Dec 7th - Lord Shiva - Dwadasa Jyothirlingas

One God, Many Forms

The 5th grade class enjoyed the Bhiksha and Satsang with Swamiji. After re-living the moments spent with Swamiji, we began our discussion about why we have so many 'Gods' in Hinduism. God is one but we worship him in various forms that are to our liking. Just as one is a daughter, sister, friend, niece etc to others in her family, but she is one and the same person assuming different roles. Though we worship God as Rama, Krishna, Shiva, Lakshmi etc , we are indeed worshiping the same supreme being, that is manifest to us in those forms.

Lord Shiva as JyothirLinga

One of the Manifested forms of Lord Shiva is as a Column of Fire or Jyothi. A Sadhaka who has reached the highest level of enlightenment is believed to see the Lord in this form.

Dwadasa (12) Jyotirlingas 

In India there are 12 powerful Jyotirlingas spread across the country, Northernmost being Kedarnath and Southernmost being Rameshwaram. The Puranas and the great teacher Sri Adishankaracharya have praised the greatness of these 12 jyothirlingas. They are:

Somnath - located in Prabhas Patann in Saurashtra, Gujarat

Sree Sailam - Mallikarjuna temple in Srisailam (Andhra Pradesh). Adi Shankara composed the famous Sivanandalahari here.

Ujjain - Mahakaleshwar Shrine in Ujjain , Madhya Pradesh

Omkareshwar - Madhya Pradesh

Vaidyanath - Deogarh , in the Santal Paraganas district in Bihar

Bhimashankar - Located in Sahyadri hills near Pune.

Rameshwaram - Ramalingaeshwar shrine in south Tamil Nadu

Nageshwar - Dwaraka in Gujarat

Varanasi - Kasi Vishwanath temple in Benaras, Uttar Pradesh. One of the most celebrated Pilgrimage site for all Hindus in India

Tryambakeshwar - Nasik in Maharashtra, origin of the River Godavari

Kedarnath - Northenmost Jyothirlinga shrine among the Himalayas. The shrine is open only 6 months in a year during the summer months.

Grishneshwar -Ellora Caves, Maharashtra

Adi Shankaracharya has composed the 'Dwadasa Linga Sthothra' which is known to remove sins of the Sadhaka, when recited regularly.
“Saurashtre Somanathamcha Srisaile Mallikarjunam|
Ujjayinya Mahakalam Omkaramamaleswaram ||
Paralyam Vaidyanathancha Dakinyam Bheema Shankaram |
Setu Bandhethu Ramesam, Nagesam Darukavane||
Varanasyantu Vishwesam Tryambakam Gautameethate|
Himalayetu Kedaaram, Ghrishnesamcha shivaalaye||
Etani jyotirlingani, Saayam Praatah Patennarah|
Sapta Janma Kritam pApam, Smaranena Vinashyati||”

Nov 24th - Swamiji's Bhiksha

Today is a special day for our class, we are hosting bhiksha for Swamiji. Sangita aunty & Asha aunty went to the ashram well ahead of the rest of the class to setup for the bhiksha.
In the balavihar class, after the opening prayers, we reviewed the symbolism of goddesses - Durga, Lakshmi, Saraswati. To understand the virtue of "titksha" we discussed the story of saint Ekanath, how one day a young man spit on him every time he took bath in the river and went past his home, to make him angry. But Eaknath maharaj didn't get angered even once.
Then we chanted the first 4 slokas of  Srimad Bhagavad Gita, chapter 14, in preparation for the Gita chanting competition in March, 2014.      
The kids were given index cards to write any questions they would like to ask Swamiji during the satsang after bhiksha.
We concluded the class a little early so as to be at the ashram before Swamiji arrives.

Swamiji's Bhiksha 

All of us convened at the ashram for the bhiksha. Kids were all excited in welcoming Swamiji with "Hari OM", followed by poorna kumbha.  Kids took turns to serve Swamiji & Ericji.
After the Swamiji  completed his meal, kids started their lunch.
Then we had a very stimulating satsang with Swamiji. Kids asked a wide rang of questions, and Swamiji explained in detail satisfying the minds of both kids & parents. Here are a  few questions:

• Where is God?
• Is God real?
• If God is everywhere, Why do we need to go the temple?   
• Why does Swamiji always wear "saffron" colored clothes?

We concluded the bhiksha by doing Chinmaya aarti to Gurudev's portrait. Each family offered namaskarams & gurudakshina to Swamiji, and got his blessings.