I was approached by a devotee today, who asked me why I would not go out and preach sanatana dharma and the Sri Vaishnava sampradayam (legacy) to the general populace by voluntarily visiting remote places that have otherwise been out of reach of elite knowledge. He said Ramanujacharya himself traversed the length and breadth of our country on foot and imparted knowledge, thereby bringing many people into his fold. Then why are we – the servants of Ramanujacharya or ‘ramanuja dasa’s – not treading his path and going about creating awareness about our sampradayam. Wouldn’t it be our moral responsibility to do so? It is actually the need of the hour to reach out to masses who have poor accessibility to the sampradayam and impart the sacred knowledge so that they would not give up sanatana dharma forever and get mass converted to other faiths by wrong means and for wrong reasons.

I humbly replied by confessing that I am not qualified enough to preach sanatana dharma or Sri Vaishnava sampradayam to the masses. That requires a lot of knowledge (earned from a learned acharya) and oratory/writing skills, none of which I possess to my satisfaction. He interrupted me saying none of us would readily accept that we are perfect. Not even Ramanujacharya would accept it just like that. Yet, when we see some fallen souls, wouldn’t it be our duty to help them with our knowledge? Is that not what ‘kaarey karunai iraamaanusan’ would want each of his disciples to do?

Here I wish to record a train of thoughts based on which we then debated about this topic – albeit in a very healthy manner, finally reaching consensus.

Sanatana dharma has stood the test of time, and has grown to be like a huge banyan tree whose roots cannot be demolished completely. As the name says, it is ‘sanatana’ – meaning it is very old, yet very refreshing. It would stay that way for all times to come. Of course, there have been many mass conversions to other faiths, and it is the need of the hour to impart right knowledge in order to avoid such unwarranted conversions. Also, even if people are not being converted, they are still in stark ignorance so they get easily carried away by the western outlook and start giving up our dharma. But does that call for our volunteering to preach our dharma to the masses? At least the Sri Vaishnava sampradaya does not subscribe to this thought.

The process of voluntarily reaching out to the masses and preaching dharma without caring for their individual reciprocation is – in simple terms – called ‘push marketing’. This is something that has to do with the western thought process. This is not how the sanatana dharma was propagated through the generations earlier. This has become the norm only these days, when the missionaries started using this technique to lure people from other faiths into their own.

In the sanatana dharma, there are two ways of conducting oneself. One is the pravrtti maarga (the path of engagement) and the other is nivrtti maarga (the path of refraining). All the active efforts of voluntarily reaching out to the masses is categorized under pravrtti maarga, and abstaining from such active efforts is called the nivrtti maarga. All our Acharyas in the past have loyally treaded the nivrtti maarga in order to preach our dharma and sampradayam. That is how those preceptors have shown us the way. So we cannot plunge into pravrtti maarga just out of the blue and claim ourselves to be the torchbearers of the sanatana dharma. After all, it is not without any reason that our preceptors restricted themselves to the nivrtti maarga.

Now one may ask, there have been so many preachers before. Even Ramanujacharya himself – and many of his followers – can be seen preaching the nuances of dharma to the general populace even without them seeking for knowledge (as seen from authentic records). Then how are they consciously treading the nivrtti maarga? The devotee in fact asked me, “After all, are we not in the process of realizing things? We begin by preaching others, only to gradually realize that it is not we who are doing it. The strength in the body is not ours. The knowledge is not ours. The conducive environment to impart such knowledge is also not created by ourselves. Everything comes due to Bhagavan’s mercy and we are only being tools in his hands. Now if this is not nivrtti, then what is?”

Well, pravrtti or nivrtti are not measured just by the thought of non-action (i.e., by thinking or knowing “I am not the doer”). Rather, they are measured by the realization of that thought. That means, one may possess the knowledge that he/she is not the doer of any action. But you know, knowledge is different from realization, as my preceptor puts it. One may know that he/she is not the doer, and engage in action. But has that person realized that thought? Not really. When a person realizes that he is not the doer, he would refrain from voluntarily engaging in any action in the first place. That means, he consciously ‘decides’ that he would not do anything on his own. This decision is where the categorization of pravrtti or nivrtti is made. This decision is not something that Bhagavan gives us. True, He can decide things for us (remember achidvat paaratantryam), but we must have surrendered to Him completely for that to happen. When we thus surrender unto Him, He lets us know of His decision through our Acharyas. But when a person has not abjectly surrendered to Bhagavan, any of his/her decisions are purely their own. Otherwise, Bhagavan would be accused of ‘partiality’ and ‘indifference’ (saying Bhagavan is partial because He decides good things for some and bad things for others; and Bhagavan is indifferent to the sufferings of the fallen souls). For all that we know, Bhagavan is not afflicted with these faults. So it is our decision within our limited independence (as chit vastu or sentient entity) that forms the base for our actions. In either case (whether we have abjectly surrendered to Bhagavan or not), pravrtti is when a decision is taken to engage in action, and nivrtti is when that responsibility is given up. Then how do we reconcile the fact that our Acharyas are seen as preachers with nivrtti maarga? Simple; when our Acharyas preach, it is not because they went out voluntarily to preach, but only because their own Acharyas instructed them to do so. They would still consider themselves as mere tools in the hands of their own Acharyas in propagating dharma and sampradayam. So they are still practicing nivrtti, aren’t they?

What if one’s own Acharyan doesn’t select a person for such propagation? Not a problem at all. The Acharyan and Bhagavan know the big picture and can decide whom to select for propagating dharma to the masses. So such non-selected people may keep to themselves and continue with the other services that they are assigned with. Are there not so many learned scholars out there who are already doing the propagation upon their Acharyas’ instructions? There is no dearth of scholars who can preach our dharma and sampradaya at all. Then why would I worry about it unless my Acharyan instructs me to do the preaching?

And you may finally ask – would I consider myself qualified enough to preach things when (and if) my Acharyan decides to instruct me to do so? Well, I would, certainly. It is not because of my knowledge that I would be preaching anything. That’s not my qualification. Rather, it is merely due to Acharya kataaksham (graceful glance of my Acharya) that I would be able to do it to his satisfaction. Then, my Acharya’s consideration (or abhimaanam) that I may preach is itself the qualification. Without his orders, I would only be doing blunder and creating mess by volunteering to preach things to people. Of course, I am ready to exchange ideas with others even now, but not impart knowledge. I am still not qualified, after all!

Adiyen Ramanuja Dasan