De Lai De Ram.

[By SJ. Kishori Mohan Pal, B.L. July 1929]

THOSE who live in towns are not unfamiliar with cries like 'De lai de Ram' (Oh Ram, Give me something). They know that there are some Sannyasi mendicants of the West who instead of begging from individual persons, are in the habit of begging in the above fashion. They often make cries like (Oh Ram! Give me a seer of flour or a quarter seer of clarified butter). Their object is that they will not beg of any individual person, because they have faith in God Who maintains the universe and they have taken refuge in Him after complete surrender. They think that if they beg of any person, it will show their lack of confidence in God. Mendicancy is the religion of a Sannyasin and that is the symptom of his surrender to God. Complete surrender is then attained when a man practices Haribhajan in the accompaniment of Kirtan by living upon the daily collection of alms to the extent he is in need of for that day only but that he should not save anything for the future. But those who adopt the practice of unsolicitude become so much absorbed in their mental service to the Godhead, that no scope is left there for the perception of their physical body and hence they forget to beg altogether. They do not wilfully entertain such a silly idea that Bhagaban with food in hand will call at their doors that He will serve them. But what are those who are crying about de lai de Ram in order to gratify their own material senses? What do they mean by this? They mean that they are not beggars but they have accept the practice of unsolicitude, that they are asking Ram (God) to give them this and that or, in plain words, they are calling upon the Lord to serve them. Instead of serving Sri Ramachandra, their idea is to have services done to them by Him. This is like the conduct of those professional idol-worshippers or priests and the hired Bhagabat lectures of these days who are in the habit of getting services done to them by Him who is the object of their service. Because Sri Bigraha and Sri Bhagabat are the personification of Godhead and to earn money by Them and then to gratify their material senses therewith are no other than getting services done to them by Him who is the object of their service. What more heinous offences can there be than this?

While walking on the road one day, such a man began to cry aloud, 'Oh Ram! Give me a horse'. But a horse is not available anywhere and everywhere. However, sometime after, the man came across an unclaimed mare standing there. As soon as he found her, he hastily tore off a creeper, put the same into her mouth as reins and was about to get on her back, when to his surprise, he found that she had given birth to a child. Now the man has felt some attachment for the mare and hence could not let her go. Then, when the mare become a little well off, she felt reluctant to step forward, leaving behind her little one; and why should she go without her child? Then the man, finding no other alternative, took the young one upon his own shoulders, when the mare began to advance. Now talking the young one upon his shoulders, he began to cry 'Oh Ram! What have you given me? I asked for a horse to ride on, but instead, the horse has got on my shoulder. There are many who have to repent like this man. Like an ass, doing hard labour day and night in quest of pleasures, we come across miseries in place of happiness. Then with hearts full of sorrow, we begin to think 'Oh, what has come to pass!'

"With happiness in view, we built this house, but it has been burnt down." We find such things everywhere, with a motive to have services done to us by wives and children we take recourse to them, but as fate would have it, we end our lives in serving them on the contrary. Such things happen to the lot of almost all persons. With what high hopes do we enter into the threshhold of this worldly life only to find in the end that neither can we keep it nor give it up--like the snake catching hold of a male. It is for that reason that intelligent people are not prepared to meddle in it. They are not prepared to be annihilated in the whirlpools of weal and woe and hence they, keeping aloof from these whirlpools, engage their lives in the eternal service of Sri Hari and do not fall into the fifth of this material life. If, on the footsteps of these ideal persons, we try to build our characters and engage ourselves in the service of Sri Hari with the accompaniment of Sri Nam Kirtan after surrendering ourselves to the holy feet of a Sadhu Guru. Then we shall not have to suffer like the man who, with a desire to ride on a horse had to carry the horse on his back. All the material desires of the mind are like the cries 'Oh Ram! Give me a horse'. Hence we request all to beware of falling into such a miserable condition.