Video 31

32. Mandukya Upanishad | Chapter 2 Karika 37

[Music] so we are studying the manduk upanishad second chapter in the second chapter gowdapadha wants to demonstrate the central teaching one aspect of the central teaching of advaita vedanta one aspect is that the world is an appearance the ultimate reality is pure consciousness of course but the world is an appearance what is this multiple multiplicity we see it's an appearance in pure consciousness now this is what gaura father wants to demonstrate with the use of reasoning based on our own experience this is what he has been doing in the second chapter now that's over and to conclude he gives us you know we have this question so what now now what do you do with this knowledge where do you go with this so he gives us these four beautiful verses very inspiring verses how to live how to practice this how to bring it into our own life we have done two of the verses the first one that is verse number 35 35 36 that is 7 38 4 verses 35 it said that um fourfold qualifications are necessary the six treasures and intense desire to be free mumuksuttwa so that was said in the 35th verse and emphasize the importance of vedantic study that means you immerse yourself in this knowledge and then you realize the verse say verses [Music] a beautiful verse where he mentions the fourfold qualifications of vedanta who the the sage who has transcended attraction and repulsion raga dwesha uh fear and anger bhaya and who has transcended these and munibir veda paraguay by one who is immersed in this vedantic awareness it's on the basis of this knowledge this understanding that a person who has already transcended this and on the basis of this study realizes the atman the self ayam means this self drishta see sees means not with these eyes with the eye of knowledge understands i am such and such what is this self nirvikalpa very beautiful two terms have been used um without any division you see the waker is different from this dreamer the dreamer is different from the deep sleeper but it is one atman one pure consciousness in which these three divisions appear and disappear does that make sense you are the consciousness which itself appears as the waker now which itself appears as the deep as the dreamer in your dreams which itself is the one which has the deep sleep experience that one consciousness has not no division in itself you realize i am that and in this consciousness there is no external world pra pancho pashama the world is is an appearance in this country consciousness it's not like here i am and there is a world outside me the way we normally think prabhancho the cessation of the world non-dual this consciousness is non-dual then one more thing the verse verse number 36 emphasize the importance of needing vedantic meditation that is to dwell on this truth to be centered in this truth 36 was mr once you have realized once this knowledge becomes clear i am this atman one needs to stay with it remain centered in it for a long time so that the contrary tendencies in the mind the habitual patterns of behaving as body mind they are eradicated they're already enlightened but to manifest this enlightenment in life that requires you to remain centered in this in uh advaita yojai it's written connect your memory that means connect your recollection maintain that awareness that i am brahmana not for enlightenment you are already enlightened here you are using that in life bringing the light of that enlightenment to bear upon your life and then what do you do having realized non-duality what do you do the surprising uh statement behave in the world just like any of the other ignorant people those who have not realized live your live your life in a most ordinary fashion and don't immediately start a cult i'm enlightened now come and worship me follow me i shall liberate you um don't do don't create a fuss live exactly as you were living you might say oh what's the use then i all this was for nothing i i am special you want to be special that is then then you are you cannot be a non-dualistic then the enlightened person is the most ordinary and externally the enlightened person does not want to be even the least bit different from others the idea that this body and mind must be somehow special different from others which is deep inside us that is bar that is rooted in ignorance that is rooted in ignorance it's because i identify myself entirely with this body and mind i want to make it special but your special nature my special nature our special nature is this is the absolute itself is this glorious non-dual consciousness which is the the ground of this entire universe absolute yes basically yes yes it's like enlightenment it's like i feel like it's a gateway to this absolute fear it is absolute freedom absolutely because then you're here it doesn't really matter it doesn't matter and it's it's not it doesn't matter a kind of uh hopelessness not like that it's glorious yeah it doesn't matter yes it you're free even trying to make this body and mind special it's a kind of enslavement you're trapped in this vicious circle of trying to you know make this body healthier richer make this mind more learned more more spiritual more calm more more enlightened no you have found that which is perfect already you and you realize i am that yes one more question yeah that i'm struggling with so if i'm brahmana what about uh prayer to god i like my relationship with god but that's still then separate true once you realize your true nature as that non-dual reality and then that relationship that you have with god remember that desire for that love for god that reverence for god it's in the mind clearly because for example when the mind goes to sleep in deep sleep where is the reverence for god where is the devotion to god where is god in fact where is the devotee and where is god not there once you you separate yourself from the mind it happens in unconsciousness or deep sleep so um when we are associated with the mind and i find myself the world comes back into my awareness then i can continue to worship god i there is a very beautiful saying that before realization before enlightenment this world of duality leads to delusion we get trapped in samsara after you are enlightened you realize this after you realize this then an imagined duality in imagined duality uh for what for worshipping god as you said for the love of god is it is more beautiful than non-duality the original sanskrit goes um [Music] before enlightenment duality leads to samsara mohammed means to delusion this is we are trapped in this duality this is samsara manishaya once you are enlightened i am brahmana i am the absolutely realize that after that you can still superimpose a duality upon yourself because you do appear as a person so if i am the person now i realize in the background i am that non-dual brahmana but as a person i can relate to that very non-dual brahman as god it will come to the into this verse again you can have your cake and eat it too once you do that and imagine a duality it's an imagined or superimposed duality why would you even superimpose that because first of all it appears to you you still have a body so if you can eat and walk and talk and go to your job and come to vedanta class why can't you love god of course you can love god and that is it says advaita de pisundaram that kind of im superimposed duality is more beautiful than non-duality i mean you have the non-duality already and on the basis of that in fact in our order in fact in all the non-dualist orders in shankara and all of them they all worship god in this fashion exactly shankara himself has composed such beautiful hymns to god are they in contact in contradict contradiction to his duality no no no they are based on non-duality now now one more point here suppose now will you say that if that is so then suppose i i am not inclined this way suppose somebody says the unduality is sufficient for me i'm not particularly interested in god or worshiping god then and it's also all right it's perfectly all right because that non-dual reality is the reality once you're based on that any form of life you you take up jared loka macharith he says like the the unenlightened folk the way they lead their lives some may be very very um ritualistic some may be engaged in action some may seem to be engaged in worldly may seem to be engaged in worldly pleasures but underlying all of them is that one blazing realization i think last time i quoted that verse krishna bhogi shook us tyagi krishna is engaged with 16 000 gopis and shuka is a great renunciant he has only a loincloth and nothing else in the world has given up everything extraordinarily austere and rama is a king and janaka is an emperor they are kings they are engaged in administering king kingdoms and vashishta is is engaged in a ritualistic religion they seem so diverse one seems to be you know the lover of sixteen thousand gopis the other one seems to be the supreme monk to another two seem to be uh great kings busy with their empires another one seems to be a ritualistic a very religious kind of person samaha they are same as far as their enlightenment is concerned yes i was listening to ayaan maharaja's talk again and he draws very clear distinction between gaudapada and shankara's yoga path is the golden path as opposed to the more encompassing what he calls began of ramakrishna so where shankaran all say that you know karma yoga and bhakti yoga only take you so far and then you have to go to nyana yoga so what is uh what is your view of that as as our teacher which which camp are you in are you distracted right no i i mean i am in all camps if you ask see if you think uh keep a couple of things in mind one is we are studying gaurav padha now so we must be loyal to the text what we are trying to study unless you grasp one you won't get anything so this is one the second thing is advaitha is a kind of foundation for all of this even for sudama krishna's vikyana vedanta that is based on non-dualism presented it as an extension a superstructure built on non-dualism but non-dualism is the foundation if you stop here you get gordopod or shankara but you can go further that's what ayan was saying that sudama krishna is draws a much longer larger much larger canvas and i would tend to agree i would tend to agree encompass duality is bhakti yoga not a duality that duality which srinam krishna talks about now it's uh um see because he is talking in a much larger canvas he says that there is look at it this way there is one ultimate reality now realize it in whichever way you can he's saying that this non-duality is a path to that definitely but if you take it dualistically without even coming to non-duality is that wrong is that limited according to shankar anal it is limited it's still within the transactional realm surrounding krishna wouldn't say no you touch the reality in whichever way you can you will become enlightened now to say something like that you must have a broader framework which is what aryan raj is sketching with the vikyana vedanta i would tend to agree with that but with one qualification if you push me on that if you ask too many questions i will immediately retreat to godapad and shankara one reason is it italies well with my conviction second is it's a thoroughly well worked out system for the last 14 1500 years so many questions have been attacked and so as asked and so many attacks have been withstood that you have the the tradition has worked out the answers and approaches to to all these questions right yoga is that being worked out it's been worked out but the problem with that is for example if i take from this point of view if you take a bhakti something like bhakti yoga without that purely dualistic kind of bhakti yoga the first objection will be it's an entire it's a belief system you believe in it once you really believe in it nothing more needs to be asked but if you ask questions that's why no bhakti tradition are they willing to withstand questions there's a limit to questioning there after that they will say no my book says it or god said it i believe in it if you say it it's irrational that's an no they will not agree another reason is in this day and age the non-dualistic this this approach which you have in say tibetan buddhism or in advaita vedanta is the only one which can actually engage with the thought of this age so today i can go to nyu and talk with david chalmers on equal terms about consciousness and he's interested in what i have got to say i am interested in the way he's putting the question but if i am a say a simple devotee of christ or krishna they are not interested in what i have got to say they will dismiss me immediately as some religious nut and i am i have no way of connecting to the questions they are asking if my appeal is to god what can i say to an atheist if you push the matter you become you see you become a religious fanatic in um you say has it been worked out the dualist will say yes it has been worked out if you look at it from an agnostic point of view atheistic point of view you'll say no nothing has been worked out it's just a belief system how do you answer that there's no answer to it the duelist certainly believes there's an answer but his belief is based on a belief if you probe any if you prove the the dualistic other than advaita if you prove the other systems vishishta dwaita dwayta shuddhadwaita they are all bhakti systems they cannot withstand questions why what are you believing i love my krishna very good does krishna exist how do you know somebody said to me no but don't we believe that the atman or brahman exists in that case you have not understood the first thing about advaita i'm sorry you don't belong in this class we are basing this entire study on the undeniable certitude of your own existence have you ever seriously doubted that you exist you can doubt what you are and although it encourages you to doubt that but that you do exist there is some kind of existence even the buddhist doesn't exist deny that that we have some kind of existence what are we that's the question that's where advaita starts it does not start with the belief in some god in some heaven no so swami vivekananda said that's why more than 100 years ago advaita is the only system for modern man for is the only kind of religion that modern man can believe in now what i've seen often happening is people come to this and get an interest in this and then slowly they become more accepting of dualistic religion many people they come to vedanta they have they're skeptical about religion generally genuine spiritual seekers they go through a phase of skepticism agnosticism and then they need clear reasons clear demonstration clear proof that some such thing is there so then they come to either advaita or yoga and then they come in and after that they become more accepting of dualism a dualism based on the non-dualistic truth is acceptable our dualism in the ramakrishna order are all the shankara schools they seem to be doing a lot of puja and worship it's all firmly based on non-dualism sri ramakrishna himself he would repeat one thing he would say tie the knowledge of advaita to the not the hem of your class and then do whatever you can whatever you want i have said this earlier in bengali he would say adoit women in india especially rural women on small towns they would tie the key keys to the house bunch of keys to the hem of their sarees so that's how they would die there and suramar krishna uses that example tie the knowledge of advaita there that means this whole that make it your foundation then do whatever you please whatever you please means be a dualist be a tremendously active person in the world be a an aesthetic like ramana maharishi living in a cave a great meditator be a great gyani be the most inconspicuous of persons when nobody notices whatever you want to do you can live in that way because you are brahmana let's hear the questions quickly yes welcome to i had a question you have talked about uh the heart problem of consciousness earlier uh i had a question about how it would relate to raja yoga in the sense that when a sadaqa is in advanced stages of meditation they may feel a state of mania or depression at the time is that would you say because of chemical reactions which are happening in the body or is that something that the consciousness is governing how would you take answer you said so many things you said raja yoga heart problem of consciousness meditating deeply and feeling various kinds of depression or mania and neurochemicals in the body in the brain what can you narrow down your question specifically like the scientific community would say that you're having uh mania or depression because of chemical reactions in the body yeah whereas uh if you're meditating and you are in that state where you're having some sensations which are very strange at that time is that something that is governed by the consciousness or is that actual chemical reactions which are happening in the body is what i was trying to understand what do you mean by governed by consciousness uh i mean is that something natural that happens to people who are meditating now we are coming to the question it's almost entirely unrelated to what we are studying by the way no no you don't have to sorry but i understand you are asking this is a natural question to ask let me give you an advertising answer to this uh have you attended earlier classes this is not this one but other classes class you haven't attended a medical class see from the point of view of mandu kyopanishad from the point of view advaita vedanta the analysis is very clean and elegant you have are having extraordinary sensations feelings thoughts might be um like manic thoughts or depressive thoughts from advaita vedanta point of view those thoughts are objects just as this is an object and it's illumine by consciousness you are aware of it the thoughts are also objects now question is what are those thoughts due to and and from advaita point of view that's all that's important advaita is not interested in your thoughts what is advaita interested in can anybody tell me in you you say no no but i am depressive or i am having manics go see a psychiatrist or do something else but advaita is saying you the one who is experiencing these thoughts advaita is interested in you the experiencing consciousness not in what you experience what you experience is the realm of psychiatry it's the realm of um of different kinds of spiritual practices like bhakti or yoga even even yoga philosophy patanjali yoga is not interested in that the very fundamentals of patanjali yoga absolute abcd is that you are the pure consciousness not the brittis not the thoughts in your mind so a manic thought a depressive thought is a thought if this is not clear nothing of what we are going to do today will make any sense whatsoever or it will even worse it will be it will be dangerously misleading we are going to go into the very very climax of the second chapter today yeah see i am giving these things i know we we are very ambitious in this class we are starting off at the top we are not climbing up systematically from base upwards so at the top i'm giving it with that idea that you will take it responsibly so what we're going to do today for example today we will come to uh uh the club the final verse of this uh chapter which will say exactly this that whatever happens in the mind it really doesn't matter it's going to come to that and to understand that i'm going to come to you but yes so the answer to that is yes it could be chemical reactions i'm sure if there is a thought in the mind it's a vritti in the mind now we're not talking about at all from patanjali yoga point of view any kind of thought including a manic thought a depressive thought is a virty in the mind if it's a vritti in the mind now coming down to the level of psychiatry if it's a virtue in the mind then there must be some corresponding chemical activity going on neurochemical activity going on in the brain sure all that's possible advaita not interested in this patanjali yoga only marginally interested in this psychiatry is interested in this neuroscience is interested in this right okay traditions i mean the god is also kind of considered someone who is rewarding for the good deeds so for enlightened person from the angle of advaitha what is it that stops that person from doing bad things and knowing that the good things are to be done all right first of all this question of duty and morality good things god bad things what is it that stops you from doing bad things or even good things in deep sleep you cannot do anything now imagine from non-dualistic perspective there's only brahman i don't have to be see this is like i am this person this body and mind i have to be kicked and beaten by god to be nice otherwise i will be naughty so this is the most kindergarten kind of religion god will will spank you if you are if you are naughty and god will give you cookies if you are if you are nice right so this is the most kindergarten kind of religion i mean some people might need it they're slightly above animals nothing more than that it's not a kind of religion that interests me it's kind of repugnant to me actually now that role is taken up by the more sophisticated form if you want to say by the role by karma cause and effect so in indian religions for example buddhism hinduism jainism sikhism karma good karma it automatically leads to good results so dharma leads to punya punya leads to sukha bad karma adharma leads to papa papa leads to dukkha and the whole system is administered by god so in this sense it's basically the same idea but in a more sophisticated philosophically more satisfying way it cause and effect why is it more satisfying because we believe in cause and effect everybody believes in cause and effect so if you put good and bad in terms of cause and effect seems to be a more uh none of it is again of any interest to the non-dualist what good and bad when there is no world at all if brahman alone exists but you said anyway that might be nice philosophically but practically what prevents a non-dual it's a good important question good question um two things first of all practically this person as we just saw to be this to reach this stage at all we just saw the fourfold qualifications a person is already has a strong foundation of morality there's no question of lying still stealing murdering if you are in this path fourfold qualifications if you actually meet a good student in this path you would consider that person to be already a saint there's no question asking why that person would do something bad why why does anybody do anything bad why does anybody do anything bad tell me gain fear i will get something or i will lose something either there is temptation or there is fear and when the temptation and fear is too much we overstep the limits of of decency morality law and then we do bad things that's why just think is there any exception to this no exception nobody does bad things out as a spiritual practice why do you steal because it's good for my meditation no why do you hurt people because it's great for enlightenment no nobody does it it's ridiculous it's just because we can't we we are unable to control temptation or fear these are two things either driven by fear anxiety i tell a lie because if i get caught oh my god what will happen or temptation if i tell a lie i will get such unsuch things so that adharma is prompted by fear or temptation this person because of renunciation complete renunciation does not have anything to gain from this world and has nothing to fear from this world why would this person do anything bad and might do because of past conditioning and so there will be a struggle nobody is an automatic saint but there's a struggle so by the time a person comes to enlightenment the person's condition is already is what you person one we might call a saint already so it's very unlikely that a person will do bad things because of conditioning because of sadhana already the person's body-mind complex is so purified so disciplined it will be very strange if that person suddenly after enlightenment ah i'm enlightened now now i can go around stealing and telling lies no look at the lives of enlightened people you never see such a thing yeah and one more thing philosophically this is because of practical conditioning philosophically if you see god inside and outside whom do you want to hurt what do you want to take from somebody else if you are one being whom to praise and whom to blame do you still have a question here was that this the only thing i was trying to say was that this is basically the objection that the kind of people have it's very easy to understand in the sense of reward but philosophy what do i get that's the question easy to understand bhakti as reward yeah nothing to do with bhakti at all why don't you why didn't you have any such rule the law of karma applies to everybody so even when you are practicing advaitha you still are expected to practice karma you bound by karma the law of karma does not they don't ask you what you have signed up for the law of karma will not say that you are attending vedanta classes and so you are exempt from the law of karma no so with whatever you believe whatever you practice does not matter if karma is real if actions have consequences they'll have consequences for everybody why won't they have consequences for another waiting of course even advaitan can commit to sin will get the result of sin why not yes law of karma holds for everybody think about it what is the question here it's like let me let let me try to put it from the i have heard these objections from the bhakti schools let me see if i can put it in their language does it sound familiar the advaitin thinks i am god and so the other thing can do see i can do anything it does not matter and this is very sinful no this is the form of the question is this how they ask is this what you're asking no what am i trying to find out if this is what you're asking this is a question this is this is what they ask and for this there's an answer if this is not what you're asking then i don't understand what you're asking no it's like how there is an objection to an atheist person that some very religious people who uh believe that if i do a good thing then i will always get a good thing out of it in fact more like if i do something bad then it's definitely going to do something better so those people don't believe that atheist person can be moralistic right so now you're shifting the question okay so uh the question is an atheist is not going to be moral many atheists would be very very annoyed at that very very offended at that but yeah and but that's the question that's that religious people often say that religion holds the grounds for morality um so if you don't believe in god how can you be moral yeah i mean that's right that's the question that's the question i'm not saying that you believe it but this is the question and so can a similar question be asked of the non-dualist answer is no because the non-dualist believes in god you look surprised the non-duel is believed in god look here we have got uh we worship so god definitely does exist and we believe in god now you're qualifying the question do you see how you have to work on setting the question up right now you are saying that you have to believe in god but you have to believe in god in the dualistic way no i what i'm saying is when you worship then he comes across more like a duality non-dualistic people also worship chankara terry also worshiped but it's not from the angle that only if i worship then i am doing something for the dog if i don't worship that's also fine that is true but it's it's not that they don't believe in god they know that god exists they they believe in karma they believe in god that's why you see the answer it i mean this is like uh there are two levels at which advaita functions one is paramar thicker another is viva harika vivaric is transactional at the transactional level you have jiva you and i you have ishwara god you have karma and all of these questions all of dualistic religion is acceptable at the level of a harika level why would there be a question why would there be a problem there is a she's not wrong this question does come up the dualists they act but because they don't understand advaitha they are rattled by advaitha see the idea is somehow they're suspicious these guys are something like atheists do they believe in god the thing is the the dualist is firmly set in the belief i am this body-mind or even if not the body i am an individual sentient being i go from body to body and there is a separate god existing who rules this universe to whom we must surrender and this is how it is dwellers will say yes this is what you don't believe radiation will say this is what we believe at the vehicle level there is a deeper level than this that's all we are saying at this level if i do wrong things then i'll be punished for that i will get the results of bad karma let's hear the questions first yes maybe it's a stupid question but i keep noticing so whenever we talk about enlightened people or most enlightened people that you read about or you mention they all seem to be men i very rarely do i read or hear are you mentioning an enlightened woman so [Music] yeah are the chances less for women becoming enlightened no no not at all not at all not less but i'm confused by the fact that why is it that we don't hear about enlightened women why well did they there are there where in the open issues also you kind of come across people like gargi and maitreyi who were they were there but still in the picture one not two or three uh and uh there are few but um in in all the uh myths also you come the ramayana mahabharata you come across women um like shabari for example meera mira is much later it's not in the it's not mythical so throughout the history of hinduism for example or buddhism also you will come across many many women who are enlightened there's absolutely nothing which prevents women from being enlightened but you would still say that it still seems to be a little the imbalance there at least a little if not a lot and that's the i would agree with you entirely remember these were enormously patriarchal societies all throughout all across the world so every religion would seem to be dominated by men would seem to be dominated by men so does that mean women have a second class position or they are not women are not eligible for enlightenment no not at all no no it is biased because of because of the fact because of historical reasons because of historical reasons and there is absolutely no reason why women cannot be spiritual equally as much as men and actually in many traditions more than men and enlightened as well absolutely no difference at all and from the advaita point of view again there is no difference of gender which there cannot be no i didn't believe that i know a general question i know so my answer to that is first of all no from a non-dualistic perspective men and women are absolutely equal from a non-dual perspective we are not men or women we are beyond gender not transgender or anything beyond gender these are all body related so from you don't even have to come to advaita any kind of hindu view or jain view or buddhist view would say that we have gone through so many bodies human bodies animal bodies male bodies female bodies so are you man or woman in this particular body i might be a man but earlier who knows and later on who knows so that strong discrimination is actually not a part of the indian mental makeup that men and women because reason is we are not body centered in that sense we are not fundamentally bodies with spirits we are spirits with bodies yeah so that's there having said that it's also true that indian society like all other societies were strongly patriarchal dominated by men until very recently now changes are coming big changes across the world and in india too and these changes are there in religion and have to be reflected in religion they should be it should be reflected in religion actually if you say from um from that perspective if you ask what is it in this vedanta in in gowdapada or in shankara which gives men an advantage over women nothing nothing even when there are some texts in which shankara seems to say that men have an advantage over women all those things are can be traced back to culture in society there's nothing in the philosophy itself in spirituality itself which says men are in any sense superior to women can't be yeah anyway it's good that you asked all right let's hear the questions um uh last week i asked you a question um and you mentioned the difference between brahman and as a muslim i use the name allah and my question went to whether or not it was an equivalent which i was trying to draw upon in my mind he said no and you said that there was a different word that you used in relationship to the use of the word i don't remember what that was brahman with qualifications thank you yeah it's my understanding now from some reading that i've done including in the book that we're studying tonight that um the essence is that a better terminology to be used for brahman because what i think i am beginning to understand is if there had been no this is funny it's tricky but if there had been no creation and of course in the doctor there is no creation if there was no illusion of creation there would be no need for an illusion of divinity so relative very beautifully put correct i agree with that entirely yes so now when there is this illusion of creation there is also the illusion of divinity and also the illusion of individuality and at that level this is very beautifully put the vahrika is what he said illusion of divinity illusion of individuality a new illusion of creation why would you call it illusion because at the heart at the essence that one undivided reality still remains it has not been divided up into divinity and individuality and creation it still is undivided then what is this it must be an appearance then what else could it be right but if you in from this point of view if you look at that divinity then it appears to you as god so that is what the hindu would call saguna brahman ishwara or bhagavan the muslim would call god or the jew would call jehovah or would not call would not openly say that or bhagavan ishwara or whatever yeah correct and anybody else wanted to say something yes well i still have trouble because every time you use the word god it deflects my my mind it gets confused me couldn't you study this ended with uh without using the word god absolutely so this is the other extreme of what you were asking from if you say that from the dualistic point of view that is not acceptable at all that is you are an atheist you are beyond the pale of religion and all of that the non-dualistic is perfectly all right yeah gorda pada for example is perfectly comfortable without using the term god in fact among the 35 um theories which came up to explain the world one of the theories was god god is the cause of this world god our father dismisses that also yeah so from an advaita point of view but we are perfectly all right you need not talk the language of religion that's the beauty of advaita that's what i thought yeah that's what attracts me to this right right there are many people who are attracted to it because they are not comfortable with the religious paradigm or even repelled by the religious paradigm and yet they want to be spiritual and they find this i say sometimes especially when i deal with religious fanatics you know those who are very narrow and dogmatic i sometimes say when i'm feeling particularly nasty that that i'll put you through a course of listen for the next one month listen daily to christopher hitchens and richard dawkins and purge yourself up this nonsense afterwards come to non-duality so you can easily be a non-dualist without going through the religion track but remember vedanta also is religion that's the other side of it it is based on a dualistic religion but it's not limited to dualism so what part does devotion have because when you use the word god it seems like there's devotion devotion there yeah so and i see people bowing yes and i can understand the beauty of that yeah why because if you approach it in a dualistic way the answer will be from the point of view of appearance that non-dualistic reality itself appears to you as a multiplicity of this world and here there are three you are there the world is there and there is something called an ultimate reality that you may call it god or whatever you call it then the possibility of religion opens up there so that's the track which leads to religion you may go by that track or you may say look i want to investigate what i am and you come straight to the absolute which is the ground of those three you don't have to go through that but if you approach it through the guard path then devotion comes on along the path yeah because you establish a relation with god the relation with individual with the divine must be one of surrender devotion the dualistic religions are perfectly right that way but the dualistic religions are limited in their vision they don't see beyond that or they can dare not go one step beyond that in islam also you will see the mystics have very well realized this they know this but it is marginalized it's not it's not a speakable truth for the majority of people in hinduism advaita is a mainstream so it is not um it is not something horrible or terrible to think about let's hear it yes you and then yeah [Music] world that unreal is really in the objective point of view we think these are projection here false everything is right but if i am brahman i can control the whole world which brahman are you talking about okay i will not answer this question yeah why can't i even it is false then i can control false nothing to control look i understand that if it is false i'd have not to control it is nothing there okay i understand but sometimes i mix up i think if i am brahman i am so absolute then i am the whole you know but i understand i understand now yeah this is right and the answer to answer to that question the answer to that question would be that as the absolute sachidan and that's pure consciousness this whole question of controlling something does not come up it's only when as an individual limited individual that this question of controlling something comes up from the point of pure being what is there to control the question of what you are asking is god is absolutely powerful such saguna brahman but you are not god the moment you bring god you bring the universe in god in yeah you say that if i am that you but this is the this is what the dualistic religions get furious about advaita never says that i am god the individual is not not god that would definitely be sacrilege and that is not true at all all right so verse 35 from and what says in karma yoga that every action in essence can be can have a polarity positive or negative and the recommendation is to do your actions with god in mind but if you're following the advice you know when non-dualistic then it's almost like a never-ending loop because or you can only practice karma yoga as a dualistic form i'm going back to the question about morality um if if you're acting in non-dualistic or thinking in in such a way and every action could be positive or negative uh based on karma then if you're not thinking necessarily about god which puts you on on a dualistic sort of track then all right i'll just give this suggestion here get into the habit of thinking in the two-tiered level of together so two levels of reality non-duality if you understand you have to have this conception of two levels of reality the absolute and the relative the relative is where body mind world action religion belief disbelief all of this comes into play and the very reality of all of this the the ground of this reality is the absolute brahman now your question karma yoga will deal with what the relative or the absolute what will it deal with what will it deal with is it at the relative level or is it absolute relative absolutely it's absolutely relative yes the moment you have a world to act in a body to act in a mind to think with obviously you are you are talking about this relative world here karma yoga has full sway and your questions of karma morality about detached action all of that comes into play what advaita only has to say about it is practice karma yoga if you would gain fitness for realizing that all of this is an appearance brahman alone is real the the advaitic idea about karma yoga would be this we chanted before food every day brahman the instruments of action are brahman the one who does the action is brahman the beneficiary of the action is brahman the one who sees brahman in all action realizes brahman so that is from the absolute point of view karma yoga bhakti yoga raja yoga all of these have to be practiced for gaining fitness for realization of this absolute truth yeah okay so karma seems obvious to me as as if it's in the waking world what does that have to do with brahma that's what i don't understand and you say karma is a universal principle that exists in the world of brahma but how i mean it seems very very much in the world of uh awakening it is it that's exactly what i'm saying yeah from the point of view of brahman is there karma or not if you're asking the answer is no okay brahman is safe the absolute is always safe there's none of this all right let's go ahead now now the last two verses remember 35 36 37 38 are what god happened is proposing we do now after studying all of this so 35 are the initial uh the preliminary qualifications um the four ford qualifications plus sravana and manana gaining this knowledge hearing it and cogitating upon it thinking about it and 36th verse is um meditating upon this knowledge and then how do you live in this world jadawat loka macharit live in the world externally just like anybody else that does not mean that internally you'll be like anybody else that anger envy greed hatred will be there because your godupathi said be just like everybody else no you are enlightened so you those things will not touch you at all you'll you will be able to transcend them easily but externally your life may not have any uh any special distinction at all there's no need to make any major change in life externally now 37th verse this is what i have not said openly this is one more godupath has one more offering to make that one more suggestion to make which will help you to realize all of this he says become a monk so he says this so let's see how but it's the english for this let me see does anybody have the english 37 right that is 37 years the man of self restraint should be out of all praise salutation and all rights prescribed by the smriti in connection with the departed ancestors he should have this body and the atman as his support and depend upon chances that is he should be satisfied with those things for for his physical wants that chance bring to him okay a completely monastic lifestyle a very traditional indian monastic lifestyle is prescribed because this is the most natural one which will help you to become enlightened so it's a suggestion now before i go into this it is is it an option formal monasticism is an option one can become a monk or a nun if circumstances permit opportunities permit if one wants to follow this path that is there but what is not negotiable is that internal attitude so internally internally one must become monk-like whatever life you lead outside internally the attitude becomes monk-like so it's good to see what traditionally a monk is supposed to be and in vedanta and then extract from that from the the essence which we can actually imbibe whether you are actually formally a monk or not so to before we go into this do i have to become a monk answered yes and no no externally one can or one may not internally yes one must become monk like internally what does that mean so that now here he's actually talking about the external lifestyle of a monk completely becoming a monk leaving everything else behind so let's quickly take a look at what he has said here nistuti nir namaskar and swadhakar what does it mean literally study means hymns of praise namaskara means salutations swadha means the rituals offered to departed ancestors one gives all these up what it refers to is traditional hinduism the religious householder householder religious householder was supposed to have pancha maha yagya the five great practices of five great sacrifices the which is supposed to be part of a religious lifestyle when i say what they they are you will understand they are just like um worship of god that's one and then the chanting of the vedas that's another one it's a duty of the householder the worship of the the uh departed ancestors uh or rituals performed for the departed ancestors um the sacrifice for human beings all for the community and for animals and other living beings so the five great sacrifices so basically you would perform a puja two to god you would chant the vedas daily or in ancient times you would perform the daily sacrifices the fire ritual and you you would chant the vedas daily you would chant the vedas or or study the vedas daily uh you would perform the yearly uh rituals the shraddha rituals associated with departed fathers forefathers and all of that the the ancestors who have gone and then you would um you know do whatever is necessary for people around you the community around you human beings and then also for animals and plants and all of that so this is a the five great sacrifices for pancha mahayakya and the monk is set free from all of that this is meant for the householder so when you say he goes beyond the the chanting of the hymns the stuti that means he doesn't have to regularly chant the vedas anymore like the house or the religious householder has to do namaskar the one who goes beyond the worship or salutations to the gods so he doesn't have to do the regular pujas which the religious householder has to do doesn't have to do this is the mantra chanted when you make offerings to departed ancestors so aha for god and swaddha for departed ancestors so you don't have to do that anymore in fact when one becomes a monk one is released from so these are three there are two more also the sacrifice for the human beings and sacrifices for the um animals and plants for for nature so it's a very comprehensive view of human life very beautiful structure and the monk is released from all of that monk is one who gives up all of that so what does the monk do see the thing is you might ask why why would a religion permit the whole class of people to give up religion apparently anyone must take a step back and see what all this is meant for what is the point of all of this so from a vedantic perspective the point of human life is god realization brahmagyana to realize our true nature and be free that is the whole point swami vivekananda put it this way the goal of religion each soul is potentially divine uh the goal is to manifest this divinity already within us do it by by work or meditation by devotion or by psychic control he means meditation by philosophy philosophy ghana yoga by psychic control raja yoga meditation by devotion that is bhakti or by selfless work karma yoga any of the four yogas by one or more of or all of our all of these and be free that is the whole of religion books temples doctrines and churches are secondary details so this is the idea of human life we are born to realize our infinite nature that's our whole purpose the game of life is meant for that now all of these practices which are prescribed i am in the world and i am this individual i am trying to make a living for myself and be happy in this world what can religion do religion wants to guide me to that infinite realization but right now i am not i don't want that i want this world and the next world i want to be happy here and go to heaven afterwards i want to be this person my infinite nature that just is talk to me or it's scary to me all right then religion says leave your life in such a way you'll become ready for that and for that it prescribes a religious lifestyle be moral take care of people around you the environment around you follow the religious traditions of your of your ancestors and try to become more and more purer more evolved more sensitive more spiritual till one day you are ready that this whole cycle of birth and that this transmigratory cycle does not interest me anymore how many times am i going to repeat what's the term groundhog day or something this it's a phrase a movie is it it's a movie or something yeah so you're repeating it's something about repeating the same thing again and again how many times am i going to repeat this cycle again and again what is the reality behind all of this then religion itself says yes there is a reality behind all of this that's what i want that's the question i wanted you to ask all these lives have been guiding you towards a better life a more religious life be you are leading a worldly life religion shows you how to lead a more sustainable more better worldly life so that you can become more spiritual but when you are ready for this highest spirituality then you don't need that scaffolding anymore you need only enlightenment that's what you're looking for now if you are here if you are at that point you don't need all that then you come to this life when you come to this life this monastic life is meant only for enlightenment there's only one thing here nothing else it's not meant for earning money raising a family doing politics nothing art science no no no it's meant only for enlightenment if you're ready for that when you clear the decks for action all the rest is given up why is it given up because they were meant for this they were meant for this to bring you to this point that's the that's why the whole structure is set up there's an interesting portion in the criteria open issues in the commentary shankaracharya he makes a very interesting remark this talk about brahman brahman they talk about the ultimate reality somebody asks the question suppose brahman doesn't exist suppose brahman doesn't exist there is no ultimate reality that question comes up actually then shankaracharya in his commentary makes a very interesting observation he says in that case the entire thing which we are talking about religion the society civilization everything has actually no meaning at all because the point of all of this is enlightenment brahma it's for realizing your nature as the absolute for realizing the infinite religion not just vedic religion all religion not only religion all civilization all morality all our experiences in science and art and whatever we are doing in life is ultimately meant to bring us to that point of enlightenment if that is not there the whole thing falls apart it has no meaning at all okay so that's how they thought of it now if you are at the point where you want that and nothing else then the other things can be dispensed with the other practices the preparatory practices so it's like i've seen you know the rocket takeoff in nasa i mean not actually but in video so the rockets or space shuttle are always supported by gantries by all these structures all around but before takeoff they're all removed and those are necessary to keep it safe and to for to supply it and whatever but the last thing is they are all removed for finally so these support structures are removed now is the monk completely free now can do whatever you like be up to monkey business monk no no the monk is now going to do one thing and one thing only which is immerse yourself in vedantic study contemplation and meditation till you get it till that enlightenment happens so that's the point there is a saying among monks so all what about all these activities which the the religious household is supposed to do they're all replaced by one thing vedanta so a wandering monk in india even now there are so many um the vedantic monks what do they do they had they cut off all connections with family with uh with society and it's a society actually which provides for them the minimum requirements they need clothing and food and maybe shelter and they spend their whole day they will go out begging for their food maybe once or maximum twice and we spend the whole day in the study and contemplation of upanishads gita and vedantic texts and meditation on that as long as it takes to get enlightenment so that is the idea of renunciation monastically and religious religion it is done ritualistically there is actually a vedic a vedic ritual called viraja homa viraja means the last vedic sacrifice which is done which sets you free from veda itself after that you don't have to do any of these sacrifices anymore it sets you free but then you are governed are there no rules the rule is this one only you're governed by this rule only that there are rules if you go to the monastic thing there's so many um things but all of them are meant to uh sort of narrow down the options streamline your life towards this only that's all so there'll be lot of every monastic order has many many rules monks love rules so they'll be full of rules but all the rules are basically the outcome of this only that your the life is prepared for enlightenment yes i was wondering what does vedanta say about sexuality can you use sexuality as a spiritual path to enlightenment all right i'll come to that so what does a monk give up actually sri krishna points he puts it very clearly he says that kama kanchana so sexuality and possession that means literally it means desire karma and kanchana means gold gold or money so possession and lust these two things are given up these are the things to give up so a monastic life a vedantic monastic life is based on the uh renunciation of these two fundamental urges the urge to accumulate and the urge to procreate so these two are given up now your question is um so this is the perspective the upanishads would take which says shankara or godhapath would take but your question has another aspect to it there in the tantras there is one aspect of tantra which says instead of trying to give up the most fundamental urges in human life how about transmuting channelizing these enormous psychic powers right so direct them towards enlightenment harness these these energies so that's the tantric way but that is not the vedantic way or the the way of the vedantic monk especially a monk is definitely supposed to give these up there is absolute in fact there are fundamental vows which cut you off from this uh from uh literally from the acquisition of wealth or from the pursuit of pleasure so so that's the perspective is there a reason for that yes because these are the ones which tie you to this world to this relative existence if you pursue that you are trying to what are you trying to say you're trying to say that i want happiness through these this is where happiness lies for me this is where fulfillment lies for me that is worldly life that's the very definition of worldly life so fulfillment for me lies in this and if i pursue this i will be happy as we pursue this we realize no we are not happy by pursuing this we do not get you know overcoming of the suffering that does not happen attainment of lasting joy or peace does not happen through accumulation of wealth or the pursuit of pleasure then we ask the question how can i achieve overcoming of suffering and achievement of bliss so achievement of true happiness then the vedantic path starts and tantra also has the same perspective only thing is tantra says instead of tantra doesn't say pursue that that's a misrepresentation of tantra it's not meant to enhance worldly pleasure it's rather meant to use those powers to achieve enlightenment so that's the tantric approach a vedantic approach does not take that path at all it takes the path of giving up those pursuits so that that energy that power can be used for spiritual for the spiritual quest in fact the very definition of a monk is that uh if a monk pursues worldly pleasure and accumulation of wealth it's not a monk it's against the definition of being a monk let me go let me finish this um actually by now i should have started the last verse but i've barely gone to the second uh let me just finish this verse then we'll take questions um let me go deeper into what being a monk is from this perspective and then tell you what we can extract from that which we can have everybody can apply in if you are a spiritual seeker um the most general thing is what i said sridhara krishna said karma kanchanatha giving up the pursuit of worldly pleasure and accumulation worldly accumulation giving up means for a householder it will mean one thing for a monk it will mean another thing uh so depending upon your station in life you ca what godupath describes here as a monk you can't be that if you are living in manhattan and you have to pay your rent and you know you can't do that uh so i'll see what i will see what godfather describes as being life of a monk you'll have to suitably modify it but the principles can be taken and applied your mental attitude becomes like that you can live a very simple life in manhattan too but we'll be in details it will be different from if you're living in a cave in the himalayas all right so giving up karma karma literally means desire but it specifically means pursuit of sexuality as a a path towards fulfillment and kanchana the accumulation of wealth consular literally means gold but it means money wealth acumen possessions and all that and remember sriram krishna said this is essential for spirituality for everybody for everybody for a monk it means one thing for householder it will be another thing but the principle is this think about it what ties us to worldliness think about it just these two it's these two and as a thinking in today's world these are the two places i was thinking i was in hollywood and now here is this wall street here the god here is money and the god there is i will not say sexuality i'll just say it's glamour fame so these two and the idea is if you if you rise high in this world of money and glamour you will be happy this is the thing to do this is the definition of success in this world and spirituality says that no and it's not just vedanta any religion will tell you that it's not going to lead to any kind of lasting happiness in fact it's only going to increase your unhappiness ultimately no questions now hold on let me finish the whole verse itself so this is at the most general level let us go deeper into what is meant here we are talking about vedantic monasticism so you must go into the vedas to see how they understand worldliness and a religious worldly life but a religious life and a spiritual monastic life the differences they say there are three desires which a monk must give up they are called in sanskrit asian aisha means desire and being a monk means giving these three up [Music] the three are it's very interesting the vedic background it may not seem directly relevant to us but it's good to know where all this comes from because we are just seeing the final product of it but if you open the hood and go underneath what is going on when they talked about monastic life like this this is what's going on the three desires one is putra aisha another is with traditional literally means desire for children or progeny desire for wealth or money location a desire for the higher worlds what is behind this why does one want this not what you would think the vedic context is this by having children and the children will perform the vedic rituals they're all connected to vedic ritualism they'll perform the vedic rituals for the departed ancestors which will ensure that you get a human birth next life so that they say the original vedic statement is human world by this now money why does one need money so that one can engage in vedic ritualism the merit of which you perform the yagya the fire rituals the merit of which ensures that after our death we attend to heavenly worlds which are we don't we don't go to hell and we go to pleasurable words good words which which which give you happiness you for some time you will be there gita also says as long as you have got good karma you will be in those worlds and then you come back to attain a human birth provided you have got children who have performed the necessary vedic rituals which will enable you to get you bought the ticket for this so this is the whole thing is the context of a vedic ritualism so what is the meaning of this the desire for this is progeny this is wealth this is the highest heaven heaven heaven heaven okay now with taishana means that by this this wealth i will perform vedic rituals karma karma means vedic ritual karma here does not mean worldly activities it only means vedic rituals by that vedic rituals by those vedic rituals i have an accumulated good karma we call it punya we know these words punya and as a result of that after death i will go to swarga the swarga is heaven and there are levels of heaven three-star hotel four-star hotel five-star hotel i remember i went to the world parliament of religions the first thing they asked me was uh uh so they put us up in a hotel near the convention center and they asked me are you afraid of height swami i said no i said good i've got the room for you so they took me up to this room it was really luxurious and comfortable and the whole one wall was a window and you could see out into the whole of toronto from there so that's some kind of punya says so not even seven there's a 37th floor so 37th he said that you don't have vertigo then you can enjoy it so you it depending on the ticket you have purchased your the melody of accumulated literally they literally meant it that you will go to the ancestral heavens as ancestral worlds petri loka so ancestors our fathers and grandmothers and grandparents and our great-great-grandparents they're all in different kinds of worlds or they go there and they stay there for some time depending on how nice or naughty they have been or how much of vedic rituals they have done so those are the words we can aspire for if you lead a moral if you lead a ritualistic lifestyle for that you need worldly wealth also because they are expensive those rituals and and the priests tend to make a lot of money in that you can see the logic behind this actually also so there is some economic logic behind all of this and then the location the last one is the highest heaven they say brahma local the exact same the upanishadic term is um [Music] what is called heaven in dualistic religions the highest possible heaven the dwelling of god you can go there and vedanta says if you have desires even from there you're going to come back again if you still want something in this world you're going to fall from that again uh but that that brahmaloka if you want that then um this is devaloka or brahmaloka the exact vedic term is devaloka a close english translation would be the highest possible heaven now these are three kinds of desires which a religious person in vedic india was likely or supposed to possess actually you would aspire for this now human birth human world means you're already a human being but next time you get a good human birth and after death you go to ancestral world and this is the best possible you can go to heaven itself the highest heaven brahmaloka and dwell in the company of god again all of these are limited and you come back you recycle back into this world again this is a kind of higher worldliness if you will this is not really very spiritual at all now so this is the background when you become a monk you're supposed to give up all of this because the basic idea is what shall i do with these worlds am i translating the upanishads directly what shall i do with these words i who am atman i am sachidanda all these words are my appearances they are appearances in me physi these this world the universe all of them are appearances in me i am that absolute in which all of these appear and disappear why do i want to be one individual creature in one of these words going from one to another another no i want to attain to my own infinite nature as atman therefore this is the original text what shall i do with this words if i don't want these these are the ends which i want these are the means these are desires these are also desires but these desires are a means to these desires the entertainment of that this is the underlying vedic logic of of sannyasa of monastic life so since i do not want a human birth again look at the strange logic of it since i do not want a human birth again i do not need children to perform the vedic rituals which will give me a human birth again hence i need don't have to get married and lead a married life with children and all of that so i give up marriage and sexuality that is given up since i do not need wealth to perform religious activities which will ensure me a place in ancestral worlds i give it up accumulation of wealth since i don't have a family i don't need wealth anyway and i don't need wealth for for the vedic purpose that is going to other worlds afterwards i give that up and since i'm not interested even in the highest heaven brahmaloka or devaloka so i give up the vedic they call it upasana now the means for this is prajni assuming your children are also believers in the vedic religion who will perform the necessity it's dicey so and the second one is uh wealth for attaining these worlds and then how do you attain this this devaloka how do you do that the means are upasana there are vedic meditations or what uh let's put it this simply this way upasana vedic meditations they are found in the upanishads in in the karma khand of the veda also these are special mental exercises if you become masters of them you go to heaven afterwards so they're like visualizations prayers and so and so forth um whereas these ones are karma that means actual physical rituals performed these are internal meditations performed these ones are also given up if this is given up this is given up this is given up practically in the life of the monk what will happen that person will not marry will not have children or a family that person will not be engaged in in agriculture or trade or any of the professions to earn or accumulate money doesn't need it that person also will not engage in the regular worship puja and also japa and dhyana and all of that no not necessary that's why a traditional monk upasana means actually a worship so we for example in our order even after becoming monks we still repeat the mantra and meditate on our easter devote and all of that we do a traditional shankar right monk would actually not do that also so there is this funny story of one of our monks on our on a pilgrimage to amanat so they are intense on in the high himalayas so in the evening the monk from our order he sits down wraps a blanket around himself and sits straight and starts meditating repeating the mantra and another monk from a traditional shankarai order he pokes his head into the tent and he says what swami upasana even now even now you are doing so that's their attitude but remember when we do persona uh they also do it there's a whole different side to it uh when we do a person it's not for attaining higher worlds it's for attaining enlightenment in fact it is a different story altogether but anyway so um because it's a important thing to keep your mind focused on uh on a higher reality in fact i have heard the the traditional idea of monasticism in shankara vedanta is so high and so subtle and difficult to grasp many people who take it to that path they don't understand what they're going in for i remember i was in the gathering of traditional monks in shankara this non-extreme non-dualist monks and one young monk who had just taken the vows of monasticism maybe a few months ago he comes to the teacher and he says swami so i've become a monk now this one the master he says yes you have and so what do i do now then exactly the master chuckled like that and he said well well well so you have now what will you do yes that is so that's the question what will you do in hindi you can understand and this old swami he chuckles and he says the very fact that you are asking this question shows you have not understood what is meant so but there is something that is suggested the the masters are very gracious they will give you something to hang on to so they say that don't do the traditional upasanas worship of god in this form or that form give all that up meditate on om meditate on om deergha pranava urana if you want to do anything at all wanting to do anything with the body and mind means you're still thinking of yourself as this yeah what you are actually supposed to do is dwell on the truth that you are brahmana and be centered in that but you think you have to do something well in that case meditate on what else can you do so these are the three asianas the three fundamental desires which have to be given up to become a monk this is what he's talking about you notice he says give up the traditional chanting of the vedas give up the that means these upasanas are to be given up give up the worship of god that is the stuti um then he says namaskar give up namaskar give up the worship of the ancestors all of these things he says you give give these up that is the fundamental nature of um vedantic monasticism uh wait one more thing i want to say so the idea is we are giving up all limited words in vedanta we are giving up all limited words we are giving up on having a limited existence somebody asked what about individuality somebody was asking last time what about individuality this literally this sounds very archaic but basically what it means is you are giving up individuality you are becoming one with everything or you realize that you are that infinite not limited to a particular existence of as a body and mind that's what you want to put a stop to that is the nature that is the very philosophy of vedantic monasticism or non-dualistic monasticism okay now let us go ahead and see what he said about this monasticism in this this verse so i swami vivekananda in his poem song of the sannyasi which is literally means song of the monk one of the lines is he refers to this actually it's it's a beautiful composition in lucid english but it's got a fundamental basis in vedanta in the upanishads in one of the lines he says all worlds high and low do i give up all hopes and fears i give up from me no fear be to to ought that lives so these are actually the vows of monasticism the fundamental vows the actual vows i will not mention because the tradition is if you hear those vows you have to become a monk that's the end if the the rule is that if you actually yeah there are people who like superstitiously believe this in the high himalayas that they're one thing the reason they're terrified of a monk is at least one power this guy has he may tell me those vows and then there is and the thing is then i have to give up everything my my heart and my wife and children and my farm and everything and go out and become a monk so if you hear them then no need to search for your parked car or anything like that off you go to the himalayan no wait let me finish then what else does he suggest these are very important let's take this one first yati bhavit means be a monk yadrichiko means subsist in afterwards as far as this individual being the one who is a monk now you are brahman but this body mind is the body mind of a monk how does that live it lives on whatever comes your way provided by god or by by your own karma so he says so as far as food clothing and shelter are concerned that's all your concern is that is you say why would you want that you would want that because you're still not an enlightened person this is also a practice that you are doing to become enlightened if you are enlightened you don't even need to be a monk this is also a practice there's also a suggestion that he's giving so how would you live yadric maintain the body with the food which you get by begging gracia mata means begging with you with the palm of your hand you don't even have a begging board that kind of austerity and kopi not charge the only thing you're wearing is a loin cloth and we last time we talked about swami premananda see how you you practice this in the midst of many things in the midst of of uh swami premananda was the manager of belormat the first manager of bedrumut last sunday we talked about his life i meant forgot to mention when he passed away when after his death is you they went to his room remember this is the person who's in charge of a huge monastery went to his room and what were his positions one half empty canvas bag in which there were two dhotis dirties like this one shirt one undershirt i think and one gita an old copy of the gita that's it this is the entire worldly position of swami premaranda swami turiyananda whose birthday also is coming up in january who was a who was exactly a monk of this description you see when you see their lives you realize these are not um theoretical they're actually practiced even by people who are who were living very recently and even now there are people living he lived for a long time in mountains and forests in huts he describes his life in rishikesh in those days on the bank of the ganga living in a hut made of twigs and leaves and in the morning they would start he and other monks they would study gita and the upanishads he would memorize the verses he would go one day once in the day he would go out to beg for his food and sometimes he would be so absorbed in the study that by the time sunset he would hadn't realized that he had not gone for begging for food and so that day he would remain hungry once the sun sets it's dark and this is you cannot go out there right you're actually tigers around at that time so he goes back to his hut whole night remains immersed in meditation no sleep it's not he's practicing not sleeping he's right um once a whole week six days went by without any kind of sleep and i never felt tired and i felt scared and i tried to sleep on saturday oh after six days of trying the um on the sixth day or seventh day sixth day he got half an hour of sleep at night and he said i felt so happy even if we get half an hour of good meditation we feel happy he gets half an hour of sleep he feels happy another time there's a description of how he was going off from the monastery in kangkall we have a hospital there he was going off into um into the woods into the hills to remain and meditate there and the monks in the hospital were so concerned for him that in the little packet they packed for him with a bundle of clothes they put some money there rupees he discovered it several hours later when he had walked off quite a lot and he walked all the way back to return the money i will not keep any money on the way there's a description of how his clothes were torn uh and so he takes clothes discarded in a crematorium and in in in a cremation ground discarded clothes on the ground takes it and washes it in the ganga and puts it on as a lion glass literally exactly the description given here depending only on a lion cloth and the food which one gets in the palm of one's hand for one's survival survival of the body so this is called yadrichiga whatever comes your way now whatever comes your way means usually for a monk you have to be a monk to realize this the problem often is not that too little comes your way problem is too much comes your way so whatever comes your way it's not that you have to take everything that comes here but then you are you'll be deluged i know it will be uh swamped a bit with things which people give you so it basically it means whatever you need a senior monk told me once whatever you need the basic minimum take a little less than that minimum this is what i need to live so take a little less than that then it's a good practice for you so that is the uh but then this is for a traditional monk wandering in the himalayas one more term he has used and i will end with that so what is the attitude of such a monk he has two houses nikita means houses one of the definitions of a monk in the gita is aniketa the homeless so in l.a when i was there homelessness is a big problem there so i was saying in vedanta recommends homelessness but of course not out of uh you know it's out of choice not choiceless uh helplessly so the bug here it says gaurav father says he has two houses this is a surprising use of the term because a monk is supposed to be aniketa homeless nikita means house here he says there are two houses one a mobile house and a mobile house what is the immobile house the mobile house is atman the absolute that's your house you are brahmana you are the house itself you are brahman what you are that is your you are that know that and there is a mobile house what is the mobile house the body mind and the sankrachary explains once in a while to look after the body mind remember you're not yet enlightened so you still have to keep it up to look after the body mind maybe you have to take a bath in the ganga you have to go to the the place where food is being given to monks so he says for going for begging for your food you take help of the mobile mobile house get into the mobile house and walk there and get food for the for the mobile house or you could take a bath in the ganga so that's the moving house and the non-moving house and remember even when you are identified with the moving house i'm walking i'm talking i'm begging for food i'm eating even then the fact that you are brahmana is not at all clouded i am brahman when monk put it this way when the when the monk goes around his round of begging for food and taking care of the body the fact that he is brahman and not the body even while acting through the body that fact that he is brahman is not clouded one and when he's immersed in his nature as the absolute it's not that the body will die the body is still there as long as the prarabdha for this body the karma past karma for this body is there it will continue and this i've seen so many instances of monks i'm reminded of a monk who was in the hut where i lived this monk as the nepali monk who was there many years before i lived so i was living in a hut in the in the himalayas and another monk he told me but you know where you live there was this nepali monk another vedantic monk many years ago and he had a very strict routine of getting up early in the morning no matter how cold and then he would come and take a bath in the ganga and all of that so and they would there are no chairs or beds no furniture no electricity nothing so it's just a few blankets on the floor and a few blankets on top of you and the blankets are older than you so that's all you've got nothing else now once this monk he was late in getting up the sun had already risen it's cold and remember cold there means what it's what cold is there outside is the same cold inside too it's there's no heating or anything like that so it was really a tough job to get out of the warm blanket so he went back to sleep again i mean he woke up the sun was high in the sky and he was so furious with himself he kept the blanket wrapped around himself raised to the ganga and jumped in took a dip in it and came back with a soaking chilled blanket and is telling his body that you want to you wanted to sleep you want to sleep in the blankets well well now enjoy the blanket sure we are getting pneumonia but there are many many such stories and i saw even now even the most ordinary of monks who live in the hearts in the in the caves there they come out once in a day to go for their round of begging so that's the mobile house i'll end with a funny story this idea of a mobile house i remember i thought i should tell this story of course here the idea is not so unknown because in america the idea of an rv is that you can actually stay in that it's a big vehicle like a house you can stay in that and you can stay with the family too and move around and and settle down in different places and then start moving again so that's really a mobile house that concept is not there in india another thing i saw was these ready-made houses they can put them on a big trailer truck and can take them by them and take them away what modular house modular houses and today i read in the news that in saint louis have you read that yeah a woman's house got stolen right people burgle houses they come inside and take things away from the house the burglars came and took the house away it's a small house of course and a tiny house yes and they found it somewhere outside 60 miles away so the house itself was taken away now the funny story is this in uttarkashi in our we have a cottage there for monks who stay there who want to stay they beg for their food and they have a place to stay and they spend their time in meditation prayer and study one of the monks very interesting monk and he was when i met him he was under the vow of silence he didn't want he had he maintained a vow of silence for nearly 10 years or so never spoke or he spoke with sign language and he would write little notes but he wouldn't speak um but that doesn't mean that if you're involved silence doesn't mean that mind is silent so you get into quarrels with others and so if you don't speak how can you get into queries with others as well you can do quite a lot with sign language now at one point this month was so upset with the other monks staying in the cottage he uh he told them that he has decided not to stay with with you all i'm not going to stay i'll stay by myself where will you stay i said i'll make a mobile cottage so it's like those halal carts you see there so he actually designed one but didn't actually make it and use it so he said that he will stay inside that just a little box he'll stay inside that and go on the bank of the ganga and stay there maybe a few days later it doesn't feel like it he'll wheel it away and take it elsewhere so kind of monastic rv you know like yeah but god apartheid says we all have our mobile house which is the physical body so a monk should have these two houses brahman the absolute i am that and for the for the for as far as the world is concerned the minimal dealings you have with the world for the food of this body for the maintenance of this body the minimum then you have the mobile house the physical body i wanted to finish this chapter but the next verse a is a fantastic verse it's the climax of the entire chapter so maybe we'll do it next time then and then also summarize the whole chapter that's a good idea om shanteshan [Music] foreign