Yoga Vasishta - Post 37

The enlightened Lila said: O Goddess, kindly enlighten me concerning death: is it pleasant or unpleasant, and what happens after death?

 

Sarasvati said: There are three types of human beings, my dear: the fool, one who is practicing concentration and meditation, and the yogi (or intelligent one). The two latter types of human beings abandon the body by the practice 'of the yoga of concentration and meditation and depart at their sweet will and pleasure. 

 

But, the fool who has not practiced concentration or meditation, being at the mercy of forces outside himself, experiences great anguish at the approach of death.

 

He wishes to express his suffering, but is unable to do so. Gradually, his senses lose their power; and he is unable even to think. Therefore he sinks in unwisdom and ignorance.  

 

When there is cessation of the flow of the life­ breath, the consciousness of the individual becomes utterly passive. Please remember, O Lila, that consciousness is pure, eternal and infinite: it does not arise nor cease to be. It is ever there in the moving and unmoving creatures, in the sky, on the mountain and in fire and air. 

 

When life­ breath ceases, the body is said to be 'dead' or 'inert'. The life ­breath returns to its source—air—and consciousness freed from memory and tendencies remains as the self.

 

After a momentary lapse of consciousness, the jiva begins to fancy that it sees another body, another world and another life­span.

 

O Lila, there are six categories of such 'departed souls': bad, worse and worst sinners; good, better, best of virtuous ones. Of course, there are sub­divisions among these, too. 

 

(In the case of some of the worst sinners, the momentary lapse of consciousness may last a considerable time.)

 

The worst among the sinners undergo terrible sufferings in hell and then are born in countless living species, before they see the end of their agony. They might even exist as trees for a long time.

 

The middling among sinners also suffer lapse of consciousness for a considerable time; and then are born as worms and animals.

 

The light sinners are soon reborn as human beings.

 

The best among the righteous ascend to heaven and enjoy life there. Later they are born in good and affluent families on earth.

 

The middling among the righteous go to the region of the celestials, and return to the earth as children of brahmanas, etc.

 

Even the righteous among the departed ones, after enjoying such heavenly pleasures, have to pass through the realms of the demigods to suffer the consequences of the iniquities they might have committed.

SARASVATI continued:

All these departed souls experience within themselves the fruition of their own past actions. At first there is the notion 'I am dead', and then 'I am being carried away  by the messengers of the god of death'. 

The righteous among them fancy that they are taken to heaven; and the ordinary sinners fancy that they are standing in the  court of the god of death where, with the help of Chitragupta (the hidden record of one's deeds), they are being tried and judged for their past life. 

Love

 

Yoga Vasishta - Post 36

Only one who has arrived at wisdom can ascend to the ethereal realms, O Lila, not others. This Lila does not possess such wisdom; hence, she only fancied that she had reached the city where her husband dwelt.

 

The enlightened Lila said:

 

Let that be as you say, O Goddess. But, please tell me: how did the objects acquire their characteristics—like heat in fire, coolness in ice, solidity of earth? How did  the world order (niyati) first arise, as also birth and death?

 

Sarasvati said:

 

Dear one, during the cosmic dissolution, the entire universe having disappeared, only the infinite Brahman remains in peace. This infinite being of the nature of  consciousness feels 'I am' and then 'I am an atom of light'. 

 

Thus it experiences the truth of that statement within itself. It also fancies the existence within itself of the  diverse creatures: and since its nature is pure and absolute consciousness, that fanciful creation appears to be a real creation, with objects of diverse characteristics in  strict accord with the fancy of the infinite consciousness.

 

Whatever, wherever and however was conceived or fancied by the infinite consciousness during that first creation, all that has remained there and in that manner and  with those characteristics even now. Thus was a definite order brought into being here.

 

In fact, this order is inherent in infinite consciousness. All these objects and their characteristics were potentially present in it even during the cosmic dissolution: into  what else could they dissolve? 

 

Moreover, how can something become nothing? Gold that appears as bracelet cannot become formless entirely.

 

Thus, although all the elements of this creation are utter emptiness, yet whatever element was conceived of in the beginning with whatever characteristic, such order has  persisted until now. All this is only from the relative point of view: for, the universe has not been created at all, and whatever is, is the infinite consciousness and naught  else. It is the nature of appearance to appear to be real, even though it is unreal.

 

Such is the order (niyati) in the universe, that nothing until now has been able to alter it. It was the infinite consciousness itself that thought of all these elements within itself and it experienced them within itself, and that experience appears to have materialised. 

 

Continued.. 

 

Love

 

 

Yoga Vasishta - Post 35

Vasishta continued:

O Rama, the second Lila who had obtain husband the king was. The girl thereupon flew away with her mother.

 

First, they passed through the region of the clouds, then they passed through the region of air. Beyond that they went through the orbit of the sun into the starry heaven. 

 

They proceeded still further to the realms of Brahma the creator, Vishnu, and Siva, and after all that into the summit of the universe. They were able to do all this even as the coolness of ice is able to radiate from the ice­jar without breaking it. Of course, Lila who had an ethereal body composed of materialised thought, experienced all this within herself.

 

Passing beyond even this universe, Lila crossed over the oceans and other elements that envelop this universe, and entered into the infinite consciousness. In that infinite consciousness there are countless universes which do not know of one another's existence.

 

Lila entered one of those universes in which lay the body of king Padma covered with a heap of flowers. She again passed through the regions of the gods (Brahma, etc.), entered the city and the palace in which the body lay.

 

But, alas, when she looked around she could not see her daughter—who had disappeared mysteriously. 

 

She recognized the king as her husband and thought that having died a warrior's glorious death on the battlefield he had ascended to the hero's heaven. She thought "By the grace of Sarasvati, I have physically reached this place. I am the most blessed among persons." She began to fan the king's body.

 

She could not go in her own physical body to the new realm because light cannot co­exist with darkness, and as long as there is in oneself the blind notion of ignorance, wisdom does not arise. When the wisdom concerning one's ethereal body arises, the physical body ceases to be recognized as true. 

 

This is the fruit of the boon that I granted her. The recipient of the boon thinks, "Just as you have made me think by your boon, so I am". Therefore, she thinks she has reached her husband's abode in her physical body.

 

One may ignorantly see a snake in the rope; but the rope cannot behave like a snake.

 

Love.