Friendship with good people

Establishing contact with pious and noblemen will transform a person into piety and enable him to reap good benefits. The Ramayana portrays apt examples. Poet Valmiki met sage Narada and derived his blessings to write the great epic Ramayana. After meeting sage Rishyasrunga, King Dasaratha performed puthra kameshti yaga to beget children. It was sage Viswamitra’s guidance that helped Sri Rama marry Sri Sita.

Sri. Rajagopal Hari said in a discourse that after meeting Mathanga Maharshi, the vicissitudes made Sabari, an ordinary woman roaming in a forest, to change herself to chant “Rama nama“ and derive His blessings.

People who meet pious men are fortunate enough. It is a kind of chain of links where one with God’s blessings gets the chance to meet noble souls, and with the help and advice of such Acharyas, they seek to realise God.

In his work “Harikathamrutha Lahari”, Sri Krishna Premi Swamigal says those who get friendship with good people will be like a person in a fainting condition under the scorching sun finding the shade of a tree, one who is bereft of money receiving enormous wealth, a person finding an oasis in a desert, a person in hunger receiving sumptuous meals, like guards retrieving a man from the clutches of unwanted elements, a person on his deathbed tasting a drop of the nectar and renewing the lease of his life, a person struggling in the sea to find a boat and like a small dust particle taken away by a strong wind to the peak of a mountain.

Published - October 28, 2024 05:11 am IST