Creation of the Universe - Part 20

Dear All,

Continuing with panchadasi 6th chapter!

Brahmādyāḥ stamba paryantāḥ prāṇino’tra jaḍā api, uttamā dhama bhāvena vartante paṭa citra vat (5).

All kinds of things can be seen in the picture. There are human beings, gods, mountains, flowing rivers, sky, shining stars, the sun and the moon. Actually, they are not there.

There is only ink, yet we can see a beautiful face, a beautiful landscape, how the rising sun looks in the picture. We enjoy it. 

The rising sun is not there; only the ink is there, but it looks like the rising sun.

In a similar manner, all the wonders in creation, right from the creative principle of Brahma down to the lowest green grass in the meadow and a particle of sand—right from that supreme creative principle down to the littlest atom in the world are presented in this picture which Brahman has painted over itself.

Citrārpita manuṣyāṇāṁ vastrā bhāsāḥ pṛthak pṛthak, citrā dhāreṇa vastreṇa sadṛśā iva kalpitāḥ (6).

Pure canvas and drawings on the canvas

·  People painted in a picture wear different types of clothing. We can see someone tying their cloth in one way, and another person dressing himself or herself in another way.

·Varieties of dress, presentations, and embellishments are seen on the various people in the picture. Do we not see them?

·  We cannot take our eyes away from a beautiful painted picture.

Are we gazing at the ink? Are we gazing at the cloth?

The beauty of the presentation is what attracts the mind, but where does that beauty arise? Where does it lie?

·       What is it that attracts us in a painted picture?

·       Is it the cloth that attracts us?

·       Is it the starch that attracts us?

·       Is it the outline of ink that attracts us, or is it the colors of the ink?

We all know this much that the ink cannot attract us, nor can the outline of the pencil sketch, nor can the starch or the cloth.

What else is there in the picture which attracts our attention and stuns us, practically?

White screen and motion picture on the screen in a movie hall

Exactly all the points mentioned with respect to the pure canvas and drawings above, apply to the motion picture on the movie hall.

Only difference is that instead of ink used in drawings, it is the projector which throws up a ray of light which carries the movie and flashes the same on the white screen and then we see various movements on the screen just like we see various drawings on canvas.

What is it that attracts us in a movie?

·       Is it the pure white screen that attracts us?

·     Is it the ray of light focused on the screen that attracts    us?

·  Is it the various characters moving, singing, dancing, laughing, crying, fighting, Romancing that attracts us?

Now, for the reality!

·     The cloth does not even know that there is ink on it, and it does not see the beauty.

·    The movie screen does not know various characters and various emotions played on it through the projector.

Exactly this is what happens when we are caught up in the samsara.

We lose sight of the substratum which is God/ Brahman/ Pure consciousness (pure canvas), we are unaware of His plans for creating this universe, We are unaware of the energy (ink) which He himself has filled up through Himself and Himself.

Instead, we are so engrossed with the objects created (the final picture on the canvas, the moving characters on the movie screen) that we  are not able to appreciate that only constant, everlasting existence is God/ Pure consciousness (pure canvas or white screen in the move hall) and all other  things that have appeared subsequently on the canvas are just super impositions on the screen which can be erased any time.

All the picture on the movie screen are mere super imposition on the screen, appearing on the screen when the projector is switched on, they come, they act and they appear to be real.

However, when the projector is switched off, only the screen remains.

Today's learning

Once we seriously try and start re-tracing from the beautiful pictures which we see on the picture screen or on the pure canvas, we can retrace to the ink, then to the outer line of the object and then, at last, only the pure canvas remains, devoid of any outline, any ink!!

Similarly, once we seriously try and start re-tracing from various objects/ human beings/ nature that we see in this world, we can retrace to the cosmic mind of Iswara which planned / inked all such objects, then from the cosmic mind of Iswara, we can retrace to the unmanifest Iswara/ God and from Iswara, we can re trace to the pure canvas prior to starch, the PURUSHOTTAMA prior to purusha and prakriti,  the ONE who is beyond manifest (hiranya garbha) and unmanifest (Iswara) and settle in HIM, THE SUPREME GOD!

Love.