15 Aug 2014
Shri Ramanath asked:- “What is the best way to please God? What is meant by sixth sense? I think that the best effort is that type of service for which the fruit is to become the human incarnation”.
Swami replied: What best pleases somebody should be expressed by that person himself. What best pleases you need not be the best that pleases God. People generally rub their liking on God and propagate that their liking is the best path to please God and hence, everybody should follow it. Suppose you are a good singer. You will propagate that God is always pleased by only songs. You expect that everybody should believe this and promote the art of singing and in such process, you will be also engaged and benefitted. You have taken this path since God is not speaking anything represented by statues or photos. Thus, everybody is exploiting God. All this is utterly wrong because God has already spoken and His speech was recorded by the ancient sages in the name “Veda”. Therefore, the Veda is considered to be the best and first authority of spiritual knowledge. The next authority is the speech of God in Human form called as the Gita. The first authority is Shruti (the Veda) and the second authority is Smruti (the Gita). There cannot be a contradiction between these two since the same God is the author. The third authority is logical discussion (Yukti) and the fourth is experience in the world (anubhava). All these four should be present for the full validity. The third and fourth authorities are only to check the misinterpretation of the speech of God.
Let us take the Shruti, which says that neither worship, nor the issues can please God and the only way is sacrifice of money (Na karmanaa…). People tried to bring ‘no’ before money also, though it is not present in the original text. If you reject the money also by the above process, the question will come that which is to be sacrificed? When you have specifically mentioned the items like worship or issue, you should also specifically mention which is to be sacrificed if the money is also deleted along with worship and issue. This is only a misinterpretation of clever scholars to avoid the sacrifice of money because it is the most difficult point. God is the highest and so the achievement of God also will be with highest difficulty. The status of the fruit indicates the status of effort also. If you pass the IAS examination, you will get the post of Collector. If you pass group-4 examination, you will become peon. People always wish to become Collector through group 4 examination! Similarly, people want to please God through any means other than money. Money is the root of the world and even the family also. If there is no money, even your life leaves you due to hunger! The Smruti (Gita) says that you can please God by sacrificing the fruit of your hard work (Karma Phala Tyaga). It is always more difficult to sacrifice hard earned money by one’s own work than ancestral property. Thus, the Gita brings higher climax. In this way, the Gita excels the Veda. But, the Veda also excels the Gita in another way in this point. The Gita mentions the fruit of work instead of money because sometimes the fruit of work given need not be money always but also kind. It is cash or kind. The Veda mentions cash only because any kind can be procured by cash. If you donate in kind, that may not be essential for the receiver. Then the receiver has to sell that kind for half rate and procure the kind of his requirement reduced to half quantity only. In this point, the Veda excels the Gita. Of course for a saint, who does not possess any cash or kind can sacrifice the work alone to God (Karma samnyasa). The third authority is logic. Money is proved as the most valuable item in this world by the very behavior of the human beings, who try to escape from such sacrifice. This is also supported by the worldly observation that with the help of money everything in the world can be attained and hence, it is highest. The last authority, which is experience, proves this also that finally you sacrifice all your money and property to your issues only since your maximum love is always on your issues.
Therefore, the best service is the sacrifice of the thing on which your love is the highest. There may be certain items which are little higher than money or sometimes in some cases money may be higher than those items also. In any case, God tests your love to Him by aspiring your sacrifice of your highest item only. I will illustrate this point with an example. Generally, life or issue may be higher than the money. But, in the case of a specific greedy person, money may be higher than even those two. Whatever may be the case, the test involves the sacrifice of the highest to prove that God is highest for you. Gopikas sacrificed all the items of the highest level. They sacrificed their money which is milk, curd and butter to the Lord even neglecting their children. They sacrificed their lives also by jumping in to fire on hearing that Krishna left this earth. The story of the Bhagvatam gave salvation to Parikshit, which alone was heard in the last seven days. It is said that the Bhagavatam is the final test of the scholars in spiritual knowledge since it shows the total practical sacrifice (vidyaavataam bhagavate parikshaa).
The best service is understood in the above manner. But, God is unimaginable as per the Veda (Yasyaamatam... Neti Neti... etc.) and the Gita (Maamtuveda na kashchana). Hence, the unimaginable God cannot be served by anyway. Such unimaginable God enters a human body as per the Veda (Tadanupravishya...) and as per the Gita (ManusheemTanum...). There is no other way than this (Naanyah Panthaah- Veda). You want to reward a poet for his best poetry. Poetry is the quality of life and awareness. But, you are garlanding the external inert body of the poet through which the inner awareness is pleased. Awareness also pervades the entire body and gets identified with it and hence, the awareness is directly garlanded here. In the human incarnation, God pervades not only the internal soul but also the external body (antar bahishcha - Veda). Since the external body is also pervaded by God, the finger of the body of Krishna could lift the hill and this unimaginable event indicates the presence of the unimaginable God in the finger also. Hence, the service rendered to the external medium of the God is received by the God in the medium. Some people misinterpret this concept by saying that the Veda says that God exists in every item of the universe (Eeshaavaasyam - Veda). The word ‘vaasyam’ in the Veda means the verb in the future tense and not the verb in past tense. Vaasyam means that any item in the world can be pervaded by God. It does not mean that every item is already pervaded by God. The Gita clearly presents this concept by saying that everything exists in Him but He does not exist in anything here (Natvaham Teshu Te Mayi) and also by saying that He is beyond all these things of the world (maamebhyah para mavyayam). The entry of God into human being is also clearly mentioned in the Gita and the main purpose is to give right direction through the spiritual knowledge to the spiritual aspirants. The right direction will always take you to the right goal. This is the reason why the post of Director is highest in any institution. This right direction becomes more important in the confusing atmosphere due to wrong directions given by false human incarnations. Several false human incarnations emerge with some false spiritual knowledge since the spiritual knowledge is given as correct identification of the human incarnation. Hence, catching the right spiritual preacher is the essence of the spiritual effort.
The sixth sense raised by you is nothing but the flash of knowledge given by God, who is the sixth element. The whole creation including human beings is made of five elements only. The matter is represented by three elements as earth, water and air (solid, liquid and gaseous states). Agni represents the visible energy. Akasha or space represents the invisible energy. Thus, creation is made of matter and energy represented by the five elements. Even the human being or awareness is only a specific work form of inert energy functioning in a specific system called brain and nervous system. All the creation including living beings is made of five elements only. The sixth element is God or the Creator, who is beyond these five elements. The sixth sense means the sense or a flash of idea, which is beyond the scope of your imagination, from God, the sixth element.
The human being is selected by God to become the human incarnation for a specific programme that benefits the welfare of the creation. Becoming human incarnation is only the beginning of the fruit and not the end of the fruit. There is a saying that the cleaning of the house is not the end of the festival! After becoming human incarnation, the human component should maintain the God throughout its life resisting the infection of ego induced by others through praise. Parashurama failed and got insulted by the exit of God due to the infection of ego. After killing all the kings on this earth, he thought that he is God. Rama maintained God throughout his life and hence, is called as complete incarnation (Purnaavataara). When sages praised him as God, Rama replied “I don’t know what you say. I know that I am only a human being as son of Dasharatha (Atmaanam Maanusham Manye)”. The human component in human incarnation should be very careful and should constantly think that he is only a human being and not the God. Such thinking saves the human component of the human incarnation. But, this concept should not be taken by a devotee serving the human incarnation. The devotee must take the human incarnation as God in toto and such belief alone saves the devotee. It is very difficult for the devotee to maintain this faith especially after knowing the truth of human component of the human incarnation. The real and strong faith is only that which is maintained in the condition of high difficulty. The Veda says that God after entering a specific human being selected by Him remains in His original form as unimaginable God and also is identified with the human being so that the human being also becomes unimaginable God for all practical purposes (satcha tyatcha abhavat). The human component in the human incarnation should think that the unimaginable God is separately remaining in His original unimaginable nature and hence, the imaginable human being is totally different from the unimaginable God (dvaita). The devoted human being should think that the human component of the human incarnation is internally and externally pervaded by God with full identification and hence, the human component is the unimaginable God Himself for all practical purposes exhibiting the divine unimaginable nature (advaita).
★ ★ ★ ★ ★