Hari OM
Opening Prayer:
We started the class by chanting OM 3 times followed by morning prayers- "Sahanaavathu".
Guru Stotram:
We practiced Guru Stotram (1-3). Please make sure kids are practicing at home.
We briefly introduced Bhagavad Geeta and chapter 3 we will be practicing this year.
Bala Bhagavatham - Recap:
First, we did the recap of the last class. We recollected who Pariksit is, what are the 4 legs of Dharma (PAKT – Purity, Austerity, Kindness and Truthfulness). We discussed briefly where Kali resides. Kali asked King Pariksit to give him some place to live. Thus, Pariksit gave him 5 adharmic places to live: untruthfulness, arrogance/ ignorance, lust, cruelty, running after wealth.
Today's Story – The Curse
King Pariksit went hunting alone in the forest. After a while he felt thirsty and went looking for water. His search ended up seeing sage Samika's ashram. But the sage was in deep meditation, and he was not aware of the king's presence. The King wanted to test the sage so he took a snake and put it around the sage's neck and on seeing this act of the king the sage's son, Sringi got angry and cursed the King that he will be bitten by a poisonous snake, Thakshak and thus he will be killed in 7 days. When the Sage Samika heard this, he was upset with his son. The noble sage didn't even think bad about the king but instead defended the king saying that there is no king as good as King Pariksit. Such is the greatness of the sages of our land.
Story continues – Pariksit meets Sukhadeva
Pariksit was sorry for what he had done and thought he deserved the curse. He handed over his Kingdom to his son, Janamejaya and went to live on the banks of River Ganga. Many sages, including Sukadeva, son of Vyasa visited him. King Pariksit took his blessings. He was very happy to be with all these sages.Pariksit asked Sukadeva how he should spend the last few days of his life, what good things should he do. Sukadeva taught Pariksit how to Meditate. Then he started telling the stories of Bhagavatam. Learning those stories made Pariksit really happy.
What did we learn from this story?
Why Pariksit, a nice king, did a bad act of putting the snake around the sage's neck?
It was because the king was not on guard. He was not alert. His hunger, thirst and tiredness made him to do the act. The noble king lost his mind momentarily and could not make right from wrong
One wrong act cannot be set right by another wrong act. We explained it more by giving examples from our day-to-day life like it is not good to shout and people shouting back at you. It is not nice to push someone and in turn someone pushes you back. Same way it is not good to hit someone, and someone hits you back.
Quiz:
We did a recap quiz by playing a word tile game in order to revise all that we have studied until now.
Geetha Chanting time:
We recited the first 2 slokas of Bhagavad Geetha chapter 3 (Karma Yoga) taught by Swamiji.
Link to Verse 1 and 2 are here - https://youtu.be/YR_0-rSUa5U
Please practice and come for class.
We concluded the session after performing Aarathi and taking the pledge.
Wish you all a very Happy Deepavali!
With sincere and warm regards,
Aruna and Subbu
(Chinmaya Vrindavan Bala Vihar Grade 3 Teachers)
