Initiation

A King visited his minister at his residence. There, he was told that the minister was engaged in the chanting of certain mantras and he would have to wait. The king patiently waited and when the minister was done, asked him what the mantra was. The minster told him that it was the holiest of the holy, the Gayatri mantra.

The king requested if he could also be initiated to the mantra. The minister refused and said that he would be unable to initiate the king. The King was keen and requested another person in his court to initiate him to Gayatri mantra. He learnt the mantra and later recounted it to the minister and wanted to know if he said it right.

The minister went silent. After some thought, he told the king that the words were right but he couldn’t say if mantra would have the desired impact. The king got upset and asked the minister to explain why he had said that. The minister was a wise man. He thought he will give the king an illustration. He ordered one of king’s guard to come forward and arrest the king. The guard, heard what the minster had said and remained unmoved. The minister, than ordered the leader of the bodyguard unit to arrest the king. The order was not obeyed. Seeing such insolence by his minister, the king got very angry. He ordered his guards to arrest the minister immediately. The order was immediately obeyed and the minster was arrested.

The minister burst into laughter. The king asked him to explain why he was laughing. The minister said, “my lord, I ordered the guard to arrest you to explain the meaning of my statement. My words had no impact on the guards, but yours did. The order was the same as was the executioner, but authority was different. Similarly, the holy mantra needs an authority to chant it for it to have the desired impact. You need to be initiated by the right authority.”

The END

Learnings

1: This is the story which was narrated by Shri Ramana Maharishi when he was talking to someone on the power of Mantra. It is about how same sentence being spoken by different people leads to very different results. It is the power behind the spoken word which really creates the impact. This lesson is brought to life in this story.

2: What makes our word powerful? The way to make your word powerful is to have a competent authority (usually achieved by the way of our hard work). The King’s word, being the head of the nation and of the government, has more power than that of a Minister and a Minister’s word will have more power when it is being compared with that of a lower rank official in the court. So, as you grow in stature your power of your word grows!

3: A King is a person who is an authority and appoints a Minister and various other. He bestows power on all officials. When he says something, it becomes a decree. Similarly, a spiritual leader is a king in own sense and his words carry similar power. (This is described in Raja Yoga and many saints are also referred to as Maharaj). So, when a competent teacher gives us a yoga Sadhana or any kind of a Mantra, he is giving power to repeat that word and have desired benefit. This is called initiation. Whenever we follow a particular process, the required amount of energy for that conduct is needed which is bestowed by initiation. The power conferred by the king is normally visible in the physical world so everybody can identify with that. However, the powers given in the spiritual practices are more subtle so we cannot directly perceive it but they are still very much present!

STORY CREDIT: This story is taken from Spiritual Stories As Told By Ramana Maharishi – English, Published by Sri Ramana Ashram