RE: A six party Conversation on Consept of GOD

August 25, 2008

Dear Dilip Ji: TIP of the Ice berg is portrayed superbly. I had

a wonderful reading and I recommend all devotees to read once with lots of

concentration.

Thanks

Guru

guruvayur [guruvayur ] On Behalf Of DILIP

KUMAR RAVINDRAN

Sunday, August 24, 2008 5:50 PM

dilip kumar

[Guruvayur] A six party Conversation on Consept of GOD

Wave

6: A Six-Party Conversation on

the

Concept of ‘GOD’ in Hinduism

The

following is an imaginary six-party conversation on the concept of ‘God’ in

Hinduism. The six persons who are parties to this conversation, namely, RNB, DD, OT, PP, SV and PA are all Hindus who

have grown in an atmosphere full of the culture and tradition. They are

such thick friends of one another that each

knows the others inside out! But the six have different views on Hindu

beliefs, philosophy and practices and that makes the conversation

interesting.

1.

RNB is a rationalist and a non-believer to

the extent that he has serious questions on the existence of God. The one

thing he appreciates is the necessity for the purification of one’s mind. He

has a soft corner for karma-yoga, because the

concept of unselfish service means something to him but his ideas are only

vague. His attitudes to his friends’ perception of

the ‘faith’ part of religion are rather blurred.

2.

DD is a simple and pious devotee, but he is

a kind of a ‘doubting’ devotee, because every alternate day he discovers that

his prayers are not answered by God. He jumps from one form of God to another

(and Hinduism gives him this flexibility) and is carried

by naivity to believe in any one who poses the frontal of a saffron

colour. He thinks he understands Lord Krishna and His leelas, but of

Krishna’s Gita and the philosophical undercurrent

running through it, he has only a confused perception, if at all.

An undercurrent of vacillation and doubt constantly bothers him. In

fact he represents a large number of ordinary Hindus.

3.

OT is the orthodox theologist. He knows all

the puranic stories. He corresponds to the traditional layman-Hindu, very

often superstitious. He does not have a clear understanding of the basic

philosophy of the religion and he tends to develop dogmatic attitudes towards

viewpoints that do not coincide with his own perception of religion. He

thinks he understands both Krishna’s pranks as well as his Gita, but his

attitudes which have a colour of dogmatism in them prevent him from a full

understanding.

4.

PP is one who professes Philosophy. Mostly

his is an arm-chair philosophy. He believes in

the omnipresence of Divinity. He knows that God is immanent in himself

and he has to only realise that Godly presence. He believes or cares for

nothing else. For him, neither karma yoga nor bhakti nor surrender theory nor

the concept of Avatar has any meaning, much less, any fascination. But he is

very knowledgeable because he is well-read.

5.

SV, the Scientist-Vedantin, on the other hand, has a great fascination for the

intellectual exercises embodied in the philosophical schools of Hinduism, the

consequent corollary of a karma yoga and so on. He even probes into treatises

which deal with these teachings in their depth. He needs ‘proof’ for

everything on the lines of what his scientific mind seems to be familiar

with. The concept of One God with myriads of names and forms is unpalatable

to him even as an academic hypothesis. He thinks he understands the Gita, but

certainly he cannot swallow the pranks of Krishna.

6.

AV is an advaita-vedantin. He claims to

have read (and understood!) all the advaitic

treatises and has probably a good perception of the Prasthana-traya.

The

conversation starts in an elementary casual way between #s 1 and 2 on the

existence of God. At some point #3 joins in the debate. The

conversation turns into a serious debate. #4 also joins now. #s 5 and

#6 join in the final stages. Now let us go to the conversation from the

beginning. The paragraphs are numbered so as to facilitate any further

reference.

1. RNB: Good morning DD, what

temple did you visit today? What was your latest prayer?

2. DD: Well, over the weekend I

had been to the temple of Guruvayoor. Do you know it draws

the second largest crowd of devotees among all Hindu temples, next

only to Tirupati? Guru-vayoor-appan is the greatest boon-giver according to

Narayaneeyam. Among the many prayers I carried to the Lord was one

which concerns you. I prayed that God should grant you what you do not have.

3. RNB: I know what you mean.

You have prayed to your God that he should grant me faith in him. And you think he can do that for you.

4. DD: Why not? God can get

anything done if He wills it.

5. RNB: So do you think He can

put that faith in me in spite of my will otherwise?

6. DD: Certainly. Further

I am not asking Him to give me material benefits. I have asked Him, on your

behalf, the one and only thing you need and that is not a material benefit.

7. RNB: That is your feeling

about me. But I don’t feel I am lacking anything.

Why should I have faith in a non-existent God?

8. DD: Come on, don’t repeat all

that talk of yours. You seem to take pleasure in denying God. Don’t you know that even in the west they are talking about a

super-designer who must have designed this universe with all its fantastic

order and in-built regularity, which is unexplainable?

9. RNB: But you are begging the

question. Who designed that super-designer?

10. DD: That

super-designer is God. Nobody designed Him.

11. RNB: That is

exactly my point. You are only making a hypothesis, aren’t you?

12. DD: So

what? That is the declaration of all religions of the world.

13. RNB:

Religion is man-made. God is just a creation of man’s intelligence. Man

created God in his own image as an anthropomorphic super-duplicate of

himself. I don’t need such a creation.

14. DD: Have you

ever felt depressed when things don’t work the way you wanted them to work

for you?

15. RNB: I

don’t feel depression at such times. I know I am lucky most of the time and

some times I am not lucky; that is all.

16. DD: What is

luck, if not God’s Grace?

17. RNB: Why do

you bring in God into everything? Luck is luck; there is no God there. What

does your God gain by giving me luck? I do my duty and I expect rewards. If I

don’t get those rewards it only means there is some fault in the system and I

have to work towards removal of that fault. You believers rely on God to give

you those rewards or correct those faults in the system. Last year you were

visiting local temples one by one for redress of your grievances and this

year you have gone all the way to Guruvayoor. But your grievances are still

there!

18. DD: You may

not agreee with this. But it is God that gives all the rewards.

19. RNB: But if

it is a God that rewards only those who pamper him, then I am not willing to

have anything to do with him.

20. OT

(entering): Hello friends, it appears you are seriously discussing something.

Can I join you?

21. RNB. Actually

we were looking for you. DD has just returned from a trip to Guruvayoor. He

is trying to convince me that Guruvayoorappan is the supreme God. Last year

he tried to convince me that the elephant-God Ganesha in the corner of this

street is the supreme God. This year it is different!

22. OT. Nobody

can convince you, because you don’t believe in anything.

23. RNB. Why

can’t you folks give me a logical argument for the existence of God? Don’t

bring in a bundle of primitive concepts from your Puranas and all your

superstitious beliefs.

24. OT: Is it

superstition to believe what hundreds of great men like Shankara, Tirunavukkarasar, Ramanuja, Madhva, Vedanta Deshika, Appayya Dikshidar, Kabirdas, Meerabai,

Chaitanya or a Vallalar have believed? Is it superstition to believe a Ramakrishna of our own times who saw the Goddess in

person? Is it superstition to have trust in a Raghavendra who lives still in his samadhi and grants our

wishes? Have you ever exposed yourself to the sayings or the life story

of any of these? That is exactly your problem, the problem of Ignorance!

25. RNB: Wait

for a minute! I thought you were going to give a logical argument.

26. DD: The

logical argument is three-fold: 1. First you have to let go your mental

block which says that that everything can be reduced to simple explanations.

You have to change your mental framework to admit truths beyond the reach of

your common sense. 2. Just as we individuals have minds of our own there are

greater minds which are able to see the global picture more clearly than most

of us single individuals. Carrying this analogy further we have to grant a

super mind that may be called the transcendental mind. This is the mind of

the all-knowing God. 3. The mystics of the world have a common story to

tell the rest of the world. It is a compelling story whose authenticity is

difficult to dismiss on the basis of our subjective understanding with our

limited minds. ...

27. RNB:

Excuse me. Pardon me for telling you that you are only

making profound statements without an iota of logic or personal

experience.

28. PP (entering

at this time): What personal experience are you talking about?

29. OT: RNB

wants to have a logical argument for the existence of God. And DD is telling

him that mystics of the world have a lot of personal experience which we

cannot but believe.

30. PP: I

agree with RNB that we should not believe in something of which we have no

personal experience.

31. OT: Come on, that is false logic. Do you have personal

experience that so and so is your father?

32. RNB: Please,

my friends, stop going in that direction. Our

business here is not to win a point, but to search and find out whether there

is any logical way in which we can believe in the existence of God.

33. PP: That is

right. As a professor of philosophy I like Hinduism not because of its

variety, flexibility and tolerance but because of its ideal mixture of reason

and faith. Reason saves the aspiring devotee from avoidable errors and

pitfalls and faith supports him with courage in the hour of despondency.

34. RNB: Then

what is the final authority? Reason or Faith?

35. OT:

Faith in the scriptures, certainly.

36. DD: But even

the Gita is difficult to comprehend.

37. PP: By

depending solely on faith in the scriptures one tends to be dogmatic. By

depending solely on Reason one may fall into the trap of rationalising one’s

desire. Such a person proves what he wants to prove. Personal experience by

itself can be deceptive because one may be just projecting one’s own

favourite ideas. All three have to be combined to arrive at the truth.

I am told this is what the Upanishads claim to be doing.

38. RNB: Aren’t

the Upanishads also full of dogmatic pronouncements called ‘maha-vakyas’?

39. OT: These

mahavakyas are the axioms from which the other things are logically deduced.

40. PP: Do they

tell you why man has been created? What

must have been the purpose of creation?

41. DD: Man has

been created in order for him to work out the path to go back to his source,

namely God.

42. RNB: Then it

means he was separated from God originally. Why was he separated?

43. PP:

You will go nowhere by asking these questions. Because if you assign some

purpose to God for his creation you will have then to question the very

omniscience and omnipotence which are part of the definition of God.

44. RNB: What is

wrong in questioning the omniscience and omnipotence? That is why I say

you cannot even postulate a God. Because by the nature of your postulation

you have also to postulate that he is

omnipresent, omniscient and omnipotent. In other words you are postulating

everything about him and then you say you can logically deduce his presence

from the mahavakyas.

45. OT: But the

omnipresence, omnipotence and omniscience have been demonstrated in several

instances recorded in the puranas of religion.

Have you heard of Prahlada’s story where the Lord appeared from a pillar just

like that in order to demonstrate the truth of his omnipresence asserted by

his devotee?

46. RNB: These

are only stories and have only a story-value.

47. PP: All of

this tantamounts to saying that one should have faith. As I said already,

only by a proper mixture of reason and faith you can arrive at the truth.

Neither of them singly will be satisfactory.

48. RNB: On the

other hand the laws of nature as discovered by

science can explain almost all the phenomena in the universe. And very soon

they will also discover explanations for those phenomena which are at present

eluding our scientific understanding.

49. OT: Can

science explain all the mystery that is experienced at the individual human

level?

50. DD:

All through history we have heard of thousands

of individuals who have been emotionally influenced by the Divnity of temple

deities.

51. OT: That is

where religion and philosophy play a part. Every temple in the world of Hindus is a monumental example of what

spiritual giants have achieved in the past. Their achievements in the

spiritual field are all part of the history of that temple.

52. PP: Hindu

philosophy, on the other hand, starts by

investigating the mystery surrounding the individual mind. The innermost

essence of man refers to the substratum of the individual mind. But ancient

Hindu philosophers have seen a parallelism between

the study of the individual and that of the universe as a whole.

53. SV (entering

at this point): Friends, I was standing nearby and I

heard the words ‘religion’, ‘philosophy’ and ‘science’ tossed about among

you. I think I can join the discussion , if you

don’t mind.

54. RNB: What is

your opinion, SV, since you have dabbled in both

science and Vedanta, about the question of the existence of God? Can you tell

us some real good reason why I should believe in God?

55. SV: Frankly,

if you ask my sincere opinion, the existence of God cannot be proved. I would

love myself to have a proof but all the proofs they are all giving has some

flaw or other. God must be the name we have

given to what we cannot understand even collectively. Such a God has to be the creative force, the overall intelligence

which governs the universe, the all-pervading essence which binds together

everything in the universe and gives life to all living beings.

56. RNB:

Beautiful definition! But only a definition. It does not say whether such a

thing exists or not.

57. PP: If you

are looking for it intellectually, it is the creative force, the sustaining

power, the motivation towards change, the overall intelligence, the truth.

58. OT: If you

are looking at it emotionally, it is love, goodness, kindness and beauty.

Among feminine qualities, says the Lord in the tenth chapter of the Gita, “I

am glory, beauty, speech, memory, intelligence, steadfastness and

forgiveness”. (KiirtiH shrIr-vAk-ca nArINAM

.... )

59. SV: If you

are looking at it spiritually, it is the ever-present all-pervading essence

or spirit that gives life to everything and binds them all.

60. DD: You are

all confusing me. I simply know Him as He who gives me rewards when I do good and punishes me when I default in my ethics or

morals.

61. PP: There

are different levels of the conception of God. An answer given to a

questioner at one level will not suit or be satisfactory to, the questioner

at a different level. When a Hindu child asks you to tell her about God, you

can tell her stories about Rama and Krishna. When a teen-ager questions you

about the existence of God, you may deal out the

super-designer argument, which may satisfy the questioner for

the moment. When an adult asks the same question you have to answer at

a higher level; the super-designer argument may not work with all persons.

62. SV: The

beauty of Hindu philosophy and religion lies in the fact that instead of

starting with the reality of the universal mind (this is the name that I give

to God in my understanding of things), they start

from what is experienced at the human level. So the innermost recesses of the

human mind are first explored. This investigation leads to what constitutes

the innermost essence of man. One finds that the innermost essence of man is

the seeker himself, rid of all his tools of search. In fact the mind itself

is part of the luggage that is to be shed off. But the exploration of this

innermost core is inextricably interlinked with the preconditioning of the

mind. This preconditioning is nothing but the cumulative effect of all traces

of sensory experience left in the memory bank. This preconditioning differs

from individual to individual and so the understanding of the innermost core also varies from person to person.

63. DD:

Ah, I see the point now. It is clear now why I jumped from one God to another

in my search for that God who will listen to me! It all depends on the preconditioning of my mind at that time.

Wonderful!

64. PP: The

technical jargon that is equivalent to this ‘preconditioning’ is

‘VasanA’. This innermost core is what I call the psychic principle. The

Vedantins call it the Atman.

65. SV: Though

there is no scientific proof of this, it is declared by Vedantic works that

this psychic principle, the Atman, is so deep-seated within us that it has a

sense of undeniable reality that goes with it, in the same sense that one

does not look for a proof of one’s own existence.

66. OT: That is

because, it is God seated in our heart of hearts. “IshvaraH sarva-bhutAnAM ..” in the last

chapter of the Gita. He is the One who prompts all our actions and our

thoughts.

67. SV: Don’t

confuse the issue now by bringing theology and

all that stuff about God being the motivator of our actions. RNB here and I would immediately ask you to give logical

proof for it and you will be stuck. The subject here is different; it is

about the question as to what the innermost core of Man is. Let me continue

my observations. This innermost reality within us is the real subject of all

our experiences. It is the eternal witness to everything that I do or think.

68. RNB: But

where is God now, in all this?

69. AV

(entering

and joining the discussion): It appears you are looking for God.

70. SV: Now that

you have joined us, AV, we would like you to give us the benefit of all your

knowledge about Vedanta and advaita to solve this riddle of the existence of

God.

71. AV: Since you have referred to advaita, let me say this much.

There is no God other than yourself.

72. OT: I

see you are referring to the Atman within each man. But then, that would mean

there are several Gods.

73. PP: Simple.

There are not several Atmans. The Atman within yourself and the Atman within myself is the same.

74. DD: But the

question is about God who is Master of the universe and who is the Creator of

this universe.

75. PP: This is

where Hindu philosophy has scored. Particularly the advaita

school. They assert that the Atman which is the innermost core of

ourselves is also the transcendent eternal Reality which is omnipresent . The name given to that Supreme Reality is

Brahman. The declaration of the Upanishads is, according to advaita, Atman is the same as Brahman, period! This

statement is not amenable to any proof. Yogis however

say that it will be seen as true in meditative Samadhi.

76. AV:

But instead of getting into those

technicalities, let me ask you all: How often have you asked God to provide

guidance in making your decisions? And what has been your experience?

77. DD and OT

(together): Almost all the time.

78. RNB:

Frankly, I don’t remember to have ever asked God to guide my decisions. And

the reason is obvious. It never struck me. I have no practice of going to God

for every one of my dilemmas. You may call it my ego, if you want to.

79. PP: Both

of you, RNB on one side and DD and OT on the other, have a point of view

which is acceptable. It is no use asking a non-beleiver of God whether he

invokes God in his decisions. The question should actually be posed in

another manner. “Have you ever had occasion to feel helpless in making

decisions? And in such times what do you do?”

80. RNB: The

answer is the same. Even when I felt helpless, how would I go to a

non-existent God?

81. SV: I

think we are pursuing matters to a dead end.

82. AV:

May I be permitted to shock you all at this moment? The matter whether

God exists or not is not relevant from the absolute point of view. For, our

advaita teachers are very clear on this point. The necessity or otherwise for

a God, the existence or otherwise of a God with superlative attributes all

arise only in the mundane world which is after all only relatively

real. As far as absolute truth is concerned only non-duality is

true: namely, Truth is One and only One.

You may call it God. But that God is not your God with superlative qualities.

It is Brahman, the unqualified Brahman, to which there can be no attributes.

83. OT: Then why

do all the scriptures say that everything in the universe owe their existence

to God?

84. AV: They say

it in the sense that all the movie pictures you see on the screen owe their

existence to the screen. If the screen were not there there would be no

pictures. This is the famous ‘anvaya’ logic. But the screen alone is

always there, before the projection of the pictures on it, during the

projection and after the projection . So the screen

is relatively more real than the pictures on it. It is in this sense

that the scriptures including the Brahma Sutra say that Brahman is the source

of everything.

85. SV:

That portion of Brahma sutra is usually quoted to affirm that Brahman is the

First Cause and is itself uncaused.

86. OT: In fact

almost all scriptures say this. Krishna says: “aham

Adirhi madhyam ca ...” in the tenth chapter of his Gita.

87. SV:

Let us look at it in another way. Man is conscious of his limitations. It

means he is capable of imagining or conceiving the infinite and in comparison

he knows he has limitations that make him lack that

infiniteness. It is that infiniteness he renames as

God. It is a vague consciousness, no doubt. But it is that vague

consciousness, I think, that brings religion

as a vital need of man.

88. AV: The

advaita teaching goes somewhat like this. It says that man has to rise from

his limitations which are collectively termed as his avidyA. So long as he is

subject to these limitations or avidya, he cannot dispense with religion or

his belief in God.

89. PP: In other

words advaita also tells you what to do in your world of duality.

90. OT: Only

through the Grace of God does the saving knowledge of non-duality come to us.

We have to resort to prayer and meditation to make ourselves worthy of God’s

Grace. Adi Shankara emphasizes this in almost all his devotional poems.

91. PP: Much

research has been done to establish a strong connection

between prayerful or meditative states and overall health as

confirmed by physiological indicators.

92. DD: And that

God to whom you do prayers can be your

ishta-devata (favourite deity). I don’t see anything wrong in it provided it

does not carry with it hatred of any other God, either of Hinduism or of

other religions.

93. PP: One can

have preferences without exclusions. Hinduism is a graded religious

discipline. It takes man step by step from the worship of the popular gods

for gaining material ends all the way up to the prayer of the Jiva. This is

the prayer which is keen on being led “from unreality

to reality, from darkness to light and from death to immortality”. One

has to observe all forms of worship and go all the way with religion in order

to arrive at a point beyond religion.

94. AV: Reason

is strongest when it accepts divine guidance. This divine guidance does not

necessarily have to come from a personality

called God. Whenever we say ‘personality’ we think of it only in human form.

We are not able to think of it as something which makes us think. This

something which makes us think is the consciousness within us. This

consciousness is actually what guides us. That is divine guidance, not

necessarily someone who is sitting there in the distant heavens and guiding

every one of us.

95. DD: But then

all those descriptions of Kailasa (the divine abode of Shiva) and Vaikuntha

(the divine abode of Vishnu) must be taken to be mere imaginations. I for one

would not want to accept your stand. The other schools of philosophy like

Dvaita and Vishishtadvaita have no problems here, because for them the

Ultimate God is personal and his abode is a real place. How can you say that

advaita is the right view?

96. PP: As I

have already said, there are levels of evolution

among us all. There are some of us for whom nothing but the grossest form of

a divinity has appeal. There are others among us for whom the most impersonal

representation of that divinity is the only thing acceptable. There is no

right or wrong here.

97. AV: No. It

cannot be made that simple. Different presentations of the all-pervading

divinity are true only in their respective

spheres . There is only one reality from the transcendental point of view.

For purposes of worship various names and forms are superimposed upon it.

Note the word ‘superimposed’. Once this process of giving a name and

form to what in reality is nameless and formless starts,

there is no end to it. We lay down all forms of worship and compose litanies

in praise of Gods. We undertake pilgrimages to distant places to offer worship

to deities in sacred shrines. All this is quite necessary in the case of

ordinary men who choose to live in a world which takes multiplicity as real

either as truth or as an unavoidable come-down. The true advaitin belongs to

the latter category. He knows all this is maya but he cannot but do it. He

knows he is sinning against his own enlightened state in doing all this.

Appayya Dikshidar said: “Oh Lord I have in my

weakness committed three sins and I beg forgiveness from you. To serve as a

support for meditation I have given a form to the Highest who is really

formless; I have tried to define the indefinable by composing stotras and

litanies and lastly I have confined the omnipresent Lord to particular places

of worship and have journeyed to those places”. This is the attitude

of a true advaitin towards all forms of worship. Whether each such form or

for that matter the formless Ultimate was the first Cause or not does not make any difference to this attitude.

98. OT: I find

it very difficult to accept that all the myriad deities in the various

temples are part of the passing world of Maya.

How come there have been so many theological discussions and stories about different manifestations and deities?

99. DD: I have

always been confused about the relationships among the different Gods and

Goddesses. The deity called ShAstA is the son of Shiva and Mohini, the

feminine manifestation of Vishnu. So Vishnu is ShAstA’s mother and Shiva is

his father. So what is the relation of Lakshmi, the wife of Vishnu, to

ShAstA? In fact this question was raised by the famous Appayya Dikshidar

himself, whom you just quoted.

100. PP: Yes, the mythological set-up is

certainly confusing if you take them all at their story-value. For instance,

Shiva and Saraswati, the Goddess of Learning are brother and sister because

they both emanated from the Supreme Mother Goddess in her Mahalakshmi form.

Like that Vishnu and Parvati are brother and sister. Brahma and Lakshmi are

brother and sister. But Brahma himself emanated from Lord Vishnu. So Lakshmi

is also the mother of Brahma. Can you take all these things literally in

terms of our worldly language, imagery and relationships?

101.

AV:

The Vedic tradition seems to be contradicting itself if you look at it as if

they were written by successive generations to elaborate differing theories.

At one place it may say that the universe was created by God in the way

in which a carpenter creates or constructs a work of art from his mind. At

another place the same Vedas will declare that the entire universe came just

out of the will-power of God. At another place it will raise the question:

‘Who knows about this creation?’. Such writing if at

all, reflects only a questioning intellectual mind

which tries to present the truth to different levels of understanding. For

the discerning mind the last word is that of the Upanishads. For example, to

the question: Who is this Self, whom we desire to worship? Is he the Self by

which we hear, see, etc.? Is he the heart and mind by which we perceive? The

answer comes, just to cite one instance, in

Aitareya Upanishad. No, these are only adjuncts of

the Self. The Self itself is Pure Consciousness. He is Brahman, He is God. He

is Creator BrahmA, He is Indra, He is all Gods. The

reality behind all the five elements, all that is born, everything that

breathes, is Brahman, who is pure Consciousness. All creation and all the universe is established in Consciousness, they

exist only through Consciousness, they work through Consciousness, their

foundation is Consciousness. Brahman is Consciousness and Consciousness is Brahman. PrajnAnaM Brahma.

102. RNB: What appeals to me in all the

scriptures is the repeated appeals for the

purification of our mind. Without that basic requisite, everything else is

only an academic exercise.

103. SV: What appeals to me most is the

theory of the Causeless Cause of all causes. A cause and effect relationship

can be entertained only when there is a feature that can clearly distinguish

between the two and there is no such distinguishing feature in the case of

Brahman. The maxim that says, as in the Mandukya-Karika, That

which does not exist in the beginning and the end is equally so in the middle

present, is the most wonderful statement that appeals to me.

104. PP: What appeals to me most is the

universal human urge to be at all places at the same time, to know everything

and to be always happy. These three urges may be summarized as ‘to be’, ‘to know’ and ‘to be happy’. They are

actual finite dim reflections of the essential infinite nature of Brahman,

namely, existence, consciousness and bliss. These basic insitincts of man are

also responsible for producing an innate fear of death, fear of ignorance and

fear of misery.

105. OT: What appeals to me most is the

fact that this Ultimate Reality that is Brahman, though incomprehensible to

ordinary men like me, manifests itself as transcending everything, as

immanent in everything and as the supreme perfection. All our stotras and

sahasranamas with which we propitiate our deities at temples and in homes

repeatedly affirm only this transcendence, immanence and perfection of the

ultimate God.

106. DD:The

three qualities Transcendence, Immanence and

Perfection appeal to me most.

107. AV: What appeals to me most is that

these three qualities Transcendence, Immanence and Perfection constitute only

the TIP

of the Iceberg that is God. T for Transcendence, I for Immanence and P

for Perfection. The Reality is far far beyond the

TIP.

108. PP: Transcendence points to Sat, Immanence to Chit and Perfection to Ananda

i.e., bliss. So the TIP is what points to Sat-chid-ananda.

with regards

dilip

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