Swami Vivekananda about Vedanta

[Guest guest]

THE VEDANTA IN ALL ITS PHASES

(Delivered in Calcutta)

 

Whatever system in India does not obey the Upanishads cannot be called

orthodox, and even the systems of the Jains and the Buddhists have been

rejected from the soil of India only because they did not bear allegiance to

the Upanishads. Thus the Vedanta, whether we know it or not, has penetrated

all the sects in India, and what we call Hinduism, this mighty banyan with

its immense, almost infinite ramifications, has been throughout

interpenetrated by the influence of the Vedanta. Whether we are conscious of

it or not, we think the Vedanta, we live in the Vedanta, we breathe the

Vedanta, and we die in the Vedanta, and every Hindu does that.

 

But the Western people never made a move more, they remained there, they

failed in the search for the solution of the great problems of life and

death in the external world, and there they remained, stranded; our

forefathers also found it impossible, but were bolder in declaring the utter

helplessness of the senses to find the solution. Nowhere else was the answer

better put than in the Upanishad: — " From whence words come back reflected,

together with the mind " ; — " There the eye cannot go, nor can speech reach " .

 

So far as the Bible and the scriptures of other nations agree with the

Vedas, they are perfectly good, but when they do not agree, they are no more

to be accepted. So with the Koran. There are many moral teachings in these,

and so far as they agree with the Vedas they have the authority of the

Puranas, but no more. The idea is that the Vedas were never written; the

idea is, they never came into existence.

 

I was told once by a Christian missionary that their scriptures have a

historical character, and therefore are true, to which I replied, " Mine have

no historical character and therefore they are true; yours being historical,

they were evidently made by some man the other day. Yours are man-made and

mine are not; their non-historicity is in their favour. " Such is the

relation of the Vedas with all the other scriptures at the present day.

 

They believe in a still higher phase of this Personal God, which is

personal-impersonal. No adjective can illustrate where there is no

qualification, and the Advaitist would not give Him any qualities except the

three —Sat-Chit-Ananda, Existence, Knowledge, and Bliss Absolute. This is

what Shankara did. But in the Upanishads themselves you find they penetrate

even further, and say, nothing can be predicated of it except Neti, Neti, " Not

this, Not this " .

 

There are sects too who also believe that out of Himself God has evolved

this universe, and individuals in the long run attain to Nirvâna to give up

the finite and become the Infinite. But these sects have disappeared. The

one sect of Advaitists that you see in modern India is composed of the

followers of Shankara. According to Shankara, God is both the material and

the efficient cause through Mâyâ, but not in reality. God has not become

this universe; but the universe is not, and God is. This is one of the

highest points to understand of Advaita Vedanta, this idea of Maya.

 

This is the challenge that this world is a delusion, that it is all Maya,

that whether you eat off the ground with your fingers or dine off golden

plates, whether you live in palaces and are one of the mightiest monarchs or

are the poorest of beggars, death is the one result; it is all the same, all

Maya. That is the old Indian theme, and again and again nations are

springing up trying to unsay it, to disprove it; becoming great, with

enjoyment as their watchword, power in their hands, they use that power to

the utmost, enjoy to the utmost, and the next moment they die. We stand for

ever because we see that everything is Maya. The children of Maya live for

ever, but the children of enjoyment die.

 

Renunciation, that is the flag, the banner of India, floating over the

world, the one undying thought which India sends again and again as a

warning to dying races, as a warning to all tyranny, as a warning to

wickedness in the world. Ay, Hindus, let not your hold of that banner go.

Hold it aloft. Even if you are weak and cannot renounce, do not lower the

ideal. Say, " I am weak and cannot renounce the world " , but do not try to be

hypocrites, torturing texts, and making specious arguments, and trying to

throw dust in the eyes of people who are ignorant.

 

Do not do that, but own you are weak. For the idea is great, that of

renunciation. What matters it if millions fail in the attempt, if ten

soldiers or even two return victorious! Blessed be the millions dead! Their

blood has bought the victory. This renunciation is the one ideal throughout

the different Vedic sects except one, and that is the Vallabhâchârya sect in

Bombay Presidency, and most of you are aware what comes where renunciation

does not exist.

 

The land of Buddha, the land of Ramanuja, of Ramakrishna Paramahamsa, the

land of renunciation, the land where, from the days of yore, Karma Kanda was

preached against, and even today there are hundreds who have given up

everything, and become Jivanmuktas — ay, will that land give up its ideals?

Certainly not.There may be people whose brains have become turned by the

Western luxurious ideals; there may be thousands and hundreds of thousands

who have drunk deep of enjoyment, this curse of the West — the senses — the

curse of the world; yet for all that, there will be other thousands in this

motherland of mine to whom religion will ever be a reality, and who will be

ever ready to give up without counting the cost, if need be.

 

According to the Advaitist, this individuality which we have today is a

delusion. This has been a hard nut to crack all over the world. Forthwith

you tell a man he is not an individual, he is so much afraid that his

individuality, whatever that may be, will be lost! But the Advaitist says

there never has been an individuality, you have been changing every moment

of your life. You were a child and thought in one way, now you are a man and

think another way, again you will be an old man and think differently.

Everybody is changing. If so, where is your individuality? Certainly not in

the body, or in the mind, or in thought.

 

And beyond that is your Atman, and, says the Advaitist, this Atman is the

Brahman Itself. There cannot be two infinites. There is only one individual

and it is infinite. In plain words, we are rational beings, and we want to

reason. And what is reason? More or less of classification, until you cannot

go on any further. And the finite can only find its ultimate rest when it is

classified into the infinite. Take up a finite thing and go on analysing it,

but you will find rest nowhere until you reach the ultimate or infinite, and

that infinite, says the Advaitist, is what alone exists.

 

Everything else is Maya, nothing else has real existence; whatever is of

existence in any material thing is this Brahman; we are this Brahman, and

the shape and everything else is Maya. Take away the form and shape, and you

and I are all one. But we have to guard against the word, " I " . Generally

people say, " If I am the Brahman, why cannot I do this and that? " But this

is using the word in a different sense. As soon as you think you are bound,

no more you are Brahman, the Self, who wants nothing, whose light is inside.

All His pleasures and bliss are inside; perfectly satisfied with Himself, He

wants nothing, expects nothing, perfectly fearless, perfectly free. That is

Brahman. In That we are all one.

 

" Even in this life they have conquered the round of birth and death whose

minds are firm-fixed on the sameness of everything, for God is pure and the

same to all, and therefore such are said to be living in God. "

 

" Thus seeing the Lord the same everywhere, he, the sage, does not hurt the

Self by the self, and so goes to the highest goal. "

 

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Om namo Bhagavate Sri Ramanaya

Prashant Jalasutram

 

 

 

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Om namo Bhagavate Sri Ramanaya

Prashant Jalasutram