Is a Mother’s love unique or one among the several as any person could experience in his or her life in relationship with others. Mother’s love is unique for me not because I never experienced other kinds of love in my life. Though not married I enjoyed the love of my siblings, relatives, friends, neighbours but not that of a wife, which is conditional and reciprocal. But mother’s love still stands unique for me and others, because her love is not like that of other’s love. It is unconditional and unreciprocated. Even God’s love is conditional and reciprocated in every faith. Whichever term one might use [Agape, Karuna, anukampa etc.] to denote the special love of his or her deity or God, still it is conditional. God won’t thrust Her love or bhakti or mukti on anyone’s throat. Though Her ‘common grace’ [like Sunshine and rain] is for all, still the ‘saving grace’ is only for those who accept Her terms and conditions and only when it is reciprocated. This is not the case with a mother’s love. If a Mother’s love is not unique but only one among several other kinds of love, then the same logic can be extended to God’s love. Her [God’s] love would be one among several that we experience.
Of course God will seek the lost sheep or search for the lost coin. But only that sheep that strayed away from Her fold or the coin that slipped from Her pocket. Even in our Indian [or Hindu] mythology God out of compassion would save Her bhakta who fell down from Her grace even by killing that bhakta. This is known as ‘Marakkarunai’ ‘Maram opposite to Aram viz., dharma, Karunai is compassion [like a doctor using a knife in operation]. Even for this that fallen bhakta should have been an estranged bhakta went away from Her fold. To say in other words, there is no concept of ‘fall’ in a Mother’s kingdom as she never had a Prodigal son. She will become upset, pained when her child goes astray, but her love for him or her will remain unconditional to welcome back without any terms and conditions. Of course a mother would punish her child for discipline. In a few cases she would even give up in adaptation. But she will do this only to keep the welfare of her child. When a mother gives up her child in adaptation, she does it thinking of its need and welfare. When she has to give up her child, her only thought would be: I cannot take care of this child because of poverty or health issues. Let it go and live comfortably with someone else rather than to suffer with me.
I don’t know how many of you know about the famous story: Sorrows of Satan by Marie Corelli. It is available on the Internet, download and read it [her other works are: Vendetta; Romance of the Two World; Thelma, She, He etc.] I read her many stories. The main theme is this: Satan, the fallen angel again approaches God with much repentance pleading Her to restore to his former status before his fall. God agrees but puts one condition. He has to go back again to earth and tempt human beings. As he caused the fall of humans only by temptation, now he too can be restored back only by that process. And if he managed to find one person who didn’t succumb to his temptation, then God would restore him back to his original status. And with hope he comes again to this earth and takes various forms and tempts so many people. But till the end he couldn’t find one person who successfully resisted his temptation. At the end Satan broke down and cried by saying, ‘now even God, though willing, cannot save me because of the second fall of humans.’ It is important to note that God never told in this story that, ‘its all right. That is not your mistake. Though you were responsible for the FIRST FALL, this time now it is their moral choice. Anyhow as you repented and sought my forgiveness, I forgive you and now restore back to your original status.’ But at least in this story it didn’t happen and the second time Satan was punished for not his mistake and God was not ready to forgive him without any condition’.
Of course, this is an imaginary story. The message is clear: Even if a sinner repents and seeks forgiveness from God, She cannot bestow forgiveness, mukti and bhakti without any condition. Of course, She waits eagerly for Her prodigal child to return back with much penitence. But She can receive that child back only when it is willing to accept the terms and conditions to receive that forgiveness. Whereas this is not the case with a mother. So a mother’s love stands unique, because she never has a ‘PRODIGAL’ child but always remains ‘her child’.
There is no surprise that the Indian worldview keeps a mother on the highest pedestal even above God. The traditional saying is: Mata, pita, Guru and finally God. One can pay back the debt to everyone else, including God, but never to a mother@. A bhakta can win over the favour of her chosen deity by so many means [prayer, fasting, vows, obedience, loving her deity etc. etc.], but need not do any of these to receive the unconditional love of a mother. Grace is free but it is not cheap—both for God and Her devotee. While God paid Her cost [by any means by dying for the sin of the world or taking avatara to destroy adharma and protect dharma, or drinking poison, or killing demons etc.] the devotee also has to pay the cost for it—unless you forgive others, I won’t forgive you, you will receive only if you seek, knock and ask etc. But a mother’s love never works like grace. Of course Manikkavasagar said: ‘You who show a greater love than that of a mother who feeds her child remembering its need….’ [பால் நினைந்து ஊட்டும் தாயினும் சாலப் பரிந்து] But even to compare God’s love he has to compare it with the love of a mother who ‘remembers the needs of her child’ and comes and feeds, even before the child cries. We often hear a mother telling, ‘time to feed the baby. Otherwise, she will start to cry because of hunger’.
I know I am stirring a controversy or someone calls this as blasphemy, glorifying the mother and keeping her even above God. I don’t know in other languages, but there are several hundreds of poems in Tamil that clearly say that a Mother is greater than God and a God is nothing before Her love and sacrifice. [Amma Kadavul kuuda un munne summa = Amma even God is nothing before you]
There is no substitute for a mother in a person’s life. One can change his or her lift partner, siblings will be estranged, friends will desert. Even God will give you up or you can change your God as per your need and choice. But this is not possible with a mother. Of course one can call another woman a ‘Mother’ but even she too cannot replace one’s own mother. The umbilical cord relationship is unique. One can have only ONE MOTHER but several Gods, step mothers, [fathers, brothers, sisters] life partners, new relatives [though cannot be changed can be kept away in a distance], through marriage alliance etc. but never another MOTHER.
One person in one discussion asked: ‘How long will you call God as She.’ In response I said, ‘As long as She remains a MOTHER and happy to remain as a woman. Call God as She or MOTHER and see the special touch in your atman. Then you will understand why God remains only as She and a Mother.’
Finally, I would like to end this brainstorm with a famous story which everyone knows: When a married son falls in love with another woman, his mother warns him not to do that. When that woman came to know about it, she became upset with his mother and told him, ‘unless you bring your mother’s beating heart, I won’t receive you no more’. Out of lust, he goes back and kills his mother and rushes back with the beating heart. On the way when he stumbled and about to fall, that heart tells him, ‘be careful my son’. Don’t drop me. Otherwise, she won’t receive you again’.
Dayanand Bharati
Gurukulam, 17-05-2023
Notes @ …Human life, the Pandits aver, consists of the obligation to repay debts (rna) incurred in the course of numerous lives: debts to gods, ancestors (including one’s father), teachers, fellow human beings. There is one debt, however, which never gets repaid because it cannot be repaid: this is the debt one owes one’s mother (matr-rna)….— The ideology of the householder among the Kashmiri Pandits, T.N. Madan, pp. 223-249, in, N Madan, ed. Way of Life King, Householder, Renouncer: Essays in honour of Louis Dumont. Delhi, Motilal Banarsidass, (1982) New edition (with corrections and additions), 1988, p. 231
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