25 Jul 2010
[Guru Purnima Day Afternoon Message: Some devotees told about their visit to a sacred place called Tripurantakam. Swami gave the following message.]
The word Tripurantakam means God, who destroyed the three bodies. The gross body or sthula shariram is made of the inert five elements. The second body is the subtle body or sukshma shariram made of the vibrations of pure awareness. These vibrations are thoughts or feelings, which can be classified into three main categories called as trigunas or the three qualities i.e. sattvam, rajas and tamas. The third body is the causal body or karana shariram, which is made of pure awareness without vibrations. The subtle body is called as jeeva and the causal body is called as atman. The subtle body cannot exist without the causal body just like the golden pot cannot exist without gold. The gold can exist as a lump without the pot. Similarly, the atman can exist without jeeva. Infact, the advaita philosophy gives stress on the achievement of atman by eradicating jeeva. In this state, the pure awareness is left over without vibrations like a water pond remaining without waves. This is the state of sthita prajna as explained in the Gita. This achievement is called as the attainment of soul or atma yoga, by which you can be relieved from the worldly worries. This atma yoga is not the attainment of God. The attainment of God is Paramatma yoga or Bramha yoga. The soul is an imaginable item of creation, which is a specific work form of inert energy functioning in a specific machine called nervous system. God is unimaginable being beyond the space. Therefore, the soul or atman is also an item of creation only. If the soul is really eternal without birth and death, Lord Krishna could not have created certain individuals and cows which were taken away by Bramha for one year.
An eternal object cannot be created again. When a cow or an individual is created, the soul in it is also created. Ofcourse, the soul is said to be eternal with respect to the gross body. Such eternality is only relative and not absolute. In the Gita, the eternality of soul is mentioned with respect to the gross body only and it is not mentioned as absolute (Na hanyate hanyamane sharire…). It means that even though the gross body is destroyed, the soul is not destroyed. The constancy of soul is thus with reference to the gross body only. Therefore, all the three bodies are created, controlled and destroyed by God. The Veda says that God is controller of the souls (Atmeshwaram…). That which has birth and is controlled, must be also destroyed. Infact, the Gita says that the soul is destroyed and is created everyday (Atha chainam…). The soul taken as the basic inert energy remains as eternal, but even this eternality is relative only since the inert energy is also created by God as the first item of creation in the form of space.
Science says that space bends along the boundaries of the article and if space is nothing, it cannot bend. If something bends, it must be something existing only and not the non-existent nothing. The soul, taken as specific work form of energy, disappears everyday in the deep sleep and appears again after the deep sleep. Thus, the soul viewed as work form of energy is born and destroyed everyday. The soul viewed as the basic inert energy was born in the beginning of the creation and can disappear at anytime by the will of God. Thus, the soul viewed in any form is not absolutely eternal. The soul is one of the three bodies and the word Tripurantakam means that the soul is not God and the soul has birth and death. This is the concept in the word ‘Tripurantakam’. If the concept is known, the pilgrimage is not necessary.
Different Ways of Worship
God is worshipped in two ways. The first way is the direct worship of God when He comes down in human form. The second way of worship of God is the worship of statues and photos, which are the representative models of God. The first way is direct high form of worship. The second way is the indirect low form of worship. In any type of worship, if selfishness is absent and if the worship is the service without any selfish desire, such worship is pure worship. If the worship is with a desire, it is impure worship. Blessed souls worship God in human form with absolute purity. Hanuman worshipped Rama and Gopikas worshipped Krishna in this way of high form of pure worship. If you worship statues and photos of God with desire, such worship is low form and impure also. In this low impure worship, the fruits of your service do not reach God and reach the undeserving priests. If the human form of God is not available, you should worship deserving devotees with pure service. God is more pleased in this way, because God loves His deserving devotees more than Himself.
Ramakrishna Paramahamsa worshipped the statue of Kaali, but without any selfish desire. By this way, he is advising the people, who are doing the low form of worship to make it at least pure. The pure low form of worship is certainly better than the impure low form of worship.
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