[SPEAKER_00]: So this is our class on the Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna, which is an English translation of the Bengali, Sri Ramakrishna Kautam Rita.
[SPEAKER_00]: Before I get into today's reading, I was just thinking, this translation itself is a remarkable piece of work.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I mean, Nikhilar and the Jidhirit, but he had a very, you know, an amazing team.
[SPEAKER_00]: Many people don't know about that.
[SPEAKER_00]: So the writing itself, good deal of what we are reading now, writing itself has certainly reviewed and edited by his secretary, who was none other than Margaret Woodrow Wilson, which was the daughter of the President of the United States Woodrow Wilson.
[SPEAKER_00]: In fact, just reading upon her, she, for time she was doing the duties of the first lady.
[SPEAKER_00]: because when her mother died, and her father was still the president, so somebody had to be the hostess at the White House for all the, you know, the duties at the first lady normally does.
[SPEAKER_00]: So she was there too.
[SPEAKER_00]: And later after that,
[SPEAKER_00]: Um, she became a disciple of Swami Nikhilan and the Ji, and she thoroughly revised this, uh, the manuscript so that it had, it has this nice flow, you know, the English has a very nice flow to it, Joseph Campbell, who later became this very noted writer on, uh, on mythology.
[SPEAKER_00]: where he'd owe it to a thousand faces and then he had this PBS series on the power of myth with Bill Myers, I think.
[SPEAKER_00]: So he also helped with the, he was a disciple of Swami Nikhilan and Ji and he also helped with the manuscript and the songs.
[SPEAKER_00]: the Bengali songs were translated.
[SPEAKER_00]: Of course, so I mean, Nikhil Ranjee was the one who translated, but the present form in which we find them.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is so poetical, so, so, so, so, so, lyrical.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's because they were put together by a poet, none other than John Moffitt, who was a leading poet of America at that time.
[SPEAKER_00]: Margaret Woodrow Wilson, she after
[SPEAKER_00]: and she lived a rest of her life in the Arabindo ashram in India.
[SPEAKER_00]: She took, she was known as Nishdha, which means they're dedicated.
[SPEAKER_00]: And she lived the land of her life in India.
[SPEAKER_00]: So that's some interesting background to it.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was voted.
[SPEAKER_00]: as one of the 100 best spiritual books of the century, but that's just, I mean, it's just not it doesn't compare.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you look at all the books in the list, you're already good books.
[SPEAKER_00]: There is a tall cane, the fellowship of the ring, what do you call it?
[SPEAKER_00]: The lot of the rings, yes.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's also part of the 100 best spiritual books, but there's some of some of the books are pretty good.
[SPEAKER_00]: But none of them comes even, you know, close to the Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna.
[SPEAKER_00]: There is no comparison whatsoever.
[SPEAKER_00]: This book is one for the centuries.
[SPEAKER_00]: When all these books written, you know, those everything else on that side list might fade away.
[SPEAKER_00]: They won't fade away, many of them are very good books, but they will diminish any importance over the centuries.
[SPEAKER_00]: This will only grow in importance as the centuries pass.
[SPEAKER_00]: All right, so let me continue reading.
[SPEAKER_00]: Last time we were reading is section 27 October 1882, 27 October 1882 page 133, the master and Keshab.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we had started, we read a couple of pages.
[SPEAKER_00]: Actually, it's a very extraordinary meeting between Siramakrishna and Keshab Chandrasayna and his Brahmin followers.
[SPEAKER_00]: On a boat, it comes on a large boat to the river, on the bank of the tank of the river, the temple, the election issue, the temple stands there.
[SPEAKER_00]: And Sri Ramakrishna was taken in a small boat to that large steward.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then he was already in a semi-extetic state and not very conscious of the external world.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then he's brought in to a room, we read about how everybody crowded around to take a look at him and it was very stuffy.
[SPEAKER_00]: So the windows were opened and then he was beginning to just be able to speak a little to others.
[SPEAKER_00]: He was so absorbed in in in in in our ecstasy in his society.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so that's where we will pick up again.
[SPEAKER_00]: We have read this portion, but then we haven't discussed it yet.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's a lot here.
[SPEAKER_00]: So on page 133, the Brahmodevities looked wistfully at the master.
[SPEAKER_00]: Gradually he came back to sense consciousness, but the divine intoxication still lingered.
[SPEAKER_00]: He said to himself, and a whisper, mother, why have you brought me here?
[SPEAKER_00]: They are hedged around and not free.
[SPEAKER_00]: Can I free them?
[SPEAKER_00]: did the master find that the people assembled there were locked within the prison walls of the world, did their helplessness make the master address these words to the divine mother.
[SPEAKER_00]: Sri Ramakrishna was gradually becoming conscious of the outside world.
[SPEAKER_00]: Nil Madhav of Ghazipur,
[SPEAKER_00]: and a Brahmo devotee, we're talking about Poweri Baba.
[SPEAKER_00]: Another Brahmo devotee said to the master.
[SPEAKER_00]: Sir, these gentlemen visited Poweri Baba.
[SPEAKER_00]: He lives in Ghazipur.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's a holy man like yourself.
[SPEAKER_00]: So we know that later on Swami Vivekananda also went and met Poweri Baba and some others also did.
[SPEAKER_00]: So he was very well known as a very highly evolved spiritual so at that time in India.
[SPEAKER_00]: He's a holy man like yourself.
[SPEAKER_00]: The master could hardly talk, he only smiled.
[SPEAKER_00]: The devotee continued, Sir, Poweribaba keeps your photograph in his room.
[SPEAKER_00]: Pointing to his body, the master said with a smile.
[SPEAKER_00]: Just a pillowcase.
[SPEAKER_00]: The master continued, but you should remember that the heart of the devotee is the abode of God.
[SPEAKER_00]: He dwells, no doubt in all beings, but he especially, especially manifest himself in the heart of the devotee, a landlord may at one time or another, visit all parts of his estate, but people say he is generally to be found in a particular drawing room.
[SPEAKER_00]: The heart of the devotee is the drawing room of God.
[SPEAKER_00]: So he says, Powery Baba keeps your photograph in his room and that's pretty special.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because remember, in those days, photographs were rare and photographs of Sri Ramakrishna, but even more rare, very difficult to come by.
[SPEAKER_00]: So long before Swami Vivekananda actually visited Poweri Baba, we can see that Poweri Baba keeps Sri Ramakrishna's photograph in his room.
[SPEAKER_00]: Room is he lived in a sort of an artificial cave there.
[SPEAKER_00]: So there he kept a photograph of Sri Ramakrishna.
[SPEAKER_00]: A pointing to the body, Sri Ramakrishna,
[SPEAKER_00]: Then he says, but in the heart of the devotees, the abode of God is in all beings, but especially manifests in the heart of the devotee, a landlord visits all parts of his estate, but especially people know that if you want to meet him, you go to that particular drawing room.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, that particular mansion in that mansion, in that drawing room, that's very spends most of his time.
[SPEAKER_00]: The heart of the devotee, the one who loves God, that is the special
[SPEAKER_00]: Here itself, let's take a look.
[SPEAKER_00]: First of all, the moment a photograph is mentioned, and the body, the photograph is of the body.
[SPEAKER_00]: And Sri Ramakrishna immediately is dismissive.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says, it's just a pillow case.
[SPEAKER_00]: Just as the pillow is inside the pillow case, is just the outer covering.
[SPEAKER_00]: Similarly, the body is just the outer covering.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not us.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's what he wants to say.
[SPEAKER_00]: The reality is within, but the body itself is not the reality.
[SPEAKER_00]: Here itself, like Krishna saying to Arjuna, in the 30 in chapter of the Bhagavad Gita,
[SPEAKER_00]: Krishna says that, there are these two, the field and its nor.
[SPEAKER_00]: The body is the field.
[SPEAKER_00]: And within the body is the one who knows the body, who experiences the body, one who is embodied in this body, one who uses the body, one who lives life through the body, that one is called the noir of the field.
[SPEAKER_00]: 8th year, 8th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year, 7th year
[SPEAKER_00]: I, the one who does experience is the body.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am the knower of the body, and this body is the known.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am the knower of the field, shetra-gya, and the body is the field.
[SPEAKER_00]: Why is the body the field and why am I the knower of the field?
[SPEAKER_00]: Why is it called a field?
[SPEAKER_00]: There's a commentator Shankaran and the who wrote about five hundred six hundred years ago on the gita He gives ten reasons why the body is called a field.
[SPEAKER_00]: I forgot not most of them.
[SPEAKER_00]: One of them is Remember because it's the like in a field the crops, you know, the grow there.
[SPEAKER_00]: You sew the seeds and then you get
[SPEAKER_00]: Similarly, in this body, karma is done and the seeds of karma generate pleasure and pain and all kinds of experiences which we experience in and through this body.
[SPEAKER_00]: So that's why the body is called the field.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's one reason.
[SPEAKER_00]: Sri Ramakrishna uses a much more amusing example.
[SPEAKER_00]: Field and knower of the field sounds pretty philosophical.
[SPEAKER_00]: Sri Ramakrishna says, you are a pillow and the body is your pillow case.
[SPEAKER_00]: This pillow, I remember, Sri Ramakrishna, I don't know where it is, it's not one of the regular sources, but Sri Ramakrishna calls your real nature, Atman, a pillow.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says, just as you relax back into your favorite pillow at the end of the day, the enlightened one, you know, relaxes back into his real nature, the Atman.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now you relax back into your real nature, just like that, and just lay back into your real nature.
[SPEAKER_00]: Become free.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now having said that, it's just a pillowcase.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's just the feel, you are not it.
[SPEAKER_00]: If it's in it, then you are not literally the body.
[SPEAKER_00]: That itself is a big, big thing to say.
[SPEAKER_00]: that means the birth of the body is not your birth, the aging and disease and death of the body, though you experience it.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not you, but you are the one who experiences it.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's a big, big point to make.
[SPEAKER_00]: Whole of spirituality depends upon this first distinction between you and the body.
[SPEAKER_00]: Having made the distinction, he reverses it.
[SPEAKER_00]: And he notices in the very next statement he says,
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't dismiss it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Don't dismiss the body.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's where God dwells.
[SPEAKER_00]: And He says, God dwells in all beings.
[SPEAKER_00]: So that means in all the bodies, in all the bodies, the Lord is present.
[SPEAKER_00]: But especially He says, in those who love God.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, especially in the sense, not that God is more in those who love Him and less in those who do not love Him or those who don't believe in Him or those who are in animal bodies or plant bodies, but it is more manifest because the devotees attention is on God, devotees love His towards God.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because the devotee is focused on God, the mind and heart of the devotee are suffused, it's more manifest there.
[SPEAKER_00]: So the example of where is the gentle mental landlord to be found?
[SPEAKER_00]: Landlord is to be found mostly easily in a particular house in a particular drawing room.
[SPEAKER_00]: So where is God who is the landlord of this cosmos to be found?
[SPEAKER_00]: If you want connection with God, you have to go to the saints, to the highly spiritual people, those whose lives are completely immersed in God.
[SPEAKER_00]: So there you will find, when it's a very practical advice, one does feel something special.
[SPEAKER_00]: Whoever they are, whichever religion they belong to, those who are God immersed, we close to them, you feel it, a purity and elevation, something wonderful, something very profound and meaningful.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's the presence of God in the heart of the devotee.
[SPEAKER_00]: In the Gita, we were reading about the lower nature and higher nature.
[SPEAKER_00]: I just made the connection.
[SPEAKER_00]: In the seventh chapter of the Gita, we are studying secretionic says to Arjuna, see, I have these two natures.
[SPEAKER_00]: Parā and Āparā property.
[SPEAKER_00]: Āparā property, the lower nature is material nature.
[SPEAKER_00]: You remember what he says there, earth, fire, water, you know, there is these bodies, also mind, intellect, all of that.
[SPEAKER_00]: What is the higher nature?
[SPEAKER_00]: which has these two aspects, the ultimate reality Brahman and which not conscious of itself mixed up with the lower nature becomes the Jiva, the sentient being.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, here is the lower nature, the body.
[SPEAKER_00]: That is why Ram Krishna says it is a pillowcase.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, he is you know like
[SPEAKER_00]: in the lower nature.
[SPEAKER_00]: Therefore he says you look for it there.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you go deeper, this brings us to the idea of the two truths in Advaita Vedanta, the lower truth, Bhiyavaharika, transactional truth, empirical truth, and the higher truth, Paramartika, absolute truth, which is Brahman.
[SPEAKER_00]: body, mind, that's the lower truth.
[SPEAKER_00]: And what's the higher truth, Brahman, existence consciousness place.
[SPEAKER_00]: In Mahayana Buddhism, it is very clearly stated by Nagarjuna, who lived about six 700 years before Adishankara.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says that the Buddha taught two truths, the higher truth, same language, Paramārthika, the higher truth, the absolute truth.
[SPEAKER_00]: And for the lower truth, uses a different word in Sanskrit, samrithi sakti.
[SPEAKER_00]: Saktiam paramarti comes at them.
[SPEAKER_00]: Samrithi sakti.
[SPEAKER_00]: Samrithi, sakti means lower illusory appearance.
[SPEAKER_00]: And that was later made into Bhavahari or transactional in Adwaita Vedanta.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, it seems so therefore the higher truth is important paramarti can be realized that it is true.
[SPEAKER_00]: Both the Advaitan and the Mahayana Buddhist, both of them, they say you cannot reach the higher truth without the lower.
[SPEAKER_00]: So Nagarjuna's statement is very clear.
[SPEAKER_00]: Samrithi, Manārshittya, Paramārtham, Nādhigammiyati, without taking refuge, without taking the help of the lower truth.
[SPEAKER_00]: Samrithi, Satya, no one ever reaches the higher truth.
[SPEAKER_00]: why are we talking about that?
[SPEAKER_00]: Notice what Sri Ram Krishna says here, pillow case, but you will find God there, where do you find the pillow after all in the pillow case?
[SPEAKER_00]: So, in the heart of the devotee you find the dwelling place or the manifestation place of God.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's why Swami Vivekananda says, it's not that we go from the faults to the real.
[SPEAKER_00]: We go from lower troops to higher troops.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's a more useful way of putting it.
[SPEAKER_00]: The moment you say it's faults, you're supposed to completely ignore it.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then look for what is true.
[SPEAKER_00]: But the truth is right there, people misunderstand the Advaiti idea of falsity.
[SPEAKER_00]: When you say the snake is false, it's really a rope.
[SPEAKER_00]: Will you now look around?
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, it's a false snake.
[SPEAKER_00]: So let me forget the snake.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let me look for the real rope.
[SPEAKER_00]: No.
[SPEAKER_00]: The very fact, the moment you're told that a snake is false, it means that very thing is the rope.
[SPEAKER_00]: There itself you will find the rope, just like instead of all this abstraction and technicalities, SRAM Krishna's, if you ask SRAM, when SRAM Krishna's example, pillowcase and pillow, where will you find the pillow, your favorite pillow, in the pillowcase?
[SPEAKER_00]: So there itself, in fact, one Advaita teacher pointed out
[SPEAKER_00]: He said, what is the purpose of teaching the falsity of the word, Jagat Mithyathu in Adwaita Vedanta?
[SPEAKER_00]: What's the purpose?
[SPEAKER_00]: What's the point?
[SPEAKER_00]: There are two purposes.
[SPEAKER_00]: One is what is usually understood, what is usually people think.
[SPEAKER_00]: It is that it creates dispassion for the world.
[SPEAKER_00]: The real problem is why we do not recognize yourself ourselves as the Ottoman.
[SPEAKER_00]: And having understood some of it, why we fail to center ourselves there is our continuous distraction and involvement with the world.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, if we can be convinced, if we begin to see that the world is false, like a movie, like a dream, like a mirage, then we can easily ignore it or we can rise above it.
[SPEAKER_00]: We can center our attention in the reality, which are the way that is pointing out.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, why not get dispassion, dispassion to create dispassion for the world, a falsity is taught.
[SPEAKER_00]: It creates, because one of the conditions for Advaita Vedanta is dispassion for the world by Ragga.
[SPEAKER_00]: In order to create that, falsity of the world is a powerful teaching.
[SPEAKER_00]: But this sadhu, Ratha Rakan sadhu, we pointed out, this is only preliminary.
[SPEAKER_00]: the people who have only a superficial knowledge of Vedanta, they think that is the purpose of falsity of the world.
[SPEAKER_00]: So no, there is a deeper purpose.
[SPEAKER_00]: Much more powerful purpose is served by teaching the falsity of the world.
[SPEAKER_00]: It directly points out where the reality is.
[SPEAKER_00]: that which is false is when recognized real what is the difference between the false and the real what is the difference stupidity is the difference and I'm stupid I see the false when I understand what it is I see the real and it's the same thing in ignorance it's I don't know I think it's a snake when I know what it is it is the rope it is the very same thing when
[SPEAKER_00]: When I wake up to it, that very reality, then it is, then I'm enlightened.
[SPEAKER_00]: When I'm asleep or in, I'm day dreaming, then I'm in some sorrow.
[SPEAKER_00]: So the deeper teaching of the deeper meaning of the teaching of falseity of the world is to directly point out where the reality is.
[SPEAKER_00]: If Jagat Mithya, world is false, all right, if we accept that, then where is the reality?
[SPEAKER_00]: Here, here, right here, that which you consider the false world.
[SPEAKER_00]: Today I was reading in Astaavakra, very powerful verse, prakash, amme ni jam ru pam, nati riktoham tatahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahah
[SPEAKER_00]: Prakasham may nijam ru-pam, light consciousness is my real nature, that's my own nature, that's what I am.
[SPEAKER_00]: And not that atirik, not atirik to aham tata-ha, I'm not anything other than that.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's important to say that, otherwise what happens is consciousness, aware, this view does not say that's nothing very special.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm aware, but my problem is not with the awareness, my problem is with my mind, my problem is with the body, my problem is with the family, with the job, with the world, with COVID.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because I am, notice all the problems are body mind and Nastravakhra here says, my real nature is light and nothing but light, not mind, not body.
[SPEAKER_00]: This body and mind, you have nothing to do with it.
[SPEAKER_00]: It is just revealed by you, the light.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, not iriktoham takahah.
[SPEAKER_00]: Other than that, I'm not one little bit.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am not body and mind, I am light itself.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I am nothing other than light.
[SPEAKER_00]: Then, you're not Jagat Bhati.
[SPEAKER_00]: It is I alone who I am shining.
[SPEAKER_00]: When the world shines, it is I alone who I am shining.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is a very beautiful, very powerful verse.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, this is possible only when the world is an appearance in me.
[SPEAKER_00]: When the world shines, I alone am shining.
[SPEAKER_00]: So this real eye, where is it to be found?
[SPEAKER_00]: In the world, when the world is shining, is shining of the world, is my shining.
[SPEAKER_00]: What do we normally think?
[SPEAKER_00]: I am separate a tiny part of the world and there is this world outside me.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's a huge world outside me.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's be respect to the body.
[SPEAKER_00]: But with respect to awareness, body, mind, world, including space and time, all are appearing to awareness in awareness and nothing but awareness.
[SPEAKER_00]: So the teaching of the falsity of the world is to point out the reality that you are, teaching that of this, when the world is shining, you alone are shining.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, even deeper, if we go into this pillowcase mystery,
[SPEAKER_00]: When you get the teaching of the transcendent imminent call, transcendent means beyond this universe, beyond space, time, beyond matter, something beyond something higher.
[SPEAKER_00]: God is always taken to be transcendent.
[SPEAKER_00]: Our real nature is transcendent.
[SPEAKER_00]: Great, that's what Sri Ram Krishna says, just a pillowcase.
[SPEAKER_00]: But that real nature is also imminent in and through, in every being, in our own body, in the mind, but consciousness shines which we are, and in all other beings.
[SPEAKER_00]: imminent nature of God.
[SPEAKER_00]: So we derived all this, ancient teaching of the two truths, absolute truth and relative truth, higher truth and lower truth, higher nature of God in the lower nature and 7 chapter of Bhagavad Gita, the transcendent, imminent God all from, it's all hidden in the pillow case.
[SPEAKER_00]: Alright, now let's go ahead.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you thought that was heavy, now some
[SPEAKER_00]: He, who is called Brahman by the Gyanis, is known as Atman by the Yogis and as Bhagavan by the Bhaktas.
[SPEAKER_00]: The same Brahman is called priest when he is worshiping in the temple and the cook when preparing a meal in the kitchen.
[SPEAKER_00]: The Gyanis sticking to the path of knowledge.
[SPEAKER_00]: Always reason about reality saying, not this Brahman is neither this nor that.
[SPEAKER_00]: It is neither the universe nor its living beings.
[SPEAKER_00]: reasoning in this way, the mind becomes steady, then it disappears, and the aspirin goes into samadhi, that is the knowledge of, this is the knowledge of Brahman.
[SPEAKER_00]: What is the knowledge of Brahman?
[SPEAKER_00]: Which is the unwavering conviction of the Gandhi, that Brahman alone is real, and the world is illusory.
[SPEAKER_00]: All these names and forms are illusory, like a dream.
[SPEAKER_00]: what Brahman is cannot be described.
[SPEAKER_00]: One cannot even say that Brahman is a person.
[SPEAKER_00]: That is this is the opinion of the Gyanis, the followers of Vedanta philosophy.
[SPEAKER_00]: But the Bhaktas accept all the states of consciousness.
[SPEAKER_00]: They take their waking state to be real also.
[SPEAKER_00]: They do not see thing the world to be illusory like a dream.
[SPEAKER_00]: They say that the universe is a manifestation of God's power and glory.
[SPEAKER_00]: God has created all these skies, stars, moons, sun, mountains, ocean, men, animals.
[SPEAKER_00]: They constitute His glory.
[SPEAKER_00]: He is within us in our hearts, again, His outside.
[SPEAKER_00]: The most advanced devotees say that He Himself has become all this, the 24 cosmic principles, the universe, and all living beings.
[SPEAKER_00]: The devotee of God wants to eat sugar, not to become sugar, all laugh.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's a lot packed in here.
[SPEAKER_00]: So the way of the gary, the way of knowledge, the way of the yogi, the way of meditation, the way of the bhakta, the way of devotion, or love.
[SPEAKER_00]: Depending upon how you put the spiritual problem, the solution will be according to that.
[SPEAKER_00]: To the bhakta, the problem is that we do not believe in God.
[SPEAKER_00]: And therefore, we suffer.
[SPEAKER_00]: And the solution is having faith in the existence of God, having love for God, devotion to God, surrendered to God.
[SPEAKER_00]: It will solve your problem.
[SPEAKER_00]: Lack of devotion is the problem.
[SPEAKER_00]: And devotion, love, love for God is the solution.
[SPEAKER_00]: lack of love for God leads to our love being scattered in a hundred, a thousand different, you know, streams into the world, flowing into the world and we get trapped in some sorrow.
[SPEAKER_00]: That entire love is taken and directed towards God will become free of some sorrow.
[SPEAKER_00]: So that's the solution of the
[SPEAKER_00]: you know, you'll be free of the suffering of some sorrow.
[SPEAKER_00]: You will attain not only free of suffering, you will attain bliss and joy and deep fulfillment.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, the yogi says, no, no, no, not faith.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you faith is problematic because who knows?
[SPEAKER_00]: whether it is true or not, it may just be a superstition, no, no, no, in this day and age, we all demand experience, we all demand empirical evidence.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, yogi is path of evidence, we will show to you, you will demonstrate by your own experience that God is real, experience is necessary, not just believing in God.
[SPEAKER_00]: So,
[SPEAKER_00]: Instead of saying, believe in God and surrender to God, no, here are the set of psychospiritual experiments, practices, sit in this way, breathe in this way, withdraw your mind, focus in this way, you will get a series of mystical experiences which will prove to you the existence of the soul, the ophman, the real nature.
[SPEAKER_00]: And by that experience,
[SPEAKER_00]: you will be free.
[SPEAKER_00]: But then what is the problem here?
[SPEAKER_00]: The problem is the mind, the restlessness of the mind.
[SPEAKER_00]: And the solution is calmness of the mind, focus of the mind, samadhi.
[SPEAKER_00]: That will show you and they will give you freedom.
[SPEAKER_00]: That is the way of yoga, Patanjali yoga.
[SPEAKER_00]: You raise a very broad term.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, Patanjali yoga.
[SPEAKER_00]: belief in lack of belief is not the real problem, not even lack of experience.
[SPEAKER_00]: Rather, the real problem is ignorance, ignorance of your real nature.
[SPEAKER_00]: Ignorance of your real nature is the problem and the knowledge of your real nature is a solution.
[SPEAKER_00]: Therefore, inquire into who am I or
[SPEAKER_00]: what is the ultimate reality and by the process of inquiry, you will gain release because you are the ultimate reality by inquiry, you will discover your own reality.
[SPEAKER_00]: your limited nature, so-called limited nature, which seems to be there, is because you have not inquired into it.
[SPEAKER_00]: As you inquire, direct your attention, with the help of the teachings of Vedanta, you will begin to see that you are not this limited body, not even this limited mind.
[SPEAKER_00]: You are awareness and you begin to appreciate, first of all, you isolate awareness.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, the unclean is used by Nathinethi.
[SPEAKER_00]: not just by understanding, by actually, you know, inquiring and attending to it, that this awareness, which I always knew I was aware, I was conscious, but this consciousness in itself if you disentangle it in your understanding from body mind, you begin to see that this is my essential reality.
[SPEAKER_00]: Having realized that I am consciousness, next you begin to appreciate the nature of consciousness
[SPEAKER_00]: that it is always shining, that it is the one which reveals to me all the experiences of life, whether you believe in God or you don't believe in God, both are revealed by consciousness, whether the mind is restless or a restless or concentrated by yoga, both are revealed by the same consciousness.
[SPEAKER_00]: Consciousness you don't have to believe in it, belief depends on consciousness, even lack of belief depends on consciousness.
[SPEAKER_00]: Restlessness and calmness of mind, both are revealed by the same consciousness, which is never restless.
[SPEAKER_00]: You don't have to make any effort to make it calm.
[SPEAKER_00]: As we begin to understand the nature of consciousness, we realize it can't be born, it can't die, it doesn't change, all change happens in time and time is revealed by consciousness.
[SPEAKER_00]: Time is in consciousness, not something outside consciousness, space is revealed by consciousness,
[SPEAKER_00]: And not something outside.
[SPEAKER_00]: In fact, there is no question of anything being other than beyond consciousness.
[SPEAKER_00]: You begin to realize that consciousness is immortal.
[SPEAKER_00]: Consciousness is all that there is.
[SPEAKER_00]: Everything else is an appearance in consciousness.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is everything else is an appearance in consciousness.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's literally Jagat Mithya, the fall city of the world.
[SPEAKER_00]: Everything depends for its existence and manifestation on the consciousness which you are.
[SPEAKER_00]: When this becomes clear, you begin to drop everything.
[SPEAKER_00]: I mean, the mind itself, it turns inwards towards its source and drops everything else.
[SPEAKER_00]: And when it drops all supports, external world is left behind.
[SPEAKER_00]: Awareness of the body is left behind.
[SPEAKER_00]: Saut's disappear, mind merges in, samadhi, in the deepest Vedant technique in the asala, which is same as the asam pragyata samadhi of yoga.
[SPEAKER_00]: and consciousness alone shines.
[SPEAKER_00]: So that's Advaita Vedanta.
[SPEAKER_00]: No, Sriankrishna says, you come back again.
[SPEAKER_00]: Then you have absolutely the language is very interesting.
[SPEAKER_00]: What is the knowledge of Brahman?
[SPEAKER_00]: This is the knowledge of Brahman.
[SPEAKER_00]: What is it?
[SPEAKER_00]: It is the unwavering conviction of the Gyanid that Brahman alone is real and the world is illusory.
[SPEAKER_00]: a conviction of whom the illumined one.
[SPEAKER_00]: Conviction, illumined one, world is appearance, Brahman is real, where is it possible, not in Samadhi?
[SPEAKER_00]: Only when you come out of Samadhi, mind starts functioning and you can be called the illumined one.
[SPEAKER_00]: and the world appears to you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, how do you regard the world and how do you regard yourself?
[SPEAKER_00]: What is real and what is false?
[SPEAKER_00]: This, this, this, this is the state which is the knowledge of Brahman.
[SPEAKER_00]: Brahman septem jadath mithyar becomes absolutely clear.
[SPEAKER_00]: There is no doubt about it.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is the way of the journey, the way of knowledge.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, the way of devotion, problem, lack of faith.
[SPEAKER_00]: devotion, solution, faith in God, love, love for God, surrender to God.
[SPEAKER_00]: The way of the yogi, problem, restlessness of mind, solution, meditation, calming the mind down in summary and you realize your real nature.
[SPEAKER_00]: When the path of the Ghani, path of knowledge, problem ignorance of who we are or what we are.
[SPEAKER_00]: Solution, knowledge of what we are, when you realize you are this infinite awareness.
[SPEAKER_00]: The whole world is an appearance in you, you are not touched by anything in the world.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now, this is liberation.
[SPEAKER_00]: In each case, the Sadhana will be different.
[SPEAKER_00]: Spiritual practice will be different for each case.
[SPEAKER_00]: faith, devotion, prayer, love of God, directing our emotions towards God, complete engagement with God.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then what will be the Sagan of the Yogi?
[SPEAKER_00]: Very clear, the Ashhtanga Yoga, here to withdraw from the activities, calm down the mind and the senses and focus inwards, satyoga, yoga, chitta, rithtti, nirodha.
[SPEAKER_00]: the calmness, the one-pointedness, and the settledness of the mind, leading to samathi.
[SPEAKER_00]: That is the sazan of the yogi.
[SPEAKER_00]: What is the sazan of the gany?
[SPEAKER_00]: Again, a different path.
[SPEAKER_00]: Shravanamanan and Nizidhdi Hassan, you must take the instructions, the teachings, the truth is pointed out, must dwell on that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Then you think about it, clearly.
[SPEAKER_00]: Once clarity is attained, you stay with it, until the Sri Ram Krishna says, the mind is still in samadhi, that's the ultimate, where it becomes very clear to you.
[SPEAKER_00]: After that, the unshakable clarity, just as we are very clear now, I am the body mind, like that, even more so, that you are this radiance.
[SPEAKER_00]: Prakasham, may in Nijam, Rupam, as Asthchavakras things.
[SPEAKER_00]: This radiance is my real nature.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am not anything other than that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yadav Haseyate Vishwam, Tadah, Aham Haseyaywai, when the world shines forth to I alone, I'm shining for this becomes very clear, unshakably clear to the Gany.
[SPEAKER_00]: So these are the different ways Sri Ramakrishna says.
[SPEAKER_00]: And he explains in detail the Vedanta approach, unshakable conviction of the Gany that Dhramman alone is real and the world unreal.
[SPEAKER_00]: All these names and forms are illusory like a dream.
[SPEAKER_00]: what Brahman is cannot be described.
[SPEAKER_00]: So like a dream about the dream is usually we know, all of us agree.
[SPEAKER_00]: When we wake up from a dream, what do we say?
[SPEAKER_00]: Oh, it was only a dream, which means it was not real.
[SPEAKER_00]: The same conviction comes about the waking word.
[SPEAKER_00]: Is the distinction between the Gany and others.
[SPEAKER_00]: The others considered everybody else, the ignorant one, and the devotee, and the yogi.
[SPEAKER_00]: They all considered the dream is a dream, but the waking word is real.
[SPEAKER_00]: And the Ghani says, the waking world is as unreal as the dream.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's also an appearance in consciousness.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is the whole teaching of the Mandukyo.
[SPEAKER_00]: In fact, the Advaita Vedanta, Mandukyo is very clear.
[SPEAKER_00]: Waking, dreaming, and deep sleep.
[SPEAKER_00]: They all appear and disappear to the same consciousness.
[SPEAKER_00]: Why would you give more importance to the waking world that it is real and the dream world is false?
[SPEAKER_00]: every objection that why dream is false, but making is real, every objection can be knocked down and go to power that does that actually.
[SPEAKER_00]: Buddhist do it very nicely.
[SPEAKER_00]: I was reading this teaching of Buddhist lama.
[SPEAKER_00]: Somebody asked him that I used that answer in fact in a class last week.
[SPEAKER_00]: The Buddhist, somebody asked that standard question, you know our waking world persists.
[SPEAKER_00]: Every time we wake up we wake up to the same house and the same body and the same problems and all of that is every time we wake up it's it's persisting, it's stable.
[SPEAKER_00]: The dream world is unstable.
[SPEAKER_00]: Every time I go into a dream it's a different story altogether.
[SPEAKER_00]: there's no connection.
[SPEAKER_00]: When the Buddhist and the Vedant also says, so what follows from that is stability and argument for reality.
[SPEAKER_00]: And the answer, the Buddhist girl Lama gave is very beautiful.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says, all right, if the dreams where this vegetable, every time you went into a dream,
[SPEAKER_00]: If it did become real, imagine, I come to this world and when I go to dream every night after the same dream, our stories come, come continuing in my dream like a TV serial.
[SPEAKER_00]: TV serial is also very stable, the same story, same characters, all this was going on.
[SPEAKER_00]: So is it real?
[SPEAKER_00]: Does that make it real?
[SPEAKER_00]: Is stability an argument for reality?
[SPEAKER_00]: No.
[SPEAKER_00]: Opposite, make it opposite, let the, let the, let the waking world become unstable, suppose
[SPEAKER_00]: So, every time the person wakes up, everything seems new, does that make the waking world unreal?
[SPEAKER_00]: No?
[SPEAKER_00]: Lack of stability does not make something unreal.
[SPEAKER_00]: Stability does not make something real, logically, anyway.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, this is the opinion of the Gany's, Saddam Krishna says, and it is the opinion of Saddam Krishna also, notwithstanding what I am, I would say is, huh?
[SPEAKER_00]: Brahman is real world is real, he just have to see what Sri Ramakrishna, when he was asked by somebody tell me one sentence, spirituality in one sentence, so that I can become enlightened.
[SPEAKER_00]: What did Sri Ramakrishna say?
[SPEAKER_00]: He said, Brahman is real, the world is unreal, assimilate this truth.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, whole thing is set aside our whole thing that Sri Ram Krishna says Brahman is real and the world is real and now so is it wrong to say that Sri Ram Krishna did say that no, there is there are lot of nuances but it's interesting to note that if you press Sri Ram Krishna and say it give me spirituality in one sentence, he will say Brahman is real world is false, that's fine.
[SPEAKER_00]: those who say world is real, can't they be spiritual?
[SPEAKER_00]: He will say, yes, they can be.
[SPEAKER_00]: He will not be a fanatical non-dewalist, he says, no, you have to come to the to go to a father and Shankara, otherwise you can't be spiritual, that he does not do.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, there, then the whole thing opens up, and then what, what Ayanmar is doing and many others have done also, that becomes valid.
[SPEAKER_00]: Another thing to note is that
[SPEAKER_00]: Because Ramakrishna has this more expanded and expansive view, does not mean he thinks that the Vedantines say or Shankar or Gauravati says is wrong, not at all.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you think every path is right, why would suddenly Shankarabi wrong?
[SPEAKER_00]: Shankarabi is absolutely right.
[SPEAKER_00]: Godappa is absolutely right.
[SPEAKER_00]: But that's not the only way.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's not the only truth that there is.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's not the only way to become enlightened.
[SPEAKER_00]: So here he has given three broad pathways, the way of knowledge, the way of meditation, the way of devotion.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I mean Vivekananda comes here and says, why have one?
[SPEAKER_00]: It have all three.
[SPEAKER_00]: meditate and be devoted and be an enquiring to our real nature and go further and you also emphasize the way of karma, of transformation of our work into spiritual practice.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's a very practical advice, and if you see really in our lives, we are spiritual seekers, all of us, all of us are basically doing that only.
[SPEAKER_00]: We are doing Vedantic inquiry.
[SPEAKER_00]: We also are most of us are initiated with the Ishtaman, Thran, Ishtar, Devata, and we do Japa.
[SPEAKER_00]: We have devotional practices.
[SPEAKER_00]: And we try to do our best to spiritualize our action.
[SPEAKER_00]: At least, even if we don't directly do karma yoga, at least we make sure that our lives are moral.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, first of all moral action, Dharmic then that Dharmic action is converted into Yoga, Karma Yoga.
[SPEAKER_00]: Then, he says,
[SPEAKER_00]: Bhaktas, in distinction with this, he says, this is the teaching of the Vedant things.
[SPEAKER_00]: What we are talking till now, and Siram Krishna has not yet thrown in his decision on either side.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says, in distinction, in contrast to the Vedant and the devotee, the Bhakta, says the waking state is real.
[SPEAKER_00]: dream is unreal, but the waking state is real.
[SPEAKER_00]: This world is real.
[SPEAKER_00]: We really have these bodies and these people are there.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not just an appearance in consciousness.
[SPEAKER_00]: These are all real, but real means in what sense.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says, they're all the glory of God's power.
[SPEAKER_00]: The God has created all these things sky and stars and moon and suns and mountains and oceans
[SPEAKER_00]: He's within us, again, he is outside, transcendent imminent, again, transcendent imminent.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now notice one thing, especially here, both the Advaitant approach of declaring the world to be false, and the dualist approach of holding the world to be true, are useful in God realization.
[SPEAKER_00]: They are useful, number one, they take our minds away from materialism, from worldliness and take our minds to God.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a unique how, if you take the world to be unreal, it helps you to transcend the world and focus on the reality, which is Brahman, our real nature.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you take the world to be real in the dualistic sense, then it again points our attention to the great power which is the source of the world, God has created all things.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, when we look at the glories of the world, we say God has created all things.
[SPEAKER_00]: In the Geetife you remember, studying the lower nature and higher nature, an impression starts pointing out and in the light and in the water and in the earth and in the
[SPEAKER_00]: I am the fragrance in the earth, the taste in the water and so on, the sound in space, what is he doing there?
[SPEAKER_00]: He is saying that, all these are there, they are all real and I am there in all of them.
[SPEAKER_00]: What is the difference between this and the way ordinarily people think the world to be real, ordinarily when we take the world to be real as we do in our day to day lights.
[SPEAKER_00]: We take to be the world to be real without God.
[SPEAKER_00]: God is nowhere in the equation.
[SPEAKER_00]: Here is the real world.
[SPEAKER_00]: Here I am in a real body and now I'm this little creature struggling to exist in the world and have to make my way.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's it.
[SPEAKER_00]: All this is the glory of God.
[SPEAKER_00]: God is within and outside.
[SPEAKER_00]: No, no way I'm the seeing at all.
[SPEAKER_00]: I may give as Swami Mejdan and the awareness is pointing out.
[SPEAKER_00]: At the most, I may give intellectual ascent to it, but I don't believe it really.
[SPEAKER_00]: If I believe it, I would have behaved accordingly.
[SPEAKER_00]: See, a devotee, how instantly a knowledge devotion, all of them say, solve your problem instantly.
[SPEAKER_00]: If I make an effort and say that I really, really believe in God, then really our problem is solved.
[SPEAKER_00]: Whatever happens, if God exists and I believe in God, where is my problem, the worst thing that happens, I must say that it is because of God's will, everything is God's will.
[SPEAKER_00]: And God is loving, God is good, God is always taking care of me.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it should be fine with it.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's very difficult to do that, but I should be, if I really believe in God.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, all of this is God's glory.
[SPEAKER_00]: It is real, God is real, God's glory is real, and so, I inhabit a pluralistic world where God exists, sentient beings exist, material things exist, and all of this is the
[SPEAKER_00]: My point here is understanding the material world as an appearance in consciousness helps to point out the reality, just like understanding the snake is false, helps to understand where the rope is.
[SPEAKER_00]: Understanding the world is real, and as the glory of God, that also helps in God realization.
[SPEAKER_00]: Both are helpful, it's interesting.
[SPEAKER_00]: Your world is false, helps you towards enlightenment.
[SPEAKER_00]: World is real, helps you towards enlightenment.
[SPEAKER_00]: One is on the path of knowledge,
[SPEAKER_00]: Which one one will take up depends a good deal on our which feels right to you sort of and also our tradition the path which you are following one of the beauties of Sri Ramakrishna and the Ramakrishna movement is it's so expansive and inclusive.
[SPEAKER_00]: You can throw yourself heart and soul into the path of devotion and surrender.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you find it very difficult to sign on to the concept of, you know, extra cosmic god and Advaita Vedanta seems very logical and satisfying to you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Fine.
[SPEAKER_00]: Absolutely fine.
[SPEAKER_00]: Sri Ramakrishna says, both of these will work and he goes further and says,
[SPEAKER_00]: This is the beauty of Sri Ramakrishna.
[SPEAKER_00]: Otherwise, what happens is, without that, what happens is, what has happened for the last thousand years after Shankara?
[SPEAKER_00]: If you look at the texts of, you know, Vishish Tadwaita, Dwaita Vedanta, you have enormous amounts of dialectics.
[SPEAKER_00]: Each side attacking the other, we have the truth.
[SPEAKER_00]: What you are seeing is not quite right.
[SPEAKER_00]: What did non-doerists do?
[SPEAKER_00]: Dwaitans do is, they denigrate or they say
[SPEAKER_00]: So, the dualism is the lower truth is we have a haric, yes, transactional it is true, but ultimately there is this non-dual truth, so it is the ultimate reality.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, they give a lower position to dualistic practices.
[SPEAKER_00]: Devotion is good as a stepping stone towards God Realization.
[SPEAKER_00]: Devotion is fine, it is helpful, it is useful, it prepares the mind, all of that, but ultimately you have to come to the Realization that Brahman alone is real, and the world is an appearance and so on.
[SPEAKER_00]: What the devotees do, the dualistic schools do is even worse, because there is a logical reason why they can't accept non-realism.
[SPEAKER_00]: So from their perspective, non-realism has to be false.
[SPEAKER_00]: not a load truth, it has to be false, it has to be wrong, only dualism has to be true.
[SPEAKER_00]: The dualistic schools do not have this distinction between absolute truth and relative truth, parametric and we have a haric impact, in all Hindu philosophies, only a Dwaita Vedanta talks about two levels of truth.
[SPEAKER_00]: We easily talk about absolute truth, relative truth.
[SPEAKER_00]: But remember, that's another way to use it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Devotional schools, dualistic schools, do not and they don't need it with lower truth and higher truth.
[SPEAKER_00]: In fact, it can be very damaging to dualistic worldview.
[SPEAKER_00]: Everything has to be real.
[SPEAKER_00]: So world is real, God is also real.
[SPEAKER_00]: Your body is real, this life is real as we see it.
[SPEAKER_00]: And now you must cultivate faith and devotion to that real God.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, this is the approach.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let me take a look at the comments here.
[SPEAKER_00]: Sean Lee says, Sonam Swamiji, can you please talk a little bit about image worshiping?
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, image worship is using Tell the different levels to understanding image worship.
[SPEAKER_00]: One is that it is a powerful aid.
[SPEAKER_00]: Even when you say God is formless, if you actually ask a person who's praying to God, who's formless, some kind of concept will be there in the mind, some kind of, it may not externally worship an image or an icon, but some kind of form will always be, you can't, the mind requires something to hold on to.
[SPEAKER_00]: So that became the basis of the entire technology.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's a spiritual technology.
[SPEAKER_00]: Remember, when the Hindu worships an image, it's not the image which is being worshiped.
[SPEAKER_00]: Otherwise, in the wooden task, the image of into the Ganga, when the worship is done, in the biggest festival in Bengal, Durga Puja.
[SPEAKER_00]: After five days of worship of the Divine Mother, with so much palm and ceremony and devotion, then that bill of a image is now
[SPEAKER_00]: Because one knows that it's that image, no matter how God just can have beautiful enough, it's not God.
[SPEAKER_00]: So that's the first thing.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's an aid to worshiping of God.
[SPEAKER_00]: And the mantras, if you see, you who are farmedless forgive me for worshiping you in a form.
[SPEAKER_00]: You who are all pervading, forgive me for worshiping you in a particular place.
[SPEAKER_00]: You who are beyond all speech, forgive me for worshiping you through mantras.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so on, you who own the entire universe, forgive me for offering you.
[SPEAKER_00]: And so like I'm offering all these offerings.
[SPEAKER_00]: So look at the mantras.
[SPEAKER_00]: We are absolutely clear on the presence of a transcendent man and divinity and no point does it say this clay or this stone is God.
[SPEAKER_00]: Then it doesn't matter, I can do anything with the image.
[SPEAKER_00]: It should treat it like just like another piece of stone.
[SPEAKER_00]: No, you can't.
[SPEAKER_00]: That was the swami Vivekananda's teaching to that Maharaja.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, the Maharaja, I think, in Jai Pood, probably, asked swami Vivekananda about image worship.
[SPEAKER_00]: Why should we worship images?
[SPEAKER_00]: So I'm Vivekananda pointed to a portrait of the Maharaja's father, the earlier Maharaja, and said to the minister, bring that portrait down.
[SPEAKER_00]: and he bought the portrait down and said throw it on the ground and stamp on it.
[SPEAKER_00]: The minister was shocked.
[SPEAKER_00]: And he said, of course, I can't do that.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's the portrait of his late, you know, the royal highness.
[SPEAKER_00]: But then so I'm very kind to say, what's wrong with it?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's just paper.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's just ink and paper and ink.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not the king himself.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now you give the same respect.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because the king is invoked in that picture, you have a sense of respect.
[SPEAKER_00]: Disrespecting that picture is taken as disrespecting the king or the king's father late king.
[SPEAKER_00]: Similarly, you don't treat a stone image or clay image or whatever it is an icon, just like another piece of metal or stone.
[SPEAKER_00]: You don't.
[SPEAKER_00]: Now a deeper meaning of this.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not just an aid.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is something that the Puri Shankaracharya pointed out.
[SPEAKER_00]: And for this, you need to understand.
[SPEAKER_00]: This is a real deep meaning of image worship.
[SPEAKER_00]: The Puri Shankaracharya of Puri pointed out, it's from an adhwaiti perspective.
[SPEAKER_00]: The worship of the divinity, all pervading, transcendent, immanent divinity, in and image is to correct the error that it is not brahmana.
[SPEAKER_00]: see we think it is not Brahman now I am using it as a symbol in order to as a support for meditating on Brahman all that is correct even deeper meaning of that if you go further it has to be Brahman what else is Brahman is the only reality that there is.
[SPEAKER_00]: So the error of thinking here is something that is not Brahman that is corrected by nature.
[SPEAKER_00]: I never thought of it that way
[SPEAKER_00]: If the only reality is Brahman, then anything and everything must be ultimately nothing other than Brahman, is that image other than Brahman?
[SPEAKER_00]: Of course not, the moment you say, you do not have to go to Advaith also, moment you say, my God is all pervading, then God must be in that image also.
[SPEAKER_00]: in Sengita says, do you believe that the Madhematar doctrine of the two aspects of Truth you mentioned?
[SPEAKER_00]: Subhityan Paramata Satya is what influenced Adishankara to the understanding of the two levels of reality on Vaita Vedanta, or they likely independent events?
[SPEAKER_00]: Both, see, Adishankara based his formulation of Advaita Vedanta on the Upanishads, not on Buddha's teachings and not on Nagarjuna's teachings, but there's no doubt that God
[SPEAKER_00]: the borrowed arguments sometimes terminology, especially go to part of the borrowed terminology from Buddhist philosophers.
[SPEAKER_00]: So wherever it suits their purpose, he borrows it.
[SPEAKER_00]: And there's nothing very strange.
[SPEAKER_00]: Continuously these schools were borrowing and they were, you know, they'll find Nyaaya arguments used by Shankara against the Buddhists.
[SPEAKER_00]: Buddhists arguments used by Shankara against the many icons.
[SPEAKER_00]: And Gaurapar is even more explicit.
[SPEAKER_00]: He says, these dualistic schools refute each other.
[SPEAKER_00]: We are not touched by their arguments.
[SPEAKER_00]: So each school, he says, is refuted by the other school.
[SPEAKER_00]: And they all refute each other.
[SPEAKER_00]: And they fall, all fall apart.
[SPEAKER_00]: We are the only one who's remaining standing.
[SPEAKER_00]: So if he has no compunction about using borrowing and using arguments, and every school did that at that time.
[SPEAKER_00]: That has led some scholars to say, oh, great, buddhistic influence on Godopath.
[SPEAKER_00]: But then there's a Godopathian influence on Buddhism and there's an AI influence on Buddhism.
[SPEAKER_00]: So they're mutually, because they were in continuous dialogue for a long time, one more than a thousand years, a thousand years.
[SPEAKER_00]: And that's good.
[SPEAKER_00]: It led to a flourishing of Indian philosophy.
[SPEAKER_00]: I said, there are two periods in Indian history where Indian philosophy flourished tremendously.
[SPEAKER_00]: One was the debate between the Buddhists and Hindus.
[SPEAKER_00]: For nearly 1,000 years, you find, on one side, the Hindus school is trying to defend the Atman doctrine.
[SPEAKER_00]: And as an extension, the doctrine of God against the Buddhists attacks of the no-self, emptiness doctrine.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it led to tremendous development in metaphysics, in epistemology, in logic,
[SPEAKER_00]: So that was one time when Indian philosophy developed tremendously, very rich it became because of this criticism, counter criticism, attack counter attack debate.
[SPEAKER_00]: Then the next period of flourishing of Indian philosophy was Adwaita and the post-Trunkar Adwaitans, when they faced attack from Ramanujacharya and the Vishishdha Advaitans, Madhvaacharya and the Dwaitavaadis, specially these two schools and others also and then they responded.
[SPEAKER_00]: So that led to a further development of Advaita Vedanta and a further development of Advaita Vedanta and Dishistad Vedanta.
[SPEAKER_00]: All these very subtle and highly intricate, highly sophisticated, very intellectual books, as somebody said, they have brain fryers.
[SPEAKER_00]: They'll fry your brain if you try to read them.
[SPEAKER_00]: But it developed to that extent.
[SPEAKER_00]: On the other hand, philosophy as such did not develop, did not gain anything by the interaction with the presence of Islam or Christianity, because these religions of foreign origin they refuse to engage.
[SPEAKER_00]: They were not part of the Indian milieu, you know, the Buddhists, they are very interesting.
[SPEAKER_00]: Christians and Muslims believe in God, they believe in the soul, they are much closer to dualistic Hinduism.
[SPEAKER_00]: Then say Buddhism for example, Buddhism is radically opposed to these views and it takes an entirely different approach to it.
[SPEAKER_00]: But you had close interaction with Buddhists and various Hindu schools for more than a thousand years.
[SPEAKER_00]: Whereas virtually there is no presence of Islam or Christianity in any of these debates.
[SPEAKER_00]: Christianity has been present in India for nearly 2,000 years.
[SPEAKER_00]: In a large way in the last 4,500 years, it's colonial times.
[SPEAKER_00]: But before that, the first questions came to India, from the Middle East, just after the time of Jesus Christ, one of the apostles is supposed to have come to India.
[SPEAKER_00]: But no presence at all, virtually no presence anywhere in any philosophical literature in India.
[SPEAKER_00]: One reason is they were not plugged into the same environment,
[SPEAKER_00]: you have to be Sanskrit scholars, you have to be nihilogicians, the Buddhists, Hindus, whoever they wish ever school, they used a common language, common system of debate, so they engaged each other.
[SPEAKER_00]: But these were outsiders, they didn't have that.
[SPEAKER_00]: And also, these were very exclusiveistic approaches.
[SPEAKER_00]: We have the truth, everything else is false.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's no question of engaging in debate to develop or understand, I'll get a deeper understanding of truth.
[SPEAKER_00]: And when Islam came, it became worse.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's not only we have the truth, and you do not.
[SPEAKER_00]: There's no point in engaging in debate.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you try to oppose those, I'm going to cut off your heads.
[SPEAKER_00]: And a stump on your temples and idols in whatever.
[SPEAKER_00]: So they never became part of the,
[SPEAKER_00]: with the scene, the debating scene.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, Shrinivasra as you say, the world is unreal in appearance and real in a sense.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, Ramakrishna, good, that's another way of putting it, which works of Ashta Bhakras.
[SPEAKER_00]: In the second chapter, I'll just tell you, I'll get the verse.
[SPEAKER_00]: Prakash Omenijam Rupam, Nati Riktos Biham Tataha, Yadaprakashati Vishwam Tadaham Bhasa Iva He, Light is My Essential Nature.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am not anything more than that or anything other than that.
[SPEAKER_00]: When the Universe shines, I alone shine.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, verse chapter 2, verse number 8, Girish, Swami, Medhan and this talk last Saturday was illuminating to a struck by a particular comment on one of his lines, religious belief is involuntary.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, that was a very interesting insight he gave that belief, not only religious belief, any belief.
[SPEAKER_00]: You come to the belief, you can't just decide that I'll believe.
[SPEAKER_00]: This one view is that you know, a toxic volunteerism that term, which he used.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I come to this belief, now I decide to believe in this thing.
[SPEAKER_00]: No, what you are doing is you are giving your intellectual assent to it.
[SPEAKER_00]: but you generally don't believe it, it is a difference between genuinely believing something and I'm giving your intellectual assent to it.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you genuinely believe in something, your behaviour will be affected by it.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you genuinely believe that there is a snake there, you will get scared.
[SPEAKER_00]: It would be very careful not to walk that way.
[SPEAKER_00]: You genuinely believe that there is God, your behaviour will change tremendously.
[SPEAKER_00]: Often, persons who large numbers of people who ascent, yes, we are believers in this religion or that religion, they'll behave, it doesn't change too much.
[SPEAKER_00]: But that's because they have agreed, they've declared that I am now a believer of this religion, or I agree to this kind of intellectual position.
[SPEAKER_00]: But inside, I don't really believe in it now.
[SPEAKER_00]: In my day-to-day life goes on, pretty much unaffected.
[SPEAKER_00]: that's what he means.
[SPEAKER_00]: When really Bhakti comes, belief comes, it is not your choice.
[SPEAKER_00]: You come to it.
[SPEAKER_00]: It arises in you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Krishna says, what is the role of Ishwar Pani in Hana?
[SPEAKER_00]: So that is one way in yoga.
[SPEAKER_00]: Notice, yoga is a path of meditation and samadhi.
[SPEAKER_00]: But an alternate is given by Patanjali that by Ishwar Pani in Hana, or by devotion to God, one may come to enlightenment.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, it's an alternate, Nila Vora says, does the word bithya mean illusion or one that has temporarily existence in relation to the eternal?
[SPEAKER_00]: Something that has temporarily existence in relation to the internal, and that is equal to illusion.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you don't understand that, 16th verse of second chapter, nasa to Bhagavad-gita, nasa to Vidyate Vahavu,
[SPEAKER_00]: The unreal never comes into existence and the real never goes out of existence.
[SPEAKER_00]: There is one sadhu said that is the philosophical heart of Bhagavad-gita.
[SPEAKER_00]: There he shows that which is temporary must also be necessarily false.
[SPEAKER_00]: temporary, impermanent, but the world is temporary and impermanent, everybody knows all of us know except that we just don't pay attention to it and it's important to draw our attention to the fact that everything here is temporary and that's, it helps in spiritual life really helps.
[SPEAKER_00]: But it goes further, Advaita Vedanta goes further, there's a whole analysis, it takes up, what does it mean for something as Nila Ji says?
[SPEAKER_00]: something that has temporary existence in relation to the eternal, go to a part of the stage that which did not exist earlier, that which does not exist afterwards, does not exist now also.
[SPEAKER_00]: Then what exists, a Brahman-Alonex system.
[SPEAKER_00]: that then there's a whole argument, whole set of very clear well-reasoned steps which can demonstrate.
[SPEAKER_00]: And that's the beauty about the way to be done, which takes the impermanence, the temporaryness, the transient nature of things and takes it to the level of falsity.
[SPEAKER_00]: Whereas the dualistic schools, the realistic schools, they will agree, yeah, things are impermanent.
[SPEAKER_00]: Why do they have to be false?
[SPEAKER_00]: Pudam sees consciousness or awareness whose mere reflection in the mind gives awareness to a Jeep.
[SPEAKER_00]: Isn't the consciousness self aware?
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, it is.
[SPEAKER_00]: We are all self aware right now.
[SPEAKER_00]: Bill, whatever the path of karma over, right?
[SPEAKER_00]: It's like the, I said, Swami Vivekan, the has emphasized that also.
[SPEAKER_00]: She has Sri Ram Krishna.
[SPEAKER_00]: Sri Sri Ram Krishna generally mentions meditation and devotion and knowledge.
[SPEAKER_00]: That was the traditional approach.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you look at these scriptures, always the different schools of Indian philosophy will always give karma a basic role, a foundational role.
[SPEAKER_00]: But the higher more advanced paths will be devotional or knowledge or meditation, mystical tantric something like that.
[SPEAKER_00]: And also in many cases, by karma, they will mean ritualistic karma, not our day-to-day activities, in many cases.
[SPEAKER_00]: Abhijit says, regarding the spiritual problem and solution, Ramanamachri gave the following example.
[SPEAKER_00]: Just as an ion ball comes into being separate from the mass of ion, gets fiery, in fire, retracoolstown, giving up fire, but must again be made fire to unite with the original mass.
[SPEAKER_00]: So also the cause of this separation must also, so also the cause of separation must also form the means of reunion.
[SPEAKER_00]: All right.
[SPEAKER_00]: But yes, the path by which we have apparently become separated, that's the path we must go back on.
[SPEAKER_00]: I read somewhere, somebody came to Ramana Maharsheek and asked, what's the way?
[SPEAKER_00]: And Samana Maharsheek said to him, shall we go back the way you've come?
[SPEAKER_00]: And the gentle and poor gentleman thought he was being turned away from the Asha.
[SPEAKER_00]: And he got, he actually got up to go up.
[SPEAKER_00]: No, that's not what Ramana Maharsheek meant.
[SPEAKER_00]: The way we have come out emerged, apparently, that's the way you have to trace yourself back to the source.
[SPEAKER_00]: Sangita says in contrast as the advanced bhakta in some sense also arrive at a state where the dream state feels just as real as the waking state thereby equating to to know that will never happen.
[SPEAKER_00]: The false erroneous never becomes real that will that will be delusional for the bhakta god alone is real in everything.
[SPEAKER_00]: and whether the waking or the dream, they are not, when you say bhakta says that waking is real, does not mean the waking is important to that bhakta, it is only, it is real as the glory of God, God is real, God's glory is real, dream is also a glory of God, in that sense, it is a glory of God, but dream does not become as real as waking, then it
[SPEAKER_00]: lower and higher truths and interpretations of one truth, one needs grace from God to understand appreciate such higher and lower levels, which is grace listed in Vedanta philosophy.
[SPEAKER_00]: Always grace of God is, by grace of God alone, one gets a taste for Vedanta.
[SPEAKER_00]: Priya says, how would you explain Sri Ramakrishna's devotion to divine mother and his concurrent belief in Brahman being the one ultimate reality?
[SPEAKER_00]: Not in theories, we are
[SPEAKER_00]: whether it is Sri Ramakrishna or Shankaracharya or Sri Krishna Himself, curiously enough non-dualism, dualism, they all seem to coexist happily.
[SPEAKER_00]: in the Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna, Sri Ramakrishna transits smoothly glides from devotion to Krishna to Brahman and Advaita Vedanta and back to the Divine Mother in the space of one page, because for him, there is only one ultimate reality and all of these are extraordinary and very beautiful ways of pointing out that reality.
[SPEAKER_00]: We tend to grasp the path as the reality, but the path
[SPEAKER_00]: one sadhu put it nicely, but non-dualism.
[SPEAKER_00]: Do you want Advaita Brahman or Advaita Vada?
[SPEAKER_00]: Do you want the non-dual reality or do you want the philosophy of non-dualism?
[SPEAKER_00]: Be careful what you want.
[SPEAKER_00]: If you hold on too tightly to the, I am a non-dualist and Advaita, well you'll get the philosophy of Advaita Vadam, but you won't get, all right.
[SPEAKER_00]: Let's wrap it up now.
[SPEAKER_00]: Om shanti shanti hari hiyom tatsap Sri Ramakrishna Rukarnamastu.