Swami teaches... Vidya - the door open to the Real Self

[Guest guest]

Sai Ram

 

Light and Love

 

Swami teaches.... (1 - 2 May 2005)

 

Vidya - the Door Open to the Real Self

Swami liquidates barriers of race and religion, aimed only at restoring

dharma and establishing the unity of faiths and peoples under the awareness of

universal love and brotherhood.

Swami directed: "O mind, chant the glory of the Guru's feet, which can take

you across the treacherous ocean of samsara." All the life and every activity is

as a touch of the Divine. The quest for Atma Vidya or knowledge of the real Self

is essential in every human being.

 

The human body is a world in itself. Blood flows through and animates every

part of the body. God is 'flowing' in and through and activating every spot in

the world.

Humans' present condition of incompleteness is the consequence of the

activities during previous lives. The future condition is being built on the

basis of present deeds and desires, thoughts and feelings. This does not mean

that one should not seek and secure assistance from others for promoting one's

good fortune and avoiding misfortune. Such assistance is essential nearly for

all.

 

"By means of Vidya and Thapas, human is transformed into a purified soul."

Such is Swami's words. Vidya has two aspects: Baahya Vidya and Brahma Vidya.

Baahya Vidya provides the wherewithal for human livelihood. Human being can

study many subjects, earn valuable degrees, acquire higher and higher jobs and

manage to spend the life with no worry and fear. Brahma Vidya endows all human

beings with the strength which enables them to discharge successfully the duty

they owe to themselves. It lays down the path which leads both to joy in

worldly relations and bliss in the life beyond. Brahma Vidya is superior to

all the Vidyas available on the Earth. Brahma Vidya has the divine potency to

liberate everyone from bondage and makes aware of the Omniself, the Absolute,

the Parabrahma. Vidya is the process of acquiring knowledge; Thapas is the

known. The first is indirect, it is the means. The second is the goal, the end.

A bird cannot fly on one wing. No human can be rendered holy or purified without Vidya and Thapas.

 

Thapas does not mean positioning oneself upside down, head on the ground and

feet held up. Nor is it the renunciation of possessions, properties and family

and emaciating one's body, holding the nose to regulate breath. Physical

actions, oral assertions and mental resolves - all three have to be in unison.

The thought, the speech and the act all have to be pure. The effort must be

undertaken for satisfying one's inner yearnings, for the contentment of the

self. This struggle is the essence of Thapas.

 

This vivifying inspiration cannot be got through the perusal of books. It

can be gained only when one mind-element contacts another mind-element.

Scholarship and culture are not related as cause and effect. However learned

one is in worldly knowledge, unless one's mind is cultured, the learning is

mere junk.

 

There is one Law guiding and guarding this world - the Law of Love. The

essence of this law humans can obtain through Vidya. Each nation or community

has joy or grief, good life or bad, decided by the derived from its activities.

The 'bad' too is 'good' in reverse. It serves to teach what has to be avoided.

Neither 'bad' nor 'good' can be pronounced as 'absolutely unrelieved' states.

Vidya reveals and makes clear that 'good' and 'bad' are only the reactions

caused by the failings and feelings of the mind.

One must be able to judge the difference between one 'good thing' and

another that seems to be 'better'. But it must be understood that the 'better'

is not harmful to the good. Just as 'unrighteousness' prods to cultivate

'righteousness', troubles induce to manifest compassion and charity. Compassion

has as its inevitable seed, suffering. If there were no wrong and no suffering,

human would have become either stock or stone. One who has no capacity to weigh

and to respond to the call of agony and pain is like a blind person who cannot

distinguish between what is good and what is bad.

 

The pure consciousness becomes apparently limited into a variety of

individuals. In deep sleep, the variety disappears and each individual lapses

back into this "is-ness". Pictorially the names Ganga, Krishna, Indus are all

lost when they enter the sea.

They are thereafter called "the sea". The Jivi (Individualised Soul) who is

eternal and immortal is born again and again, as a transitory mortal; he

continues to accumulate activity, prompted by inherited impulses and the

activity produces consequences, which he must shoulder and suffer.

Yogis who are turned away from the objective world can attain the

Parabrahmam, with Its Splendour of Realised Knowledge, in the pure clear sky of

their hearts. We can know the Parabrahmam by a single test. That which

remains, after everything is negated as 'Not this,' 'Not that' - that is

Brahmam.

This is the Truth that all aspirants seek. Attaining It, they get the status

of emperors and can travel wherever they like. (The Self that is in the human

body cannot lead the body, so long as it is under the illusion that it is

identical with the body. It is only by throwing away this illusory feeling and

becoming disengaged from the body that the Self can gain control over the

situation).

For attaining Atmic Wisdom one would be aware of values and relative

importances of powers, qualities and objects what is one of topics of Vidya.

The renouncing of evil deeds, the giving up of desire are accomplished by

manas or mind. The objectives of human life have to be gained only through

that. As a result of persistent training, it will learn to obey your interests.

The Chiththam (inner consciousness), on the other hand, presents before you past

and present experience and invites you to see things in perspective and judge

them against that background. Equanimity has to be attained in and through this

process, that goes on in Chiththa.

So the Chiththa is the source and support of resolution. All resolutions,

decisions and plans are the products of the Chiththa; they are of its form.

That is when death overtakes a scholar of all Sastras, he becomes but the equal

of ordinary people. The mind cannot free itself, as the Chiththa can. The

Chiththa discriminates between resolutions; it tests them as duty and not-duty

and justifies with proper reasons the classification it has made. There can be

no proper Karma without Chiththa.

Dhyna is superior than Chiththa. Dhyana is the fixing of the Buddhi

(intellect) on the Divine. In Dhyana, all agitations cease, all modifications

are unnoticed. (On account of the effect of the Thamoguna, and even of the

Rajoguna, all created things like the waters, the hills and mountains, the

stars and planets, people, all are agitation-bound, change-bound).

Vijnana (Jnana) is better than Dhyana. Jnana based on scholarship steeped in

the Sastras is referred to as Vijnana. It is attained by Dhyana and, hence, it

is more valuable than Dhyana.

Superior to Vijnana is Balam ... Strength, Fortitude, Vigour. It illumines

the objective world, it sharpens the Prathibha or Intuition. Prathibha is the

power by which you can sense the Consciousness in all knowledge objects. Now

there is one thing superior even to Prathibha: Annam, Food, Sustenance. It is

the support of life. It is life that makes possible all activity of human

being.

Thejas or Illumination is higher than Intuition, Prathibha or Food. Thejas is

Fire, heat and light. Thejas creates water and water produces food. Thejas can

make even Wind lighter. It shines as lightning and sounds as thunder.

Akasa is superior to Thejas, remember. It is through Akasa that sounds are

transmitted and heard. Love and play are products of Akasa. Seeds sprout on

account of Akasa.

Smarana, memory, is superior to Akasa. Without it, all experience is

meaningless, all knowledge is waste, all effort is purposeless. Nothing can be

experienced without the help of memory. It can be said that memory creates the

Akasa and other objects.

 

Thus analysing the value and relative importance of objects and powers,

human must give up identification of self with the physical body. Human's

nature keeps on changing from moment to moment. The changing mind veils the

true nature of the Self. Due to this ignorance, human sees duality in this

world, and begins to relish change. Through Atmic wisdom acquired by Vidya is

possible to be aware, recognise the real Self, Reality. A person aware of the

Self rises to the noblest, laughing, playing and moving without regard to

the comforts, luxurious needs of the body. The wind, the lightning and the

thunder have no permanent existence. So too the particularised Jivi appears as

separate for a time against the background of Brahmam and gets merged in It, at

last.

 

The universe, willed by Iswara, is the embodiment of Ananda. Prakriti or

nature, Ishwara, and Brahman appear to be different but their oneness can be

recognised by the Rasa (thick, sweet juice which emerged from the Ocean of

Milk) prevalent in all of them. These have been divided for the purpose of

understanding. They have been given the names 'Mukti Dhama', 'Vaikunta Dhama'

and 'Goloka Dhama' what correspond respectively to Moksha or liberation, Bhakti

or devotion and Jnana or wisdom.

Mukti Dhama is the name given to the path wherein one enquires about the

various forms and names visible in creation, which being impermanent, lead one

to realise that Satchidananda that is, Nirakara or the God without name or

form, is the essence of reality. In this way, one reaches the aspect of Yoga

and through Yoga one attains Mukti. This path is, therefore, called the 'Mukti

Dhama'.

When one surrenders one's ego to the Lord, thinks of Him and Him alone at

all times, one would be following the path of devotion and this is named

'Vaikunta Dhama'.

If one develops noble ideas in all the three states, namely the gross, the

subtle and the causal, and enjoys continued bliss recognising the oneness of

everything and developing fully the feeling of the identity with Brahman, one

will be following the path named 'Goloka Dhama'.

The purpose of life is to make contact with God within, who is truth, light,

love and beauty and to take from that Universal source the inspiration for a

meaningful and purposeful life of serving.

Swami asks devotees and followers to distinguish between the momentary and

the momentous. He asks us to be aware of faith in God, the illusory and

ephemeral nature of the everchanging world, and the imperishable nature of the

Atma within. (Reet's compilation from,

Sathya Sai Baba. Vidya Vahini. Chapters V, VI and XII;

Sathya Sai Baba. Dharma Vahini, Chapter XIII;

Sathya Sai Baba. Upanishad Vahini. IX. Chandogya Upanishad;

Sathya Sai Baba. The Divine Discourse, "Detachment gives Peace even amidst

Troubles," Summer Showers in Brindavan. May 1973, Brindavan).

 

Namaste - Reet