Posted on: 24 Sep 2006
It is a misunderstanding that the life history of every soul is written by God or destiny. God is certainly the creator of this whole world like the builder of the stage and the supplier of dress for a drama. He is responsible up to this level only. The story, dialogues and actions are written by the created self only. The self is pure awareness and is called as causal body, but is composed of several types of vibrations which are the feelings or thoughts or qualities. The various types result due to various mixing proportions of Sattvam, Rajas and Tamas. Some of these thoughts have become very strong since from several millions of births. Such solidified thoughts are like hard diamonds. The bundle of such diamonds is called as the subtle body. The soul writes its own story of drama based on the directions of these diamonds (Samskaras or Vasanas). Thus, in that way, these diamonds can be treated as destiny. But this destiny has nothing to do with God. The soul itself created its own destiny. Therefore, the theme of the drama will be uniform in any number of births of that soul. How to change these diamonds? You can change the destiny. The only way is to cut these diamonds by divine diamonds which come out from the preaching of divine knowledge by God through human form called as Satguru. The Gita says clearly that God has not created anything and only the nature of the soul, which is bundle of these diamonds, decides the theme of the life of any soul here (Svabhavastu Pravartate). When the God enters this world in human form, then only God writes His own program which is the story of His divine play. The Gita says that if you recognize such human incarnation and His divine mission, you will be liberated through your participation (Janama Karmacha Me Divyam…).
Pleasing the God in His divine mission should be your ultimate aim. To serve Him in His divine mission, you need the basic requirements like food, shelter etc. For that you need a job if you do not have sufficient support. Today the householders are not respecting the real monk because several mockers are there in the dress of monk. You must study well to secure a job. For all this, your life should exist and therefore, you should never think of the suicide under any circumstances. If you are turned to ultimate aim, all your problems will be solved by God. You must have full faith in Him and infinite patience because God always has a special style of helping His devotee through an unimaginable way and that too in the last fraction of the last second. Your faith should not vibrate even if that last fraction of last second has also gone, because He can change the past, present and future in any way. He can take the present into past, past into present, future into present and future into the past. For God, after all, the time is also a relative reality like space. For some, the ultimate aim is the pleasure of the self or pleasure of the family. A person who aims at the self-pleasure is worst. A person who sacrifices his pleasure for the sake of the family is a better soul because the concept of sacrifice has started in it. But such soul should analyze and realize that the other souls will not even recognize it after leaving these gross bodies here. Thus, the ultimate aim should be divine, aiming at the God.
Importance of the Contemporary Human Incarnation
You are always fascinated to the infinite cosmic form (Viswaroopam) which is like one lakh. You are neglecting the finite human form present before your eyes which are like hundred. Your present one-lakh rupees were just equal to one hundred rupees in the past. To realize the value of the money you have to stand in the corresponding time. Thus, one lakh is equal to one hundred in magnitude also, if the analysis corresponding to the time is done. In your human life the human incarnation is neglected. When you leave this human body and go to the upper world after taking the energetic body, you will neglect the Lord in the energetic form also at that time. Therefore, the energetic form and human form of the Lord are equal in magnitude also in view of the corresponding times. You have given great importance to one lakh in the past and neglected the hundred. But today you are neglecting this one lakh also, which is as good as that hundred in the past. If you realize this point, you will certainly give top most importance to the present human incarnation and will not have any fascination towards energetic forms of God like Narayana, Shiva etc.
People want visions from the human incarnation as a proof of its divinity. They think that giving vision is just like switching on the T.V [Television]. The vision is given on the decision of God. If you are really a ripened soul in all the angles and if the vision is only the deficiency, certainly the vision is given by God in a spontaneous way. The estimation of the ripened state is done by God and not by yourself. There is no use of giving vision to unripe souls. If it is given they will treat it as illusion and neglect. When Lord gave the vision of Viswaroopam, Kauravas neglected it as illusion. Dhrutarashtra was also blessed with vision that has very much excited him during the vision and he praised the Lord. But after the vision, he gained his original nature and became curved like a dog tail.
Asking the Lord for Devotion
Some people pray God to grant them with eternal devotion. You think that such people are greatest devotees. But I say that they are the cleverest. If the devotion is eternal, the subsequent protection from all the problems is inevitable. They show the climax of intelligence in asking such boon. They like to have the Railway engine which is linked with the whole train. In this boon, I am unable to understand one keen point. The devotion, development and maintenance of the devotion are responsibilities of the devotee only. God can never interfere in that. Will a girl ask a boy “Make me to love you”? It means that the love is not existing. Will the girl say “See that my love on you continues without failure”? It means her love is not real and fears in its failure. A real lover loves God spontaneously and retains it under any circumstances. The love should come from the side of the devotee. God cannot give the devotion so that a soul loves Him. Then it looks like a politician bringing public by paying them to clap during his lecture! God will not put His finger in devotion. Instead, God opposes your devotion to see its strength. God gives knowledge which is the generator of devotion like the fertilizer for the sprout from seed. The knowledge also acts as pesticide to kill the bacteria and worms which are the doubts. But the knowledge given by God is also in the form of general concept only. Satguru will speak about the importance and identification of the human incarnation, but will never say that He is the human incarnation. Devotion is based on personification. Krishna can say that one should find out the real form of God to worship. But He cannot say that He is the real form of the God and that He should be worshipped. He never told like this to anybody in His lifetime. Of course, He revealed Himself to Arjuna, who was an exceptional devotee being His closest associate (Nara) during several previous births. Even to Arjuna, He said this only once, during the time of preaching the Gita, which was a necessary occasion. Even Jesus told that He and His father are one and the same. But He disclosed this to a very few deserving devotees only, who were as good as Arjuna. The devotion should be generated when the knowledge is complete. Similarly the answer in the examination should be generated if the study was perfect. If you are asking devotion from God, it is just like asking the answer from the teacher in the time of examination. If you get devotion and if it is proved real through service, the grace of God falls on you spontaneously. Similarly if your study is perfect, you must get the correct answer and if it is proved correct in the valuation, the degree falls on you.
Some people always aim at the attainment of eternal bliss as the final goal of all the spiritual effort. In such case, they are not the real spiritual people. If ordinary human beings are like small thieves, they are the big robbers. An ordinary person desires for a materialistic boon, which is certainly temporary and gives a drop of bliss. But this fellow wants the entire ocean of bliss. The Advaitin wants to be God so that he can enjoy the eternal bliss. He does not mind to leave the Lordship on the world. He knows that anything is only aimed to get bliss. He says that he is simple awareness. But the simple awareness is not having bliss. In the meditation, simple awareness without any thought is possible. Such state is giving peace but not the bliss. Only the service to God is giving the real and eternal bliss. But the service of God is full of sacrifices which are like thorns in the path. In such sacrifice also, the bliss continues in the heart of a real devotee. Such divine service is the aim of all the spiritual efforts and not the bliss which is the climax of selfishness.
Ocean of the World
Devotees often pray that they should cross this ocean of world. What is this ocean? Does it mean this physical world which is made of matter, awareness and inert energy? No. The world here means the worldly bonds which are just your strong feelings of mind. The drama is neither the stage, nor the dress nor the actors. The drama means only the story, dialogues and actions. Therefore, the drama means only the activity of mind and does not have any physical sense. Such worldly bonds with your human form and some other human forms (family) constitute the ocean of the world, which you have to cross. God also comes in the same human form and competes with those worldly bonds. God will not compete with the worldly bonds of every soul, because He knows that He will be utterly defeated without deposit in the case of almost all the human beings. If He wants to have a real bond with soul, He should be born as the family member of the soul. Then only He can achieve the real love from any soul, being its family member. Dasaratha, Nanda, Kausalya and Yasoda etc., loved the Lord as their son but not as God. If God comes in human form, which is not related to the human being in anyway (as son or father or brother etc.,), God is sure to lose His deposit in such competition. In such competition if God wins, you are blessed. Hanuman is not related to Rama in anyway. He does not belong to the family or caste or even the race (humanity) of Rama. But Hanuman was the top most blessed soul of God. Hanuman left His beloved mother to see Rama. Rama did not give such highest fruit to any relative.
Broad Classification of the Veda
The Veda is divided into three parts. The first one is Jnana Kanda, which is the divine knowledge. This belongs to the intelligence. The second part is Upasana Kanda, which is devotion to God. This belongs to the words (Prayers) and mind (feelings). The intelligence, mind and words constitute the theoretical part of the spiritual effort. The third part of the Veda is Karma Kanda which is practical. This belongs to the practical sacrifice of work and fruit of work. In the time of sages, the present concept of money and wealth did not exist. Preparation of meals from the procured grains was the greatest work. Offering such meals associated with ghee was the greatest sacrifice of wealth. Therefore, the whole Karma Kanda of the Veda was described in terms of gathering the materials to cook the food and offer the cooked food to the deserving devotee or God in human form, if available. Most of the Veda was concentrated on the description of sacrifice (Yajna) only. The deserving person was personified as fire due to the light of knowledge and heat of hunger. The fire is famous for light and heat. The ignorant and uneducated priests have taken real physical fire and are burning the food! Thus, the three parts of the Veda are concentrating on the five-fold service to God which constitutes intelligence (knowledge), words and mind (devotion) and sacrifice of work and fruit of work (karma samnyasa and karma phala tyaga).