M N Kundu
Rabindranath Tagore’s 157th birth anniversary today, May 9, reminds us how during the pre-world war days of turmoil and unrest in Europe, his Song Offerings sprinkled waters of peace and rest with meditative poise and deeper engagement with life. It offered the much-needed refuge and kept everyone spellbound. Now, amid serious sociocultural degeneration and loss of ethics and values, we need to recall the timeless poet, Tagore, in infinite context for a cultural renaissance. He inspired in us a cultural ‘art of living’ as a kindred point between heaven and home. He taught us to appreciate and understand life in every aspect with a holistic sense of togetherness, acknowledging the Divine’s Omnipresence.
A unique aspect of Tagore is that he translated his intense creative impulse into social context for solution of contemporary problems of humanity. He viewed the world and life as a seer, interpreter and healer. His artistic engagement with religion, people, love and nature was intensely poetic but his expression is also taken as practical spirituality of mystic love. In him, we find an exquisite exposition of the crisis of man, along with an experiential solution with purgation of human emotions or catharsis. This is in the Aristotelian sense, by discovery of the miracle of playful finite existence, in the context of eternity.
Human beings are preoccupied with dual identity – individual and universal. The individual self-rotates around immediate needs and wish-fulfilment. The universal identity whispers as an inner call for human perfection in unison, in self-expanding service and in identification with unity in diversity in divine ecstasy. He said, “I slept and dreamt that life was joy, I awoke and saw that life was service, I acted and behold, that service was joy!”
WB Yeats held, “He is the first amongst our saints who has not refused to live, but has spoken out of life itself.” He was intensely spiritual but alive to the feast of sight and symphony in creation.
While exchanging views with Einstein, Tagore clarified, “The progress of our soul is like a perfect poem. It has an infinite idea, which, once realised, makes all movements full of meaning and joy. But if we detach its movements from that ultimate idea, if we do not see the infinite rest and only see infinite motion, then existence appears to us as a monstrous evil, impetuously rushing towards an unending aimlessness.”
He held that knowledge and skills alone do not have the potential to lead humanity to a happy and dignified life. We must acquire aspiration for expansion of human spirit, and freedom of soul in religious creeds. The mind in social environment should be empowered with knowledge and skill and moral communion.
He said, “Everyone has something special called ‘my religion’. Which is his religion? The one that lies hidden in his heart and keeps on creating him.” The process lies in internal urge and self-purification irrespective of external rituals. The more we are preoccupied with blinding externals, the more distanced we become from human perfection. This is the expansion of love in Christianity, maitri bhavana in Buddhism and Self-realisation in Vedanta, which found exquisite poetic expression in Tagore’s creations.
As we seek to achieve permanent peace with sustainable progress, Tagore’s focus on solutions along with discovery of life, and joyful process of becoming offers a beacon on the cultural highway.
DISCLAIMER
The views expressed in the Article above are Author’s personal views and kashmiribhatta.in is not in any way responsible for the opinions expressed in the above article. The article belongs to its respective owner or owners and this site does not claim any right over it. Copyright Disclaimer under section 107 of the Copyright Act of 1976, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, education, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing."
Courtesy: Times Of India: Speaking Tree: May 09 ,2019
M N Kundu
Rabindranath Tagore’s 157th birth anniversary today, May 9, reminds us how during the pre-world war days of turmoil and unrest in Europe, his Song Offerings sprinkled waters of peace and rest with meditative poise and deeper engagement with life. It offered the much-needed refuge and kept everyone spellbound. Now, amid serious sociocultural degeneration and loss of ethics and values, we need to recall the timeless poet, Tagore, in infinite context for a cultural renaissance. He inspired in us a cultural ‘art of living’ as a kindred point between heaven and home. He taught us to appreciate and understand life in every aspect with a holistic sense of togetherness, acknowledging the Divine’s Omnipresence.
A unique aspect of Tagore is that he translated his intense creative impulse into social context for solution of contemporary problems of humanity. He viewed the world and life as a seer, interpreter and healer. His artistic engagement with religion, people, love and nature was intensely poetic but his expression is also taken as practical spirituality of mystic love. In him, we find an exquisite exposition of the crisis of man, along with an experiential solution with purgation of human emotions or catharsis. This is in the Aristotelian sense, by discovery of the miracle of playful finite existence, in the context of eternity.
Human beings are preoccupied with dual identity – individual and universal. The individual self-rotates around immediate needs and wish-fulfilment. The universal identity whispers as an inner call for human perfection in unison, in self-expanding service and in identification with unity in diversity in divine ecstasy. He said, “I slept and dreamt that life was joy, I awoke and saw that life was service, I acted and behold, that service was joy!”
WB Yeats held, “He is the first amongst our saints who has not refused to live, but has spoken out of life itself.” He was intensely spiritual but alive to the feast of sight and symphony in creation.
While exchanging views with Einstein, Tagore clarified, “The progress of our soul is like a perfect poem. It has an infinite idea, which, once realised, makes all movements full of meaning and joy. But if we detach its movements from that ultimate idea, if we do not see the infinite rest and only see infinite motion, then existence appears to us as a monstrous evil, impetuously rushing towards an unending aimlessness.”
He held that knowledge and skills alone do not have the potential to lead humanity to a happy and dignified life. We must acquire aspiration for expansion of human spirit, and freedom of soul in religious creeds. The mind in social environment should be empowered with knowledge and skill and moral communion.
He said, “Everyone has something special called ‘my religion’. Which is his religion? The one that lies hidden in his heart and keeps on creating him.” The process lies in internal urge and self-purification irrespective of external rituals. The more we are preoccupied with blinding externals, the more distanced we become from human perfection. This is the expansion of love in Christianity, maitri bhavana in Buddhism and Self-realisation in Vedanta, which found exquisite poetic expression in Tagore’s creations.
As we seek to achieve permanent peace with sustainable progress, Tagore’s focus on solutions along with discovery of life, and joyful process of becoming offers a beacon on the cultural highway.
DISCLAIMER
The views expressed in the Article above are Author’s personal views and kashmiribhatta.in is not in any way responsible for the opinions expressed in the above article. The article belongs to its respective owner or owners and this site does not claim any right over it. Copyright Disclaimer under section 107 of the Copyright Act of 1976, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, education, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing."
Courtesy: Times Of India: Speaking Tree: May 09 ,2019