Jnana YajnasA 108 Day Pilgrimage with Swami Chinmayananda

Rewa was caught up in Pujya Gurudev’s contagious passion for Vedanta that on July 5, 1956, a day before the yajna concluded, Sri. K. K. Sharma, the Chief Secretary to the Vindhya Pradesh Government, admired: “He has made Vedanta as precise as science, as beautiful as poetry, and as enchanting as romance.” Mrs. Sheila Sharma who had devotedly translated into Hindi a few books of Pujya Gurudev’s including the Kenopanishad wrote in Tyagi about a special happening; on the 19th day of the Yajna until Pujya Gurudev returned from the sacred bath (Avabhrta Snanam) at Panna, the gathered audience had waited for Him in sublime silence for over an hour! The 18 days of Kenopanishad, the three days of Maha Mrtyunjaya Homa, the sacred bath and the prayers offered to both Krishna and Khuda at the Pran-nath temple in Panna, the joyful procession of Mahamantra chanting, and the engulfing silence of meditation after the  sacred Ganga waters was sprinkled on the audience – Pujya Gurudev had taken Rewa into spiritual ecstasy.

In Admiration 

Mrs. Susheela Sharma from Rewa recounts Pujya Gurudev’s mysterious ability to connect with people and draw them in, guiding their focus towards profound self-inquiry. “He distributed Vedanta in such a sugar-coated form, that it became acceptable to all who has even for once strayed into the canopy under which he carried on his free distribution. They were all left smacking their lips when it was over. The taste left was so pleasing that they all hung around for more and more of it. He moved with crowds, and he had time for one and all. Each one felt that he was only his, while he was all the time everybody’s and therefore, nobody’s.”