The grandeur of Gayathri

An article by Sri S. Kannan :


It is ones destiny that leads him to his guru. But destiny playing a hand in the making of a guru is rare.  That is what happened when king Kaushika came into contact with sage Vashista.  Kaushika is none other than the great sage Vishwamitra who along with sage Vashista played the crucial role of being the guru of the supreme being Narayana in His Rama Avatar.  While Vashista was the spiritual guru of Sri Rama, Vishwamitra was the one who taught him the basic tenets of warfare and the use of divine weapons and in fact was instrumental in having him marry Sita devi by taking him to the swayamvara.

Now let us go to the story.  The king and his retinue after a tiring hunting expedition landed up in the hermitage of sage Vashista who entertained his guests with all due courtesies becoming a king and also offered a splendid lunch served by divine damsels.  The perplexed king found the answer to his question as to how a forest hermit could command so much to provide comfort par excellence to his large army when he found that it was the beautiful cow Nandini in Vashista's ashram who created everything from her own body. Nandini is the daughter of the celestial cow Kamadhenu gifted to sage Vashista by the lord of the devas Indira.

Kaushika felt that this cow should logically be owned by the king and not a hermit who had renounced the world and asked Vashista to part with the cow (Do we see some parallel things  happening in India especially the land grab in Tamil Nadu today?) and Vashista quietly said if Nandini wanted to go with the king, how could he prevent her?  But Nandini did not want to go. With tears in her eyes she pleaded with Vashishta not to make her go with the king.  When Kaushika ordered his men to take her by force, Vashista asked Nandini to protect herself which she did by bringing out a far superior army which easily outclassed Kaushika's.  The defeated king vowed to come back and realsing the it was the tapsya of Vashista which had endowed him with such prowess, decided to acquire Tapas and turned to the himalayas and did penence to Lord Shiva and got as his boon the prayoga of divine weapons (See how it is ordained that these divine weapons including the brahmastra and Rama banam should be routed through Vishwamitra to Sri Rama - what a preparation before hand for the arrival of the supreme being to establish dharma by vanquishing the demons)

Confident that he could now defeat Vashista, Kaushika turned up at the Ashram gates to wage a war, but was welcomed with open arms by the inmates, nevertheless Kaushika challenged Vashista to face the power of his divine weapons and Vashista calmly placed his brahma danda (a cleaved stick that hermits use for resting their arm during meditation) and that simple stick swallowed all the divine weapons that Kaushika launched.  Dismayed at the performance of his weapons, Kaushika understands that physical prowess cannot match spiritual powers and spiritual powers can only be obtained through intense tapas.  Back he goes to perform Tapas and though distracted twice by the divine damsels Menaka and Rambha sent by the wily Indira (king of gods) to test his will, Kaushika is yet stead fast to attain the blessings of the Creator Brahma himself.  Not satisfied with that Kaushika wants Vashista to accept him as a brahma rishi and Vashista willingly does so as he knows that both of them have to work together to receive Sri Rama as their disciple.

The contemplation of Kaushika's intense tapas was on the supreme as a being of light to clear his doubts and inner darkness.  To him was revealed the power of the universe in the form of Gayatri and hence he was called Vishwa - Mitra, the friend of the universe.  What he could achieve with this power is evident when he sends king Trishanku to the heavens with his human form and when cursed and thrown out by Indira, his ability to create a parallel universe of stars and suns with Trishanku shining brightly as a star. He gave the Bala - Ati Bala mantra which is also known as ajapa to Sri Rama and Sri Lakshmana so that the young boys do not suffer separation from their mothers.  He took Sri Rama for the redemption of Ahalya from her curse and then to Mithila for the Swayamvara. 

Gayatri is the mother of all Vedhas "Gayatrim Chandasaam Maatha" as the quintessence of the vedhas is contained in the 24 syllables.  It starts with the pranava 'OM' which is the primordial sound that started creation as the vyahritis Bhu Bhuvaha and Suvaha, the three planes of existence.  The meditation is on that Supreme Being of light "Tat Savitur" who is worshipful "Varenyam" which is full of light "Bhargo Devasya Deemahi" (all three stand for light) and the prayer is to clear the inner darkness "Diyo Yo nah Prachodayaat".

The full benefit of this mantra will be obtained if it is chanted internally without the movement of lips stoping the chanting at five places as given below:

Om

Bhur Bhuvaha Suvaha

Tat Savitur Varenyam

Bhargo Devasya Deemahi

Diyo Yo Nah Prachodayaat

Now a days people sing the mantra aloud to some tune which may be sweet on the ears, but might not yield the desired results. 

There is a significance attached for performing pranayama with the Gayatri Mantra imbeded before chanting, as this would help in cleansing the nadis and would facilitate easy contemplation.  One can visualise the Supreme in any form for meditation, but the core of the mantra being light, any source of light like the sun, a flame and so on will also help. Contemplation between the eyebrows will activate the Agnya chakra which directly controls the medulla and the pineal glands which is the control tower for the nervous and endocrine systems and therefore has a bearing on the functioning of the body and mind.  One who chants the Gayatri mantra continuously will have perfect clarity of thought and his actions and work will be of the highest quality.

There is no discrimination or limitation such as gender, caste or creed or time for chanting the divine Mantra. It can be chanted by all who are initiated into it, at all places and at all times. "Na Gayatryah param Mantra" that is there is no mantra above the Gayatri mantra can be experienced by one who regularly performs the sandhyavandana and chants Gayatri.

On the day following the Sravana Pournami Gayatri japam is chanted 1008 times by the brahmins.  This is to remove the dosha supposed to occur to our vedhas on account of its antiquity. As anything which is old and ancient needs to be renewed, chanting of Gayatri is supposed to give new vigour to the vedhas. Actually no dosha attaches to the vedhas.  It is only in our mind and we cleanse and make our intellect shine by chanting the Gayatri mantra so that it can reflect the full import of the vedhas in our thoughts words and action.

OM TAT SAT