SWAMIJI'S TIMES

SWAMIJI’S TIMES

SRI RAMAKRISHNA PARAMAHAMSA

MY MASTER

He would talk of Krishna,realizing Him as the incarnation of love. " " Look at the countenance of Krishna as represented popularly. Does it resemble a man's face, or a woman's?

Is there a shadow of sensuality in it?

is there a hair of masculine coarseness?

It is a tender female face that Krishna has; in it is the fullness of boyish delicacy and girlish grace. By his affectionateness, many sided and multiform, he won the hearts of men and women to the religion of Bhakti (Devotion).

That, Divine love can take the form of every sanctified human relation is the great mission of Krishna to prove. As a loving child monopolizing all the fondness of the hearts of aged parents;

as a loving companion and friend attracting the profoundest loyalty and afifection of men and brethren;

as an admired and adored master, the sweetness and tenderness of whose teaching and whose afifectionate persuasions converted girls and women to the self-consecration of a heartfelt piety, Krishna, the beauty and depth of Whose character remain still beyond the reach of men's appreciation, introduced the religion of love into Hindustan.

Then the good man would say how for long years he dressed himself as a cowherd, or a milkmaid, to be able to realize the experiences of that form of piety in which the human soul was like a faithful wife, and a loyal friend to the loving Spirit who is our Lord and only friend. Krishna is the incarnation of Bhakti.

Then in the intensity of that burning love of God which is in his

simple heart, the devotee's form and features suddenly grow stifif and motionless, unconsciousness overtakes him, his eyes lose their sight, and tears trickle down his fixed, pale, but smiling face.

There is a transcendent sense and meaning in that unconscious ness. What he perceives and enjoys in his soul when he has lost all outward perception who can say? Who will fathom the depth of that insensibility which the love of God produces? But that he sees something, hears, and enjoys when he is dead to all the outward world there is no doubt. If not, why should he, in the midst of that unconsciousness, burst into floods of tears and break out into prayers, songs and utterances the force and pathos of which pierce through the hardest heart, and bring tears to eyes that never before wept under the influence of religion?