Hari
OM
Application - that is what 'Workings-days' are about!
The Narada Bhakti Sutra is our guide for a while… the
nature of Love (with the capital 'ell') and a full exploration of it. As
always, you are encouraged to seek out the full text from Chinmaya Publications
(links in side-bar); but for those who prefer e-readers, this version is recommended. Whilst awareness and interest can be
raised by these posts on AV-blog, they cannot substitute for a thorough reading
and contemplation...and practice!
Chapter
Five, Section One, continued. Sri Narada has been lifting us with his words in
an attempt to describe the indescribable.
Now he tells how a person may be who attains the Highest Element.
Tat!
àaPy tdevavlaekyit, tdev Z&[aeit,
Tadev
_aa;yit, tdev icNtyit.55.
Tat
praapya tadevaavalokayati, tadeva shRnoti,
Tadeva
bhaashayati, tadeva chintayati ||55||
Having reached the Supreme Love ('that') the devotee
sees (feels, comprehends) that alone, hears that alone, speaks that alone and
thinks (contemplates) that alone.
 |
` © Yamini Ali
MacLean
|
Upanishadic
teachings all come to a crescendo as they attempt to describe the state of
samaadhi. Here our Guru gives a sutra which echoes strongly with the Chhandogya
shloka 24 from adhyaaya 7; "There where
you see nothing else, where you hear nothing else, nothing else you know or
feel, that state is called 'Bhuma' - the All-pervading, Infinite, Eternal,
Immutable Brahman…"
What,
then, is that which we call Brahman? It is a state of Consciousness with
emptiness and the only state of 'experience' is of infinity and we face our own Self, the nature of Creation. Whenever we have any awareness of otherness, even a
sliver of individual identity, we are not yet in That. In coming into the state
of samaadhi - that place of silence and suspension, for the once-seeker
everything now perceived is understood and accepted as Brahman manifested as
Creation. All is Naaraayana, within and without and ever present in the mind of
the newly Realised one (tadeva chintayati). When we have cleared our mind of
all muck and damage, it becomes alert and contemplative and in this way we can
come to comprehend the Higher and the source of all.
The
once-seeker is now resting in the Love Divine and can only call praises in
devotion to it. Devotion here is no longer for the Lord alone, but the entirety
of Creation and all the manifestations of Brahman. The devotee is now lodged in
bliss of unity despite diversity. Now, such a person is no longer, father,
mother, sister, brother, child or friend, or even seeker. All relationships
dissolve into the unity. The state of 'just being' remains with the sadhu.
Naaraayana
(Brahman as the Created) is all that is beheld now. Wherever the sadhu looks,
he sees only the play of the One Reality. This form of samaadhi is called
'savikalpa', the state where the intellect is capable of apprehending only one
reality - according to the conduit the seeker followed, it will be coloured by
that; it may be Shivoham, Krishna hai, Naaraayana-mayam-jagat, or even
Christ-mayam-jagat; 'all the world is Christ-consciousness'. From this you may
surmise that this is even not yet a completion of Truth Realisation. There
remains one stage, for at this point there is still the observance of 'other',
albeit in the form of That Consciousness, as Naaraayana, Buddha, Yeshu… it is
yet still a conditioned samaadhi - without doubt, a noble and exalted state -
but it is still within the realm of 'dwaita' - duality. From here Total Unity
remains.
A short discourse today; new section next week.
