Help on the Quest for Self-realization-Reminders-57

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Help on the Quest for Self-realization-Reminders-57

 

Effort, Grace and Destiny

 

By Arthur Osborne in "Be Still, It Is The Wind That Sings"

 

It is said in scriptures and by gurus that an aspirant must make

effort on the path but that Grace also is necessary and that in the

end Realization is bestowed by Grace, not achieved by effort. It is

said in the Upanishads that the Atma chooses whom It will. This is a

hard saying. Those in whom the spiritual urge is powerful do not

worry their heads over it but strive because they must, because they

are drawn to without any thought of reward. Those, however, in whom

the mind is too active and the Spirit too weak are apt to be puzzled

and ask why they should make any effort if the final achievement is

not to be won by effort but bestowed by Grace. They also ask why the

Atma should choose one rather than another. For such people I will

try to clarify the saying.

 

Who is the `you' that has to make effort, and who is the `God'

or `Atma' that chooses and that bestows Grace on one rather than

another? The essence of a man is pure Spirit or, which comes to the

same, pure Being or pure universal Consciousness. This Spirit prowls

in the lion, spreads in the tree, endures in the stone; in man alone

it not only lives but knows that it lives. The difference between

man and other animals is not that man has greater ability (in many

ways he has less), but that he knows that he is man; he is self-

consciously man. This is through the human mind which, looking

outward, knows and dominates the world, looking inward, knows and

reflects Being as the Essence and Source of the world. However, the

ability to do this implies also the ability to not do it, to regard

oneself as a complete autonomous individual and forget the inner

Reality.

 

The various religions express this simple truth through myth,

allegory and doctrine and are apt to be puzzling. In the Koran it is

said that Allah offered the trust to the heavens and earth and the

mountains but all declined it; only man accepted and was untrue to

it. Religions assert that God gave man free will, which implies the

freedom to rebel. In Christianity it is said that man is fallen on

account of original sin. The Book of Genesis gives the story of how

man fell into the domain of opposites, the differentiation of good

and evil. All these are allegories of the simple truth stated above.

 

The mind creates an ego, a seemingly complete, autonomous individual

self, which, although illusory, seems to be the reality of one. This

is the state known in Hinduism as `ajnana' or ignorance, in

Christianity as `original sin', in Islam, in its more violent form,

as `kufr' or `denial', in its milder form, recognizing the Spirit as

real but believing the ego also to be real, as `shirk'

or `association' (of other with God).

 

This is the obstruction to Self-Realization. Therefore it has to be

removed. That is why the Masters say that Self-Realization is not

something new to be achieved but an eternally existent state to be

discovered or revealed. Therefore they compare it to an overcast sky—

the clear sky does not have to be created, only the clouds covering

it to be blown away; or to a pond overgrown with water-lilies—the

water is there all time and only has to be revealed by clearing away

the plants that have overgrown it. To do this constitutes the effort

of which the teachers and scriptures speak. The mind has created

the obstruction; the mind has to remove it. But merely to recognize

this, to recognize, that is to say, that the ego is (according to

the Advatin) an illusory self or (according to the dualist) a

creation of the Spirit, to which it should be submitted and totally

passive, is far from constituting the full effort required. Indeed,

it increases the obligation for total effort

and therefore, so to speak, the guilt in not making effort.

 

The effort involves the will and emotions as well as the

understanding and therefore has to be persistent, determined and

skilful. The ego has put out tentacles which cling to the world, and

either these have to be lopped off or the ego itself killed. It

craves the admiration or submission of other egos, and therefore

humility is enjoined. It craves enjoyment of creation in its own

right instead of being a mere channel through which the Spirit

perceives and enjoys, and therefore celibacy and asceticism are

sometimes prescribed and self-indulgence is always, in all

religions, forbidden. The attempt to lop off the tentacles of ego

has been compared in mythology to a battle with a many-headed giant

who grew two new heads for each one lopped off. The only way of

disposing of him was to strike at the heart and kill the entire

being, not deal with the heads individually. The campaign must be

skilful and intelligently planned as well as ruthless. What wonder

if different Masters in different religions have prescribed

different ways of

conducting it. The goal in all cases is the same: the taming or

destruction of the ego or the discovery that it never really existed.

 

Methods such as I have been alluding to consist largely in

curtailing the ego's outer manifestations so as to induce the mind

to turn inwards to the Self or Spirit behind it. It is also possible

to proceed in the opposite direction by turning inward to the Spirit

and thence deriving strength to renounce the outer manifestations.

This is the path of love and devotion, worshipping God, submitting

to Him, calling upon His Name, striving to serve and remember Him

with one's whole life. Either path can be followed, or both

together. A third part is that of questioning the very existence of

the ego by Self-enquiry.

 

All this is effort. Then what about Grace? Grace is the natural flow

of the Spirit into and through the mind and faculties. There is

nothing capricious or erratic about it. Bhagavan said: "Grace is

always there: it is only you who have to make yourself receptive to

it." It is likened traditionally to the sunlight falling on a flower

garden: if one bud opens and not another it is not due to any

partiality on the side of the sun but only to the maturity or

immaturity of the buds. Or if the sunlight penetrates one room but

not another it is simply because the doors and windows are open in

one and in the other shut.

 

Why then is it said that the Atma chooses whom it will and that the

final Realization comes by Grace, not by effort? In order to remove

the insidious idea that the ego-self can continue to exist and

attain something called `Realization', whereas all it can do is to

immolate itself and be replaced by the realized state of the Spirit,

which is ever-present Grace. The mind makes efforts to remove

obstructions; it is hard for it to understand that it is itself the

final obstruction. The very desire for Realization has to be

carefully watched and can become an impediment, for it implies some

one to achieve something. At the end all that the mind is called on

to do is to keep still and allow the Grace to flow unimpeded—but

that is the hardest thing of all for it to do. Till in the end,

 

All battles fought, all earthy loves abjured,

Dawn in the east, there is no other way

But to be still. In stillness then to find

The giants all were windmills, all the strife

Self-made, unreal; even he that strove

A fancied being, as when that good knight

Woke from delirium and with a loud cry

Rendered his soul to God.

 

On the devotional path this danger of supposing that it is the ego

who strives and attains, this warning against desires, even the

desire to get Realization, is expressed in the attitude

that true service of God must be for love alone with no thought of

reward. He who asks for reward is a merchant, not a lover.

 

The impossibility of achieving when there is no one to achieve

explains why a Guru will never answer the question: "When shall I

attain Realization?" It implies the false presumption: "There is an

individual me; when will it cease to exist?" whereas the Guru

realizes the ultimate truth that: "There is no being of the unreal

and no not-being of the Real."1 Not that the unreal ego will cease

to be at such and such a point in time, but that it

is not now, never has been and never could be. Therefore the

attitude of mind which questions when one can attain Realization or

whether it is one's destiny to be realized in this lifetime is an

obstruction sufficient to prevent Realization, being an assertion of

the temporary existence of the unreal. Similarly, if you assert that

you cannot attain Realization in this lifetime you are thereby

preventing yourself from doing so by postulating the existence of

a `you' who cannot attain. And yet, paradoxically, it is also an

impediment to assert that no effort need be made, on the pretext

that, as "there is no being of the unreal and no not-being of the

Real", one is That now and has therefore no need to strive to become

That. It sounds plausible, but it is an impediment because it is the

pseudo-self, the illusory unreal, that is saying it. The Master can

say that there is nothing to achieve because one is That already;

the disciple can't. Bhagavan would sometimes say that asking the

best way to Realization is like being at Tiruvannamalai and

asking how to get there, but that could not be the attitude of the

devotee. He expected the devotee to make effort, even while

appreciating the paradox that there is no effort to make. In the

same way he could say that for the Realized Man there is no Guru-

disciple relationship but add that for the disciple the relationship

is a reality and is of importance. For the disciple effort is

necessary, but it is also necessary to remember that effort can

never attain the final goal, since he who makes the effort must

dissolve, leaving only the Spirit. The Spirit, which is the true

Self, replaces the illusory ego-self when latter has removed the

obstructions; and that is Grace. The Spirit flows into the vacuum

which remains when the egoself dissolves; doing so is the `choice'

which the Spirit makes. It is for the aspirant to create the vacuum

by removing the obstructions.

[Guest guest]

I appreciate your help. This is a great post as well all of your

others. I don't think I've ever posted here before, I read only,

several times a week. I have been studying Ramana Maharshi and other

Advaita teachers for several years. I'm glad to have found this site.-

-- In RamanaMaharshi, "saikali6362" <saikali6362

wrote:

>

> Help on the Quest for Self-realization-Reminders-57

>

> Effort, Grace and Destiny

>

> By Arthur Osborne in "Be Still, It Is The Wind That Sings"

>

> It is said in scriptures and by gurus that an aspirant must make

> effort on the path but that Grace also is necessary and that in the

> end Realization is bestowed by Grace, not achieved by effort. It

is

> said in the Upanishads that the Atma chooses whom It will. This is

a

> hard saying. Those in whom the spiritual urge is powerful do not

> worry their heads