Clarification of Knowledge, Devotion and Service

O Learned and Devoted Servants of God,

Today morning, Swami composed this song spontaneously in Sanskrit and was singing it. He explained the meaning of the song.

Naasadhyamasti kimapi te Datta
Nacha karnamapi karunayaste Datta
Papi shailamuddhartum shaktiraparacha
Ayogyashikharaa yapya karana karunacha
Mahyam dvyamida mavasara bhavyam bhavtihi.

Meaning:

Oh Lord Datta! Nothing is impossible for Your infinite power
And no reason exists for Your kindness that is shown on Me.
Infinite power is needed to uplift Me, the mountain of sins
Reasonless kindness is needed to protect Me, the most undeserving
These two divine qualities in You are needed in My case now
Therefore, I am praising these two out of Your infinite divine qualities.

Swami continued: In this creation, people are running for money thinking that it can solve all the problems. But if some incurable disease attacks a person, any amount of money cannot solve the problem. Therefore, artha (money) is not the power that can be applicable to every place. The next one is kama (sex), which only destroys the person both physically and mentally and no problem can be solved by it because it is the source of several problems. The fruit of kama is issues, which are responsible for the extension of the family bonds. The third is dharma (justice) or doing good social works. The fruit of dharma is temporary heaven and one has to return back to the earth (kshiinepunye… Gita).

Hence, all these three are not complete and permanent powers. The fourth is moksha (related to God) and the power of God is infinite and permanent. Our forefathers have realized this and were spending their most of energy and time in worshipping God only. Today, we treat them as old outdated people without materialistic intelligence (laukika) and we are running after dharma, artha, and kama only. We are trying to save the life of the tree by pouring water to the branches, leaves and flowers of the tree. Our ancestors were pouring the water to the root of the tree. Any problem in the world and any problem in the upper world have a permanent solution only in God. Therefore, we are not having even the materialistic intelligence and our intelligence regarding the problems of the upper world is a big zero. Therefore, you should understand that our forefathers were the real intellectuals who could solve all the problems not only in this world but also in the upper worlds by catching God who is the root of the tree. All the worlds in this creation are only the branches of this big tree of creation. The Lord advises us to understand the path of our forefathers and follow it, which is the good tradition (purvataramkrutam… Gita).

Singing the songs by the words involving the emotional mind is devotion (bhakti). This is the result of spiritual knowledge (Jnana), which is spiritual discussion with words involving the analytical intelligence. Awareness has two faculties. The lower faculty is mind (manomaya kosha) and the higher faculty is intelligence (vijnanamaya kosha). The awareness is represented by the word mind itself (manas). The word is a mixture of the sound representing the inert energy and the awareness, which is the nervous energy. The inert energy involving the action (karma) is the final phase. Thus, these three are the instrumental faculties (trikaranas), which are word, mind, and action (vak, manas and karma). The Jnana is the first step preached by Shankara, which is like the stage of school. The bhakti is the second step preached by Ramanuja, which is like the stage of college. The karma or seva is the third step preached by Madhva, which is like the stage of university and is directly related to the fruit. Only work or karma can yield the fruit and not the words or mind. The Jnana and bhakti involve words and mind. This means the Jnana and bhakti cannot yield the fruit directly, but are instrumental indirectly for the fruit because they lead to karma or work. In both jnana and bhakti, mind is involved. Mind or awareness as a lower faculty gives emotion or bhakti or love. The same awareness as a higher faculty gives knowledge or jnana, which generates the love. There are several children on the road. First, you have to identify your child and such identification of your child is jnana. Then, love on your child is generated, which is bhakti. Subsequently, you will serve your child and this is karma or seva. Shankara, Ramanuja and Madhva came one after the other subsequently because jnana, bhakti and seva are the three subsequent steps.

The Path Follwed by Divine Mother Rukmini

Rukmini heard the details of Krishna from sage Narada and these details constitute the first step. From this, the second step is generated, which is the love for Krishna. Due to this love, she could attain Krishna. After attaining Krishna, she served Krishna by pressing His divine feet. Therefore, her love leads to the subsequent service and not to enjoy any fruit like becoming the queen of the Dwaraka kingdom. The Lord by Himself made her as the queen and it was not in her intention at all. She was the incarnation of Goddess Mahalakshmi who also did the same service to the Lord after marriage and she was made as the deity of the entire wealth of the creation. But she remained in the continuous service of the Lord because that was not in her intention. Hence, when God is attained, your intention should be to serve the Lord without aspiration of any fruit in return for your love to Him. Service to Lord itself is the highest divine fruit. Service is like the plant yielding the divine fruit. Devotion is like the fertilizer and knowledge is like the water. The fertilizer and the water are essential for the generation of the fruit but they cannot yield the fruit directly without the plant. Therefore, you must understand as well as the limitation of knowledge and devotion and both these together constitute the theoretical devotion. Service is the practical devotion, which alone can yield the fruit, but the plant cannot generate the fruit without fertilizer and water. Hence, you must understand the importance and limitation of the service also. In every step, you must understand both the importance and limitation of the step. You should not say that any step without the other two steps could yield the fruit. Service cannot be generated at all without the love and knowledge. Unless you identify your child and unless you love your child, the service to your child cannot be seen at all. Therefore, all the three steps are important and have their own limitations. No step can alone yield the fruit. The three divine preachers are together and have given the single composite spiritual effort, which constitutes the three subsequent steps.

Service is like the plate of meals and the theoretical devotion is like drinking water. Even in a hotel, the drinking water is given freely without any charge. Hence, you should not ask for any fruit for the theoretical devotion from God. If you ask for any fruit for theoretical devotion, it is like charging for drinking water, which even a commercial hotel is not doing. This should not mean that the water has no value and the plate of meals, which alone is charged as the total value. While taking the meals, suppose your throat is blocked, and then you require the drinking water immediately. Then, the value of the water is understood. In that time, you cannot tell the eater to take another sweet instead of the valueless water. Therefore, you should not criticize any step as valueless and claim that any single step can alone yield the fruit. Some people say that devotion alone can give the fruit. If that is true, the Sundarakanda in the Ramayana, which describes the sincere service done by Hanuman for the Lord Rama, should have been simply the collection of various songs sung by Hanuman for Rama. In fact, Hanuman did not sing any song on Rama because in the Ramayana that is not mentioned in any verse. However, this does not mean that Hanuman did not sing any song on Rama. When you say that somebody has given you meals, it means that it includes the drinking water also. The drinking water need not be mentioned separately. Simply giving drinking water without meals is horrible and is not worth mentioning at all.

The first step (Jnana) is very important because the correct information about yourself, the path to please God and the actual present address of God (contemporary human incarnation) is completely obtained in this step. If the information is correct, you are sure to reach the goal one day or the other even if the implementation is delayed. But if the information is wrong, all your concentration and immediate activity become waste since you are reaching the wrong goal quickly. Datta means the unimaginable God given to you through a convenient medium that suits you. If you are a human being on this earth, the human incarnation is the best. If you are departed soul existing in energetic body in the upper world, energetic forms like Vishnu, Shiva etc., are Datta through which God is given to you. The human being on this earth worshipping energetic form of God of the upper world is equal to a dead human being because such forms are only for the departed souls. Arjuna could not recognize Krishna as God who is existing before his eyes and did lot of penance for Lord Shiva, who is the energetic form charged by God. Shiva is an individual soul, qualified with predominated Tamas, charged by Brahman (God) existing in the energetic form. Vishnu is an individual soul, qualified with predominated Sattvam, charged by Brahman (God) existing in the energetic form. Similarly, Lord Brahma in whom the soul is qualified with predominated Rajas, charged by Brahman (God) existing in the energetic form. In no way these energetic forms are different from the human incarnation, except in one point i.e., the external gross body of the human incarnation is made of five elements, whereas the external gross body of the energetic form is made of only one element called as Agni or energy.

Fascination to Energetic Forms

The human beings are fascinated to the external energetic form just like an ignorant villager wearing cotton dress is fascinated to a citizen from the city wearing silk dress. The same God exists in Shiva and Krishna. The angels who are the souls of the upper world are in pitiable condition since they do not care for the energetic forms of God due to repulsion between common external media and do not care for the human incarnations on the earth due to their negligence towards the external human bodies. Thus, they lose God on both sides. Indra is such a soul in the upper world and neglected Krishna on the earth. Indra neglected Shiva also and was going to hit Shiva with his weapon on one occasion and Shiva punished him. At least, human beings are fortunate because even though they neglect the human incarnation on the earth due to repulsion between common external media, at least they respect the energetic forms of the upper world due to fascination towards the energetic bodies. Arjuna could get the vision of Shiva by penance but he was born as a hunter in the next birth for neglecting the contemporary human incarnation. Some recognize the concept of human incarnation and worship a particular past human incarnation only due to ego and jealousy against the contemporary human form of God. Such rigid people do not recognize any other past human incarnation also due to their ignorance about the common God existing in all human incarnations. The devotee of Krishna says that Krishna alone is God because Krishna said that one should surrender to Him only (Mamekam sharanam… Gita). But Jesus told that one can reach God only through Him and hence, the Christian is particular of Jesus only. Now, both quarrel with each other, and sometimes it is resulting in violence and disturbance of world peace. Laden killed Christians and Hindus in America and root concept is this religious fanaticism only. Here, you should take that Krishna and Jesus were referring to the contemporary human incarnations only and not to the individual souls, which are charged by God. Remember, Krishna and Jesus were giving these statements to the people who were before their eyes in their times and not to the present generation. If you realize this single point, the confusion is removed.

Jnana means knowledge related to God and not the knowledge related to the creation like mathematics, physics etc. Similarly, bhakti means love to God and not love to the world. Similarly, karma (seva) means service to God and not to service to your family or society. The word ‘karma’ in the entire Gita strictly means the work related to God. But people have written commentaries on the Gita interpreting the word ‘karma’ to worldly works also. The Gita clearly says that one should attach to the work of God (Matkarmaparamobhava) only. The word samnyasa means both complete attachment as well as detachment. In the first sense, God is taken and in the second sense, the world is taken. The word karma phala tyaga means the sacrifice of the fruit of worldly work only because there is no point of any fruit in the case of God’s work. Karma samnyasa means dedication of the work to God or detachment of work from the world. The meanings should be fixed according to the proper context and if you reverse the meanings the reverse concepts result.

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