19 Dec 2017
Shri Kartik asked:1) Can you please explain the quality of fearlessness and how it’s relevant in the spiritual path?
Swami replied:- Fearlessness is required initially as self-confidence before putting effort in the spiritual path. The monism of Shankara gives such initial kick before starting the spiritual journey. But, this alone is not sufficient because if that alone continues in you, you lose seriousness in the effort since you feel that you are already God and further effort is useless. This leads to overconfidence and subsequent ego, resulting in your downfall. Fear for the inevitable (theory of unimaginable domain is the basis of such inevitability since sin is punished in unimaginable ways also by God even if the law is escaped here) punishment for the sin must continue in your mind like a torch light throughout your spiritual life. While travelling in spiritual path, if you do sins, you will go back even behind the starting point of spiritual path. The present spiritual preachers must keep this point constantly in their minds so that people don’t start hating the spiritual path and become atheists. God will be very furious with such spiritual preachers. But, you should also not generalize this defect to all on observing a few examples. When fear is essential even for a spiritual preacher, what to speak of its necessity for an ordinary spiritual aspirant! It is always better to travel with love to God than fear as torchlight in the spiritual path. But, in 99.999% of people, fear alone acts as sufficient and efficient torchlight.
2) God is a perfect reflection of yourself - Please elaborate on this concept.
Swami replied:- God gives you the fruits in the same phase (theoretical or practical ) in which your effort exists. Almost all spiritual aspirants miss this basic nut. Everybody wants the cancelation of the punishment of his/her sin through theoretical phase like praying God, repenting in mind and words etc. The punishment is in practical phase and can be cancelled by God only when you practice the non-repetition of such sin. You desire a practical fruit from God through your theoretical step! The reason is that you doubt the practical fruit from God for your practical step involving expenditure of money, done before since there was no written agreement signed by God. Due to this reason, for safety, many people promise practical worship to God after getting practical boon from God (payment after delivery)! Due to the same reason i.e., absence of written agreement, people try to avoid this promise also! There was a case of this type in which Sai Baba demanded a specific amount of offering from a devotee, who promised the same after getting practical boon from God! The Gita says that God approaches devotee with fruit in the same phase as the devotee approaches God with sacrifice (ye yathaa maam ...). The Veda also says the same (Rupam rupam Pratirupo babhuva).
3) This question is about the sin that can possibly be accumulated by working for a business that does both good and bad deeds. For example, let’s say someone works in a soft drink company that uses pesticide-ridden water to make its products. These products are potentially harmful to customers in the long run. Now, the employee, because of the position he/she is in, cannot do anything about such a bad practice. Does it mean that he/she also shares the sin of the company? After all, this employee is an indirect (although unwilling) promoter of the crime.
Swami replied: Here, there is no will since the action is to be done in inevitable conditions (kurvannapi na lipyate- Gita). Promoter (Preraka as holder of 1/4th sin - direct doer, indirect doer as owner doing through his servant, promoter and supporter share any sin equally as said ‘kartaa kaarayitaa…’) is such person, who willingly promotes the sin. As an employee working for inevitable livelihood, he doesn’t participate in the sin since he is not willing it in his mind.
4) In theoretical phase, God should be doer and in practical phase, the individual soul/'I' should be the doer. As far I’ve understood (please correct me if I’m wrong), this is the gist of one of Your teachings. Does this not lead to problems if the person is not fully aware of the Lord's associated qualities? For example, some ignorant person may think that the idea of killing someone else is by the will of God in the theoretical phase and in the practical phase, may actually do it keeping himself as the doer.
Swami replied: Who told that God is the doer in theoretical phase? The soul is the doer in theoretical phase also. When somebody thinks to kill a person based on his individual logic and judgment, the soul is the doer in the theoretical phase (samkalpa or will). This will gives direction in the practical implementation of the will, called as action. In practical phase as well as in theoretical phase, God is only the force of will and action and not the director (implementing own will) of will or action. The powerhouse supplies current to a house. The person in the house can use it for good purposes like light, fan etc., or can use to kill somebody or even to commit suicide. You can’t file a case on powerhouse for the bad purpose used by you arguing that had the powerhouse not supplied the current, the bad purpose couldn’t have been done! Of course, you can appreciate powerhouse for using power for good purposes or you can even keep silent. People try to file case on the powerhouse (God) only to defend against their sins! God is only the force of action (mental or physical) and this is told in the Veda that God is the force of action or the bull dragging the cart (abdhnan purusham pashum). The bull is only force of action and not the director of the path of action. You are the director of the force of action and hence, you will get the fruit of that path and not the bull! Doership arises only by directorship. Directorship means the will to do a work in the direction planned by the will.
5) Please explain the following excerpt from one of Your discourses:
[Remember that the qualities (Sankalpas) generating the deeds alone are associated with the soul going to the upper world or coming from the upper world. These qualities are the links of the deeds. Thus, the chart of the qualities associated with the soul represents the chart of the deeds. The results are passed on to the soul based on the chart of these qualities only. The deed has no address in the soul if it is done without the quality and this point is well explained in the Gita (Kurvannapi na lipyate). The results of the deeds will not touch such a Divine soul.]
Swami replied:- The meaning of this statement is that the soul always carries on the list of deeds done by it in terms of the list of proportional ratios of three qualities (Good Sattvam and bad Rajas and Tamas) used in each deed. This ratio reflects the entire deed indirectly. Since reward or punishment is for the deed done provoked by its related qualities, rewards and punishments can be directly linked to the ratios of these three qualities that provoked to do the deeds. The soul doesn’t carry an audio-video cassette of each deed with it or supporting evidences. Already, the audio-video cassette is preserved by the deity called Chitragupta (Chitragupta means preserver of the live pictures of all deeds of all the souls to be exhibited in case some powerful divine personality is interested in verification of facts). The ratios of qualities reflect all these deeds one by one and hence, there is no need of referring again to these pictures for understanding the cases. The present courts depend on witness since such live pictures of deeds are absent. If the witness is fraud, justice can be misled! The lawyers argue cases just for money and hence may twist the logic also to win the case. Hence, there is possibility of escaping injustice here. But, in the court of God, such blunder will never happen. God (represented by Yamadharma Raja) announces the punishments directly observing these ratios of qualities of deeds exposed in the souls by the divine force. When the soul is taking birth in this world, these ratios (samskaaras) follow the soul, which are linked to the rewards and punishments. The administration of God is very simple and straight without any scope of even hairline flaws!
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