SOUNDARYA LAHARI ( ANANDA LAHARI : THE BLISSFUL WAVE ) - 4. SRI ADI SWAMI SANKARACHARYA

26/09/2018
4.

Mother worship is the worship of God as the Divine Mother, Sri Mata. Sakti is the power of the Lord or the cosmic energy. Sakti is the energy aspect of Ishwara or the Lord. Sakti is inherent in God. Just as you cannot separate heat from fire, so also you cannot separate Sakti from God, the Sakta, or the Possessor of Sakti. Sakti and Sakta are one. They are inseparable. Worship of Durga or Parvati or Kali is worship of Lord Siva. The Divine Mother, in Her aspect of Durga, is represented as having ten different weapons in her ten hands, and as sitting on a lion.

Electricity, magnetism, force, heat, light, the five elements and their combinations are all external manifestations of Sakti. Intelligence, discrimination, psychic power and will are all Her internal manifestations. She keeps up the Lila of the Lord through the three Gunas, Sattva, Rajas, and Tamas. Vidya, Santi, lust, anger, greed, egoism and pride are all Her forms. Her manifestations are countless. Durga, Kali, Bhagavati, Bhavani, Ambal, Ambika, Jagadamba, Kameswari, Ganga, Uma, Chandi, Chamunmdi, Lalita, Gouri, Kundalini, Tara, Rajeswari, Tripurasundari, etc., are all Her forms. She is Para Sakti, Radha, Durga, Lakshmi, Saraswati and Savitri are the five Prakritis. She is worshipped, during the nine days of the Dussera, as Durga, Lakshmi and Saraswati.

She lies dormant in the Muladhara Chakra in the form of a serpentine power or coiled up energy known as the ‘Kundalini Sakti’. She is at the centre of the life of the universe. She is the primal force of life that underlies all existence. She vitalises the body through the Sushumna Nadi and nerves. She nourishes the body with chyle and blood. She vitalises the universe through Her energy. She is the energy in the Sun, the fragrance in the flowers, the beauty in the landscape, the Gayatri or the Blessed Mother in the Vedas, colour in the rainbow, intelligence in the mind, potency in the homeopathic pills, power in Makaradhwaja and gold oxide, will and Vichara Sakti in sages, devotion in Bhaktas, Samyama and Samadhi in Yogins.

You are more free with your mother than with anybody else. You open your heart more freely to your mother than to your father. Na Matuh Paramadaivatam—there is no other God greater than the Mother. It is the mother who protects you, nourishes you, consoles you, cheers you and nurses you. She is your first Guru. The first syllable which almost every quadruped or human being utters is the beloved name of the Mother (Ma). She sacrifices her all for the sake of her children.

To be continued ..