Guru Purnima

Importance and Significance of Guru Purnima
Guru Purnima is the pure full moon day of the Hindu calendar month of ashadh (usually coincides with July of the English calender). This day is celebrated every year to express gratitude unto the Guru Principle. The ArchGuru, Sage Vyas (founder of the Guru-disciple lineage), is worshipped on this day. This festival is the greatest festival in the life of a seeker. Of course, even this celebration in gratitude to the Guru is done for the seeker's spiritual progress, since the Guru is a manifest form of The Lord Himself. The Guru Principle is a thousand times more active on this day than on any other through out the year. Under the pretext of this celebration, the festival provides an unmatchable opportunity to progress spiritually through service and sacrifice unto the Truth. That is why seekers and Disciple participate in this mission for the Truth with all their body, wealth and mind.

The Guru Lineage
The Guru's energy of initiation (anugraha) itself is the universal energy of the Guru principle. This energy is transmitted from the Guru to the disciple. This energy originates from the God principle, gets transmitted through the Guru-disciple lineage, and culminates in God-realization by the disciples in the lineage. To augment a disciple's faith in his Guru, the Sadguru and Paratpar Guru of the Guru guide that disciple, using the Guru as the medium.

It is the day that the Guru Principle or the Teaching Principle of God is thousand times more active than on any other day of the year.

A seeker, by definition, is one who makes daily efforts with the motivation of spiritual progress and with spiritual progress occurring, irrespective of his religion of birth and path of spiritual practice.
Participating in Guru Purnima preparations and celebrations provides seekers unmatchable opportunities to serve the Guru Principle and thus, progress spiritually.

Thus, Guru Purnima holds equal importance to every seeker, regardless of his religion or spiritual path.

Why is Guru Purnima celebrated and what is its importance?

The real disciple remembers his Guru every moment and strives to do spiritual practice regularly. Even so, this day is especially celebrated for the following reasons:

Seekers celebrate Guru Purnima to express gratitude to the Guru.
On Guru Purnima day, the grace, blessings and non-verbal (subtle) knowledge endowed by the Guru principle is a thousand times more than that on any other day.

Where can one join in a Guru Purnima celebration?
In order to give opportunities to seekers for serving the Guru principle, the Sanatan holds Guru Purnima celebrations through out the world. Seekers are welcome to join in the celebration at a Sanatan's center convenient to one. Refer to the section, Guru Purnima Celebrations and Activities Worldwide of the Weekly Online Issue for a listing of venues and timings for the Sanatan's Guru Purnima celebration.

Importance of active participation in Guru Purnima
Active participation in the preparation and celebration of Guru Purnima, rather than only passively attending the celebration brings more spiritual benefit. One derives benefits from the heightened grace during Guru Purnima in proportion to one's involvement in preparation and celebration of the day. Hence, one should participate actively for Guru Purnima as much as possible.

How can one participate in Guru Purnima preparation and celebration?
Surrendering everything one has, including one's mind, body, wealth and life itself to the cause of Sat (God) is the real offering to the Guru (Gurudakshina). One can start this process by taking small steps towards this goal, as follows.

By body:
Instead of being a visitor, one can participate wholeheartedly in the function as if it were one's own. Thus, one can attempt to take part in as many types of service (satseva, Service unto The Truth) as possible. For example:

• Organizing the seating arrangements for the attendees, the display of spiritual publications for exhibition.

• Cooking of the holy sacrament (prasad).

• Serving the holy sacrament to the attendees.

• Decorating the altar and Guru Purnima venue.

• Setting up the stage for discourses on Spirituality, posters explaining concepts of Spirituality, etc.

• Looking after the parking arrangements, and belongings like shoes, jackets, etc., of the attendees.

By mind:
One can offer one's mind by chanting (the Repetition of The Lord’s Name) as much as possible on this day.

• Special emphasis must be made to ensure that one is chanting while performing any satseva (Service unto The Truth). This will ensure that all activities are done as satseva, in service to God, and not for the sake of doing them.

• One can pray and review while doing each satseva, and judge for oneself if the satseva is being done with the spiritual emotion (bhav) that one is doing them as if for God Himself, as if in His presence.

• One can encourage others to attend the Guru Purnima celebration by explaining to them the importance of this day.

• One can take responsibility or assist in planning and executing the plan for the celebrations.

By wealth:

• One can offer money (wealth earned by righteous means) for the Guru's mission of spreading Spirituality.

• If one runs a business one can offer the business products for Guru Purnima.
  One can sponsor travel, accommodation or food arrangements of participating seekers.

• One can encourage others to offer wealth for Guru Purnima by giving ways to do so.
   

The information on this page was provided by http://www.sanatan.org