[aesop_image overlay_revealfx=”off” revealfx=”off” force_fullwidth=”off” lightbox=”off” captionposition=”left” captionsrc=”custom” align=”center” imgwidth=”100%” img=”https:\/\/performingartslegacy.org\/guhamalabika\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/314\/2023\/11\/MG_Swamiji.jpeg” panorama=”off”]\n
“Pujarini” is a poem about a court dancer, Sreemati, who sacrificed her life for Buddhism during the reign of the great-grandson of Emperor Ashoka, Ajatoshatru, who decided to revive the Vedic form of worship in the face of widespread worship of Lord Buddha.<\/em><\/p>\n I first read Pujarini <\/em>when I was very young, in school. It is a poem by Rabindranath Tagore. It stuck with me ever since my childhood. Later, as a choreographer, I set it for the stage, and transformed it into a dance drama. I performed it many times with my troupe, and every time it evolved slightly with my incremental realization of what Rabindranath was trying to say one hundred fifty years ago. The theme is so universal! The central character in Pujarini<\/em> is Sreemati, a court dancer.\u00a0 Her humility and spirituality reflect the core ideals of Buddhism. She performs the daily rituals of a priestess in front of the Buddhist stupa (a stupa is a mound-like structure containing relics that is used as a place of meditation). The citizenry is terrified by the new decree of king Ajatshatru: \u201cMy land will allow only Hinduism; any other faith or religious practice during my reign will be punishable by death\u201d.\u00a0 All are scared, but not Sreemati. She is not willing to give up on her faith and devotion to Buddha.\u00a0 She continues with defiance, performing her duties as a priestess, encouraging others not to stray from their devotional paths, and eventually pays the ultimate price.\u00a0 Rabindranath was intrigued and impressed by Lord Buddha\u2019s philosophy, particularly Buddha\u2019s preachings on how our journey through life should be, the quest for freedom from the darkness of ignorance, and awareness of our actions and the desires that limit our consciousness. Buddha\u2019s \u201cmiddle way\u201d requires an awareness of human dignity, a belief that we are all equal and need not accept societal oppressions codified in the class or the caste systems, and lifelong spiritual awakening. We have drifted so much away from this worldview. We do not practice humility as a part of living: we see our worldly possessions as essential for our being and we overlook the humanity in all those who are suffering around us. Over and over again, Rabindranath had focused on the historical aspects of Eastern cultural and spiritual life in his writings, and his messages of love for humanity permeates all his writings. That\u2019s why I go back to staging and performing dance dramas like Pujarini<\/em> over and over again. And every time I feel rejuvenated. [aesop_image overlay_revealfx=”off” revealfx=”off” force_fullwidth=”off” lightbox=”off” captionposition=”left” captionsrc=”custom” align=”center” imgwidth=”100%” img=”https:\/\/performingartslegacy.org\/guhamalabika\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/314\/2023\/11\/MG_Swamiji.jpeg” panorama=”off”] “Pujarini” is a poem about a court dancer, Sreemati, who sacrificed her life for Buddhism during the reign of the great-grandson of Emperor Ashoka, Ajatoshatru, who decided to revive the Vedic form of worship in the face of widespread worship of Lord Buddha. I […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":344,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-324","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-highlight","category-repertoire"],"metadata":{"_wpac_members_redirect_to":[""],"_wpac_show_in_search":["0"],"_wpac_show_excerpt_in_search":["0"],"_wpac_nonmembers_redirect_to":[""],"ase_chapter_enable_timeline":["off"],"_edit_last":["344"],"ase_map_component_start_point":["a:2:{s:3:\"lat\";d:29.76;s:3:\"lng\";d:-95.38;}"]},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/performingartslegacy.org\/guhamalabika\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/324","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/performingartslegacy.org\/guhamalabika\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/performingartslegacy.org\/guhamalabika\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/performingartslegacy.org\/guhamalabika\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/344"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/performingartslegacy.org\/guhamalabika\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=324"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/performingartslegacy.org\/guhamalabika\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/324\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/performingartslegacy.org\/guhamalabika\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=324"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/performingartslegacy.org\/guhamalabika\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=324"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/performingartslegacy.org\/guhamalabika\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=324"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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