Consciousness and self XVII: The Light of the Bhagavat

Divine Light, Divine Sound, and the Light of the Bhagavat

Michael Dolan, B.V. Mahayogi at Angkor

Big Bang, Physics, Speed of Light

Modern physicists dislike the idea of a special creation of the universe. We’ve all seen TV programs where forensic detectives can analyze the scene of a crime and reconstruct a chain of events. Modern physicists like the idea that they can reconstruct the chain of events just after the origin of the universe.

They can explain what happened “moments after the Big Bang.” http://www.physicsoftheuniverse.com/topics_bigbang_timeline.html

But the question of why there was a big bang in the first place is not interesting to such scientific minds. There is no intellectual curiosity as to how it would be possible to have all the mass and energy in the universe concentrated into a singularity. As Hawkings puts it, “Since events before the Big Bang have no observational consequences, one may as well cut them out of the theory,” http://www.hawking.org.uk/the-beginning-of-time.html

Mathematical models and Metaphysics

In other words, it is not intellectually interesting to think about the origin of the universe, since we have no means for creating a mathematical model that would describe such an event. This kind of truth is not “useful” since it is outside the realm of our understanding. In Sanskrit this is called acintya. And yet, the great teachers held that the acintya may be discovered; only that it is not possible through ordinary logic.

Acintya escapes ordinary logic

Taboos of Science

So, according to Hawkings and company it is not worthy of discussion to contemplate the origin of the so-called “Big Bang,” since it yields no “useful truth.” According to the pragmatic theory of truth, truth is defined as usefulness. That a statement is true means that it is useful—truth means "what works." Scientific inquiry must serve some pragmatic end, a “useful truth.” Interestingly the word “work” in english translates into Sanskrit as karma, so another way of framing the argument would be to say that unless there is some karmic result to inquiry, then it is useless. Any metaphysical inquiry into the origin of the universe, therefore is “useless,” by definition.

Mathematical models

"No question is useless"

Nor can it be explained how such an explosion as the Big Bang would organize itself into sophisticated living ecosystems without the existence of some spiritual organizing entity. 

Since the normal tendency of the universe is towards entropy, or a dissipation of energy leading to chaos, this makes no logical sense. Entropy is an important natural law governing the universe. All systems tend to disintegrate, to become more and more chaotic over time. How is it then, that an essential chaotic process such as an explosion would magically organize over time? But since such a question produces no “useful” truths according to Hawkings it might as well be “cut out of the discussion.”

Let there be light

In the Bible, it is written, “And God said, ‘Let there be light, and there was light.’”

This argument may appear to lack subtlety or derive purely from mythology and yet, if as Hegel has put it “The Absolute is By Himself and For Himself,” He must certainly have divine power.

But the devil is in the details. What are the details of creation by light? Unlike Stephen Hawkings my mind is not crowded with theoretical formulas, and since the idle mind is the devil’s workshop I have plenty of time for metaphysical questions.

So where it may not be profitable for him to ask certain questions, let me take up the following:

“How does light create?”

“Where does light come from?”

and “What is the nature of spiritual light?”

In our previous piece we wrote about light as a spiritual force or energy. It must be kept in mind that this light is different in quality from what we see with our eyes. Human eyes can detect a narrowly focused spectrum of light. Ultraviolet and infrared light vibrate beyond the spectrum of what may be seen by the human eye. And yet, while we cannot see ultraviolet or infrared light, these wavelengths exist. Gravity certainly exists. And yet we cannot see gravity waves with the naked eye. Indeed proper detection of gravity waves is a kind of “holy grail” for those who would delve deeply into the exigencies of Einsteinian relativity. Gravity seems to be the “glue” holding the universe together. And yet such a force is devilishly difficult to detect.

Light and consciousness

Since consciousness is demonstrably everywhere in our experience, spiritual light, like gravity waves, must certainly exist but this powerful force cannot be seen by our vegetable eyes. The jelly-like substance called vitreous lodged within the globules of our eye balls has no such transcendental power. Nor can divine light be visualized by the synapses of the optic nerve. The darkness that encases the pre-frontal cerebral lobes bear no witness to divine light. Spiritual light is such a subtle force that it escapes detection not only by the naked eye, but by the blunt instruments of empirical science.

Then, how can we see this spiritual light?

Ironically it is possible to see, but through sound, divine sound, or mantra.

Divine sound, Mantra as Light

In the beginning there were no scriptures. There was only the divine word. As it is written in the Christian Bible, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”

ॐ

ॐॐ

ॐॐॐ

ॐॐ

ॐ

Oṁ.

In Sanskrit, the primal word, the Logos (λόγος), is called Pranava. This primal word existed only as a sound vibration or mantra. At that time there was no written script. There was only the divine sound. Pranava consists of one syllable with anusvara added to it: Oṁ. ॐ

Oṁ ॐ is an affirmation. It means “Yes.” The divine sound affirms the existence of God, the existence of the soul, the relationship between soul and God.

In Śrīdhara Mahārāja’s words, “The Vedas tell us, "Om!" Om means a big "Yes!" "What you are searching for -- that is! Don't be disappointed." The Vedas say that the object of our inner search exists. The common search of all your hearts is existing, and your thirst will be quenched.”

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.”

First there was the word: ॐ

Oṁ

In the beginning there was no need for scriptural explanation. The corruption of consciousness had not advanced so much. In the tradition of the Vedas, there was a Golden Age of Man.

And so it was that in ancient times, during the Golden Age the only mantra was the one syllable, Oṁ.

After the rule of the Manus began, other syllables came into use as divine: the Oṁ mantra was expanded.

Oṁ tat sat, appeared.

The Gayatri Mantra

And it came to pass that during the rule of the gods, the ancient mantras expanded. After the Golden Age called Satya-yuga passed, according to Vedic tradtion, people began to perform sacrifices to the gods.

And so it was that the Gayatri mantra gained currency. The Gayātri mantra is divine sound that expands the meaning of pranava.

Soon after this, other mantras and Vedic incantations appeared and began to be used in the oral tradition.

These divine sounds which were capable of revealing divine light were communicated by guru to disciple for a long time.

With the corruption of time the mantras became more complicated; the rituals more elaborate; the knowledge of the Vedas more esoteric. And while the mantras had survived the scourges of time for thousands of years, gradually it became necessary to make a written record.

What was known as divine knowledge, or Veda had become greatly expanded. At this time it became necessary to properly compose, revise, edit, and publish the Vedic knowledge.

The original One Veda needed to be properly divided.

Vyāsa

During this age, a special empowered soul named Vyāsa appeared. This avatara of God divided the One Veda into four.

Vyāsa collected the old mantras and edited them, composing a great work in the form of 4 books which included the 108 Upanishads as appended philosophical treatises. According to modern scholars of the Vedic tradition Vyāsa worked and lived in the time of King Yudhisthira, the son of Pandu, lord of Hastinapura, around the time of the Kurukshetra war.

Vyāsa began a school and taught his disciples the four Vedas. They were known as Rishis, or “seers of the truth.” Those seers, then divided the four Vedas into different branches of knowledge: Medicine, Astrology, Ethics, Metaphysics, Ritual practice, and so on, so that people could easily study them.

Connotation decreases, Denotation increases...

The One Veda becomes Four

In his Kṛṣṇa Saṁhita, Bhaktivinoda Ṭhakura notes that of all the different branches of the Vedas, of course, the Ṛk, Sama, and Yajur Vedas are the most widely respected and quoted, since the most ancient verses and mantras were compiled in these three Vedas. But the Atharva Veda is also of a very ancient origin since it is mentioned in the in the Brhad-aranyaha Upanisad (4.5.11) : asya mahato bhatasya etc.

“The Ṛk Veda, Yajur Veda, Sama Veda, and Atharva Veda, the Itihasas, or histories, the Puroas, the Upanisads, the Slohas, or mantras chanted by the brahmanas, the sutras, or accumulations of Vedic statements, as well as vidya, transcendental knowledge, and the explanations of the sutras and mantras are all emanations from the breathing of the great Personality of Godhead."

Bhaktivinoda Ṭhakura

All truths discovered are related to the Supreme Lord, therefore they are eternal. The date of the discovery is not important. What is valuable is the truth itself. At whatever date in time a valuable truth is discovered it must be accepted by the wise. Those who try to establish a date for the Vedic truths are missing this valuable point.

Opponents of the Vedic version try to prove that they are temporary or recently written. This misses the point. It may be argued that Newton discovered gravity in the 18th century; nevertheless gravity is a law of nature established millions of years before Newton’s discovery. Newton’s discovery is not rejected because the formulas he worked out are of a recent vintage. Rather Newton is accepted as a genius for having worked out a mathematical model by which gravity can be defined as a natural force.

Bhaktivinoda Ṭhakura describes the passion of Vyāsa after having composed the Vedas and Mahābharata:

“Vyāsa was not satisfied with what he collected in the Vedas, arranged in the Purāṇas, and composed in the Mahābhārata. The peace of his conscience did not sanction his labors. It dictated him from inside:

“No, Vyās! You cannot rest contented with the erroneous picture of truth which was necessarily presented to you by the sages of by-gone days! You must yourself knock at the door of the inexhaustible store of truth from which the former sages drew their wealth. Go, go up to the fountainhead of truth, where no pilgrim meets “with disappointment of any kind.”

Śukadeva's reading of the Bhāgavata

“Vyās did it and obtained what he wanted. We have been all advised to do so. Liberty then is the principle which we must appreciate as the most valuable gift of God. We must not allow ourselves to be led by those who lived and thought before us. We must think for ourselves and try to get further truths which are still undiscovered or unadapted in the present conditions and circumstances for purpose of our realisation of the same.”

How to Read the Bhagavat?

So, the Bhagavat is condensed divine sound capable of delivering divine light through the ears and the heart. But how should we read the Bhagavat?

Śrīdhara Mahārāja explains his approach:

"My nature is non-interfering, from the beginning. So much so that I am called an ease-lover. I am not aggressive in a preaching mood, but only to know. The knowing aspect, the listening aspect, the aspect of inquisitiveness, predominates within me: To find new light from the scripture, from the words heard from my Guru Mahārāj.

Śrīdhara Mahārāja

“Every day, I can see, I can feel, new colour. Everything is infinite. Every word, every letter, is of infinite characteristic. I am internally busy with that in my last days.

“My expressions... present an ontological conception based on pure chit-vilās [spiritual play]. That is, whatever I see, whatever I have in view, must cross the level of Brahmaloka [the highest material dimension]. I see things to be not of this world, but of the other world, as chit-vilās-lakṣaṇ [expressions of spiritual play].

“The smallest things that we mention here are placed above renunciation and liberation. They are not of that side. Rather, they are śuddha-sattva, viśuddha-sattva [the quality of pure existence]. They are not related to liberation or emancipation, or to sattva-guṇa [the highest material quality].

“They are viśuddha-sattva, nirguṇa, chit-vilās [pure, nonmaterial, spiritual play]. Every word, every syllable that I express and give out is from the plane of viśuddha-sattva. That is the special characteristic of my sayings. They are ever-new. They are not a stereotyped thing.

“Whenever I approach, whenever I give an explanation of a particular verse, every time some new thing will come — not any mere repetition but something coming with some touch of the Infinite. Whatever I say must have some touch with conception of the Infinite.

“That is their peculiarity, and they are to increase faith. Faith, śraddhā, the basis, the foundation, always that will be more consolidated by my sayings." (http://nimaihuset.blogspot.mx/2012/11/srila-sridhar-maharaj.html)

Śrīdhara Mahārāja was a living witness to the living light. He could see deeply into the meaning of the Bhāgavata with divine vision. He was possessed of a divine intellect and would often approach the esoteric realities revealed in the Bhagavat with a divinely guided intellectual curiosity. And having delved deep into that reality, he would emerge before us with a new touch of the infinite, as if he had found in those hidden depths a rare and divine jewel. He would hold that jewel up to the light for us and allow us to inspect it. Like a master magician, he would conjure a jewel as if from thin air, and give us a glimpse of its brilliance. And with a wave of his hand, as soon as it appeared it would return whence it had come, becoming acintya once again.

Śrīdhara Mahārāja’s supernatural ability to probe divine sound for living light was a special gift, not available to everyone.

This unusual gift is praised by Śrīnivāsa Ācārya, in his ode to the six Goswāmīs. He tells us that his spiritual masters, Rūpa, Sanātana, Jīva, Gopāla Bhaṭṭa, Raghunātha Bhaṭṭa and Raghunātha Dāsa Goswami were expert in the scriptures.

नाना-शास्त्र-विचारणैक-निपुणौ सद्-धर्म-संस्थापकौ लोकानां हित-कारिणौ त्रि-भुवने मान्यौ शरण्याकरौ राधा-कृष्ण-पदारविन्द-भजनानन्देन मत्तालिकौ

nānā-śāstra-vicāraṇaika-nipuṇau sad-dharma-saḿsthāpakau
lokānāḿ hita-kāriṇau tri-bhuvane mānyau śaraṇyākarau
rādhā-kṛṣṇa-padāravinda-bhajanānandena mattālikau 

(Sad-Goswāmi-Ashtakam)

“[The six Goswāmis] are very expert in scrutinizingly studying all the revealed scriptures with the aim of establishing eternal religious principles for the benefit of all human beings. Thus they are honored all over the three worlds and they are worth taking shelter of because they are absorbed in the mood of the gopis and are engaged in the transcendental loving service of Radha and Krsna.”

Not only were the six Goswāmīs expert in studying and memorizing the Sanskrit ślokas of the different scriptures; they themselves created scriptures. Revealed truth came to them through divine vision and they distributed that divine light through divine sound. One such example is Rūpa Goswāmi’s Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu the “Nectar of Devotion.”

Rupa Goswami

In this way, the Goswāmīs retrieved the cintamani jewels of the divine world and revealed the rays of light from those jewels to those initiated in the spiritual science. Śrīnivāsa Ācarya continues, explaining that the Goswāmīs “revealed the truth about the Lord’s divine above of Vṛṇdāvana where desire trees flourish, full of fruits and flowers which have under their roots all valuable jewels.” 

नाना-रत्न-निबद्ध-मूल-विटप-श्री-युक्त-वृन्दावने nānā-ratna-nibaddha-mūla-viṭapa-śrī-yukta-vṛndāvane (Sad-Goswāmi Aṣṭakam)

The gift of scriptural interpretation may be rare, but one who is interested in experiencing divine light through sound must learn to read more deeply. This doesn’t mean that we are not to accept the words of the scriptures literally. The literal meaning always has an important value which is not to be scoffed at lightly. A deeper reading of the scriptural truths revealed by Vyāsa and his followers the Six Goswāmis of Vṛṇdāvana must be guided by a capable guru. The Bhāgavata is not for amateurs or imitationists. Only those who have been properly initiated in its secrets can truly interpet its meaning.

But since the Bhagavat is sound revealing light, those who are capable of seeing that divine light do have the ability to illuminate us with their own deep interpretations, just as Śrīdhara Mahārāja has pointed out above.

Śrīdhara Mahārāja “Every day, I can see, I can feel, new colour. Everything is infinite. Every word, every letter, is of infinite characteristic. I am internally busy with that in my last days."

The Bhagavat is a living message, filled with living light for those who have divine vision. And that living light is filled with divine color and divine forms for those who see with the pure vision of faith, śraddhā, as Śrīdhara Mahārāja has pointed out.

In his speech on The Bhagavata, Bhaktivinoda has also brought out the idea that the Bhagavat is a living text and demands a living interpretation and reading.

“In the twenty-third text of the twenty-first chapter of eleventh skandha of the Bhāgavat, we have been advised to take the spirit of the śāstras and not the words.

फलश्रुतिरियं नृणां न श्रेयो रोचनं परम् ।

श्रेयोविवक्षया प्रोक्तं यथा भैषज्यरोचनम् ॥

phala-śrutir iyaṁ nṛṇāṁ na śreyo rochanaṁ param

śreyo-vivakṣayā proktaṁ yathā bhaiṣajya-rochanam

(Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam 11.21.23)

“The Bhāgavat stands therefore for a religion of liberty, of unmixed truth, and of absolute love. The other characteristic is progress. Liberty certainly is the father of all progress. Holy liberty is the cause of progress upwards and upwards in eternity and in endless activity of love.

Bhaktivinoda Ṭhakura

“Liberty abused causes degradation, and the Vaiṣṇava must always carefully use this benign and beautiful gift of God.

“The progress of the Bhāgavat is described as the rise of the soul from nature up to nature’s God, from māyā, the absolute and the infinite energy, to the transcendental absolute.

“The texts of Vyās are still ringing in the ears of all theists as if some great spirit is singing them from a distance! Badrīk Ashram! What a powerful name! The seat of Vyās and of the selected religion of thought! The pilgrim tells us that the land is cold! How mightily did the genius of Vyās generate the heat of philosophy in such cold region! Not only did he heat the locality but sent its serene ray far to the shores of the sea! Like the great Napoleon in the political world, Vyas knocked down empires and kingdoms of old and by-gone philosophy by the mighty stroke of his transcendental thoughts! This is real power!

Bhaktivinoda Ṭhakura

“The atheistic philosophers from Sāṅkhya, Chārvāk, and the Jains, to the Buddhists shuddered with fear at the heroic approach of the spiritual sentiments and creations of the Bhāgavat philosopher!

“The army of the atheists was composed of gross and impotent creatures like the legions that stood under the banner of the fallen Lucifer, but the pure, holy, and spiritual soldiers of Vyās, sent by his almighty Father, were invincibly fierce to the enemy and destructive of the unholy and the unfounded. 

Atheist philosopher Bertrand Russell

He that works in the light of God sees the minutest things in creation; he that wields the power of God is invincible and great; and he that performs his destined mission with God’s holiness in his heart finds no difficulty whatsoever in the accomplishment of his duty against unholy things and thoughts. God works through His agents, and these agents are styled by Vyās himself as the incarnation of the power of God.”

अवतारा ह्यसंख्ये या हरेः सत्त्वनिधेर्द्विजाः ।

यथाविदासिनः कुल्याः सरसः स्युः सहस्रशः ॥

avatārā hy asaṅkhyeyā hareḥ sattva-nidher dvijāḥ

yathāvidāsinaḥ kulyāḥ sarasaḥ syuḥ sahasraśaḥ

(Śrīmad Bhāgavatam: 1.3.26)

“All great souls were incarnations of this class, and we have the authority of this fact in the Bhāgavat itself: O Brāhmaṇs! God is the soul of the principle of goodness! The incarnations of that principle are innumerable! As thousands of watercourses flow out of one inexhaustible fountain of water, so these incarnations are but emanations of that infinitely good energy of God which is full at all times.”

“The Bhāgavat, therefore, allows us to call Vyās and Nārad as śaktyāveś-āvatārs of the infinite energy of God, and the spirit of this text goes far to honor all great reformers and teachers who lived and will live in future in this or other countries. The Vaiṣṇava is ready to honor all great men without distinction of colour or caste, because they are filled with the energy of God.

“See how universal is the religion of Bhāgavat. It is not intended for a certain class of the Hindus alone, but it is a gift to man at large in whatever country born, whatever society bred, and whatever culture produced.”

Bhaktivinoda Ṭhakura concludes:

“In short, Vaiṣṇavism is the absolute love binding all men together into the infinite, unconditioned, and absolute God.

“May its peace reign forever in the whole universe in the continual development of its purity through the exertions of the future heroes, who will be blessed according to the promise of the Bhāgavat with powers from the almighty Father, the Creator, Preserver, and the Annihilator of all things in heaven and earth.”