Hari OM
Prayer time:
We started the class by chanting OM 3 times followed by morning prayers- "Sahanaavathu" followed by Vakrathunda Mahakaya, Saraswathi Namsthubhyam, Guru Brahma and Buddhir balam.
Discussion time:
Today in class we talked about the upcoming festival 'Navrathri'. All of us shared how we celebrate this festival at home with family. The thoughts shared - keeping steps and arranging Golu dolls, eating sundal and sweets, praying to goddess (Durga, Lakshmi, Saraswati) , arranging music instruments in front of God, and attending Durga Pooja at the temple.
Bhagvatham Time:
First, we did the recap of the last class ('How to be Happy forever') and moved on with the story of Narada.
Narada was the son of a servant lady who lived serving saints in the ashram. Narada lived there hearing the glories of Bhagavan from the saints. It so happened that one-day Narada mother got bitten by a snake and died and thus Narada Ji was left all alone. After this incident Narada went to the forest for mediating and Bhagavan, being happy with him, blessed him by saying he will be reborn as Brahmaji's son. Few years later he died and was reborn again as the son of Brahmaji.
Pariksit Meets Kali
One day King Pariksit was going around, and he was shocked to see a strange sight. A mean, well-dressed man, Kali was torturing a white bull and a cow was standing close by and crying seeing this. The mean man had already pulled out three of the bull's legs and was about to cut out the fourth leg. Seeing this King Pariksit got angry and asked Kali why he was doing this to the poor animal. Then the King turned to the bull and cow and asked why he was doing this. The bull answered he didn't know why- but some say it may be due to past karmas. Parikshit thought deeply and realized that the bull was the personification of Dharma & the cow was of Mother Earth. The four legs stand for Austerity, Purity, Kindness and Truthfulness. We discussed the three legs of the bull that were missing - Austerity, Purity and Kindness. In our next class we will continue the story and discuss Truthfulness.
Geetha Chanting time:
We learnt from Sanskrit words and pronunciation. We will start learning verses from Chp 2 in our next class.
Game time/Craft time:
We tried the word search game online. The theme was Gods and Goddess.
We concluded the class with Aarti and Pledge.
Wishing you all a very Happy Navratri!
**No Class on Oct 10th**. See you all on Sunday, October 17th.
With Love,
Indira & Raji Aunty