The Three Types of Discipline of the Bhagavadgita 7. Swami Krishnananda
========================================================================
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
7.1
But the Gita is still more.
The third step is absolute discipline.
This is the only way in which that third type of discipline can be defined. Absolute discipline is that type of unitedness and harmony that you establish in life whereby you are friendly not only with the outer universe but with the profundities of the inner structure of the universe. Just as your body is not your whole personality, the physical universe is not the whole creation. Just as you may mistake the physical body for a human being, you may mistake the visible, physical universe for the total reality. Even as there are many more interesting features within your physical personality, there are riches and vaster secrets internal to the visible physical universe which are not recognisable by human understanding, and not perceptible to human senses.
7.2
What does the Bhagavadgita say, finally?
Within you is the secret consciousness, the intelligence with which you are identifying yourself every step of your life and every moment of the activities of your life. Even as within the body there are the senses, and within the senses there is the mind, and within the mind there is the intellect, and inside the intellect there is the animating consciousness, there is some such secret within this physical universe also. These inner secrets are called the various layers or realms of being.
In our Eastern cosmology, these are called the lokas or the worlds which are internal to the visible physical universe. You must have heard these words Bhuloka, Bhuvarloka, Svarloka, Maharloka, Janaloka, Tapoloka and Satyaloka. There are so many worlds, one over the other, they say. These worlds are not kept one over the other like sandwiches. They are one inside the other, like the layers of your personality. The body, the senses, the mind, the intellect and the spirit within you are not kept one over the other like slices of bread. They are one internal to the other, one controlling the other, one more pervasive than the other, the higher becoming more real than the lower, so that the highest is the real principle of your being.
The lokas, or the various realms of being outside, are the internal structural features or peculiarities of the creation before us.
7.3
Corresponding to the physical body, there is the physical universe. Corresponding to the mind within, there is the cosmic mind. Corresponding to the intellect here, there is the cosmic intellect.
Corresponding to the spirit within you, which is your intelligence, there is the Universal Spirit.
That is called God in religion, that is called the Absolute in philosophy, that is the reality of the scientists and physicists which we cannot gainsay, and that is the Ultimate Truth of all truths.
Whether it exists or not is an irrelevant question because nothing else can be, and it is only a name for being itself. You are asking whether it exists, and I am saying that it is the name for existence itself. What you call existence is that, and you cannot ask me whether existence exists.
That is a meaningless question. That which you call existence in its universal character and in its totality, and also in its internality, is called the Absolute. Just as the limbs of your body cannot be isolated in any manner whatsoever from your total personality, you as an individual cannot be isolated from the total structure of the cosmos and from the ultimate reality, which is the Absolute.
7.4
Thus, the goal of the life of the human being is the realisation of the Supreme Being, which is not an outside something but the higher reality of your own personality. The Bhagavadgita is a gospel not only for human beings, not only for India, Bharatavarsha, not only for this Earth, but for the whole of creation.
"In one sentence I can say that the Bhagavadgita is the exposition of the science of life."
THE END
================================================================================================================
31/08/2019
(Spoken on September 18th, 1974.)
7.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Recap :
The Bhagavadgita takes us into a vaster realm of a wider cosmos, I should say, of which you are a citizen because you are ruled by the government of the universe. Just as you have a constitution for your own country, there is a constitution for the entire universe, according to which every leaf moves, and every wisp of wind blows. Nothing can happen in this world unless it is ordained and permitted by the constitution of the setup of the whole cosmos, of which you are an integral part. You cannot isolate yourself from that. So self-discipline, according to the Bhagavadgita, does not merely mean individual bodily, psychological, intellectual discipline, which of course is necessary. It is also universal and cosmic discipline.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------7.1
But the Gita is still more.
The third step is absolute discipline.
This is the only way in which that third type of discipline can be defined. Absolute discipline is that type of unitedness and harmony that you establish in life whereby you are friendly not only with the outer universe but with the profundities of the inner structure of the universe. Just as your body is not your whole personality, the physical universe is not the whole creation. Just as you may mistake the physical body for a human being, you may mistake the visible, physical universe for the total reality. Even as there are many more interesting features within your physical personality, there are riches and vaster secrets internal to the visible physical universe which are not recognisable by human understanding, and not perceptible to human senses.
7.2
What does the Bhagavadgita say, finally?
Within you is the secret consciousness, the intelligence with which you are identifying yourself every step of your life and every moment of the activities of your life. Even as within the body there are the senses, and within the senses there is the mind, and within the mind there is the intellect, and inside the intellect there is the animating consciousness, there is some such secret within this physical universe also. These inner secrets are called the various layers or realms of being.
In our Eastern cosmology, these are called the lokas or the worlds which are internal to the visible physical universe. You must have heard these words Bhuloka, Bhuvarloka, Svarloka, Maharloka, Janaloka, Tapoloka and Satyaloka. There are so many worlds, one over the other, they say. These worlds are not kept one over the other like sandwiches. They are one inside the other, like the layers of your personality. The body, the senses, the mind, the intellect and the spirit within you are not kept one over the other like slices of bread. They are one internal to the other, one controlling the other, one more pervasive than the other, the higher becoming more real than the lower, so that the highest is the real principle of your being.
The lokas, or the various realms of being outside, are the internal structural features or peculiarities of the creation before us.
7.3
Corresponding to the physical body, there is the physical universe. Corresponding to the mind within, there is the cosmic mind. Corresponding to the intellect here, there is the cosmic intellect.
Corresponding to the spirit within you, which is your intelligence, there is the Universal Spirit.
That is called God in religion, that is called the Absolute in philosophy, that is the reality of the scientists and physicists which we cannot gainsay, and that is the Ultimate Truth of all truths.
Whether it exists or not is an irrelevant question because nothing else can be, and it is only a name for being itself. You are asking whether it exists, and I am saying that it is the name for existence itself. What you call existence is that, and you cannot ask me whether existence exists.
That is a meaningless question. That which you call existence in its universal character and in its totality, and also in its internality, is called the Absolute. Just as the limbs of your body cannot be isolated in any manner whatsoever from your total personality, you as an individual cannot be isolated from the total structure of the cosmos and from the ultimate reality, which is the Absolute.
7.4
Thus, the goal of the life of the human being is the realisation of the Supreme Being, which is not an outside something but the higher reality of your own personality. The Bhagavadgita is a gospel not only for human beings, not only for India, Bharatavarsha, not only for this Earth, but for the whole of creation.
"In one sentence I can say that the Bhagavadgita is the exposition of the science of life."
THE END
================================================================================================================
Comments
Post a Comment