Posted on: 10 Oct 2016
Note: This article is meant for intellectuals only
Shri Prasad asked: Can you please elaborate more regarding the entry of unimaginable God in to human form through energetic form only and not entering the human form directly?
Swami replied: First, at the very outset, I give a straight answer which is that when unimaginable God entered the first created energetic form called Datta (Narayana), then no human being or no soul in energetic body also existed to understand the entry of unimaginable God into energetic form called Datta. The explanation of the direct entry of unimaginable God into Datta, needs the recognition of unimaginable God as a specific entity. If I understand that some object absorbed the light energy, I understand the existence of light energy separately from the existence of the item absorbing that light energy. An electron absorbs light energy, which jumps to higher orbit and emits the same light energy when it comes back to its original lower orbit. Here I understand the light energy and electron separately. But, in the case of unimaginable God absorbed by the energetic form, I can understand only the existence of energetic form and I understand nothing about the unimaginable God. Hence, entry and exit of unimaginable God can’t be understood by anybody in view of the above problem. When I say that God is unimaginable, several arrows attack the concept mainly questioning about the entry of an unimaginable item into imaginable item. Since the entering item is beyond imagination, no solid proof can be given regarding the very entry and also regarding even the mechanism of entry. Mechanism of entry of one imaginable item into another imaginable item is quite understandable. Of course, exit of unimaginable God from the first energetic incarnation becomes irrelevant since the first energetic form will never be separated from unimaginable God in future at any time.
Ramanuja and Madhva have taken the very first energetic incarnation called as Datta or Narayana, which is the first energetic incarnation called as God Datta. The mixture of Datta (energetic form) and unimaginable God is called as God Datta. Instead of taking the dangerous unimaginable God as the starting point and enter into various dangers, it is the best way to start with the energetic incarnation called God Datta as the starting point without touching unimaginable God beyond it. Of course, one has to touch the unimaginable God since the energetic form must have had a beginning since energy itself is the first creation of God. But, such unimaginable God can’t be not only indicated by the finger but also can’t even be imagined by brain! Such unimaginable God will certainly bring fundamental doubt that ‘is it not better to say that unimaginable God does not exist at all’! Every chance is there for the birth of atheism due to the concept of unimaginable God. Hence, Ramanuja and Madhva took the first energetic form itself as beginningless and endless entity with unimaginable power. This unimaginable power indicates the merged unimaginable God. Hence, the energetic form with unimaginable power (unimaginable God indirectly) Itself is the unimaginable God having an address for the sake of understanding. This energetic incarnation Itself is the basis of unimaginable God. When this energetic incarnation merges with human form like Krishna, even the human form (through energetic form) is said to be the basis of unimaginable God (Brahmanopi pratishthaaham... Gita). No preacher touches the pure unimaginable God due to these dangers and treats the energetic incarnation Itself as the unimaginable God with address to be imagined.
Even Shankara didn’t touch the pure unimaginable God especially in the atmosphere of atheists, who are ready to fight to disprove the existence of God through the concept of unimaginable God. He has taken the medium as awareness, which is nothing but a specific work form of inert energy functioning in a specific nervous system. Hence, you can treat the awareness also as inert energy or even light energy because light is a form of inert energy only. Awareness has no form whereas energetic incarnation has a form. Form is unreal in view of the material cause. Hence, there is no difference between the medium selected by Shankara (awareness) and the medium selected by Ramanuja and Madhva (energetic form). The reason for such difference is that the task of Shankara was to convert atheist into theist since all were atheists only in His time. In such context, atheist will not agree to God existing other than himself (awareness). Hence, unimaginable God should be mediated by awareness only. If God is told to be unimaginable, atheist will say that such God does not exist. If God is told to be other than self or awareness, atheist will not agree for this! Well is in the front and pit is in the back! The only option is to say that God is awareness or God is mediated by awareness or awareness itself is God. In the time of Ramanuja and Madhva, atheists were reduced to a small minority only and many were theists. For theists also unimaginable God has the above danger. Theists do agree that God is other than self and hence the first energetic incarnation or Datta or Narayana was established as the absolute God by Ramanuja and Madhva.
The main point here is that the entry of unimaginable God in to first energetic form (Datta or Narayana) need not be explained to anybody since no body existed during that first entry. That concept need not be explained to the present receivers also because such energetic incarnation Itself is the starting point of entire philosophy instead the unimaginable God. The exit of unimaginable God from the first energetic form need not be explained in the future also because such exit will never take place. This is not the case with human incarnation. Entry and exit in the case of each human incarnation is in the present span of time and must be explained clearly. For such explanation of entry and exit, two objects must be understood clearly and separately. The energetic incarnation of God is very clear to understand. The human form is also very clear for understanding. Hence, exit and entry of energetic incarnation into human form can be explained easily to receivers. During the entry, the frequency of the energetic form is lowered by the will of unimaginable God (present in the energetic incarnation) so that absorption of energetic form by human form is very much congenial maintaining the range of intensity of energy suiting to human body. My personal experience is that the human body experiences the entry and merger of energetic form through a little difference between a little higher energy of the energetic form and a little lower energy of human body. When Lord Dattatreya (the first energetic incarnation) merged with Me (by all limbs of Datta dissolving in all the respective limbs of human body), throughout the night, My body emitted heat in the form of slight white smokes of water vapour just like the hot earth at the end of summer emits such smokes drenched by the first rain.
Shankara selected awareness as medium of God. Awareness is imaginable, though invisible to naked eye. It can be treated as the work form of energy in the invisible range that can come down to the lower visible range by reducing its frequency. Hence, there is no problem in the line of imaginable and visible properties. But, the serious problem is that awareness does not exist independently anywhere in the cosmos. It only exists in the living beings as discontinuous quanta. When the living being dies, the awareness leaves the body but is engulfed by a new energetic body to go to the upper worlds. Shankara didn’t mind this defect of lack of independence to awareness because His requirement was to say that the awareness or soul is God. Hence, it is congenial to His effort to change atheist in to theist. However, He stated that the body is not God. At least, He has taken God one step up in the line of ‘beyond world’. For this, He proposed a valid reason that God is eternal where as the body is not eternal.
Ramanuja and Madhva took the medium of God as separate energetic form, which is eternal. The eternality of energetic form is not bad since we don’t experience it in this world since we experience only the non-eternality of materialised forms only in this world. Even though there is no direct proof for such eternality of energetic form, at least, it need not be opposed since the energy can remain as one lump homogeneously for any long time unlike the matter. By this, God represented by energetic incarnation is separated from souls and dualism between God and soul is established.
Please do not mistake that Shankara sticks only to monism between God and ordinary soul only. This plan was made by Him to tackle many atheists. His idea was that if God is every soul, everyone has to accept the existence of God since the existence of self (soul) can never be negated by anybody. His greatest achievement in that atmosphere is only to make every atheist to say that God exists because everyone is God only. Conversion of atheists to theists was His main idea, without which Ramanuja and Madhva couldn’t have developed further devotion to God. Unless existence is established, you can’t think of devotion. Here, what I am trying to say is that Shankara knows very well about the existence of first energetic incarnation called as Narayana or Brahma or Shiva or generally Eshwara (Datta) because He composed several devotional prayers on the energetic incarnations. The first energetic incarnation (Eshwara or Datta) is again absorbed in three energetic forms called Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva to make them God Brahma, God Vishnu and God Shiva respectively. The first energetic incarnation is called as Datta because Datta means the first energetic form through which unimaginable God is donated to the souls in energetic bodies in the upper world. Datta is also the first energetic incarnation that is introduced to humanity also because rarely for a very short time Datta appears to human devotees also.
Datta, the first energetic incarnation in human form, is also called as Divine Father by Christianity. Islam takes this first energetic incarnation in formless lump of energy called as Allah. Christianity also accepts this formless energy as Holy Spirit. In the Veda also this formless first energetic incarnation appeared to angels in the name Yaksha or Brahma, for the sake of which, the king of angels (Indra) did penance for thousand years. In view of the energy being close medium of unimaginable God, this Yaksha is also told as Uma, who is very closely associated to unimaginable God called as Shiva. You need not doubt that the unimaginable God in this lump or human form of inert energy has inert energetic medium only without awareness since nervous system (matter) was not yet created by the time of expression of Datta (Divine Father) or Yaksha (Uma or Holy spirit). The reason is that the unimaginable God in the inert medium develops awareness by His unimaginable power. If you analyze sharply, awareness is not an entity like house, tree etc. It is only a specific mode of work and the work itself is a specific form of energy. Other modes of work are talking, walking, looking etc. Awareness means just the process of knowing only and is not an entity to be called as God. Hence, we can say that the formless energy or energy in human form is not inert due to the presence of unimaginable God, who can do anything including the process of knowing or awareness due to His unimaginable nature. Therefore, Datta in Hinduism or Divine Father called as Jehovah in Christianity (first energetic incarnation of unimaginable God in human form) and Uma or Yaksha in Hinduism or Holy Spirit in Christianity or Allah in Islam is inert energy with form and without form respectively, which are full of awareness due to the inner unimaginable God. Thus, the first type (Datta or Jehovah) and second type (Yaksha or Allah) are one and the same since the difference is only in having form or having no form only. This difference is only a theoretical angle because form is not as real as the material cause. In this way, you can find the unity in Trinity, which is the Unity in the Philosophies of Hinduism, Christianity and Islam.