Sacrifice, Generosity, and Service

 Sacrifice, Generosity, and Service


 

Yesterday, we reflected on the virtue of embracing simplicity and letting go of crookedness. In truth, however, sacrifice is not limited to giving up crookedness alone; it has many forms. Just as every divine virtue has its own special power, sacrifice too is a supremely elevated quality. When a person truly imbibes it, they become great.

Today, we call someone a sanyasi (renunciate) because they appear to have given up many things. Just as mountains rise above all other places on earth, and a great warrior or hero stands above ordinary warriors, in the same way, sacrifice stands at the peak of all virtues. A truly sacrificial person stands above even other virtuous people. Just as one feels small in front of a mighty mountain, one naturally feels small in front of a true renunciate. This is why ordinary people instinctively bow before genuine ascetics.


 

However, it is not easy to sacrifice. It is like climbing a tall palm tree or reaching the peak of a mountain. To sacrifice is, in a way, to ascend—to become higher, nobler, and greater. In the single word “sacrifice,” a person can experience the very gesture of “greatness.” But how many kinds of sacrifice are there?

Material or Limited Sacrifice vs. Mental and Unlimited Sacrifice


 

First, it is necessary to understand that the sacrifice made by sanyasis—those who leave their homeland and worldly life—is not the kind of sacrifice we are primarily speaking of here. Why?

    1. It is not a deeply internal or purely mental sacrifice.
    2. It is also a limited sacrifice, and not the highest form.

The highest sacrifice is that of a person who remains a householder—who lives amidst all kinds of worldly pleasures and sensory attractions—yet stays inwardly detached. Such a person works in the world, fulfills responsibilities, but remains inwardly free, with a sacrificial attitude.

Ascetics may leave their worldly relations and duties, but what they truly need to give up are:

    1. Their attachment to those relationships.
    2. Their ego is related to those duties.

That is why I say: their sacrifice and asceticism often remain gross (external). They leave their physical home, shop, wife, or children—meaning, they physically separate from them—but they do not necessarily detach from the feeling of bodily or possessive relationships.

Secondly, even if someone renounces a small house, a palace, or vehicles, they often do not withdraw their intellect from the entire world. They may leave things outwardly, but inwardly still remain entangled. Therefore, their sacrifice is limited and gross.

This type of sacrifice can be called rajasic—a middle path of renunciation. The highest, or sattvic, sacrifice is that in which a person, while still living in this world, does not consider themselves to belong to it. They live like a lotus in the water: surrounded by the world, yet untouched by it.


 

Is this sattvic sacrifice difficult?


 

We will explore this in the next blog… 

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