, respecting others, working hard selflessly, etc. are all acquired by the growing mind of the child by observing his father. These seed traits help the child to be a hero in his friend circle, thus igniting the fire of purity in the heart with the love and affection of the close friend circles. So, a father indirectly helps a child to take up a demi-role in his small domain of friends and enriches his childhood experiences. These experiences strengthen the character as the age proceeds and thus by the time the child grows into a youth, he will be firm in his character and will be hard for evil to sway away into undesired habits or actions.
Though, a father’s role, visibly seems very little, in actuality it is very important in helping the children grow in proper direction. In an analogous way if a mother’s role is compared to the nourishment offered to a seed by the ground, the father’s role is that which lets the tree grow straight without deviations and strengthens it on its way up. So, the role of a father is equally important for a proper directionality of the development.
As far as the above two roles are considered, we see that they mainly concentrate on laying the foundations of ethics and building the character. But, who will be the guiding light in terms of self-independent living? We see many a time we all face with moral doubts, scientific confusions and health emergencies. People who took the roles of mother or father also would have had these questions. That person or thing which throws light upon the ignorance in our conscience and reveals the truth behind the veil of this worldly Maya is called as GURU. If you closely observed, I mentioned a person or a thing. One can get into a doubt – “how can a thing be a guru”. If one reads the story of “Dattatreya”, one will be very well satisfied with what I said (he has 24 gurus including sun, moon, deer etc.). Anyway, let us see one example: Consider our SUN. He shines light during day, he helps maintain seasons, his light is reflected by moon and thus helps us have lovely evenings and his very absence would put this world into a literal HELL. But what does SUN get in return? We in this modern civilization never even acknowledge his presence, owing to the busy life in the A/Cs and on the laptops. Yet, his duty is never stopped nor altered. This is called a sacrifice / Yajna (as I mentioned earlier) because, irrespective of our reaction, he performs his duty as a LAW (DHARMA). Thus, we can lean from SUN how to help others without accepting anything in return – the noble selfless act. Thus, SUN becomes a GURU for us. Thus, a non-human or a human from whom we learn or those who help us remove the darkness in our understanding are all GURUS.
If we consider the human gurus, those who are pious and selfless, lets all the people of this world lead the life of DHARMA – the righteous living. They do not impose conditions like a ruling authority, but lets us discover our path by transforming us over a period of time. Without these gurus, we all would go into darkness of our uncontrolled mind and would have been the cause of a living hell. If we see great people like Dr. Abdul Kalam, we will know how GURU can have a huge impact on one’s life (please refer the book Transcendence). In fact, in a subtle way, mother and father roles are subset of this GURU set, as they also teach us something. But, due to specificity of their roles, we could distinguish them different from a GURU and in general we refer GURU as Acharya or teacher.
Society is nothing but a group of individuals living together and having a complex nexus of interactions. One might think, in these modern days, that “I like to be alone. I hate this world” etc. But if one closely observes, from the time we wake up till we sleep, we all are interlinked Take food for example – Food – comes from farmers, farmers get the money to live and educate their children from those who buy the food, those who buy the food should have money by virtue of job for which education is needed, few of those who study develops the irrigation techniques and help farmers to ease their way of life and productivity and the cycle loops. Thus we see that both the food giver, taker and the developer are interlinked and if either of them stop what they do, there will be a congestion in the flow of lives of the people. Thus society is a necessity for living (individually or in a group). If this society need to run in a smooth way, every individual needs to be equipped with the art of living – good character, ability to think and help in right direction etc. for which the above roles of mother, father and guru are very needed.
Now, imagine if above mentioned three roles were not perfectly carried out by people – say mother does not care a child, father behaves badly in-front of the children or the guru misdirects a student — then there will be improper foundations and growth for a child and such group of children, forming a mini society causes troubles and havoc in a normally functioning bigger society, thus leading to a living HELL. But, if the roles were perfectly carried out, we see that on a grand scale, they will not only develop each individual, but forms an ideal society, having men and women of selfless behavior and thus making each and everyone’s lives a living HEAVEN.
Thus we see the Mother sows the seed of love, the Father sows the seed of strength and the Guru sows the seed of right action. When these seeds sprout in the individual self over the time, they manifest themselves to express through him as — the right actions (with discrimination) with proper strength to fight the evil that always attacks the good, but grounded in solid foundation of universal LOVE. Hence a society, with such individuals, can never face any problem what so ever or if faced at all, will face it with courage and solve it with unity.
PhD (Quantum Physics), M.Sc. (IIT Madras), B.Tech. (LNMIIT).
Bridging the depths of Science and the wisdom of the Vedas
End of Content.
