Sadhana Panchakam - Post 12

Dear All,

For each instruction, we shall delve in 2 ways, one at the normal level, depending upon the ashram at which the instruction is given by Sankara and then, for the same instruction, we will see what it means at a higher level in Spiritual sadhana, which is applicable  universally, irrespective of the Asrama, irrespective of the varna in which one is.

Taking clue from the last part of the previous post which declared God as the supreme creator or the one who existed prior to creator as the Prime existence, let us delve on “Finding that God, the Primal existence”.

What is that, which needs to be found, which needs to be propitiated?

It is That One, the immutable Prime Existence, which is unseen, ungraspable, without identification, unclassifiable, without sight or hearing, hand or feet, eternal, all-pervading, omnipresent, exceedingly subtle, undecaying and which is the source of all creation conceived with name and a form. It is not the one which is adored here in the primordial world, says Kena Upanishad.  

There are five verses in Kena Upanishad declaring the above. One of them says, 

yat chakshushaa na pashyati;

yena chakshoo-gmshi pashyati;

tad eva brahma twam viddhi:

na idam yat idam upaasate

 

What cannot be seen by the eye;

But by which the eyes are able to see;

Know That alone as Brahman,

And not this which people worship here.

(The session on this upanishad given initially in 2014 and then again couple of years before, is a standalone session, truly enough to bestow realization to the one who takes up this one session as a lifetime sadhana, for lifetime nidhidhyasana)

The abstract form of the Prime Existence is designated as Brahman, one whose effulgence bursts out as creation. The effulgence cannot contradict what effulgence is. Therefore, what was alone in the beginning became effulgent in eightfold gross categories as earth, water, fire, air, mind, intellect and ego-sense and yet in distinct category as the subtle Self by which this world is upheld. 

It is the Mind, the intellect and the ego sense which lead That One seeing creation around to acknowledge as ‘I’, as ‘Existence’, as “Effulgence”.

With the above awareness, “I am verily is the creation”– “I am all that has been created.”

The Prime Existence became SAT-CHIT-ANANDA, the Pure Existence, Pure Awareness and Pure Bliss.

With such realization, one experiences presence of the Prime Existence within one's own being and concluding that in truth ‘I do nothing’ when I see, hear, touch, smell, taste, walk, sleep, breathe, speak, grasp, open or close eyes but it is the Self within that is the hearer who hears, thinker who thinks, speaker who speaks, breath who breaths and eye which sees, as mentioned in Kena Upanishad. 

In Brahadaranyaka Upanishad, when Ushasta Chakrayana asked Yajnavalkya, ‘explain to me the Brahman that is immediately present and directly perceived as the self in all things’, he was told, ‘This is the Self, which is within all things, he who breathes in with your breathing in, he who breathes out with your breathing out, he who breathes about when you breathe about, he who breathes up with your breathing up is the Self which is in all beings. 

When Ushasta Chakrayana protests that the explanation was as one might say, ‘This is a cow’ ‘This is a horse’ it was clarified further, ‘You cannot see the seer of seeing, hear the hearer of hearing, think of the thinker of thinking, understand the understander of understanding. He is the Self, which is in all things. 

Therefore, when Sankara says, ‘That (Prime Existence) should be propitiated’, it is the universal Self that is to be propitiated, rites, rituals and performance of sacrifice become subsidiary instruments.

All sessions, all satsangh, all messages, all talks on Samarpan Bhajans, are exactly focussed on this single purpose, “To know the SELF”.

Swami says,

“Embodiments of Love!

Human life is the most sacred in the entire creation of God. Daivam Maanusha Rupena (God incarnates in the form of human being). Humanness is pure, unsullied and beyond attributes. Such a sacred human life is being polluted with evil desires and thus man is bringing disrepute to human birth itself.

Jantu Naam Nara Janma Durlabham (human birth is the rarest and the noblest). It was God who created everything in the universe, right from the microcosm to macrocosm. In that case, why is it that He has attached utmost importance to human birth alone? Only man has the capacity to accomplish things which no other living being can.”

(Divine discourse -16.10.1999)

Love.