Gurudev, can you please tell me the exact purpose of shraddha (faith or devotion)?
Shraddha means loving the unknown. You know, you either love or do not love that which you already know about. Right? But if there is something you do not know, then you do not hate it, and you also have a choice to love it or not. Loving something which you have no idea about is called shraddha.
Shraddha brings you knowledge. It is very subtle. You have to catch this else it slips from your understanding. There is something that is unknown, and you love it. And because of your love, you slowly start knowing it. Do you see what I am saying? Let us take a small example. Say there is some small ceremony or ritual being done, like how in the morning today we had the Rudrabhishekam. You do not know what it is, some mantras are being chanted and there is a Yajna happening, yet you simply love it and sit for it. Then you feel something, you experience certain vibrations arising during the pooja. How many of you have experienced this? (Many in the audience raise their hands) Similarly, you do not know what meditation is, but you start liking it and do it, and then you start knowing it. You feel, 'Oh wow, meditation is so good'.
So shraddha gives you more understanding, and more knowledge.
If there is a resistance in you, then that is a lack of shraddha. It means that even before knowing something, you have a resistance to it. It is like putting a wall, thinking, 'I shall sit separately. I do not want to know this'. Then you cannot know it at all. When you say, 'I do not like it', then you also cannot know it. But when you think, 'Oh! There is something new, I love this', then loving the unknown is what is called shraddha.
It is not even important that you understand it totally, yet its benefits surely come to you.
