Gita Satsangh, Chapter 9 Verses 4 to 6 - From Aurobindo: 2 of 4

[Guest guest]

Namaste

 

(Please read the brief introduction and Important note at the

beginning of No.1 of 4 - Post #14995 - if you have not

already read it)

 

We have, to start with, the crude experience of a Divine who is

something quite different from and greater than ourselves, quite

different from and greater than ourselves, quite different from

and greater than the universe in which we live. And so it is, so

long as we live in our phenomenal selves and see around us only

the phenomenal face of the world. When we dwell in this

difference only, we regard the divine as extracosmic. It is

only in this sense he is not contained in the cosmos and its

creations, (SEE HOW SUBTLY HE BRINGS OUT THE MEANING OF THE 2ND

LINE OF VERSE 4) but not in the sense that they are outside his

being; for there is nothing outside the one Eternal and Real.

We realise this first truth of the Godhead spiritually when we

get the experience that we live and move and have our being in

him alone, that however different from him we may be, we depend

on him for our existence. The universe itself is only a

phenomenon and movement in the Spirit.

 

But again we have the farther and more transcendent experience

that our self-existence is one with his self-existence.

(ADVAITA). We perceive a one self of all and of that we have the

consciousness and the vision. We can no longer say or think that

we are entirely different from him, but that there is self and

there is phenomenon of the self-existent. All is one in the

self, but all is variation in the phenomenon. By an exclusive

intensity of union with the self we may even (NOTE THIS WORD

‘EVEN’) come to experience the phenomenon as a thing dreamlike

and real. (AUROBINDO GENERALLY IS IN LINE WITH THE CONCEPT OF

NON-DUALITY BUT DOES NOT AGREE WITH SANKARA – AND CERTAINLY NOT

WITH GAUDAPADA - ALL THE WAY, PARTICULARLY IN THEIR CONCEPT OF

MAYA. THAT IS WHY THE WORD ‘EVEN’ IN THIS SENTENCE!)

 

But again by a double intensity we may have too the double

experience of a supreme self-existent one-ness with him and yet

of ourselves as living with him and in many relations to him in

a persistent form, an actual derivation of his being. The

universe, and our existence in this universe, becomes to us a

constant and real form of the self-aware existence of the

Divine. (VISHISHTADVAITA?). In that lesser truth we have our

relations of difference between us and him. These relations are

other than the supracosmic truth. They are derivative creations

of a certain power of consciousness of the spirit. Because they

are other and because they are creations, the exclusive seekers

of the supracosmic Absolute (AUROBINDO REFERS HERE TO THE

ADVAITINS) tax them with an unreality relative or complete. Yet

are they from him, they are existent forms derived from his

being, not figments created out of nothing. Nor can we say there

is nothing at all in the supracosmic that corresponds to these

relations. We cannot say that they are derivations of

consciousness sprung from that source but yet with nothing in

the source which at all supports or justifies them.

We have the experience of the Spirit, the Divine Being immutable

and ever containing in his vision the mutabilities of the

universe. We have too, the separate, the simultaneous or the

coincident experience of the Divine immanent in ourselves and in

all creatures.

We get another revealing spiritual experience in which we are

forced to see as the very Divine all things, not only that

Spirit which dwells immutable in the universe and in its

countless creatures, but all this inward and outward becoming.

All is then to us a divine Reality manifesting himself in us and

the cosmos. If this experience is exclusive, (I HAVE DIFFICULTY

IN UNDERSTANDING THE MEANING OF ‘EXCLUSIVE’ HERE. PLEASE HELP)

we get the pantheistic identity, the One that is all. But the

pantheistic vision is only a partial seeing. This extended

universe is not all that the Spirit is. There is an Eternal

greater than it by which alone its existence is possible.

All these spiritual experiences however different or opposed at

first sight, are yet reconcilable if we cease to press on one or

other exclusively.

The phrase ‘vAsudevaH sarvaM iti’ intends that the Godhead is

all that is universe and all that is in the universe and all

that is more than the universe. The Gita lays stress first on

his supracosmic existence. It lays stress next on his universal

existence in which all moves and acts. Next it insists with a

certain austere emphasis on the acceptance of the Godhead as the

inhabitant in the human body. Finally it insists at great length

on the divine manifestation in all things in the universe and

affirms the derivation of all that is from the nature, power and

light of the one Godhead.

(TO BE CONTINUED in No.3 of 4).

 

praNAms to all advaitins

profvk

 

 

=====

Prof. V. Krishnamurthy

My website on Science and Spirituality is http://www.geocities.com/profvk/

You can access my book on Gems from the Ocean of Hindu Thought Vision and

Practice, and my father R. Visvanatha Sastri's manuscripts from the site.

 

 

 

Faith Hill - Exclusive Performances, Videos & More

http://faith.