Video 83

The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna read by Swami Atmajnanananda (12/31/21)

foreign [Music] your words are like nectar bringing life to squirt souls they're praised by poets and removal sin they are auspicious to hear wonderful and exalted those who spread these words throughout the world are truly giving souls welcome everyone and happy new years to everyone we are uh reading from the chapter of the gospel of israel krishna the master and m it is friday september 7th 1883 and we're on page 285. suramar krishna i'm sorry is sunday september 9th 1883 and srama krishna was in the room with rakal m and rotten was somebody who worked in jadhou malik's garden house was very devoted to srama krishna and they were talking about some theft that took place okay so ceramic krishna is speaking there was once a goldsmith whose tongue suddenly turned up and stuck to his palate he looked like a man in samadhi he became completely inert and remained so a long time people came to worship him after several years his tongue suddenly returned to its natural position and he became conscious of things as before so we went back to his work as a goldsmith or left these are physical things and have nothing to do with god there was a man who knew 82 postures and talked big about yoga samadhi but inwardly he was drawn to woman in gold once he found a banknote worth several thousand rupees he could not resist the temptation and swallowed it thinking he would get it out somehow later on the note was got out of him all right but he was sent to jail for three years in my guilelessness i used to think that the man had made great spiritual progress really i say it upon my word now this is interesting because uh we know that srama krishna had this ability to judge people and he could look and look inside their hearts and their minds and know everything that was going on now we have a simple case where he said i was so guideless that i took this man to be a great spiritual soul so sometimes he he was back in in that balaclava just in that mood of a child where he's not thinking too much about things very innocent and guileless other times he has that that vision so because people were asking we were we were all wondering about the problem so highly and some others also and then afterwards that they seem to be a disappointment to people at least from our point of view that way so he had a human mind but he had this this uh spiritual insight that human ordinary people don't have a combination is very hard to understand how sometimes he could just like here he said really mairiwochi really upon my word that i took him to be a great soul and he was just a fake so sometimes we see just that simplicity in guylessness and other times that sharp division to be able to know exactly what a person is thinking what their present and past and future are and everything else funny come he always spoke about that the avatar being this this combination of of the human and divine that the avatar has a human body has a human mind and the human emotions and everything else and at the same time they represent a completely different class of individual mahindra of sinti once gave ramallah five rupees ramallah told me about it after he had gone i asked him what the gift was for and ramla said that it was meant for me i thought it might enable me to pay off some of my debt for milk see he was a priest and then kali temple and i think he got seven rupees a month something like that some of it he kept aside we find out later for holy mother and if he needed anything extra it had to be paid for somehow so he had a little bit of debt so even he wasn't completely free of having to worry about these things a little bit i thought it might enable me to pay off some of my debt for milk that night i went to bed and if you believe me i suddenly woke up with the pain i felt as if a cat was scratching inside my chest he used to get these sensations huh sometimes when he was longing for god it was like this sweat towel being being dried when we squeezed it and everything and when it was something like this it would be like the clawing of a cat a terrible thing i'd once went to ramla and asked him for whom did mahendra give this money was it for your aunt that means holy mother he never never referred the holy mother by her name that this was a tradition that it was held to be a little bit disrespectful to use the actual name for people that uh that we have great respect for yeah so uh totopori he never used the name totopuri it was always nanka the naked one and for holy mother always ramallah's aunt and so this one way that shows this great regard he had for holy mother for whom did mahendra give this money was it for your end no said ramla it is meant for you i said to him go and return the money at once or i shall have no peace of mind ramallah returned the money early in the morning and i felt relieved this was something that uh was a literal manifestation of a mood this we there were certain things that tucker had this that he couldn't touch money that he couldn't save anything that he couldn't worry about the future different things like that that manifested in in in his physical body even so we know with money if he touched it that it would be like this the type of fish this uh horn stinging fish something like that what is it called like this portuguese man of war huh they have in florida sometimes huh blowfish something anyhow it's very painful type of stinky thing so these things would actually happen in physical things and uh there's so many instances where if he if he took something unknowingly somebody gave him something for later and without thinking he put it in his pocket and started walking and he would start going here and there and without knowing why or how he would find himself walking towards the ganges ready to drown himself and he said what is happening to me then he would remember that he'd taken something and then so he he would throw it away or give it back something like that so this is an instance where it shows that he's not fully dependent on the divine mother if he's saving something for the future if he's worried about what will happen that pay off the debt anything like that so it wasn't just that he took this resolve in his mind that he wouldn't do these things if he did it even unconsciously the body would react this thing with money you know swamiji narendra he tested him he put a little coin under his under his mat on his bed and to see what would happen taco said now what is this immediately he felt it and he looked and saw oh you're testing me so uh it's very odd that we we don't find this phenomenon and and i don't know better than anybody other than shirley krishna how these things happen so tangibly and literally in in his life with the physical reaction to things that we normally take to be a mental reaction okay i took it by mistake i feel bad something but he actually hold bollywood would have some reaction to it well the rich man came here and said to me sir you must do something so that i may win my lawsuit i've heard of your reputation and so i have come here my dear sir i said to him you've made a mistake i'm not the person you were looking for is your man this is we met him a couple of sessions ago there was a little description of him he was a married man with his family children and everything and decided that he wanted to become the sadhu and i wasn't so honest and earned money by uh professing to cure people and and do rituals and tantric things and everything so tucker knew him he would come and visit sometime they had some type of relationship but tucker knew that the man was a little bit of a cheat that he wasn't so genuine and so if anybody came uh because there was a reputation that saudis could heal people and that they could practice magical things and you could win your lawsuits and all of that and of course takwork wouldn't even imagine these things so he would always send them to achala a true devotee of god does not care for such things as wealth or health now what about health do we not care about health we read so many times and unless the body is in good physical shape how can we practice meditation and everything else it means we shouldn't be overly obsessed with it that we we do whatever we have to try to remain healthy and if we're not healthy that we accept it this is our karma or however we understand it we shouldn't be overly concerned money we don't want to find ourselves out on the street we have to be sensible but to to just try to accumulate money or have that is the goal of life then we're missing the whole point the true devotee of god does not care for such things as wealth or health he thinks why should i practice spiritual austerities for creature comforts money or name and fame these are all impermanent they last only a day or two this this really is a question of of priorities in life sometimes we we just lose our perspective on things and and constantly worry about uh our situation in life and what will happen with this and what will happen with that and we we forget this life is going to go just like that and whatever we have we we are we buy some new thing we get a new car and everything we take such good care of it we forget five or ten years it's going to be dented and old and and we won't care for it we'll we can't wait to get rid of it the same thing was even with his body the same thing so we we have to have a different perspective in spiritual life that uh there's a goal that has nothing to do with any of these things these things are all ephemeral they they occupy the mind they make us attached to things they make us worry about things they give us anxiety and it's impossible to practice spiritual life they're all signs of of not having the ultimate goal knowing what the goal in life is and of not having a spirit of dependence on god we have this real dependence on god we don't worry about the future we do it what's necessary to try to uh eliminate you know all the possible tragedies that will take place in everything but other than that whatever comes we accept and we accept it as will of god or the grace of god whatever it is and we're happy we're content otherwise there's no contentment there's no contentment in life when the mind is is all busy and concerned about our situation or financial situation health situation social situation all of these things these are all just so fleeting and we we look back at how we worried about things in the past and how everything took care of itself we we were ourselves to death and then we can't enjoy anything so this is a really a real question of if we want to be spiritual aspirants we have to really think about what are our priorities in life what is our perspective on life what is important what things do we simply accept as they come we have to do a little bit of planning we have to do the minimum a little bit of planning the minimum of trying to remain healthy but no matter how healthy this body is it's going to die one day i i often think of how many people spend their whole life trying to lose weight overweight people whole life trying to lose weight and then the final illness comes and you see they died their skin and bones was because the inner life their skin and bones whole life they were praying oh if only i could lose weight uh how nice i'll look in my bathing suit and the beach and everything and then look what happens at the end not that we shouldn't you know we don't want to get fat we want to be sensible but and yeah we have to think we have to analyze and look at our priorities look at our experiences from the past how [Music] some of the things that we looked forward the most turned out to be disappointments some of the things that we wanted uh we found out that not getting them was better or we have to learn from all of these things so that we really can change our way of living in the world this is see what tucker says he says that uh a true deity of god so if we want to be genuine does not care for such things as wealth or health he thinks why should i practice spiritual austerities for creature comforts money or name and fame of course this is really a low class anybody who will you know go to assad and ask for these things or or do meditation for these things but even why should why should we care for these things these are all impermanent they last only a day or two the visiting gentleman took leave of the master after saluting him now there were other people here sometimes we'll see that takur is speaking very strongly about renunciation and in in front of people who he knows are not the least bit interested in it weeding them out reading them out they'll get up and leave after a while say nice to meet you sir so the visiting gentleman took leave of the master after saluting him when they had departed sriram krsna smiled and said to him you can never make a thief listen to religion well what do you think of narendra this was one of takwa's favorite questions he would very often ask what do you think of me and what do you think of narendra if they like narendra say oh he's a good person he likes miranda yeah that's as far as farmers but he wanted to say because not everyone liked narendra he came off as arrogant not some people thought ah he doesn't care for anybody he sees the first time that uh shut up met him who is this guy he's just standing in the corner and listening singing a song to himself not paying any attention and anybody else later he found out oh this is the narendra and then when they got to talk and said ah and now i see that the hawaii tucker loved them so much and everything they became of course great great and great friends they these direct disciples they had this special friendship real friendship not just a relationship or anything but really a real brotherhood they really loved each other so many people misunderstood they thought that he doesn't care for people is arrogant it's interesting what impressed takur about narendra when he first met him paying attention yeah he was clothes weren't exactly pressed or cleaned or anything just indifferent seemed to be indifferent to the appearance and everything like that not bohemian lifestyle he had a good life [Music] yeah no swamiji was never like that i i heard something by this huh he was saying that how swamiji went around asking people have you seen god very arrogantly just to just show that you don't know this you don't know that such a wrong impression so i mean he was so sincere he really wanted to find somebody who could say yes i've seen god he was really so genuine and sincere uh even at that age this is a teenage boy and everything so it's very easy to misunders understand them for others so taco how he could judge somebody's uh inside into character and and ability to judge somebody's spirituality either he would ask what do you think of me or he would ask what you think of narendra other questions also but these these two m he is splendid master yes his intelligent tucker loved to praise him and then narendra's pharmacy he couldn't bear it so many times taco would praise him he'd get up and leave the room or tako would start feeding him and you'd say no feed my friends also he would get embarrassed talk where he was just lavished praise and attention on him yes his intelligence is as great as his learning besides he is gifted in music both as a singer and player and two he has control over his passions he says he will never marry yeah he could do anything he was as an athlete he was a wrestler and and musician he could play several different uh instruments he knew horseback riding he came for a wealthy family they had tutors for him he learned all of these different things and that brilliant mind and that that tremendously compassionate heart he really was the most well-rounded person we can imagine m he once said that one who constantly talks of his sin really becomes a sinner he cannot ex extricate himself from sin but if a man has firm faith that he is the son of god then he makes rapid strides in spiritual life this was the one thing that taku didn't like especially about the vaisnava tradition and the christian tradition these two that uh he used to say that people were reading from that book meant the bible he didn't know exactly maybe the name of it and there was nothing but sin and sin pop or pop you would say and uh the division of a tradition he liked it he appreciated it he came from the division of a family but he didn't like this idea whenever people would say oh but we calculate make progress we're sinners we're the lowest of the low and everything humility is one thing but this is this yeah yesterday no one of the time you say i'm not a puppy i'm not a puppy yeah yeah the other thing of course still this attitude of the low lowest of the low and everything yeah yeah yes cindered not so much that they've done horrible things but just just they're nobody and they're nothing no no no no we're talking about his followers now yeah tanya deva i don't know uh we don't know we don't have his words recorded the way tucker's words were recorded so it's hard to say exactly but and yes chocolate is uh standing up for the division of israel [Laughter] she's a ghostwoman herself so it's understandable now tucker had so much respect for the goswami's when they would come he would with folded hands and really show tremendous respect to them so this is m speaking but a man has firm faith that he is the son of god then he makes rapid strides in spiritual life master yes faith what tremendous faith is we have two words didn't use this term quite as much this this vishwasa means conviction not not faith that i don't understand it but somebody told me it's true so i'll believe it not that type of belief but conviction that yes the 100 percent convinced that this is the goal of life not not 100 percent convinced that i am roman or anything like that but that this is this is the spiritual path that i want to follow this is the will of life that type of conviction it can also be of course that uh god will hear our prayers that the mother will look after us that also type of conviction to be there so master yes faith what tremendous faith krishna kishore had he used to say i've spoken the name of god once that is enough how can i remain a sinner this is the attitude also of of the of the shaktis all of these different songs if you repeat the name of course the division of the tradition is the same you repeat the name of god at the final moment you'll get liberation but yeah tucker also would say very often yet take that attitude that i may have done bad things in the past but uh i won't do it again and take the name of god and this uh i shouldn't think of myself as impure really what is what is if we if we think of ourselves as impure that means we've identified with the mind if we identify with the ottoman the perfectly pure now we don't want to say i'm perfectly pure as the odd men and go around doing all sorts of things we have to be consistent also but this was something that swamiji learned from takur he also couldn't bear this this idea of the greatest thing is calling oneself a sinner yes faith with tremendous faith krsna's your head he used to say i've spoken the name of god once that is enough how can i remain a sinner i become pure and stainless one day khalid hari said even a jamilah had to perform austerities to gratify god can one receive the grace of god without austerities what will one gain by speaking the name of narayana only once this is a story from the puranas of course this uh jamilah wasn't wasn't a spiritual person he did all sorts of things but uh at the moment of death he called his son his son's name was narayana so without thinking that he's he's calling on god by calling on the son he's uttering the name of god not ayanna so according to the quran he got his liberation now tucker also he he said perhaps he did spiritual practices in his previous lifetime also he tries to explain it in another way but this so krishna kishore at these remarks christian kitchen anger knew no bounds the next time he came to this garden to pick flowers he wouldn't even look at the holodori his father was a great devotee at bathing time he would stand way steep in the water and meditate on god uttering the sacred mantra then the tears would flow from his eyes this of course is a tradition those who repeat the gayatri very often if if possible they would do that they would go sometimes waist deep or chest and deep the ganga will be facing the sun and repeating it that way three times a day one day a holy man came to the bathing place on the ganges said ariya we talked about seeing him he said what shall we gain by seeing the body of a man in your cage made of the five elements krishna sure heard about it and said what did he ask what would be gained by visiting a holy man by repeating the name of krishna or rama a man transforms his physical body into a spiritual body to such a man everything is the embodiment of spirit to him krishna is the embodiment of spirit and the sacred abode it's the embodiment of spirit this uh chin moisham used to repeat this sometimes that uh we also say in in our different hymns chinmayam komalangam they were talk about shrama christian that way but it's a question of faith and reverence and everything that a holy person we don't even look upon his body is the ordinary human body he also said krishna a man who utters the name of krishna or rama even once reaps the result of a hundred sandhyas this is santiago is the ritual that's connected with the gayatri mantra those who take the sacred thread and i don't know everything that's involved but there's certain rituals and things that go along with it otherwise you can just repeat the month the talker used to say this santiaga as we grow spiritually we drop off a lot of the rituals and just repeat light then as we go a little and deeper and deeper we give that of also and just repeat all sundia so yeah this is that type of faith whatever we get from doing long austerities and spiritual practices those who have that type of faith in the name of god they'll feel that everything can be achieved by the name especially the moment of death people have tremendous faith in that if if they see somebody die a relative dies and at the last moment they repeat the holy name then they'll feel great consolation that they'll have their liberation gandhiji huh here it is one of his sons chanted the name of rama on his deathbed krishna kishore said he has nothing to worry about he has chanted the name of rama but now and then he wept after all it was the death of his own son nothing whatsoever is achieved by the performance of worship japa and devotions without faith isn't that so so we we can't do these things just mechanically we have to have some conviction that the goal of life is attainable and it can be attained by following the means that we've been taught especially if we if we take initiation and we're given instructions that we have to have tremendous faith in this especially in the mantra that we're given that's tremendously important if we feel that yeah i've been given this month i could have repeated it before that i could do something else some other time then it won't have that same tremendous power that it can have for us we have to really we feel that receiving this mantra is the greatest gift in spiritual life and that repeating that is the most important spiritual practice and that somehow it works its magic we don't know how it does it exactly but this process of purification and transformation takes place through the repetition of this mantra it can be of course any name of god but in our tradition especially is receiving from the lips of the guru the the sacred mantra and letting that be the uh the pillar that we hold on to in spiritual life tucker uses that illustration that if we hold on to a pillar we can spin around we won't fall so the mantra is like that so the holy name of god so we have to have that conviction otherwise just doing things mechanically it'll give some result but not not so much taco is very strong nothing whatsoever is achieved by the performance of worship drop in devotions without faith isn't that so holy mother is a little softer you repeat the monterey even without concentration or faith it will have some effect of course but how much more if we have that the deep conviction m yes sir that is true now he's talking to him so he wants m to have this this real tremendous faith and was a skeptic in the beginning he was just not not a cynic but a skeptic cynic is somebody who just dismisses everything skeptic is someone who will question things because he had such a uh strong background educational background in in western thought and uh for western philosophy and history and science and everything and and had so much contact with the brahmo tradition and uh i just was part of that that wave that young bengal uh in kolkata at that time that was so influenced by western thought but sometimes we wonder can people really change we ask this question with some scars somebody's a little the skeptic they don't remain a skeptic um is a good example of radical change because his faith in taqwa became unshakable it didn't take long within within a year probably huh that just became unshakable so sometimes we see that this really radical transformation does take place and yes sir that is true master i see people coming to the ganges to bathe they talk their heads off about everything under the sun the widowed ant says without me they cannot perform the durga puja i have to look after even the smallest detail again i have to supervise everything when there is a marriage festival in the family even a bed of the bride and groom em why should we blame them how else will they pass the time and feels a little bad because probably he's thinking his own family members and everything and so many people are good people but they they don't take these things very seriously master with a smile some people have their shrine room in their attics the women arranged the offerings and flowers and make the sandal paste but while doing so they never say a word about god the burden of the conversation is what shall we cook today i couldn't get good vegetables in the market that curry was delicious yesterday that boy is my cousin hello there have you that job still don't ask me how i am my hoodie is no more just fancy they talk of such things in the shrine room at the time of worship m yes sir it is so in the majority of cases m is not anxious to to join in on the criticism here he feels a little bad for these people i think as you say can one who has passionate yearning for god continue formal worship and devotions for long now what about us we may not have passionate devotion but in our order we see the great great sadhus that still will attend the oddity they'll attend puja and all of that there's a joy in that also it's not done ritualistically at all this uh formal worship uh when we say formal we shouldn't think mechanical formal worship means if we do it according to different uh rules that we follow and the mantras and everything but it can lead to great devotion also if we if we really feel that when we're making the food offering we're really offering they're takwa and man swamiji that they're there that accept our offering if we do it with that attitude it's a tremendous thing so when he's talking about formal worship the highly ritualistic things that that we we don't really think about the significance of too much of that of course we'll drop off but otherwise uh a little bit of pujia a little formal puja is very nice very helpful and otherwise how do we pass our days we can't spend all day long in meditation no very few people have that power of concentration to be able to do that so we have a little puja we have our our bhajans we have our spiritual reading all of these other nice spiritual practices srirama christian m we're now conversing alone m sir if it is god himself who has become everything then why do people have so many different feelings these are all very good questions but also there's a little bit of some misunderstanding in it as well and when we start out with some of this with some very high ideas and then we go to some practical things so i mean if analyze this question if it is god himself who has become everything then how do we get these people here and then who are the people it'll be god himself who has so many different feelings so there's this a little bit of this misunderstanding or inconsistency what does it mean god himself god himself has become everything then either we remain with the idea that god himself i remember once i was i asked one of our very senior swamis that brahman alone is real then where did this maya come from so he said that look at the question that you've just asked if you're saying suppose we say that somebody came into the room alone and you say okay then where is his brother then how did his brother get here well you can't talk about his brother if he came alone there's nobody else there so if you're going to say that brahman alone exists you can't ask about maya so i was thinking about things okay well it sounds interesting if there's an idea and uh and then then he made a very interesting comment yeah and and also that this maya you get knowledge that disappears so you don't have to have where it came from because if it disappears and these do they satisfy us intellectually half have satisfied so then he said to me see what a nice idea this is and then it struck me that yeah it's just an idea do we how true is it this is our human understanding of something that we can't really understand it's such a nice idea he said it was very uh it struck me very strongly i was only 24 years old something like that and just because i was beating my head against the wall how do you understand this roman alone exist then how does this universe come the maya is isn't real how does it work and everything and then all that were just like that he eliminated everything that uh yeah what a brilliant idea that somebody came over to try to explain it this way not that this is exactly it's not like you know the engine of a car or something you know exactly how the piston works and the the turning the key and all of that is just super imposing some some uh ideas on on this reality to help us try to understand it in their own way that's all so but this is an interesting question and uh if god himself has become everything then why is there so much suffering how how is it possible that god forgets himself god is all-knowing so did god come under the power of his own maya all of these questions will come up if we take it very seriously and and say yes there's a logical flaw in that i'll throw all this with out the window then then we're just losing everything we're we're misunderstanding that every philosophy has a flaw everyone none of them can claim to be a hundred percent logical and and uh infallible because they're all different different points of view ways of looking at it what this takwee is a beautiful example everybody thinks that their watch keeps the right time now what what is the right time what is the proper time the position of the sun if it's directly uh above then it's midday the position of the sun has nothing to do with my ability to devise a device that will enable me to say now it's exactly 12 or 1201 or something whenever it's in the middle of the sun it's it's known that's all regardless of my ability to be able to to say when it does it and how it does it and and uh to come up with some device that will tell me exactly what it is won't do it that's why you you see some of these places i remember one was in somewhere in gujarat where they had and also right in delhi huh right on that uh is it yeah you see all of these things that they have with astrological things where the shadow will come and everything and what do they call them these dials these sundials and everything that's the most accurate thing that's the most accurate thing we know that uh where thakura said when there's no shadow then it's midday yeah so it's got nothing to do with the watch who what's the best swatch the most accurate watch so he says that the sun alone is the real they we have to adjust our watch with the sun it's it's uh so it's the same thing with these philosophical ideas that brahman would ruminate brahmanites that's all it is what it is what the ghee tastes like we can't explain it in any other way so anyhow this is his question if it is god himself who has become everything then why do people have so many different feelings if god has become all different things in all different minds and everything then there'll be a different feeling and the master undoubtedly god exists in all beings as the all-pervading spirit but the manifestation of his power manifestations of his power are different in different beings this is why taqwa would always react when people say that this should be the same power within all beings he would say no how can you say that that uh he the vidyasagar said that others used to say that that uh one person with one arm can can fight off on you know a dozen people and another person can't do anything this so the the essence of everyone is the same they put your consciousness but shakti is different this is everyone will have a different capacity physical mental intellectual artistic that'll all depend on so many other factors some scottish and upbringing and culture so many different things in some places there is a manifestation of the power of knowledge now he doesn't say why these are all impossible questions uh we can take it back also the previous birth but then still we we we run into a dead end with everything in philosophy we run into a dead end that's why they say religion begins where philosophy ends something like that so anyhow turquoise explaining undoubtedly god exists in all beings as the all-pervading spirit but the manifestation of his power manifestations of his power are different in different beings in some places there is a manifestation of the power of knowledge and others of the power of ignorance in some places there is a greater manifestation of power than in others don't you see that among human beings there are cheats and gamblers to say nothing of men who are like tigers i think of them as the cheat god the tiger god and with the smile we should salute them from a distance if we go near the tiger god and embrace him he may devour us now he's quoting taquer of course he says from a distance yeah that means that we have to be sensible people god dwells within somebody but we know that that person is not good for us bad influence for us we get angry with that person or that person always trying to draw us out and go and uh enjoy things that we're not interested in anymore so we keep a little distance that's all we don't have to judge them we don't have to look down upon them we can just say no my mind is weak and tender i know it's easily affected by by the company that i keep and better for me to stay away that's all master he and his power and brahmin and its power nothing else exists but this in him to rama narada said o rama you are shiva and sita is bhagavati you are brahma and sita is brahmani you are indra and sita is indrani you are not ayana and sita is lakshmi o rama you are the symbol of all that is masculine and sita of all that is feminine this is easier for us to understand if we if we deny shakti say brahman alone everything is brahmin and yet through maya which we don't know what it means exactly through maya there's a one from in when reality appears to be many now how do we explain it and if we just say well it's some ignorance then how does brahman fall under the influence of ignorance very difficult if we accept shakti we may say it's a compromise okay brahman is not homogeneous now possesses something a little bit of a compromise the dweitens don't like to do that but it allows us to understand how the brahman can be the source of this universe also if if someone is sleeping then how do we explain how the dream comes about causes a dream somebody's sleeping they can't decide to dream huh something has to cause it so the the dwightens will say this maya somehow that maya causes this infinite reality to become many to break out into a dream and then enter into the dream and everything but what's the stuff of the dream there has to be there has to be yeah subconscious mind for the individual so even from that point of view this brahman has to have some type of cosmic mind there has to be something which not only shakti we can say explains this the projected universe but what explains the way it is there has to be some type of storehouse cosmic mind these these some of them announces say this is the veda the vedas that storehouse otherwise we can just say that just as an individual has everything stored up in this unconscious mind and from that the dream comes so the same thing with the moment when this unit first comes it doesn't come out of nothing and uh when it's projected then everything has a certain independence that's how we get in trouble that's how we can explain that this uh pride comes and desire comes and then we do things we shouldn't do and everything but otherwise everything is all mysterious why and how things happen em sir what is the spirit form of god like i don't know what uh maybe chinmaya this is maybe surah krishna reflected a moment and said softly shall i tell you what it is like it is like water one understands all this through spiritual discipline now i like this idea of order that if we if we look at all of the times that talk whereas they asked what is a brahman like that uh 99 of the time he'll say what what roman is cannot be described it can't be uttered by the tongue when roman is everything else can be described but brahman this is almost the only time that he gives us a little clue he says like water now if we look at all of the illustrations that tucker uses with water what do we find out water is very interesting it's not solid and yet it can become solid it has no form of its own so it's formless but it always comes in a form it always seeks its lowest level it has lots of qualities to it it may be tasteless it may be colorless and all of those things but it has all of these other qualities so if we say that brahman is formless water is also formless there is no form of its own you can't pick it up and move it or anything like that but whatever container it's in it takes the shape of that container so tucker uses this illustration we take something out of we use a picture it takes the form of the picture that picture is the human heart god enters into the heart it takes that particular form so uh there's one idea about about uh form and formlessness and then water is is nourishing and it's so it's always trying to to seek its its lowest point so this roman is trying to fill the heart all the illustrations tucker has that that we have the reservoir and then there's the floodgate and we have to dig the canal then we lift it and automatically it goes down we don't have to bring it so the brahmin is this is that idea of grace also hi monty okay good yeah yeah yeah so so when he says like water we think of all the different qualities and characteristics of water it's the same thing with light with sometimes we identify vermin with the sun light of the sun and we think the light of the sun sun is invisible the light light is invisible right what it contains within it all of the colors of the rainbow of the spectrum contains within it we we put it through the prism and we see all of the other colors that has to be contained within this colorless light so the formless reality contains form within it it's near gonna contains the saguna the shakti is part of it this is the the explanation that tupper likes best again i won't say that this is the the final word and we can't understand reality in a different way but this is what what he's talking about with this idea of saguan and nireguna and brahman and shakti and everything one understands all this through spiritual discipline then he says believe in the form of god it is only after attaining brahmagyana that one sees non-duality the oneness of brahman and the shakti so we may we may have a conviction about it we may understand it but now he's talking about the realization that we have to have some experience some direct direct realization before we'll know the truth of these things the oneness in brahman are the chakti that means that this this power doesn't have any separate existence and that brahman is not simply near gonna in their gona and saguna both and brahman and shakti are identical like fire and its power to burn when a man thinks of fire he must also think of its power to burn again when he thinks of the power to burn he must also think of fire further brahman and shakti are like milk and its whiteness water and its wetness so the substance and attribute these two things uh they they all come together there's there's nothing in this world that doesn't have uh shape and form and color texture all of these other things and there's no color or anything like that can exist independent of any object of any substance substance and attribute they go together we can't separate them mentally we can do it but in terms of objects we never come across anything that's just a color even the sky is the color of the sky and we never could come across anything that uh that doesn't have its own shape and form and color everything does so this is the illustration they use for brahman and shakti but there is a stage beyond even brahman okay this would be your vigyana state after guyana comes vignana he was aware of knowledge is also aware of ignorance the sage vashishta was stricken with grief at the death of his hundred sons asked by lakshmana why a man of knowledge should grieve for such a reason but rama said brother go beyond both knowledge and ignorance he who has knowledge has ignorance also if a thorn has entered your foot get another thorn and with the tail take out the first then throw away the second also now what does this mean we can think of this in in so many different ways i sometimes think of these two thorns as uh in terms of the three gunas that now they're filled with uh radish and thomas and everything and how do we remove these things we have to use satwa but satwiks are also part of maya we have to transcend that as well so once we've done that we've used that thorn to remove the other one then we then we throw them both away if we throw away this sort of knowledge first then we're stuck we can't do anything some people they think oh how do i go beyond sattva it's such a silly thing silly idea we have to become satwik people first we have to develop all of these software qualities then why do we have to go be beyond the sattva because there's also a subtle scent of i that i'm a good person i'm a kind person i'm intelligent person i'm a wise person the little sense of little bit of this ego is there that we have to go beyond it also so that means throwing away that that second the thorn which we've used to transcend the others to take out the other if a thorn has entered your foot get another thorn and with the tail take out the first then throw away the second also m should one throw away both knowledge and ignorance master yes that is why one should acquire vignana so throwing away knowledge again we don't need to to have this speculative philosophical knowledge when we've when we've really had that experience taco you always gave that example so long we've been talking about shivanand and all of the good qualities and that now he come he came here now we simply enjoy his company we don't have to think about any of these things you see he who is aware of light is also aware of darkness he who is aware of happiness is also aware of suffering he who is aware of virtue is also aware of vice he who is aware of good is also aware of evil he who is aware of holiness is also aware of unholiness he who is aware of i is also aware of you so these pairs of opposites we want to transcend these things uh and realize that ultimate reality which is beyond any of these the relative things this is the duanduas they're called we want to become go beyond that because as soon as we think that something is good then the mind comes this idea something is bad that we think that everything in relative terms what is vigna it is knowing god in a special way the awareness the conviction that fire exists in wood is a guyana knowledge but to cook rice on that fire eat the rice and get nourishment from it it's vigna to know by one's inner experience that god exists is guyana but to talk to him now this is where we get into this the very mystical side of things very often we give a highly philosophical understanding of vigna now we see everything a manifestation of brahman taqwa is a very highly personal way of looking at it also for the for the bhakta now one talks to god but to talk to him to enjoy him his child his friend his master as beloved is vigna the realization that god alone has become the universe in all living beings is vigna that's for the gyani for the bhakta it's this other thing that the personal god becomes real 100 real the divine mother was so real for shirley krishna we gave philosophical interpretations of it yes this is of the mind creating the water to form a block of ice he gives those teachings and everything but the bottom line for him was no she talks to me how can i deny the existence of the divine mother she supplies the words that i use to weaken if we want we can come up with our own theories about this but this was his conviction according to one school of thought god cannot be seen who sees whom this would be the gyanis the advaitans is god outside you that you can see him because the seer can never be seen the subject can never be objectified this is one of the tenets of deuteronomy one sees only oneself having once entered the black waters of the ocean the ship does not come back and so cannot describe what it has experienced m it is true sir as you say having climbed to the top of the monument one becomes unaware of what is below horses and carriages men and women houses shops and offices and so on master i don't go to the kali temple nowadays why exactly we don't know this idea of giving up may be ritual and things is that an offense at one time the renderer used to say what he still goes to the kalitan book em every day you are in a new state of mind how can you ever offend god master someone said to sen we don't know who which sin this is about friday he is very ill please bring two pieces of cloth and a couple of shirts for him we will send them to his village sin offered only two rupees how do you explain that he has so much money and yet he is so miserly what do you say to that am those who seek god cannot behave that way i mean those whose goal is the attainment of knowledge master god alone is the reality and all else is unreal and that brings us to the end of that day we'll start with september 22nd 1883 next time page 288 close oh [Music] our heads before srama krishna who is stainless of infinite nature whose heart melts in sympathy for his devotees who is an embodiment of the divine and the supreme lord and ever worthy of our worship [Music] we wish everyone a very very happy new year we uh we're gonna show live streaming tonight our program that begins at 11 with the reading from the great master about the culprit today that's goes from 11 to about 11 20. then if you want to check out you can check out because it's just silent meditation and then at midnight if you want to check back in uh we'll do oddity at midnight and welcome in the new year that way and so we we stand our prayers and best wishes for everyone that it'll be a good new year thank you