Narayanasramam

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Not Liberation, but Pure Wisdom by Swami Bhoomananda Tirtha

 

The seeker must definitely have an idea that he suffers from

`bondage' if he has to begin his pursuit of `liberation' . The idea of bondage

is thus the beginning point as well as the background of his efforts at

liberation. If the question as to what exactly in him has courted bondage is

raised, the seeker has to think inevitably of something like the Soul, about

which, however, he does not know anything clearly. Bondage, liberation and the

Soul are thus the three props upon which the entire pursuit of his subsists.

 

Strangely enough, these are no more than mere ideas, very vague and

indefinite, which he accepts and decides to think upon initially.

However, when his seeking progresses and with that his sense of enquiry grows

deeper and firmer, he will surely undergo some transformation as a result of

which he will be forced to consider the very basis of his saadhana all afresh.

 

This is no wonder at all. For the real spiritual effort is intended not to act

upon the Soul and improve it in any way with a view to make it free of Its

present troubles like ridding a tree of its branches by cutting the latter one

after another and then proceeding to remove even the bark and the outer layers

of wood. On the other hand, it is to elevate and strengthen oneself to

understand matters with depth and clarity.

 

The Soul cannot, in the initial stages, mean anything more than a mere

word or an idea; It cannot denote anything factual or real, though the

seeker accepts It outright. Only when his understanding deepens and

expands and he gains the power to comprehend the subtle existence as

different from the gross - for instance, he is able to think of the mind as

different from the body, the space as different from the solid bodies hovering

within it – his idea about the Soul will turn to become clearer and more

definite. With that will, he also begins to know and realize for himself that

the Soul in fact refers to a positive reality, a real substance, nearer and more

factual than even the body of his. The body, which is now seen and felt as the

`first' and as the cause of all else, he will now feel sure, is in truth not so;

its position, status and value are far less and different. Truly the body comes

only as the second and as a mere by-product.

 

The first to come into existence and then into one's revelation,

hence the only real cause for everything else including the body, is the Soul,

the subtle self-existent Reality. The body, at best, acts as a suitable occasion

and help to point to this self-existent Reality and make it first inferred and

then perceived and realized.