Vedantham : ( 07/11/2012. )

The Method of Conscious Expansion : This Infinite Being is not experienced by mere metaphysical speculation, but has its meaning in immediate non-relational experience. An integral experience necessitates an integral approach, a transformation of the integral personality. Hence, intellect which is a part of the integral man, cannot reach the Reality which is the Whole. The entire consciousness has to be concentrated upon the Ideal to be attained. Towards this end, it is imperative that the dissipated rays of personal consciousness should be withdrawn to their primal relative source, the root of the individual personality, the purified ego. The purified ego-consciousness thus freed from the divergent attractions of sense-perception is allowed to devote itself completely to the higher purpose of conscious expansion into the subtler and vaster states of consciousness. Each higher state is more extensive, subtler and more inclusive than the lower states, and the power of i...

1: Introduction Integrality and Aspiration: Part-2. The reality of the universe, both in its objective and subjective aspects, is in its existence, which cannot be known unless it becomes a content of consciousness. Unless, again, this content itself is non-different from consciousness, it will have no relation to consciousness, and it cannot be known. Existence must be the same as consciousness in order that existence may be known. If it is not known, it itself is not. Existence is really the existence of consciousness. The cognitive organ modifying the basic consciousness follows existence. And, as consciousness is indivisible, such a distinction in existence gets narrowed to identity of nature through inseparability in undifferentiatedness which has neither inside nor outside. Nothing that is related to another is real. Relation always means interdependence and not self-existence. Existence is always absolute; nothing else. Common perception, however, is not the...

1: Introduction Integrality and Aspiration: The Attainment of Perfection is the Conscious Integration of Being. This is the central theme of the Upanishads. The Upanishads are intuitional revelations, and intuition is integral experience. Their declarations cannot fail to include within themselves the absolute scope of the diverse methods of approach to the one Reality, for integrality excludes nothing. No two individuals think alike, for thinking, which is the objective movement of the Spiritual Force, differs in its mode and impetus in different points of stress in integral existence. But, then, in spite of this separation of beings through their modes of mentation, all individuals have to aim at the attainment of a common Goal, the achievement of a common purpose, for, the truth of them all is one, and all their paths must but meet at One Perfection. Perfection or truth cannot be two, and there cannot be two absolutes. Hence, the methods of approach to Rea...

3: The Reason for Birth and Death : 11. ( Last Part ) Hence, death and birth of this body—or the process of metempsychosis, transmigration—is a continuous effort on the part of our inner core to cast off old instruments which are not useful for a higher purpose, and to utilise new instruments for gaining greater and greater insight into the higher realms of existence. No one can free oneself from these difficulties we call birth and death as long as one is finite. Birth and death are processes compelled upon the finitude of individuals, and this cycle ceases only when we cease to be finite. The urge of the finite towards the infinite is the reason behind the transformations we undergo through the processes called birth and death. Thus, it is a cosmic need, a necessity under the circumstance in which the universe is working. No one can be free from this phenomenon because we are in the phenomenon of finitude. As long as there is something outside us, as long as there is sp...

3: The Reason for Birth and Death : 10. Freedom from involvement in this space-time complex relationship is not possible. And why do we get into the clutches of birth and death? Now we come to the point. The world is evolving. The universe is in a state of process, and it is not stable on any permanent ground. It is moving, because the world is a name that we give to the externalisation of experience in space and time. And nature or God or anything that we regard as real is not an externalised something. It is a compact, integrated substance. It is Being—Pure Satta, as Sanskrit philosophers tell us—and division within this Pure Being is not conceivable. The Ultimate Reality is indivisible; and the world is made up of divisible particles. Time is divided into minute bits of process, and space is again divided into minute bits of extension—and, therefore, the whole of the universe, constituted of its contents, is the opposite of Reality. The indivisible character of Realit...

3: The Reason for Birth and Death : 9. The point is, the fact of other people accepting our notion that the land belongs to us does not explain the belonging of the land to us. The explanation has to come from the deep root—the grass roots—of the experience itself. In what way are we possessing this land? Is it under our grip? Are we holding it in our palm, carrying it on our head? It is difficult to say how it belongs to us. It belongs only in a peculiar movement of our head. A wave of the mind is concentrating itself on a consciousness of a relationship called possession. So land or no land, the joy of possession is only the consciousness of possession. If the consciousness is absent, the land may be there or may not be there, but it is not going to help us in any manner. We cannot eat this land. It cannot become part of our body. As a matter of fact, we cannot swallow any material which we regard as our possession. In fact, possession is a concept; it is not a material ...

3: The Reason for Birth and Death : 8 Hence, our involvement is not merely as a thread in a fabric or a piece of cloth, which is only to describe part of the mystery; we are also involved in a terrible illusion called the time process. No one can understand what time is. Time is not the movement of a watch or a clock. It is also not the recurrence of day and night. Even if the Sun were not to be there, there would be a time consciousness. Do we not feel there is time even in pitch darkness, when there is no light? So it is not wholly true that time is due to the revolution or the rotation of the Earth or the presence or the absence of light, like the light of the Sun. It is a mysterious way in which our mind itself works. Time can ultimately be reduced to a state of consciousness of the succession of events in space. As space is involved in time and time is involved in space, we cannot know space unless we know space is now. So we have brought the time factor into our con...

3: The Reason for Birth and Death : 7. It is space, time and causal relation which deal a death blow at our personality. The reason behind this phenomenon is, as mentioned earlier, that the universe does not behave in the way we behold it with our eyes or try to understand it with our mind. It is controlled by a law which is supernatural and beyond the comprehension of the logical intellect or the scientific understanding. What we call space and time—or, as people today say, space-time—is a mysterious complex in which we as individuals are involved. It is a network of relations. The space-time causal complex is a network of relations which surpasses the understanding of man. This network of relations cannot become the object of the understanding of man’s mind, because he himself is involved in these relations, just as a thread is involved in the network of a fabric or a piece of cloth. And just as a particular thread in a cloth cannot know the cloth unless it also knows i...

3: The Reason for Birth and Death-6. This is not the freedom that we are expecting in this world. The freedom we want is not only to be totally free from every kind of shackle imposed upon us. We want to be free not merely from the presence of other people around, but even from the presence of anything around us. The very presence of anything outside us is a limitation upon us. There is always a need felt by us to adjust ourselves to the presence of something outside us. Thus, we are not entirely and wholly natural in our thinking, in our speech and in our behaviour when we are in the presence of other people. To some extent, we have to make an adjustment and concession, and live a sort of artificial life in the presence of others. While in the presence of others, we cannot think whatever we want to think, say whatever we want to say and behave in any way we like. This is a limitation. Beyond this, there is the limitation of space and time which constricts our existence ...

3: The Reason for Birth and Death-5. So we can have a substanceless experience also. We can be very comfortable in a world which has no substantiality behind it and, therefore, our comfort may be an unsubstantial comfort. It is like living in a fairyland where, like Aladdin with his magic lamp, we seem to be rubbing a lamp of the wonder of magic with the power of our empirical intellect and associations, and are glorying in the heaven of this world that we ourselves have created in our own minds. This is real bondage; and freedom from subjection to a compulsion to think in this manner is real freedom. Great masters and adepts who have plumbed the depths of experience have compared this world to a dream world. It is difficult to believe that this world is a dream because it is substantial, tangible, visible, audible, and we can taste it and experience it in a concrete manner. But we can have a concrete, substantial, solid experience even without a concrete atmosphere being...

3: The Reason for Birth and Death : 4. This is a story which, to some extent, also explains our condition. We are in hell. We may say that we are not in a stinking place. Yudhishthira was not able to breathe. He was in darkness; and it was an awful atmosphere in which he was. But we are not in that condition. We are happy. Here is the blazing sunlight. We have oxygen to breath. We have food to eat. What is wrong with us? That we are totally ignorant of what has happened to us and what is happening to us, and we are not able to know that we are in this state of ignorance, can be said to be a worse state than the one in which Yudhishthira was. Yudhishthira was in a better state because he knew what was happening and where he was standing. He knew that it was a very undesirable, awful atmosphere. But we think this is paradise. This is the bondage of man. Man’s bondage does not necessarily consist in absence of currency notes or any physical amenities, but in his incapacity to...

3: The Reason for Birth and Death : 3. “Where are you taking me?” asked Yudhishthira to the Great Ones. “We are taking you to the place where your brethren and your queen are.” “Is this the way to the place where they are staying?” “This is the way.” He could not understand. His brain did not function. He felt it was no more tolerable. He was suffocated with the stink of the place, and he was walking on slippery ground, knowing not what was around him. Then only he heard a faint cry. “Save us! Save us! Wait here for a few minutes. Don’t go.” This was the voice of his brother. It was Bhima’s voice, Arjuna’s voice, Draupati crying. “What is all this?” cried out Yudhishthira to Narada and the others. “Well, you wanted to see your relatives. They are here. This is the paradise, this is the heaven in which your brethren are,” said the celestials. “This is what they deserve. But your destination is different. Turn away from this place. This is not your place. You...

3: The Reason for Birth and Death : 2. This ignorance defeats all complacency that we may have in respect of our achievements of any freedom in this world. It is like the beautiful body of an emperor that has lost its soul no longer has any significance. It is no more a prince, it is no more a king or an emperor; it is nothing whatsoever because its appearance has been deprived of the essence of what it was constituted to be. Likewise, our formal freedoms, which are what we are after in our elections, in our business and in our general attitude in society, all these attitudes of ours are infected by a secret anguish which gnaws into us—that is, death. Yama taught the great mystery of life to the aspiring student Nachiketas. Yama teaches the mysteries. Death is the best teacher. No one can tell us what the world is made of except the phenomenon of death, because it reveals the inner mystery behind the outward form of the physical and social world. Freedom from this untowa...

3: The Reason for Birth and Death : 1. Moksha is the great goal of life. This is the ringing message of every genius in any field who has gone to the depths of things. This is to say, freedom is the birthright of man. There is a struggle in and out for liberation, freedom, and shaking off every kind of bondage. There is nothing anyone needs in this world except freedom to the largest extent possible, and for the longest duration conceivable—freedom in society, freedom in political relationships, freedom from illness, freedom from ignorance and unknowing of every kind, and freedom from the fear of death. Some of us may be under the notion that we are enjoying some sort of a freedom in life, such as the freedom of a rich man, the freedom of a powerful man, and the freedom of a healthy man. They are freedoms, no doubt, in some way. But just as a beautiful, rotund fruit looking healthy and delicious from the outside may have a secret worm eating it from inside, an outwardly ...