Guest guest Posted December 18, 1998 Report Share Posted December 18, 1998 Gummuluru Murthy on 18th Dec. asked for an interpretation of verses 15 and 16 of IzopaniSad. I have attempted one below The Golden Prayer The verses 15 and 16 of IzopaniSad translate as follows: The face of Reality is hidden by the golden container. Reveal it, O Sun, so that I may visualise the dharma of the Self as Truth. O Lord of Light, the only Seer, Controller of all, the Sun, Giver of Life to all, spread apart your rays, gather up your brilliance, so that I may perceive the wondrous Form of your being; For I myself am That. The Sun is the only visible representative of the Supreme Truth, Divine Light, brahman. There are only three locations in which one can visualise that brahman in this earthly world: One is the Sun, the second is the inside of the heart, the third is the space between the eyebrows. Incidentally, this last one gives the esoteric reason why Hinduism insists on a tilak or mark between the eyebrows. Of these three since the Sun itself can be visualised as brahman, the worship of brahman, the ultimate, through worship of the Sun is the easiest to practise. He is the One therefore who illuminates from within. Our limited consciousness has to open up to the infinite Consciousness represented by the Sun. The allegory of the golden container is full of meaning. The Sanskrit word 'pAtra' is derived from the definition: 'pIyate anena iti pAtram' - that by which we 'drink', i.e., experience. We experience the good and bad results of our past karma from this reservoir of our samskAra which brings forth our cycle of births and deaths. There are three seeds for this sprouting forth of our samskAras or vAsanas. The three are: Light (cit), Existence (sat) and Love (Ananda). They respectively activate, our Intelligence from its states of ignorance and inertness, our Life (i.e., birth and death) from its state of formless subtlety and our Mind through its states of Love and Hate. These activations express themselves in our wish to know, our wish to live, and our wish to enjoy - these three being in turn sustained by one's father through knowledge, one's mother through food, and one's spouse through pleasure and companionship. This then is the whole cycle of our samsAra. The resservoir for all this is the golden container representing the reservoir of all our vAsanAs. The Creator, brahmA through whom this blossoms in the world as Life is called hiraNya-garbha (= Golden Conception) in this charge of His. So the rays of the Sun which are golden in colour, and which constitute the blinding factor (the veil of ignorance) for not allowing us to see the Sun, the Reality, constitute, as it were, the golden container of our vAsanAs. The only Seer is hiraNya-garbha, who sees it all through. Our individuality, our names and forms, our inner organ of Mind with all its ramifications, its accessories in the form of sense organs - all these are created by this hiraNya-garbha, who gives the Light, to all of them. He is therefore the savitA, the Sun. So we ask Him, plead with Him and request Him to remove the blinding rays from himself, because the seeds of our samskAras are with Him, so that we can see Him as He really is. He is the one who can make us transcend our individuality and make us see the Oneness and realise that 'What I see is Myself; I am this Purusha' I am brahman - aham brahma asmi. V. Krishnamurthy Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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