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| Badhu Baran or Welcoming the Newly Married Bride |
The following liturgy for the Badhu Baran or Welcoming a Newly Married Bride has been taken from the Manual of Brahmo Rituals and Devotions by Sitanath Tattwabhushan. The book was first published in 1924 with its second edition in 1971 by the Sadharan Brahmo Samaj. The language is archaeic and can be suitably modified keeping in mind with the occassion and times.
 The bridegroom's house is usually decorated with evergreens, festoons and flags to welcome a newly married bride when she comes to it from her paternal home for the first time after marriage. When she arrives, she is at first introduced to the members of the family and then to the assembled guests. She bows down to the elders and receives their blessings. The youngsters bow down to her or salute her and receive her blessings or greetings. A short service, in the usual form, then takes place, in the course of which the minister addresses the bride thus:
"Srimati..............., we heartily welcome you to this your new home. Every member of this family will try his or her utmost to make you happy and comfortable, and every friend of the family will help you with his or her kind advice and active service. Try, with prayers, good resolutions and the assistance of your husband, to feel at home here, to adapt yourself to the modes of life prevailing in this house and to make everyone of its inmates your own. Perhaps you will often find the task difficult but it must be done, for it is the will of .God."
"It is divinely ordained that woman, as a rule, must leave the family in which she is born, come to live with those who were formerly aliens to her and make them her own people. Your father and mother, brothers and sisters, and other relatives by blood are still and will ever remain what they are, dear and near to you. But it is required, by the new relation you have entered into, that you will look upon the parents of your husband as your own parents, his brothers and sisters as your brothers and sisters, his other relatives and friends as your own relatives and friends."
The task is indeed a difficult one, but love and earnest endeavour can and do achieve this wonderful feat. If you are prayerful, thoughtful and earnest, you will see how, in a short time, your new home relatives and friends have become as dear to you as the old."
"And, it is also divinely ordained, you'll be blessed by this transformation in your life. Your heart will be broadened, your intellect sharpened and your capacity for active service indefinitely increased. The married life, the home that is made by one's moral efforts as distinguished from the one that is merely born into, - is a great training ground, a much greater one than the latter; and blessed is the woman who receives willingly and with thanks the full benefit of this training."
Glve us more Wisdom, that we may avoid ruinous errors in training it. Give us more patience and endurance, and more of thy divine watchfulness, that we may take better care of thy child and overcome the innumerable difficulties, inward and outward, that beset our path. Make our thoughts holy, our feelings warm, our words kind and truthful and our deeds righteous not sully thy heavenly flower with our unholy touch, but may always keep it holy and make it more and more fit for thy service. Enable us to feel constantly that the service of this child is thy own service and a means of our salvation and everlasting union with thee.
"Do not look upon this life as one of mere pleasure, as the shallow and sensuous do. No doubt you will enjoy many pleasures here, such pleasures as unmarried life can never afford. But be prepared for many a trouble also. Both pleasure and pain are ordained. by God to lead us to something higher,-the perfection of our souls through union with him."
"In your life as a married woman, your patience and energies will often be sorely tried. You will see sights, hear words, and receive treatment which will be very painful to you and from which you will wish to fly. But you must remember that they are a part of your allotted destiny, and that you must put up with them with patience. Your conduct will often draw criticism which will appear to you unjust and unsympathetic. It may be so, but it is often unavoidable and must be patiently borne. Gradually it will die out. It takes time for people to be just and loving to a new-comer."
"You will often have to do tasks which will tax your energy and perseverance day after day, month after month, and perhaps year after year, - such tasks perhaps as you were never required to do in your old home. They must be prayerfully and faithfully done, and their doing will bless your soul and perfect your life. In this country the joint family system makes the life of a housewife far more strenuous than where this system does not prevail. The system has both its advantages and disadvantages. Perhaps it is not suited to the times and seems to be gradually passing away. But so long as it exists among us we must patiently put up with the unavoidable troubles arising from it and endeavour to reap its benefits. For a newly married bride it is a distinct advantage to be guided by the superior experience of a mother-in-law, an elder sister-in-law and other elderly relatives, and or all housewives it is a blessing to love and serve and be loved and helped by a large number of relatives. However, the Spirit of God, if you only seek its help, will teach you your duties at every step of the new life you have entered upon."
"Make prayer, both private prayer and united family prayer, the basis, the binding thread, of your home life. Union with the Supreme Heart will make the union of human hearts easy. Let the spirit of prayer pervade everything that is done here,-the meals that are taken, the pleasures that are enjoyed, the trials that are borne, the lessons that are learnt, and the labours that are gone through. Let friends and guests always, find a hearty welcome here. Let the poor and the distressed find here willing ears. and helping hands. Let the Brahma Samaj feel that in this new home one more useful institution is added to it, and .let every good cause pertaining to the country or humanity in general, draw its hearty sympathy and active co-operation."
The ceremony doses with the minister's prayer and a hymn. Some donations are to be made to the Brahmo Samaj or for some charitable purposes |
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