Astrology special on the 11th saravanabhavananda anniversary

Astrologers typically explore 🤰🏻 ‘natal birth charts’ but I’d like to introduce to you a brand new concept of ‘fatal death charts!’ Truly speaking, the latter are equally, if not more, educative than the former! Indeed, life & death are but two sides of the same coin. Lemme explain this briefly before we get onto analysing svāmi-ji thathā‘s death chart, as a practical demo. For those of you who haven’t known him, I had shared a 30-page booklet [click to read] on him last year. Those who know him &/or already read this ‘ode to my grandpa 👴🏻’ are most welcome to refresh on katham! 

Whatever one’s national, religious, linguistic or cultural backgrounds, it’s a no-brainer as to what happens to our physical bodies after our death, irrespective of whether they’re cremated, buried, floated, offered to the vultures or whatever else. Our physical body merges back into the five basic elements <pañca-bhūtās> of solid, liquid, energy, gas & space-time, represented mnemonically & conveniently in practice by earth 🌏, water 💧, fire 🔥, air 🌪 & ether 🌌.

But, what’s far more significant & seemingly mysterious to many is the question: what happens post-death to our subtle body: a delectable salad 🥗combo of our mind, intellect & soul, which can never be blended into a smoothie! For, the first two don’t even exist in reality, being mere ephemeral projections of the third.

The apparent source of this knowledge was of coz an adventurous attempt to squarely get to the very root of negativity in unity, as if there were any! Hence, imaginary. 🕉 tat sat. For those still familiar with their high school concept of the actually not-so-complex ‘complex numbers,’ our BMI are imaginary numbers while ourSelf/soul <ātmā> is THE only real number. Extending the analogy, you can’t mix up real & imaginary numbers, though they temporarily appear in a package deal called ‘complex numbers!’

Yes, you read me right: package deal: buy 1, get 3 free! Sounds familiar?!!! Yes, the BMI are the 3 freebies thrown in charity to us for a fleeting bit of time: the body for the duration of just 1 lifetime each, while the mind & intellect last a few lifetimes, until we awaken from this silly game of role-playing hide’n’seek that we’ve gotten ourselves embroiled in! As if this wasn’t enough, we season our BMI with false identities <aham̐-kārā>… the more the merrier, schizophrenic or possessed!

While birth charts are thus the bookies to bet on the short-term, the death charts have a longer shelf life!!! In fact, in my observations over the last couple of decades as a kindergartener jyōtiśi, death-charts far more clearly indicate how well one has lived his/her life & what’s in store for the individual’s subtle body post-mortem 💀, even after discounting the obvious benefits of a rear-view mirror called hindsight!

So, let’s take the example of the lord of the reed-forest-sourced-bliss <svāmi śara-vana-bhava-ānanda>, who incidentally checked out & popped off exactly 108 years after svāmi vivéka-ānandā, both preferring the US Independence Day of July, the 4th, but of course on the sanctified & consecrated land of bhārat-bhūmī! Maybe it’s not for nothing that independence is translated as mukti;-) 🤣

Departing his BMI toolkit 🧰 even while administrating the centenary charitable hospital 🏥 till his very last breath in one of the most poor, rural & backward villages of bhārat: patta-maḍai, tiru-nel-véli, tamiḻ nāḍu, the holy birthplace of his malayā-returned parama-guru Dr. kuppu-svāmi-śiva-ānandā, the founder-president, Divine Life Society (DLS), r̥ṣi-kēś, uttara-akhanḍ, bhārat.

The mahā-samā-dhi chart has seven of the nine grahās in the strongest quadrant/angular positions. Even the two remaining grahās, Mars <sévvāi> & Venus <śukran> are well-placed, balancing material loss & spiritual gain. Life is all about such balance, especially inner. Interestingly the only 2 grahās which aren’t angular are the ones which indicate sexuality. He undoubtedly had transcended it gradually over this lifetime & gone beyond gender & its stereotypes. Phenomenal time chosen by a phenomenal ātmā to leave his physical container. hari ĀŪM̐ 🥬 🕉 |

OMG 😳, the more I meditatively 🧘‍♂️ observe this mahā-samādhi chart, the more & more amazing truths emerge about this wonderful ātman, who has willingly shed his last mortal coils during the wisest possible gaja-kēśari yōgam̐ of his mind absolutely integrated with his guru svāmi cit-ānandā, that too in the 7th house of partnership, owned by guru himself, & actually closeted in the very same room of higher auspicious paths <uttara-bhādra-pādā>, owned & aspected by his eventual lordship over patience🪐<śanaiś-carā@śani-īśvarā>!

As if that great rāja yōgam̐ wasn’t enough, the most sharp & brilliant possible budha-āditya yogam of his intellect & spirit in the strongest possible location of karmā, owned by the lagṅā lord, the intellectual mercury & further conjoined with mōkṣa-kārakā kétu. In fact, the Sun ☀️ & the equally fiery kétu were tightly closeted in mṛtyuñ-jayā’s own raging 😡 tears 😭 of ārdrā nakṣatrā, that too exactly in the cozy quarter couch of the room: the last & final 4th pādā.

This discriminative wisdom <vi-vēkā> of his was topped 🆙 with the potent dispassion <vai-rāg-yā> of being utterly stabilised <śanaiś-carā> 🪐 in a conducively virgin ♍️ lagṅā, recognizing immense potency, & yet, without any need whatsoever to display it. To add even more fuel to this fiery mocktail, there’s an energy storm of masculinity & femininity in his mōkṣa sthānā owned by the spiritual sun ⛅️too, leaving absolutely no doubt that it was his very last birth <janmā>.

Wait, you haven’t heard it all yet! The icing 🧁 on this utmost delicious 😋☠️’death-day cake’ 🍰 of mukti is that the tithi was an āvani mādam téi-pirai kāḷa-bhairava-aṣṭami, along with śōbhana yōgā & bālava karaṇā, exactly at the stroke of 🕛 ucchi-kāḷa pūjā on a 🌞day! Just can’t ask for a better combo, can you, to bid a final goodbye 👋 to the BMI toolkit, an interest-free loan 💸 that we all need to payback, sooner or later⁉️Bodyblow: neither is it us nor is it ours!!! Neither am I the body nor is the body mine. Neither in the past, nor in the present nor in the future. Never & no-where. Now-here is all that matters, albeit matter doesn’t matter. 👼

Having shared with him the fire 🔥 of his multi-faceted & multi-dimensional āratīs; also having partaken the prasādam̐ 🍌that he cooked & sanctified as well as the tīrtham̐ 💦 that he offered & drank; in exactly the same sacred space 🌌 of nandi-durgā paḻani-nivās; a few amongst us are indeed privileged to have breathed in the same pockets of air 🌬 that he exhaled; & walked on exactly the same spots of earth 🌏 that he trekked.

Essentially, we had the access to identical grace & blessings of the very same elemental pañca-bhūtās at his disposal. This raises the bar for us also to responsibly strive to experience the same highest standards of spirituality that he naturally exuded. Let’s go! 🕉śara-vana-bhavāya namaha | AUM śrī svāmi śara-vana-bhava-ānand-āya namaha |

While we’re on astrology, grahās & tithīs, let’s check out the other ‘here & now’ aspects too! It’s yōgini ēkādaśi from 8:42PM IST on Sunday, July 4th (also śrī svāmi śaravanabhavānandā samādhi day) to 10:40PM IST on Monday, July 5th (also budha jayanti, b’day of mercury, death of one intellectual followed by the birth of another… an unbroken chain!). My fortnightly 42-hour fast is from 6PM 🕕Sunday to 12Noon 🕛 Tuesday, daśami to dvādaśi, as usual. But it’s even more special this time as it’s right in the middle of my 42-day mauna vratā & at the end of another 48-hour jāgran too! Never underestimate our willpower!