Sivananda's Personality - 9.

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The Master saw God in women.

He saw, not sex, but Goddess Durga in every female form.

One Vijaya Dasami day, he felt the urge to worship the visible manifestations of the Divine Mother.

Immediately he sent an Ashram worker to the Rishikesh market to procure fruit, flowers and silk for the worship.

And who were the Goddesses?

They were the little girls of the school run by the Ashram.

Aged three to ten, they were seated in a row on a long mat.

It was a most entrancing sight to see the tall, burly Swamiji bend down with feeling before each little girl, applying kumkum on the forehead and offering worship with flowers.

Then he gently waved the camphor Arati before them and served them with sweets specially prepared as offering.

Such was the Master’s worship of the Divine Mother.


The Master saw God in enemies and in dacoits.

On January 8, 1950, during the evening Satsang at the Ashram, a disgruntled inmate, Govindan by name, aimed three blows at the Master’s head with a crude axe.

But in the dim light of the oil lamp—electricity had not come to the Ashram then—he missed his mark and hit the door and the wall instead.

Only the wooden handle struck on the heavily turbaned head.

The assailant was caught and the police were called in, but the Master would not let Govindan be prosecuted.

Sri N. Ananthanarayanan
To be continued  ...


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