The Higher Power

Swami Tattvavidananda Saraswati

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 Much gratitude to our sponsors
Dr. Prasad & Meena Mantravadi
for their devotion and generosity

We try to form a concept of the Higher

Power. But being the unknown and
unknowable, how can the Higher Power
ever be brought under the purview of
intellectual conceptualization? We search
for the limitless Power to solve our
dilemmas, but do we have the
wherewithal to capture that Power, which
is the formless? With a thousand names
we beseech that Power to answer our
prayers, but how futile, as it is essentially
nameless! Swamiji says, “Only by
complete surrender unto that Higher
Power can we sense its presence.” The
excerpts featured in this booklet, from
some of these profound and powerful
teachings, give an intimation of that one-
without-a-second Higher Power.

Swamini Srividyananda
April, 2023

We are very grateful to our editor

Terry Coe
for his invaluable assistance.

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 Foreword

Bṛhat, that which is vast, which expands

without limit, which is infinite, is
brahman. There is a reality that is free of
the world. The world cannot be real
because it is contradictory, an assemblage
of opposites. Brahman is the reality which
has no opposites. It is Absolute Being; it
is not phenomenal. Knowledge of
brahman is the brahmāstra, the weapon
that destroys all opposites – pain/pleasure,
birth/death, etc. Brahman is indescribable.
Words cannot reach it, so you use an
open-ended language – neti, neti, not this,
not this, or “that by which all this is
pervaded.” It is not conclusive because
conclusions are conditioned.

Saying that brahman is spaceless and

timeless implies space-time, which is not
absolute. In the sentence idam agre āsīt,
“this was there at the beginning,” the
word agre, beginning, does not imply
time. Rather, it implies a time when time
itself was not there. There is no other way
to express the being. You have to reach a
state of being when there is no space-time
yet.

Brahma asti is prathamaṁ darśanam.

When you hear the word brahman, it
should instinctively bring in asti, ‘is’;
otherwise, it will remain ‘the other’ as a
concept. The sense of being, the is-ness, is
within you. The sense of being associated
with the thing is in you – it is you, always
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with you. The Upaniṣad explains it that
way. Any word used is only a hint. Our
ṛṣis used the word ‘space’ or vastness to
refer to brahman. It is vast and pervades
all, including space. Your body is within
space, so when you hear the word
brahman, you feel it.

We already have an appreciation of

brahman, but it is hampered because we
ensnare ourselves in the cocoon of self-
identification, mixing up the real with the
unreal. Do not consider the body a trap,
however, or you will become a prisoner
for the rest of your life. Viveka is the only
way out of this trap. Do not revere,
worship, glorify, or adore the body.
Instead, look at it as a tool of action. Do
not identify with it; you are not it.
Changes in the body come to light by the
inner light, and you are that light.

When a sense of separation from the body

emerges and you become free of the ‘me-
and-mine syndrome,’ that is enough to
shift the focus from ideas and
identifications. Events will continue, but
you will not be tethered to them. You will
come to know, in time, that the Prime
Mover prevails and you are only a
dispassionate witness. The Prime Mover
is not separate from you. When the sense
of me-mine vanishes, there is ātma-
ekatva-darśanam, oneness with brahman.
The sense of separation is due to
ignorance. Everything is in me when there
is separation; everything is me when the
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separation is negated. You are that
infinite.

Infinite in the true sense is timeless,

spaceless, indescribable. Like space
exploration, infinite expressions have no
end. Look around: everyone is an
expression of brahman. There is nothing
like reaching a conclusion to an answer
here. An answer is a conclusion born of
conditioning from the past. There can be
no answer; there can only be enquiry. The
nature of brahman cannot be grasped by
the intellect. Therefore, one must keep the
spirit of enquiry alive. It is this spirit
which makes it possible for the seeker to
sense the reality when it reveals itself.

When all expressions and images in

thought end, there is a welling of love. It
cannot be measured with words. This is
inner silence, brahman. It is boundaryless,
spaciousness, divisionless. Thought is
frozen in time. In brahman, there is
silence – centerless, frontierless. In that
state of silence, there is peace. You enter
into the embrace of the unknown; the
beauty and quietude of the unknown,
brahman. Brahman is sensed in silence.
There are no words, images, or waves of
memory. It is a flame. In that embrace of
silence, which burns all borders and
enclosures, brahman engulfs you.

Swami Tattvavidananda

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 Asti – Existence

naiva vācā na manasā prāptuṁ śakyo na

cakṣuṣā, astīti bruvato’nyatra kathaṁ
tadupalabhyate
(Kaṭha Upaniṣad, 2.3.12)

“It cannot be attained through speech, nor

through mind, nor through eye. How can
It be known to anyone apart from him
who speaks of It as existing?”

Whenever you see the word asti, “is,” in

that is-ness you sense brahman. The
words you speak are not the issue here.
When you say asti, there is a buddhi
associated with the word. This is called
asti-buddhi or sat-buddhi. When you say,
“pot,” intellection happens. The mind,
which is the process of intellection, takes
the form of a pot. The pot idea happens
when you say ‘pot is.’ What is the
experience of pot? Look at the verbal
effort, which gives expression to the is-
ness; and look at the process of
intellection, which has now acquired the
form of is-ness. There you will sense
brahman. If you ignore the is-ness and
then look around for brahman, how will
you realize brahman?

The sense organs and the mind, which are

tools of cognition, cannot encapsulate
Reality. The mind can never ideate
Reality because what we think is only a
thought and what we ideate is only an
idea. The process of intellection comes
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out only with knowledge. What we emote
is only emotion. Brahman is beyond the
operation of the mind. When the mind
cannot express brahman, how can words
do so?

Brahman is the origin of the jagat, world.

The jagat, which is nothing but a
collection of distinctions or objects, has
its origin in Reality, which has no
distinctions. Even though it is not
available for the tools of cognition, still
brahman ‘is.’ How?

Pravilāpanam means to resolve

cognitively. Wherever you have an effect
and you follow the cognitive process of
resolution, the effect resolves in is-ness.
For example, you start with pot-buddhi by
thinking of a pot. Now the buddhi is
modified in the form of a pot. The
mechanism is that the mind acquires the
shape of the object it knows. The buddhi
becomes ‘pot-like’ to know the pot. When
we say pot-buddhi, the mind has elements
of the form of pot that are associated with
the name ‘pot.’ If you reject the name and
form of pot, you resolve it in sat-buddhi.
Suppose you say, “pot is” and I say,
“cloth is.” Now the pot-buddhi is replaced
with cloth-buddhi, but the asti-buddhi is
not replaced. The is-ness continues in the
buddhi even after resolving the name and
form under consideration.

We are habituated to look at name and

form in the world. If you make an effort
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to resolve the awareness of name and
form, it will take you to the awareness of
is-ness, which is sat-buddhi. The residue
is not nothingness; it is is-ness, which is
brahman. How?

What is this experience called “pot is”?

Initially it appears as a gross object that is
outside. Is it a gross object outside, or is
what you see neither gross nor outside? In
fact, what you see is a mental
modification in the form of a pot.
Therefore, what you see is not gross
because the mind is not gross; it is subtle
and also it is not outside. It is very much
within the space of mental cognition.
When you say, “pot is,” it refers to the
pot-modification of the mind.

What is this mind? It is movement, which

has a substratum, a changeless underlying
reality. That reality is the is-ness or sat-
buddhi. There you sense brahman. If you
pursue it and reach its source, you will
understand that the is-ness has its origin
in the awareness of existence. Ultimately,
the awareness of the pot has its origin in
awareness alone.

When you resolve the pot-buddhi by

rejecting the idea of pot, there is only
buddhi left. Before becoming aware of
pot, which is awareness with particularity
(distinction), you were aware of nothing
in particular, which is the undifferentiated
being or brahman without particularities.
Brahman can be sensed only through
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abhāva, absence. When all verbal efforts
and the process of intellection are dropped
– in other words, when name and form
(distinctions) are cognitively negated –
what remains is nothingness. This
nothingness is not void; it is the Reality
without any particularity. Brahman
transcends all distinctions.

The origin of the world of distinctions is

the is-ness, the being. The is-ness is the
immanent reality of the jagat, the world
of objects, just as the world of ornaments
has its origin in the underlying gold, the
immanent reality for that world. When
you recognize this fact, you will realize
that the transcendental being has nothing
to do with the names and forms. It is the
being alone which has manifested in the
shape of pots, sounds, etc. – all the
distinctions and pointers.

Begin to appreciate the immanent and the

transcendent will engulf you. You get a
glimpse of it and know that the body-
mind is not your true nature. Your true
nature is the impersonal nature of being.

There are many portals to enter into that

being. Meditation is one of them. Take
one of the portals, go into it, and abide in
the awareness of being. Slowly, you will
get a glimpse, you sense the Reality. You
will realize that your persona is a pale
shadow of that impersonal being.

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Meditation: Sit with eyes closed and say,
“This body is dead.” Continue to sit
quietly. Eventually it will take you to the
transcendent.

Look into a clear sky and imagine the

magnificent vastness of space. You will
transcend the mind and the infinite being
has already engulfed you. Then raise the
question, “Am I different from the being
or is the being different from me?” You
will realize that you are not other than the
being and the being is not other than you.
The vastness transports you to the
distinctionless being. The division
between observer and observed resolves.
When you are in the Presence, there is no
separation. In that divisionless
experiencing, that Presence, you are
transcendental. You are not in contact
with the distinctions. The unmanifest
flows into the manifest.

September, 2020
********

“Without the Real, the ground of

Reality, there cannot be the unreal.
Without the rope, there cannot be a
snake.”

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 Bhāti – Awareness

Yasyaiva sphuraṇaṁ sadātmakam

asatkalpārthagaṁ bhāsate, sākṣāt
tattvamasīti vedavacasā yo bodhayaty-
āśritān, yatsākṣātkaraṇādbhavenna
punarāvṛttirbhavāmbhonidhau, tasmai
śrīgurumūrtaye nama idaṁ
śrīdakṣiṇāmūrtaye
(Dakṣiṇāmūrti-stotram, 3)

“Brahman, which is Existence-Awareness

Absolute alone, pervades all the objects of
the world, making them shine/become
evident and imparting its own reality to
them, even though they themselves are
unreal. That brahman is indeed you, the
Atman. Whosoever realizes this truth will
not return to the ocean of repeated births
and deaths.”

Sattā, asti, existence, and sphuraṇa, bhāti,

becoming evident, are interconnected. A
thing is validated as existent only when it
becomes evident. A thing becomes
evident because it exists. It is the nature
of the mind to divide where there is no
division. The issue is not the division as
such, but the reality of the division. The
Presence, asti, is the Awareness, bhāti,
and Awareness is the Presence. The
dividing nature of the mind puts asti
outside and bhāti inside. The criterion for
this division is the false identification
with the body.

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The words jaḍa, insentient, and cetana,
sentient, are understood in different ways.
Things having life are taken as cetana and
lifeless objects are taken as jaḍa. But in
Vedanta, jaḍa means that which cannot
know itself or know others, whereas
cetana means that which knows itself and
others. It is obvious that everything is
known to me and I am self-evident. You
think you are in the world, but the world
is in you. You are the beacon of
consciousness, the light that illumines
whatever comes in its way.

Whatever you see is nama-rūpa

superimposed on sattā, Existence
Absolute. When the Reality expresses
through the mind and senses, it is
understood as nama-rūpa. The sattā,
which is supposed to be outside, is indeed
you, the Awareness. Thus, in the
Existence which pervades all, the objects
of the world are taken as existent. Also,
this Existence is Awareness, since a pot
does not exist outside the awareness of
the pot. The Supreme Reality, which is
the cause of the universe, is not one of the
objects of the world.

Asti and bhāti are two aspects of the same

Reality. Bhāti means shining. It is not the
light outside that lights up different
objects. Even that light shines only
because of consciousness, and that
consciousness is you. The world exists
because of you; you bless it with your
reality and consciousness.
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There is no world other than your concept
of the world. Are the objects making
themselves known to you, or is it you who
are illuminating them? You are like a
miner with a headlamp illuminating the
dark areas in the mine. The world is a
gallery and you are the central reality, the
light because of which everything else
exists and shines, asti bhāti. If you have
knowledge of a particular branch of
science, etc., it is you, the Awareness, in
which that knowledge is shining. If there
is ignorance, it is again the Awareness in
whose presence the ignorance is
recognized.

Asti bhāti is the essential reality of the

universe; name and form are only
shadows. The substance of the wave is
water; the substance of the ornament is
gold. The substance of anything that
exists is existence, which is the awareful
Atman.

The manifest has no independent reality.

The essential content of the manifest is
the unmanifest. Vedanta does not promise
us the vision of Viṣṇu, Śiva, etc. It clears
up our misconceptions about reality. It
tries to show that you are the very center
around which the universe is revolving in
terms of reality or existence, asti, and
shining, bhāti.

2001
*********
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 Ātma-jyoti

kiṁ jyotistava bhānumānahani me ratrau

pradīpādikaṁ syād evaṁ ravidīpa-
darśanavidhau kiṁ jyotirākhyāhi me,
cakṣuṣtasya nimīlinādisamaye kiṁ
dhīrdhiyo darśane kiṁ tatrāhamato
bhavānparamakaṁ jyotisdadasmi prabho
(Ekaślokī)

What is the essence of the human being?

Is it doing or knowing? It is knowing
because in the human being there are two
elements: ātmā and anātmā. Ātmā is the
knowing element in you and anātmā is
the body-mind, which is the doing
apparatus, also called the psychophysical
apparatus. The knowing element is within
the physical apparatus. The knowing
element, ātmā, is you, but the doing
element is not you. It is other than you.

People do not know the difference

between doing and knowing. Suppose you
ask someone, “What are you?” He may
say, “I am an engineer.” ‘I am’ is the
ātmā and engineer is the job he does. He
has confused himself as the doer. This is
how we live, believing that we are the
doers. There is doing, but we are not the
doers. Then what am I? You are the
knowing element. This is the message
presented by Śrī Ādi Śaṅkara in the
Ekaślokī, a text consisting of a single
verse in the form of questions and
answers.

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Kiṁ jyotistava? What is the light for you?
You see the whole world, make
conclusions about it, interact with it, and
do mischief also. Even to do mischief you
need light, what to speak of proper
activities? We are so busy with physical
things that we have the tendency to ignore
the light. Suppose I put up my hand and
ask, “What is here?” You say, “A hand”
and when the hand is taken away you say,
“Nothing.” But there is light, without
which you could not have seen the hand.

Bhānumānahani me ratrau pradīpādikaṁ

syād. During the daytime, the sun is the
light. During the night, when there is no
sunlight, we use the moon and various
kinds of lamps to see things and interact
with the world.

Ākhyāhi me ravidīpadarśanavidhau kiṁ

jyotiḥ. During the daytime you see
everything with the sunlight. What is the
light which sees the sunlight? At night,
you see things with the light of the moon
and lamps. What is the light which sees
the moon and lamps? This is called a
quantum shift. With this, your attitude of
looking outward is over; now you are
obliged to look within. Instead of looking
for the source of light outside – sun,
moon, etc. – look within. There is a light
within you.

Cakṣuḥ, there is a light in your eyes,

because of which you are able to see the
light of the sun, moon, and lamps. Now
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you have shifted from the outward
attitude to within; the quantum shift has
happened.

Tasya nimīlinādisamaye kim? Suppose

you close the eyes; is there a light in you
or not? Now the light is not physical light,
it is the light within. It is metaphorical
light, the light of knowingness. When you
close the eyes, you know you have closed
them, and when they are open, you know
they are open and seeing things. You
know you are seeing. When you close the
eyes, you are not seeing, and you know
that you are not seeing. That is the light
inner to the eyes – dhīḥ, the mind.

Dhiyo darśane kim? What is the light by

which you see the ever-changing mind?
The mind has many states and is ever-
changing. You are able to see or know the
moods of the mind – happy, unhappy,
angry, compassionate, jealous, etc. Just as
the fish live in the ocean of water and the
birds live in the ocean of air, so too you
live in that ocean of light within you. The
name of that light is ātma-jyoti, the
knowing element in you that illuminates
and comes to know the mind. In the light
of that ātmā, the mind becomes evident.
You always know the happy or unhappy
state of the mind. This means there is a
light that is inner to the mind. That inner
light illuminates the mind; through the
mind, it illuminates the eyes, and through
the eyes the whole world, including all the
lamps, sun, and moon.
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Worldly people are attracted by lamps and
religious people are attracted by the light
of the sun and moon. What is it that
illuminates the mind and knows the mind?
When you live with this question, you
will realize the Self because the inner
light which illuminates the mind is always
present. It is present in the waking state
illuminating the mind as it interacts with
the world; during the dream state it
illuminates the moving mind alone; and in
the deep sleep state it illuminates the
absence of the mind’s movement. If your
goal is to rise to the summit of realization,
the supreme goal, then it is absolutely
necessary to associate yourself with that
ever-present inner light. What is it that
sees the movement of the mind? Tatra
aham, that inner light is myself.

Ato bhavān paramakaṁ jyotiḥ, therefore,

dear son, you are that inner light: the
supreme light; ātma-jyotiḥ, jyotiṣāṁ
jyotiḥ, the light of all lights.

Tat asmi prabho. The student addresses

the ācārya as prabho, revered Sir,
because he has understood; he knows he
has to associate with the ever-present
inner light, the light of lights, ātma-jyotiḥ,
the knowing element, the light of
awareness that I am.

October, 2022
********

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 Ānanda
(Yogavāsiṣṭha)

Sat-cit constitutes the Reality, brahman.

Cit is the nature of sat. Ānanda is the
fragrance of sat-cit. Ānanda is not a state
of mind called pleasure; it is the svarūpa,
essence. It is like the fragrance of a
flower, which is not a state of the flower
but the flower itself. The ‘flowerness’
itself is experienced as the fragrance.

Generally, there is a great deal of

movement in the mind during pleasure.
The same movement is reflected in the
person’s conduct. In pleasure, the mind is
put in an excited state of high energy.
When we talk about ānanda, we are not
talking about that state because the body-
mind cannot remain in an excited state of
high energy for long; it gets burnt out. It
is like a filament in a bulb, which can
contain only a certain amount of energy
and still glow. If more energy is supplied,
the filament fuses.

Because the movement of the mind acts

like a screen and covers up the ground of
sat-cit, what we need is quietude and
peace of mind. When all the turbulence of
the mind subsides and is set aside, then
the inner reality of sat-cit reveals itself or
comes to the surface, as it were. Then
there is the fragrance of sat-cit, which is
ānanda in the form of mahā-śānti. It is
more negative than positive, in the sense
that when you are going through a
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pleasurable experience, you are self-
conscious about it and say ‘my joy,’ my
victory,’ etc. When you abide in sat-cit,
however, there is no small self and hence
you are not conscious of it as a state.
Because it is free from all attributes,
descriptions, and limitations, you cannot
be conscious of it. To be conscious of it, it
must have certain attributes. When it is
free from all attributes and you do not
stand apart from it as an individual, there
is nothing like being conscious of ānanda.

Therefore, even when we use the word

‘experience’ or ‘ānanda’ or ‘bliss,’ you
have to understand it cautiously. It is not
the ānanda of the ordinary kind, where all
divisions are in place and it is time-bound
also. The real ānanda is not time-bound
because it is the svarūpa. Whatever
comes from outside and goes is time-
bound; whatever is your own is timeless.
The svarūpa can be described as the
absence of self-consciousness, sense of
limitation, or sense of want. It can be
described only in a negative way.

In a different way, satyam, which is sat, is

presented as satyaṁ śivaṁ sundaram.
Śivam is auspicious; what is auspicious is
beauty. When you look at the world, the
mind projects a sense of beauty that is
transitory and unreal, whereas the inner
beauty is not a product of thought. It is no
different from satyam. Being the Reality
in itself, it is beauty. Sometimes it is also
called perfection. When we look at
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satyam from that standpoint, that satyam
is described as satyaṁ śivaṁ sundaram.
Sundaram is not beauty as understood by
human mind; it is the perfection of the
entire creation.

When we look around, there is joy

everywhere, but it gets interrupted. There
are moments of joy in the life of every
human being.

When we say that the lamp is illuminating

all the objects, that statement is a formula
for duality. The lamp is a doer and is
doing the job of illuminating. If I say that
the shining of the lamp is its svarūpa and
everything shines after that, it takes you to
the Truth. Whatever appears in the
shining is unreal. The Real is and it shines
– sat-cit and ānanda are its fragrance.

If sat-cit is timeless and ever-shining,

then ānanda must be with us always. We
do get droplets of ānanda occasionally.
Being happier or less happy is due to how
the ānanda is covered up by the mind.
When the mind is more agitated, the
covering is like a thick screen and hence
you are seldom happy. When the mind is
relatively calm and the covering lifts even
a little, letting the ever-shining ānanda
reveal itself, you experience some joy.

A person is alive and the body-mind is

animated. People tend to think that the
physical body nourished by food is the
source of aliveness. This is due to
20
annamaya thinking. Some think the
aliveness is due to the movement of the
physical body, which is prāṇamaya
thinking. Another group thinks aliveness
has its origin in the mind, which is a focus
on manomaya. Some say that it is the
buddhi, which is vijñānamaya. Or they
say that egoity is the source of aliveness,
which is ānandamaya. In these, the search
is confined to adhyātma. Your search has
not covered the real thing, however,
which is the source of life and the power
of knowing. That is ānanda.

Ānanda is the source of the aliveness that

animates the body-mind. You do not
know what that ānanda is, but it is there.
There are moments when the mind is
quiet for a brief time. At that time,
ānanda surfaces and flows, as it were,
into the body-mind. However small it is,
that flow of ānanda makes the body-mind
alive. That source is the secret of life.
That ānanda is none other than brahman.

When you reach the source of life, you

have reached brahmānanda. Look within,
search within, and find the secret of life,
the source of life. Bhagavan Ramana says,
“Find the source of the sense of ‘I am.’
That is where you discover your svarūpa
as ānanda.”

2015
********

21
 Māyā

Māyopādhirjagadyoniḥ sarvajñatvādi-
lakṣaṇaḥ, pārokṣyaśabalaḥ
satyādyātmakaḥ tatpadābhidhaḥ
(Vākya-vṛtti, 45)

“The immediate meaning of the word

‘that’ is the one who has māyā as an
apparently limiting adjunct, who is the
cause of the universe, who is
characterized as all-knowing, who can be
known only indirectly, and who is of the
nature of Existence, etc.”

The vācyārtha or primary meaning of tat

comes with a blemish. Brahman is
aparokṣa, but is taken as parokṣa and
indicated as ‘that.’ It is all around and
within you, so brahman is not ‘that.’ It is
taken as ‘that,’ however, which is the
blemish. The impurity comes from the
upādhi, limiting adjunct, which is māyā.

Nirguṇa-parabrahman is not the primary

meaning of tatpada. The primary meaning
is saguṇa-brahman, māyopādhi, jagat-
yoni, sarva-jña, sarvaśaktimān, parokṣa.
Parokṣa means ‘otherness.’

Brahman or caitanya is the substantive

and constitutive cause of the jagat.
Caitanya alone appears as matter. From
the perspective of the jagat, we have to
ask what is the substance out of which the
jagat is created? It is brahman, which is
caitanya. Therefore caitanya is the
22
substantive cause of the jagat. The jagat
is name and form, and brahman is its
substance. From the jagat’s perspective it
is the substantive cause, and from its own
perspective it is the constitutive cause.

Brahman cannot be the cause of creation

without the upādhi. If brahman is the
cause of creation, then brahman becomes
saguṇa and is different from the jīva. The
jīva has to worship saguṇa-brahman. If
you keep the cause of creation, which is
the primary meaning of tat, intact, then
you cannot have identity between jīva and
saguṇa-brahman. The upādhi has brought
in this division. What is the upādhi
because of which tat became parokṣa and
also apparently divided from jīva? It is
māyā. Brahman is the cause of creation
only because of the upādhi of māyā.
Māyā has three guṇas – sattva, rajas, and
tamas. That is why brahman as the cause
of creation when associated with māyā, is
called saguṇa-brahman.

What is māyā? Some say that māyā is a

theory that explains the world; you invoke
māyā to explain the world. But māyā is
not a theory. It is a statement of fact
because the foundation of our life is
contradiction. Are you life or death? You
cannot answer that question because if
you say life, then death is staring you in
the face, and you cannot say that death is
the essence of life because there is life.
Our lives move through tremendous
opposites and contradictions – life/death;
23
pleasure/pain; good/evil. Māyā is the
explanation for these contradictions.
Therefore, māyā is not merely theory, but
rather an attempt to understand the
contradictions of human existence.

When you whirl a lighted torch, the

shapes, which are phenomena, are not
inherent to the glow. They do not come
out of the glow, and when the whirling
ends, they do not merge back into the
glow. This is māyā. It seems as if they are
born out of the glow, sustained by the
glow, and resolve in the glow. But the
glow remains as glow; it does not do
anything. The only way to describe this is
as māyā because it is an elaborate trick.
The trick has two elements: one element
is the movement of the torch, without
which there can be no shapes. The second
element is the eyesight and the mind. All
of this creates the illusion of a shape. In
this example, the whirling is the māyā.
Therefore, māyā is movement and power
because it has to move. Brahman does not
and need not move. It is changeless,
motionless, immobile, and has no power.
On the other hand, saguṇa-brahman
needs power to become the origin of the
universe, just as the glow in the torch
becomes the origin of the shapes.

With reference to the shapes, the whirling

is the cause, māyā. With reference to the
creation, the whirling is replaced by the
mind, which is not a thing but a
movement. The ‘thing-in-itself’ is
24
caitanya. In the torch there is only glow
and movement. When the upādhi of
movement is joined with the glow, it
appears as a shape. Similarly, brahman
appears as the creation because of the
upādhi. That upādhi is the mind, which is
ignorance. It is ignorance because you see
what is not there and take it as real; it is
due to māyā.

The elaborate trick of the phenomenal

power of movement associated with
ignorance makes you believe that there is
a creation. But brahman cannot be the
real creator because the creation is not
real. You cannot say that the glow created
the shapes because they are unreal, an
appearance. The glow appears as shapes
because of the whirling. Similarly,
brahman appears as jagat because of
māyā. Brahman appears as the jagat to us,
so we must have māyā in us in the form of
avidyā, ignorance. The whirling is the
mind. There is no difference between
ignorance and the mind.

The jīva is the same as brahman, so how

can the avidyā of the jīva be different
from the māyā of brahman? Therefore
māyā is avidyā alone. Māyā-śakti and
avidyā are provisionally said to be
different, just as jīva and īśvara are said
to be different in order to make upāsana
possible. You need that upāsana as part of
sādhana to overcome māyā. To make this
upāsana possible, saguṇa-brahman is
invoked with the help of māyopādhi.
25
When you separate avidyā and māyā,
avidyā is vyaṣṭi and māyā is samaṣṭi;
avidyā is alpajña and māyā is sarvajña.
Sarva means the glow in the torch knows
all the shapes; so brahman knows all. If
you want to establish oneness, you have
to say that sarvajña is jīva alone. If you
analyze the matter, the jīva knows all –
known and unknown. Thus, you can
create a distinction between jīva and
brahman, using māyā/sarvajña on the one
side and avidyā/alpajña on the other. In
the process you have created a provisional
division, which is called parokṣatva,
saguṇa-brahman, other than myself.

Nirguṇa-parabrahman has no trace of the

jagat. The jagat is nothing but manifold
names and forms, which appear out of
that parabrahman. The names and forms
are illusory; what you see is the shape in
the glow, not what is there. It is due to
māyā. The interesting fact is that the glow
is present in all the shapes. Therefore,
brahman persists in all names and forms.
The whirling corresponds to māyā-śakti
and the shapes correspond to the
phenomenal world. You cannot make a
categorical statement about māyā because
of its uncertainty. It cannot be understood
as such-and-such and it is impossible to
know it in certain terms.

September, 2021
********

26
 Jīva

Jīvātmanā praveśaśca niyantṛtvaṁ ca

tānprati, śrūyate yasya vedeṣu
tadbrahmetyavadhāraya
(Vākya-vṛtti, 35)

“That which is heard from the Vedas as

having entered each creature as its
individual self, and is their controller,
ascertain that to be brahman.”

There are statements of the śruti which

talk of praveśa, entering. Jīvena ātmanā
anupraveśya (Chāndogya Upaniṣad,
6.3.2), “Brahman created this universe
and entered it as the jīva.” If you do not
understand properly, you will think that
the cosmic person is different from
brahman. Brahman entered the cosmic
body as the cosmic person called
Hiraṇyagarbha. Hiraṇyagarbha was the
prathama-jīva, first person, known as
Brahmādeva in the Purāṇas.

The spirit of praveśa-śruti is that

Hiraṇyagarbha is no different from
brahman – in other words, tat tvam asi.
What Hiraṇyagarbha is, you are. Brahman
entered as the jīva, individual soul.
Therefore, what you said to
Hiraṇyagarbha, you can say to the jīva
also: tattvamasi. What has entered in you
is brahman. How do you know that? You
know that electricity has entered this
building by turning the light on. Similarly,
the eyes see, ears hear, nose smells, mind
27
thinks; that by which you are aware of
everything, including the inner mental
states and sensations, is brahman, the
inner light. Having entered, brahman
appears as a jīva, individual soul, but
what entered and what is there cannot be
two different things. The inner light in the
body-mind is brahman because having
created the body, it entered into it. If
brahman entered, how can there be a jīva
other than brahman? You are calling that
brahman alone as jīva. This is the spirit of
praveśa-śruti.

Praveśa should not be misconstrued as

meaning something enters a hole, like
serpent enters an anthill; there is no
physical entering here. ‘Entering’ is only
a metaphor aimed at establishing the
oneness. There is a light within this body-
mind that commands the sense organs and
organs of action, mind, and ego. That
light is brahman. The ‘me’ is not there; it
has already merged. It is not a real entity.
The inner light is one light illuminating
all the life forms. The illustration given is
one sun reflecting in a billion dewdrops.
The inner light makes the life forms
functional as living beings, and that
brahman you are.

Generally, there is the misconception that

the sentient being obtaining in the body is
essentially a limited being, called a jīva.
A person enters into a room. How many
things are there now? Two: the person
and the room. Here is the body. Brahman
28
has entered into it. Now there is the body
and the knower of the body, which is the
same brahman. This Supreme Reality, the
Light of lights, that ātma-jyoti shining in
the body, illuminates the objects of the
world through the sense organs, just as a
brilliant light kept covered by a pot with
many apertures pours out through the
holes and illuminates whatever object
comes in its way. Kena Upaniṣad
describes the ātma-jyoti as the eye of the
eye, ear of the ear, etc.

You are not the body-mind illuminated by

brahman. You are the light of that
illumination, which makes the body-mind
alive and shining. On one side is the finite
body-mind, and on the other side is the
infinite brahman shining within. So where
do you belong: in the limited body-mind
or the infinite light within? The infinite is
reflecting in the finite.

How do you connect yourself with this

infinite light? This is the critical aspect.
Do it with prāṇa-upāsana. Look at the
vāyu outside and the breath inside.
Outside is the infinite vāyu and inside is
the limited breath. There is confusion: are
you the infinite vāyu or the limited
breath? There cannot be limited breath
without the infinite vāyu. If you dwell
upon this, it will dawn upon you that you
are connected to the infinite vāyu, not the
limited breath. The confusion between the
limited and unlimited is dismissed.

29
Jīva-īśvara-bedha is kalpita, imagined.
The finite is jīva, limited to the body-
mind, and the infinite is brahman. There
is confusion: am I the jīva, separate from
brahman and connected to this limited
body-mind, or am I the Awareness
Absolute? The jīva is awareness, but is it
limited to the body-mind or does it
illuminate the body-mind? Is the
electricity limited to the building or is
electricity universal, illuminating the
building? Awareness is not limited to the
body-mind. Awareness is in the body-
mind, but not of the body-mind.
Therefore, the body-mind limitation does
not apply to the light of Awareness.
Examine the body-mind and the light of
Awareness and conclude, “I do not belong
to the category of the body-mind. I belong
to the category of the Awareness, which is
brahman.”

End the identification with the body-

mind. In other words, die to the body-
mind even while living. Dying to the
mind means dying to the memories of the
past, imaginations of the future, and all
attachments and aversions. When you die
to the limited, you discover your oneness
with the infinite. This is the crucifixion of
Christ. Jesus must be crucified to become
the Christ. The jīva identified with the
body-mind has to die to the body-mind,
now. That is the spirit of praveśa-śruti.

August, 2021
*********
30
 Creation

Ko addha veda ka iha pravocat, kuta

ājātā kuta iyaṁ visṛṣṭiḥ, arvāgdevā asya
visarjanāya, atha ko veda yata ābabhūva
(Nāsadīya-sūktam, 6)

“Who is it that intimately knows from

where this variegated universe originated?
(No one). Who is it that can declare its
cause? (No one). Even the gods appear
after the creation of this universe. Who
else can know the source from which this
creation arose? (No one).”

The spirit of the enquiry dictates that one

must raise the question and stay with it. If
there is no question, there is no enquiry.

Visṛṣṭi is no mere sṛṣṭi; it is vividhā sṛṣṭi,

a variegated creation. It consists of
marvelous variety. Visṛṣṭi could also be
understood as viruddha sṛṣṭi, a universe
of contradictions.

What is the essence of the creation? Is it

pleasure or pain? There is both pleasure
and pain everywhere. Then, is the creation
existent or non-existent? One cannot call
it non-existent because it does appear
before us, binding us to it. At the same
time, one cannot say that it is real because
it is ever changeful, and whatever changes
in time and space is not real. This creation
is truly full of contradictions. Something
that is complete by itself and true to itself
will not exhibit any contradictions. Also,
31
the creation is composed entirely of
opposites; all manifestation is in the form
of opposites. In truth, just as water
manifests as the crest and troughs of
waves, and light manifests as the dark and
bright lines of the spectrum, so also the
Reality alone appears as the creation full
of opposites like heat and cold, etc.

Visṛṣṭi has yet another meaning, which is

viparīta sṛṣṭi, that which appears as what
it is not. The creation appears real, but is
unreal; it is understood in terms of me and
mine, but is neither. The Reality is sat,
being, whereas the creation appears death-
ridden. The Reality is cit, awareness,
whereas there is much ignorance in the
creation. The Reality is ānanda, bliss,
while the creation has a lot of sorrow.
From where did such a creation arise?
Can anyone speak definitively of its
origin? Ultimately, everything that is said
about it is but an admission of an inability
to understand it.

The hymn deals with dṛṣṭi-sṛṣṭi-vāda, the

assertion that “we see and it appears;
therefore, the seeing causes the seen,” or
ajāta-vāda, which holds that the creation
does not exist at all and is merely an
illusion; therefore, nothing is created. In
both of these stances, the spirit of enquiry
is kept alive and there is no scope for
complacency.

32
asya visarjanāya, atha ko veda yata
iyaṁ visṛṣṭiryata ābabhūva, yadi vā
dadhe yadi vā na, yo asyādhyakṣaḥ
parame vyomann, so aṅga veda yadi vā
na veda (7)

“From where did this variegated creation

originate? Does He (the creator) uphold
it? Or does he not? He that is the
Awareness Absolute witnessing this
creation abides in his own supreme space
(of Awareness). He alone knows (about
this creation). Or it may be that even He
does not know.”

From where did this creation come?

Suppose we say it originated from
brahman – that begs the question, did
brahman truly materialize the creation
from itself, sustain it, and uphold it? Śrī
Kṛṣṇa says in the Gītā, “Know me as the
creator, and know that I am yet not the
creator.” The conundrum here is, did he
create or did he not, yadi vā yadi vā na?
We can understand this in terms of the
light that illuminates all the scenes on the
movie screen. Would you say that it
makes all the scenes available to be seen
and then illumes them? Does it assertively
illumine them? Does it actively illumine
anything at all? There is no appropriate
answer to this question.

The commentator Vidyāraṇya says,

sṛṣṭikartṛtvam api kalpitam eva, the status
of creator is also imagination alone. The
fact of the creation is but in the mind.
33
Creation is an action. Is īśvara then the
doer of the action of creation? No; he is
the uninvolved witness of the ‘action’ of
creation. Witnessing itself is not to be
taken as an action; it is a manner of being.
It is in the presence of the Awareful Being
that everything appears to happen. On the
other hand, nothing appears when it is not
present. It is like saying that while the
light does not create the movie, the movie
cannot appear without the light. It is the
light that makes images, which do not
exist, visible on the screen.

Śrī Kṛṣṇa says, “Māyā-śakti manifests as

the universe, even as I remain as the
uninvolved witness.” This is the vision
that is difficult to grasp or appreciate. It is
impossible to make any categorical
statement about the creation that cannot
be immediately negated. There is no
factual creation; it appears only when one
sees it. There is only the witnessing
Awareness, in whose presence everything
appears.

Having made all the assertions, the hymn

leaves the enquiry open-ended and
unanswered. It goes to the extent of
saying that it is not certain whether even
brahman knows. Brahman neither knows
nor does not know. Brahman just ‘is,’
parame vyoman, in the supreme space.

2011
*********

34
 Oneness

saccidātmanyanusyūte nitye viṣṇau

prakalpitāḥ, vyaktayo vividhāssarvā
hāṭake kaṭakādivat
(Ātmabodha, 9)

“All the manifested world of things and

beings are projected by imagination upon
the substratum, which is the eternal all-
pervading Viṣṇu, whose nature is
Existence-Consciousness, just as different
ornaments are made of gold alone.”

All the life forms are superimposed on

brahman. Really speaking, there are not
many life forms, just as there is no such
thing as myself, yourself, herself, or
himself. There is only the Self, which is
the Self of all – ātmā.

What is a human being, fundamentally? It

is ‘I am.’ Everything else is wrongly
added to it. ‘I am’ is the sense of being.
You are and you know that you are. That
is the ‘I am.’ It is the same in all living
beings. For example, there is one ocean or
sea, but when the adjoining landmass is
China, the sea is called the China Sea; if
the landmass is India, it is called the
Indian Ocean, and so on. The ocean or sea
is the same, but when you add the
landmass, because of association there are
many oceans or seas. The same thing
applies to ‘I am,’ the sense of being. It is
the same in every one of us. We are not
trying to prove oneness, but rather to
35
prove that manyness is false. The division
is superimposed and it is false. That is
why it is called advaita-vedānta.

A dog is and it knows that it is; I am and I

know that I am. This is how our ṛṣis see
through the outer cover of body-mind.
Different bodies have different genders,
ages, conditions, minds, health, etc. There
is ātmā behind the body-mind and it is
sat-cit-ātmā – sat, it is; cit, it knows. The
being shining as knowing is ātmā. It is the
essence and is present in every individual
life form. Ātmā is not a person. A person
is ego. If you say, “I am,” that is an
individual; “I am an American,” is a
person. Just as the sea is conditioned by
adding the name of a landmass, so too in
the case of ‘I am’ – I am father, Hindu,
etc. As you add these attributes to the one
sat-cit, you get different individuals. The
oneness of sat-cit is common to all.

We are the same sat-cit because there is

no reason for sat-cit to be different. What
is the reason to say that the ‘I am’ in one
life-form is different from the ‘I am’ in
another life-form? The sāṅkhya
philosophy says that sukha-duḥkha in
both are different. Śrī Śaṅkara says that
sukha-duḥkha are mental states, not
attributes of sat-cit. Different mental
states create a division in different minds,
not in sat-cit-ātmā. The attributes of one
thing cannot become the cause of division
in another. Therefore, there is no reason
for ‘I am’ to be different in different life
36
forms. You can say that there is only one
sat-cit-ātmā and many bodies, but the
body-mind is not real.

We say that there are many ornaments

and one gold. Gold is real, but ornaments
are unreal. They are superimpositions
because an ornament is a shape. A shape
is a condition of space. Space is
conditioned in a particular way and the
mind calls it a shape. When you think of
space – this place, that place – there is
space. Otherwise, there is no space; when
you think of ‘now’ and ‘then,’ there is
time; not otherwise. Space-time is a
mental category. Therefore, name and
form are in the mind. When name and
form are not examined correctly, they
appear real. All ornaments are in the mind
alone.

A mosquito knows that it ‘is’; that is the

sense of being. The ṛṣis look at a living
being, negate the outer cover, and arrive
at the core, which is sat-cit. That is God.
It is not space-bound or time-bound. In
sleep, you are avyakta, unmanifest. There
is no ‘I am’ sense. When you wake up,
you are vyakta, manifest and aware, and
that can be expressed as ‘I am.’ Then you
add here and now, which is space-time, to
‘I am,’ and only then add father, mother,
etc. The moment you add space-time to
that primordial sense of being, it becomes
individual, vyakti. Humans look for food
when they wake up, and so too animals,
birds, etc. They are different as far their
37
cover is concerned, but essentially they
are the same. It is one aham, ‘I am,’
brahman.

Space-time is the fundamental framework

of the mind. Whatever input comes to the
mind through the sense organs is fitted
into that framework and cognition is
synthesized. In the idea “this is a flower,”
‘this’ means space-time; it is a flower
now and is distinct from every other
object. The deśa-kāla-vastu-pariccheda,
division in terms of space, time, and
object, is in the mind as a framework and
all cognitions are conditioned by that
framework. Space-time conditionality
makes it an individual. When you make
an individual out of sat-cit, then sat-cit
becomes many. Therefore, individuals are
many because of different space and
different time. But when space-time
conditionality is removed, all the
individuals merge in one ocean of sat-cit,
which is brahman. You are already
merged, but you have to know that. All
individuals are imagined within one
brahman.

When you abstract name and form from

the necklace, gold remains. When you
abstract name and form from the vyakti or
individual life-form, sat-cit remains,
which is brahman. The sat-cit sense of
being in you is not many; it only appears
as many by mistake. It is one-without-a-
second, spaceless, timeless, and it is
brahman.
38
The painter is in the picture. Brahman has
created this entire universe and that
brahman is in the universe in every
individual life-form as sat-cit-ātmā. If you
separate the painter from the picture and
look for the painter, you will not find the
painter.

You are not personal, but impersonal; not

divided, but indivisible; not jīva, but
brahman. Your potential is waiting to be
manifested. Knowledge and
understanding manifest your potential. As
you understand yourself well, you
manifest the infinite potential you have.
That is the meaning of tattvamasi and
aham brahmāsmi. Believe in yourself and
your potential.

Swami Vivekānanda says, “Your God

knows all because you yourself know
little.” Because knowing is intrinsic to
you, the God you worship is an ideal to
you. You know little and therefore God is
all-knowing. The all-knowing God has
come from you because you are the
knowing entity. Cit, knowing, is common
between you and God. It is only a matter
of all-knowing and little-knowing
conditionality. Suppose the conditionality
is kalpita, imagined; then there is no
difference between you and God. That
means you are worshipping your own
hidden self as the God outside. The God
you worship is an ideal that you visualize
by looking at yourself. Therefore, God is
39
not as separate as you imagine. This is
practical in the sense that you have to
discover the divinity within you.

Divinity is love. You have the potential to

love all. Love is ātmā, so you have the
potential to see all as your innermost self.
All of this is ātmā – ātmā vā idaṁ
sarvam. When you manifest your
potential, you are brahman. All divisions
are kalpita; there are so many
superimpositions and projections. All is
one. Differences do not separate. There
are vyaktis, but it is all one sat-cit-ātmā.

October, 2022

********

“The oneness is experienced through

harmony. There is no separation between
the inner and the outer. The mind plays a
criticial role in this.”

om tat sat śrī kṛṣṇārpaṇamastu

40