Srimathe Ramanujaya Namaha Dear Shri Bhagavadhottamas, >God will shower His grace without any act of surrender. We are >already His. That is what Sri Alawandar conveys in stotra ratna >("mama nAtha yadasti yOsmyaham...). >If we have to do soemthing, how can His grace be nirhEtukam? >Prapatti as an act is not there in all thenkalai paramparAs. What I >mean is, some AchAryas do not include this as a ritual in their >samASrayaNam. So whoever is belonging to these paramparAs does not >do something that is considered by others as prapatti. In the above, >God will shower His grace without any act of surrender. I strongly disagree with the above statement due to the absence of the word "too" at the end. God will shower His grace, without any act of surrender too. This does not mean that one should take for granted God will anyway shower His grace, and hence can do whatever he/she wants. This is not as per our Sampradayam. >Prapatti as an act is not there in all thenkalai paramparAs. Prapatti as a "physical" act is not there in all Thenkalai paramparAs. For any act, the cause is the intent. Whether followed by act or not, the intent is pretty much the actual karma and not the physial act. As elders say, for Brahmanas, even a thought of killing a cow or anything else becomes a papam. Why would they say so? Hence, if the intent is what is the actual karma(immaterial of whether an act follows it or not), then realizing prapatti or understanding it or following it whatever, whether for moksham(means) or as His kainkaryam, all these things become "our" acts. Iranyan, Sisupalan, Ravanan, pretty much all those asuras who died out of lord's hands(or weapon) got the moksham. This is what is Nirhetuka krupai of the lord. He uses His free will. He may choose anyone at random and give him/her moksham. At the same time, if one does bhakthi, karma, raja, sankhya yogas etc, then ALSO He would give moksham(He has promised Himself in Gita). If one "does" prapatti, then also He would give moksham. If this weren't true, out of 18 chapters, whatever the lord had promised saying one would attain moksha if he/she does those yogas, would be breached. Moreover, there are various types of mokshams(Salokyam, Sarupyam, Sameepyam, Sayujyam, Kaivalyam etc). The moksham attained by Sahetukam (we doing something for attaining moksham) is not valued as that of the one attained by Prapatti, is what is my understanding of the Thennacharya Sampradayam. Note: Sahetukam does not lead to Kaivalyam. Kaivalyam is a moksham where the atma enjoys itself. Sahetukam "may" lead to this i.e this Kaivalyam is a trap and hence our Acharyas have warned us about this. This by no means stops one from following the Karma, Raja, Bhakthi yogas. In other yoga margams, one is instructed to do certain things i.e one must follow certain disciplines in order to attain the results. One could do prapatti and still live the way one wants to live. Prapatti is an advanced stage of other yogas. In Prapatti, one realizes that he/she belongs to Him and hence He is the upayam and upeyam. The moment we say "He" is the means, then, this too becomes an effort by us to use Him as a means to attain Him. Whether we go by markata or marjara nyaya, the point is one puts effort. If a baby doesn't cry, a mother feeds the baby automatically is what we say. If the baby is bit by a snake and still doesn't cry, the mother will not know about this, only to see her baby die. So, we can use these examples to support individuals views. If we are going to sit like a baby not doing "anything" assuming he would shower his Nirhetuka grace, what happens to the world? Is this what our Acharyas told us? Ok. Assume, you do kainkaryam, instead of sitting idle. Why would you do kainkaryam? Why not something else? Even then the lord will shower His grace right? So, why was the concept of Kainkaryam even introduced/insisted by our Acharyas? Why they introduced the concept of "change in mindset" which they call as Prapatti? Why did our Acharyas bring in the tradition of so many things in the name of kainkaryam, while we could do anything and everything(including what we call the sinful actions) having realized Prapatti? The only answer is, when one realizes Prapatti, he/she will automatically tend to think whatever he/she does as a kainkaryam. So, any act done by a Prapannan becomes a kainkaryam(and by default, the Prapannan would not get into sinful actions). But, for this, one needs to know, how it is, to realize Prapatti and atma swaroopam. No one can make other, realize Prapatti, by making them read his/her writings because, one could realize Prapatti only by the lord's grace(or Acharya's grace i.e the lord's grace through a person). What Smt Sumithra said was correct from a different point of view. We could always bring in statements in support of / against, other's understandings/views. But we need to understand that these mails or articles can, in no way enlighten people. These articles can add value. We could discuss so many other things that add value instead of discussing these rahasyams which lead to combative articles due to lack of expressiveness, understanding, interpretations etc. I apologize to everyone to have written many posts on this subject and has caused a chaos not realizing that this subject is not for these kind of internet discussions. This is my last post on this subject and hence request others not to expect any further reply from me on this, while they could continue to comment/criticize this post at their will. My humble apologies in case of any offense perceived. Adiyen, Ramanuja Dasan.
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