A Wisdom Archive on Renunciation

renunciation:
See: sannyasa, tyaga, vairagya.

(See also: Renunciation, Hinduism, Body Mind and Soul )

For more dictionary entries, see » Renunciation Dictionary

Detachment is not renunciation. It is a re-orientation of attitudes and lifestyles. It is a creative endeavour that involves a shift in consciousness. Free-flowing consciousness helps us reach a state of creative calm.
 
According to Sri Aurobindo , when one withdraws from the turmoil of outer life, the evolving consciousness becomes centred and observant like a detached witness or sakshi . The witness state, sakshi bhav , is a continual disassociation from worldly desires and sense-identification. It is a state of neutrality that goes beyond body and mind to communicate with the spirit.

 
(See also: Love and Happiness, Life and Beyond, Body Mind and Soul )

Read more here: » Love and Happiness: Limitless Love Is Free Of Bondage

Renunciation Not a painful obligation, but the result of a free choice; nor the giving up of an object of desire in favor of another object of desire. The question of advantage or disadvantage does not enter into it; these are delusions of the personal ego.
 
The one who truly renounces abandons the acquisitiveness and desire for personal advantage which are the law of the lower nature, and follows the law of the higher nature, which is the law of love and harmony. The question as to whether he gains or loses is then relatively meaningless for him, for he has forgotten himself, because he has found his greater self.

 
(See also: Renunciation, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary )

For more dictionary entries, see » Renunciation Dictionary

The next stage is that of a Sannyasin. When a man becomes a Sannyasin, he renounces all possessions, all distinctions of caste, all rites and ceremonies and all attachments to any particular country, nation, or religion. He lives alone and spends his time in meditation. He lives on alms. When he attains the sublime state of deep meditation he rejoices in his own Self.
 
Excerpt from All About Hinduism by Sri Swami Sivananda
 

Read more here: » Sanatana Dharma: The Sannyasin or the Renunciate in Sanatana Dharma

On September 22, 1931, two icons of the West and the East met in a humble tenement in London. Mahatma Gandhi impressed Charlie Chaplin with his view that supreme independence meant shedding oneself of unnecessary things.
 
Chaplin believed this principle was the basis of Gandhi's political-economic-spiritual argument against machinery.
 
However, what Gandhi told Chaplin that day echoes the Jaina principle of aparigraha.
 

 
(See also: Peace on Earth, Peace of Mind, Love and Happiness, Life and Beyond, Body Mind and Soul )

Read more here: » Peace on Earth: Renunciation Keeps Man, Nature Happy - Aparigraha

Du Bois was invited to Ghana in 1961 by President Kwame Nkrumah to direct the Encyclopedia Africana, a government production, and a long-held dream of his. When in 1963 he was refused a new U.S. passport because of his communism, he and his wife, Shirley Graham Du Bois, renounced their citizenship and became citizens of Ghana. Du Bois' health had declined in 1962, and on August 27, 1963 he died in Accra, Ghana at the age of ninety-five ...

Read more here: » W.E.B. DuBois: Encyclopedia II - W.E.B. DuBois - Renunciation of U.S. citizenship

The exact derivation of the term 'Mae Ji' is not known. Several possible etymologies have been suggested, relating 'Mae Ji' either to Sanskrit or Sinhala terms for renunciants, morality, or other positive qualities. The word ji is occasionally used in the Thai language to refer either to Buddhist monks, or to ordained followers of other traditions, such as Brahmanist priests or Jain monks. Historically, little is known about the status and lives of Mae Ji prior to Western contact with the kingdoms that preceded the modern state ...

Read more here: » Mae Ji: Encyclopedia II - Mae Ji - History

Because the bhikkhuni sangha (the order of ordained Buddhist nuns) was never established in Thailand, there has traditionally been no way for a female Buddhist to become an ordained member of the Buddhist clergy. Instead, for several centuries Thai women have chosen to live as Mae Jis, taking the eight precepts and living either in monasteries or in dedicated communities of female renunciants. Temporary Mae Jis (who typically do not shave their ...

Read more here: » Mae Ji: Encyclopedia II - Mae Ji - Overview