Unknown Pilgrims

SR No.: 007014
Original Sutra Author: N/A
Author: N Shanta
Publisher: Sri Satguru Publications Delhi
Publication Year: 1997
Total Pages: 820
Language: English
Classification: Book_English
File Size: 19 MB

Page 628

600
The Unknown Pilgrims
Sādhvi Candrayaśā had not chosen to terminate her life by saṁlekhană (or saṁstăra), which is the culmination of an absolute fast. She was young and zealous with the consent of her guruņi, she was endeavouring to live out in every detail and stage by stage, the ideal set forth in the doctrine, namely, the purification of the deha, the body, with a view to its final separation from the ātman. To reach this goal, she used the means prescribed: faithful adherence to the rules, dhyāna, svādhyāya, and fasting, to which, in accordance with the tradition of her gaccha, she attached particular importance.
Thc pcoplc of Madrās, greatly impressed and deeply moved, thus venerated with enthusiasm a young saint who had evidenced extraordinary zeal for spiritual values. It was this life-testimony, bearing, as it did, the mark of the Absolute, that attracted in her train people of all ages, all beliefs and all social strata. By her faithful adherence to her ideal, Sãdhvi Candrayaśā awoke in everybody's consciousness, in differing degrees of course, an awareness of the ātman, of that Reality which is simultaneously both transcendent and immanent.
D - Ujjvala Vāņi
The pravacanas of Mahāsati Sri Ujjvalakumari
Mahāsati Ujjvalakumāri likewise was originally from Gujarāta and belonged to the Sthănakavāsis. Her memory is still very vivid among those who knew her, for she left this world only in 1976 at the age of around fifty-seven. As a child, she lived with her mother, a young widow and schoolmistress, in a suburb of Mumbai. When the young girl was no more than ten, they came into contact with Mahāsati Rājakumari. The young woman, attracted by the teaching of this guruņi, decided to become her disciple and her daughter followed suit. For several years they shared the life of the sādhvis who took good care to instruct them and in 1934 both received dikṣā at Karamālă in Mahārāștra. The mother became Mahāsati Sri Candanabālā and the