Who is a Guru and what does He do to His disciple? A Guru is the One who removes the darkness of ignorance and spreads the light of knowledge in the disciple.
Tomorrow is a very great day called Guru Poornima. It is also the birthday of Ved Vyas. Considering that almost every person celebrates Teachers Day, I feel this day should not be considered the same Teachers Day! The material worldly teacher is someone who covers the spiritual with the veil of ignorance by teaching logical and scientific methodologies, whereas the Guru removes this veil of falsehood to look towards the divine. Just as an Eskimo can teach Eskimo stuff to a normal man, the God stuff or the spiritual stuff can be taught only by the divine itself! No human can take the garb of a Guru and teach about God! It is God who takes the garb of a human to teach about Himself.
The Guru cannot be made to order or available off the shelf and no one can feign to be one. How can normal people discus about a subject whom they haven’t seen or experienced? So the One who has seen, touched or experienced can talk about Him alone.
Just as we have Teacher training institute to teach a teacher the art of teaching, there 
are no teachers courses for making a Guru! You cannot tell the Guru what He should teach or how! He has His own methodologies and techniques to drive home the lessons. He is the divinity incarnate so how can He have any relatives or friends? He is all by Himself, full of Himself. He is not there because of nature, He is there because He is the Nature and Divinity incarnate! Anybody can become a sadhak or disciple but only few can become devotees. To become a devotee of the divine is to completely surrender the mind, body, ego and the idea of meum! The Lord Himself becomes the devotees devotee in the form of a Guru. The Guru serves the devotees by taking them across the illusory world of maya like a boatman. He becomes the charioteer, friend, servant, guide and relative of the devotee!
When a disciple who is ripe for initiation arrives to the Gurus fold, He shaves all their past relationships away. He performs the death rites of the disciple and gives him new clothes, name and identity. The disciple has to let go of all his past attachments and he then becomes a guru putra. The Guru removes the veils of maya and helps him to rise above. All the past and present vasanas or tendencies are erased by the Guru. A new person emerges who can rise above the mundane. To again rise to the level of a devotee requires tremendous sadhanas. Faith in Guru and His word, surrendering completely to His will so that He can mold him the way He needs to. Unconditional love for Him and His lotus feet and complete devotion for Him alone makes one a good devotee.
Tomorrow is such a day to honor this great One. I truly revere my dearest Guru Dattatreya and His compassion and benevolence. Hail Gurudev! The ocean of mercy and the true Brahman!
