CHAPTER-8; PART-III: IN THE SERVICE OF THE MASTER
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| Holy Mother Sri Sarada Devi |
Though her life at Dakshineswar was thus
crowded with work, she felt it in no way a burden. For to be of service to the
Master was her highest delight. What pained her sometimes was that she could
not get sufficient opportunity to attend on him. For example, her only chance
in the course of the day to stay by the Master's side was when she carried his
meals to his room. Once she was unwittingly deprived of this privilege by
Golap-Ma, a woman disciple of Sri Ramakrishna. Being asked by the Master to
serve his food on one occasion, Golap-Ma began to do so every day afterwards,
thus usurping that cherished duty of the Holy Mother and depriving her of her
only opportunity of seeing the Master at close quarters. She felt very much
grieved at heart for this, but kept silent, as she was never in the habit of
putting forward her own claims as against those of others. For though Sri
Ramakrishna was the nearest and dearest object of her heart, her pure mind was
so free from any sense of monopoly over him that she recognized the equal right
of everyone else to serve him. (Note: Another incident illustrating this trait of
the Holy Mother was told by Golap-Ma. One day, as the Holy Mother was bringing
the Master's plate of food, she saw a lady standing near the Master's room. She
hurriedly came to her and wanted to be allowed to carry the Master's food that
day. The Holy Mother gladly handed over the plate to her. Afterwards, when the
lady had left, and the Holy Mother was fanning the Master during his meal, he
told her that he found it very difficult to take that food as the woman who
carried it was not pure in life. The Holy Mother admitted that she knew about
it, and requested the Master to take his food somehow that day. When she was
thus appealing to him, he asked her to give word that she would never hand over
his food to any body else in future. At this, the Holy Mother laid aside the
fan and said with folded hands, 'That I cannot; for if anyone wants something
of me, I feel I must grant it. But anyway I shall try my best to carry your
food myself.' Sri Ramakrishna at once understood the nobility of her outlook,
and said nothing more on the subject. He continued his meal, talking joyously
with her on various subjects). This sensitiveness of the Master to
the feelings and difficulties of the Holy Mother, in spite of the very limited
occasions of personal contact between them, is something very remarkable. It is
illustrative of how true spiritual love can be thoroughly impersonal and
non-physical, and yet be vigilantly operative for the welfare of the object of
affection. It was perhaps with reference to these days of Golap-Ma's
interference that the Holy Mother said to a disciple in later times: 'At that
time I would see the Master perhaps once in two months. I used to console my
mind by saying, "O mind, are you so fortunate - that you can see him every
day?' " Sri Ramakrishna, however, came to understand her feeling and
rectified the mistake.
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| Golap-Ma |
Here are a few more illustrations of this
fact from this period of the Holy Mother's life. Once Golap-Ma, of whom we
spoke before, took to the habit of spending long hours with the Master in the
evenings. Sometimes she would be with him till ten O' clock, and the Holy
Mother had to watch over her food till then at the Nahabat. That was very
inconvenient to her. One day Sri Ramakrishna heard her saying, 'Let the cat or
dog spoil her food; I cannot keep guard over it any more.' Next day he told
Golap-Ma how she was inconveniencing the Holy Mother by this habit, but she
replied innocently, 'No, the Mother loves me dearly. She calls me by my first
name, as if I were her own daughter.' Sri Ramakrishna, however, corrected her.
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| Gauri-Ma |
Speaking on this point, Gauri-Ma, another
woman disciple of Sri Ramakrishna, said: 'These two beings, residing only at a
distance of about fifty yards, would not meet each other for long stretches of
time, but in spite of it, there was much warmth between them. Once I saw how,
when the Mother had a headache, Sri Ramakrishna was very anxious and frequently
asked Ramlal, "O Ramlal, why has she got headache?' "
Once in the course of a conversation about
the Master, the Holy Mother said, 'He was a man of perfect renunciation, but
still he had his worry about me. One day he asked me, "How much money do
you need for your expenses in a month?" I said, "Just five or six
rupees will suffice." Next he asked me, "How many Chapatis do you eat
in the evening?" I almost died of shame. How could I answer that? But as
he asked me again and again, I had to reply, "Five or six." ' On the
basis of this, he calculated that she would require a capital of six hundred
rupees for her bare maintenance, and deposited that amount with Balaram Babu, a
lay disciple. Balaram invested it in his estate, and used to make a remittance
of rupees thirty half-yearly to the Holy Mother as the proceeds of this
investment.
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| Mathur Babu |
The Master's solicitude for her was not
confined merely to her physical welfare. For, in spite of his being an ascetic,
he did everything in his power to bestow on her that subtle satisfaction which
a woman feels on her husband showing special consideration for her personal
tastes and inclinations. It is interesting to note how he came to divine the
Holy Mother's liking for ornaments and thought it his duty to satisfy the same.
To quote the Holy Mother's own words on the point, 'He used to say, "Her
name is Sarada. She is the incarnation of Saraswati. (Sri Ramakrishna once said to Golap-Ma regarding the Holy Mother; 'She
is the incarnation of Saraswati (the wisdom aspect of the Divine Mother). She
is born to bestow knowledge on others. She has hidden her physical beauty lest
people should look upon her with impure eyes and thus commit sin.').
Therefore she likes to put on some ornaments." Once he said to Hriday, his
nephew, "See how much money there is in your box. (Mathur Babu had made an arrangement by which Sri Ramakrishna used to
get a monthly pension of rupees seven from the temple funds. This used to be
kept in a box). Have some nice gold ornaments made for her." The
Master was then ill; still he spent three hundred rupees on those ornaments. (Note:There is a
tradition according to which Sri Ramakrishna had a vision of Sita at the
Panchavati. He found that she was wearing bracelets with many tiny facets like
those of a diamond. It was in imitation of these that he had the golden
bracelets made for the Holy Mother. Concerning
the Holy Mother's decor in those early days Yogin-Ma says: 'At that time the
Mother lived in the Nahabat like the most revered Sita. She wore a piece of
cloth with broad red borders and put vermilion at the parting of her hair. Her
thick tresses almost touched her knees. She wore a gold necklace, a big
nose-ring, earrings and bracelets - those which Mathur Babu had given the
Master when he practised spiritual discipline assuming the role of a handmaid
of the Divine Mother). And mind you, he
himself could not touch money.' Referring to this, he would sometimes jocularly
remark, 'Oh! I have this much of relation with her!'
SOURCE: saradadevi.info
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