HOW TO OVERCOME TEMPTATIONS – Part 3
Have you ever looked at a fly sipping honey? At first, it is very careful to see its legs are free. It sips on the edge of the spoon containing honey, saying to itself that after just one wee little taste of honey, it would fly away. But once it gets the relish of honey, it forgets everything and goes all out for it. And when it has had its fill, it finds that all its legs are stuck in honey: it cannot fly away. There it dies a tragic death in its sweet grave. Such is the case with man. He is lured into temptation by the thought of a little pleasure that he expects to get. Once he has tasted pleasure, it draws him to itself, again and again, until he becomes the slave of a habit cannot overcome. Pleasure leads a man ashtray!
There is a Bengali proverb which tells us: “The heron is a saint when there are no fish in sight.” And there is an amusing little story told to us concerning a young woman who trained her cat to hold a candle stick in his paws while she ate dinner. This the cat did, night after night, and when the young woman felt satisfied with the cat’s performance, she invited her friends to dinner, so that they could see what she had trained her cat to do. The cat jumped on the table, got hold of the candlestick and sat there quietly. One of the friends spread the food on the floor, thinking that the cat would be driven to it, but was surprised to find that the cat sat motionless, holding the candlestick in his paws. Another friend held a piece of meat close to the nose but even that did not affect the cat. However, when someone who had brought a mouse in a box, opened the box and let the mouse go, the cat immediately dropped the candlestick and ran after the mouse.
We are like that. We seem to be safe in virtue, but as soon as we see some pleasure, we run after it, forgetting everything else, forgetting even our reputation, our family, honour, and prestige.
The question has been considered in the Gita. Arjuna asks Sri Krishna: “Master! why does a man commit sin against his will? What is the force that drags him, irresistibly to pathways of evil?” Many of us have had a similar experience. We think we do not wish to fall into. In our saner moment, we wish to avoid sin. Then suddenly, there wakes up within us a storm, and we are led ashtray. What is the force that drags us to pathways of evil?
In answer, the Master says to Arjuna: “You say that man is dragged to the path of sin. That is not so! For man is not a machine. Man is endowed with willpower, - the power of determination, the power to make his own choice. Man can never commit sin against his will. Man’s will consents, gives the green signal, before man falls into sin. And, Arjuna, you ask me what is the force that makes a man commit sin. The force is kama, desire, lust. It is the enemy of man! It is man’s deadly foe! Beware of it! And, never forget, that desire is insatiable!”
Significant are the words of the great law-giver, Manu: “Desire is never satisfied by the enjoyment of the objects of desire. It grows from more to more as does the fire to which fuel is added.” And the Yoga Vashista tells us: “We think it is we who enjoy pleasure. But, in truth, it is pleasures that enjoy us. For a while pleasure always remains young and vital, it is we who keep growing old and get consumed in the fire of pleasure.”
An old man of eighty met me. His hair were white and he walked with stoop. With tears in his eyes, he said to me: “Even at this age, I feel drawn to the sins of flesh. My body is become old, my limbs have grown feeble, but the pull of pleasure is stronger than ever before!”
Yes, desire is insatiable. There is the classic example of Henry VIII, called the “Great Widower.” He married one women after another. He married six times. His lust was insatiable. He had to break off with the Pope of Rome. He said: “What does it matter? I shall set up a new church, but I must satisfy my lust.”
Kama cannot be quenched. The more you seek to satisfy it, the more you add fuel to its flame. Kama, desire, lust, reigns over man’s unregenerate senses. His reason is clouded: he cannot discriminate between right and wrong: and there are no depths of degradation to which a man, under the influence of kama, will not stoop.
In our days, in the city of Pune, there was a man who lived happily with his wife for several years, until one day he met a girl. Lust woke up within him. He lost his appetite and sleep. He but desired to marry the girl. How could he do so? In Maharashtra, there is a law forbidding a man to remarry during the life-time of his wife. So he hatched a plan. To his wife he said: “You have not moved out of Pune for some years. Why should not we go out for a change to Mumbai?” They travelled by a night train on a moonlight night. There were only the two of them in the compartment. While the train crossed Lonavla, the man called his wife to the door of the compartment, saying, “Come and see the mountains in the moonlight; how wonderfully beautiful they are!” The wife, not knowing what was in store for her, looked out through the door at the enchanting valley. Suddenly, the husband pushed her from behind, and down she went, her body rolling on the slops of the lofty mountains. The man thought he was rid of his wife and would now be able to marry the young, pretty girl. Destiny had decreed otherwise. Early next morning, a shuttling engine passed by. The engine stopped at that spot for a while. The engine driver heard moanful sounds. Curious to find the origin of the sounds, he went and looked down the mountain-side, and saw the body of a woman lying in a cluster of branches of trees on the mountain slopes. Soon rescue parties arrived and the woman’s life was saved. The husband was tried in a court of law and sentenced to capital punishment. This is what kama, desire, lust does to man. It clouds his reason and leads him to his own destruction.
In the Gita, Sri Krishna gives us the mechanics of desire. Desire is man’s deadliest foe: and how does it work? In answer to this question, Sri Krishna says: “Arjuna, desire, kama, lust enters through the outer gates of the senses and captures the fort of the mind and then invades the region of determination and will.” Therefore, if you are wise, if you wish to overcome temptation, if you wish to live a pure, peaceful, happy life, a life of freedom and fulfillment, you must guard the gates. Each sensation of pleasure should be to you a warning. Watchman! Let not the enemy in! When kama, lust leads the senses; the mind and the reason, the man goes swiftly down the path of decline.
Goethe was a great man. He was, perhaps, the greatest poet the world produced during the nineteenth century. But when kama, lust darkened his senses, he ran after girls in restlessness. Nelson was a great general who won many victories on the battlefield: he could not gain victory over desire. In the face of kama, lust, he crumbled. Nelson lived with the wife of another man. Shelly was a man of poetic genius; but his poetic intuitions were darkened by lust, and Shelly, leaving his wife, married another woman and the first wife committed suicide.
I could go on and on, but my time has travelled fast, and the question still remains: How to overcome temptations? What may we do to overcome this which is, perhaps, the greatest foe of man, man’s arch enemy, desire?
(Author: J P Vaswani)
Have you ever looked at a fly sipping honey? At first, it is very careful to see its legs are free. It sips on the edge of the spoon containing honey, saying to itself that after just one wee little taste of honey, it would fly away. But once it gets the relish of honey, it forgets everything and goes all out for it. And when it has had its fill, it finds that all its legs are stuck in honey: it cannot fly away. There it dies a tragic death in its sweet grave. Such is the case with man. He is lured into temptation by the thought of a little pleasure that he expects to get. Once he has tasted pleasure, it draws him to itself, again and again, until he becomes the slave of a habit cannot overcome. Pleasure leads a man ashtray!
There is a Bengali proverb which tells us: “The heron is a saint when there are no fish in sight.” And there is an amusing little story told to us concerning a young woman who trained her cat to hold a candle stick in his paws while she ate dinner. This the cat did, night after night, and when the young woman felt satisfied with the cat’s performance, she invited her friends to dinner, so that they could see what she had trained her cat to do. The cat jumped on the table, got hold of the candlestick and sat there quietly. One of the friends spread the food on the floor, thinking that the cat would be driven to it, but was surprised to find that the cat sat motionless, holding the candlestick in his paws. Another friend held a piece of meat close to the nose but even that did not affect the cat. However, when someone who had brought a mouse in a box, opened the box and let the mouse go, the cat immediately dropped the candlestick and ran after the mouse.
We are like that. We seem to be safe in virtue, but as soon as we see some pleasure, we run after it, forgetting everything else, forgetting even our reputation, our family, honour, and prestige.
The question has been considered in the Gita. Arjuna asks Sri Krishna: “Master! why does a man commit sin against his will? What is the force that drags him, irresistibly to pathways of evil?” Many of us have had a similar experience. We think we do not wish to fall into. In our saner moment, we wish to avoid sin. Then suddenly, there wakes up within us a storm, and we are led ashtray. What is the force that drags us to pathways of evil?
In answer, the Master says to Arjuna: “You say that man is dragged to the path of sin. That is not so! For man is not a machine. Man is endowed with willpower, - the power of determination, the power to make his own choice. Man can never commit sin against his will. Man’s will consents, gives the green signal, before man falls into sin. And, Arjuna, you ask me what is the force that makes a man commit sin. The force is kama, desire, lust. It is the enemy of man! It is man’s deadly foe! Beware of it! And, never forget, that desire is insatiable!”
Significant are the words of the great law-giver, Manu: “Desire is never satisfied by the enjoyment of the objects of desire. It grows from more to more as does the fire to which fuel is added.” And the Yoga Vashista tells us: “We think it is we who enjoy pleasure. But, in truth, it is pleasures that enjoy us. For a while pleasure always remains young and vital, it is we who keep growing old and get consumed in the fire of pleasure.”
An old man of eighty met me. His hair were white and he walked with stoop. With tears in his eyes, he said to me: “Even at this age, I feel drawn to the sins of flesh. My body is become old, my limbs have grown feeble, but the pull of pleasure is stronger than ever before!”
Yes, desire is insatiable. There is the classic example of Henry VIII, called the “Great Widower.” He married one women after another. He married six times. His lust was insatiable. He had to break off with the Pope of Rome. He said: “What does it matter? I shall set up a new church, but I must satisfy my lust.”
Kama cannot be quenched. The more you seek to satisfy it, the more you add fuel to its flame. Kama, desire, lust, reigns over man’s unregenerate senses. His reason is clouded: he cannot discriminate between right and wrong: and there are no depths of degradation to which a man, under the influence of kama, will not stoop.
In our days, in the city of Pune, there was a man who lived happily with his wife for several years, until one day he met a girl. Lust woke up within him. He lost his appetite and sleep. He but desired to marry the girl. How could he do so? In Maharashtra, there is a law forbidding a man to remarry during the life-time of his wife. So he hatched a plan. To his wife he said: “You have not moved out of Pune for some years. Why should not we go out for a change to Mumbai?” They travelled by a night train on a moonlight night. There were only the two of them in the compartment. While the train crossed Lonavla, the man called his wife to the door of the compartment, saying, “Come and see the mountains in the moonlight; how wonderfully beautiful they are!” The wife, not knowing what was in store for her, looked out through the door at the enchanting valley. Suddenly, the husband pushed her from behind, and down she went, her body rolling on the slops of the lofty mountains. The man thought he was rid of his wife and would now be able to marry the young, pretty girl. Destiny had decreed otherwise. Early next morning, a shuttling engine passed by. The engine stopped at that spot for a while. The engine driver heard moanful sounds. Curious to find the origin of the sounds, he went and looked down the mountain-side, and saw the body of a woman lying in a cluster of branches of trees on the mountain slopes. Soon rescue parties arrived and the woman’s life was saved. The husband was tried in a court of law and sentenced to capital punishment. This is what kama, desire, lust does to man. It clouds his reason and leads him to his own destruction.
In the Gita, Sri Krishna gives us the mechanics of desire. Desire is man’s deadliest foe: and how does it work? In answer to this question, Sri Krishna says: “Arjuna, desire, kama, lust enters through the outer gates of the senses and captures the fort of the mind and then invades the region of determination and will.” Therefore, if you are wise, if you wish to overcome temptation, if you wish to live a pure, peaceful, happy life, a life of freedom and fulfillment, you must guard the gates. Each sensation of pleasure should be to you a warning. Watchman! Let not the enemy in! When kama, lust leads the senses; the mind and the reason, the man goes swiftly down the path of decline.
Goethe was a great man. He was, perhaps, the greatest poet the world produced during the nineteenth century. But when kama, lust darkened his senses, he ran after girls in restlessness. Nelson was a great general who won many victories on the battlefield: he could not gain victory over desire. In the face of kama, lust, he crumbled. Nelson lived with the wife of another man. Shelly was a man of poetic genius; but his poetic intuitions were darkened by lust, and Shelly, leaving his wife, married another woman and the first wife committed suicide.
I could go on and on, but my time has travelled fast, and the question still remains: How to overcome temptations? What may we do to overcome this which is, perhaps, the greatest foe of man, man’s arch enemy, desire?
(Author: J P Vaswani)
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