Dispelling Darkness: Part 1

Eastern Wisdom Weekly #8: The importance of Guru in life and Guru as a principle.

Happy Tuesday everyone 🌞 In the Sanatan culture, the role of Guru is the most important. It’s considered even greater than the principle of God. But why is that and what is a Guru? The literal meaning of the word Guru is “One who dispels darkness”.

Darkness is used to symbolize ignorance in our lives. And the only way to come out of this ignorance, or remove darkness is to bring light into our lives. The darkness symbolized by ignorance can be removed only through the light of knowledge. The knowledge of what’s real and what’s not. This is the function of the Guru, to remove darkness from your life and different aspects of life.

The knowledge can be of different subjects you go through in your academics, related to your daily grind, or even related to spiritual matters. A true Guru will impart the given knowledge to remove ignorance from your life. But many times, Guru is not just a physical person. Rather than a physical person Guru is a principle. A principle with no physical form but is there to guide you always. This principle takes a physical form to teach you what is not known. Sometimes instances, people serve as Guru and many times even your inner call guides you as a Guru.

Sage Dattatreya with his disciples, the famous 9 Natha Yogis.

Let’s see a beautiful story about Dattatreya and what he has to say about Guru. Sage Dattatreya is revered as one of the greatest sages and Gurus of India. He is also said to be a combined avatar of the holy trinity (Brahma, Vishnu, and Mahesh) walking on earth. He has been the Guru to many great disciples like Parashurama, the Natha Yogis, and many famous kings. Upon being asked by the great King Yadu (ancestor of Shri Krishna and a disciple of Dattatreya), who was Sage Dattatreya’s Guru, the sage answered:

Dear Yadu, my Atman alone has been my Guru so far.

This stresses the fact that the Guru as a principle evolves as an inner voice that guides you many times. Atman here means soul and soul has always been symbolized as an unwavering bright light that is not affected by worldly matters. He continues to say:

There are 24 other entities as well through which I have learned a lot. They are:

1. The Earth
2. Water
3. Air
4. Fire
5. Sky
6. The Moon
7. The Sun
8. Pigeon
9. Python
10. The Ocean
11. Moth
12. Bee
13. The Honey-gatherer
14. The Elephant
15. Deer
16. Fish
17. The Dancing-girl Pingala
18. Raven
19. Child
20. Maiden
21. The Serpent
22. An arrow-maker
23. Spider
24. Beetle.

We will cover each of these entities and what Sage Dattatreya learned from them in the coming editions of Eastern Wisdom. Another thing to mention, when we say Guru, the first Guru in physical form is always considered as the Mother for a newborn child as she is responsible for early behavior and teachings. Besides that, for every type of individual, deities, demons and organisms Lord Shiva is considered and respected as the Aadi Guru (The First Guru). It is said that Lord Shiva spread the knowledge of Tantra, Yoga and many sciences to his first 7 disciples known as the Sapta Rishis (7 great sages), and this is the reason why Shiva is considered as the First Guru. When a spiritual practitioner is not related to any spiritual tradition and yet wants to practise Yoga or Tantra, it is mentioned to consider Shiva as the Guru for the individual’s practice and progress.

Lord Shiva as Dakshina Murthy (Southern Faced) imparting knowledge to the sages.

As we close this edition, the great night of Shiva (Maha Shivaratri) will be on 8th March 2024, for which we will have a special edition. Lord Shiva is seen as the First Guru, the First Yogi, the First God, and much more. He is ascetic for yogis, the perfect householder for family people, and is quite democratic. Until next time…

असतो मा सद्गमय। तमसो मा ज्योतिर्गमय।मृत्योर्मामृतं गमय ॥

Let’s move from the unreal world to the true self, from the darkness of ignorance to the light of knowledge, and from mortality to immortality.

— Brihadaranyak Upanishad 1.3.28