By: BK Charlie Hogg 
Source: The Daily Guardian https://epaper.sundayguardianlive.com/19-january-2025/
Dated: January 21st, 2025

The Kumba Mela is probably the world’s greatest event. In 2019 the estimate was that over the few weeks of the Kumb 200 million took part and on the most auspicious day the estimate was around 50 million people. There is no greater even in the world than this event of people coming together with a common aim to really elevate themselves, purify themselves and become free from their own past karmic story. The kumb symbolises our common wish for purification and renewal, and freedom from the burden of sin. I visited the Ganges, 50 years ago, where the Kumba Mela takes place, and what is at the heart of this symbolic ritual of bathing, is to become pure. Because, in the heart of each human soul is the desire for the soul to become pure; in our memory is the experience of purity being the basis for peace and happiness.   

As I travelled the world, many years ago, I experienced so many religious spiritual events or rituals, signifying purification. Many religions say “Become pure and you can know God”. Christians bathe in Lourdes for healing and purification. In Malaysia at the Batu caves, Kuala Lumpur, at the time around Shiv Ratri, people will put huge hooks through their flesh and hang themselves from strings and ropes as a way of purifying themselves. At a church in Mexico, a huge church, people crawled for up to 15 – 20 kilometres, as a way of punishing the self for the sins of the past, to become purer. Muslims in Bangkok perform a ritual with the horse of Hussain. They slash their heads and beat their chests to put themselves through what Hussain, Mohammed’s nephew, went through - thereby punishing themselves. Many rituals involve a great deal of self-inflicted suffering because of the idea that if I suffer, I can settle my past sins. 

At the heart of the soul’s journey is the desire to purify the self and become free from their past karmic story of sin. The soul is really an ‘over name’ for three aspects of consciousness:  the mind, that receives the data from the sense organs; the intellect, the faculty that accesses and makes sense of the data. The intellect then decides to act or not act, speak or not speak. Whatever action I then perform leaves an impression on my subconscious.  

However, the original past of the human soul was pure, absolutely clean and made up of a set of impressions, or sanskaras, that were full of peace, love and happiness. Over time, as the soul forgot the original state of the self, and began to assume the identity of the body. The subconscious impressions became polluted with ego, anger, greed, lust, attachment, fear and much more, incurring ‘sin’.  

What I have learnt from the Brahma Kumaris, is that the method to really purify myself is to bathe in the truth of the self and the truth of the Divine. When I bathe in knowledge on a regular basis, and interpret life through the filter of truth, then the effect of my past lessens. The ultimate spiritual practice of Raja Yoga is to keep the subtle thread of the intellect with God, to purify the soul, because each time we remember, three things happen:  Firstly, I connect with a memory, a person or a situation. Secondly, the moment I do that I am immediately influenced by what I connected to. Thirdly, I have a feeling or experience. When I connect with past sad memories, or the bad behaviour of others, I am influenced and the effect is an experience of sadness, and negativity. I actually give power back to my impurity, and my old sanskaras.  

The whole idea of Raja Yoga is to remember God in His eternal form, as the Supreme Soul, the Joyti bindu of Divine light, the One Soul that remains eternally pure and unadulterated. When I remember that Being, as the Mother and Father, as a lover of the soul, I am influenced by that love, that peace, that silence, that power. That elevated experience that reconnects me with my original sanskaras.  

So, the real way to celebrate this great festival is to remember God. The more I remember God, the more I genuinely become pure. I have loving feelings for everybody, I remain peaceful, I remain content and I live in a state of happiness. The Great Kumb is about to be with us very soon. Why not also celebrate by remembering God, and make myself more elevated, purer and free from my past sins. 

Charlie Hogg, based in Sydney, 
is the National Coordinator, Brahma Kumaris, Australia.