Today as the world rejoices on the New Year, the 1st. of January, it has other significance. It is Kalpataru Day. I have received innumerable messages asking me about the meaning and significance as it is beamed in loops over the local tv network.
I am not a religious person, neither spiritual. I have my own interpretation. To me Kalpataru to Ramakrishna was what Nirvana was to Buddha.
Gautama Buddha experienced nirvana while sitting under the bodhi tree. Nirvana is a Buddhist concept of an ideal state where the spirit is liberated from the cycles of death and rebirth. Nirvana can be after life, but Nirvana is called a spiritual enlightenment and release from human suffering, lust and anger. The Gautama attained Nirvana and left his earthly body.
Ramakrishna became Kalpataru. On this day Ramakrishna sitting under a Banyan tree, revealed himself to be an Avatar, or God incarnate on earth. Ramakrishna had, in effect become Kalpataru, also called Kalpavriksha, the "wish-fulfilling tree" of Sanskrit literature and Hindu mythology. It also prepared Ramakrishna's followers for his death”,which occurred only a few months later, on August 16, 1886.
Kalpataru commemorates the day on January 1, 1886 when his followers believe that Ramakrishna revealed himself to be God incarnate on earth, sitting under a Banayan tree at ‘Udayanbati’ at Cossipore. On this day Ramakrishna entered an "ecstatic state" and touched his followers who experienced a variety of new states of consciousness, including vivid visions. For one, Vaikuntha, the visions persisted and interfered with daily life to an extent when many feared that he might be going insane.
The disciples of Ramakrishna commemorates this mystical event as "Kalpataru Day”. This event "carried meanings and memories of cosmic import for the disciples".
The first Kalpataru Day was "an event of unusual consequence and meaning" in the life of Ramakrishna and his followers. Ramakrishna was suffering from cancer at that time, and his health was declining. He and his closest followers had moved to a garden house in the northern Calcutta neighbourhood of Cossipore. The day was a relatively good day for him, and he took a walk in the garden. There, he asked his follower, Girish Ghosh , a question he had asked before, "Who do you say that I am?" Girish responded that he believed that Ramakrishna was "God incarnate, come to Earth out of mercy for humankind". Ramakrishna replied, "What more shall I say? May you be awakened!"
Kalpataru Utsav is now observed by monks of the Ramakrishna Math monastic order of Hinduism and lay followers of the associated Ramakrishna Mission, as well as the worldwide Vedanta Societies. It is classified as one of the "Lord's special festivals" by followers of Ramakrishna. Devotees from all over the country visit the famed Kali Temple at Dakshineshwar for Kalpataru Utsav, which is celebrated on this day every year.