Bhaja Govindam.....The first attempt....

As all of you would know, this was written by one of the greatest teachers of vedanta of all times. Adi shankara, who was believed to have written this hymn during his visit to varanasi along with his disciples.

We shall try to understand the different aspects of bhaja govindam. In the begining, we shall try to analyze the mood/thought/situation and ambience while this hymn was written. Secondly, we shall go through the meaning of each of these hymns. Thirdly, i shall compare my beliefs and disbeliefs alongside the passages.

Why Write This Hymn at all? Why try to enlighten people? What triggered this writing? What did he achieve? What was the situation when he wrote it? So many more questions.....

After quite some time, i convinced myself that the above questions should be attempted before proceeding to the actual hymn and its meaning. The reasoning was actually triggered last week when i was having an intense conversation with a friend gaurav during a week end get together. The question was, why would someone spend a huge amount of money (say 20,000$ or whatever) to buy a piece of painting. For one, these paintings are most of the time so abstract, so much different than a scenary or photo or a live theme....Then why should someone spend so much money on it.

The reasoning given was that the guys who purchase these paintings (apart from those who buy it for prestige/show off etc etc) have seen something that you /i and the normal cannot see. It could be anything, it could be very well that the buyer is seeing the same emotion/tension/thought/belief/passion/anger/mood....of the person who painted it. The buyer can feel the painting would be a better way to put it. He can relate to the painting just like the painter related to it. You see through what the eye shows you and you see what the painters eye wanted to see.....Thats when you are convinced, you probably want to spend a small portion of your immense wealth to feel it and discover what the other soul sees.....In other words, 2 somewhat different souls want to relate to each other through a common medium...in this case being a painting....Think of it this way, a painter saw an entire plethora of emotions and feelings. He couldnt describe what he saw, because they were too much to be said....You have to experience it, feel it....He dint want to be the only guy to experience it....So, what could he do? He was a painter, and he created a painting which was the key to opening his door of thought. A person who sees the painting the same way as he did would discover the key to this door. In turn the the buyer not just gets the painting, but gets a key to whole new world of thoughts and feelings............

So, i still believe its important for us to relate to this process in a more serious way than just learning and reciting the hymn. We need to feel the hymn, in other words, you shoul have some kind of pain in your heart when you recite or listen to it. That means, your non physical self is realising the hymn and its meaning and that will ensure that the meaning is preserved at a subconciously level than just the brain or physical self.