This is the fourth
sacrament and it is performed immediately after the child is born. Whereas
the first three sacraments deal with the mother’s mental and psychic
attributes as well as the parental hereditary endowments, the fourth and the
remainder of the sacraments bear direct relationship with the child’s
environment be it at home or beyond the home.
As has been stated
in the previous issues, the purpose of the sacraments is to endow the
growing child with human positive values and to influence and inspire the
child towards attainment of noble characteristics and behaviours. The
ultimate aim is to create a society of exemplary qualities wherein the
growing child has the capabilities to play an active
role.
At birth the child’s
mouth, nose, ears and the whole body are cleansed. This activity stimulates
the child’s five perceptual functions - hearing, vision, smell, taste and
touch. The child is then bathed in fresh water, the body is dried with a
clean piece of cloth, and attired with new set of clothes. At the
completion of this cleansing process, the child is ready to receive the JAAT
KARMA sacrament. The father then takes hold of the child and sits at the
HAVAN-YAJ (fire sacrifice) officiated by a Vedic priest.
If the child has
taken birth at the hospital then the Havan-Yaj and the sacrament should be
performed the day the mother and the child return home. The performance of
the Havan-Yaj itself has a purifying effect on the mother, child as well as
the home and its environment.
Following the Yaj
the father proceeds to inscribe the word “AUM” on the tongue of the new born
with the blunted end of a small golden skewer dipped in a mixture of honey
and ghee. AUM is the universal name of the all-pervasive God.
The father then
murmurs clearly the word VEDOASI into the child’s right ear. This means :
“You are an intelligent human being; and not an unintelligent being - you
will accept VIDYA (knowledge) in its entirety and dispel AVIDYA (ignorance)
completely”. Other blessing mantras are also uttered in both the ears.
By performing this
sacrament the parents become conscious of their undertakings and
responsibility to mould the growing child into a worthy person and to
provide the child with an education so that in later years the person has
the ability and capability to discriminate between good and evil deeds and
to accept a righteous path.
Psychologists maintain that whatever education is provided to
the child during the first five years of the child’s life it becomes his/her
life-long legacy. The Vedic literature is in complete accord with this
philosophy.
For the first five
years the child stays in an environment which had already been created and
moulded by the parents-that is, the home becomes the initial environment
where the child grows and nurtures.
The behavioural
attitudes of the parents have a direct bearing on the child’s behaviour and
attitudes; if the parents lead a virtuous exemplary life, the child will
copy these positive values for his/her own advancements; but if the parents
indulge in worldly ways of alcohol, harmful drugs, night parties and
nightclubs etc., the child will inherit these negative values and eventually
will end up with sorrowful days and early death.
During the Jaat Karma sacrament, the
responsibility which the parents had undertaken upon themselves had
inadvertently placed an equal and even accountability on the child. When
the growing child realises in his adulthood the relentless loving efforts
undertaken by his/her parents to mould him/her into a worthy person, he/she
becomes dutybound to fulfill this “spiritual-pact” and gladly accepts the
moral obligations inherent therein.
We are aware that
the child at the infant age is devoid of any mental comprehension as to the
sacrament performed on him / her; nonetheless, the sacrament has created an
immense psychic impact and is a constant reminder to the growing adolescent
whenever similar sacraments are witnessed by him/her. It is maintained that
murmuring the sacred mantras in the child’s ears and the vibrations so
created in the child’s mental processes has an uncanny spiritual effect on
the psychic development of the person. The growing person becomes adamantly
faithful to this mantra as his/her very own (and not belonging to any other
person). This person’s spiritual behaviour is thus further reinforced and
is reflected in his/her attitudes, articulations and orations
