Bhakti and Jnana

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There are always disputes from ancient times between the concepts of Bhakti and Jnana and always one section claims one concept is superior over the other.Prompted by bias and predisposition these schools of thoughts think that they are always right.But the Lord makes no such artificial difference between the two.Some preliminary distinctions may seem to exist between these two paths.,whereas they become one and the same at their culmination.A baby and its mother evince inordinate love for each other,revealing thereby elements of Bhakti.Where is the scope of Jnana,may be a point pertinently raised.The Jnana that the baby belongs to that mother and that it is she who has become the baby ,is implied in that sweet love.Jnana and Bhakti are the obverse and reverse of the same coin of a perfected personality.

 

An incident clarifies this point further.A benefactor was liberally doling out to all the poor who resorted to him without even scrutinizing into their merits.But one day he was involunatarily drawn to a lad of fifteen who was found in the midst of a few holy nomads.The boy's physical feature with a scar on his cheek roused the rich man's earnest curiosity.The nomads responded to his enquiry with the information that about tweleve years before they picked up the boy lying unconscious on the river bank somewhere in that locality.The benefactor concluded that this in fact was the child of three that he lost in a boat tragedy those twelve years before.The apparently lost son was reclaimed with joy and filial love.Knowing and loving are interrelated,one augmenting the other.

 

Bhakti being involved in Jnana and Jnana being involved in Bhakti are but natural.A Brahma Jnanai is simultaneously a Bhakta of Iswara.He beholds all beings with reverence,they being the veritable manifestations of Iswara.Cognising God everywhere in all beings,he grieves not that any loss has occured to him in any manner.No desire crops up in his mind for anything that he has not obtained.Love makes way to the inaccessible.It opens the door to the impossible.The unknown and the unknowable become known to the true lover.More than diagnosing the disease,if the doctor truly loves the patient and identifies himself with the sufferings to which the man is subjected,his diagnosis would be accurate and treatment very efficacious.What is known thru love is the true knowledge and what is done thru love is the true service.

 

The Bhakta understands the Lord well becoz he sees with the eye of love.The more he understands the Lord,the more he loves Him.What the two wings are to a bird,Bhakti and Jnana are to the sadhaka.He understands that his Lord is both the Saguna Brahman and the Nirguna Brahman.The universe and the beings hv all come from Him.After knowing his own relationship with the Lord,he gives himself over entirely to Him.The Lord accepts him as His own self.The knower of Brahman becomes Brahman.It is possible for Jivatma to merge in the Paramatma.A devoted servant of a master may in the long run be treated by him as a member of his family.Being quite pleased with his earnest service,the master may also instal the servant in his place and empower him to execute the domestic concerns in his stead.But the installed man declines the high office with compunction.Still the master insists on his assuming that status.It is in this wise that Iswara claims the ardent devotee as His own.He first

reveals His attributes and glories to the Bhakta and then absorbs him in union.

 

As Jnana and Bhakti are the same in their supreme state.Jnana and karma are the same in their climax.On the other hand ,he who serves the Lord thinks of Him and none else.The thought of his own self goes into obliteration.That state of self-abnegation is verily the state of self-surrender.A river maintains its individuality until it reaches the sea.It has an activity too,of its own.But on reaching the sea,that river loses its individuality.It may further get commingled with an under-current in the sea.That activity belongs to the sea and not to the river.Such is the case with a devotee who dedicates himself to Iswara.He seems bodily an entity,but mentally he is absorbed in Iswara.Whatever takes place in and thru that individual is actually the doing of the Lord.The patterns of that action may be variegated.A world devastating warfare also has its place in the sport of of the Lord.He who submits himself to be an instrument in the hands of the Lord,is no actor,no agent,no reaper

of the fruit of the karma taking place thru his instrumentality.His ego is surrendered.Brahman,the Pure Consciousness alone persists,instead.So whether a person is a Bhakta or Jnani it makes no differnce as for as the Lord is concerned as He treats them both with equal affection.Consistent pursuit in their allotted spheres leads the sadhaka Godward.Never mistake the means for the end in this.The road to a town is not itself that town.That is the culmination point of Bhakti and Jnana.

 

Hare Krishna,

agraman

 

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