When Ramakrishna Saw the Divine Mother in Everything

Sri Ramakrishna once gave a cat the food that had been prepared as an offering to Mother Kali. The act caused concern in the temple garden. Its manager considered it improper and reported the matter to Mathur Babu, who had authority over the temple.

Ramakrishna later explained what had led him to do this. During an experience in the Kali temple, the Divine Mother had revealed to him that She had become everything. He saw consciousness not only in the image of Kali, before which he worshipped, but also in the altar, the vessels used in worship, the threshold, and the marble floor. The entire room seemed filled with bliss.

The experience was not confined to the shrine. Ramakrishna also saw the power of the Divine Mother present in a man standing outside the temple whom he regarded as wicked. The same presence that he had encountered in the image of Kali was apparent to him beyond the temple walls.

It was in this state of awareness that he fed the cat. If the Mother had become everything, then She had become the animal as well. The food intended for Her could therefore be given to the cat, whom Ramakrishna now perceived as another manifestation of the Divine Mother.

The temple manager did not share this understanding. He complained to Mathur Babu about the use of the offering. Mathur, however, understood something of Ramakrishna’s state of mind and replied that the priest should be allowed to do as he wished, without interference.

The incident grew out of a vision in which the boundary between the image worshipped in the temple and the life surrounding it had disappeared for Ramakrishna. He had seen the Mother in the objects of worship, in a man outside the shrine, and in the cat to which he gave the offering. What the temple manager regarded as an improper act was, for Ramakrishna, a consequence of what he believed the Mother had revealed to him.

Source & Note

This article is based on Sri Ramakrishna’s The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna. The material has been edited and adapted for this publication.