Rantideva: The Glory of Spontaneous Compassion and absolute Unselfishness
Śrī Śuka introduces the account of King Rantideva:
rantidevasya mahimā ihāmutra ca gīyate
The glory of Rantideva is celebrated both here and in the higher worlds.
Bhāgavata Purāṇa 9.21.2
Rantideva was a king, but his greatness did not consist in
sovereignty, wealth, military power, or even ritual accomplishment. His glory
arose from the manner in which he responded to suffering. We are herewith
reflecting on this story, only to know to what extend can a bhakta go, w.r.t.
to manifesting unselfishness, as a natural act of compassion.
This is being discussed in the context of nivrrti lakshana
pārangatah example, during our Gita Mananam.
(Story of the Mahātma Rantideva)
A great king, with flourishing kingdom, was once afflicted by great famine, in which his subjects suffered, for the lack of food and water. He did his best to help, but eventually he had to give away all his wealth to support the people of his land. While doing so, he regarded wealth as temporary and therefore unsuitable as a basis for
security. Gradually, he became completely destitute. His family shared his
condition.
At the height of misfortune.....for forty eight days, they remained without proper food. They did not even receive sufficient water. On the morning of the forty ninth day, some food finally came to them. There was rice cooked in milk, ghee, saṃyāva, and a small quantity of water. Rantideva and his family were weakened by hunger and tormented by thirst. Just as they were about to eat, a Brāhmaṇa arrived as a guest.
Rantideva welcomed him with reverence and gave him a portion
of the food.
The Bhāgavatam gives the reason for his hospitality.
Rantideva saw Hari everywhere.
The Brāhmaṇa
was not merely an individual asking for food. He was a form through which the
Lord had arrived. Rantideva therefore served him with śraddhā and reverence.
The Brāhmaṇa ate and
departed.
The family divided what remained. Before Rantideva could
eat, another guest arrived, this time a Śūdra. Rantideva gave him a portion of
the remaining food, continuing to contemplate on Sri Hari.
After the Śūdra departed, another man appeared, surrounded
by hungry dogs. He requested food for himself and for the animals accompanying
him.
Rantideva gave them everything that remained. He then bowed
to the man and to the dogs.
At this point, there was no food left. Only a small quantity
of water remained, just enough for one person. Rantideva was about to drink it
when a Chaṇḍāla
approached him and asked for water.
The man was exhausted and close to death. Hearing his
painful request, Rantideva was overcome by compassion.
He then spoke the words for which his name continues to be
remembered:
na kāmaye ahaṃ
gatim īśvarāt parām
aṣṭarddhiyuktām
apunarbhavaṃ vā
ārtiṃ prapadye akhila
dehabhājām
antaḥsthito yena
bhavanty aduḥkhāḥ
I do not desire from Īśvara the highest state endowed
with the eight siddhis, nor even freedom from rebirth. May I enter the
suffering of all embodied beings and bear it within myself, so that they may
become free from sorrow.
Bhāgavata Purāṇa 9.21.12
Rantideva does not ask for prosperity. He does not ask for
celestial enjoyment. He does not ask for yogic powers. More strikingly, he does
not even ask for liberation from saṃsāra.
He asks to bear the suffering of living beings so that they
may be relieved.
This should remind us of the lakṣaṇa of the bhakta given by
Bhagavān in the Gītā:
adveṣṭā sarvabhūtānāṃ maitraḥ karuṇa eva ca |
nirmamo nirahaṃkāraḥ samaduḥkhasukhaḥ kṣamī ||
Bhagavad Gītā 12.13
The devotee is adveṣṭā sarvabhūtānām, one who
bears hatred towards no being. He is maitraḥ, friendly towards all, and karuṇaḥ, compassionate towards
those who suffer. He is nirmamaḥ,
free from the notion of “mine,” and nirahaṃkāraḥ,
free from the notion of “I.” He is samaduḥkhasukhaḥ,
one whose composure is not disturbed by pleasure or pain, and kṣamī, one
endowed with forbearance.
To this, our Ācārya comments:
adveṣṭā sarvabhūtānāṃ na dveṣṭā, ātmano duḥkhahetum api na kiṃcid dveṣṭi, sarvāṇi bhūtāny ātmatvena hi paśyati
|
Adveṣṭā sarvabhūtānām means na dveṣṭā, one who hates no being.
Even one who becomes ātmano duḥkhahetuḥ, a cause of suffering to
oneself, is not hated. Why? Because sarvāṇi
bhūtāni ātmatvena paśyati, he sees all beings as the Self, as nonseparate from
himself.
maitro mitrabhāvo maitrī
mitratayā vartata iti maitraḥ
| karuṇa eva ca,
karuṇā kṛpā duḥkhiteṣu dayā, tadvān karuṇaḥ, sarvabhūtābhayapradaḥ, saṃnyāsīty arthaḥ |
Maitraḥ is one in whom there is mitrabhāvaḥ, the disposition of a friend.
Maitrī means relating to all with friendliness, and one who conducts himself in
this manner is called maitraḥ.
(think of how Sri Rāma befriended
Sugriva)
He is also karuṇaḥ. Karuṇā
is kṛpā, compassion,
further explained as duḥkhiteṣu
dayā, tenderness towards those who suffer. One who possesses such compassion is
karuṇaḥ.
(think of how Sri Rāma forgave
Kākāsurā, after he apologized to seetamma)
Such a person is sarvabhūtābhayapradaḥ, one who gives freedom from
fear to all beings. Ācārya concludes, saṃnyāsī
iti arthaḥ, this is the
meaning of a true saṃnyāsī.
(this is the vratam of a sanyasi)
nirmamo mamapratyayavarjitaḥ | nirahaṃkāro nirgatāhaṃpratyayaḥ |
Nirmamaḥ means mamapratyayavarjitaḥ, one who is free from the thought mama, “this is
mine.”
Nirahaṃkāraḥ
means nirgata ahaṃpratyayaḥ, one from whom the thought aham,
the limiting identification “I am this body and mind,” has departed.
(what a blessed life)
samaduḥkhasukhaḥ same duḥkhasukhe dveṣarāgayor
apravartake yasya sa samaduḥkhasukhaḥ |
Samaduḥkhasukhaḥ
is one for whom duḥkha
and sukha, pain and pleasure, are same, equal in their capacity to disturb the
mind. They do not become dveṣarāgayoḥ
pravartake, causes that set aversion and attachment into motion.
Thus, he is not governed by dveṣa
when duḥkha comes, nor by
rāga when sukha comes.
(to such a person the samsāra has
disappeared as it were)
kṣamī kṣamāvān, ākruṣṭo ’bhihato vāvikriya evāste |
Kṣamī means kṣamāvān, one endowed
with forbearance. Even when ākruṣṭaḥ, verbally abused, or abhihataḥ, physically struck, he
remains avikriyaḥ,
inwardly unchanged and free from agitation.
(In the same episode referred to
above, seethamma bore all the injury inflicted by kākāsurā. Its only the blood
oozing out of her thirumenni, that woke up swāmi and caused him to release the
brahmāstra, at kākāsura. Seethamma bore all this patiently, silently, without
any pratikāra bhāvam. Reminds one of titksha definition in Vivekachudāmani
sahanaṃ sarva duḥkhānām
apratīkāra pūrvakam .
cintā vilāpa rahitaṃ sā titikṣā nigadyate .. 24
)
Rantideva embodies this description.
While traveling in train or bus, we often see some people in
dire poverty, begging, living in unimaginably harsh conditions. Our heart may
skip a beat or two. Sometime while at our computer, we often get a GoFundMe
appeal, which we may honor. We may have our own donation cycles in a year. All
good.
But now come back to the story and see the heart of
Rantideva. He does not merely feel sympathy for the suffering Chāṇḍāla. He sees no separation
between the other person’s suffering and his own. His hunger does not produce
resentment. His thirst does not narrow his concern to the preservation of his
own body. He is nirmamaḥ,
because he does not claim the water as his. He is nirahaṃkāraḥ, because he does not
place his own survival at the centre of his action. He is karuṇaḥ, because the suffering of
another moves him more deeply than his own physical distress.
His compassion is therefore not merely an ethical virtue. It
is the expression of a mind in which the boundaries created by ahaṃkāra and mamakāra have become
attenuated. The vision of Hari in all beings becomes visible as maitrī, karuṇā and sarvabhūtābhaya.
Sri Rantideva continues:
kṣuttṛṭśramo
gātraparibhramaś ca
dainyaṃ klamaḥ śokaviṣādamohāḥ
sarve nivṛttāḥ kṛpaṇasya jantor
jijīviṣor jīvajalārpaṇān
me
By offering this life sustaining water to this
unfortunate being who longs to live, my hunger, thirst, physical exhaustion,
helplessness, fatigue, grief, despondency and delusion have all disappeared.
Bhāgavata Purāṇa 9.21.13
Externally, nothing had changed. His body remained weak. Yet
he says that his suffering had disappeared. What had disappeared was the mind’s
preoccupation with its own condition. The spontaneous compassion overflowed,
like the river breaking its banks at the time of flood.
This brings to mind the opening
of the Nārada Bhakti Sūtras:
athāto bhaktiṃ vyākhyāsyāmaḥ || 1 ||
Now, therefore, we shall explain
bhakti.
sā tv asmin parama premarūpā
|| 2 ||
That bhakti is of the nature of
supreme love for Him.
Rantideva’s conduct reveals what
such parama prema becomes when it matures. It is not merely an intense
private feeling directed towards Bhagavān. Since Bhagavān is seen in all
beings, love for Bhagavān expresses itself as compassion towards all beings.
The suffering of the
other is not treated as remote, secondary, or irrelevant to him.
This also recalls the vision unfolded in the Īśāvāsya Upaniṣad:
yas tu sarvāṇi
bhūtāny ātmany evānupaśyati |
sarvabhūteṣu cātmānaṃ tato
na vijugupsate || 6
The one who sees all beings in oneself and oneself in all beings does not
shrink away from anything.
yasmin sarvāṇi
bhūtāny ātmaivābhūd vijānataḥ |
tatra ko mohaḥ kaḥ śoka ekatvam anupaśyataḥ || 7
For the one who knows, in whose vision all beings have become the Self,
what delusion and what sorrow can remain, when one sees oneness?
The Upaniṣad is speaking
of the vision born of Self knowledge. All beings are understood as non-separate, from the one Ātmā. Therefore, there is no basis for vijugupsā, rejection or
withdrawal from another. There is also no basis for moha and śoka,
because both depend upon taking division to be absolutely real.
Rantideva’s
statement carries the fragrance of this vision.
They are the natural expression of a heart in which
separation has lost its force.
The Bhāgavata presents this through bhakti. The Nārada
Bhakti Sūtras call it parama prema. The Īśāvāsya Upaniṣad
reveals its ultimate foundation as ekatva darśanam, the recognition of
nonseparation.
This brings to mind Swami Vivekananda’s lectures on Karma
Yoga. He observes that the person who truly serves others “cannot be
confined within the limited circle of ‘me and mine’.” In every act of genuine
unselfishness, the individual is moving beyond identification with the little
body and the limited personality. As this movement becomes complete, the narrow
personality loses its hold, and the person attains an expansion that is no
longer confined by individuality. Swamiji says “Karma, Bhakti, and Jnana all
meet here.”. What is here? – Its
Unselfishness. He says “What they mean by world is selfishness. Unselfishness
is God”
The world, referred to above by Swamiji, (in the
context of His lecture), is not constituted by external possessions, social
position, or physical surroundings. A person may possess wealth and yet remain
free from the world if he is free from selfishness. Another may possess nothing
and yet, remain deeply bound if the mind continues to revolve around its own
preservation and importance.
As long as the mind says, “My hunger, my thirst, my
survival,” pain becomes enclosed within the boundaries of individuality. When
attention becomes wholly absorbed in another being’s distress, this enclosure
is broken.
Rantideva did not overcome suffering by obtaining what he
lacked. He overcame it by becoming free from selfishness.
iti prabhāṣya pānīyaṃ
mriyamāṇaḥ pipāsayā
pulkasāyādadād dhīro
nisargakaruṇo nṛpaḥ
Having spoken thus, the steadfast king, compassionate by
nature, gave the water to the Chaṇḍāla,
though he himself was dying of thirst.
Bhāgavata Purāṇa 9.21.14
The Bhāgavatam describes him as dhīraḥ, one endowed with
steadiness and clarity (even in the face of testing adversity), and as nisargakaruṇaḥ, compassionate by his
very nature.
Needless to reemphasize :- (by now it must be apparent to
the reader that….)
·
His action was not an emotional impulse.
·
Nor was it charity performed for religious
merit.
·
He was not attempting to appear virtuous.
·
He did not know that he was being tested.
·
His giving arose naturally from his vision.
The Brāhmaṇa, the Śūdra, the man with the dogs, and the Chaṇḍāla were forms assumed by the deities under the direction of Bhagavān Viṣṇu. Having witnessed Rantideva’s complete freedom from selfish desire, they revealed themselves to him.
But even when the devtas stood before him, Rantideva asked
for nothing.
sa vai tebhyo namaskṛtya
niḥsaṅgo vigataspṛhaḥ
vāsudeve bhagavati
bhaktyā cakre manaḥ
param
Having bowed to them, free from attachment and devoid of
desire, he fixed his mind through devotion upon Bhagavān Vāsudeva alone.
Bhāgavata Purāṇa
9.21.16
The appearance of the devas did not distract him from
Vāsudeva. Divine powers, visions, and rewards had no attraction for him. His
mind had become niḥsaṅga, free from attachment,
and vigataspṛha,
free from longing.
The test revealed that his devotion was not a means to
obtain something else. Vāsudeva alone was its end.
īśvarālambanaṃ
cittaṃ
kurvato ananyarādhasaḥ
māyā guṇamayī
rājan
svapnavat pratyalīyata
As his mind rested entirely upon Īśvara, without any other
object of worship, māyā composed of the guṇas
dissolved before him like a dream.
Bhāgavata Purāṇa 9.21.17
We have to know that the power of Māyā to confound the
jeeva, does not disappear merely through an extraordinary act of sacrifice
(i.e. ignorance is not removed by karma), instead it withdraws when the mind
rests wholly in Īśvara and no longer seeks fulfilment from the field of
objects, achievements, identities, powers, or experiences. This implies abheda jnāna
nista.
Rantideva’s compassion and his devotion were not two
separate qualities. His compassion arose because he saw Hari in all beings. His
devotion became complete because he retained no separate interest of his own. Such beings are rare indeed !
This kind of rare being is
referred to in Gita
bahūnām janmanām ante jñānavān
mām prapadyate .
vāsudevaḥ sarvam iti saḥ
mahātmā sudurlabhaḥ .. 7-19..
At the end of many births, the
person endowed with mature knowledge reaches Me with the recognition, vāsudevaḥ sarvam iti, “Vāsudeva is
all.” Such a person is a mahātmā, a great being, and is sudurlabhaḥ, exceedingly rare.
To this, our Ācārya comments:
bahūnāṃ janmanāṃ jñānārthasaṃskārāśrayāṇām ante samāptau jñānavān
prāptaparipākajñāno māṃ
vāsudevaṃ
pratyagātmānaṃ
pratyakṣataḥ
prapadyate |
Bahūnāṃ janmanām ante means at
the culmination of many births that have served as the āśraya, the
field, for jñānārthasaṃskārāḥ, impressions and
disciplines directed towards knowledge.
At that point, he becomes jñānavān,
one whose knowledge has attained maturity. Ācārya makes this explicit through
the expression prāptaparipākajñānaḥ,
one whose knowledge has reached full ripeness.
Such a person directly recognizes
māṃ vāsudevaṃ pratyagātmānam, Me,
Vāsudeva, as the innermost Self. The word pratyakṣataḥ indicates that this is no
longer a distant belief or devotional conception. It is immediate recognition.
Āchārya then asks:
katham? vāsudevaḥ sarvam iti |
How does he recognize Vāsudeva?
Through the vision, vāsudevaḥ sarvam, Vāsudeva is all.
ya evaṃ sarvātmānaṃ māṃ nārāyaṇaṃ pratipadyate, sa mahātmā |
The one who recognizes Me, Nārāyaṇa, as sarvātmā, the
Self of all, is the mahātmā.
The greatness of the mahātmā lies in the disappearance of the narrow
individuality through which beings are divided into “myself” and “others.”
Āchārya therefore says:
na tatsamo anyo asti, adhiko
vā |
There is no other equal to such a
person, much less one greater.
Hence Bhagavān calls him sudurlabhaḥ, exceedingly rare.
Rantideva’s life reveals the
disposition born of this vision. He saw Hari in the Brāhmaṇa, the Śūdra, the man
accompanied by dogs, and the Chaṇḍāla.
The fruit of such a life extended beyond Rantideva himself:
tatprasaṅgānubhāvena
rantidevānuvartinaḥ
abhavan yoginaḥ
sarve
nārāyaṇaparāyaṇāḥ
Through the power of association with him, all those who
followed Rantideva became yogins devoted entirely to Nārāyaṇa.
Bhāgavata Purāṇa 9.21.18
A person established in dharma transforms others not merely
through instruction, but through presence. Rantideva’s life demonstrated that
devotion to Nārāyaṇa must
become visible as freedom from personal demand and spontaneous concern for
living beings.
Conclusion
His glory lies not merely in giving away food and water, but
in relinquishing the inner claimant who says, “This must first be preserved for
me.”
He did not see a Brāhmaṇa,
a Śūdra, a Chāṇḍāla, a
man, or a dog as beings outside the ambit of the sacred. He saw Hari arriving
repeatedly, each time in a form that challenged social distinction, bodily
attachment, and self-preservation.
The story therefore moves through progressively deeper
levels of renunciation.
First, Rantideva relinquishes wealth.
Then he relinquishes food.
Then he relinquishes the distinction between high and low.
Finally, he relinquishes even the instinct to preserve his
own life.
At the culmination, he relinquishes the desire for any other worldly rewards.
Bhagavān describes such a bhakta in Gita 12.14
santuṣṭaḥ satataṃ yogī yatātmā dṛḍhaniścayaḥ |
mayyarpitamanobuddhir yo madbhaktaḥ sa me priyaḥ ||
The bhakta is santuṣṭaḥ, inwardly content, and satataṃ yogī, constantly united in yoga. He is yatātmā, one whose body, senses, and mind are disciplined, and dṛḍhaniścayaḥ, one whose conviction is firm and settled.
He is mayyarpitamanobuddhiḥ, one whose manas, the emotional and volitional mind, and whose buddhi, the faculty of understanding and determination, have both been offered to Me.
Such a person, Bhagavān says, is madbhaktaḥ, My devotee, and sa me priyaḥ, he is dear to Me.
Rantideva embodies this lakṣaṇa. His contentment did not depend upon food, comfort, or security. Even after prolonged hunger and thirst, his mind did not turn bitter or accusatory.
This is santuṣṭi, not as passive satisfaction, but as freedom from inner demand.
Therefore, his compassion was not separate from his bhakti.
It was the action of a mind and buddhi already placed in Vāsudeva.
rantidevasya mahimā ihāmutra ca gīyate // BhP_09.21.002 //
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