In a unique attempt to bring our Indian culture to the attention of today's youngsters and elderly alike, Scion Master minds organized an event featuring Smt. Vishaka Hari on the occasion of Women's day. Smt Vishaka Hari, a disciple of Shri Lalgudi Jayaram, is a Harikatha specialist. She has a number of works behind her, some being - Sabari Moksham, Sundara Kandam, Rama Pattabhishekam, and many more.
Smt Vishaka Hari presented a discourse combined with appropriate musical renditions for each of them. The topic chosen was "Women of Wisdom", where in the characters of women from our vedic era - Sharada Devi, Gargi, Sita, Chintamani and Kanhopatra - were elaborated on. The present generation has a misconception that the women from earlier generations were only good at cooking and keeping the home. It is thought that they stayed indoors and were weak at heart and cried at the drop of a pin. However, by elaborating on important events of life of the characters above, and also some more, Smt Vishaka Hari erased this misconception.
She started with the eye-opening fact that in the Vedic era, during Ramayana, Mahabharatha and Bhagavatham, women were respected a great deal. They were treated as equals to men, and man and woman were infact complementary to each other. It was understood that without one, the other would cease to exist.
The story of Sharada Devi is an inspirational one of how man and woman are complementary. Sharada Devi, even after hearing from everyone that her husband was a good for nothing, and was mentally unstable, she decided to join him, though her parents repeatedly told her that he would be of no use to her. Her belief was "I am not expecting him to be of use to me, I am going there as, if he is mentally unstable, as a wife, it is my duty to be of use to him, to support him and nurse him back to health". When she went there with this belief, she found Ramakrishna to be a very caring person. He treated Sarada Devi as an incarnation of Divine mother, and worshipped her as Sree Maa. Theirs was an example of a marriage that was a spiritual union. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarada_Devi)
Thus, just as today's woman expects man to respect her, she must not forget that the vis a vis also holds true and necessary.
Gargi was the first women philosopher of the Vedic times. She was invited to the world's first conference on philosophy convened by King Janaka of Videha. She challenged Yagnavalkya to a debate and acknowledged defeat and praised Yagnavalkya for his presentation.
Gargi was thus known for being a very knowledgeable woman.
To highlight Sita, Smt Vishaka Hari picked the delicate interaction between Sita and Rama, after Rama was told that there would be no crowning ceremony, and that he had to leave to the forest immediately and for fourteen years. She brought out this conversation with a beautiful rendition of a sanskrit song.
Sita is known for her immovable patience, courageous nature and dedication to lord Rama. The patience with which she bore the decision of Rama sending her away to the forest, when she was carrying her twin children, the dedication to Rama with which she decided to follow her dharma and accompany Rama to the forest for 14 years, the courage with which she spurned Ravana's advances, were a few of her characteristics that we can definitely learn from.
The next story was of Kanhopatra - a little known marathi poet. She was the daughter of a courtesan, and lived near Pandharpur. Though she had a rich childhood, as she was the child of a courtesan, she was treated as a socially low status woman. As she grew up, she refused to follow the lifestyle of her mother. She became devoted to Vithoba and fled to Pandharpur, when she heard that Vithoba was kind, generous and would accept her as she was. She dedicated her life to the Lord, and she asked a boon of the Lord that she be able to serve the people even after her death. The Lord then merged her soul with that of a tree near the temple, and she thus got her boon as she provided shade to the number of devotees who visited the temple.
The last story was of Bilvamangala and Chintamani. Chintamani, who happened to be the daughter of a prostitute, was a great Krishna devotee. She had a pet parrot to whom she taught names of Narayana and made the parrot repeat the same in its sweet voice. Bilvamangala was besotted by Chintamani and her devotion, and he kept coming to visit her. One night, when it rained heavily and the rivers were flooded, he refused to be held back, and swam through the overflowing waters and reached Chintamani, all exhausted. She watched him and told that his devotion to her amazed her, and treating him as her inspiration, she jumped into the same flooded waters and swam all the way to Brindavan to devote her life to the lord. This act of hers transformed Bilvamangala, and he followed her footsteps and dedicated his life to meditation and the lord.
Through this presentation, Smt Vishaka Hari also shared some interesting tidbits -
1. 90% of the raga names of Carnatic music are of female gender, some examples being - bhairavi, asaveri, sahana, ranjani, rasikapriya ... and so on!
2. Even the Gods had their names after their wives names - Lakshmi Narasimha, Lakshmi Narayana, Parvati Parameshwara, Sitaram etc!
3. A conversation between a husband and wife in the vedic period was recorded as the Upanishad!
4. A conversation between Swami Vivekananda and a foreign national went thus - The Foreign national was not impressed by the so-called Indian Culture, and asked Vivekananda what was so special about it. Swami Vivekananda replied thus - In your country, you look at every woman other than your mother as your wife, however in India, a man looks at every women other than his wife, as his mother!
5. While writing the section of Ramayana where Sita decided to accompany Rama, Valmiki actually pondered over the name of the Epic and a thought crossed his mind that he should have named it Sitayana, instead of Ramayana!
What better way to spend the evening of Women's day, than to understand what Indian culture was eons ago, where we stand today, and what women empowerment actually means to us. Kudos to Vishaka Hari and the team for giving us such a beautiful evening, and to end it with the feeling that the contributions were well spent too, towards the Girl Child initiative.
Smt Vishaka Hari presented a discourse combined with appropriate musical renditions for each of them. The topic chosen was "Women of Wisdom", where in the characters of women from our vedic era - Sharada Devi, Gargi, Sita, Chintamani and Kanhopatra - were elaborated on. The present generation has a misconception that the women from earlier generations were only good at cooking and keeping the home. It is thought that they stayed indoors and were weak at heart and cried at the drop of a pin. However, by elaborating on important events of life of the characters above, and also some more, Smt Vishaka Hari erased this misconception.
She started with the eye-opening fact that in the Vedic era, during Ramayana, Mahabharatha and Bhagavatham, women were respected a great deal. They were treated as equals to men, and man and woman were infact complementary to each other. It was understood that without one, the other would cease to exist.
The story of Sharada Devi is an inspirational one of how man and woman are complementary. Sharada Devi, even after hearing from everyone that her husband was a good for nothing, and was mentally unstable, she decided to join him, though her parents repeatedly told her that he would be of no use to her. Her belief was "I am not expecting him to be of use to me, I am going there as, if he is mentally unstable, as a wife, it is my duty to be of use to him, to support him and nurse him back to health". When she went there with this belief, she found Ramakrishna to be a very caring person. He treated Sarada Devi as an incarnation of Divine mother, and worshipped her as Sree Maa. Theirs was an example of a marriage that was a spiritual union. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sarada_Devi)
Thus, just as today's woman expects man to respect her, she must not forget that the vis a vis also holds true and necessary.
Gargi was the first women philosopher of the Vedic times. She was invited to the world's first conference on philosophy convened by King Janaka of Videha. She challenged Yagnavalkya to a debate and acknowledged defeat and praised Yagnavalkya for his presentation.
Gargi was thus known for being a very knowledgeable woman.
To highlight Sita, Smt Vishaka Hari picked the delicate interaction between Sita and Rama, after Rama was told that there would be no crowning ceremony, and that he had to leave to the forest immediately and for fourteen years. She brought out this conversation with a beautiful rendition of a sanskrit song.
Sita is known for her immovable patience, courageous nature and dedication to lord Rama. The patience with which she bore the decision of Rama sending her away to the forest, when she was carrying her twin children, the dedication to Rama with which she decided to follow her dharma and accompany Rama to the forest for 14 years, the courage with which she spurned Ravana's advances, were a few of her characteristics that we can definitely learn from.
The next story was of Kanhopatra - a little known marathi poet. She was the daughter of a courtesan, and lived near Pandharpur. Though she had a rich childhood, as she was the child of a courtesan, she was treated as a socially low status woman. As she grew up, she refused to follow the lifestyle of her mother. She became devoted to Vithoba and fled to Pandharpur, when she heard that Vithoba was kind, generous and would accept her as she was. She dedicated her life to the Lord, and she asked a boon of the Lord that she be able to serve the people even after her death. The Lord then merged her soul with that of a tree near the temple, and she thus got her boon as she provided shade to the number of devotees who visited the temple.
The last story was of Bilvamangala and Chintamani. Chintamani, who happened to be the daughter of a prostitute, was a great Krishna devotee. She had a pet parrot to whom she taught names of Narayana and made the parrot repeat the same in its sweet voice. Bilvamangala was besotted by Chintamani and her devotion, and he kept coming to visit her. One night, when it rained heavily and the rivers were flooded, he refused to be held back, and swam through the overflowing waters and reached Chintamani, all exhausted. She watched him and told that his devotion to her amazed her, and treating him as her inspiration, she jumped into the same flooded waters and swam all the way to Brindavan to devote her life to the lord. This act of hers transformed Bilvamangala, and he followed her footsteps and dedicated his life to meditation and the lord.
Through this presentation, Smt Vishaka Hari also shared some interesting tidbits -
1. 90% of the raga names of Carnatic music are of female gender, some examples being - bhairavi, asaveri, sahana, ranjani, rasikapriya ... and so on!
2. Even the Gods had their names after their wives names - Lakshmi Narasimha, Lakshmi Narayana, Parvati Parameshwara, Sitaram etc!
3. A conversation between a husband and wife in the vedic period was recorded as the Upanishad!
4. A conversation between Swami Vivekananda and a foreign national went thus - The Foreign national was not impressed by the so-called Indian Culture, and asked Vivekananda what was so special about it. Swami Vivekananda replied thus - In your country, you look at every woman other than your mother as your wife, however in India, a man looks at every women other than his wife, as his mother!
5. While writing the section of Ramayana where Sita decided to accompany Rama, Valmiki actually pondered over the name of the Epic and a thought crossed his mind that he should have named it Sitayana, instead of Ramayana!
What better way to spend the evening of Women's day, than to understand what Indian culture was eons ago, where we stand today, and what women empowerment actually means to us. Kudos to Vishaka Hari and the team for giving us such a beautiful evening, and to end it with the feeling that the contributions were well spent too, towards the Girl Child initiative.
