Posted on: 22 Jul 2021
O Learned and Devoted Servants of God,
The three divine preachers, Śaṅkara, Rāmānuja and Madhva must be remembered today, who wrote commentaries on the Brahmasūtrams and the Bhagavad Gītā composed by Sage Vyāsa, which represent the Veda of God. This is the holy birthday of the divine preacher, Sage Vyāsa. If we realise the unity of these three divine preachers, that will be the real celebration of Guru Pūrṇimā.
An actor called Devadatta played in a role of King Hariścandra in a drama. The actor merged in the role perfectly and lived in the role and this is Monism (advaita) of Śaṅkara. This Monism is applicable to the actor and role playing in the drama only. In this way, God merges with a selected human devotee to identify Himself with the devotee to become incarnation to do a divine programme for the welfare of the world and this is Monism, which is confined to one or two or three souls only in a generation. This Monism is not applicable to the audience seeing the drama, which means it is applicable only in the case of incarnation. This is one angle and another simultaneous angle is Dualism in which the soul is totally different from God just like every spectator of the drama is totally different from Devadatta acting as King Hariścandra. This is Dualism (Dvaita) of Madhva. In between these two lies the Special Monism or Qualified Monism (Viśiṣṭādvaita) of Rāmānuja.
To explain this, let us say that the same Devadatta acted in several different roles also like King Dharmarāja, King Yayāti, King Nala etc. Devadatta is the main essential inner totality whereas all these roles played by him are his external parts (whole-part relationship). Similarly, God is the main essential total whole and all the souls are His different external roles. This theory is based on Dualism, but, speaks of Monism from the angle that the whole (actor) and part (soul) are inseparable. In this way, all these three are simultaneous angles of the single truth made by different devotees in different levels. In all these three philosophies, there is no question of ego and jealousy of any devotee because every devotee finds equal place. As per Śaṅkara, every devotee is God. As per Rāmānuja, every devotee is part of God. As per Madhva, every devotee is totally different from God. In this way, there is equal distribution of the divine status in all souls irrespective of will of God and devotion of the soul.
The fourth divine preacher, Shri Datta Swami has revealed the actual true background of these three divine philosophies because the surrounding devotees have developed perfect IQ based on well-developed scientific sharp analysis. In the time of Śaṅkara, the surrounding souls were complete atheists (Pūrvamīmāṃsakas and Buddhists) and hence, there is no other way than to say that every soul (atheist) is God. The atheist asked Śaṅkara that if he is already God, where is the miraculous power of God with him. Śaṅkara told that due to the practical influence of ignorance (vikṣepa), the soul could not become God practically and the soul shall worship God to get purity of mind by filtering practical influence of ignorance, for which, devotion and practical service to God are essential. In the subsequent time of Rāmānuja, the atheists, who were already converted into theists by Śaṅkara became theoretical devotees in order to become God and Rāmānuja stressed on theoretical devotion to God by saying that the soul is a part of God and not total God. By this, Rāmānuja pulled down the ambition of the devotee from Monism (Soul is God) to whole-part status (Soul is a part of God). Total pulling down to ground is not good because such steep fall will discourage the soul!
Later on, Madhva was surrounded by theoretical devotees aspiring to attain at least status of part of God. Madhva advised these devotees that the devotee shall not aspire either to become God or to become part of God because such status may be given to any devotee by the will of God only and not by aspiration or effort of devotee. Thus, He destroyed the whole aspiration based devotion. He advised practical devotion (karmayoga) consisting of service and sacrifice and told that to become servant of God is the aspiration that should be possessed by a devotee. In this way, if you really analyse the deep concepts of these three philosophies, one will realise that the ordinary soul is neither God nor part of God nor even servant of God. They gave an impression that every ordinary soul has already this inherent divine status (as God, as part of God and as servant of God) without any effort since they wanted to encourage the ordinary soul to put spiritual effort to attain such inherent divine status.
Shri Datta Swami revealed all the background and stated that this divine status is not inherent status of any soul and is given by God by His will only. Datta Swami said that the devotee can aspire to become the servant of God (as told by Madhva) without aspiring for any fruit further for the service done. He said that the practical service and sacrifice (Karmayoga) generated from theoretical devotion (Bhaktiyoga), which is again generated from the Spiritual knowledge (Jñānayoga) given by divine preacher or Sadguru must be done to God without aspiring any fruit in return. In such case, it is left to God whether He makes the soul as God or part of God for the sake of doing a divine programme for the welfare of the world. He makes the soul as God while becoming incarnation or Sadguru and makes His climax-devoted soul as part of Himself to assist Him in the divine mission. The devoted soul must aspire to become servant of God only and shall not aspire to become part of God or God. Aspiration to become part of God or God Himself makes the soul to become permanently disqualified to become either part of God or God Himself.
Shri Datta Swami says that the main aim of God to create this creation is to enjoy the true love of a devotee, who shows the true love on God through total surrender developed by total attraction towards the divine personality of God and further says that the love is true only when it is without aspiration for any fruit in return. He gives the example of a mad fan spending from his pocket only for the sake of his pet hero and committing suicide when the hero dies! Such true love is very rare since every worldly bond is based on false love only, which stands for happiness of self and not for happiness of others (Ātmanastu kāmāya…- Veda). If the creation is to watch it like a cinema to get rid of boredom, God need not enter into the creation in a role. He entered in the role (Tadevā'nuprāviśat…- Veda) only to taste the bliss coming from the true love of a real devotee in the shooting of the cinema by merging with the role totally (Sat ca tyat ca...- Veda). Such discovery of Shri Datta Swami regarding the true love without any aspiration for fruit in return makes the Spiritual effort very very difficult because every Spiritual effort is based on the fruit in return only either in this life or after life (Ihā'mutra phalavirāgaḥ…- Śaṅkara). The worldly saying is that even a fool does not work without any aspiration for fruit (Prayojanamanuddiśya, na mando'pi pravartate…).
Shri Datta Swami became the cause of a lot of ego and jealousy in the devotees because He opened the true philosophy in a straight way without any initial sugar coating like inherent status since the receivers of knowledge are well developed in the IQ. The reason for the ego and jealousy of a devoted soul in the field of Spiritual philosophy of Shri Datta Swami is that He never mentioned about the false inherent status of the soul and mentioned the real status of every ordinary soul as totally disconnected from God, which can aspire to become only a servant of God without aspiration for any fruit in return at the maximum. Then, He told that any soul by Spiritual effort will become either servant or part of God or God as per the will of God, which is based on the eligibility of soul. The eligibility of soul again means the attitude of practical participation in the programme of God through practical service and practical sacrifice based on theoretical devotion generated from theoretical Spiritual knowledge blessed by Sadguru. On the whole, the result of this philosophy ends in the God’s selection of few souls to become God or a part of God and this leads to ego and jealousy of other devoted souls. Hence, Shri Datta Swami gives stress on crossing the first two gates of ego and jealousy by every devotee even to recognise God, not to speak of attaining God!
The philosophy of Shri Datta Swami is again complicated because He says that the contemporary human incarnation of God alone is relevant to humanity just like the energetic incarnation of God is relevant to the energetic beings of the upper worlds. In the case of contemporary human incarnation and the human devotee, the repulsion between common human media of God and devotee will be the main source of ego and jealousy of human devotee.
Shri Datta Swami says that since energetic incarnation of God is irrelevant to humanity, the energetic incarnation does not appear to a living human being even after tedious effort. He further says that if the human devotee misses the contemporary human incarnation on the earth, while he is alive, due to repulsion between common media, for the same reason, the same human devoted soul after death entering into energetic body and reaching upper world misses the energetic incarnation in the upper world also due to the same repulsion between common energetic media of God and devotee. This will lead to permanent loss of God here as well as there and hence, forever (Mahatī vinaṣṭiḥ…- Veda). One side force is developed to recognise the contemporary human incarnation and on the other side, permanent loss of God is advised due to ego and jealousy. Hence, the philosophy of Shri Datta Swami is as much inconvenient as much it is true! Shri Datta Swami feels that the right time has come to reveal the truth of Spiritual knowledge since the receiver of knowledge is very much capable of overcoming the ego and jealousy based on the tremendous IQ developed in the recent times of progress of scientific logic.