Message from the Gospel – 34. Don’t Shirk Responsibilities

Sri Ramakrishna does not support practice of spirituality without fulfilling one’s responsibilities. If a young unmarried man expressed his desire to renounce the world, he used to rejoice. He would appreciate it. However, he would still enquire if he had made provisions to take care of his parents. On the other hand, if a married man expressed a desire to renounce his family and practice spiritual disciplines to escape from his responsibilities, he would chide the man and ask him to go back to his family and complete his responsibility towards his family, i.e. to take care of his wife and children. We understand this from the following passage in the Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna (Chapter 1):

 

SRI RAMAKRISHNA: "Pratap's brother came here.  He stayed a few days.  He had nothing to do and said he wanted to live here.  I came to know that he had left his wife and children with his father-in-law.  He has a whole brood of them! So I took him to task.  Just fancy! He is the father of so many children! Will people from the neighbourhood feed them and bring them up? He isn't even ashamed that someone else is feeding his wife and children, and that they have been left at his father-in-law's house.  I scolded him very hard and asked him to look for a job.  Then he was willing to leave here. 

 

Won’t God take responsibility of my family?

 

Then what is the way for married people? Should they get immersed in worldliness? Is there no reprieve for them?

The Gospel answers all these questions. We will see them all in the forthcoming blogs!