Intellectual grasping of Advaita -- what value does it have?

[Guest guest]

I have read many of Ramana Maharishi's books. "Talks With Ramana

Maharishi" I've read cover to cover four times, and now I open it at

random and read about 30 minutes each day. I write about his

teaching for hours each week.

 

What use to me has this been? It was not self inquiry as Ramana

Maharishi defines it.

 

I came to Ramana Maharishi from another tradition -- wherein I

practiced spiritual techniques for about four hours per day for 29

years. In all my time doing that, I never had intellectual clarity

about what I was doing and why I was doing it. Yes, I THOUGHT I had

clarity, but now I know that I was "off a bit."

 

And being off a bit was a source of doubts.

 

Ramana Maharishi's conceptual delineation in his dialogs have given

me a perspective that fills me with intellectual peace. Every

question I've ever had about spirituality has been answered by him

with such clarity that I have been able to greatly reduce my

addiction to concepts. In India they say, "It takes a thorn to

remove a thorn."

 

This has not been a fast process for me. I had to read several books

on Advaita, before, finally, something clicked inside me, and, then,

so much fit so suddenly into a conceptual framework. I call it

"clarity from saturation" -- I literally bathed my mind with Ramana

Maharishi's concepts until they "took hold." How many times did I

have to have "jiva is ego" go through my mind in how many contexts

before I "got what those three words meant?" -- I don't know, but I

am convinced that the simple -- call it mechanical -- running of

concepts over and over again finally instituted them into my general

thinking/processing. These are strongly held beliefs now --

psychological patterns burned into my nervous system, if you will.

 

Since then, I have never found a single religion that was not

Advaita-esque. I see the concepts of Ramana Maharishi everywhere in

every scripture. It has brought me intellectual peace -- a quieter

mind that doesn't have to "do turmoil" when it touches upon

spirituality in any the many forms on this planet. I believe that my

saturation-technique works like this for anyone. Just keep reading

until you get this conceptual peace I speak of.

 

When I ask, "Who am I?" -- the silence, the mouna, the inability of

the mind to "nutshell the answer," is exactly the response

required. By seeking a "mind target" that doesn't exist, we get our

true nature revealed -- silence -- a silence like the quietness of an

arrow fully drawn back but unreleased -- infinite potency. That is THAT.

 

So, my conclusion is that reading Ramana Maharishi's words has

created in me the justification that my ego wanted so that it could

avoid doubts and "just do the program without having the ego

constantly saying but? but? but?" I let my inner silence "arise" now

-- more often than not.

 

If I were a person of faith, I could have gotten to this point

decades ago -- I could have just surrendered to the fact that Ramana

Maharishi is the perfect embodiment of THAT SILENCE. Bhakti is a

wonderful path for those who can resonate with it immediately. For

those like myself, intellectual saturation has been the longer path

to God, but it's my path nonetheless. I believe that, now, I am

finally ready for Bhakti in the sense that I feel SILENCE is LOVE,

and putting my attention on silence, love, is my form of Bhakti.

 

Ramana Maharishi's physicality can serve as a wonderful "mantra" of

sorts -- just gazing at his photograph with surrender in one's heart

is a powerful form of saturation too. I have come to love his

temporary form, but, for me, it is the silence within him that is in

the foreground of every one of his images.

 

I seem to hear him not speaking!

 

My public musing, here, about the use of words, may be a concern. I

don't want to foster idle debates about angels on the head of a

pin. Hopefully, my words above will convey how I see my relationship

with Ramana Maharishi, and that this will help others here see that

each of us comes to him from a separate path, and that my seeking

evermore clarity will not be an offence -- but rather another nuance

of Ramana Maharishi's manifestation to love.

 

Edg

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Dear Edg,

 

Thanks for your posting. I think many that are with Ramana have come from

disparate directions. (Particularly Western followers) I was focused on

Buddhism for maybe 25 years, particularly Ch'an, before I found Ramana.

 

As you have said, the key to Ramana's teachings are found when you

investigate what is your own identity. (Or as my teacher says, "Your

stand." What is your experience is a matter of your stand. If you stand as

a body, then there is the world, etc. If you stand as the Self, there is

only the Self.)

 

The words point the way, but are not the Reality. The Reality is within. We

ARE the Reality. We have never been anything other than Reality. Any other

view is only ignorance, illusion, a wrong assumption, maya, samsara.

 

Thanks for your sharing.

 

Not two,

richard

 

Edg wrote::

-----------------

Edg edg

Fri, 07 Apr 2006 11:59:24 -0500

RamanaMaharshi

[RamanaMaharshi] Intellectual grasping of Advaita -- what value

does it have?

 

 

I have read many of Ramana Maharishi's books. "Talks With Ramana

Maharishi" I've read cover to cover four times, and now I open it at

random and read about 30 minutes each day. I write about his

teaching for hours each week....

[Guest guest]

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When replying to long posts, please shorten

the post to which you are replying.

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Dear Edg,

 

I just want to say how inspiring your writing is for a

newcomer to Bhagavan's teachings.

 

Thank you.

 

--- Edg <edg wrote:

 

 

 

I have read many of Ramana Maharishi's books. "Talks

With Ramana

Maharishi" I've read cover to cover four times, and

now I open it at

random and read about 30 minutes each day. I write

about his

teaching for hours each week....

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

....something is sounding, or shining, as 'I-I', in the

Heart...