Wending A Way Home

Peace

2011-01-02T00:13:00.002+05:30

David Godman translates Muruganar's Guruvachaka kovai, verse 796 thus-

There is no fortune greater than peace; there is no force greater than peace; there is no excellent tapas greater than peace; there is no immortal life greater than living in peace.

The original verse reads-

அமைதியின் மேற்பட் டாக்கமு மில்லை

அமைதியின் மேற்பட் டூக்கமும் மில்லை

அமைதியின் மேற்பட் டருந்தவ மில்லை

அமைதியின் மேற்பட் டமரவாழ் வின்றே.

The translation is close and accurate, though i feel a short discussion of two particular words would of more help.

The tamil word, - மேற்பட்டு (maerpattu), reads more like above, better than, superior to, greater, and so on. I would have liked to see 'superior to' used here, but the usage of 'greater than' takes nothing away from the meaning of this verse.

The tamil word, ஆக்கம் (aakkam), stands for create, build, construct and so on- I don't think the fortune that is mentioned in, "There is no fortune greater than peace" is random- it is earned, built up through one's own efforts (though the results of our effort is not in our hands, but comes through Grace).

Then, in the next line, ஊக்கம் (ookkam), is translated as force, thus- " there is no force greater than peace". But in common usage, it more or less means motivation, enthusiasm, the something force that inspires us to act. Again, there is nothing wrong in Godman's translation, but when you see that this peace is referred to as no ordinary force, but an inspiring force- then our understanding is better enhanced, I think.

What the first two lines of this verse means is that we can't ever make anything that is better than peace- it will be our greatest fortune and legacy. And nothing can inspire us better than peace: so in a manner of speaking, peace is the way and the goal, seed and the fruit.

All this comes through Godman's translation, though, but still I think, a bit of close reading helps us get the importance of what it means.

Arunachala

2010-10-14T05:45:00.000+05:30

Breathtaking visuals Extraordinary clarity.

Pledging Allegiance to the Heart

2010-04-29T22:49:00.000+05:30

Pledging Allegiance To My Heart. « Intimacy with the Abyss:

"I have been asking the question; ‘Who am I?’, not as idle speculation but as Ramana Maharishi describes it. As a way of re- identifying with my true self, my heart, with the divine. It is a path to enlightenment. It is the path of my heart.

I will not make a life changing vow to myself in haste. But the resistance to it is falling away. There is nothing of value in these falsehoods and illusions. Do I have the courage then to trust my true self and pledge myself to the path of my heart."

It feels great to read when someone takes to the path of self-enquiry in a crisis, when faced with problems that seems to be personality bound in nature. The author of this blog has written, in an earlier passage,

"There are so many falsehoods wrapped around me, I have held them close like old friends to shield me from being hurt by life. But the shield keeps everything away, leaving me disconnected and separate from everyone else. They keep at bay the pain of fear, rejection and anger but they also block the hope of true intimacy with others. They have left me craving, lost and alone…. I am numbed while behind these shields, disconnected and lonely.

Confronted with making a pledge of allegiance to my heart, to the true self within, to the divine void, I balked."

I would like to pray to Bhagavan to be a safe harbour and bring light to this person.

Sri Ramana Maharshi at Ivory Coast

2010-04-28T11:05:00.001+05:30

SANOU Amadou: Obsèques du président de l’Unjci : Criwa Zéli inhumé, ce matin:

"Pour cet homme d’exception, nous pensons comme Ramana Maharshi, philosophe et mystique hindou, que là où il se trouve, il « est heureux ». Satisfait d’avoir marqué le paysage médiatique ivoirien d’une tache indélébile.

I think this is a blog at Ivory Coast, I read it through Google Translate:

"...The president of the National Union of Journalists of Côte d'Ivoire (UNJCI), Zelia CRIW Paulin, who died last February 2, will today at 11 am, his last journey. A departure from the land of men for the spirit world. Before this final flight, a lifting body will take place at 9am at Ivosep at Treichville. Followed by a requiem mass at Notre Dame de l'Assomption of Kumasi. After having given the CRIW soul to God, that his body will be taken to the municipal cemetery in Williamsville. For this exceptional man, we agree with Ramana Maharshi, a Hindu mystic and philosopher, that where he is, he is "happy". Satisfied to have marked the Ivorian media landscape an indelible stain..."

Glad to see Sri Ramana Maharshi's life and teachings reach far and wide.

A Blog of a different kind

2010-04-27T19:46:00.000+05:30

I don't know how quotes of this kind belong to the blog titled:

Car Insurance for Students in Louisiana:

"RAMADAS –“First a person should learn to lead a life of righteousness, discharge one’s duties to self and neighbours and then think of the other (spiritual) side of life. One who strives to establish >Dharma is alone a godly person.”

RAMANA MAHARISHI – “When you turn the mind inwards. God manifests as the inner consciousness.”

RAMANA MAHARISHI –“For the faithful, the work lies within, not without.”

RAMANA MAHARISHI –“Mind is consciousness which has put on limitations. You are originally unlimited and perfect. Later you take on limitations and become the mind.”

There's more, and quite good.

Thoreau's Contemplative Manner

2010-04-19T09:02:00.000+05:30

Thoreau's powers of observation are amazing: I say this not just from looking at his wonderful writing- here is a quote from a farmer who saw Thoreau do something amazing:

""Why one morning I went out in my field across there to the river, and there, beside that little old mud pond, was standing Da-a-vid Henry, and he wasn't doin' nothin' but just standin' there--lookin' at that pond, and when I came back at noon, there he was standin' with his hands behind him just lookin' down into that pond, and after dinner when I come back again if there wasn'tDa-a-vid standin' there just like as if he had been there all day, gazin' down into thatpond, and I stopped and looked at him and I says, 'Da-a-vid Henry, what air you a'doin'?' And he didn't turn his head and he didn't look at me. He kept on lookin' down at that pond, and he said, as if he was thinkin' about the stars in the heavens, 'Mr. Murray, I'm a-studyin'--the habits--of the bullfrog!' And there that darned fool had been standin'--the livelong day--a-studyin'--the habits--of the bull-frog!" (Quoted in Mrs. Daniel Chester French, Memories of a Sculptor's Wife, 1928)"

Thoreau's journals from NYRB Classics via All that is required in studying them is patience," or, On youthful enthusiasm

Machu Picch

2010-03-28T16:33:00.001+05:30

80 - Machu Picchu - Juin 2009 - edit.jpg [POTD for March 28 from commons.wikimedia.org]: "

80 - Machu Picchu - Juin 2009 - edit.jpg
from commons.wikimedia.org,
provided by S23678

Awesome image...

What is non duality?

2010-03-27T13:00:00.001+05:30

What is the secret to understanding nonduality? « Nonduality Blog

where, Jerry Katz, citing a question in "Yahoo Answers", writes-

"What is the “secret” to understanding non-duality?
Everything appears to our senses to be dual here, hot & cold, light & dark, male & female.
Yet many speak of Oneness & Unity.
What understanding bridges the gap?"

I thought of making a comment there, or at the Yahoo site: but my answer is not likely to be appreciated anywhere- so this is the place for it to be:

There is this verse in Bhagavad Gita, verse 2: 14, which goes

matra-sparsas tu kaunteya
sitosna-sukha-duhkha-dah
agamapayino 'nityas
tams titiksasva bharata

"But the contacts of the organs with the objects are the producers of cold and heat, happiness and sorrow. They have a beginning and an end, (and) are transient. Bear them, O descendant of Bharata."-
- Chapter 2:14 of Bhagvad Gita - "The Path Of Knowledge " Commentary by Sri Adi Sankaracharya, Translated by Swami Gambhirananda

I think this is the key to understanding non-duality.

In his commentary, Sri Sankaracharya says,

'Matra-sparsah, the contacts of the organs with objects; are sita-usna-sukha-duhkha-dah, producers of cold, heat, happiness and sorrow. Matrah means those by which are marked off (measured up) sounds etc., i.e. the organs of hearing etc. The sparsah, contacts, of the organs with sound etc. are matra-sparsah. Or, sparsah means those which are contacted, i.e. objects, viz sound etc. Matra-sparsah, the organs and objects, are the producers of cold, heat, happiness and sorrow."

The word Matra indicates sense organs, because, it is the sense organs that contact objects: this is the commonly understood meaning.

But take the words matra-sparsah: measurement-contact or even, contact-measurement: when you connect with the instruments of measurement, heat, cold, happiness and sorrow happens.

It is not merely the fact that the skin touches this hot object that I feel scalding heat, which is not the same as freezing cold. In other conditions, the heat won't be felt so intensely as I feel now.

For example, consider this passage:

"We are able to judge of the difference in temperature of bodies which come in contact with our skin. Since our sensations have no accurate standard for comparison, we are unable to form any exact conception of the absolute temperature of the substances we feel. The sensation of heat or cold, derived from the skin itself, without its coming into contact with anything but air of moderate temperature, varies with many circumstances, and because of these variations the powers of judgment of high or low temperature must be imperfect.. The skin feels hot when its blood vessels are full; it feels cold when they are comparatively empty. An object of constant temperature can thus give the impression of being hot or cold according as the skin itself is full or empty of warm blood. But, independent of any very material change in the blood supply of the cutaneous surface of a part, any change in the temperature of its surroundings causes a sensation of change of temperature, which is, however, a purely relative judgment. Thus, if the hand be placed in cold water, we have at first the sensation of cold; to which, however, the skin of the hand soon becomes accustomed and no longer feels cold; if, now, the hand be placed in water somewhat warmer - but not higher in temperature than the atmosphere - we have a feeling of warmth. If the hand be placed in as hot water as the skin can bear, it feels at first unpleasantly hot, but this feeling soon passes away and the sensation is comfortable. If from this hot water it be placed again in the water of the air temperature, this - which before felt warm - feels very cold."

- "A Manual Of Physiology "

Without prior knowledge, and judgment based on comparing the present experience and measuring it against past knowledge, there is no duality.

So, I'd say that the secret to understanding non-duality lies in finding the extent to which we understand the process of measurement: that of the past with present, knowledge with experience, and idea with actuality.

TA - Thinkers Anonymous

2010-03-22T08:21:00.000+05:30

This is hilarious, so I borrowed it from Michael James' Blog: I think this passage deserves to stand alone, so I copy and post it here: hope Michael James and Anonymous don't mind.

TA - Thinkers Anonymous It started out innocently ...:

"It started out innocently enough. I began to think at parties now and then to loosen up. Inevitably though, one thought led to another, and soon I was more than just a social thinker I began to think alone - "to relax," I told myself - but I knew it wasn't true. Thinking became more and more important to me, and finally I was thinking all the time. I began to think on the job. I knew that thinking and employment don't mix, but I couldn't stop myself. I began to avoid friends at lunchtime so I could read Thoreau and Kafka. I would return to the office dizzied and confused, asking, "What is it exactly we are doing here?"

Things weren't going so great at home either. One evening I had turned off the TV and asked my wife about the meaning of life. She spent that night at her mother's. I soon had a reputation as a heavy thinker. One day the boss called me in. He said, " I like you, and it hurts me to say this, but your thinking has become a real problem. If you don't stop thinking on the job, you'll have to find another job." This gave me a lot to think about.

"I came home early after my conversation with the boss. "Honey," I confessed, "I've been thinking..." "I know you've been thinking," she said, "and I want a divorce!" "But, Honey, surely it's not that serious." "It is serious," she said, lower lip aquiver. "You think as much as college professors, and college professors don't make any money, so if you keep on thinking we won't have any money!" "That's a faulty syllogism," I said impatiently, and she began to cry. I'd had enough. "I'm going to the library," I snarled as I stomped out the door.

I headed for the library, in the mood for some Nietzsche. I roared into the parking lot and ran up to the big glass doors... they didn't open. The library was closed. As I sank to the ground clawing at the unfeeling glass, whimpering for Zarathustra, a poster caught my eye. "Friend, is heavy thinking ruining your life?" it asked. You probably recognize that line. It comes from the standard Thinker Anonymous poster.

Which is why I am what I am today: a recovering thinker. I never miss a TA meeting. At each meeting we watch a non educational video; last week it was "Porky's." Then we share experiences about how we avoided thinking since the last meeting. I still have my job, and things are a lot better at home. Life just seemed... easier, somehow, as soon as I stopped thinking.

---------------------------------------"

Who Am I?: A Journey Towards the Light

2010-03-19T18:35:00.000+05:30

The light of advaita: by a devotee attracted to Sathya Sai Baba:

"In the 80s, I was extremely busy at work, running a 'syndicate', becoming a partner and then helping to create a new insurance club for Thomas Miller, and had little time for recreational reading. But towards the end of the decade when the new business was established I encountered 'I Am That' on the coffee table of my dear friend on the day we first met, and devoured it. It was the purest expression of advaita thought I had ever read and it immediately reawakened in me the 'seeing' and 'knowing' of those earlier years. It seemed to instil a more acute perception even in the business world and most strikingly I found that I knew what people were going to say before they said it. "

Who Am I?: A Journey Towards the Light

The Swine Come Home

2010-03-16T07:10:00.000+05:30

I liked this post for the usual reason, if you've read this blog already:

First this:

"Friday in the late afternoon the first 5 pigs arrived in the back of our pick up. Adam drove 5 hours south to Williams OR to pick up the piglets from Full Circle Bison Ranch, where Tobias Hatfield is experimenting with heritage swine raised organically and following Swedish farrowing practices. They are the much anticipated cross of two heritage breeds; a Tamworth sow crossed with a Large Black boar. The tamworths are good mothers and an excellent (dare I say the best) bacon pig available because the meat is lean and red in color, and has tremendous flavor, fast growing for a heritage breed, and good foragers. The large blacks are slower growing and tend to be lardy when bred pure so should add perfect marbling as a cross, love grazing by the mouthful, and are docile. Should be a prodigal combination."

And later, this:

"In spite of all my meditations over the years on the non-duality of the universe, it’s often hard for me to keep this connection at the grocery store. The package of Niman Ranch bacon now has a face living in my barn, something I love. Here on the farm interconnection is part of everyday life, reminding me of some Mary Oliver line about how love essentially is paying attention. Doing chores, taking care of the lives here, is helping me to pay attention. It’s not that I don’t want to eat meat, but to be more reverent and frugal of the lives I take to provide for my own. I did my customary time as a vegetarian during college years but who knows, this animal farming could have that effect on me. It’s like Adam’s dad Pete, lifelong farmer, LOVES chickens, I mean he loves his girls – and just can’t find an appetite for eating their meat. There’s another childhood story of midwest chicken farming, maybe we can coax out of Pete, that reinforces his preference."

-COMING HOME

When I started out, I thought I'd like blogs that discussed the philosophy of advaita and the process of enlightenment, but being what I am, I've ended up looking for posts from ordinary people going on with their ordinary lives with the glimmering light of non duality at the heart of their being: now aware, and then lost, but never for long.

An Accidental Life

2010-02-27T11:59:00.000+05:30

War and Conscience - Opinionator Blog - NYTimes.com

For some reason, this seems to resonate:

"I was sitting in Applebee’s with my wife when she asked me what I was thinking about. All I could say was my thoughts revolved around one thought: What if I was dead and just did not know it? We’d just sort of kept going even though we were blown up that day the captain screamed “Oh my God, look out!!” We weren’t blown up … but maybe we were, and I just didn’t accept it. Every day it is the same…
Thank God for my wife and young daughter; they make my life worth living everyday.

— Posted by 1st Sgt. Bruce L. Reges (Ret.)"

This seems like something straight out of Yoga Vasishta- but I've often felt it would be this way if I ever met with an accident: there would be some pain and anguish, but then it would clear up and I would continue with the 'life' I am presented with.

A note on writing about nonduality

2010-02-24T21:12:00.002+05:30

This suggestion by Jerry Katz at Nonduality Blog is meant for writers who wish to have their books lpublished, but applies to bloggers as well:

"The audience for nonduality books is layered like an onion. There is the “very hard core nonduality” layer , the “hard core,” the medium core, the soft core layer, etc.
I’m not going to give examples of each layer, but if you’re writing a book on nonduality I’m sure you have your own impressions. You can define each layer by the kinds of books, media, personalities, and lifestyles with which it is identified.
"Your book will sell throughout all those layers, but the huge audience is outside the onion altogether, drawing its fumes..."

I think we should learn not to be too picky about this, but instead understand the audience that these books/ bloggers address, and appreciate their writing in that context.

Communicating the Truth...

2010-02-17T09:15:00.000+05:30

A bit of a snarky post - quoting out of context and all that- but this should intrigue you to go and read the whole post, I hope:

"I came across a spiritual internet tv station called conscious tv and I looked at some of the interviews of spiritual people that were on there. I understood absolutely everything that was being spoken about. Some of the speakers resonated with me more than others. But throughout all of them my loudest thought was that I can speak just as well and with the credibility of having had a powerful experience during which I transcended duality and touched the non-dual....

"After listening to about six people being interviewed on this tv station and convinced that if I could get an interview that it would expand my profile and my visibility, I wrote a careful, articulate, grounded letter to the contact person on the website. I explained about the experience I had on the meditation retreat where I transcended duality and how my consciousness has expanded as a result and I explained about my book and told him that it was being translated into Hindi and Gujerati. He replied promptly and asked me to send him a copy of my book and he would have a look at it and give me an answer. Delighted and confident I sent a copy of the book to him.

Late last night I got a response saying that he had received the book and that I didn’t appear to be a suitable interviewee for conscious tv!!!! This completely stunned me as I can’t see how I wouldn’t have been. I could have spoken on either non-duality or consciousness two topics on which interviews were held. ...

"....All of this has made me wonder what is it about the way I speak about the spiritual path that has experienced people in the field not want to interview me. There is a lot of money made from spirituality or to be more precise the wooliness and vagueness with which it is characterised. This vagueness contributes to its mystery and to the allure of something else…the holy grail which is a very lucrative market...."

I hope you don't get the impression that the blogger is looking for money- that is not the case if you read the whole post. I quote these particular passages because I find them interesting: the non-dual experience, the desire to communicate it, and then the frustration of not being able to get across because of the situation in the materialistic world, etc., etc.

The post is here at Margaret Dempsey's Blog

A Disorder of a New Kind

2010-02-17T09:01:00.000+05:30

This is a new one: PNDD (Post Non-Duality Depression):

There are no separate beings there is only BEING but in the appearance, Oneness has many ‘faces’ to it - or facets - like the facets reflected in a diamond. One facet of Being could be your dog – another, your chairs and tables, another, your neighbour, and another facet is an apparent ‘you’ etc. And this is the TRUTH of what we are – we are all God – this is our essential BEING. For this reason, it is true that nothing we do, think or say really matters or has any importance, as it cannot change the way things are. And since we are all God whether we realise it or not, it simply doesn’t matter whether this is ‘seen’ or not.

HOWEVER - when some people hear this, they get stuck at the ‘nothing really matters’ bit, and then fall into a pit of depression and even despair in some cases, because they have missed the point entirely. They will often say things like : ‘I use to love music but now I don’t because there’s no point to it.’ - or: ‘ I use to love my work which was helping people, but since there aren’t any people, there’s no point any more’ - or ‘ I’ve become a recluse because I can’t see the point in talking to people because everything they say is so trivial’ , and most commonly: ‘ I can’t talk to my partner any more because they just don’t understand about Nonduality’.

Video (PremDass)

2010-02-16T21:40:00.000+05:30

An interesting video:

The info at YouTube gives-

"Tonight, right now, at 11:11 pm, on Valentine's Day...this Day of Love...I offer my body, mind, and spirit to God to do as It pleases. Today, I commit to being a Non-Duality (Advaita) Monk. Today, I commit to Realizing the Truth of my Being. I use this Lifetime to go to God. I use this Lifetime in order to find out who and what I really am. I surrender to Freedom, to Life, to Truth and to Love! May I always love and serve the One with the Totality of my Being and may I love my neighbor as my Self. Thy will be done unto and through me...now, forever, and always. God bless you. "

The site of PremDass is http://www.PremDaas.com

The Sannyasi who means Business

2010-02-16T18:42:00.000+05:30

Fashion designer Christian Fabre, born in Beziers in France arrives in Chennai in 1971 to source leather for a Franco-Belgian company; he loses his job and wife, left penniless, survives on leftover food and discarded cigarettes; a chance meeting leads to better circumstances, and now a chastened man, Fabre reads of Ramakrishna. The turning point comes when he meets a limbless mahant, who becomes his guru.

""He spoke of non-duality, that every human being is as important as the other. You are part of the brahman or the ultimate, which is the all-pervading energy. Everything that exists is the same one thing, brahman. This awareness makes life much easier because it brings everyone down to one plane,” says Fabre, who has now become a sannyasin, having been initiated by the mahant.

Now a succesful businessman, his "Christian Fabre Textiles Pvt Ltd" caters to around 20 global brands, Christian Fabre clothes himself in saffron, the clothes of a Sannyasi, except for ten days every year, which he spends nude in his ashram as Kolli Hills.

The full story is at The Economic Times.

A Different Frame of Mind

2010-02-15T19:07:00.001+05:30

The nature of personality is puzzling, no matter what we read: I think unless we figure it out for ourselves, this will remain so.

But different states of mind, such as that of Asperger’s syndrome throw some light on the fact that the givens of our experience are not what they are.

I recently found an article that discusses Daniel Tammet, a savant with Asperger's Syndrome, who has outwitted the constraints imposed by his condition:

A paragraph of the article reads,

"There is a bit of Daniel Tammet in all of us. I think all of us, at one time or another, have felt different in a particular context, and have felt the intense conflict to simultaneously want to fit in while also wanting to just be accepted for being different. Not all of us may be able to calculate pi to as many places as Daniel can, or can automatically associate numbers with colors, or can write both prose and poetry as beautifully as he does, or can paint as he does. But what my interview with Daniel taught me is that it doesn’t matter if you can’t do everything he does. Life is not about deliberately practicing yourself down someone else’s path. It’s about staying true to yourself at all times, and being fully open to going down your own unique, unplanned, and unpredictable path."

- Reflections on Creativity: Interview with Daniel Tammet

The interviews conducted by Scott Barry Kaufman, are interesting and links are there in the post at Sharp Brains.

Jim Carrey

2010-02-14T19:20:00.000+05:30

""I was on Prozac for a long time. It may have helped me out of a jam for a little bit, but people stay on it forever. I had to get off at a certain point because I realized that, you know, everything's just OK," says Carrey.

"There are peaks, there are valleys. But they're all kind of carved and smoothed out, and it feels like a low level of despair you live in. Where you're not getting any answers, but you're living OK. And you can smile at the office. You know? But it's a low level of despair. You know?"

Instead, he says he doesn’t take anything. "I rarely drink coffee. I'm very serious about no alcohol, no drugs. Life is too beautiful."

Now, he draws his strength from the spiritual side of his life. And despite a rare Los Angeles downpour, he insisted on taking Kroft to his secret spot where he goes to shut out the rest of the world. It took a five-minute climb up a trail on his property to reach his destination.

"This is my spot. This is the center of the universe," says Carrey. "This is where I hang out with Buddha and Krishna and you know, all those guys.""

Actor Jim Carrey on 60 Minutes.

via Kriptodanny

The Sea and the Wave

2010-01-15T06:55:00.000+05:30

I liked this post, and learned from it- this is someone struggling to get to the core of what life is, what it means:

"I grew up in a determinedly non-religious, Jewish family. I believe that I always felt God’s whispers in my heart, but I didn’t know what to do with them. In my college years, as I experimented with various drugs, my longing began to emerge more fully.

How I wanted a spiritual teacher. I remember one night, looking up into the stars, beseeching the heavens for that person who would teach me about spiritual matters, who would help me to know God.

That was the first time I ever got an answer from the Universe. It was: wait.

I was both terribly depressed and absolutely thrilled that Someone, Something had responded to my call. And I waited. And I watched.

When I finally found that my path was an inner one of meditation and a more universal view of God, I dove in headfirst. Things were rosy and exciting. Many times I felt God’s quiet, inner presence guiding me or loving me. And I loved her back.

Then I got an email from my best childhood friend. Her brother, Daniel Pearl, was the reporter from the Wall Street Journal who was kidnapped in Afghanistan. The Pearls had taught me all I knew about the Jewish religion and our families had been very close for a while. I had watched while the Pearl children went to Hebrew school. I celebrated Passover and Sabbath with them. They are exceptional, talented people who live their lives with integrity.

After Danny was brutally murdered, I had to process through all the grief and horror just like everyone else who’d known him and loved him. And one of the discoveries I made was that I had a belief that ran like this:

If I do everything right, God will leave me alone.

Leave me alone in the respect that He won’t do anything horrible to me, in that tragedy won’t touch my life too terribly. But when I saw what happened to the Pearls, knowing that they “did everything right,” I realized that the game was much bigger than I thought.

So, I asked myself, why do I even try to connect with God if she won’t take care of me, won’t play nice with me?

Ultimately I came to the fact that I am a part of God. I cannot separate from him no matter how he treats me, and I will always want to connect more deeply for the same reason a wave always melts back into the sea. We are one."

- Autism and Spirituality: the Dance

The post goes much more farther, discusses how love need not be all sweetness and honey, there is a tough, irreconcilable aspect to it, too.

May be I am wrong here, we need more talk about what it means to live a life- and how it makes sense with ideas of interconnectedness, non-duality, wholeness and what not. 'It is all not real', or 'take a look at who all this is happening to', are both helpful pointers, of course, but as long as we are moving within a framework of thought, some kind of conceptual coherence might be of some help, for what it is worth.

Otherwise it becomes more like being a post-modern philosopher in a culture where ideas of modernity are yet to arrive.

The Light of Advaita in Everyday Life

2010-01-13T10:59:00.000+05:30

I felt flattered, two days before, when I saw that this blog has been included in Jerry Katz list of Other Nonduality Blogs. There are about two hundred blogs there, and this is one of them.

And then I thought, does this blog deserve to be there? How many of those on the list deserve to be on any list? This one sure should not be there. Much of what is written here is linked from somewhere else. If you are looking for original insights, or at least a new look at any old problem- as someone who reads at least about a hundred of those blogs, I despair. Honestly.

I read some Buddhist blogs too, and they have got it about right, the way MS Ayers among the non-duality bloggers has done. What makes the writing alive, when you don't claim to be a realised one, and when you don't have the background of having published a book, or when you don't have any useful information to provide- is to write about non-duality as it relates to your everyday life. When you read the Buddhist Blogs, many of them relate the ideas of Buddhism to the hours of their ordinary life. This gives your writing a sense of honesty and purpose, and much more important than that, it lets people like me relate to you.

But with advaita blogs, it is either theory- always theory in fact. Apart from the blogs of the realised ones- and they all read the same- they merely post some quotes and leave it at that without even bothering to let us know why they chose to blog that particular quote.

It gives the impression that most of the people who write about non-duality are bothered by the fact that they know themselves to be- some can't stand it, some want to be rid of it, and some say, it is there, but not really, so what? Advaita has been simplified to just this: "Who am I?", and then, in most blogs, "Who Cares- question mark followed by exclamation mark: Who Cares? Who Cares!"

I don't know whether this is a good thing or not, but it definitely does not make for good reading. Life is much larger to be confined to this single question, though I believe that a directly intuited answer to this question is enough for enlightenment- but as long as we are not enlightened, should we not talk about our life, and how the light of non-duality illuminates it, or at least makes itself known?

I don't know really, this is just my grouse, because most all non-duality blogs read just about the same, with a hint of being written by and for depersonalised people.

Anyway- I found this part in a comment at AYP Support Forums, and would like to share this with you: it is by someone who calls himself Johnc, and I hope this illustrates what it means when I say 'the light of Advaita in our everyday life':

Eventually, as a 19 year old, when living by myself and trying hard to be a hedonistic materialist, I became deeply depressed and prayed to Jesus (desperately) to please show me the truth. Next day I was inspired to write a song (was a musician) and when I presented it to other band members they said I should read this book (on yoga philosophy) as the song related to it. Prayer answered - thanks Jesus! The penny dropped as my childhood experiences/questions were explained and answered.

Was trying to meditate (non dual understanding) in a cave and do the whole yogi thing, without supervision, and realized I needed help. Decided to join a yoga group, got waylaid (that's another story!) and decided to hitchhike back to my cave. Got a lift with a Hare Krishna devotee. A philosophical discussion ensued and his simple logic (dualistic - more on this later) convinced me to give their process a go. I was still an immortal spirit soul BUT separate eternally from the Supreme Spirit (known in their parlance as 'The Supreme Personality of Godhead'). Like I say, simple logic - if I stick a pin in you I can't feel it nor the cow in that paddock over there - therefore, separate. Same quality (sac cid ananda with a bit of vigraha=form, thrown in), different quantity. We are God's eternal, separate parts (and parcels). According to them, we are his eternal servants and our sojourn in this material world a temporary glitch as the thought of actually being the Lord (envy of his position) is purged from our consciousness. We are, in effect, forced to serve (painfully) matter. The thought of being the Lord, coming from our qualitative oneness with Him, will be perceived in eternity as the Lord asking us the question - "Do you really love me?" Our pausing for a moment, to consider the option of lordship ourselves, before answering "Yes" - this moment of hesitation is our time in the material world, the spiritual equivalent to the 'blink of an eye' until we realise our "constitutional position" i.e. eternal servants, either of the Lord directly or of his external energy (matter).

Okay, that's their dualistic (technically, qualified non-dualism - one and separate) philosophy a subset of one of the 6 Indian schools, called Acintya bheda abheda see:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindu_philosophy

So, I joined up (long story short) and left several years later completely disillusioned with the humans running the show, but not the philosophy TILL (from the sublime to the ridiculous!) the Jehovah's Witnesses knocked on the door and I challenged their understanding of the bible according to what the Hare Krishna's said the bible said. They had misquoted it to suit their purposes and it was exposed as such by the Witnesses and I was therefore challenged to study the bible with the witnesses which I did for 2 years until I woke up one day and said to myself - " How the hell did I get involved in this fundamentalist, mundane understanding of reality in contrast to my childhood realisations? - Answer (to my mind): To flush out the other fundamentalist understanding of the Bhagavad Gita known as "The Bhagavad Gita 'as it is'" by A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhpada. In fact, the same 'as it is' principle is used in their translation of the Bible, not a criticism of their (Witnesses) scholarship just their mundane (nonspiritual) viewpoint. All this serving me to take another hard look at my original, awe inspiring, non sectarian, inSPIRITational beginnings.

Moving right along. Having now been introduced to vedantic dualism and christian literalism I now went back to my advaitic (all is one, non sectarian) roots via "Autobiography of a Yogi" by Paramahansa Yogananda - or so I thought, because the teaching there is we remain eternally individual. This does not sit well with advaita in my understanding and leads itself to the dualistic understanding and to be quite honest NO ONE is able to reconcile the fact that we (who are supposed to be 'THAT' already) have to realize it - who the hell ISN'T realising it anyway, and if we are God already, how has He fallen into illusion and if He hasn't who the hell has - don't tell me the (my) pain is illusion.

Sorry for the frustrated rhetoric but all this discussion on the forum re this subject makes no sense and anyone who claims to understand it is having themselves on (IMHO) - the best understanding, to my mind, comes from PY who said - "...don't think you will become God, He has become you!” A partial explanation, at least, but still his adherents tow the advaitist line. Reverse engineering is the best we can do, BUT, to say that we are all exactly the same conciousness is, frankly, inconceivable! I don't concur with this conclusion and don't find it helpful in my meditation (yes, I do Yogani's lessons and KNOW they bear fruit) but let's get self realised first and, meanwhile, stop pretending that we are one (quantitatively) when we are obviously not.

I state this in the hope I will get a non mystical/conundrum type of reply that will not, typically try to eat it's own tale - a la Zen (my wife ran off with a Zen bloke - there’s nothing to be achieved and nothing to discuss - how about doing nothing with my wife!!). IMHO oneness defeats itself - oceans and waves, really - what does that mean? Am I an illusion - who experiences pain? Can God loan a fragment of his reality yet have nothing to do with it?

A Note for Rabbi Rami

2010-01-09T11:57:00.000+05:30

I made a comment at Rabbi Rami's blog, and then, thinking I could have said much more, here I come.

Rabbi Rami gets initiated at Sri Ramakrishna Mutt, and he writes that with this initiation, he shall become a Hindu, but would retain his Jewish faith.

This reminded me of another person of Jewish origins, Maurice Frydman, who took the garb of the Hindu Sannyasi. I think his is a tremendous contribution to the cause of Advaita.

Let me get some links.

At Wikipedia I find that he was associated with Swami Ramadas, Sri Ramana Maharshi, J Krishnamurti, Gandhiji and Nisargadatta Maharaj who considered him a Gnani.

At Wikipedia i find that he came to India as a refugee from Krakow in the 1930, worked as a MD in an electricity company in Karnataka, became a Gandhian (he refined the design of Gandhiji's spinning wheel), and as an advisor to the king of Aundh, convinced him to draft a constitution that handed over power to people, advised Nehruji on granting asylum to Tibetan refugees. An extraordinary life.

Abdi Assadi writes more about him.

But this piece is more interesting, being written by Apa Pant, son of the erstwhile Raja of Aundh:

"Maurice Frydman was born in 1894 in the Jewish ghetto of Krakow in Southern Poland, then a part of tsarist Russia.

From the accounts that Maurice gave out grudgingly from time to time during our long and close association, it seems that his family was very poor. His father, a devout Jew, worked in the synagogue. His mother sewed, washed clothes and cooked, and brought up her children as best she could, though there was hardly any money to do so. Maurice did not taste white bread until he was thirteen. He acquired his first toothbrush when he was fifteen!

But Maurice was a born genius. He was reading and writing in the Cyrillic, Roman and Hebrew alphabets, and speaking fluent Russian, Polish, French, English and Hebrew before he was ten. His father wanted Maurice, his eldest son, to become a rabbi and lead a secure, holy and useful life of service to the “chosen people”, who were suffering under the heel of tsarist authority and thus help them survive the persecution generated by the prevalent racial intolerance. However, Maurice’s capabilities were early recognized by his teachers, who thus enabled him to accomplish the all-too-rare feat of a Jew entering the tsarist Russian school in his area. He proved himself exceptionally brilliant and, having stood first amongst 500 boys in his high school final examinations, he sat for the Central Scholarship Examination and got 95%, standing first in the province of Poland. For this he received a State scholarship, and opted for what was then his strongest urge, a course in electrical engineering. Before he was 20 he had about 100 patents to his name for his electrical and mechanical inventions, of which a “talking book” was one.

Soon he was picked up by the laboratories and then research institutes, and by 1925 had traveled over much of Europe and worked in German, Dutch and Danish industrial establishments.

By the age of 25, however, what was to be his life-long urge had come desperately to the surface. He wanted to “see God”. For a few years he had seriously studied the Talmud and other Jewish religious books. Judaism, however, did not satisfy for long the incisive, logical, courageous, non-dogmatic mind of Maurice.

He then converted to Russian Orthodoxy and became a monk, retreating to a solitary monastery in the Carpathian mountains in Southern Poland. One incident during this period clearly illustrates Maurice’s character. It seems that one day “Satan” tempted him to jump over a mighty waterfall to ”prove his faith” in Jesus Christ and the Church. So this intrepid seeker after truth immediately jumped down a 100-foot precipice! He was saved by a few shrubs in which his cassock got entangled. This was typical Maurice! This is what inspired and was loved by thousands during his 78-year span of life on this earth.

By 1926 Maurice had got “sick and tired”, as he once told us, of all orthodox dogmas. “Believe this, don’t do this, do this, follow me – didn’t suit me,” he said. He wanted to seek freely everywhere and try desperately to find out for himself “what all this is about”. It was at about this time that he came in touch with the Theosophical Society and met Annie Besant and J. Krishnamurti. In the Swiss Alps and many times in Saanen in Holland, he met Krishnaji. For nearly fifty years Maurice was “very, very close to Krishnaji”, and the most serious and obstinate questioner of this great seer.

By 1928 he was ready to emigrate to France in search of a job and “new adventures”, as he put it. He arrived in Paris with high hopes, no money and nowhere to stay. But soon he saw an advertisement in Paris Soir about a new electrical factory that was being started in the outskirts of the city. He applied and was immediately accepted. By 1934 he had become General Manager of the factory.

All this while, his real urge to “find and meet God” was not forgotten. He read voraciously books on religion, mysticism and occultism. He continuously experimented on himself with whatever practice he was reading about in the vast section on these subjects in the Biblioteque Nationale in Paris.

Then suddenly he hit upon Vedanta. In translation (French and German) he pored over the Upanishads, the Gita, the Mahabharata. Paul Brunton’s books on Ramana Maharshi attracted him greatly. This was his first introduction to the great master and what was, for Maurice, the greatest revelation: “Who am I?”"

David Godman notes,

"One morning Maharaj seemed to be more-than-usually frustrated about our collective inability to grasp what he was talking about.
     'Why do I waste my time with you people?' he exclaimed. 'Why does no one ever understand what I am saying?'
     I took my chance: 'In all the years that you have been teaching how many people have truly understood and experienced your teachings?'
     He was quiet for a moment, and then he said, 'One. Maurice Frydman.' He didn't elaborate and I didn't follow it up.
     I mentioned earlier that at the conclusion of his morning puja he put kum kum on the forehead of all the pictures in his room of the people he knew were enlightened. There were two big pictures of Maurice there, and both of them were daily given the kum kum treatment. Maharaj clearly had a great respect for Maurice. I remember on one of my early visits querying Maharaj about some statement of his that had been recorded in I am That. I think it was about fulfilling desires.
      Maharaj initially didn't seem to agree with the remarks that had been attributed to him in the book, but then he added, 'The words must be true because Maurice wrote them. Maurice was a jnani, and the jnani's words are always the words of truth.'
     I have met several people who knew Maurice, and all of them have extraordinary stories to tell about him. He visited Swami Ramdas in the 1930s and Ramdas apparently told him that this would be his final birth. That comment was recorded in Talks with Sri Ramana Maharshi in the late 1930s, decades before he had his meetings with Maharaj. He was at various stages of his life a follower of Ramana Maharshi, Gandhi, and J. Krishnamurti. While he was a Gandhian he went to work for the raja of a small principality and somehow persuaded him to abdicate and hand over all his authority to people he had formerly ruled as an absolute monarch. His whole life is full of astonishing incidents such as these that are virtually unknown. I have been told by someone who used to be a senior Indian government official in the 1960s that it was Frydman who persuaded the then India Prime Minister Nehru to allow the Dalai Lama and the other exiled Tibetans to stay in India. Frydman apparently pestered him continuously for months until he finally gave his consent. None of these activities were ever publicly acknowledged because Frydman disliked publicity of any kind and always tried to do his work anonymously."

I could write more about Frydman, but all that would've been cut and copied from these sources.

But most important of all, in the context of Judaism and Hinduism, is te statement of Sri Ramana Maharshi that David Godman notes in his brilliant article, "I am- The First Name of God":

"'I am' is the name of God. Of all the definitions of God, none is so well put as the biblical statement 'I am that I am' in Exodus chapter three. There are other statements such as brahmavaiham [Brahman am I], aham brahmasmi [I am Brahman] and soham [I am He]. But none is so direct as Jehovah [which means] 'I am'."

I think that Rabbi Rami, in turning to Hinduism will find that he has only turned back to his roots.

I wish him well.

On Cultishness

2009-11-23T19:43:00.000+05:30

I would like you to read these three articles in the blog, "The Broken Yogi Samyama":

The posts are about cults, they are well-written, there is lot to learn from them, and I am not qualified to add anything except ask you to please read them.

But this sets me thinking:

I don't know the difference between real religious/ spiritual organisations and cults: I imagine that you can make a cult of any religion if you are inclined to do that. May be I am giving my own meaning to what a cult is, but it seems that if you think that by following something/ someone, you will get some benefit which others won't, and if you are inclined to be dogmatic about it and if you have surrendered your judgment to a superior power and then if you like to hang out with like-minded people- you are cultish.

All this is true of all major religions, but what sets the cults apart from them?

History.

We know enough of religions to know that they are not faultless, and that their dogma has changed over time, and the salvation they offer is too human to be perfect. But in the case of cults, we see only the fulfilment of our projections, and the comfort of satsang blinds us to the illusory nature of our experiences (to be fair, all experiences are illusory- of course).

So, there is no The One True Master upon whom we can pin all our hopes, and no The One True Way that will take us home once we give ourselves to it entirely- if we think otherwise, we run the risk of making a cult of whatever we believe in, or belong to.

I believe that Sri Ramana Maharshi is an enlightened sage, and devotion to him is enough to put an end to my sufferings- but if I think this belief by itself will reveal to me my true nature- then I am making a cult of Bhagavan.

What ultimately matters is what I do with my own life, and when you look at that- my belief and knowledge has no relevance at all.

Tweet outs

2009-11-22T06:52:00.000+05:30

From Twitter via Brizzly:-

dhamma musings: Can it be that Hitler was better than this Chinese Government, speaking of heritage?- passionate http://sdhammika.blogspot.com/2009/11/thoughts-on-chinese-occupation-ii_19.html
"We tag our scripts, and that helps us relocate into the Seer. That's what it's all about. Location-location-location." http://tottonu3aphilosophy.blogspot.com/2009/11/november-meeting.html
For the philosophically inclined- “base of infinite consciousness.” samadhi states in various traditions (short post) http://www.gurdjieff-con.net/2009/11/20/more-on-pali-tradition/
Translation of Vivekachoodamani (first five verses) at Sushupti- an Italian blog http://sushupti.wordpress.com/2009/11/20/vivekacudamani-parte-n-1/
A superb discussion of Ramana's vichara (with ample quotes) and traditional advaita/ buddhism is at http://brokenyogi.blogspot.com/2009/11/ramana-and-method-of-self-enquiry_19.html. Great work.
"The Hypnotic Trance of Cults and Cultists" Likely to be controversial, but alerts you to the consequences of "faith"- http://brokenyogi.blogspot.com/2009/11/hypnotic-trance-of-cults-and-cultists.html
Awakurious- Affectionate Awareness: mind-centric awareness is likely to be cold, its centre has to be heart. http://awakurious.blogspot.com/

Affectionate Awareness

2009-11-21T09:50:00.000+05:30

From a short post at Awakurious on Adyashanti's idea of "Affectionate Awareness":

Awakurious: "...if awareness was centered in the mind only, it would tend to be cold, but that it needed to center itself in the heart."

When the occasion demands...

2009-11-21T09:38:00.002+05:30

Broken Yogi Samyama is a blog I found today- it is an exceptional blog, and the fact that I discovered it only today tells you how ignorant I am of the really good blogs to follow. I don't know who Broken Yogi is, but one gets the idea that he has been in this Advaita business for quite a long time, and has spent lots of passion, time and money seeking the right people to know. He is also knowledgeable, and fluent, and is totally without rancour: the even-handedness of his approach, even when making statements that could likely be controversial, stands out.

I wish this blog could be more popular, and more people interact with Broken Yogi.

Here is an excerpt from his recent post-

The Un-Cult Spiritual Movement:

"A few years ago when I was still spending time in Marin, I was invited by a friend to a small gathering for Prem Avadhoot, a close disciple and attendant to Rang Avadhut, who was known to me through the lore of Adidam as one of the most interesting saints of 20th century India. Rang Avadhoot is not well known even in India, yet was a very impressive figure in the area around Ganeshpuri, and occasionally visited with Swami Muktananda where he by chance met young Franklin Jones (Adi Da) on his first visit to India. According to Jones, it was actually Rang Avadhoot whose penetrating glance sent him into Nirvikalpa Samadhi near the end of that first trip, and he thus occupies a high place in the Adidam pantheon. I knew little about him other than what I'd learned through Adidam.

"Meeting Prem Avadhoot was a very different experience than the kind of thing one finds in Adidam, however. Prem Avadhoot was a very unassuming, rather frail old man at this point, in his seventies, but still very lively and extremely friendly. In fact, when he introduced himself to the gathering of about 50 people in a large private living room in Mill Valley, his first words were, “Don't think of me as a guru or a teacher, relate to me as a family friend”. He proceeded to describe his relationship to Rang Avadhoot, who lived a life of great simplicity and integrity, as one of loving and ordinary intimacy. He made no claims about himself, and he explained that he didn't even have much of a spiritual teaching. His God, he said, was humanity itself, and his practice was to love and worship human beings as God, as a servant to God. In accord with this, he would accept no financial donations. His travel expenses had been paid for by a wealthy Marinite (the host of the gathering), but beyond that, he had taken vows of poverty and lived in ordinary simplicity. In his home village he was known as “the loving saint” who spent all his time simply being with people, loving then, acting literally as a family friend, spending time with children and animals, and not really trying to make anything more of himself than that. To him, this was his teaching – how he actually lived and related to others. In appreciation of this, he gave everyone at the gathering a small gift, personally, as they come up to his chair and were embraced by him. I received a small cloth, which I used on my meditation altar still, and a laminated card that had a number of brief aphorisms from Rang Avadhoot, which were touching in their simplicity and loving attitude. I got to spend some time with him after the gathering, and he invited anyone who was there to simply sit with him in his room.

"I didn't get the sense from Prem Avadhoot that he was a great non-dual realizer, but he didn't pretend to be either. He was a simple bhakti, a lover of God who understood that to love God meant to love others unconditionally. This is what his Guru Rang Avadhoot had taught him to do. He was living what to him was a simple, traditional life of renunciation, but it was immensely full and happy and loving, and he didn't need anything more than that. He didn't need to make money, he didn't need to travel to the US, it just worked out that way through the generosity of a patron. He didn't need to create a following or a movement or an organization around any of this. He kept it all very human and small and intimate. No money exchanged hands. There was no fee at the door, not even a bowl for “donations”. You could see from his body and clothing that he simply had no use for money or luxuries. He was spiritually alive, awake, and full of love, and he just lived in a natural manner, keeping that love pure and untouched by the commercial life.

"As he describes his life:

"I eat when I feel hunger. I sleep when I feel to sleep. An unhappy happening makes me weep too. When occasion demands, I laugh aloud and freely.At the time of silence, I go into deep silence.Whatever I do, I do it as a worship to and of God."
~ Prem Avadhoot Bapuji

"Anyway, if there's a “model” for the un-cult, Prem Avadhut is one of the best examples I could offer. Unfortunately, he's not easy to find, since he doesn't promote himself. I don't think he even has a website. It was sheer chance that I happened to know the right people to be invited to meet him. But that also is part of the un-cult model It works off of basic human intimacies, and the notion that God will find a way to touch you through people like Prem Avadhut if you simply allow Grace to guide you."

Lord Vishnu in an Indonesian Blog

2009-11-21T09:10:00.000+05:30

Lord Vishnu represented in an Indonesian Blog (the mythology as I read it through Google Translate is interesting):

Batara Wisnu � Tokoh Wayang: "Wisnu Solo"

Jnana

2009-11-21T09:02:00.001+05:30

Exceptional quote:

The Gurdjieff Con � More on Pali tradition:

"“Jnana is given neither from outside nor from another person. It can be realised by each and everyone in his own Heart. The jnana Guru of everyone is only the Supreme Self that is always revealing its own truth in every Heart through the being-conciousness ‘I am, I am.’ The granting of true knowledge by him is initiation into jnana. The grace of the Guru is only that Self-awareness that is one’s own true nature. It is the inner conciousness by which he is unceasingly revealing his existence. This divine upadesa is always going on naturally in everyone.”

http://www.davidgodman.org/"

Thought

2009-11-20T06:26:00.000+05:30

As the header says, this is a blog with links: I share here interesting posts I found elsewhere on the net, but not all: some I share on The Twitter- so I think I should cross post them here, nothing wrong in that.

So, here goes.

Beanmine Blog: Intro- Madhukar "As a practical philosopher Madhukar connect qabalah spirituality with modern science.." http://beanmine.typepad.com/the_bean_mines/2009/11/madhukar.html
Curiosity and love- "When all of our experiences are met with love, there is no longer a need to avoid or defend." http://aflourishinglife.com/2009/11/how-to-be-curious/
(Blog) "But to those few who seek jnana, Arunachala always makes itself known through some means or other." http://asilentjourney.blogspot.com/
""Never seek this Gohonzon outside yourself. The Gohonzon exists only within the mortal flesh of us ordinary people..." http://keiltan.blogspot.com/2009/11/non-duality-of-gohonzon-and-us.html

Gohonzon

2009-11-18T14:00:00.000+05:30

I don't know what the Gohonzon is, but this finds an echo:

Sensei's Disciple: The Non-duality of the Gohonzon and Us!:
"'[E]ven though you chant and believe in Myoho-renge-kyo, if you think the Law is outside yourself, you are embracing not the Mystic Law but an inferior teaching.'

[On Attaining Buddhahood in This Lifetime, WND-1-3]"

Sri Krishna

2009-11-17T14:04:00.000+05:30

DHARMADVAR: TUHAN DAN JIWA, SAMA DAN JUGA BERBEDA

Liked this photograph at this Indonesian blog: by a Chaitanya Devotee:

The need for a word-by-word translation of Hsin Hsin Ming

2009-11-17T09:27:00.001+05:30

Made this comment at Happiness of Being:

Re Akira:Thanks for your comments- I found these...:

"Re Akira:

Thanks for your comments- I found these verses in "Three pillars of Zen", I think, and another version in an old issue of Mountain Path: I was amazed at the terseness of the verses, and how similar it is to the teachings of Bhagavan. I think one should read this alongside Ribhu Gita: that good.

However, these are translations: do you have any intention of discussing this word by word, the way Michael James here does with the original Tamil writings of Bhagavan? That would help us a lot, I think.

Because, in the translation you give, you write, "All you have to do it to hate making choices." Is this a positive hatred, or is it more like a resistance to the making of choices? I think possibly the original word for 'hate' has different connotations than the one we have in English.

And the other query I have is, about this: "it is clear like a (big entrance of) cave.": I think this means you are in darkness, and once you have found the Way- it leads into light: so, the Way itself is in effect, clear like a vast opening out from a cave- am I right in reading it this way? Because, the way and the goal could not be different in time or thought."

Beware of Enlightenment!

2009-11-16T15:14:00.000+05:30

A post with beautiful photos layered with extraordinarily perceptive observations:

If Enlightenment Came with a Warning Label… | You Are Truly Loved: "Rasha: Letting Go of Control"

Beautiful design.

The miracle of life- in terms of the awakening of kundalini

2009-11-16T09:12:00.001+05:30

This is an interesting blog that I found, that brings together Yoga and Judaism- and here is an interesting interpretation of the miracle of giving life:

Yoga And Judaism Center: Elisha The Prophet, Part Two:

"I can only say that I was fascinated with the procedures involved in bringing the boy back to life, without fully understanding all of it. The details are just fascinating, first placing the staff (and the staff, as I have expounded elsewhere in the context of Moses, is the staff of the serpent power of existential life, of the Shechinah/kundalini) on the child, and then lying face to face, eyeball to eyeball, mouth to mouth, hand to hand. The Tree of Life correlates with the human body, and the rudimentary life force/prana/ruach carried through the breath is what brought life to Adam. Sneezing in this case seems to be the equivalent to the first cries of a newborn baby, the expression of inhalation and exhalation, not only of breath, but of life force (think about it, sneezing begins with an inhalation, the “ah”, which is followed by an exhalation, the “choo”). And the sneezing seven times is indicative of energizing the seven primary life force centers identified in yoga as chakras, which have correlates in the kabala’s Tree of Life."

Looks lie a great blog.

Eternity in Disguise (What is so special about Sabbath?- ‘HaYom,’ be present, here, now): Dover Emet: Speaking the Truth

2009-11-15T07:37:00.000+05:30

I liked this post at Dover Emet: Speaking the truth:

It is about presence and forgetfulness, nescience and awakening, time and timelessness, death and eternity: same as what all non-dual teachers say, but this comes from a different tradition, and because of that- this has a novel flavour, I liked this, and would recommend this blog to you-

Eternity in Disguise:

"The Sfat Emet, a wonderful commentary from the last century, derives a very powerful teaching from the opening line from this week’s Torah reading about Sarah’s years. According to the Sfat Emet, there’s an important mitzvah about time that we all are commanded to follow. In the first paragraph of the Shema, from the book of Deuteronomy (6:5), there are the words ‘v’hayu had’varim ha’eleh asher anochi metzavcha hayom al levavecha,” What does that mean literally? ‘These are the words that I command you this day upon your heart.’ The Sfat Emet suggests another way of reading this line: he says the point of the line is the phrase: asher anochi metzavcha Hayom: What I, God, command you this day. Stop there, says the Sfat Emet, and the power of all these words, of all the Torah becomes clear: What God commands upon us is ‘HaYom,’ Today! In other words, what God on high commands us to do is to be Present to what’s happening HaYom, today! That Hebrew word, HaYom, doesn’t just mean a 24 hour period the way we conventionally think of a day. HaYom means ‘right now.’ For the Sfat Emet, the one commandment that makes our True adherence to Torah possible is our adherence to HaYom, to just being Here, right now!""

From which it follows,

"...While, all other six days of the week, we’re constantly checking our watches and mentally living in the past or in the future, Shabbat is an opportunity to put away your watch and live with no time at all. Shabbat is all about basking in the eternity that flashes in this moment. And somehow, our people have managed to survive for thousands of years even without worrying about the time for one day a week. So today, you can put away your watch. What time is it? It’s just Shabbat. Just for now, there is no past and no future. Just this! Imagine if you could live your life with that kind of freedom! How liberating that would be! This is the promise of Shabbat! Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel said it best in his book, The Sabbath: “What is so luminous about a day? What is so precious to captivate the heart? It is because the seventh day is a mine where spirit’s precious metal can be found with which to construct the palace in time…There is no quality that space has with the essence of God…the likeness of God can be found in time, which is eternity in disguise.”

"When we look at our watches and become stressed because we’re late, or we feel guilt because of time we have wasted—the reason why we are really feeling that pain in our souls is because at that moment, we’re in the disguise, and not in the Reality of this moment. When we lose ourselves in projected pasts or futures, we have abandoned our True Selves. We have left Eternity. We have left God! The Kotzker Rebbe once famously asked, “Where is God? Wherever you let Him in!” If we’re never Here, Now, then we can never find God!"

The Three States

2009-11-11T12:00:00.004+05:30

The New York Times has this quote in an article on dreaming- A Dream Interpretation: Tuneups for the Brain:

"“I argue that dreaming is not a parallel state but that it is consciousness itself, in the absence of input from the senses,” said Dr. Llinás, who makes the case in the book “I of the Vortex: From Neurons to Self” (M.I.T., 2001). Once people are awake, he argued, their brain essentially revises its dream images to match what it sees, hears and feels — the dreams are “corrected” by the senses."

The article is not about this viewpoint, it is more an argument that dreams rehearse reality, are a warmup for waking- but in view of the Advaitic contention that all the three (or four) states are no different from one another, this quote is interesting, to say the least.

It is a common point that the world we see outside is projected outward through the sense-organs, so this point made by Dr. Llinás is worth further reading.

A post of interest

2009-11-03T10:14:00.002+05:30

On Saradamma, Lakshmanasamy, a special dream and thoughts on the nature of meditation. Excellent post- devotional in nature, philosophical in approach, honest writing.
in reference to: http://brokenyogi.blogspot.com/2009/11/lakshmana-swamy-and-muthra-sir-sarada.html

Desire

2009-09-14T06:40:00.000+05:30

Tricycle has an article on desire, the varieties of desire:

sense desires:

"kama tanha: craving for certain food tastes or for pleasing sounds or for silence..."

"...desire for existence and for becoming what you are not. In Pali this is called bhava tanha."

"The third type of tanha arises when you are so disillusioned with something in your life and want to get rid of it or want it to cease with such intensity that you crave nonexistence. This state of mind is called vibhava tanha."

Short, brief and to the point- excellent article, I liked it actually.

Vivekachudamani- the student comes to his senses, and speaks out.

2009-08-09T20:38:00.000+05:30

I got a call from a friend today, whose mother is ailing, and being depressed, he asked me to send him some spiritual messages. So I took Viveka Chudamani and sent him (and to five others) my reading of verses 547 to 552 wherein the disciple speaks of his realisation of truth.

Here is it, since I think no good thing, even though it is done bad, should go waste- I am now sharing them with you:

Thanks to his Master's faultless transmission of knowledge, his own faith in scriptures and persistent meditation, the student came to grasp the Truth. Having attained the restraint of sense organs and the benediction of undisturbed unitary consciousness, he sat unmoving- as himself, whole in himself.

Thus for a while, the student was blessed with faultless abidance in absolute transcendence through his unfragmented mind. And then the saintly student took leave of contemplation, and with effervescent joy, talked of his unending experience of being himself.

"I have assiduously pursued, and now I am sure, that what I know myself to be is ever absolute transcendence; the divisive mind is dropped- no more, the tendency to project outward. I am. Has it form? Or am I formless? I see no need for these questions- absolute oneness is all there is, and this happy state knows no bounds.

"The joy of my true nature that I so devoutly desired to know, has been revealed to be an immaculate mirror, a gateway- permeated with transcendence-, a vast ocean of innocence. Who can with speech describe, or with his mind explore, the magic by which the absolute has become the intimate- there is none, none be there with such aptitude.

"I have become as the chunk of ice that fell and dissolved in the sea, and found itself returned to its own, but now it had no name or form. The happiness that had penetrated my mind was a small drop that fell into the vast ocean of absolute bliss- yet, in falling, and in dissolving, as in love, I lost myself and then regained, the ease and comfort of my natural state.

"What wonder! Such variety I did see in this world till date- now all are gone, not a whit remains. What to make of it! A world of such multitude, so diverse, but now no more- where is it gone, what caused it go, in what is it subsumed- what to say, words are of no avail!"

That's it.

Peace and Happiness to you.

Be happy.

Aksharamanamalai (Marital Garland of Letters)- verse 6 (Such, is your love!)

2009-07-08T17:48:00.006+05:30

This verse has stymied me for some time now- I have been mulling over it off and on for these past two three days on how to translate this without making it sound banal. Here is a version of my desperate efforts:

More loving than a mother, Arunachala-

hast Thy love brought

such things to be,

Arunachala!

Reverting back to Thou, Thy etc., because I do not see any other way of getting this verse into proper-sounding poetic English.

This verse can be read as an expression of amazement or, disappointment: "All this is your love? You sure have more love for us than a mother!", or else, "Is this all that your love can do? OMG!- And to think that you have more love in you than a mother has- :( ".

If ambiguity adds to the sense of poetry, this verse has it. Because, consider this maritally: I need all the love that you can give- if I get it, I am on top of the world; and when I don't, I am down in the dump.

No man can love another that way, or can be loved in that manner- how much love can you give so that the other feels totally loved? It is not humanly possible for us to have enough of love. The only way we can come to know no lack of love is when we lose the sense of being loved and we have no need for any love- we are the expression of love, so to say. There is no object towards which it is directed, and there is no other, God or man, from which we receive it.

In my mind, Aksharamanamalai is a call for companionship- it just happens to be that this is a plea addressed to God; but in its implicit premise, Aksharamanamalai is in every sense of the word an expression of love that carries with it the affirmation to be one together- the openness of spirit that will let itself be totally and unreservedly dissolved- so that there remains not even an iota of isolation, and loneliness is brought irrevocably to an end. Radiant Stillness, indeed!

Here is the Osbourne translation:

6. (a) Kinder far art Thou than one's own mother. Is this then Thy all-kindness, Oh Arunachala!

(b) Kinder indeed art Thou than one's own mother, such is Thy Love, Oh Arunachala!

Be happy.

A Plea to People to Write Poetry, of the kind that Ramana Did

2009-07-07T19:17:00.003+05:30

This is in continuation of the post I made yesterday:

Over the net, I find two great blogs on Sri Ramana Maharshi: Happiness of Being - The Teachings of Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi by Michael James, and Arunachala and Ramana Maharshi by David Godman.

Michael James is more inclined to communicate the teachings of Bhagavan as it relates to Self-enquiry. He knows Tamil well, and analyses the implicit meanings of words in great depth. His is a painstaking work, and it shows. There is a strong streak of "Self-Enquiry is the only way of self-realization". People may agree with that or not, but there is no question that his blog is worth reading and reflecting upon. His is more a self-enquiry blog, but there is a strong element of devotion too.

Then, David Godman's blog places the teachings of Bhagavan in a wider setting- in time and place, and even in thought, if I may say so. He is well informed with the teachings of other Advaitic masters, and it is a delight to read his posts. He does great research, his language is simple and uncomplicated, he communicates very well. We can see that Godman's approach to Bhagavan is devotional in a quiet, unloud manner, and an implicit tone of surrender can be noticed in his writings. There are long discussions going there, on a wide variety of issues, and it is a lively blog.

I think, among all the blogs on Bhagavan in English, these two stand out.

I am not expert in these, I am just sharing my thoughts on this.

But if you think about it, Bhagavan has two sides- it is not right to say he has two sides, it is just that different people emphasize two different takes on Bhagavan- one is philosophical and the other is devotional, one is self-enquiry and the other is surrender.

What I would like to see more on the net, are blogs of the kind that Alan Jacobs does. Bhagavan wrote masterly poems, both devotional and philosophical, and in English, they are scarce. In that blog of Alan Jacobs, you find a hint of it: Bhagavan's devotional and philosophical verses are informed by each other, the only difference being that the devotional poems are addressed to a higher being.

It is a pity that the poetic side of Bhagavan's teachings finds no resonance in the blogs- the experience is somewhat strange and disconcerting- not unlike being constantly presented with the wrong side of the moon.

Postscript:

There are two more blogs that I regularly read, both by students, 'sishyas' should be the right word, of Nome- for they state that they have both learned a lot from Nome.

One is The PreCambrian Corner. The author of the blog is open about the problems he faces, and he has no assumption of his spiritual attainments. His understanding of Bhagavan's teachings is as good as it can be- to my limited knowledge, his understanding is complete, and his engagement with Vichara is total. The one thing I really appreciate in his posts is that he comes across as what he is- he makes no effort to hide his tendencies, problems, predilections, personality etc. He does not write a spiritual blog, it is very much a personal blog, but because his persona seems to be spiritual (at least for now, and at least in my eyes), it comes across as a spiritual blog.

And the other blog that I want to mention here is that of Richard Clarke, "Living in the Embrace of Arunachala". Bhagavan was really 'attached' to Arunachala, the Hill at Tiruvannamalai, and this blog explores its nooks and corners, the cracks and caves on the face of the hill. Richard Clarke posts great photos, and maps, and I think if he continues in the same vein, this blog will become one of the most important ones to anyone who wants to explore Arunachala. His is a great service in the cause of Bhagavan, as important as writing books on Bhagavan or explaining the teachings of Bhagavan. And it is good that Richard Clarke has a happy time doing this, possibly he has massive purva punya! :)

Post-postscript:

The first thing I do in the morning when I browse, is to google A blogsearch on Bhagavan. It used to be that I'll find about ten or eleven blogs that had mentioned his name in the past twelve hours, but recently I get about twenty blogs. Maybe I am mistaken, but the impression I get is that more people are blogging about Bhagavan.

Anyway, when I come across blogs in other languages, I use Google Translate and read them anyway! I mention this because, doing that, I came across this blog, "Shambala" in Spanish. It is by Sankaradas, and reading his posts and the comments, I find that there is quite a sizeable group of Bhagavan's devotees there. I don't know how it happened thus, but I am pleasantly surprised by this.

Post-post-postscript:

I have wandered from the motive I had in making this post: it is that I want to see more blogs of the kind that Alan Jacobs has.

Peace and happiness to you all, random readers who stumble into this blog.

May you come to find true happiness, perfect in itself, and enduring all thought (which you already have and are- in case you are a neo-advaitin :) ).

Ramana Followers note- Poetry Blog by Alan Jacobs

2009-07-06T19:01:00.001+05:30

There is a very good blog of poetry that has totally and wholesomely the flavour of Sri Ramana Maharshi- Alan Jacobs. The posts are traditional, rhymed poetry- mostly sonnets- but each and every poem is inspired by the poet's absorption and understanding of the teachings of Ramana.

I reproduce a poem here:

DIVE DEEP

Deep in the sacred shrine of the heart cave,

Dwells the glorious formlessness of Self:

One pointed, shines as I; not demon elf

Of ego, but subtle space, our soul to save

Through questing mind. Dive inwardly deep!

Let vital breath and thought quiesce to keep

Self abidance. These words the great Guru gave.

Who perceives and wakes from sleep to see

The essence of this verse, uttered by the Sage,

Will through his life be unassailed by doubt.

The precious pearl of Self shall set him free

From slavery to that banal world without.

Stay in Self by any way we can engage,

For gates to open; this is the master key.

Aksharamanamalai (Marital Garland of Letters)- verse 5 (Constant Love)

2009-07-02T19:14:00.005+05:30

Another poor piece of translation:

Escape this calumny:

Having been caused such obsessive thought of you,

Would I ever let you be-

Arunachala!

Here is Osborne's Translation:

5. Escape this blame! Why didst Thou then recall Thyself to me? How can I leave Thee now, Oh Arunachala!

The Tamil verse is open to two different, but related readings:

"Escape this blame: why have you caused me to think of you constantly, it is impossible for anyone to forget you after this!"

and then,

"Escape this blame: I have become mad with constant thinking of you, it is impossible for anyone to forget you after this!"

To me, both the readings add to the richness of the text. Not only is this constant thought of Arunachala, this yearning is caused by Him and being out of control, it is hardly possible for us to forget Him, no matter what happens, how frustrated we are or how unfulfilled we feel.

I remember reading this: "If Kitty thinks of Bhagavan, Bhagavan also thinks of Kitty"- Ramana Leela

The point is, our thoughts are constantly centred on Arunachala, despite all its wavering we return to Him because it is impossible for us to leave off, and if we remain unfulfilled at the end of our life, all blame is upon Him. So it is ultimately His responsibility to save us, enlighten us, liberate us, whatever.

Aksharamanamalai (Marital Garland of Letters)- verse 4 (Don't Let me Go!)

2009-07-01T13:52:00.002+05:30

For the love of whom

Did you make me Thine?

Arunachala,

Don't you ever let go-

For we will be reviled.

Okay.

Here is Osborne's translation:

Was it for Thy pleasure or for my sake Thou didst win me? If now Thou turn me away, the world will blame Thee, Oh Arunachala!

Some thoughts on this:

None of us who come to non-duality stay with it without having had some sort of experience of non-duality.

At one level we can read this verse this way: Okay, you have brought me with you- may be you loved me, or may be I loved you, but here we are. Now, I am not sure about your love for me- I want you to let me go. But don't let me go, because if that happens we will both be reviled by the world for what we have done.

Anyone who has committed himself to the spiritual path cannot really return to worldliness without inviting scorn, right?

But I would read it this way:

Okay our relationship is consummated to some extent- let us go all the way so that there is no difference between us- no I, no You; so that I am irrevocable yours, so that nothing that might happen anytime can annul the marriage between us.

I think it will terrible for someone to give up everything in the world and go to God, and then come back disappointed, and find that he has nothing- the only thing he has is the mocking laughter of the worldly-minded, who justifiably point out the error of this way.

This should not happen to any of us, it is all-or-nothing for us.

Be happy.

Aksharamanamalai (Marital Garland of Letters)- verse 3 (WTF4!)

2009-06-26T09:51:00.002+05:30

This is lousy, and actually a disservice to Sri Ramana Maharshi:

You crash my home, pull me in,

set me up

in this cave-house of yours

(as in prison),

but,

WTF4, Arunachala!

There are at least two possible versions to this:

Cave-man enters home, kidnaps girl and holds her in his cave.
And the other is, God enters the inner space, attracts the soul towards Himself, and once the attraction is set into motion- there is no escaping- God keeps the soul in the confines on his heart (cave).

Since God's heart is the same as our heart, so the attraction we feel towards this stuff, takes us into our source, directly and easily, because the attraction acts as the force that pulls us in back to it.

But still, we can't but complain: why do You have to do this? Here I am, attracted despite myself- and nothing happens.

As you probably wonder, WTF4 does this stuff happen?

It helps if you have someone like a God to address this question to- because when you are a cut and dried advaitin for whom nothing is, then there is no one to ask this question, and no one at whom to ask this question and so on, but the question remains- like that smile of the Cheshire Cat.

(Thanks to Garfield.nfs.host.com)

Here is the translation by Arthur Osborne:

Verse 3
Entering (my) home and luring me 9to Thine) why didst Thou keep me prisoner in Thy heart's cavern, Oh Arunachala!"

Aksharamanamalai - verse 2 (distinction without a difference)

2009-06-24T10:10:00.001+05:30

Okay, here goes:

Like Azhagu and Sundaram, let I and Thou,

Get to be soooo One,

Arunachala,

there is no Otherness with us.

This is terrible as a translation, I know, but does this read well?

I like this for the Martin Buber recall value :

Here are some links to Buber:

"A Few Thoughts on Martin Buber's I and Thou" by John Barich

Something about Martin Buber’s I and Thou at Angelfire

Some select passages of Buber at My Jewish Learning.

And a Catholic priest, FatherJeffrey, gives a brief explanation of Martin Buber's I-Thou and the Eclipse of God (whatever that means):

Azhagu in Tamil, means Beauty, which is what Sundaram in Sanskrit is. And by a strange poetic coincidence, Sri Ramana's parents were named Azhagammai and Sundaram Iyer, so it makes it nice and easy for Bhagavan to pay a tribute to his parents in this verse.

These two words look different, but they mean the same- what they stand for is something with the same identity.

I have a dictionary, and I find this: "Distinction without a difference: a merely nominal and artificial one)":- Azhagu and Sundaram : I and Thou: Me and God: Self.

This wholeness, Oneness without fragmentation is what is indicated in this verse.

Radiant Stillness. Where is the I and where the Thou?

The still point at the centre of our Heart from which everything comes, and then, ceases to be.

Sri Ramana taught that the outer Guru pushes you into the heart, and the inner Guru pulls you inside, but both are the same. The Self is the Guru.

And Arunachala, God, is no different from the Radiant Stillness that you find in your Heart. No difference at all. It just happens that we find ourselves in the world, and have a tendency to look outward: and through this prayer, we seek to turn our sight inward.

Here is Arthur Osborne's translation of this verse:

2. May Thou and I be one and inseparable like Alagu and Sundara, Oh Arunachala!

(Footnote: The Tamil word alagu and Sanskrit word sundara have the same meaning: 'beauty'. Alagu and Sundara were also the names of Sri Ramana's mother and father.)

Aksharamanamalai by Sri Ramana Maharshi (The Marital Garland of Letters)

2009-06-23T09:58:00.000+05:30

The first verse of Aksharamanamalai could be translated like this:

"You root them out of their homes, Arunachala,

Them that are minded to dwell at Arunachalam!"

Some notes to go with this:

Arunachalam is the hill at Tiruvannamalai; Arunachala is Lord Siva.

'Arunachalam' can be split into Aruna and Achalam.

Aruna is redness; and refers to the red sun of the dawn.

Achalam is stillness- chalam is movement, and achalam is unmoving.

So Arunachalam can be understood to mean, "Radiant Stillness"- which is the Light of the Self, the Light of the Lord, the Light of Realisation.

And then, these verses are addressed not merely to Siva, but also to the Self, which as we all know, is already realised.

There is a pun here. Aham means both mind/heart and home.

So, this verse can be read to mean, "You uproot and render homeless those who think of Arunachala", and then, "You destroy the mind of those who identify themselves with Arunachala, or think about Arunachala"...

Arthur Osborne translates this verse as,

1.a- "Arunachala! Thou dost root out the ego of those who meditate on Thee in the heart, Oh Arunachala!"

1.b- "Arunachala! Thous dost root the ego of those who dwell on their (spiritual) identity with Thee, Oh Arunachala!"

Since this verse was sung by mendicants on their rounds of alms-gathering, I think Arunachala, The God, rendering them homeless for their having thought of Him, is justifiable as another appropriate reading.

Now, if we put Radiant Stillness in place of Arunachala, we have,

"You root them out of their homes, Radiant Stillness,

Them that are minded to dwell at Radiant Stillness!"

This is a bit awkward because Radiant Stillness does not do anything,: may be that is why we name God as Arunachalam (so that we can worship Radiant Stillness)- but the point is, whether you meditate purposefully and intently at the Radiant and Still Core of your Heart, or just have a passing thought of the Radiant, Still Core at the Heart, or think about Arunachalam (or any other God who is a personifaction of Radiant Stillness- the Unmoving Mover), you will get there: your ignorance will be destroyed, the false self will be uprooted, and you will be rendered homeless: that which is false, will have no place to go.

Descartes questions the reality of the world

2009-06-21T08:14:00.002+05:30

Descartes: ‘I think therefore I am’ at www.newlearningonline.com

"As I then desired to give my attention solely to the search after truth, I thought … I ought to reject as absolutely false all opinions in regard to which I could suppose the least ground for doubt, in order to ascertain whether after that there remained [anything at all] in my belief that was wholly indubitable"

Descartes decides to reject everything that can be doubted: not everything false, but everything that is subject to being questioned. He seeks to know something that cannot be doubted- something about which you can be sure of- some certainty that you can rely on.

"Accordingly, seeing that our senses sometimes deceive us, I was willing to suppose that there existed nothing really such as they presented to us."

This world we see come to us through senses- and senses sometimes give distorted information. You cannot always be sure about the sense-data: so reject everything that comes through senses. The reality of the outer, objective world is subject to questioning. So absolute truth is not to be found there.

"[T]he very same thoughts (presentations) which we experience when awake may also be experienced when we are asleep, while there is at that time not one of them true, I supposed that all the objects (presentations) that had ever entered into my mind when awake, had in them no more truth than the illusions of my dreams."

In indian philosophy the reality of the world is questioned by contrasting the waking state with the dream state. This is routine. But in western philosophy, I have not seen it done. The similarity between dream and waking states is not taken up to see what is common or dissimilar between them.

But here Descartes asks, what makes my waking state experiences different from my dreams? What is seen in dream is unreal, what makes us think that the waking state objects are real?

"But immediately upon this I observed that, whilst I thus wished to think that all was false, it was absolutely necessary that I, who thus thought, should be somewhat; and as I observed that this truth, I think, therefore I am (cogito ergo sum), was so certain and of such evidence that no ground of doubt, however extravagant, could be alleged by the sceptics capable of shaking it, I concluded that I might, without scruple, accept it as the first principle of the philosophy of which I was in search."

This brings Descartes to the indubitable reality of his experiencing: "it was absolutely necessary that I, who thus thought, should be somewhat:- "I think, therefore I am". I am the thinker of these thoughts- what are thought about may be open to doubt, but thinker, the one who is not thought, he is not open to doubt. Because he cannot be doubted. Hence, the certainty of my experiencing is that I am- my presence.

Ramana used to state, you say the world is real- but who says so? Does it say I am real? You are the one that says so. I am the one that vouches for the reality of the world.

"I thence concluded that I was a substance whose whole essence or nature consists only in thinking, and which, that it may exist, has need of no place, nor is dependent on any material thing; so that ‘I’, that is to say, the mind by which I am what I am, is wholly distinct from the body, and is even more easily known than the latter."

This is an amazing insight. - 'I' does not need a place, or is not dependent on any object of awareness- the I is the most intimate truth of all experiencing.

"I considered myself as having a face, hands, arms, and all that system of members composed on bones and flesh as seen in a corpse which I designated by the name of body … By the body I understand all that which can be defined by a certain figure: something which can be confined in a certain place, and which can fill a given space in such a way that every other body will be excluded from it; which can be perceived either by touch, or by sight, or by hearing, or by taste, or by smell."

Here Descartes is questioning the "I am the body" idea- this may be compared with Bhagavan's similar lines in "Who am I"

"[However,] I have thought I perceived many things during sleep that I recognised in my waking moments as not having been experienced at all."

You cannot say any objective experience is true- you cannot be sure of the reality of objects: what you believed to be real during the dream state is falsified in the waking state. And who is to say the waking state is not merely another mode of the dream state?

"What of thinking? I find here that thought is an attribute that belongs to me; it alone cannot be separated from me. I am, I exist, that is certain."

I think Descartes means consciousness or awareness when he mentions thinking, thought. Being cannot be separated from me. Being is my attribute. I am, I exist- that is certain.

"I know that I exist, and I inquire what I am, I whom I know to exist … [W]hat then am I? A thing which thinks. What is a thing which thinks? It is a thing which doubts, understands, conceives, affirms, denies, wills, refuses, which also imagines and feels … For it is so evident of itself that it is I who doubts, who understands, and who desires, that there is no reason here to add anything to explain it."

I am not the object of my thinking- I am the ground of all thoughts- nothing can describe me- I basically have no attributes except that I am the one underneath all activities.

"And I have certainly the power of imagining likewise; for although it may happen (as I formerly supposed) that none of the things which I imagine are true, nevertheless this power of imagining does not cease to be really in use, and it forms part of my thought. Finally, I am the same who feels, that is to say, who perceives certain things, as by the organs of sense, since in truth I see light, I hear noise, I feel heat. But [sometimes it might be claimed or I might realise] that these phenomena are false and that I am dreaming. Let it be so; still it is at least quite certain that it seems to me that I see light, that I hear noise and that I feel heat. That cannot be false; properly speaking it is what is in me called feeling; and used in this precise sense that is no other thing than thinking."

So it comes to this: my activities can be shown to be subject to falsification, but they are mine- and it is certain that the one that is deceived, is still beyond deception- because he cannot be doubted.

This is like saying the cinema screen may show false images, but the screen is itself the real presence that is not modified by anything that is projected upon it.

"[P]erception is neither an act of vision, nor of touch, nor of imagination … but only an intuition of the mind, which may be imperfect and confused … or clear and distinct … according as my attention is more or less directed to the elements which are found in it, and of which it is composed."

Perception is basically that of the self, the I. And this intuition is defiled by attention upon what is found in the field of perception.

"[M]y mind loves to wander, and cannot yet suffer itself to be retained within the just limits of truth … [W]hen looking from a window and saying I see men who pass in the street, I really do not see them, but infer that what I see is men … And yet what do I see from the window but hats and coats which may cover automatic machines? Yet I judge these to be men … [B]y the faculty of judgment which rests in my mind, I comprehend that which I believed I saw with my eyes."

Ultimately I am the one that gives the colour of reality to the world--and it is because I know I am real, not open to any doubts or conjecture, that my certification is believed in. The certainty of the world flows from my certainty of what I am.

(What brought me to these passages of Descartes?

msayers weblog and The Odyssey- my thanks go to msayers and The Hoopoe.)

A diatribe against neo-advaitins

2009-06-16T09:52:00.001+05:30

I am short of time, but I want to get this out of the way for now.

I got involved in a blog, and because here I am contradicting some of the things that are being said in the blog, I won't be linking to it.

What matters is, what I said (so humble of me): here it is, with some editing:

(Referring to the line of thought: Except for the "I" everything is unreal, things are all okay as they are, we just have to let go of the notion that we have to do something etc...)

"This is getting solipsist, i think.

One cannot say, “nothing is there”, and then say, “everything is alright as it is.”

The fact we have an observer and an observed, and the observer is said to be the ground of the observed material does not mean that the observer alone is real and everything else is false.

What is false is the distinction between the observer and the observed. When the distinction goes, there is no subject-object, but that could rarely be supposed to mean that my grandpa and my son and my wife are all non-existent.

They are part of me, and I, part of them- that is how I see this.

If I am all there is, it is as good as to say there is nothing at all. Because, in the absence of others, there is no I. Which is not the case, since the I is always felt to be.

I think people are coming to a conclusion like you would work out a mathematical equation and are running off with the results- stating, these are my parameters.:since they are right, the solution has to be this, no matter what we see or hear.

My grandpa is definitely real, don’t worry, as real as you and me. Advaita is not to be taken as literally true. As with every other faith or system of thought, we have to read between the lines. It is lived every moment of our lives, even now- if any doubt arises as to how this is true, please ask yourself, “for whom does this doubt arise?” and then be aware of the self and that is all there is to it…"

and then,

"To call our thoughts ’stories’ seems to take the sting out of life, I think- may be that is the point- all this is made-up, is this what ’story’ suggests?

And there is this: “As long as no story (stories are thought created) is ever seen as better than any other story, then there is no problem with any stories (even these words are a story).”-

Now suppose I give you two stories:

“The soul is an orangish brown. This much we know–thanks to advances in the forensic sciences–for certain. The rest is mere conjecture. Does the soul survive the death of the body? Is it linked to our personal consciousness? Does it wear flared pants? We simply can’t say.” -A discourse on the soul

and, “The teachings of Sankara can be summed up in half a verse: – Brahma Satyam Jagan Mithya Jivo Brahmaiva Na Aparah. Brahman (the Absolute) is alone real; this world is unreal; and the Jiva or the individual soul is non-different from Brahman. This is the quintessence of his philosophy.”- The Advaita Philosophy Of Sri Sankara.

Do we rate both these two stories the same? And should a man be impelled to seek the orangish brownish reality of his soul, would that be the same as seeking the absoluteness of the reality of his soul?"

Advaita as I know it, did not start with Ramana Maharshi- he is part of a long line of tradition, and the way we (Indians) used to treat enlightened people is different from the way people in the west do.

First of all, to say that you are I, you are the ground of being, though true, leaves out one implication of what it means to be The source. We see the world around us. Think how much energy goes around. To say that some one is enlightened/ realised/ awakened means he is one with the source. It means he manifests that energy which made the world.

Now, we people here in India used to worship the enlightened people even above the Gods themselves. That is why you have the idea that every saint is a manifestation of some God. Ramana is said to be the incarnation of Dakshinamurti, and by some as that of Lord Muruga.

We may believe this or not. But what this indicates is that we associate realisation with something greater than what we know- what is called, mysterium tremendum et fascinans.

When you come face to face with such a realised master that is what you are supposed to feel. Not you in particular, but people in general. Some might have felt that way, others might not have- but this happens- "submergence into nothingness before an overpowering, absolute might of some kind."

Ultimately advaita is not an anodyne. It is not sitting back and getting on with your life with a vacant smile in the face, a happy song in the heart. There is mystery, there is awe, there is fascination, and there is God.

The Godless, self-satisfied, there-is-nothing to do school of advaita is a travesty of a whole tradition.

It is easy, but it isn't real.

Ramana said that if he gave way to anger, not a crow on the hill would escape his wrath- he felt that. And people senses that it would happen. And J.Krishnamurti said that if there were even five or six enlightened persons in the world at the same time, it would cause a great mutation in the whole consciousness of mankind.

With the teachers we have who parade a pain-killer type of advaita, anodyne advaita, do we get this kind of sense of awe and mystery?

Just very intelligent, easy to understand, do-nothing demand-nothing words that reassure that you are okay, there is nothing wrong- another face of the general positive psychology, feel-good thing that is in fashion these days.

A thought on J.Krishnamurti's teachings...

2009-06-15T00:10:00.000+05:30

J Krishnamurti never, to my understanding, gave much value to meditation in isolation of everyday activities. In fact, he seems to insist that one can find oneself, find what one is, only in the relationship we have with our environment. He calls this the mirror of relationship, I think.

Krishnamurti means something not easily comprehensible when he says,

"When man becomes aware of the movement of his own thoughts, he will see the division between the thinker and thought, the observer and the observed, the experiencer and the experience. He will discover that this division is an illusion. Then only is there pure observation which is insight without any shadow of the past or of time. This timeless insight brings about a deep, radical mutation in the mind.":

This movement of thought is not something you take up and see- this comes about at the point where one does not have any choice in matters of awareness, and also when the naming activity of the mind has ceased: if this is meditation, this goes twenty four hours a day and there is no verbalisation. This is not something that happens prior to 'waking up', this is the 'waking up'.

I have this simile that helps me in gaining a perspective on Krishnamurti's teachings: the truth which he is trying to convey, the insight, is like a flame. You either catch fire, or don't. There is nothing to practice. As such it is rather an empty activity to argue about what Krishnamurti said, or whether he is right or wrong. Such concepts have no validity to his teachings- his teaching and its meaning are not to be found in the words he spoke, they can only come alive when we respond to it with our whole being.

(This is a comment made at Mastering Thought.)

The Boundaries of Experience- Jill Bolte Taylor

2009-05-23T10:08:00.002+05:30

I found this extraordinary video at TED:

It is about a stroke that Jill Bolte Taylor suffered and its impact on her life:

Jill Bolte Taylor is a brain-scientist, so what she says has some added importance than what you or I would say, and I am giving here the parts of the transcript I found thought-provoking:

This is why she got interested in studying the brain:

"I grew up to study the brain because I have a brother who has been diagnosed with a brain disorder: schizophrenia. And as a sister and later, as a scientist, I wanted to understand why is it that I can take my dreams, I can connect them to my reality, and I can make my dreams come true. What is it about my brother's brain and his schizophrenia that he cannot connect his dreams to a common and shared reality, so they instead become delusions? So I dedicated my career to research into the severe mental illnesses."

What she was studying was this:

"So we were essentially mapping the microcircuitry of the brain: which cells are communicating with which cells, with which chemicals, and then in what quantities of those chemicals?"

And then this happened:

"But on the morning of December 10, 1996, I woke up to discover that I had a brain disorder of my own. A blood vessel exploded in the left half of my brain. And in the course of four hours, I watched my brain completely deteriorate in its ability to process all information. On the morning of the hemorrhage, I could not walk, talk, read, write or recall any of my life. I essentially became an infant in a woman's body."

She relates what happened to her with the two hemispheres of the brain, I am skipping that- I am reducing this, and perhaps distorting, but what I understand is, the right hemisphere of our brain is plugged into the world and gets information as part of the world- it is always in the NOW- there is no inside and no outside- and it is the left hemisphere of our brain that puts up its hand and says "I am"and does all that thinking, calculating, and planning- so the left hemisphere is the villain as far as holistic experience is concerned, and Taylor's hemorrhage happened there:

"On the morning of the stroke, I woke up to a pounding pain behind my left eye. And it was the kind of pain -- caustic pain -- that you get when you bite into ice cream. And it just gripped me -- and then it released me. And then it just gripped me -- and then it released me. And it was very unusual for me to ever experience any kind of pain, so I thought, OK, I'll just start my normal routine.

"So I got up and I jumped onto my cardio glider, which is a full-body, full-exercise machine. And I'm jamming away on this thing, and I'm realizing that my hands look like primitive claws grasping onto the bar. And I thought, "That's very peculiar." And I looked down at my body and I thought, "Whoa, I'm a weird-looking thing." And it was as though my consciousness had shifted away from my normal perception of reality, where I'm the person on the machine having the experience, to some esoteric space where I'm witnessing myself having this experience."

It gets so, she loses the boundaries of her bodily self:

" And I look down at my arm and I realize that I can no longer define the boundaries of my body. I can't define where I begin and where I end, because the atoms and the molecules of my arm blended with the atoms and molecules of the wall. And all I could detect was this energy -- energy."

So you get to hear what happens when the brain gets totally silent:

"And I'm asking myself, "What is wrong with me? What is going on?" And in that moment, my brain chatter -- my left hemisphere brain chatter -- went totally silent. Just like someone took a remote control and pushed the mute button. Total silence. And at first I was shocked to find myself inside of a silent mind. But then I was immediately captivated by the magnificence of the energy around me. And because I could no longer identify the boundaries of my body, I felt enormous and expansive. I felt at one with all the energy that was, and it was beautiful there.

"Then all of a sudden my left hemisphere comes back online, and it says to me, "Hey! We got a problem! We got a problem! We gotta get some help." And I'm going, "Ahh! I got a problem. I got a problem." So it's like, "OK. OK. I got a problem."

"But then I immediately drifted right back out into the consciousness -- and I affectionately refer to this space as La La Land. But it was beautiful there. Imagine what it would be like to be totally disconnected from your brain chatter that connects you to the external world.

"So here I am in this space, and my job -- and any stress related to my job -- it was gone. And I felt lighter in my body. And imagine: all of the relationships in the external world and any stressors related to any of those -- they were gone. And I felt this sense of peacefulness. And imagine what it would feel like to lose 37 years of emotional baggage! (Laughter) Oh! I felt euphoria. Euphoria. It was beautiful.

"And then, again, my left hemisphere comes online and it says, "Hey! You've got to pay attention. We've got to get help.""

In spite of her condition, she manages to call for help, and while going to the hospital, has a more significant moment of truth, she commits herself to an act of real faith:

"And a little while later, I am riding in an ambulance from one hospital across Boston to [Massachusetts] General Hospital And I curl up into a little fetal ball. And just like a balloon with the last bit of air, just, just right out of the balloon, I just felt my energy lift and just -- I felt my spirit surrender.

"And in that moment, I knew that I was no longer the choreographer of my life. And either the doctors rescue my body and give me a second chance at life, or this was perhaps my moment of transition."

Now her life has changed for good:

"When I awoke later that afternoon, I was shocked to discover that I was still alive. When I felt my spirit surrender, I said goodbye to my life. And my mind was now suspended between two very opposite planes of reality. Stimulation coming in through my sensory systems felt like pure pain. Light burned my brain like wildfire, and sounds were so loud and chaotic that I could not pick a voice out from the background noise, and I just wanted to escape. Because I could not identify the position of my body in space, I felt enormous and expansive, like a genie just liberated from her bottle. And my spirit soared free, like a great whale gliding through the sea of silent euphoria. Nirvana. I found Nirvana. And I remember thinking, there's no way I would ever be able to squeeze the enormousness of myself back inside this tiny little body."

And this experience inspires her to find an answer to the ultimate question:

"So who are we? We are the life force power of the universe, with manual dexterity and two cognitive minds. And we have the power to choose, moment by moment, who and how we want to be in the world. Right here, right now, I can step into the consciousness of my right hemisphere, where we are. I am the life-force power of the universe. I am the life-force power of the 50 trillion beautiful molecular geniuses that make up my form, at one with all that is. Or, I can choose to step into the consciousness of my left hemisphere, where I become a single individual, a solid. Separate from the flow, separate from you. I am Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor: intellectual, neuroanatomist. These are the "we" inside of me. Which would you choose? Which do you choose? And when? I believe that the more time we spend choosing to run the deep inner-peace circuitry of our right hemispheres, the more peace we will project into the world, and the more peaceful our planet will be."

I think, forget the language of the hemispheres, it could be about chakras for all the difference it makes- it is the experience that counts, not the explanation- in Taylor's terms, it is the right hemisphere that counts, not the left-, what happened to her is so significant, and astonishing- it is like a window opening in my life.

I wish to thank msayers for pointing out this link: I am deeply grateful to him.

Fear

2009-05-20T23:17:00.001+05:30

(Image Courtesy: 321Space.com via Examiner )

I found this wonderful story by David Parker at Examiner:

"In the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad, the first thoughts of a self-aware consciousness are explored. When consciousness first thought, "I am," it next thought, "I fear what I am not." "

This is great in itself, but when I consider that it was in response to an article at Salon that was totally political, accusing the Right of being paranoid of everything, I feel this is a wonderful approach to reading the world.

David Parker deserves great appreciation.

Thank you.

Tweets

2009-05-08T08:26:00.002+05:30

I am on Twitter, and I am not doing many tweets- I just find that it is good for short posts- microblogging- sometimes I tweet things I find profound, and sometimes just plain silly things, and sometimes ordinary life as I see it. I tweet about four or five times a day...

But how Twitter is useful for me is in getting some real, profound insights. I make them favorite, and read them now and then.

And I think, it is not right that they should just be in there among all the innumerable Tweets in Twitter, they should find a place in a blog.

Here are the first ten Tweets I liked:

sonrivers : Do not trust anyone who tells you who not to trust.

4:46 AM May 6th from twhirl

sonrivers: Any door with a sign on it, any door that proclaims itself to be a door, is not the door. But do not look for a sign saying Not-door -Merton

5:52 PM May 5th from twhirl

richschooping : Our reaction is our guru.

9:31 AM May 5th from web

DharmaTalks : RT @TarotHeals : Without changing the world, there is escape from sorrow just by shifting the perspective. by Joseph Campbell #quote

11:33 AM May 4th from TweetDeck

ilawton : The Talmud says, "Never pray in a room without windows." I feel the same way about cafes, especially today. Its beautiful!

11:04 AM May 4th from web

sonrivers: Man says that time passes; time says that man passes. ~Himalayan folk saying

9:48 AM May 4th from twhirl

sonrivers: The meaning of life: not only is there no meaning, there is no life. There’s only “living (am),” and all (I) is that.

3:35 AM May 4th from twhirl

sonrivers: RT @ilawton: _/|\_ seems to be most often used for Namaste. Hah, I learnt s'thing new. SO _/|\_ to all

3:12 PM Apr 27th from twhirl

sonrivers: RT @jeffreyjones : "Forgive me my nonsense, as I also forgive the nonsense of those that think they talk sense."-- Robert Frost

3:35 AM Apr 27th from twhirl

ilawton: During a nature slide show, I heard people say "God thats beautiful!". Maybe God cant be defined. Only exclaimed!

10:24 AM Apr 19th from web

A friend asked me when I said I was twitting, "what is the use of it?"

Probably my tweets are not of much use, but these ten are gems. I can't imagine any other medium other than Twitter that is right for these kind of thoughts. It has a kind of purposeful randomness.

The Importance of the Idea of a Self

2009-04-28T18:56:00.001+05:30

I read this article, "Enlightenment Therapy" at The New York Times

This is a real life story of Louis Nordstrom, qualified as philosopher and a Zen teacher who had psychiatric problems, and who sought treatment from Jeffrey B. Rubin, a Freudian adept at Zen philosophy, who once believed, "When you combine the best of Buddhism and psychoanalysis, you get a full-spectrum view of human nature focused on both health and spiritual potential as well as on the psychological forces we struggle with and the obstacles we unconsciously put in our way." Rubin practices what he calls meditative psychotherapy.

What strikes me is this meditation- experience of Nordstrom:

"Everything around me looked exceedingly odd, as if the glue separating things had started to melt. . . . By the time I got to my room I was weightless; there was no gravity. . . . Then the earthquake or implosion ‘body and mind dropping off’ occurred. There was an incredible explosion of light coming from inside and outside simultaneously, and everything disappeared into that light . . . there was no longer a here versus there, a this versus that. . . . I understood nothing except that nothing would ever seem the same to me. . . . And despite the fact that I had no understanding whatever of what had happened (nor do I now), this experience changed my life completely."

And subsequently Nordstrom's psychological problems took this turn:

"He (was) consumed with the feeling that no one could see him, that he’d become, in his phrase, "the invisible man." He feared what the desire to be seen might drive him to do. How could he have spent his life cultivating unity of body and mind, oneness with all beings and the ability to apprehend reality directly, unmediated by thoughts or concepts or what Zen considered the arch delusion of "the self" - only to be haunted by the feeling that he lacked the most basic unity of all?"

And this is how he feels Rubin has helped him:

"I’m converted to a very specific point, the relevance of abandonment in my life and the cost of Zen to myself - the damage I did to myself via self-neglect....What Jeffrey has done is indicate that forgetting the self is not a constructive approach. What one needs to do from a psychoanalytic perspective is remember the self."

This is a very important article, I feel. Much to ponder about.

And I just concentrate on absolutely nothing...

2009-04-24T09:40:00.001+05:30

I was watching the film, "Collateral" when this dialogue came up.

Max and Annia are in a cab. Max is the driver and Annie is a lawyer under heavy stress.

Max: "You need a vacation."

Annie: "I just had a vacation on the Harbor Freedway."

Max: "No, no, not in a cab. You know you need to get your head straight. Get your unified self up. Get harmonic, you know..."

Annie (interrupting): "When was the last time you take a break?"

Max: "I go on vacation all the time."

Annie: "How often?"

Max: "A dozen times a day. My favourite stop. Mauritius Island (He takes out and shows a pic.).

"It's my own private getaway.

"Things get heavy for me, I take five minutes out. I just go there.

"And, I just concentrate on absolutely nothing."

Things get pretty heavy later, and I don't think Max got any five minutes out, but I liked what he said: "And I just concentrate on absolutely nothing."

Awake Being

2009-04-19T08:04:00.003+05:30

I have said this before, and I will say it again and again- one of the best blogs on non-duality is Awake Being by Fredrik.

I say this now because I made a comment there, and I thought, why haven't I said anything about this blog here?

So here it is.

It is pithy, concise and infinitely wise. Not a word out of place.

You get an idea that this is a person speaking not from his reading or thinking but from the core of being- if not being, from feeling: the words carry a sense of authenticity.

Hope you like this.

Things people do to save their skin...

2009-04-19T07:18:00.003+05:30

guardian.co.uk

Can you believe this?

A don embarks on the path to sainthood today.

Tadamasa Goto of the Japanese mafia is involved in prostitution, protection racket, white collar crime, and is famous for ruthless and brutal violence.

For instance, Goto got liver transplant and in thanks gave $100,000 to the hospital "in grateful recognition", but threatened to kill Jake Adelstein, the reporter who went public with the transplant story. Adelstein still has police protection.

That kind of man.

Now he is set to train in a Buddhist temple in Kanagawa prefecture near Tokyo.

The reason for the religious turn is not any new revelation, but pressure from yakuza fraternity...

Things people do to save their skin...

- guardian.co.uk

Addendum:

1. Goto's gift of $100,000 to the hospital "in grateful recognition" might or might not have to do with the fact that he got preferred treatment over about ninety people waiting for the liver transplant.

2. The pressure from yakuza fraternity was not for him to turn to the noble eightfold path, but most probably their valid or unfounded suspicion that he had snitched on them

Ribhu Gita 26:31

2009-04-15T18:00:00.000+05:30

There wherein circularities become empty,

and not a suggestion of otherness is;

There wherein the drive of 'I' loses ground,

and desires are all destroyed;

There wherein the mind and its crops wither,

and all illusions are shattered through;

"That Self I-am", be sure in this affirmation,

Be wholly That, and enjoy eternal happiness.

Ribhu Gita 26:30

2009-04-15T08:54:00.000+05:30

You are that which becomes the I and the You,

you are the Others, all that they are-

You are that which is the ground of this world

you are the absolute, where not an atom is-

You are that which is incomparably pure,

you are perfection- vast and infinite-

"That I-am", be resolute in this affirmation,

Be wholly That, and enjoy eternal happiness.

The Conquest of Passion- Sakkapanha Sutta

2009-04-14T09:47:00.002+05:30

"Ask me, Sakka, all that you desire!
On what you ask, I’ll put your mind at rest."

Being thus invited, Sakka, Ruler of the gods, put his first question to the Lord: ‘By what fetters, sir, are beings bound - gods, humans, asuras, nagas, Gandhabbas and whatever other kinds there may be - whereby, although they wish to live without hate, harming, hostility or malignity, and in peace, they yet live in hate, harming one another, hostile and malign?’ This was Sakka’s first question to the Lord, and the Lord replied: ‘Ruler of the Gods, it is the bonds of jealously and avarice that bind beings so that though they wish to live without hate... they yet live in hate, harming one another, hostile and malign.’ This was the Lord’s reply, and Sakka, delighted, exclaimed: ‘So it is, Lord, so it is, Well-Farer! Through the Lord’s answer I have overcome my doubt and uncertainty!’

Then Sakka, having expressed his appreciation, asked another question: ‘But sir, what gives rise to jealousy and avarice, what is their origin, how are they born, how do they arise? Owing to the presence of what do they arose, owing to the absence of what do they arise?’

‘Jealousy and avarice, Ruler of the Gods, take rise from like and dislike, this is their origin, this is how they are born, how they arose. When these are present, they arise; when these are absent, they do not arise.’

‘But, sir, what gives rise to like and dislike?... Owing to the presence of what do they arise, owing to the absence of what do they not arise?’

‘They arise, Ruler of the Gods, from desire?... Owing to the presence of desire, they arise, owing to the absence of desire they do not arise.’

‘But sir, what gives rise to desire?’

‘Desire, Ruler of the Gods, arises from thinking... when the mind thinks about something, desire arises; when the mind thinks about nothing, desire does not arise.’

‘But, sir, what gives rise to thinking?’

‘Thinking arises from the tendency to proliferation... when this tendency is present, thinking arises; when it is absent, thinking does not arise.’

------- http://tipitaka.wikia.com/wiki/Sakkapanha_Sutta

I am grateful to Shravashti Dammika for this.

I don't know the exact words which mean "tendency to proliferation", but this describes the distractive mind: how it always looks outward, and finding objects in names and forms, loses its real nature and lapses into forgetfulness.

Kant on the Sublime

2009-04-14T06:42:00.002+05:30

Here in Ribhu Gita, we read about the Self as absolute and incomparable in its greatness. It is something which is repeated again and again- it is one, whole, outside of which nothing is.

I intuitively take it that it could be so, but I accidentally came across something by Immanuel Kant, which takes up this issue of greatness that overarchs everything: a greatness comparable to itself alone.

Here it is:

"If, however, we call anything not alone great, but, without qualification, absolutely, and in every respect (beyond all comparison) great, that is to say, sublime, we soon perceive that for this it is not permissible to seek an appropriate standard outside itself, but merely in itself. It is a greatness comparable to itself alone...

"The above definition may also be expressed in this way: that is sublime in comparison with which all else is small. Here we readily see that nothing can be given in nature, no matter how great we may judge it to be, which, regarded in some other relation, may not be degraded to the level of the infinitely little, and nothing so small which in comparison with some still smaller standard may not for our imagination be enlarged to the greatness of a world. Telescopes have put within our reach an abundance of material to go upon in making the first observation, and microscopes the same in making the second. Nothing, therefore, which can be an object of the senses is to be termed sublime when treated on this footing.... Consequently it is the disposition of soul evoked by a particular representation engaging the attention of the reflective judgement, and not the object, that is to be called sublime...

"...The sublime is that, the mere capacity of thinking which evidences a faculty of mind transcending every standard of sense."
- Immanuel Kant, The Critique of Judgment.

I think Kant's idea is that the use of telescopes shows that everything has something greater than itself, and that of microscopes show us that the least particle is a world in itself- so when we speak of greatness, of the sublime, we have to understand that it belongs to the quality of our mind- reflective judgment-, and that the sublime does not reside in the object itself.

Ribhu Gita 26:29

2009-04-13T06:18:00.003+05:30

That which is the infinite ground of existence,

That which is the infinite ground of consciousness,

That which is the infinite ground of happiness,

That which is the infinite ground without duality,

That which is unfragmented from the Soul,

That which is the infinite transcendent Self.

"That I-am", be resolute in this affirmation:

Be wholly That, and enjoy eternal happiness.

Ribhu Gita 26:28

2009-04-13T06:13:00.003+05:30

That within which while the mind rests absorbed,

One inheres as what one is, there being no Other,

That within which while the mind rests absorbed,

Not a grain of otherness persists outside of what one is,

That within which while the mind rests absorbed,

Shines a joy, incomparable and absolute:-

Remain therein, not having resolved to do anything,

be wholly That, and enjoy eternal happiness.

Ribhu Gita 26:27

2009-04-12T18:00:00.001+05:30

That within which while the mind rests absorbed,

all sufferings cease, and not a grain of pain remains,

That within which while the mind rests absorbed,

me, you, and others all go undiscerned,

That within which while the mind rests absorbed,

dualities are all emptied of content,

Remain therein; not having resolved to do anything,

Be wholly That, and enjoy eternal happiness.

Ribhu Gita 26:26

2009-04-12T10:56:00.003+05:30

That which is easily and past obstructions attained

through this affirmation, "I am Brahman",

That within which when this affirmation turns quiescent,

a joy is born, which is alone and perfect in itself,

That within which while the mind rests absorbed,

a vision arises, unrivalled and without distinction-

Remain therein, not having resolved to do anything,

Be wholly That, and enjoy eternal happiness.

A Dream Within a Dream

2009-04-11T19:19:00.001+05:30

I found this poem by Edgar Allan Poe:

Take this kiss upon the brow!

And, in parting from you now,

Thus much let me avow-

You are not wrong, who deem

That my days have been a dream;

Yet if hope has flown away

In a night, or in a day,

In a vision, or in none,

Is it therefore the less gone?

All that we see or seem

Is but a dream within a dream.

I stand amid the roar

Of a surf-tormented shore,

And I hold within my hand

Grains of the golden sand-

How few! yet how they creep

Through my fingers to the deep,

While I weep- while I weep!

O God! can I not grasp

Them with a tighter clasp?

O God! can I not save

One from the pitiless wave?

Is all that we see or seem

But a dream within a dream?

I wish to thank TheHoopoe for posting this poem in The Odyssey.

We speak so easily about life being as good as a dream, but when we are faced with a loss which cannot be recovered, it is hard to take- for most of us.

Excellent poem, I think this is.

Ribhu Gita 26:25

2009-04-11T18:00:00.000+05:30

He who has determined with certitude his Self

needs know nothing outside of what he is.

In That which

for being determined with certitude as Self

becomes the knowledge of all that needs be known;

In That which

for being determined with certitude as Self

brings to conclusion all that needs be done-

Remain therein; without the least thought-

Be wholly That, and enjoy eternal happiness.

Ribhu Gita 26:24

2009-04-11T09:48:00.002+05:30

In That which when

once known and constantly enjoyed,

reveals all pleasure to shine from oneself;

In That which when

once determined with certitude as Self,

leaves not a mite outside as not-self;

In That which when

once determined with certitude as Self,

brings enlightenment to the Soul at any state-

Remain Therein, without the least thought;

Be wholly That, and enjoy eternal happiness.

Ribhu Gita 26:23

2009-04-10T18:00:00.000+05:30

There wherein sense-organs are all absent,

There wherein the doer himself is absent,

There wherein Supreme Joy comes to be-

That which is the settled state of stillness,

That, which when once known, yields no escape-

That,

having become which,

one is freed from bondage with birth,

Remain therein, without the least thought,

and, being That, enjoy eternal happiness.

Vivekachudamani

2009-04-10T07:42:00.002+05:30

This could be read with Verse 26:22 of Ribhu Gita:

"Now I am going to tell you about the real nature of the supreme Self, by realizing which, man attains liberation and is freed from bondage.

That realization of “I” is indeed the Self which is experienced as “I-I” shining of its own accord, the absolute Being, the witness of the three states of waking, dream, and deep sleep, distinct from the five sheaths, aware of the mental modes in the waking and dream states, and of their absence in the state of deep sleep.

That Self sees all of its own accord but is never seen by any of these. It gives light to the intellect and ego but is not enlightened by them. It pervades the universe and by its light all this insentient universe is illumined, but the universe does not pervade it even to the slight extent.

In its presence the body, sense, mind, and intellect enter upon their functions as if commanded by it. By that unbroken knowledge, all things from the ego to the body, objects and our experience of them, occur and are perceived. By it life and the various organs are set in motion.

That inner Self, as the primeval spirit, eternal, ever effulgent, full and infinite Bliss, single, indivisible, whole and living, shines in everyone as the witness awareness. That Self in its splendour, shining in the cavity of the heart as the subtle, pervasive yet unmanifest ether, illumines this universe like the sun. It is aware of the modifications of the mind and ego, of the actions of the body, sense organs and life-breath.

It takes their form as fire does that of a heated ball of iron; yet it undergoes no change in doing so. This Self is neither born nor dies, it neither grows nor decays, nor does it suffer any change. When a pot is broken, the space inside it is not, and similarly, when the body dies, the Self in it remains eternal."

-The Advaita Fellowship Store.

Ribhu Gita 26:22

2009-04-10T07:30:00.002+05:30

There wherein there is nothing that is illumined,

There wherein there is no veiling power,

There wherein there are no distinctions,

There wherein there is no power of projection,

There wherein there is no power as such at all,

There wherein there is no delusion of a world-

Remain therein, without the least thought,

and being That, enjoy eternal happiness.

Ribhu Gita 26:21

2009-03-31T18:00:00.000+05:30

There wherein the three kinds of body are not,

there wherein the three modes of existence are not,

there wherein the three types of gunas are not,

there wherein the three varieties of pain are not,

there wherein the five sheaths are not,

there wherein there is none who adheres to them-

Therein having resolved to do nothing,

Be wholly That, and enjoy eternal happiness.

Ribhu Gita 26:20

2009-03-31T06:00:00.000+05:30

There wherein there is no element that fits in with another,

there wherein not an atom has materialised,

there wherein there is nothing that knows me and mine,

there wherein there is not the taint of association,

there wherein there is no perversity of any kind-

Therein having resolved to do nothing,

Be wholly That, and enjoy eternal happiness.

Ribhu Gita 26:19

2009-03-30T18:00:00.000+05:30

Here there is not least thought of the fear of hell,

Here there is no such thing as heavenly comfort,

Here there is no creator, no created world,

No virtue that is earned therein,

Here there is no after-life, no other-world,

no cosmos or universe or whatever-

Be there. Be unwavering in silence.

Be wholly That.

Be happy for ever.

This is IT- Epiphany at the Museum of Natural History in New York.

2009-03-30T07:01:00.003+05:30

I should thank Dosho Port at Wild Fox Zen for drawing attention to this article by Bill Harley at npr.

Bill Harley writes about a moment of insight that happened to him at the Museum of Natural History in New York.

He was being guided around Einstein exhibits by an Italian Nuclear Physicist.She was talking about Einstein's ideas about time, space and gravity when that moment of insight happened.

He writes,

"And then it happened.

"I can't tell you what she said.

"Maybe it was because she really, and I mean, really, really understood what she was talking about. But there was some trigger in her words. Suddenly, the floor fell out from beneath my feet. Something in my head expanded. I was, for an instant, adrift and free in the universe. And out there, I saw that nothing was like I thought it was. All the rules I used to walk across the street and brush my teeth and eat vegetables were only approximations of what was true. What was true was something else entirely. Everything else entirely. It wasn't anything like I thought it was. I caught my breath. My eyes dilated. My skin bristled.

"OMIGOD! I said out loud."

But the Epiphany was sooner gone, and Harley was back in his usual, common, ordinary environment.

The physicist had noticed what had happened to Harley.

""Did you get it?" she asked.

"I nodded. "But now it's gone," I said.

""That's the way it is," she said. "You just keep coming at it from different angles, and after a while you spend more time there.""

"I was, for an instant, adrift and free in the universe."- this is It/That, I think. At least a smaller That, ha ha.

Ribhu Gita 26:18

2009-03-30T06:36:00.000+05:30

Here, where there is no initiation into study and its culmination in unitary experience,

Here where there is no distinction as between the parts and the whole, or as between objects of a similar kind, or as between dissimilar objects within an universal group,

Here, where there is no distinction, none at all-

Here, where nothing is expressed or implied-

Be There. Be without the least show of thought.

Be wholly That.

Enjoy eternal happiness.

Ribhu Gita 26:17

2009-03-29T06:00:00.000+05:30

There is no argument-

nothing is won, nothing is lost.

no teaching is presented,

no teaching understood

No duality of the individual and the transcendent,

no limiting adjuncts:

Know this. Be that truth.

Make not the slightest of the choices.

Be wholly That. Be eternally happy.

Ribhu Gita 26:16

2009-03-28T17:30:00.002+05:30

Within which there is no sacred text,

no student who seeks to know

Within which there is nothing to doubt or resolve,

no argument that is established

and no argument that is denied

And within which there is nothing other than the Self-

Be there. Be without the slightest of choices-

Be wholly That. Be happy for ever.

Ribhu Gita 26:15

2009-03-27T18:00:00.001+05:30

In which the four requisite disciplines are not,

no master, no disciple,

no such thing as The Impartite Truth,

no enlightened one as such, who realises this:

Here, all varieties of enlightenment are lost,

there never was ever any one thing.

Be there.

Be without the slightest movement of thought,

Be wholly that.

Be happy for ever.

Ribhu Gita 26:14

2009-03-27T06:21:00.000+05:30

Here nothing begins, nothing comes to end,

no origin, continuance, culmination-

Here there is nothing sacred in particular,

no holy place or God.

Here there is no room for charity, or virtue,

time is not, nor is space.

Now, be there.

Keep without the slightest will,

Be wholly that, enjoy eternal happiness.

A Spiritual Story

2009-03-22T07:19:00.002+05:30

I found a story here at Portal do conhecimento divino

There lived a couple- Purusha and Prakriti. They lived as one, "I am". After a while, a child, Consciousness, was born to them.

He was an intelligent boy, and to him was born Vishnu, Awareness. He was not as smart as his father, but he was always active.

To this child was born many children: Brahma, The Mind, took over the work of making things, and Rudra was a destructive fool with a short temper.Vishnu took to the task of keeping things in working order.

Now, Purusha, The Brahman, got tired of looking after all this and went into silence. His family ignored him, and then fought between themselves and brought the sad story to an end.

I think this is a story by Siddharameshwar Maharaj- I read this through Google Translation Tool, so I am not sure (please correct my misreadings). However I like the moral that everything goes wrong because the Father (Parabrahman, The Supreme Being) is forgotten.

We have to know what we are once everything, every thought and concept, every movement of the mind, is taken away from us.

Basho's Frog by the Pond

2009-03-20T19:33:00.003+05:30

Elsewhere, with reference to a Haiku by Basho, which goes something like this,

The frog

by the old pond-

splash!,

I wrote this:

Not a plop-

this unwet frog hops about

on the rippling pond.

And then, I made it worse by writing a nonsensical equation:

"Frog x (Integral sign with limits from zero to infinity) Wetness = Old Pond + Splash"

What I meant was, Frog multiplied by the integrated value of Wetness which is a function with the range of zero to infinity, accordingly gives the sum of the differentiated values of the Old Pond and Splash. That is pure drivel. To put this more sensibly, I meant to say that the more wet the frog is, the bigger is the old pond and louder the splash. And when the frog is not wet at all, the old pond and splash disappear, and quite illogically, there is no frog.

It is rather hard on you to explain what I mean by frog, wetness, old pond and splash. Suffice to say that the frog is 'me', wetness is the contamination with the world through the sense of identity and agency, old pond is the world and splash is the self-centred activity.

And here are some quotes to go with this:

The Frog:

"All the content of consciousness is like a shallow, muddy little pool, and a little frog is making an awful noise in it. That little frog says: `I'm going to find out'. And that little frog is trying to go beyond itself. But it is still a frog in the muddy pool. Can this muddy pool empty all the content of itself? My little muddy pool is the culture in which I have lived and the little `me', the frog, is battling against the culture, saying `I must get out'. But even if it gets out, it is a little frog and whatever it gets out into, is still a little muddy pool which it will create. Please see this. The mind realizes that all the activity it indulges in, or is forced into, is the movement within the consciousness with its content. Realizing this, what is the mind to do? Can it ever go beyond this limited consciousness?"

-J.Krishnamurti, The Impossible Question

The Unwet Frog:

Here are two verses from "Supplement to the Forty Verses" by Ramana Maharshi as translated by Arthur Osborne.

Verse 26:

"Having understood the various states and always holding firmly at heart to the supreme state which is above them and free from delusion, play your part in the world (as in a stage). O hero! Having realized in the Heart that which underlies all appearances, never forget it. Then play your (allotted) part in the world, O hero, acting as though attached to it"

Verse 27:

"With simulated zeal, and joy, excitement and hatred, initiative and effort play your part in the world without attachment, O hero. Having obtained release from all kinds of bondage, having gained equanimity in all situations and performing outward actions according to your part, O hero, play your part as you like in the world."

Of Chapter 5 of The Bhagavad-gita, Robert Charles Zaehner, gives this translation:

Transcending Works by Purifying the Self

"(6)But hard to attain is (true) renunciation without (the practice of some) spiritual exercise: the sage well versed in spiritual exercise (yoga-yukta) right soon to Brahman comes. (7) Well versed in spiritual exercise, his self made pure, his self and sense quelled, his self become the (very) self of every contingent being, though working still, he is not defiled.

"(8)'Lo, nothing do I do': so thinks the integrated man (yukta) who knows things as they really are, seeing the while and hearing, touching, smelling, eating, walking, sleeping, breathing, (9) talking, evacuating, grasping, opening and shutting the eyes. 'The senses are busied with their proper objects: (what has that to do with me?' This is the way) he thinks.

"(10) And on he works as though he has (long) renounced attachment, ascribing his works to Brahman; (yet) is he not stained by evil as a lotus-petal (is not stained) by water. (11) With body, mind, soul, and senses alone-and-isolated (from the self) do men engaged in spiritual exercise (yogin) engage in action renouncing attachment for the cleansing of the self. (12) The integrated man, renouncing the fruit of works, gains an abiding peace: the man not integrated, whose works are prompted by desire, being attached to fruits, is bound."

The Old Pond (now no more):

David Godman writes, and I take the liberty of quoting him extensively:

"Ajata means ‘not created’ or ‘not caused’. When the word is used as a prefix in vedantic creation theories, it indicates a philosophical or experiential position that the world was never ‘created’. The classic formulation of this position can be found in Gaudapada’s Mandukya Upanishad Karika, chapter two, verse thirty-two. This is Bhagavan’s Tamil rendering of the Sanskrit verse:

""There is no creation, no destruction, no bondage, no longing to be freed from bondage, no striving to be free [from bondage], nor anyone who has attained [freedom from bondage]. Know that this is the ultimate truth."

"This rendering appears as ‘Stray verse nine’ in Collected Works and as ‘Bhagavan 28’ in Guru Vachaka Kovai. Variations of this verse can also be found in the Amritabindu Upanishad (verse 10), Atma Upanishad (verse 30) and Vivekachudamani (verse 574).

"The ajata doctrine takes the position that since the world was never created, there can be no jivas within it who are striving for or attaining liberation. Though it violates common sense and the experience of the senses, Bhagavan regarded it as ‘the ultimate truth’.

"Muruganar has noted that, though Bhagavan taught a variety of theories of creation to devotees who asked him questions on this topic, the only explanation that tallied with his own experience was the ajata one:

""Though Guru Ramana, who appeared as God incarnate, expounded numerous doctrines, as befitted the different states and beliefs of the various devotees who sought refuge at his feet, you should know that what we have heard him affirm to intimate devotees in private, as an act of grace, as his own true experience, is only the doctrine of ajata [non-creation]. "(Guru Vachaka Kovai, verse 100)"

This, and a further in-depth discussion of ajata vada is at Arunachala and Ramana Maharshi

If possible, we will see about the splash and the wetness later, if possible.

It is too daunting as it is.

The Imagined World

2009-03-20T09:17:00.002+05:30

My clumsy readings of Ribhu Gita, I hope, gives an idea that this world is a product of thought- and underlying it, is a deeper order of reality, which is not alien to what we are when we are aware, but not thinking.

Son Rivers has posted this at Nonduality Comics, and this clarifies the matter in a simple and telling manner:

Ribhu Gita 26:13

2009-03-20T09:16:00.000+05:30

Knowing this, there is no desire, no fear,

no coveting or holding tight;

There is nothing to believe in, no bigotry-

not a remnant of the mind remains.

There is no deluding thought of bondage,

and no deluding thought of enlightenment-

Be Thus. Be without any intention.

Be wholly That-

enjoy everlasting happiness.

Ribhu Gita 26:12

2009-03-19T18:00:00.005+05:30

Find that you are-

no bodies, senses and living ones,

no mind, no intellect, no will.

Find that the sense of 'I' is not,

neither is nescience

nor the one that follows in their wake.

Find- there is no wholeness, no oneness,

not a tiny bit of transaction.

And be there. Be wholly That.

Seek nothing. Be

endlessly happy.

Ribhu Gita 26:9

2009-03-19T09:01:00.003+05:30

Here- the illusion has not come to be

it does not force you to act

Here- you find no ignorance

and knowledge is absent

Here- you find no creator, no soul,

the world itself does not exist,

and its God has no presence.

Here. Remain without a single thought.

Be wholly that.

Enjoy eternal happiness.

Ribhu Gita 26:11

2009-03-17T18:00:00.000+05:30

There-

where no karma fructifies,

where devotion is not, and wisdom absent.

In There-

where there is no result that binds.

There-

without which there is no salvation.

There-

where there is no goal,

or any attainment.

Turn to That.

Be There-

Be wholly That,

without the slightest of intentions-

Be happy, now and for ever.

The Painfulness of Duality

2009-03-17T09:55:00.002+05:30

I found this post at Zen Mirror, which in very few words gives us an insight into what Ribhu Gita tells us:

This is a verse quoted from Stephen Mitchell's Tao Te Ching translation (Chapter 2).

"When people see some things as beautiful,

other things become ugly.

When people see some things as good,

other things become bad.

Being and non-being create each other.

Difficult and easy support each other.

Long and short define each other.

High and low depend on each other.

Before and after follow each other."

Taking this further, Dochong writes, "I just love the Daodeqing, because of the simplicity of the texts. When we choose to create (or make) something, there is a residual opposite that is created inadvertently. We don't immediately recognize it nor do we usually acknowledge it. Once we make one, then the ten thousand things follow."

This is the essential point of the verses of Ribhu Gita that I am playing with now.

But the difference is that since Ribhu Gita is meant to be recited, it keeps to a structure with a particular rhythm. In translating this, it might come out monotonous.

But to the people who recite this, replete as it is with terminologies which they had studied and tried to understand, the words would have rich association.

Ultimately all dualities are delusory and painful. Ribhu Gita asks us to look to where the dualities are not , where there is no subject-object division.

Ribhu Gita 26:10

2009-03-17T09:22:00.000+05:30

There-

where there are not the diverse immortals,

and their worship in various forms

where there is not the distinction of Trimurtis

and meditation of their forms

where there is not the form of Paramasivam

and such contemplation,

Be there-

Without the slightest of intentions,

Be wholly That:

Be happy, now and for ever.

Ribhu Gita 26:8

2009-03-16T18:00:00.001+05:30

In your consciousness,
   there is no imagination,
   no one who imagines things to be.

In your consciousness is the knowledge
   that this universe is unborn,
   does not exist, and never comes to end:
Here, nothing is, has never been.

Be that consciousness.
Be without the slightest intention,
Be wholly that,
Be happy, now, and for ever.

Ribhu Gita 26:7

2009-03-16T07:01:00.002+05:30

There is a space that is not involved
  with no corporeal activity
  or verbal, or mental;
  -no activity of any kind at all.

There is the space
  free of sin and virtue
  free of karma and its fruits:

Be that space.
Be without the slightest intention,
Be wholly that.

Be happy, now, and for ever.

On Ramana

2009-03-16T06:20:00.001+05:30

I found a very excellent pen-picture of Sri Ramana Maharshi, selected from "For Those with Little Dust", by Arthur Osborne at My Meditation Blog plus health and other issues.

It is exceptional.

Ribhu Gita 26:6

2009-03-15T15:46:00.000+05:30

Where there is no fault, no virtue,

no pain, no pleasure,

no silence, no speech,

No duality of any sort;

Where there is no body, no mind,

no object of perception-

Be There. Rid yourself of the triflest of intentions,

Be wholly That. Rest for ever,

in That state of Happiness.

Ribhu Gita 26:5

2009-03-14T12:00:00.002+05:30

That within which

There is no distinction caused by intention,

No peace or turmoil,

No mind or intellect,

No fear, no courage,

No self-image,

And, no-self image

Where there is no fragmented, dualistic consciousness

Be there. Be full of That.

Free from the merest hint of dualistic fear,

Be still-

Be happy now and ever.

Ribhu Gita 26:4

2009-03-14T06:51:00.003+05:30

Be wholly that within which

the duality that manifested in such variety

is emptied when enquired into-

Be wholly that where not a speck remains

of the too solid chain of cause and effect-

Be wholly that within which

the mind absorbed, not an atom

of duality and fear can find some space-

Be wholly that where there is not

the faintest hint of dualistic fear-

Be-

Abide unwavering-

And find the happiness that surpasses time.

Ribhu Gita 26:3

2009-03-12T09:30:00.001+05:30

All distinctive objects that appear in such profusion,

are seen to have never ever been

when you scrutinise their source.

All-embracing, transcendent Brahman

is all there is, and the Soul

is not alien or apart from this. Be firm,

in the resolve that this is You.

Be firm. Root yourself in this conviction.

Do not swerve from it, do not

be bothered with any 'thing',

but stay with the knowledge of what you are.

Grounded and full with what you are,

be one with the transcendent Brahman

and rest for ever in happiness.

Ribhu Gita 26:2

2009-03-11T11:50:00.001+05:30

Seek to know nothing

but filled with this "I-am",

and of such consciousness and happiness,

sit unwavering-

You are the soul of the world.

Be at peace...

In this non-dual wholeness of Brahman,

exhaust all distinctions

of the distracting mind

through silence...

Let the mind lose its roots,

unite, be One, be such that

you are poised still

like the pointer of the balanced scales:

Upright, at rest and unwavering.

Son, this is to be what you are:

This, is the abidance

of which perfect sages sing.

(Not exactly a translation.)

Ribhu Gita 26:1

2009-02-17T19:02:00.001+05:30

There is a vastness

in which not an atom is foreign.

And in this vastness

is eternal abidance

as what one is.

This truth,

which is all sweetness,

you will come to know.

What is described,

passes beyond thought-

It is difficult to grasp,

but is perfect Truth.

All devas and yogis

find it difficult of attainment.

Even so-

they thirst after this abidance.

(not strictly a translation)

Who Is the One That Wakes up?- A meditation on Brihadaranyaka Upanishad, Verses II.i.15 to II.i.20

2009-02-15T12:12:00.001+05:30

In the Brihadaranyka Upanishad that has been quoted previously, there is a dialogue between Ajatasatru and Gargya. A man is fast asleep. He is repeatedly called by his name (the names are that of Prana, so it is the prana that is called to respond), but it has no effect. Then he is physically addressed, being shaken repeatedly, he wakes up. Now who is the one that wakes up from sleep?

Earlier Gargy had identified various manifestations of the individual as Brahman. They were all negated by Gargy when Ajathasatru had queried, “Is this all; is this all?." There is always more to Brahman than what is manifested.

From what my friend Sankarraman has written on this, I understand:

The gist of the issue is that during the waking state the experiencer and the experienced are mixed up. The agent, the experiencer and the organs cannot be separated and identified as the sole self.

Now, when the sleeping person is woken up from sleep, who is it that wakes up? Is it the vital force (Prana) or something beyond it? Which is the true informing Light that wakes up?

Since the vital force does not respond on being addressed by its name, it is concluded to be an insentient entity. Prana cannot be the self-effulgent light which lights up all illusory phenomena. Phenomena lack luminosity, and for that reason they cannot throw light on themselves; they cannot be known in the absence of the Self, which is non-dual.

There is this difference between the vital force and the Self: whereas the former does not sleep or wake up, the latter, the relative self, being merged in the vital force during deep sleep, wakes up. As long as this relative self is asleep, its organs do not function, they being absorbed in the vital force. So it does not hear even when its name is being addressed.

Further, a point could be raised that since the vital force is never asleep, it should be able to hear when it is called. It is thence concluded that the vital force which is ever awake, is not the experiencer: if it is, it should wake up on being called.

Then who is the entity that wakes up? This is the question raised in the Upanishads.. .

The denouement is that the entity which awoke from sleep on being physically assaulted -"blazing forth as it were, flashing as it were, and coming from somewhere as it were, rendering the body different from it, endowing it with consciousness, activity, a different look..." - it is an entity other than the body and the various entities advocated by Gargya.

There is a more formidable issue here, which begs an answer:

The Prana, vital force, is an insentient entity - if so, can we say that it is asleep or awake? And if it is not the one that woke up, and if it is not the non-dual Self that woke up, who is it that was awakened from sleep?

What has woken up, Sankarraman says, is the relative self, the "I- thought" that is spoken of by Bhaghavan. This exists in the waking state and the dream state and disappears during deep sleep into avidya, and what exists then is the avidya-vritti, the absence of thoughts, the anandamaya kosa, which is also not the Self.

The point is that the vital force is an insentient, mechanical force, which in relative terms, is always and unbrokenly awake.The relative self which exists in the waking and dream state and which disappears into avidya in the deep sleep state, it is this that wakes up on being harassed. The true Self is not wakened: it is beyond the three states.

All these points are explained objectively in the Upanishads with parables, suggesting the idea of the prana functioning even in the deep sleep state. But Ramana Maharshi, who explains everything in a highly subjective language, states that even the prana does not exist in the deep sleep state, the transcendental Self sublating all illusory phenomena.

Bhagavan's teachings do not subscribe to the idea of the existence of prana in deep sleep, it being absent like all the other unreal adjuncts. The existence of prana in deep sleep is only from the onlookers' view point.

It could be that because they subscribe to the reality of prana that in yoga and saiva schools they posit the fifth state of turiyathitha where prana is also dissolved, the body of the yogi becoming a blaze of light, a feat performed by the late Tamil saint Ramalingar known adoringly as Vallalar. But Bhagavan, who denies the existence of the body even in the here and now, does not countenance of the idea of the disappearance of the body on realization, a question posed by many to him.

Traditional vedanta has branded deep sleep as one of ignorance, Bhaghavan says that there is full blaze of the jnana in that state which is interrupted in the waking and dream states. The branding of deep sleep as one of ignorance is, according to Bhagavan, made only by the waking-state ego, which confounds its own absence as the absence of the true Self.

In one of the verses in Guruvachaka Kovai, it is said that on account of the identification of the Self with the vignanamaya kosa in the waking state, there is believed to exist a deep sleep state, whereas what passes for such a state is only turiya, the natural state.

The Perils Of Modern Advaitin Gurus

2009-02-15T05:37:00.000+05:30

Chi-Ting Apocalypse

"The Neo-Advaita trademarks are: Anyone can be enlightened (Apparently!) ... The I is still there after enlightenment (You can say that again with this lot!) ... You don't need a guru, you can do it yourself (So why do we need any of these idiots then?) ... and there's no sadhana: 'Nothing to do' (Except attend all their satsangs and give them lots of adulation and cash for their multiple DVDs, books, photographs and meditation cushions!)"

I found this a good 'enlightenment' talk...