I found this excerpt on Parvatis tapasya written by Kireet Joshi and it very beautifully depicts the surrender of the great Goddess to win the heart of Lord Shiva...a surrender that any spiritual aspirant can aspire to.... To awaken Shiva from his trance, all the beauty of this world, the need and aspiration of this earth took the form of a woman. Parvati is Nature, Prakriti, and from her union with the Eternal Purusha, a being will be born who will defeat evil. She is the soul of us all searching for God. She is destined to meet Him and unite with Him. Yet, for attaining Him, whom Kamas weapon could not touch, in a fierce effort she has herself to become the bow, stretched to the extreme, and the arrow, solely pointed at Him. Although she is the great goddess, in order to take her right place on Shivas lap she has to give up entirely what she was. What a paradox that for conquering the supreme Soul the divine Mother must throw herself into the fire of sacrifice! Even for her, there was a price to pay, as it were. Thus this supreme fable conceals a great lesson in human life and demonstrates the nature of action. One is reminded of the Gita, in which it is stated that all action involves a tapasya, all action involves a giving of what we are, and all action supposes a sacrifice. These are the three elements inherent in all works. They are inevitable, though they may be undertaken more or less voluntarily, more or less actively, more or less consciously. So the story of Parvati seeking after Shiva (symbolic at more than one level) is an image of mans condition in the world. Striving to realise our own perfection, we have no other choice than to move, to act — and tapasya, giving and sacrifice, are the means of our action. - Kireet Joshi in his book Parvatis Tapasya
Posted on: Sun, 24 Aug 2014 07:42:56 +0000
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