Swami answers questions of Smt. Chhanda

1. If Pravrutti is full of selfishness, then how can there be justice?

[Smt. Chhandaa asked:- Padanamaskaram to my Almighty. Request You to kindly enlighten me on the following doubts: In one of our regular satsangas You told, “Pravrutti is full of selfishness.” Most of the time we experience this. We also learnt from Your knowledge that Pravrutti is the justified life meaning justice has to be followed among the souls. If it is full of selfishness, then how can there be justice? At the same time, God likes this justice very much and He comes to establish this only in this world. These statements seem to contradict. Limits need to be clarified in all these. Is it not?]

Swami replied:- Selfishness and justice can co-exist provided the selfishness is within certain permitted limits of justice. Dushpravrutti means earning wealth through unjust ways even though God always grants to every soul the necessary wealth to meet the basic needs. Dushpravrutti also includes illegal sexual life before and after marriage. Pravrutti means earning money in justified way for the sake of expenses of oneself and one’s family. Pravrutti includes confining to legally wedded spouse for satisfying lust. Although Pravrutti is also full of selfishness, justice is not violated anywhere at any time. Justice shall be violated only if God competes with it in the context of testing the devotee and not whenever the devotee desires such context.

2. Are Angels, who follow justice, selfish?

[Angels also always do and teach the right things. They are also perfect in Pravrutti. Then can I say that they are also selfish? At the same time, You always say angels never err. How is this statement possible? Only God can never err. Is it not? And angels definitely are not God and they are bound to err. We have plenty of such stories. Please clear this confusion too.]

Swami replied:- Compared to human beings, it is said that angels don’t err. It is only a relative sense. In absolute sense, only God will never err.

3. Can we say that once the white colour comes into the devotee’s life, then only VIBGYOR will cease to exist?

[The colour of the bond with God is white, not any colour of VIBGYOR is present. But white is nothing but a mixture of other colours. But You are saying there is no separate existence of individual colour. It is a wonderful concept. In my view, once the white colour has come into a devotee’s life, then only VIBGYOR will cease to exist. But it can never be in any colourless state. Is it not? Please comment. Can I say here in the life of such devotees, science is failing to explain itself?]

Swami replied:- Love towards God (white colour) is also a bond only (colour). Absence of love (colourlessness) is not a bond (colour). VIBGYOR represents worldly bonds, which dissolve in the bond with God or white colour. Since God created all these worldly bonds, we can say that white colour splits into VIBGYOR. The resulting idea is that you need not destroy the worldly bonds (VIBGYOR), but, divert these worldly bonds towards God to form a single bond with God (white colour). White colour (bond with God) results when all other colours are mixed homogeneously, but you cannot find any colour (any worldly bond) existing separately in the white colour (bond with God). All this story is about colours only and not about colourlessness. This means that the spiritual knowledge is about thoughts and feelings and not about thoughtless state, which is inert.

4. What are the meanings of the words “Thakur” and “Swami”?

[Swami what are the meanings of the words “Thakur” and “Swami”? Where can we apply these words? I will take examples for my confusion: ‘Thakur Shri Ramkrishna Paramahamsa’, ‘Swami Vivekananda’, ‘Swami Samarth’ and of course my most favourite ‘Datta Swami’ etc. There are so many examples where we come across with this word Swami but very rarely we use ‘Thakur’.]

Swami replied:- Thakur or Swami means the owner of this entire creation and this word indicates only God. The human incarnation of God is also indicated by these words since God in the human incarnation is the aim of these words.

5. Do You think that the male soul in Dushpravrutti changes if the illusory forms of the female preacher are created?

[Swami, You said that if need arises then God may create the illusory forms of female preacher for the male devotees. But in this case, the female preacher is just a guru and not Sadguru. There is no God component already there in the preacher. Then what is the meaning of creating even more the same forms? The male soul in Dushpravrutti will not consider the created form as Sadguru even though it must treat its guru as Sadguru only? Do You think the male soul in Dushpravrutti will really change by this act?]

Swami replied:- The female preacher is Guru, but treated as Sadguru or incarnation of God by the followers. God preaches through this form of Guru and God can do any further necessary activities through this form of Guru. Guru and her illusory forms do not contain the unimaginable God or Parabrahman. We should always remember that God has His own wonderful ways to resolve any problem in both worldly line and spiritual line.

6. Does not pleasing God lead to self-pleasure in the stage of Liberation?

[Swami, in the Step 3 of Sweet Devotion i.e. in the Liberation stage, it was discussed that there is no overlap between God’s pleasure and the devotee’s own pleasure. Pleasing God does not lead to self-pleasure. Instead, it leads to a net loss and becomes a sacrifice. My thinking for this stage is little opposite to this. I think once the devotee has come to this stage then pleasing Him leads to self-pleasure only and it is not a loss at all. Otherwise, it cannot be in the liberation step. Please throw Your light again to remove this ignorance. At Your divine lotus feet, Chhanda always.]

Swami replied:- The word ‘loss’ is used from the angle of public and not from the angle of the devotee. While God is attracting a devotee present in the stage of unjust Dushpravrutti, God appears to like injustice and therefore, the intentions of both God and the devotee appear to be same, having an overlap. The unjust devotee is sincere in the intention, but the real intention of God is quite different, which is at higher hidden plane. The devotee is initially attracted towards injustice, but finally forced to settle in the justice of Pravrutti due to the preaching of God. The love developed by the devotee towards God in the initial state of injustice makes the devotee to change from injustice to justice. Hence, the initial attraction is a white lie (arthavaada) to develop love towards God that makes the devotee to be attracted to justice. We can understand this more clearly if we can concentrate on the complicated concept, which is that by using injustice as initial attraction, justice attracts the devotee finally since the devotee developed immense love to God through injustice.

We must remember here that ends justify means. This is the transformation from Dushpravrutti to Pravrutti. This is mandatory for every soul. If the soul wants to be liberated from the worldly bonds and merge in God, the very purpose of this second transformation of Pravrutti to Nivrutti is aiming only at the service of the soul to God in His spiritual mission of knowledge propagation on the earth. If we look at the ultimate aim of the soul to finally come to do the service of God after liberation, there is no place for selfish pleasure since in this stage, the devotee feels the pleasure of God alone as selfish pleasure. If a devotee jumps directly from Dushpravrutti to Nivrutti, such devotee will aspire for selfish pleasure only without caring for the pleasure of God. Therefore, there is no direct transformation of the devotee from Dushpravrutti to Nivrutti. The transformation from Dushpravrutti to Pravrutti decreases the intensity of the selfishness and fascination to the worldly bonds. Then, the transformation from Pravrutti to Nivrutti will completely eradicate both Dushpravrutti and Pravrutti together leading to the isolated Nivrutti.

The intensified Nivrutti is called Mahaa Nivrutti. The first transformation weakens the selfish-fascination and the second transformation completely eradicates the selfish fascination. When you say that the selfish pleasure becomes God’s pleasure, it implies that the devotee has passed through the intermediate state of attaining complete eradication of selfish pleasure. When the selfishness disappears completely, the discussion about both justice and injustice also disappears spontaneously. Then, the devotee has no personal likes and dislikes. In whatever way God is pleased, that becomes the selfish pleasure of the devotee. At this ultimate stage, even the word ‘justice’ drops by itself. Selfish pleasure unlimited by injustice is Dushpravrutti. Selfish pleasure limited by justice is Pravrutti. If the word ‘self’ is replaced by the word ‘God’ in the word ‘self-pleasure’, that is Nivrutti, which means that the pleasure of God alone becomes the self-pleasure of the devotee.

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