the pictures depend upon the screen

[Guest guest]

Bhagavan said:

The question arises: It is said that Brahman is real,

and world an illusion; again it is said that the whole universe

is an image of Brahman. How are these two statements to

be reconciled?

 

In the sadhak stage, you have got to say that the world is

an illusion. There is no other way, because when a man

forgets that he is the Brahman, who is real, permanent and

onmipresent, and deludes himself into thinking that he is a

body in the universe which is filled with bodies that are

transitory, and labours under that delusion, you have got to

remind him that the world is unreal and a delusion.

Why? Because, his vision which has forgotten its own Self

is dwelling in the external material universe and will not

turn inward into introspection unless you impress on him

that all this external, material universe is unreal. When once

he realises his own Self, and also that there is nothing other

than his own Self, he will come to look upon the whole universe

as Brahman. There is no universe without his Self.

 

So long as a man does not see his own Self which is the

origin of all, but looks only at the external world as real and

permanent, you have to tell him that all this external universe

is an illusion. You cannot help it.

 

Take a paper. We see only the script, and nobody notices

the paper on which the script is written. The paper is there,

whether the script on it is there or not. To those who look

upon the script as real, you have to say that it is unreal,

an illusion, since it rests upon the paper. The wise man looks

upon both the paper and script as one. So also with Brahman

and the universe.

 

It is the same in the case of the cinema. The screen is always

there; the pictures come and go, but do not affect the screen.

What does the screen care wheter the pictures appear or

disappear? The pictures depend upon the screen. But what

use are they to it?

The man who looks only at the pictures on the screen and

not the screen itself, is troubled by the pains and pleasures

that occur in the story. But the man who views the screen,

realises that the images are all shadows and not something

apart and distinct from the screen. So also with the world.

It is all a shadow play.

 

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Nagamma: Letters, p. 94

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