Beginning prayers
Comments:
· 'om' chanting - 3 times
· Meditation
· sahanaavavatu
· gurustotram
Gitaa chanting
· bhagavadgItaa 12th adhyaaya 1 - 20 shlokas
Story time
· Churning of the milky ocean
· deva-s and asura-s
Ending prayers and pledge
· pUrNamadaH pUrNamidam
· chinmaya aarati
· om jaya jagadIsha hare
· pledge
Rashmi Aunty and Indira Aunty:
First of all, we have great news! When we asked the children that are registered for the gItaa chanting to raise their hand... we had almost every hand up! (The couple others who still haven't done so have promised to register tonight!!) Congratulations parents for all the encouragement you have given them and timely registration. We are so proud of them all. Today, they chanted without the help of the script even. We had some tweaking-s after the 15th verse. They are all going to be practicing rigorously during the next week and perfect it by Saturday. Best of luck to you all for the performance next week. You will receive your time slots via e-mail. Please be there on time, so that there are no back logs.
We recapped the story from last class. We moved on to the story of the churning of milky ocean. Once sage duurvaasa was returning from vaikuNTha. He met indra on his way. He offered him, as prasaadam, a garland of lotuses that was given to him by Lord viShNu. But indra was arrogant about his power and threw the garland on his elephant airaavata. The elephant mindlessly threw the garland down and trampled on it. This enraged the sage. He cursed indra saying that he would lose all his power and lustre and so shall the 3 worlds. With this, the demons became very powerful and started troubling the devas. The devas approached brahma, who in turn directed them towards Lord viShNu himself. Lord viShNu asked the devas to churn the milky ocean, taking the help of the demons. He instructed them to use the 'mandara parvatam' as the stick and snake 'vaasuki' as the rope for the churning. He told the devas to approach the demons politely for help and accept all their conditions. More than that, He told them to - not fear the bad and not greed for the good! That is what set the devas apart from the asuras!
When they started churning, the mountain started sinking to the bottom of the ocean. The devas approached Lord viShNu for help. He took the form of a turtle (kuurma-avataara) and held up the mountain from the bottom of the ocean. The churning continued. While churning, first a lot of poisonous fumes came out. The demons feared it. But the devas approached Lord shiva. He sucked up all the fumes into his palms and was about to drink it. He had swallowed it, but his consort paarvati held his throat, so it wouldn't reach his stomach. That turned shiva's neck into a deep blue hue. He hence became neelakaNTha (blue necked one). Then, one by one, came many treasures. We have spoken about all those precious treasures and who took them. Finally, dhanvantri came out with a pot of amRutam (divine nectar that would make one immortal). The demons became greedy for that. The devas just deplored Lord viShNu. The Lord came in the form of a beautiful maiden named mohinI. The demons were infatuated to her and allowed her to distribute the amRutam to all. She promptly distributed it amongst all the devas. But raahu, a demon snuck into the line of the devas and took a sip of amRutam. By then, the Sun and Moon spotted the deceit and told Lord viShNu. He in a rage cut off the head of raahu. But because he had already tasted amRutam, he had become immortal. He became a planet.
We spoke about the lessons we learnt from this story -
1) Be polite, even to your enemies
2) Surrender yourself to the Lord and He shall lead
3) Do not fear the bad
4) Do not greed for the good
We will continue further in the next class.
Best of luck to all of you for the Saturday's competition. Do not forget to wear your participation medals to class on Sunday! See you all then.
________________________________________________
We recapped the story from last class. We moved on to the story of the churning of milky ocean. Once sage duurvaasa was returning from vaikuNTha. He met indra on his way. He offered him, as prasaadam, a garland of lotuses that was given to him by Lord viShNu. But indra was arrogant about his power and threw the garland on his elephant airaavata. The elephant mindlessly threw the garland down and trampled on it. This enraged the sage. He cursed indra saying that he would lose all his power and lustre and so shall the 3 worlds. With this, the demons became very powerful and started troubling the devas. The devas approached brahma, who in turn directed them towards Lord viShNu himself. Lord viShNu asked the devas to churn the milky ocean, taking the help of the demons. He instructed them to use the 'mandara parvatam' as the stick and snake 'vaasuki' as the rope for the churning. He told the devas to approach the demons politely for help and accept all their conditions. More than that, He told them to - not fear the bad and not greed for the good! That is what set the devas apart from the asuras!
When they started churning, the mountain started sinking to the bottom of the ocean. The devas approached Lord viShNu for help. He took the form of a turtle (kuurma-avataara) and held up the mountain from the bottom of the ocean. The churning continued. While churning, first a lot of poisonous fumes came out. The demons feared it. But the devas approached Lord shiva. He sucked up all the fumes into his palms and was about to drink it. He had swallowed it, but his consort paarvati held his throat, so it wouldn't reach his stomach. That turned shiva's neck into a deep blue hue. He hence became neelakaNTha (blue necked one). Then, one by one, came many treasures. We have spoken about all those precious treasures and who took them. Finally, dhanvantri came out with a pot of amRutam (divine nectar that would make one immortal). The demons became greedy for that. The devas just deplored Lord viShNu. The Lord came in the form of a beautiful maiden named mohinI. The demons were infatuated to her and allowed her to distribute the amRutam to all. She promptly distributed it amongst all the devas. But raahu, a demon snuck into the line of the devas and took a sip of amRutam. By then, the Sun and Moon spotted the deceit and told Lord viShNu. He in a rage cut off the head of raahu. But because he had already tasted amRutam, he had become immortal. He became a planet.
We spoke about the lessons we learnt from this story -
1) Be polite, even to your enemies
2) Surrender yourself to the Lord and He shall lead
3) Do not fear the bad
4) Do not greed for the good
We will continue further in the next class.
Best of luck to all of you for the Saturday's competition. Do not forget to wear your participation medals to class on Sunday! See you all then.
________________________________________________
Alka Aunty and Prasad Uncle:
