Thoughts : Celibacy, Health and Spirituality
Many Spiritual Guides (Not All) of today recommend or insist upon celibacy in many religions. eHow has an article on how to practice celibacy.
Doctors tells us that non-celibacy is healthy and keeps the body working well.
The Indian varnasrama dharma requires celibacy only in student days, non-celibacy in grihastha asrama and then celibacy again in the vanaprastha and sannyasa asramas.
Today’s students use their days in college to find their life-partners. The vanaprastha and sannyasa asramas do not exist at all in reality.
What is the truth?
Some people say that celibates live long.. But Sankaracharya is said to have lived on the earth for 32 years and Swami Vivekananda for 39 years. (1863-1902)
Yes the celibates, Veda Vyasa and Bhishma and Hanuman were (are.. according to some) long-lived by any standards. Atri and Anasuya were a married Rishi couple that were very long lived.
Vichitravirya died of excesses and so did his son-nephew Pandu, the legal father of the Pandavas.
My thoughts :
Krishna said that external abstinence is of no use anyway. It is inner detachment that counts. (Bhagavad Gita)
So your life context and choices may determine that you are celibate or non-celibate at different points in life and for different durations. Your life-context and choices may give you a single or many partners either all together or one after another at different points and for different durations.
That is not as relevant as whether you were absorbed in the Self at that time or after. Did you think that guNAh guNESu vartate? Did you think/know that the doer is the Brahman?
Do you have antar-vairagyam?
I think celibacy combined with your mind focussed on something be it Science, Spirituality or Social Service might be of use.
Forced celibacy as in the case of child-widows etc.. can’t be good. And people who bind young widows to celibacy with chains of praise and respect are crooks in my eyes, not very different from those few families who worship the satis who were railroaded into commiting sati-sahagamanam.
Gandhi who turned celibate though his wife was alive and Nehru who did not turn celibate though his wife died, both served the country in great capacities. But Gandhi feels like he was a more spiritual person than Nehru. I guess society has learned to associate spirituality and celibacy from ancient times. Thats why we kind of beat up Gurus who turn out to be non-celibate, even if they openly declared that they were non-celibate.. (.. as Swami Nithyananda recently.)
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