Mighty Ganga

I intended to write in my blog in India, but somehow every time I was on a computer, I felt no desire to write. The words came instead from a pen to a private page or in conversation. But now, as time goes on, I think some of the stories have to be told in this form. The form of making meaning out of experience and putting it into written word, and making them public. Please forgive if this is all very abstract or doesn't all fit yet. At the moment this is just me trying to make some sense of it all.

Instead of just traveling alone, I joined a group yatra for the purpose of traveling to Badrinath, a sacred town and temple in the Himalaya. In my mind this pilgrimage was one of the main points of my travels, a special darshan, prayer and offering I wished to give. So leading up to that journey, I made a number of choices, let go of other opportunities to make that trip with that group of people.

We left Haridwar on the road to Badrinath on Yom Kippur. It was too late in the day, bound by the need to eat in clean places, we waited until after lunch to set out. By evening we were nowhere near the intended destination of Rudraprayag. In fact we had only made it about 30 km past Rishikesh, up the road to a small town/rafting drop off point/intersection of power lines called Kaudiyala. We took rooms in a hotel shaped like a motel, with doors and porches just a few meters away from the Ganga's edge. Those of us observing broke our fast on the porch next to the river with fruit, incense, Indian perfume and a Shabbat candle. We then ate dinner in the dhaba by the road. The water was already high as the monsoon was heavy and lasting deep into September, and quickly flowing in the rains. We went to bed early, preparing to continue driving early the next day.

At about ten o'clock there came a knock on the door, pounding really. 'Pack up your things. The water is rising.' We made our way uphill to the dhaba, as the Indians packed up the televisions and other movable valuables from the rooms. The water rose quickly, reaching up to the porches of the rooms. As we stood and looked out, one man says, 'Now she turns to Rudra'. (Rudra
In ancient Vedic myth, Rudra is the malignant god of storm and wind, and is also considered the god of death. He is the personification of the uncultured nature, the symbol of unculturedness.) The angry, the howler. The dark face. The raw and uncontrollable. It was an incredible sight, the water rising. Rudra perhaps, to some, but I couldn't help thinking of the bible, Job and the tests sent repeatedly. I couldn't help think of the Sea crashing over the heads of the Egyptians, or Jonah in the belly of the whale. This is the God that can send plagues to a civilization, the God who can flood the world, and take first born sons. This is the God we pray to out of fear, hoping for the sparing hand, the easy transit, the peaceful life. When this God comes out we cry and beg, "why, God, Why? WHY have you forsaken me?"

These are our prayers like a pleading child, the God we look to like a punishing parent. We plead our case, 'I have prayed this much...' or 'I must have earned...' or we curse ourselves or our circumstances. We beg like children at the hems of our mothers dresses: I want a sweet, I want a toy, I want, I want, I want...

Of course, there is no great prayer bank in the sky, where we can withdraw our prayer merits when the going gets tough. And of course the great universal workings are beyond what we can comprehend. The fires that burn houses, burn the parasites from trees, the floods deposit fresh minerals, the destruction gives way to new life. Here she is the mighty flowing river bursting her banks till she rises up to our feet, over the bushes, up to our lamp posts. This great force washes down the mountainside, smashing the statue we built for the very purpose of remembering that God is always here. God will always be here. And yet now we cry out that she is forgetting us, or in our way!

My God did trouble the water, the water rising angry to the edges of the road, and cracking through the rock, tearing down the side of the mountain. What I don't know is if this is a test, of strength and perseverance, or faith, or some other 'lesson' wrapped up in an event.

At the moment, I am struggling with the idea that everything happens for a reason, as I feel that it personifies God. Destruction is part of the cycle of life, but is it predetermined by a plan? Meaning is overlaid after by our reflection and the wisdom gained from hindsight and the knowledge that life has gone on despite the challenges and suffering endured. A lesson has been learned, or some other unexpected benefit has arisen despite the 'failure' of the intention that we had set. But was that meaning always in the event when it came?

On the road down from Dharmashala to Chakki Bank, there are many tiny temples, sometimes just a painted rock or two, along the sides of the road and the sides of the rivers. All these little reminders that God is present, and to be praised in all her forms. When we see this rock we remember him (usually Shiva) and offer and pray. It is easy where the flowers grow, or a stream pours out of a mountain. But sometimes nature's face turns to overpowering might, the stream you bathed in rushes and destroys the structures you built, washes clean away all those earthly possessions. Even the spiritual desires are not spared, your wishes to reach the mountain, to see the temple, to make the offering. For all you can see is your own small desire, the sweet you crave. You can't see that this is so much bigger than you.

God is intelligence, but not intelligent, and presents us with challenge, setbacks, floods and broken roads. But not intentionally, to teach us as a parent would, but because that is nature, creation, sustenance and destruction, all the time. In this is how teaching arises, how wisdom unfolds, and that is the nature of the exchange between the human and the world.

That is, if there were a separation between me and not me. Which there is not. This flood itself is empty of meaning. The challenge arises not from the flood, but within me, and exists only because I hold this goal in mind. It only is reasonable if I make it have reason, and learn and grow from what is presented. The test of faith is that I need my faith to give sense to what is senseless, I need a bigger picture, I need something to hold onto while forms come and go.

I look on the swirling, brown waters, the trees and plants whipped by the power, the torrent of rain and the swirling current. God did not cause that, God is that. She is the vikalpa and the sankalpa, the intention and the obstacle. She is the teacher and the lesson, she is the river, the mountain, the flower, the drive in my heart, the sadness in the loss.

To pray then is to accept, to surrender, and to love. It is to meet the challenge with the detached awareness of what is given at this moment, and what I do with it is only what I can do. If tomorrow I awake to the sun and the repaired road and the magic of the temple, I must still remember that God is no closer than she would be if there is no road and no where to go. Its not that Because the intelligence is the journey and the changes we must endure if the journey is to make us grow. Because the consciousness is the light that illuminates the darkness of separation: the thinking that an object is somehow separate from me. This is a test because i am still wanting to get somewhere and seeing forms as reality, and seeing a geographical place as the goal of my travels. In that way the river is not a river, but a fickle guardian of the temple, or an obstacle in the way.

So I bow to pray. Not to get through to the other side. Not to reach the promised land. Not to intercede and give me my way. I pray to as an act of connection, a union of my own consciousness to the divinity in all things. I pray because there is no separation, and the act of loving what is in all her forms is an act of unconditional love for my self. Not my personality, but soul, which is divine itself.

It is the act of love that matters, the co-creation and the humility. Maybe in the prayers, the forms will be burnished until they shine only the divine light. Maybe in the act of loving, the resistance will fall away. maybe in the dark of this storm, the light of consciousness might bring me clarity, humilty and the deepest recognition that I am that.

I did make it to Badrinath, in a Jeep that took 12 hours from Rishikesh to reach the town. In my finest mountain clothes, I went to the temple at dawn, made my offerings and prayers, sat next to the sages and pilgrims, honoured the ancestors, looked to the mountains and the valleys and bowed my head. To the divine in all things, I bow. To the teacher that takes me from darkness to light, I bow. And life is the great teacher. Thank you mountains, thank you river, thank you roads, thank you rains, thank you driver, thank you eyes, thank you heart. Thank you love for all that is given and for teaching me that all is one.

Hari om, tat sat.
Om Shanti.
I love you.