RAMANA'S TEARS

I may here record that I have noticed on more than one occasion in the past how Bhagavan could not proceed with the reading of any deeply devotional portions of Tamil works such as Thevaram and Thayumanavar. ... when touching songs were recited or read out before him, or when he himself was reading out to us poems or passages from the lives or works of famous saints, he would be moved to tears and find it impossible to restrain them.

He would be reading out and explaining some passage and when he came to a very moving part he would get so choked with emotion that he could not continue but would lay aside the book. To quote a few instances, such a thing happened when he was reading and explaining some incidents in Sundaramurti Nayanar’s life in connection with the Tiruchuzhi Mahatmyam, and also when he was reading out ‘Akarabuvanam-Chidambara Rahasyam’ in Thayumanavar’s works, and came to the twenty-fourth verse:

"Conceiving you as everything from earth to space, I shall record my thoughts on the large page of my mind, and looking at that image ever and again, I shall cry out: ‘Lord of my life, will you not come?’ Repeatedly believing myself to be You, I am unable to fix my attention on anything else. Lamenting in this way, like one whose heart is wounded, dissolving inwardly, so that tears pour down in floods, uttering deep sighs, unaware even of my body, I stand transfixed.

His [Bhagavan’s] eyes were so filled with tears and his throat so choked with emotion [as he read these words] that he had to put aside the book and break off his discourse.

- Day by Day with Bhagavan, 12th December 1945, afternoon session.