Vedic Rituals and the Natural Order

Within the world of Vedic culture, rituals and remedies are a huge topic. The idea of remedying our challenges in life and creating better life circumstances has existed for centuries, and there have been traditional ways to achieve these personal shifts that everyone seeks.

One of the most common and powerful ways to to do this is to connect with the ritual flow of the calendar of the Vedic cosmos. This calendar indicates the time windows whereby it's possible to connect to certain gods, goddesses, energies, and through these connections, improve your life situation.

These traditions have been going on for thousands and thousands of years in temples throughout India, Asia and the subcontinent. The rituals can be very elaborate, but they can also be very simple and straightforward.

One of the best things we can do is understand how to connect to these forces in a simple, straightforward way in our day-to-day life to gain the benefit of these connections without elaborate, costly and complicated endeavors.

So one of the best ways is to follow the moon cycle. In Vedic culture, the lunar days, the tithis, the days of the moon, are the clock by which everything is measured, and all of the portals are opening and closing to all of these personalities and their energies too.

The lunar days are connected to the water element, and the water element is how everything flows. It's the element of relationships between everything and everyone, and it's the element that really makes life flow and move, be nourished and supported.

The water element also links to the Earth element through the panchanga, because the ‘Karana’ which is the limb related to Earth is derived from the lunar day - it is half a lunar day.

Traditionally, the way that these energies have been connected to has been through the lore or the stories, the ‘charita’ as they're called in Sanskrit, whereby pastimes of these personalities are talked about, described and remembered.

By doing so, their qualities and their energies are received and enlivened within humanity.

There is a common saying in Vedic culture, humans do rituals or worship to gods, or look up to Gods, whilst demons look up to humans, worship humans and do rituals to humans.

And what we can see in current society is a lot of humans being put on pedestals, so-called leaders of a human-level awareness, and what it's doing is creating a demonic society where people are not treating each other in beautiful ways.

And it is happening because this connection, the natural connection of humans to the gods in a genuine sense, is being broken or lost or ignored.

Essentially, in Sanskrit, the texts describe that it is the influence of tamo-guna or ignorance. Ignorance means that I'm ignoring something. What am I ignoring? I'm ignoring those higher principles embodied by those personalities, which bring me to a human level of life where I can love, cherish and be kind to my fellow humans, and then naturally to all the other species.

So it's time to re-establish our connection to these gods and goddesses.

Now it doesn't matter which lineage you follow, or if you follow a certain path, many of these archetypes, these personalities, they are liberal in grace and very happy to have our connection.

So this week, we have two of these special lunar days and three personalities connected to them.

The first is Narasingha, the half-man, half-lion avatar Who is connected to Mars. The second is Buddha. The personality who gained enlightenment under the bodhi satva tree in Gaya, and who is connected to Mercury. And the third is Kurma, the tortoise, who bears the Mandara Mountain on his back, and who represents the sadhana path, or the consistency of practice, and is linked to the planet, Saturn.

By remembering these personalities and their stories and pastimes, it supports and helps these planets in our charts, it supports and helps our progress in life, and it supports and helps us to rise to our full potential.

Sunday May 11th is the anniversary of the appearance of Narasingha. Monday May 12th on the Full Moon is the anniversary of both Buddha and Kurma.

You can use my personalised Astro Planner to follow all of the important festivals and learn more about the Vedic rituals appropriate for each timing. More info here.

Narasingha Avatar

In ancient times there were two brothers who were demonic by nature and very powerful. Their names were Hiranyaksha and Hiranyakashipu. Hiranyaksha was a great king who ruled over the universe with an iron fist and at one point sent the earth planet, Bhumi Devi, to the depths of the underworld. Bhumi was rescued by the avatar Varaha who also vanquished the demonic Hiranyaksha.

After news of this pastime spread, Hiranyakashipu was greatly aggrieved hearing about the passing of his brother. Hiranyakashipu, who was also demonic by nature, sought retribution and was determined to spread more suffering and misery amongst the living beings in the universe.

He was filled with rage, biting his lips and his angry gaze filled the sky with smoke. He was most upset because he felt that Vishnu had not acted impartially and intervened due to the whining of the gods. So for this reason he decided that he would have to teach Vishnu a lesson. He vowed to kill Vishnu in response to this act.

Hiranyakashipu had a son whose name was Prahlad. It so happened that Prahlad was visited by a great sage named Narada while in the womb of his mother. At that time Narada enlightened Prahlad about the nature of Vishnu and divinity and Prahlad was born in a realised state.

As the boy grew up he became more and more a problem to his demonic friends and classmates as he proceeded to enlighten them about divinity and higher consciousness.

In time, Hiranyakashipu became more and more aggrieved that his own son was devoted to Vishnu and was not interested in pursuing the demonic path. His anger grew to the point where he decided to kill his own son.

He tried many times to kill Prahlad, but Prahlad was always protected by Vishnu and unable to be harmed.

Hiranyakashipu's main goal in life was immortality. He performed penance and austerities for long periods of time to gain the power of long life. Interestingly, he was denied the possibility of immortality in his material form by Lord Shiva, who told him it would not be possible to be granted. Instead Hiranyakashipu came up with a long series of conditions by which he couldn't be killed, which in turn he gained the blessings for.

He could not be killed by a man or a beast, in the day or in the night, by a weapon or sword, neither inside the home or outside... He had a long list of conditions with many more...

However, at the auspicious moment on this day - the 14th day of the waxing Moon - Vishnu appeared as a half-man, half-lion. He came at dusk between the day and night and he came to fight in the doorway of the demon's home. After playing with his prey, he killed Hiranyakashipu with his nails, ripping out his intestines from his belly.

The form of Narasingha in this moment is called Ugra which means angry and violent. Usually such a form is not approached as it is too intense. Only Prahlad could calm down the angry Narasingha and pacify him.

In astrology, the Narasingha Avatar is connected to Mars which is the planet of action and determination. Narasingha helps us to pursue right action, to do our dharma and to act in harmony with everything. He also helps with crossing over obstacles, so if you have any particular obstacles to doing the actions you need to do, his blessings can help a lot with them.

Hiranyakashipu was blessed to be killed by Vishnu who honoured his challenge and respected his fight for what he believed in. The godly and demonic natures are two sides of a coin. They co-exist in the world eternally. Usually the gods have the upperhand and harmony reigns. Sometimes the demons usurp them and then Vishnu comes to re-establish the natural order.

It is described that in this current age of Kali-Yuga, the godly and demonic natures exist within each of us and at any moment we may act based upon the influence of one or the other.

So to remember Narasingha on this day helps us to walk a path of right action and to break through the obstacles that stand in the way. We can remember him simply saying a few times 'namaste narasinghaya' or 'aum narasinghaya namaha'.

- Sadhu 

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