CHARITY
Charity – it is the flow of help in various forms from the privileged towards the less privileged. It is a divine act, provided it should be performed with care and by following the spiritual rules. People who get help from us will probably bless us and praise us. Both of these should come deep from the heart of the receiver. For such thing to happen, the aim of the charity should be to help the people in need.
If charity is done by following the spiritual norms, then it helps both the receiver and the performer. Charity actually means sharing. It is not just giving. When the attitude of charity is sharing then the receiver will not have any inhibition or hesitation in receiving it, then only charity attains its purpose. Charity helps one to attain equal mentality towards others. It is an act of karma yoga. It should be done without any expectation from others. It should be done in a perfect manner without any defects. If charity is done for self praise, exhibition or advertisement then that charity is only a waste of time, energy and money. The notion of charity in the scriptures of all religions is that the totally of the material wealth in the world must be shared among all the existing people in the world. No one is expected to have more than they require. If they have excess, they have to share it with others. This principle is followed by all the religions in the world. Some will have the ability and talent to earn more. They have to share the excess with the other people in need. By this action it makes a person more humble and in due course of time, it erases the negative vasanas in the mind. Unfortunately, this principle is not followed while performing charity in today’s modern world. Many people perform charity so that their name will be of high esteem in the society, and they attain material and professional gains by performing charity. Charity done with this attitude in mind will only boost the ego. It will not help to have an equality of mind towards others.
Secondly, the scriptures say it is good if the receiver is an unknown person, because we will not have a chance to receive any help from them. Charity done with an expectation to receive future help from the receiver is not a perfect charity. It is corruption rather than charity. At the same time, care should be taken that the charity must reach the people who are in need; else the material we share will be wasted. The charity should not go towards a single receiver alone. We may imagine that if we have money every one will receive it. In my view, it is really hard to find a single person who is in real need of our money. Mostly the people who receive money from us may even survive without our help. It is a difficult task to find the real people in need of our help. Someone somewhere will be desperately searching for our type of help. It is really a sincere and hard job to find such a person to receive our charity. Each person receiving the charity should be respected and not insulted, mocked, ridiculed or ignored for receiving our charity. Such negative actions will negate the effects of our charity. Charity is a divine act. It should be performed with care and respect for others.
0 Comments