Verse 2
Idam jnaanam upaashritya
mama saadharmyam aagataah;
Sarge’pi nopajaayante
pralaye na vyathanti cha.
They who, having taken refuge in this
knowledge, attain to unity with Me, are neither born at the time of creation
nor are they disturbed at the time of dissolution.
Idaṁ jñānam
upāśritya
mama sādharmyam āgatāḥ.
“People have become almost Me;
they have attained My form; they have attained My permanent Eternal Abode; they
have practically become Me.
How?
Because of the knowledge which I
am going to describe to you now, they shall not be born at the time of
creation:
sargepi nopajāyante
pralaye na vyathanti ca.
People who know this secret will not be born in the beginning of creation, and they will not be dissolved into prakriti at the time of cosmic dissolution:
When the cosmic pralaya, or
dissolution, takes place, all of us are helplessly driven into the bosom
of prakriti’s three gunas.
Creation
In the process of creation and
activity as we see before our eyes, the three gunas are in a
state of disturbance. The qualities of sattva, rajas and tamas —
the properties of prakriti — are not in equal proportion, and
are not equally distributed.
Because of the preponderance of
one at the cost of another, we see varieties of things and manifold objects in
front of us.
Dissolution
At the time of dissolution, the
three gunas lie in a state of equilibrium. There is no
activity at that time, and even sattva does not operate. It is
complete darkness, as it were.
Our Beloved Swami said,
Nature presides over the destinies of all creatures. This nature is comprised of the three gunas. The Trinity represent the three gunas.
The three gunas account also for the processes of
creation, sustenance, and dissolution - “sristhi, sthithi and laya”. All the
varied experiences in the world arise from the three gunas. Man should aspire not for a long life, but for a divine
life.
In the Cosmos,
which is permeated by the divine, man should seek primarily to divinize or
deify his life by transcending the three gunas."
(Summer course discourse - 28/5/1990)
And, when one has actually divinized his life
and transcended the three gunas, what
is this creation for such a Jivanmukhta?
Jivanmukhta Sage Sivananda Himself answers,
“In reality the Jiva
or the individual soul creates this world of names and forms on account of his
own ignorance and delusion.
When he attains knowledge of the
Self by the Grace of his spiritual preceptor, he dissolves the external world
into himself and sees his own Self everywhere. He sees oneness everywhere.
He becomes struck with wonder when
he thinks of the world of duality. The world of diversity appears to him like a
mere dream and he exclaims in surprise, where has this world full of the charms
of Maya disappeared now which was glaring before my very eyes till this very
moment!”
Echoing the same amazement, Janaka, in one of the
verses in Ashtavakra Gita, cries out in ecstasy and says to Ashtavakra,
“The creation was just here, Aho.., where it has
vanished suddenly?”
(The creation was being experienced until
realization, it was here. Suddenly, before the eyes closed and opened, without
any time space identification, when a Jiva transcends the three Gunas and is in perfect equanimity, in
less than a fraction of a second, the creation disappears for him (i.e., He is
no more able to experience creation apart from Him, the pure essence, though in
physical terms, the creation may still be there)!!!
How beautifully the words of Incarnation (Swami), a realized sage (Sivananda) and another videhamukhta (Janaka), poured in entirely different phase of time, in different era, in different centuries, come together as a single garland!!!
One has to get deeper into the above lines, to experience undiluted bliss!!!
Love.
