Thursday, July 2nd, 2009

Mustard Seed Matter

Toronto, Ontario

In Bengal, mustard seeds are highly cherished for their flavour in seasoning while the oil extract is used for preserving, cooking and also as a massage oil and hair gel. On each fortnight of ekadasi, the eleventh day of the moon's wax and wane, devout Hindus in Bengal and some surrounding areas fast from grains and seeds of certain plants. Mustard seeds are forbidden to be used internally or externally on this day.

One of our residential monks hails from Assam, and spent time serving in our centres in India with Bengali monks. When one of our cooks tossed some mustard seeds in his prep, the monk expressed concern, "This is not right!" The communication wasn't the best. So the issue came to me and I spoke with the monk who works very hard, by the way, and with enthusiasm.

"My dear Prabhu (devotee master), our teacher, Prabhupada, asked his students to fast on this special day from grains, which includes corn, peas and beans. He never got so detailed to the point of a mustard seed. He was practical and always emphasized devotion."

If you travel to India, every district has its' own rules about this day. In some places, they abstain from spices altogether. That is not the standard that our guru gave us. I once asked one of his cooks, Yamuna, a lovely senior female disciple, about what standard our guru went by in dealing with this matter. Here's what she told me:

"He accepted whatever was the standard of the region he was in when it came to eating. The main thing he stressed was the devotion put into the cooking."

With that explanation, the intensive listener accepted and agreed to not disagree over any mustard seeds again.

"Our relationship development with our fellow servers is most important," I added.

For an evening wind-down walk, I came upon Michael Jackson fans singing and playing his songs with instruments. There's one called "ABC". The lyrics are simple. I guess people like it. Sometimes we just have to revisit the basics. Work on relationships and communication.

10 KM