Words of Wisdom of Sree Narayana Gurudev

About the Book

This collection of Gurudev’s sayings is a sum total of his views on education, business, occupation, marriage, married life, God, philosophy, temples, conferences on work, know- ledge, piety etc.

This book which is a rare one in its category, is a must read for all those who aim at happiness and peace in life and a must-keep for posterity.

Preface

Sree Narayana Gurudev was born on earth as the embodiment of the Cosmic Soul Itself. He lived here among the people fulfilling the aim of his birth, by serving people and making them wonder at his actions. He walked on this earth with his holy feet that showered blessings on all those who touched them. His life which was eventful, was at the same time extremely silent. This is a rare phenomenon in the world. The inherent holy silence was broken on rare occasions when mankind’s virtue and goodness flourished. From the sky of heart that was filled with the enlightenment of God, words emanated like stars. Those words were filled with peaceful hymns that led to spiritual attainment and at the same time, sounded the trumpet to materialistic success. This is something so rare and at the same time wonderful too.

But most of his sayings filled with spiritual beauty, have been washed away in the course of time. This is an irrepairable loss to humanity itself. Those who enjoy the nectar of these maxims tend to think like that. But, there are many who wanted to preserve at least a few of his maxims for posterity. The chief among those holy men are Dharmathirtha Swamikal, Nataraja Guru, Sarasakavi Muloor Padmanabha Panicker etc. Let us bow down before the memory of these holy men. There are many who opened the chest of time and took out those jewels of maxims collected by them and exposed them to the world. Among them, Dr. T. Bhaskaran through Sree Narayana Guru Vaikhari , Sri. A.V. Ashokan through Maxims of Gurudev, Sree Narayana Bhakthotham-sam Sri. C.R. Kesavan Vaidyar through Sree Narayana Guru in his own words, are to be remembered here because all these writings have helped us immensely along with Sivagiri Brahma-vidyalaya Library in the compilation of these words of wisdom.

Let us say something more about this booklet. When we rearrange Gurudev’s words of advice literally, they can be mainly divided into two parts. One is the books written by Gurudev, messages published by him, conversations recorded by others etc. in which the ideas and language are exclusively of Gurudev, In the second category, the ideas belong to Gurudev but the language is almost not his (For example, Sree Narayana Dharmam is a book comprising of words of advice by Gurudev but written by Athmananda Swamikal in the form of Sanskrit poetry. This compilation consists of extracts from this book which is written in a language different from that of the Guru. This compilation also consists of some parts taken from Guru’s writings like ‘Darshana-mala ‘. The Sanskrit Slokas from Darshanamala are not copied as they are, but the ideas are expressed in a language that can be understood by anybody. It is taken from the Deedhithi interpretation by Vidyananda Swamikal. Here also, the language is not that of Gurudev’s.

If the words of wisdom expressed through both the parts are combined, there is a chance of misunderstanding the language of the second part as that of Gurudev’s. So, those subjects that mostly come under the second category are given specially in the second part of this compilation. The first part consists solely of the maxims in Gurudev diction. But, when the maxims are categorized subject-wise, some of the maxims that are not in Gurudev’s own diction also come under part 1. Here, the language is not Gurudev’s, but only the ideas. To point out this fact specifically, the word ‘idea’ is given in brackets. In the same way, the second part consists of maxims that are not of Gurudev’s diction, but in some parts Gurudev’s maxims in his own diction are added subject-wise. To point out this, the words ‘message’ ‘conversation’ etc. are given in brackets. One more thing is that, the parts given in italics for some maxims that need explanation are solely for the convenience of study and clarity of ideas. I it is to be specially noted that these parts do not belong to the maxims.) We hope that all these will immensely be beneficial to people who study keenly and assess the maxims of Gurudev.

Let all of us be able to fulfill this great journey aiming at eternal happiness of the human soul as hinted kindly by Gurudev, through devotion to the Holy Feet of Gurudev who is considered God in human form by millions of people. Let us make use of the words of the Guru in this compilation, for that purpose. Praying that the Guru may shower his blessings on us to achieve this goal in life, we submit this compilation with obeisance at the auspicious feet of Sree Narayana Gurudev, that loving God who made us capable of compiling this holy work.

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