LIFE
SKETCH OF SESHADRI SWAMIGAL
Thiruvannamalai is a place
situated in Tamil Nadu, India, say about 186 kms from Chennai. According
to Hindu mythology, Lord Shiva appeared as a column of fire and later changed
in the form of Jothi hill in this place. There appears to be utmost spiritual
power in this place; thereby it attracts many siddhars, otherwise called
'yogis'. Even today it is believed that many unseen yogis are in their deep
yogic meditation in this hill of Thiruvannamalai. Now we are going to see
the life sketch of one of such Siddhars who lived in Thiruvannamalai from 1870
to 1929 A.D.
Varadarajar married
Maragathammal in Kancheepuram and for a long time, they were not blessed with
any child. Varadarajar's teacher Kamakoti Sastri prayed to Kamakshi of
Kancheepuram to bless the couple with a child, for which the Goddess appeared
in his dream and asked Sastri to give butter to the couple whereby a very
spiritual child will be born. On completion of the formality as per Goddess'
instruction, a male child is born to this couple on 22nd January, 1870 in the
famous temples' city of South India,viz Kancheepuram, and the child was
christened Seshadri.
Every day the child is
taken to the temple by his mother. On the way to the temple, there was a
shopkeeper selling Krishna idols. One day the child, Seshadri, at the age of 4,
demanded the idol to perform pooja daily. Seeing the crying of the child the
shop keeper himself came forward offering the doll to the child and insisted
that the mother shall accept it as a gift to the child; whereby the child took
it and performed poojas in his house. Next day again when they are on their way
to the temple, the shop keeper came running and taking Seshadri's hands to his
eyes said that the hands are 'golden hands'. On enquiry, he recited that the
day he gave this idol to the child as a gift, he had such a sale that is of ten
times any of his maximum sales so far in his life. It may look like having
happened incidentally, but later on, the episodes in Seshadri's life at
Tiruvannamalai confirmed that this incident also is of the child's power.
Incidentally, the child had soolam in his left hand and a circle in his right
hand; the soolam is considered as mahasakthi and the circle denotes nava graham.
Coincidentally it is said that Shirdi Sai Baba also had this sakthi in his
right foot.
Seshadri had one younger
brother, by name Narasimhan and he was adopted by Varadarajar's own brother, by
name Ramaswamy. At the age of 14 Seshadri lost his father, and thereafter they
moved to Ramaswamy's house. At the age of 17, Seshadri's mother, on her death
bed, asked her son Seshadri to sing a particular song on Shiva and by repeating
'Arunachala' thrice, she breathed her last by placing her head on the lap of
her son Seshadri. This incident has instilled a very strong impression
about Tiruvannamalai, the place of Arunachala, in the minds of the young
Seshadri.
After his parents passed
away, Seshadri was left free in the world and then he was steadfast to embrace
sanyasa even though his uncle and aunt were very kind and loveable. He was
deeply impressed about the last words, "Arunachala", of his mother,
on her death bed. He imagined Tiruvannamalai and pictured it in a sheet,
the temple tower and Arunachala hill as the background. The picture was so
vivid that it resembled the real view at Thiruvannamalai. His inner voice
(intuition) was so powerful that he was able to draw without coming to
Tiruvannamalai. This fact was made known by Seshadri himself in his later
days.
Seshadri used to do pooja
in the room for the picture of Sri.Rama, Sridevi Kamakshi and his self drawn
picture of Lord Arunachala of Thiruvannamalai from the early morning to mid day
bolting the doors inside even without taking food in time and even going on
fast thro’out the day sometimes, inspite of his relatives advising him to eat
something to maintain his health. He used to remove stones and thorns in the
street at the time of Lord Narayana coming in procession from temple. He used to throw the food given to him
to dogs and crows, for which he used to say that karma should pass off.
Therefore some people used to laugh at Seshadri. After some time, he started
going to graveyard and start penance there; even he argued with intellectuals
about this penance in graveyard and won his point. Even the threatening of his
uncle not to enter into their house if he does penance in graveyard did not
deteriorate his determination, rather he stopped of coming to his uncle’s
house; thereby, left with no option, both his uncle and aunt had to compromise
to this issue, on account of their sentiments to this boy.
A very special
note-worthy episode happened during his father’s annual ceremony. When Seshadri
was not found anywhere near the house for performing his father’s ceremony, he
was forcibly taken into the house. As he refused to perform the ceremony, as he
claimed to be a saint, he was kept in a room locked. After the ceremony is
over, when they opened the door of the room where he was imprisoned, to their
dismay and surprise, nowhere in the absolutely locked room they found him; nor
they could find him anywhere in the whole town also. Then the whole society
realised the spiritual power of Seshadri.
At the age of 19, Seshadri
met Sri Balaji Swamigal at Kancheepuram during the swamigal’s pilgrimage from
Haridhwar to Rameshwaram. He gave
Seshadri deeksha to become saint and accepted him as his disciple. Thus,
Seshadri abandoning everything, took the life of saint and left Kancheepuram.
He eventually reached Thiruvannamalai which remained as his abode till his
death. Unlike other saints, our Seshadri Swamigal used to meditate in various
temples and slopes of the hill in Thiruvannamalai.
There was no permanent
place for his stay. He used to set his feet comfortably for the people who
wanted to touch his feet with reverence, but used to rebuke the wicked people
if they come near him. He would
embrace fondly an young girl and so also a donkey in the similar fashion.
Whenever he used to come across respectful lady, he used to say, ”My mother”
and used to see every woman in the form of Goddess Shakthi; similar attitude
you find with an another yogi by name Sri.Ramakrishna paramahamsa also. He
would be roaming about when all were asleep and he never slept, but always
being in meditative mood. He scattered the food given to him; he had no thirst,
nor hunger, as if neither known or unknown, because he had completely forgotten
his body but still lived in the body.
Quite often the swamigal
used to laugh, sometimes he laughed for half an hour continuously; used to walk
faster, sometime walking front and back looking at the sky; used to drench in
the rain and get exposed in the sun; used to get into the moving vehicles,
sometimes even into rubbish carrying vehicles also, and jumping from the
vehicles instantly; used to enter into shops and throw out the items and cash
in the shop; used to sit anywhere without considering the slush, dust, mud, or
dirt. He used to eat and rub the hand and fingers in the same dress he was
wearing thereby always his dress used to be very dirty and even somebody
presents any new dress, he used to give the new one to a beggar and wear the
beggar’s dress himself. But quite interesting thing is that no one objected his
action, as they knew his power and values; because the whole town people knew
that wherever he used to enter any house, or shop, that place used to prosper
very well thereafter.
Our swamigal was so great
that he did a lot of miracles. Once he swallowed a very dangerous poison and
nothing happened. He used to relieve the pain from the sick people and make
them normal. You will find his spiritual powers in forth coming paras.
The another great saint,
Shri.Ramana Maharishi, also lived in the same place at the same period. Some
miscreants were throwing stones at Pathala Linga cave whereby our swamigal came
there and made them to run away. Then he told an elderly person present there
that his son is doing meditation in the cave and when the people went inside,
they found Ramana Maharishi there doing penance. They brought him to a safer
place. In fact our swamigal is instrumental for the popularity of Ramana
Maharashi, both used to feel themselves as if one life but two bodies. Many
incidents can be quoted in this direction. Our swamigal had ‘Atheetha Jnanam’
and ‘Anantha Jnanam’ thereby he could tell what happened, happens and will
happen anywhere at any time. With his knowledge of ‘Swapna Drishti’ he could
enter into any body’s dream and give commands. By his ‘Sookshama drishti’ he
used to know meticulously whatever happens, however small matter it may be,
anywhere, even beyond the dimension of time.
In the year 1909, in a
village viz Polur about 34 kms from Thiruvannamalai on the way to Vellore, one
great saint by name Vitoba Swamigal was living past 25 years and on one day he
told his disciples that he would die within 3 days. On this 3rd day morning, when our swamigal was
walking on a road in Thiruvannamalai, he all of a sudden started shouting,
“Vitoba going”. When the message reached Thiruvannamalai about the demise of
the great Saint Vitoba at Polur in the morning, the people could understand the
meaning of our saint’s shouting in the morning.
Once a disciple of our
swamigal was bent upon taking the swamigal to his home town by train. Due to
their strong devotion, swamigal accompanied them to the station and entrained
along with them; but when the train is to cross the boundary of
Thiruvannamalai, our swamigal jumped from the train. The guard and driver of
the train mistook his jumping for suicide and decided to hand over the saint to
police; but alas! when the driver tried to start the train with all his skills,
the train did not move an inch. When the officials were stranded with dismay,
the devotees of the swamigal explained the officials about the super natural
powers of swamigal and both driver and guard prostrated to the swamigal with
due apologies. Thereafter the train started moving ahead.
Once a person calling
himself a saint came to Thiruvannamalai with an impression that if he does
penance in this hill, he can convert metal into gold with the help of herbs
available on the hill. One day this North Indian saint saw our swamigal and not
understanding his powers, he extended his begging bowl to him. Our swamigal
kicked his metal bowl with his left leg and when it fell down from the hands of
the saint, to his surprise, he saw his bowl having become shining gold bowl
with a ‘Mohara coin’ of gold in this bowl. Having understood the powers of the
swamigal, the saint immediately prostrated to him and once for all left
Thiruvannamalai with clear heart.
There was a celebration of
marriage in a house, our swamigal straightly walked into the kitchen and
tumbled the vessel full of sambar down so that all the sambar went into ditch.
As the people had total faith in him, only they were perplexed but did not get
angry, and as per their faith, they found a dead poisonous snake in the vessel.
They were delighted to see their escape from the clutches of death.
Some people wanted to
expose the swamigal as a pretending saint and in this direction they made a
plan. They sent a non-vegetarian food thro’ an innocent lady who used to serve
food to our swamigal regularly and the lady also promptly took it to our
swamigal. He touched the food packet and asked the lady to return the packet to
the persons who gave this to her, and accordingly she executed his instruction
sincerely. When the party opened the packet, they found vegetable bondas
instead of their prepared non-vegetarian food. You can find the similar episode
in the life history of Raghavendra Swamy of Mantralaya.
It is at the close of the
year 1928 when some devotees had the ambition of conducting an abhishekam for
the swamigal. The foreigners have to understand that abhishekam means pouring
the pure and useful liquids, like water, rose water, sandal water, milk, etc,
on the idol of a god, or goddess. At that point of time Seshadri swamigal
warned the devotees that he will get fever and hinted the unwarranted
consequence on account of their action. Still the people did not heed to this
taking granted that nothing will happen to him being a great and powerful
saint. The saint who knows the fate humbly accepted their insisting offer. Thus
vessels of cold water, rose water, tender coconut water, milk were poured on
his body not by a few people but the whole town took this opportunity of
pouring liquids on him to show their reverence to their worshipping living god;
thereafter conducted pooja to him by flowers and garlands, and applied viboothi
(sacred ash) all over his body.
In the evening as the
swamigal predicted, he got fever and immediately the doctors were brought to
him. However, the swamigal neither allowed the doctors to attend on him nor
took any food from that point of time. This position continued till 4th of January, 1929 when the swamigal
joined his abode after completing his purpose with humanity. The very peculiar
aspect of his samadhi was that the planetary positions at the time of his
samadhi were similar to the positions at the time of his birth. His body was
laid at rest at a place near Ramana Maharashi ashram; Shri. Ramana Maharishi
was present then and a samadhi was constructed and a Shiva lingam was placed on
this samadhi.
Silla unified the kingdoms after winning the war against Paekje in 660 A.D. and Koguryo in 668 A.D. The Hwa Rang Do played an important role at this unification. The Hwa Rang Do was an elite group of young noble men, devoted to cultivating mind and body and serve the kingdom Silla. The best translation for HwaRang would probably be "flowering youth" (Hwa ="flower", Rang="young man"). The HwaRang Do had an honor-code and practiced various forms of martial arts, including Taekyon and Soo Bakh Do. The old honor-code of the HwaRang is the philosophical background of modern Taekwondo.
The Kwans united in 1955 as Tae Soo Do. In the beginning of 1957, the name Taekwondo was adopted by several Korean martial arts masters, for its similarity to the name Tae Kyon.
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