Guru Pournima

O Learned and Devoted Servants of God,

The word Guru means Removal of Ignorance, which is like darkness. The letter ‘Gu’ indicates darkness and the letter ‘Ru’ indicates its removal. This darkness is not in physical sense, which can be removed by Sunlight. Some people worship Sun as Guru. But it is not correct because Sun is the inert globe and can remove the darkness in physical sense only. Removal of darkness by Sun is a best simile or an example or a representative model of the concept. You should not think the model as concept. The concept is removal of ignorance by the Lord who comes in the form of spiritual preacher called as Sadguru. When you are in a state of unawareness of a concept, such a state is called as ignorance (Ajnana). Now when you are aware of the concept, the knowledge (Jnana) came to you. Any Guru (Preacher) can remove the ignorance and can give the knowledge of the concept. But only Sadguru who is the Lord in human form can show the correct concept by discrimination by logical analysis (Vijnana) and this correct concept is the final conclusion (Prajnana). Therefore, Guru gives Jnana by removing Ajnana.

You are ignorant of the knowledge of Physics. Guru removes your ignorance by giving the knowledge of Physics. This knowledge of Physics is Jnana, which can be called as Bhowtika Shastra Jnana. Like this, there are several forms of knowledge, which are related to this world and all these forms can be called as knowledge. Therefore, you can call your Physics teacher also as Guru. But the knowledge of this world can give you food, money and comforts in this world. But this knowledge cannot save you after death, which you will fully realize in the last minutes of your life. The knowledge, which can save you forever, is the best knowledge and that is called as ‘Prajnana’. The suffix ‘Pra’ means best. This Prajnana is the divine knowledge and is also called as ‘Brahma Jnana’. In the name of Prajnana again there are several wrong misleading concepts. You have to separate them. In Prajnana again there are several steps and you should not sit in the lower step thinking that as the final step. The true spiritual knowledge must be filtered from all the impurities and also the various steps in the pure spiritual knowledge should also be realized. All this is possible only by the logical analysis (Yukti), which does not contradict the experience of realized souls (Anubhava) and which follows the word of the God (the Veda) and its following texts written by sages (Smruti). All this process is called Vijnana and the final conclusions are called Prajnana. Vijnana and Prajnana are possible only with the help of Sadguru.

Knowledge, love and bliss are the qualities of awareness. Wherever these three are present, awareness must be present. But the reverse is not true. Wherever the awareness is present these three need not exist. Wherever Gold chain is present gold exists there. But wherever Gold exists, the chain need not exist there. Therefore, you should not call mere awareness as the Lord (Brahman) because an animal having mere awareness need not have these three qualities. Even all men do not have these qualities. Only the Lord in human form has these three qualities, which are infinitely intensive. Today we should remember the three divine spiritual preachers, who are Shankara, Ramanuja and Madhva. Vyasa is like Brahman and whereas these three preachers are like Brahma, Vishnu and Shiva. The three-faced Datta represents the sage Vyasa with these three faces of spiritual preachers. Infact Vyasa is Datta because He is given in human form to this world from whom the ocean of Vijnana flew, which gave the divine nectar (Prajnana), on churning by these three preachers. The basic tortoise, the golden hill (Meru) and the king of serpents (Adi Shesha) are the churning instruments. The Hill is Shankara, the serpent is Ramanuja and the tortoise is Madhva. Today we are remembering Vyasa with the three faces of these preachers means that we are remembering Datta with the three faces of three divine forms. Datta is Brahman. Madhva is Brahma. Ramanuja is Vishnu. Shankara is Shiva.

Shankara preached the knowledge of self. Self is pure awareness. Self is common item in all the living beings. This self is called as causal body. Thus, in this world-drama all roles are basically just actors or souls. In every role the actor is present. Similarly, in every living being the soul is present. This relationship between souls is the relationship between co-actors that existed before drama and will exist after the drama also. This co-actor relationship or the relationship between same souls is real compared to the relationships between external subtle bodies and gross bodies. The subtle body is made of feelings, which are like actions and dialogues in the drama. The gross bodies are like the external dress. Both the subtle bodies and gross bodies are unreal compared to the causal bodies. Again, between the gross bodies and subtle bodies, the subtle bodies are more realistic because even after the drama one may carry on the feelings and dialogues to his home but not the dress. Similarly, the gross body is leftover here and the subtle body goes out. Some Scholars destroy this subtle body also and remain as souls.

Once you get rid of the illusion of gross and subtle bodies and remain only as a soul, justice can be established in this world. The relationship between the dress-roles or gross bodies is in terms of family bonds, relation bonds, caste bonds, nationality bonds and religion bonds. If one realizes all the living beings are the co-actors or souls only, all the above bonds vanish physically and mentally. The physical bond disappears when the gross body is destroyed here. But the mental bond continues with the soul and that is destroyed when the subtle body is destroyed. Thus, realization of these false bonds and realisation of the only true bond in this world, which is the bond between souls or co-actors is the self-knowledge established by Shankara.

When the family bonds disappear, one will not torture or kill another person for wealth to be earned for his family members. The bond with this physical body is the bond with the external dress in the drama. When one realizes the blind attraction to his body and to his family members, corruption will disappear in this world. Valmiki was robbing the wealth of passengers. One day sage Narada came and asked whether his family members will share his sin. Valmiki went and asked his family members about this point. They refused to share his sin.

Infact even if they agree to share, it cannot be shared according to the rules of Karma, because he is doing the sin based on his blind attraction towards them. They never asked him to do sin and give comforts. No family asks anybody like this. Therefore, this spiritual knowledge can alone transform the people and the corruption can be permanently removed. Fear of courts and police here can never control the sin because people find very easily the alternative ways. Fear about the hell is also unable to control because the blind attraction is more powerful than the fear. The only way to remove this blind attraction and eradicate the sin from this world is to divert that very blind attraction towards God. When the attraction is fixed on the Lord and the reality of the family bonds is known, the sin is controlled. Similarly, the attraction to the nation in terms to devotion to motherland is again a false bond. This entire earth belongs to the Lord. The sons are living in various rooms according to their convenience and the whole house belongs to the father. If this truth is realized the wars between countries for the sake of national boundaries will disappear. For the foolishness of the leader of the country, several human lives are ending in the war. The human life is very precious because the human life is meant for the spiritual realisation and this realisation must stop the suicides also.

Similarly, the limitations to religion are leading to genocides and if you realise the concept of one God and the concept of co-actors, this also looks false and foolish. The realisation of the producer and the director of the drama who is the Lord and is the employer of all the actors is called as the knowledge of the Lord (Brahma Jnana). When the self-realisation (Atma Jnana) is achieved the excess blind attractions are at least controlled, leading to the establishment of the justice in this world. This is called as Pravrutti and God is pleased with you for this. In this, you are an outsider because you have not entered Nivrutti, which is His inner circle. But still the Lord is pleased with you though you are in Pravrutti. Nivrutti means the introduction of producer and director of drama who also has entered into drama in a role. When you shift the attraction from the family etc., towards the Lord, you are entering into inner circle or Nivrutti. The reduction of excess strength of the bond is Pravrutti, which is achieved by self-realisation (Atma Jnana). When the bond disappears completely, it is Brahma Jnana or Realisation of Lord or Nivrutti. Shankara propagated self- realisation and thus, established justice in the world.

Self-realisation is very easy because the Self is in every human being. There is no difficulty in search of Self, whereas there is lot of difficulty in search of Lord in human form (Brahma Jnana). There is no risk in the search of self because you are sure to reach the Self within your body; it is like searching money present in your house. But in the search of Lord in human form in this world, you may be misled and you are not sure that you can catch the human incarnation. Jealousy and egoism will not come in the way of reaching the self but these two are obstructions in the way of identifying the human incarnation.

Ramanuja established the Brahma Jnana by introducing Lord Vishnu and Lord Krishna and Rama as His human incarnations. Ramanuja established devotion that is necessary for Nivrutti, whereas Shankara established justice in Pravrutti. After reaching the goal in Nivrutti the duty of devotee is to do service to the Lord without aspiring anything in return. Madhva established such service.

Nivrutti means cutting all the worldly bonds and to have the strongest bond with the Lord. This is like getting cent per cent in the examination. Pravrutti is to reduce the extra strength of the worldly bonds so that justice is established in Pravrutti and thus the Lord is pleased. You are pleased with an outsider and you are pleased with your wife. There is difference in this. Same is the difference when the Lord is pleased with you in Pravrutti, when you follow the justice by reducing the extra strength of worldly bonds and when the Lord is pleased in Nivrutti when you cut all the worldly bonds for the sake of the Lord. However, everybody has equal possibility to reach Nivrutti though one in millions and in one birth out of millions of births can reach Nivrutti. Only one can get the gold medal in the class but every student can try since there is an equal possibility to achieve it. Therefore, Nivrutti must be explained to all as goal. Let everybody try for Nivrutti so that at least he will succeed in Pravrutti. If everybody tries for gold medal by getting cent per cent, at least everybody will pass. If you teach Pravrutti only and keep it as goal, then everybody fails. If you keep 40 per cent pass mark as the goal, every student will fail. If you try to completely destroy the worldly bonds and try to have only one bond with the Lord, at least you will reduce the strength of worldly bonds and you have atleast a thin bond with the Lord. This is the pass mark.

The scriptures of Jainism and Buddhism preach only the ethical rules and living for justice without mentioning the name of God. In this level, the fear that one gets in doing sins is only from courts and police. He will think to avoid these courts and police by bribe and thus, he fails to succeed in Pravrutti. Since there is no mention of God, there is no question of pleasing God.

If you see the scripture of Islam, it mentions God Allah and the eternal hell. At least the fear for the hell controls the sins. But the blind attraction in the worldly bonds is so intensive that it overcomes this fear also, and so people are doing sins. If you see scripture of the Bible and the Gita, Nivrutti is exposed very well. The Bible says that you have to hate all these worldly bonds for the sake of Lord. The Gita emphasises the attraction towards the Lord. When this attraction to these worldly bonds is shifted to Lord, then only the establishment of justice in Pravrutti will be completely achieved. The policy of communism believes in distributing the accumulated wealth of some rich people. But this is not a permanent solution. The blind attraction of the rich man towards the worldly bonds is not removed. Then the rich man will feel discouraged and stop his talented work, which will reduce the production of wealth itself by the way of business and industries. If he himself realises and distributes his own wealth to all by the realisation of his family bonds, the solution is permanent. The rich man will continue his talented work in producing the wealth. Therefore, propagation of spiritual knowledge will certainly establish the justice on this earth and the selfishness and corruption are removed with their roots and communism cannot achieve this because the selfishness and corruption will hide and find new ways to escape the attack from communism.

Communism is one extreme end of ignorance and capitalism is another extreme end of the ignorance. The in between socialism is also based on the same ignorance which is on the middle part. These three policies are only temporary emotional attacks only without analysing the root of ignorance. Spiritual knowledge of Nivrutti will remove the ignorance completely with the root and establish the eternal justice on this earth. Ofcourse, a very few can enter the inner circle of the Lord and also can succeed in Nivrutti.

You are a drop of pure awareness, which is called as soul or causal body. Your immediate surrounding limiting circle is the subtle body, which is made of qualities or feelings of mind. The next circle is the gross body constituted by five elements. You are neither the gross body nor subtle body. You are the causal body, which is the soul. Thus, withdrawing yourself from these two circles is called as self-analysis. Thus, the word ‘I’ which you utter itself is under illusion. Next comes the circle of your family members. From this circle the word ‘my’ starts which is also under illusion. The next circle is your relatives, the next circle is your caste. The next circle is your Nation and the last circle is your religion. From family to religion, the five circles are associated with the word ‘my’. In all these five circles, the word ‘my’ is under illusion as you can find in deep analysis. These seven circles are the seven hells which are seven lower worlds. If you introduce the devotees in these seven circles, who are theists belonging to any family or caste or nation or religion, then the same seven lower worlds become seven upper worlds.

Now you are in the biggest single circle of earth, which belongs to the creator only. Now you see every living being is a small spot of pure awareness moving in this earth without any limitation. All the souls are equally related to you and neither you hate nor love any soul and you will not kill any living being for your food and this is the main point of Jainism and Buddhism. This is the climax of the Pravrutti or justice and you will not think the mind or the external gross body as yourself and you will not think that some spots of awareness are only your family members or relatives or your caste people or your country men or your co-religious devotees. If this is achieved by this spiritual knowledge, you are now in the world of Universal of Spirituality. Ofcourse, you can have the discrimination between the people who help you as your friends and who harm you as your enemies. A marginal minimum attraction and repulsion exists, which is justified but excess of blind attraction and excess of violent hatred vanish, which are responsible for all the sins and injustice in this world.

Arjuna was under the influence of these blind seven circles. For him his grandfather is very close whereas an external king is an outsider. When his brother Dharma Raja performed Rajasuya sacrifice, he went out to fight with the kings to bring their wealth, which was injustice. He killed the kings to do this injustice because he felt them as outsiders. But when he has to fight with his grandfather who is supporting injustice, he is fighting to do justice. But the blind attraction towards his grandfather prevented him to fight for justice. The Lord removed all these circles and showed all the human beings as simple dots of pure awareness, which are equally related as co-actors. To remove these circles, the Lord started with Sankhya Yoga or Jnana Yoga, which is the divine spiritual knowledge based on logical analysis. After hearing the Gita, every human being in the world appeared as a minute spot of awareness or soul to Arjuna, which is equally related.

Pravurtti and Nivrutti are quite opposite because in Pravrutti there is a tendency of communism destroying the capitalism. In Nivrutti, it is vice versa. In Pravrutti, you are treating all the society consisting of several living beings with equality and without any partiality. In this field, the concentration on one spot like family is diluted on the entire world. In Nivrutti, you have withdrawn your attraction from the entire society also and concentrate on a single Human Incarnation. You should not find fault with Nivrutti for diverting from communism to capitalism again. The capitalism in Nivrutti is entirely different from the capitalism in Pravrutti. In Pravrutti there is no Human Incarnation and everybody is human being only. But in Nivrutti there is only one Human Incarnation like Rama on whom you have to concentrate like Hanuman. Some people cancel the Nivrutti and end in Pravrutti only as the final step. They say that every human being is the Lord and so service to the society is service to the Lord. Shankara condemned this line of thinking, which is called as Loka Sevaka Matam. Shankara denied every human being to be called as the Lord. Atleast this point will open the eyes of His followers. Let them realise that Shankara did not agree that every human being is the Lord.

There are two words used and one has to carefully analyse the meanings of these two words. The two words are Brahman and Ishwara. Brahman means greatest and Ishwara means the Controller. In the entire creation, the soul or the life energy is the greatest. Even scientists are unable to synthesise the life energy from matter or from inert energy. Therefore, the soul is the greatest out of all the items of the creation. Therefore, soul is Brahman or greatest among the created items, but the soul cannot be called as Ishwara because it cannot control even the internal organs like heart, kidneys etc., present in its own gross body. Therefore, soul is Brahman but not Ishwara. The soul is greatest in the creation as long as the creator does not enter the creation as Human Incarnation. Once the creator enters, He becomes greater than the greatest soul. Then the creator is the greatest, but not the soul. A student is the best in the classroom as the first ranker but when a lecturer enters the class room, he is not the best and the lecturer becomes the best, because the lecturer alone is able to control the class and not the best student. A sheep may become the president of association of sheep. When the lion enters, the lion is only the President since the Lion alone can control all the sheep. Therefore, once the Lord in human form enters the world, He is greater than the greatest soul and therefore, He should be only called as Brahman and Ishwara. The Human Incarnation is always present in every human generation. Therefore, strictly speaking, no soul should claim itself as Brahman at any time because the Lord always exists in this world in Human Form in every generation. There may be a chance that one may not recognise human incarnation and therefore, may claim himself as Brahman, but he should never claim himself as Ishwara.

When the students uttered Aham Brahma Asmi (I am Brahman), Shankara tolerated but when Shankara told Shivoham (I am Ishwara), the disciples also told Sivoham. Then Shankara swallowed the molten lead and showed His controlling power. The disciples could not do so. Then Shankara told Shivah Kevaloham (Only I am the Shiva). The simple argument of Advaita scholars is that the Lord wished to create this world. The life or simple awareness is essential to have a wish. Therefore, the Lord is awareness. The same awareness is in every human being. Every human being is also wishing just like the Lord created this world by His Wish, which is His imagination only. Similarly, the human being is also creating its own imaginary world. But there is lot of difference between a hill present in this real world, which is the imagination of the Lord and the hill present in the imaginary world of the human being. If the same awareness is present in the Lord and the human being, both the hills should not have any difference. Since the hills are totally different, there is total difference between the awareness of the Lord and the awareness in the human being. Infact the Lord gave the faculty of imagination to the human being so that he will understand the process of imagination of the Lord in creating the world. But this foolish human being extends the concept into the model and thinks that the model itself is the concept.

A model or example cannot be the original concept. Therefore, you have to withdraw the attraction or the bond not only from the seven external circles, but also from yourself because you are thinking that you are the Lord and you are attracted towards yourself. Thus, finally this self-bond which is also an illusion should be broken and the total attraction should be shifted towards the external super soul or the Lord. Are you greater than Hanuman in any angle? Did He not know Aham Brahmasmi? Are you greater scholar than Hanuman, who always told Daasoham, which means that He is the servant of Rama, who is the then Human Incarnation? If you put these questions to yourself, your illusion of self-bond also disappears.

When you have identified the Human form of the Lord, all your logical analysis must be closed. Till you reach the goal you must be very alert in your intelligence. Otherwise you will miss the path, which has a single narrow direction. But once you reach the city, you need not be alert and you can roam in any direction and you will not leave the city. Thus, after achieving the goal, logic should be stopped and blind faith should exist. Thus, blind faith has its own value in its proper place. The Lord will test your faith to see whether it is blind or still alert with the logic. The Lord will show lot of Maya in this angle. The Lord will appear selfish so that He will tempt you to criticise the Lord. When Sita was stolen, Rama told Lakshmana that He would destroy the entire world. Rama came to this world to kill Ravana and do welfare to the world. But now He wants to destroy this world just for the sake of His blind attraction towards His wife! He tested Lakshmana since he was the closest associate as Adishesha. But Lakshmana never misunderstood the Lord. The logic in his statement cannot be understood by our limited minds, since the background is not known, Sita is the incarnation of Sri Mahalakshmi, who is the best devotee. The Lord means that all the souls in the entire creation are not equal to that best devotee. Since the background is not known we will misunderstand Rama and doubt Him.

The Human Incarnation can be recognised by His Special Divine Knowledge, His intensive love, His infinite Bliss and His unimaginable superpowers. All these four are like the four Vedas to recognise the Lord. The Rigveda represents knowledge, the Yajurveda, which describes sacrifice, represents love. The Samveda, which is song, represents Bliss, the Adharvana Veda, which represents supernatural weapons, represents superpowers. All these four are inseparable like a single Veda. That single Veda is the dog that is running before Datta, who is the Human Incarnation given to this world as Sadguru. The full moon today represents this complete full human incarnation and the full moon also represents the full faith of the mind by which alone He is retained after recognition.

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