Guru (The Ancient Teacher)

Indian culture has a specific (vilakshnya) shishyacharya vyavastha. No other country has this type of strong, standard specific shishyadhyaika.

Our country has a great tradition of imparting teaching and training through guru shishya parampara in all fields of learning. This is one of the special traditions, where in shishya were studying with the guru for years together and learning all the skills, virtues and good qualities from the gurus. In this way not only the technical aspect of education was developments of personality of the shishyas were taken cares.

We lost this rich practice of traditional way of teaching and training by following the western method of institutional training. With the result, we lost skills and techniques because there was no transfer of knowledge from one the modern colleges of Ayurveda are often lacking in intrinsic skills which to build a sense of confidence in attending problems which have highly individualized basic.

‘Acharyavan Purushoveda’, ‘Acharyadeva Prapita Vidya’, ‘Acharya Devobhava’, like this Sruti emphasized the importance of Acharya. Loukika vangmaya also strongly highlighted the importance of Acharya as:

‘Guru Ssakshat param brahma.’

Loukika vangmaya compared gutu with param brahma and placed the status of acharya on a supreme position. As brahma is creator of the universe in the same way acharya is the creator/giver of knowledge by destroying the ignorance.

Sreemannarayana played himself as an Acharya as well as shishya on this earth and created the Ashtakshari Maha mantra which is flag of the situation while the supreme God himself as a teacher and as a student created the Bhagavadgeeta by which entire creation getting pleasure all the time.

Without proper guidance from the teacher it is not possible to study the scared precepts. Agama sastre, train arts, medical Sciences etc.

To propagate the subject from the treatises or civilization a propagator and a receiver and a receiver are essential.

One can read a novel, a story without proper guidance of an ideal preceptor. But it is not the same in the case of above said sacred precepts/treatise.

We are having enormous, miraculous mantra, tantra sastras. Our ancestors proved that letters are having hidden accumulated potency in the known as beejaksharas and each specific beejaksharas has a specific type of energy. In this computer age some people are trying to prove that hidden energy of the beejaksharas and to standard that hidden energy by rhythmical pronunciation of the beejaksharas. Proper effect can be obtained by correct pronunciation. Improper pronunciation results in no effect or improper effect which leads to misfaith on the classics.

I am writing this topic in order to highlight the sacred relationship between the teacher and student which is deteriorating at a rapid pace from one generation to the next. Due to the influence of television, junk magazines which install wrong notions and ideas in a very attractive and tantalizing manner into the students flexible of the teacher. Due to wide spread of westernization, the student of yester year, who used to place his guru in a position higher than his parents, now regards his teachers as just another ordinary human being who is imparting a part of his knowledge to earn his living. This has led to loss of respect on the part of the student for his teacher and commercialization of the existing education system.

I am writing this book to remind about rich cultural heritage of our country (India) and the essence of the relationship between the teacher and student.

With my humble effort I hope to clear the misunderstanding which has crept the minds of students and thus enable them to be more sincere in studies so that in future they would grow to be great citizens and serve the mother land. This is not possible without the student being put in the right path from the beginning of the road of education, with the help of the right guidance and enlightenment imparted by the right guru (teacher).