30-05-2016 Monday
Holy Mother By Swami Nikhilananda: 133

Spiritual Practices – 12

Sri Ramakrishna trained Sarada Devi to fulfil a special mission, namely. Demonstration of the Motherhood of God. From an early age she expressed the motherhood innate in women in many ways: by taking care of her brothers, by feeding the poor, and afterwards by looking after Sri Ramakrishna’s young disciples at Dakshineswar. As is natural with women, she occasionally wished she had children. In Hindu society a woman without children is considered unlucky and unfit to participate in certain religious observances. At Kamarpukur she had heard the jibes of her neighbours on account of her not having any children, and felt sad at heart. Several times she thought about it at Dakshineswar. We have already spoken of her mother’s grief for having married her daughter to an insane man and thus depriving her of the joy of being addressed as ‘Mother.’ One day Sri Ramakrishna read Sarada Devi’s thought and said: ‘Why should you worry? I shall leave you many children, all pure as gold, the like of whom women do not get even through the prayers and austerities of millions of lives. So many people will call you mother that you will find it hard to look after them all.’ Perhaps this assurance did not completely satisfy Sarada Devi. Still she wanted to hear the sweet word ‘mother’. Sri Ramakrishna again read her thought and instructed some of his disciples from Calcutta to stop in front of the Nahabat, before coming to his room, and say loudly: ‘Mother, here we are!’

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Holy Mother - Being the Life of Sri Sarada Devi Wife of Sri Ramakrishna And Helpmate in his Mission By Swami Nikhilananda p: 86

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