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http://www.history-for-kids.com/images/picture-canute.jpg
King Canute
Every morning here in the suburb of Hyderabad where I live nowadays, I see an auto picking up jam-packed school kids and rushing out with its driver ever busy on his cell phone, not caring a whit about the lives of his cherubic passengers.
And on the receding back of this auto I find the slogan asking me to:
"Praise the Lord!"
which I don't think its driver is doing on his eternal cell phone. Most likely he is making anxious inquiries on the latest price of the Hyderabadi Biryani in his favorite eatery.
I keep wondering why the good Lord should seek so much praise from one and all. He is supposed to be the Almighty and must even so be immune to the flattery of his subjects, like King Canute, and like him, ought to forbid any more of obsequious praise.
Lord Shivjee is also said to be a sucker for praise and bestows self-defeating boons on anyone who praises him enough, and gets into trouble and has to be rescued as in the story of Bhasmasur. So he is aptly dubbed:
"Bhola Shakar" (naive Shivjee)
Indeed this very popular professor at IIT KGP who used to ever dole out substantial cash to beseeching students, was given the name:
"Bhola Avasthi"
But why blame him? All of us are suckers for praise in appropriate doses. Its devout dispensers call their praise by various names like:
Butter, Olive Oil, Castor Oil, and even the weak Butter Milk (Thair in Tamil).
In Advaita, there is an explanation to this all-round tendency to praise the Lord. The Lord is said to be immanent in each of his creatures and so when we praise others we praise ourselves:
There are however a few people, like my father, who are ever too shy to praise others...but they are never too shy to be openly praised.
When they don't get enough of praise from others, they tend to praise themselves.
No one is really immune to praise...from little Ishani (4) to my mom (92).
I myself was always a sucker for praise.
While I was a teacher at IIT KGP, I wanted to be praised by my students as the best teacher, first in my department, then in the whole of IIT, then in all the IITs put together and later in Princeton and MIT and Berkeley.
I then retired and finding no student to praise me, I started incurable blogging with the sole aim of getting praise as the Biggest Blogger in the Universe (BBU).
But I got tired after blogging 1800 posts and thought I should take a brief rest for the last fortnight when I confined myself to re-posting my old blogs.
During this period I went on introspecting why I was such a seeker of eternal praise.
And discovered it is because of my inherent low self-esteem.
And decided to make a public confession of it today.
Isn't it terribly praiseworthy?
...Posted by Ishani
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http://www.history-for-kids.com/images/picture-canute.jpg
King Canute
A poem by Paul Perro
There once was an old king called King Canute,
He was a kind old man, and wise to boot.
He was troubled though, he thought it was odd,
That his subjects treated him like a god.
One day a man said “You are a great king
Ruler of everyone and everything.”
King Canute looked at his subject and laughed.
He said “Not everything, don’t be daft.
I couldn’t command the wind not to blow,
I couldn’t command a tree not to grow.
I'm not in charge of the birds or the bees,
The sun or the moon, the skies or the seas."
Canute was now starting to get quite vexed
The subjects just stood there looking perplexed.
The king called the servants together, then
He bellowed out an order to his men:
"Pick up my throne and take it to the beach,
There is a lesson that I want to teach.”
So they carried his throne down to the ocean
Followed by crowds, there was quite a commotion.
Canute sat on the throne facing the sea
And spoke to it with great authority.
“I am your king and I give this command -
Stay where you are, do not come on this sand”
But the sea didn’t listen to the king.
No-one can stop the tide from coming in.
As the waves kept advancing up the shore
The wise old king tried to halt them once more.
“I am the King, you must do as I say,
I command you to go back, right away.”
But the waves still came, right up to his feet.
Canute just shrugged and admitted defeat.
He faced the crowd, and he sternly outcried,
"Not even a king can control the tide.
I did my best, but no, I came up short.
I’m just not as powerful as you thought.”
http://www.history-for-kids.com/king-canute.htmlHe was a kind old man, and wise to boot.
He was troubled though, he thought it was odd,
That his subjects treated him like a god.
One day a man said “You are a great king
Ruler of everyone and everything.”
King Canute looked at his subject and laughed.
He said “Not everything, don’t be daft.
I couldn’t command the wind not to blow,
I couldn’t command a tree not to grow.
I'm not in charge of the birds or the bees,
The sun or the moon, the skies or the seas."
Canute was now starting to get quite vexed
The subjects just stood there looking perplexed.
The king called the servants together, then
He bellowed out an order to his men:
"Pick up my throne and take it to the beach,
There is a lesson that I want to teach.”
So they carried his throne down to the ocean
Followed by crowds, there was quite a commotion.
Canute sat on the throne facing the sea
And spoke to it with great authority.
“I am your king and I give this command -
Stay where you are, do not come on this sand”
But the sea didn’t listen to the king.
No-one can stop the tide from coming in.
As the waves kept advancing up the shore
The wise old king tried to halt them once more.
“I am the King, you must do as I say,
I command you to go back, right away.”
But the waves still came, right up to his feet.
Canute just shrugged and admitted defeat.
He faced the crowd, and he sternly outcried,
"Not even a king can control the tide.
I did my best, but no, I came up short.
I’m just not as powerful as you thought.”
Hmm!
When I was agonizing as a Frustrated Research Scholar (FRS) for two long years in Vizagh in the prime of my youth, doing nothing and getting nowhere, I happened to come across an essay by Bertrand Russel titled:
"In Praise of Idleness"
and thought it was a lighthearted piece about my own idleness and would cheer me up. But I was disappointed. It was an erudite left-liberal attack on the capitalists of England earning millions on the backbreaking work they imposed on child labor, like asking them to sweep endless chimneys.
Russel was not the epitome of idleness...indeed he didn't know what fun idleness could be.
So after my retirement when I found myself lazing endlessly I wrote an eloquent piece composed in 10 minutes, titled:
"In Praise of Laziness"
which was welcomed with open arms by The Statesman of Calcutta who published it the very next day in their popular 'Now & Again' column:
It turned out to be a wholehearted tribute to the discerning readers of the Old Maid of Calcutta.
And on the receding back of this auto I find the slogan asking me to:
"Praise the Lord!"
which I don't think its driver is doing on his eternal cell phone. Most likely he is making anxious inquiries on the latest price of the Hyderabadi Biryani in his favorite eatery.
I keep wondering why the good Lord should seek so much praise from one and all. He is supposed to be the Almighty and must even so be immune to the flattery of his subjects, like King Canute, and like him, ought to forbid any more of obsequious praise.
Lord Shivjee is also said to be a sucker for praise and bestows self-defeating boons on anyone who praises him enough, and gets into trouble and has to be rescued as in the story of Bhasmasur. So he is aptly dubbed:
"Bhola Shakar" (naive Shivjee)
Indeed this very popular professor at IIT KGP who used to ever dole out substantial cash to beseeching students, was given the name:
"Bhola Avasthi"
But why blame him? All of us are suckers for praise in appropriate doses. Its devout dispensers call their praise by various names like:
Butter, Olive Oil, Castor Oil, and even the weak Butter Milk (Thair in Tamil).
In Advaita, there is an explanation to this all-round tendency to praise the Lord. The Lord is said to be immanent in each of his creatures and so when we praise others we praise ourselves:
Aham Atma Gudakesha sarva bhutashaya sthita:
Aham adincha madhyamcha bhutanam anta evacha
Gita
But Adi Shankara, the prime propagator of Advaita, went on composing charming hymns like Annapoorna Ashtottaram, Mahishasura Mardani Stotram, Dakshina Moorthy Stotram...in praise of Shivjee and his consorts and other deities.
Certainly there is a feel-good factor in giving, and in turn getting, praise as is evident in the ubiquitous MSMAs (Members, Society of Mutual Admiration)...particularly at IIT KGP.
There are however a few people, like my father, who are ever too shy to praise others...but they are never too shy to be openly praised.
When they don't get enough of praise from others, they tend to praise themselves.
No one is really immune to praise...from little Ishani (4) to my mom (92).
I myself was always a sucker for praise.
While I was a teacher at IIT KGP, I wanted to be praised by my students as the best teacher, first in my department, then in the whole of IIT, then in all the IITs put together and later in Princeton and MIT and Berkeley.
I then retired and finding no student to praise me, I started incurable blogging with the sole aim of getting praise as the Biggest Blogger in the Universe (BBU).
But I got tired after blogging 1800 posts and thought I should take a brief rest for the last fortnight when I confined myself to re-posting my old blogs.
During this period I went on introspecting why I was such a seeker of eternal praise.
And discovered it is because of my inherent low self-esteem.
And decided to make a public confession of it today.
Isn't it terribly praiseworthy?
...Posted by Ishani
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