A few brahmacharis from our Mumbai ashram recently went on a piligrimage to the temple town of Guruvayoor, in the state of Kerala, in India. Guruvayoor has a traditional custom of worship of Lord Krishna over the last thousand years. For the celibate monks from our temple, this trip was an eye opener regarding the standards of dedication and service maintained by the temple priests and managers over many centuries.

Due to rapid deterioration of spiritual culture even in India due to rampant modernization, most traditional temples are abandoned by cultured and educated people. Therefore it was a refreshing sight to see that at Guruvayoor, not only traditional worship is beautifully maintained, but also the rich, educated and respected members of the society offer menial services to the deity and devotees. Many of the volunteers rendering services like ushering the crowd, managing the oil lamps, serving food to the pilgrims, and cleaning the Lord’s paraphernalia are educated and hail from good families. This was heartening because in most places in India, the educated and rich are hardly seen rendering any service while those who are struggling to make ends meet and are uneducated, opt for a small job in temples. At Guruvayoor, seeing the menial services rendered by many well to do families reinforced our conviction that in front of the Lord all are equal and humble. We have to abandon the dangerous false pride that grows in our heart due to high birth, education, beauty and wealth. Material success can intoxicate the most sober of humans with false pride. Therefore the trip was inspiring and humbling for the monks from the temple. We realized that all the servants of Guruvayoor Krishna were teaching us that our real designation is we are simply servants of the Lord and nothing else.

We also strongly felt the importance of maintaining ancient traditions in our temples. Traditions keep the culture pure, especially if the traditions are blended with imparting of knowledge of the significance of the traditions. In these elephant festivals, the tradition of serving the Lord who’s the Supreme enjoyer is reinforced; our position as the servant of the Lord is also emphatically established.

The remembrance of our ‘servant’ position and Lord’s position as ‘enjoyer’ became particularly vivid after the elephant festival where for over three and a half hours, different temple devotees and local residents perform the traditional Kathakali dance for the pleasure of the Lord. People sit and watch this performance which goes way past midnight up to 2.00 in the early morning. This service is also rendered daily. The moderns sit in front of their television sets or the internet and get themselves entertained whole night. But in a spiritual culture, the entertainment if for the Lord, and in the process, the servant also enjoys, for being a ‘cooperative’ enjoyer, i.e. in trying to please the Lord’s senses, he also feels joy. This was evident from the happy faces of the dancers and the audience enjoying the performance.

In the morning, the Guruvayoor Krishna temple opens at 3.15. Faithful pilgrims, to be able to see the Lord early in the morning, queue up at night itself; devotees sleep in the line and rush to greet the deity early in the morning. As monks we can take so much inspiration to be able to faithfully and enthusiastically participate in our morning spiritual programmes. As part of our spiritual discipline we are required to get up by 4.00 every morning.
If lethargy ever creeps into my mind, I hope to remember the devout Guruvayoor residents and pilgrims, and rush to participate in the spiritual programmes.