03 Jan 2014
[Smt. Devi asked: “We are naturally attracted towards the world from birth and not so towards God. My state is with fear for the worldly whirlpool and like that of a person with two legs in two boats. Please guide us on this”. Given below is Shri Swami’s response.]
The reason for the natural induction of the world is the associated world around us from the birth and due to this, our mind is naturally and constantly receiving the information of the world, which is its knowledge. After this state of knowledge, we develop attraction to certain items or rejection to certain other items or neutrality to some other items. The first basic stage for all these three attitudes is only the knowledge of the object that is received by the mind as information. In the case of the unimaginable God, this basic step is naturally absent. Even if some information of God is received by our mind, God is not a visual imaginable item like many items of the world. The visual contact helps a lot in developing the attitude. The human incarnation is visual but due to lot of inconvenience and loss, this concept is very much conveniently buried so far by the spiritual aspirants. The importance of this concept is so much neglected that some people even totally oppose the possibility of this concept. Only energetic incarnations of God of the upper world are accepted, which are not visual at all.
Some items of the creation like fire, infinite cosmic energy, carved stones, etc., were accepted, which are unfortunately inert. These inert items compete with other inert items of the world only and do not cause much inconvenience and loss. These people do not mind to accept even the unimaginable God since such God does not cause even a trace inconvenience. They have stressed on the Brahmasutras and the Upanishads, which have dealt with God of no inconvenience. They did not mind to stress on the Gita also, which deals with the importance of human incarnation as God only since such God happens to be the past human incarnation, which can be again represented by inert photos and statues. Thus, the actual concept of contemporary human incarnation, which comes in every generation to avoid partiality to one generation only, is buried very deeply. Based on this path, even the three great epics were given importance, which deal only with past human incarnations (Rama and Krishna). The other Puranaas were also given importance since they deal with the unavailable energetic incarnations. This is done mainly by the priest-scholars, who are put to loss in competition with the human incarnation. The fruit of work offered by you comes to them in worshipping the inert representative models of God. Even today, you find some priests totally opposing the concept of human incarnation. The background is very pitiable and the outcome has affected the spiritual path since it provides only wrong information about God. For this purpose only, God becomes the visual object by expressing Himself in human form and provides the right complete knowledge of God as Satguru in every generation. After the exit of the human incarnation, again these scholars misinterpret the scripture like the Gita given by God. However, God, not minding His personal benefits (dakshinas), excuses these priests since such methods of worship help the development of theoretical devotion, which is the source for practice.
Therefore, knowledge (Jnana Yoga) is the primary step. The subsequently generated state is the attraction to the object understood by the first state and is called as devotion or Bhakti Yoga. The final step is the involvement in the activities related to the object (Karma Yoga). These three states are common in any object whether it is the worldly item or God. These three states are valid in the case of the attraction only. Sometimes rejection also may take place as in the case of some worldly items or as the case of demons due to ego and jealousy in the case of God. Sometimes neutrality may result if the worldly item is felt useless and God also on the same reason. Even the attraction is generally impure since selfish benefit or protection from fear happens to be the main basis here. You are attracted to a worldly bond also since it gives happiness or protection to you. Same is the case with God also. The pure attraction is based on the point that you are serving the bond to make it happy without any selfishness. Yajnavalkya says that every attracting worldly bond is only based on selfishness and not sacrifice (Aaatmanah kaamaaya). Therefore, you have to analyze even this attraction, which you feel great! The worldly information is naturally injected into your mind without any effort like the sugar from the food. The knowledge of God is to be injected by you with effort after selecting the proper medicine by analysis and guidance from Satguru. Therefore, Jnana Yoga is the most important field whether it is world or God and Shankara says that once the correct Jnana Yoga is received by you from Satguru, the Bhakthi Yoga and Karma Yoga are natural subsequent steps generated by the force of knowledge. The Gita also says that nothing is more sacred than knowledge (Nahi Jnanena…) and that you will cross all the sin by Jnana that generates spontaneously the other two steps (Sarvam Jnana Plavenaiva…). The Guru Gita says that Satguru, the generator of this true knowledge is everything since the whole process of salvation takes place by His grace in generating the true knowledge. Some feel that God or Satguru, if pleased, will take care of everything irrespective of the knowledge. This is not correct since in such case the impartial God has to save everybody. The guidance given by Satguru should generate the devotion and practice, which will save you. The subsequent two steps come under your effort. In this effort, the intermediate state in which both God and world are in your contact is inevitable. In this state only, you are putting your two legs on the two boats as long as the two boats travel side by side with equal speed. If any disturbance in the river comes, you have to put both the legs in one boat. The boat chosen by you decides your fate. The disturbance is the final test and has to come one day or other like the final examination in the case of a student.
The fruit is always involved with the practical sacrifice (Karma Yoga) and theory (Jnana Yoga and Bhakthi Yoga) is only respected as the generator and promoter of the practice. This is a common point in both worldly matters and spiritual matters. In the Ramayanam, the sacrifice of work by participating in the war, which shows the readiness even to sacrifice life for the sake of Lord, is seen. This shows the total lack of selfishness for the sake of Lord. Apart from this, total surrender to the selfishness of the Lord is also required. Participation in the war is for the Lord’s work, which is generally for the welfare of the world. Thus, killing Ravana is for protection of justice in the world. Rama twisted this war as selfish work by saying that if Sita is returned, He will go back allowing the world to suffer with Ravana. Hanuman did not drop from the war for such selfishness of the Lord. Hence, you have to feel that the Lord is more important than the world. In the Bharatam, Arjuna sacrificed the war for the sake of his elders, thinking that the war is the selfish work personally. When Krishna explained that the war is not the personal work of Arjuna, since it is the work of Lord to establish justice for the welfare of the world, Arjuna participated in the war. Here, the Lord did not bring His selfishness in the war. Therefore, Hanuman, dedicated to Lord even though the Lord’s work is shown as selfishness of the Lord, is greater than Arjuna, who is dedicated to the Lord’s work as the work for the welfare of the world without any selfishness of the Lord. Therefore, Hanuman succeeded in the spiritual field more than Arjuna. In the above two epics, sacrifice of work (Karma Sanyasa) for the Lord is explained. Even though Arjuna sacrificed the bonds with his elders for the sake of the Lord, later on, he could not sacrifice his bond with his son and was prepared to sacrifice Lord’s work (war) due to the death of his son. Hanuman sacrificed even His mother and came down for the Lord. Hence, the sacrifice is very subtle to withstand the tests. In the Bhagavatam, Gopikas stand for the total sacrifice for which no test is required. All the three strong bonds (Ishanas) represented by husbands (Daareshana), children (Putreshana) and butter (Dhaneshana) were sacrificed for the Lord. The sacrifice is perfectly complete because Gopikas say that they were completely filled with the memory of Krishna, so that no word of Uddhava can enter them due to lack of any trace of space in them. They also sacrificed their bond with their lives by jumping into fire on hearing the departure of the Lord. Hanuman was made God (Brahma), which is the equal position. Gopikas were kept by God on His head where God becomes their servant. Such higher position than highest is achieved by Gopikas, who are actually the sages constantly travelling in Jnana Yoga for births together. The complete clarity through Jnana Yoga is very much essential to select the proper direction of the practice and to achieve any position. Hence, the purity and the level of attraction must be also kept in mind.
★ ★ ★ ★ ★