The Vedic Mystics often speak of the four planes that men may follow after death of the body, which are determined by ones actions and thoughts while on earth.
First, Brahmaloka, these are the highly developed souls who lead an extremely righteous life, meditate with complete devotion on God, but have not yet attained Self Knowledge. This plain corresponds to the Christian Heaven.
Second, is Candraloka or lunar sphere - the ritualists and philanthropists, who cherish a desire for the fruits of their actions. They will come back to earth as they still enjoy the desires for worldly happiness.
Third, are those who perform actions forbidden by religion and ethics. After death they have sub-human bodies and dwell in what is generally known as hell.
Forth, are those persons who perform extreme vile actions spending many birth as insignificant creatures. However, they too, in the long run return to human bodies on earth.
These four planes do not apply to those who have attained Self Knowledge either while in the body, or the time of death.
To him no going or coming can be imagined,
In revelation:’ He will go out on more.’
There is no real break in the upward journey of the soul, although at time it takes a detour.
All souls will ultimately attain perfection.
Vedanta says, that dying may be compared to falling asleep, and the after death experience to dreams. The actions and thoughts of the waking state determine the nature of the dream.
The Guru
The purpose of spiritual knowledge is the awakening of the soul and the transformation of life itself.
In the past spiritual knowledge was transmitted from one living soul to another, from teacher to disciple.
In our society this is difficult to attain.
However, we know that the ancient spiritual wisdom has come to our present time through an unbroken succession of teachers.
We too have our Guru Line that we respect and cherish.
Man afflicted by sense experience, confused by the transience of physical objects, and frightened by the thought of death in the mortal world, man longs for answers.
Often, trough disillusionment does seek the real meaning of life.
He hopefully finds a way that leads him from the unreal to the real, from darkness to light, from death, disease and suffering to immortality.
Qualities that a Truth Student must possess in order to progress on the path
True knowledge is always accompanied by direct experience.
To know Atman or the Soul is to realize, that the Self of man is Pure Consciousness.
To know Brahman is to become Brahman.
Therefore intellectual understanding must be followed by actual transformation of life; otherwise it is of no practical benefit to the aspirant.
Further, much of our reasoning is the rationalization of our desires. Most people understand a thing the way they want to understand it; they prove only what they want to prove.
Therefore the attainment of Truth demands complete non – attachment to everything including our own thoughts and ego.
The seeker of Self Knowledge must practice four disciplines.
1) Discrimination between the real and the unreal.
This is an unshakable conviction of the mind that only God alone is real. Substance and all other things are unreal and illusory.
2) Renunciation. This is the disregard for sense pleasure and to the experience of the happiness one expects in heaven after death.
The aspirant realizes that no pleasure, whether here or hereafter, is permanent.
Even good action such as charity, study, or worship are finite by nature and so are their results.
Self knowledge is not the direct result of any action.
It always exists.
The disciple merely removes ignorance, the barrier to this knowledge, so that the Glory of the Self can shine forth.
It is like the wind that blows away the clouds hiding the radiance of the sun.
Just as the sun is not a product of the of the wind, so also the Self is not the product of the discipline.
Only worldly happiness is the product of our actions.
3) The six treasures. These form the ethical foundation of spiritual life.
They are: calmness – the dwelling of the mind in God after it has detached itself from all sense objects through firm knowledge of their inherent defects.
The aspirant devotes himself to hearing about God from a teacher or from the scriptures and using his reasoning in what he reads, and then meditates on its meaning.
Self control – restraining the organs of perception and action from their respective objects, and keeping them under control
Organs of perceptions are: tasting, hearing, smelling, seeing, and touching.
Organs of action are: speaking, grasping, moving about, etc.
Self contentment – a function of the mind not to drift outwardly for its gratification
Forbearance – the endurance of all afflictions arising from the contact of the senses with their objects. The aspirant is not agitated by heat and cold, pleasure and pain, love and hate.
Complete concentration – concentration of the mind (after it has been disciplined by the practice of the above virtues) on God as taught by the scriptures.
Faith – accepting the teachings as valid and truthful.
3) Longing for liberation.
This is the intense longing of the student to free himself, through the knowledge of the true Self , from the bondage to the body, mind and ego- bondage created by ignorance.
This longing is totally different from restlessness, which is under the inferior state of the mind.
Renunciation and the longing for freedom are the cardinal virtues through which the others bear their fruit.
Without these the mere ethical disciplines give only a veneer of spirituality.
Shankara emphasizes the cultivation of Bhakti or devotion, as supremely necessary to the attainment of liberation.
Bhakti is a single minded zeal and unswerving passion for the realization of Truth.
Without bhakti, the aspirant becomes lost in the wilderness of dry intellectualism.
More on the meaning of Self – Control
Without Self control; there can be little progress in spiritual life, nor any success in meditation.
Through Self control one empties the mind of its worldly contents, its transient desires and passions, and through contemplation, fills up the void with the Spirit of Truth.
Self control means the development of will power and also the strengthening of the buddhi, or discriminative faculty, which controls all sense organs.
Philosophy
Not too many people understand the
Impersonal Absolute or God
As long as a man remains ignorant, the world is real to him, and so are the pairs of opposites, such as good and evil, righteousness and unrighteousness.
Only a highly qualified aspirant can conceive of the Impersonal Absolute and meditate on it.
He alone can seek Brahman and realize it directly by meditation.
For the rest the approach to Impersonal Reality lies through the Personal God.
Therefore the worship of the personal God is recommended at the beginning of spiritual life.
Worship and devotion enable the beginner to fix his mind on God and strengthen his power of concentration.
As long as a man regards himself as a psycho physical being, conscious of his body, mind and ego, and as long as he is not fully aware of Atman, or pure Spirit, as his true Self, he cannot effectively meditate on Impersonal Reality.
Conscious of his many weaknesses and limitations, he feels the need of prayer and other external support.
He worships the personal God (Ishvara, Christ) for protection, guidance and grace.
Though in the end the worshiper realizes that he and the Personal God are non-different, being manifestations of God, yet as long as he remains conscious of his individuality and retains even a trace of his ego, the distinction between himself and the Personal God holds good, and the latter is to be regarded as the highest reality on the relative plane.
But we must come to fully understand, that the reality behind the Divinity is the Impersonal Absolute.
The whole relative universe and all material objects are different manifestations of Absolute; the Personal God is its highest manifestation.
The Personal God is not the creation or imagination of the human mind.
He is as real as the universe.
When through self control and meditation, the aspirant becomes less and less aware of the universe and his ego, he sees more and more of the Absolute.
The Spirit of Life flowing through all of creation.
When not absorbed in communion with the Absolute, Non – dualists show a very exalted spirit of adoration for the personal aspect of the Divine.
Consider the following hymn.
I bow to Thee the everlasting cause of the world;
I bow to Thee Pure Consciousness, the Soul that sustains the whole universe;
I bow to Thee who art One without duality, who does bestow liberation;
I bow to the, Brahman, the all pervading Attributeless Reality;
Thou art the Refuge, the only object of adoration;
Thou art the only Cause of the universe, the Soul of everything that is;
Thou art the world’s Creator, Thou its preserver and Destroyer;
Thou art the immutable Supreme Lord, the Absolute;
Thou art unchanging Consciousness,
Dread of the dreadful! Terror of the terrible;
Refuge of all beings! Purity of purifiers!
Thou alone dost rule over those in high places,
Supreme over the supreme, the Protector of protectors,
Almighty Lord, who art made manifest as the form of all, yet art Thyself unmanifest and indestructible;
Thou art the imperceptible of the senses, yet art the very Truth:
Incomprehensible, imperishable, all-pervading, hidden and without form;
O Lord! O Light of the universe! Protect us from harm.
On that one alone we meditate; That one is the soul object of our worship!
To that alone, the non dual Witness of the universe we bow.
In that one who alone exists and who is our sole eternal Support, we seek refuge,
The self dependent Lord, the Vessel of Safety in the ocean of his world
An advanced Non dualist realizes the inadequacy of ritual worship, as is evidence in the following hymn.
How can I ever invoke the All pervading Absolute?
How give a seat to That which is the one support of all?
How can one bring offerings to That whose nature is Pure Awareness,
Or purify that which is ever pure?
Why should one bath with water that which is ever free from stain,
Or offer clothes to that which holds the universe in Itself?
What is the use of flowers for One insensitive to smell?
How can perfume be pleasing to Him who is all beauty’s source?
Futile are offerings of food for One who is forever satisfied!
How can one circumambulate Him who is boundless in all directions?
How contrive to salute Him who is one without a second?
How can hymns be pleasing to Tat which the Vedas cannot reveal?
How can one wave lights before the Self luminous Lord, the All pervading Reality,
And how, as an image, can He be installed who stands complete within and without?
Therefore it is that perfect knower of Brahman
always and under all conditions, Commune with the Lord through contemplating his total identity with Him.
Super imposing false attributes.
Vedanta contends that we falsely supper impose attributes of one object on another because of appearance, such as a rope for a snake.
In the same manner, Vedanta contends, the attributes of the non- Self, or jiva – individual soul, which in essence is one with the Universal Soul, comprising the body, the senses, and the mind all of which are by nature unconscious and inert) are falsely superimposed on the Self, or (Atman) which is eternal, immortal, ever pure, beyond time and space, untouched by the law of causation and of Pure Consciousness
It is very important to remember, that attributes falsely superimposed upon a thing, do not really belong to it and cannot in the least affect its nature.
Note: Vedanta here speaks of jiva as an individualized unit of God’s consciousness, identified with mind, the souls is in need of purification.
The Self is the Purified Soul.
IGNORANCE
According to Vedanta, God or Brahman which is one without a second and is of the nature of EXISTENCE, KNOWLEDGE and BLISS, is real and the only SUBSTANCE; all material things are unreal and unsubstantial; they are the product of ignorance.
The Question
How is it then, that we take the material universe and its objects as real?
How have names and forms come into existence?
If ULTIMATE REALITY is ONE, why do we see the relative relative world and its multiplicity?
What is the relationship between the ONE and the many, the ABSOLUTE and the relative?
These are the puzzling questions that we must ponder.
Some believe in the creation of the universe by an external power called God.
Some believe that GOD or the power itself has become the universe, and that the cause of the universe does not lie outside it.
Non dualists insist; that there has never been any creation and that God, Brahman alone exists.
Shankara noted, that the universe of names and forms cannot be denied as a fact of everyday experience for people under the spell of ignorance.
He describes the universe as the modification of prakrity, matter or nature where the cause manifests itself as the effect.
He calls the universe MAYA because every thoughtful person knows, that even though he perceive the world around him, he realizes that it is impermanent.
Krishna says in the Bhagavad Gita: “This divine maya of Mine consisting of the 3 Gunas and is hard to overcome. But those who take refuge in Me alone shall cross over this maya.”
But Shankara also stated that from the standpoint of God, Brahman, maya it is non existent
Hence, names and forms are real to those who do not possess true knowledge.
As long as man sees multiplicity he must work, pray, worship, reap the results of his action and experience happiness and unhappiness.
In that state he cannot disregard the distinction between morality and immorality. The observance of moral law brings him reward and the opposite brings punishment.
As long as one sees maya or its effects, one may say it belongs to God or Brahman, because nothing exists, ultimately, but Brahman.
Thus, maya has been described as the inexplicable of the Supreme Lord which produces the illusion of creation, preservation and dissolution of the universe.
But, from the standpoint of Brahman, which is all light and knowledge, there is no maya.
The one identified with Brahman, does not even see a trace of maya.
Brahman appears as the individual soul endowed with ego, mind senses and a physical body. As the mind itself is a product of maya, one cannot, through reason know the cause of maya.
It is maya, ignorance that produces time, space and causality which hides the true nature of pure consciousness and projects the multiple universes.
The three gunas are the ingredients of maya; they may be compared to three strands in a rope which binds man to the illusory world.
The three gunas are present in a varying degree in all objects, gross or subtle, including the mind, the buddhi and the ego.
The food which nourishes our body,
The thought which is a function of the mind,
The activity which elevates a man to charity, worship, sacrifice – in fact everything belonging to the universe of maya - contains the 3 gunas.
At the end of the world cycle, when names and forms go back to the state of non manifestation or involution, the gunas remain in a state of non-differentiation or equilibrium.
This is called the seed state of the universe; the sleep of the cosmic soul.
Tamas in man manifests as ignorance, dullness and lethargy.
Rajas exert its projecting powers and creates the many activities and fantasies that constitute an unenlightened man’s practical life.
Sattva is the giver of happiness and is the real friend of man in his effort to realize truth.
It manifests as humility, self-control, unselfishness, purity, contentment, truthfulness, fearlessness, faith, devotion, yearning for liberation, etc.
When sattva predominates, a man feels detached with respect to the world; it lessons his physical activities, intensifies his contemplation, and strives in various ways to attain peace and blessedness. Through the cultivation of sattva, rajas and tamas are kept under control.
Yet we must remember that the 3 gunas always exist together.
Being of maya, as long as man is attached to any of them; he is a phenomenal being andNOT A FREE SOUL.
Brahman alone is untouched by maya and beyond the gunas.
Sattva binds man to happiness,
Rajas to activity and
Tama to delusion
Maya a statement of fact
Our daily practical life in the dual world is not possible without maya. We all live, move and think in maya.
It is maya that is responsible for all the contradictions in our lives.
Good is followed by evil and yet we work to create only good, believing, that it will ultimately eliminate evil in the relative world.
We believe in the progressive evolution of the universe. This is maya.
The cause determines the effect, yet we seek to establish peace through war. This is maya.
Money creates leisure and builds up culture and in the end emasculates a nation and brings about its ruin.
We want to conquer natural resources, and in the end we become slaves to matter. This is maya.
There is no freedom in maya. Freedom is beyond maya.
This is why Jesus said:
‘Come to me all that labor and are heavy laden and I will give you rest’.
Matthew 12:28
In the Gita we read:’ those who take shelter in Me ultimately go beyond maya’.
The jiva
Pure Consciousness, associated with individual ignorance, is called the jiva, or individual living soul.
The jiva dwells in the body. The consciousness of the jiva, which is derived from pure consciousness, illumines like a lamp the individual ignorance.
This is why the mind, the buddhi, the ego and the senses which are which are products of ignorance and material in nature, appear to be conscious.
Both Ishvara, Christ Lord of the Universe, or the first expression out of Pure Consciousness are products of maya.
The difference of the two is that maya is under the control of Ishvara, whereas the jiva or individualized being is under the control of maya.
This limitation imposed on the jiva makes it totally forget its real nature.
Ishvara uses maya as his instrument for the purpose of creation, preservation and dissolution.
He is the Lord, the jiva the slave.
But we must realize that from the perspective of Brahman, Pure Consciousness, maya does not exist separate for It.
Therefore neither Ishvara nor the jiva exist separate from Pure Consciousness.
It becomes a matter of how we look at it, either from the perspective of Pure Consciousness, or from the relative plan.
From the relative plan the jiva is the worshiper and Ishvara the worshiped.
Ishvara is the creator, the jiva the created.
Ishvara is the Lord and the jiva His child or servant.
Even though Ishvara (personal God) derives its power form Brahman (impersonal God), his importance in the relative world in beyond all measure.
