MAYA AND FREEDOM

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Posted by: " Uttishthata " uttishthata

Thu Jan 24, 2008 10:17 pm (PST)

 

MAYA AND FREEDOM - Swami Vivekananda

 

On the one side, therefore, is the bold assertion that this is all

nonsense, that this is Maya, but along with it there is the most

hopeful assertion that beyond Maya, there is a way out. On the other

hand, practical men tell us, " Don't bother your heads about such

nonsense as religion and metaphysics. Live here; this is a very bad

world indeed, but make the best of it. " Which put in plain language

means, live a hypocritical, lying life, a life of continuous fraud,

covering all sores in the best way you can. Go on putting patch after

patch, until everything is lost, and you are a mass of patchwork.

This is what is called practical life. Those that are satisfied with

this patchwork will never come to religion. Religion begins with a

tremendous dissatisfaction with the present state of things, with our

lives, and a hatred, an intense hatred, for this patching up of life,

an unbounded disgust for fraud and lies. He alone can be religious

who dares say, as the mighty Buddha once said under the Bo-tree, when

this idea of practicality appeared before him and he saw that it was

nonsense, and yet could not find a way out. When the temptation came

to him to give up his search after truth, to go back to the world and

live the old life of fraud, calling things by wrong names, telling

lies to oneself and to everybody, he, the giant, conquered it and

said, " Death is better than a vegetating ignorant life; it is better

to die on the battle-field than to live a life of defeat. " This is

the basis of religion. When a man takes this stand, he is on the way

to find the truth, he is on the way to God. That determination must

be the first impulse towards becoming religious. I will hew out a way

for myself. I will know the truth or give up my life in the attempt.

For on this side it is nothing, it is gone, it is vanishing every

day. The beautiful, hopeful, young person of today is the veteran of

tomorrow. Hopes and joys and pleasures will die like blossoms with

tomorrow's frost. That is one side; on the other, there are the great

charms of conquest, victories over all the ills of life, victory over

life itself, the conquest of the universe. On that side men can

stand. Those who dare, therefore, to struggle for victory, for truth,

for religion, are in the right way; and that is what the Vedas

preach: Be not in despair, the way is very difficult, like walking on

the edge of a razor; yet despair not, arise, awake, and find the

ideal, the goal.

 

Now all these various manifestations of religion, in whatever shape

and form they have come to mankind, have this one common central

basis. It is the preaching of freedom, the way out of this world.

They never came to reconcile the world and religion, but to cut the

Gordian knot, to establish religion in its own ideal, and not to

compromise with the world. That is what every religion preaches, and

the duty of the Vedanta is to harmonise all these aspirations, to

make manifest the common ground between all the religions of the

world, the highest as well as the lowest. What we call the most

arrant superstition and the highest philosophy really have a common

aim in that they both try to show the way out of the same difficulty,

and in most cases this way is through the help of someone who is not

himself bound by the laws of nature in one word, someone who is free.

In spite of all the difficulties and differences of opinion about the

nature of the one free agent, whether he is a Personal God, or a

sentient being like man, whether masculine, feminine, or neuter - and

the discussions have been endless - the fundamental idea is the same.

In spite of the almost hopeless contradictions of the different

systems, we find the golden thread of unity running through them all,

and in this philosophy, this golden thread has been traced revealed

little by little to our view, and the first step to this revelation

is the common ground that all are advancing towards freedom.

 

to be continued...

 

The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda Volume 2 (Delivered in

London, 22nd October 1896)

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QUOTE OF THE DAY:

The highest manifestation of strength is to keep ourselves calm and

on our own feet.

- Swami Vivekananda