Forever Friends

Sage Sandipani was the teacher of Sri Krishna. Though Krishna was God Himself born on earth and as God he knew everything, still as Krishna  he  wanted to go through the motions of attending school, learning from a teacher and so on. In those days education was mostly paid by the taxpayers. But the students had to pay or do something for the teacher at the end without which the knowledge would remain incomplete. Though the teacher was a sage, (he was God’s own teacher, mind you), his wife was not. She was a mother first and spouse of a sage next. Their son had gone missing for some time and she feared for the worst. Krishna then decided to do a thing for this lady, which could then be counted as his payment.
Krishna went about searching for the teacher’s son, whom he finally found under the ocean playing with a beautiful conch shell. Krishna persuaded him to go back to his parents. The boy grew up into an ever cheerful, pleasant lad. He forgot the conch but he could not forget charming Krishna who took the conch from him.

So after a long, long time, when he suddenly saw him with the conch in his mouth rising out of the river, would you be surprised that he dived in to catch him, unthinking of his lack of swimming ability? Well, he is fine and having a whale of a time with his long lost friend, leaving friends on the surface in tears.

Dive deep, O mind,  deep in the Ocean of God's Beauty;

There you will find the gem of Love.

Offered on the thirteenth day of the passing away of our own dear brother        Br. Pratik, who was the very first fruit  of Ramakrishna Mission Centre at Vadodhara ( Baroda ), Gujarat.

Belur Math, 12 January 2012, Youth Day, Vivekananda Birthday.