Question on Self-Realized Person by Shailendra

[Guest guest]

Namaste.

 

Shailendra Bhatnagar asks:

What is the exact nature of Self-realization ? How does

the world appear to a Self-realized person ? How does it

feel to be in the company of a Self-realized person ? Is

it similar to the peace and serenity that one experiences

during Satsangh or after Omkar ? Is Gita chapter 5

shloka-pair 8 and 9 a description of a self-realized

person?

 

Yes, Shailendra-ji, it is. Arjuna asked the samwe type of

question (B.G. II-54) and Krishna answered him (II-55 to

72). But a Self-Realized Person may not go about saying

that he is self-realized. Already Dennis-ji has pointed

this out. You may also refer to my mail of long ago:

http://www.escribe.com/culture/advaitin/m5124.html

 

and the thread of ‘jIvan-mukta’ to which it belonged.

 

Descriptions of a Jivan-mukta (self-realized person) abound

profusely in the literature. And they actually cover a

wide range of the spectrum. Just as samples, for your

nidhidhyAsana, here are two interesting descriptions, each

on a different side of the spectrum.

>From Viveka-chuDAmaNi: (#426):

 

Freed from awareness of any external object by reason of

his ever-being brahman, consuming only what is needed for

bodily sustenance, proferred to him by others like one in

sleep or like a child, looking at this world when he comes

to external sight like one seen in a dream, remains the

blessed one enjoying infinite merit. He is to be honoured

on earth.

 

Here the words “like one in sleep” (= “nidrALuvat”) and

“like a child” (= “bAlavat”) seem to be significant.

Because my father used to refer to these two words every

time the topic came in his lectures.

 

He used to refer to the following experience that all of us

have with little kids of four or five. The kid goes to

sleep without drinking the glass of milk that the did is

supposed to take every night before going to bed. And the

mother wakes the kid up with a little force and in that

half-sleepy state, the kid drinks or is made to drink that

glass of milk and then again resumes his/her sleep. In the

morning, the kid has no memory of having had the drink of

milk the previous night. In fact the kid asks: “Mom, I did

not drink milk last night. Why did you not give me?”

 

On the other extreme end of the spectrum is the following

description in Shivananda-lahari (#81):

 

Oh Lord! To spend some time in offering archanas to Your

lotus feet, to spend some time in dhyAna and samAdhi and in

prostrations to You,, to spend some time in listening to

stories about You, to spend again some time in viewing Your

beautiful Forms and in prayerful stotras to them – Who ever

thus spends his time and enjoys the beatific immersement

in You, is he not already a jIvan-mukta?

 

I have a personal experience of seeing the Kanchi

Mahaswamigal (1894-1994) in around 1989. I was visiting

the Kanchi Mutt for a darshan of the three Acharyas. It was

an evening (around 7PM) when the Kamakshi deity of

Kanchipuram was having the ten-day annual festival and that

was the day of the “Kudirai-vAhanaM” (i.e., the deity would

be taken in a procession seated on the palanquin riding a

horse). And it appears before the deity is taken round the

town for the procession, they had the habit of bringing

the palanquin to the gate of the Kanchi Mutt so that the

Mahaswamigal could have a darshan of the deity. And thus

the procession appears at the gate of the Mutt. I was

totally unaware of the day’s routine. I was just mingling

and conversing with a few persons inside the Mutt hoping

to be able to see the Mahaswamigal in due course. But

suddenly I heard a bustle of movement; everybody was

rushing to the gate. And then I knew something was

happening there and I also moved with the crowd. Lo and

behold! The sight that I saw there was scintillating. The

Mahaswamigal had problems of vision those days. Maybe he

could see very little. So he was there standing at the gate

almost very near the palanquin of the divine deity. Heavy

Searchlights were being focussed on the deity for the

Acharya to see Her clearly. Of course She had been

decorated to the fullest, what with gold and diamond and

pearl and ruby. And what an abundance of flowers of all

colours on Her. The Acharya was standing on the ground

with his hands cuffing over his eyes for him to see

clearly. Maybe on one side the lights were blinding his

eyes. He was straining hard to have a vision of what was

standing befoire him. He was moving his head this side and

that side to optimise his vision. Everyone was silent . It

was difficult to decide, for us spectators, whether the

Acharya was there to have darshan of Meenakshi or whether

Meenakshi was there to have a darshan of the Acharya! This

serene silence and the drama of the Mahaswamigal slapping

his cheeks in token of having darsan of the Goddess

continued for probably full four or five minutes or so. And

at last he turned to walk inside the mutt and the disciples

led him on. I came back to earth realizing just then that

I had been witnessing all along a divinely scene which I

can never forget!

 

Mark Ye, all devotees!. What great necessity was there for

this jIvan-mukta to have a darshan of the deity with such

great difficulty ? And what did he achieve? But that is

the characteristic of a jIvan-mukta!

 

PraNAms to all the jIvan-muktas of the world.

profvk

 

 

 

Prof. V. Krishnamurthy

New on my website, particularly for beginners in Hindu philosophy:

 

Hinduism for the next generation:

http://www.geocities.com/profvk/gohitvip/contentsbeach10.html

 

Free will and Divine will - a dialogue:

http://www.geocities.com/profvk/HNG/FWDW.html