Peace

Prayer for Peace

ॐ आसतो मा सद्-गमय ।

टमसो मा ज्योतिर्-जमय ।

मृत्योर्-मा आम्र्तम् गमय ।

ॐ षान्तिह् षान्तिह् षान्तिह् ॥

oṁ āsato mā sad-gamaya |

ṭamaso mā jyotir-jamaya |

mṛtyor-mā āmrtam gamaya |

oṁ ṣāntih ṣāntih ṣāntih ||

ॐ

Oṁ

O Lord:

Lead us not to temptation.

Never to  ignorance, but always towards knowledge.

Lead us not into the darkness but towards the Light.

Not to death but to immortality.

Peace, Peace, Peace.

Oṁ

ॐ

Jiva Goswami

Lives of the Saints

I was asked recently by an old friend to provide some background on Jīva Goswāmī for the celebration of his divine appearance day. One often writes about a subject in order to discover more about it and learn what one doesn’t know. This article is an attempt to shine some light on Gaudiya Vaishnava history. To that end, I have gathered information in this article from different sources and compiled it in the hope that it may be useful.

Jiva Goswāmī

Narottama Dās Ṭhākura has written:

শ্রী-রূপ সনাতন ভট্ট-রঘুনাথ শ্রী-জীৱ গোপাল-ভট্ট দাস-রঘুনাথ

এই ছয্ গোসাইর্ কোরি চরণ ৱন্দন্ জাহা হোইতে বিঘ্ন-নাশ্ অভীষ্ট-পূরণ

এই ছয্ গোসাই জার্—মুই তার্ দাস্ তা-সবার পদ-রেণু মোর পঞ্চ-গ্রাস্

তাদের চরণ-সেবি-ভক্ত-সনে বাস্ জনমে জনমে হোয্ এই অভিলাষ

śrī-rūpa sanātana bhaṭṭa-raghunātha

śrī-jīva gopāla-bhaṭṭa dāsa-raghunātha

ei chay gosāir kori caraṇa vandan jāhā hoite bighna-nāś abhīṣṭa-pūraṇa ei chay gosāi jār—mui tār dās tā-sabāra pada-reṇu mora pañca-grās

tādera caraṇa-sebi-bhakta-sane bās janame janame hoy ei abhilāṣa

“All glories to Srila Rupa Goswami, Sanatana Goswami and Raghunatha Bhatta Goswami, to Srila Jiva Goswami, Gopala Bhatta Goswami, and Raghunatha Dasa Goswami! I bow to the feet of these six Goswamis. By their grace, our obstacles can be destroyed and all desires are fulfilled. I am the servant of these six Goswamis. The dust of their lotus feet is my fivefold subsistence. To be a servant of their lotus feet and to reside in the company of devotees--this is my aspiration birth after birth.”

500 years ago the avatar of this age made himself known in Bengal. It is said that in the age of darkness known as Kali-yuga the holy name is our only salvation. Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu appeared like a golden volcano of divine love. Śrīdhara Mahārāja once mused that there must be a relationship between the words “love and lava.”

“Is lava love?” he asked, since love gives life but also burns the heart. Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu burned with the lava of divine love. He was so illuminated by divine love that those who knew him saw him surrounded a golden halo or effulgence. Mahāprabhu appeared to distribute the sweetness of the highest divine love, embodied in the holy name of Krishna. See http://www.scsmath.com/books/Golden_Volcano.pdf

While he was famous as a scholar during his lifetime, Mahāprabhu accepted humility as a primordial religious principle and so avoided the fame of a poet. Unfortunately, he left behind few written works. Of these the only surviving is his Śikṣāṣtakam, a poetic text of only 8 Ślokas or Sanskrit verses.

Where then can we go to learn more about his teachings? While Śrī Caitanya may not have written volumes of philosophical works, he did instruct a small group of confidential disciples among whome were the Six Goswāmīs of Vrindavan, celebrated above by Narottama, the greatest proponents of His school.

Each of these Goswāmīs wrote prolifically. Among their works we may find exquisite poetry, esoteric dramatic works, and songs of worship. Each of the Goswāmīs made a special contribution to the sacred literature of the Gaudiya Vaishnavas. Sanātana Goswāmī not only summarizes the essence of the Bhāgavatam in his Bṛhād-Bhāgavatamṛtam; he also shows how the soul ascends through the different levels of consciousness and finds shelter in the supreme abode of the Lord. Sanātana Goswāmī’s Hari-bhakti-vilāsa is the authority for Vaishnava temple worship and forms the basis for all the rituals of Krishna devotees: from the “mass” called “aroti” to initiation ceremonies and other sacred rites and sacraments. He is considered to have purified the pancharatrik-viddhi or rituals, rules, and regulations practiced by devotees.

Among other great works, Sanātana’s brother Rūpa Goswāmī gives us the ontology of divine love in his Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu. His unique contribution makes him the spiritual head of the school after Śrī Caitanya.

Sanātana and Rūpa wrote prolifically to establish and defend the school of Śrī Caitanya with their texts on practice and liturgy and inspirational works on divine love from viddhi-marga and sādhana-bhakti to rāga-marga and bhāva-bhakti.

Faith, of course, needs no reason. And yet, in this age of doubt, theologians of all schools have taken care to try to establish the core understandings of faith through a certain amount of logic--to “justify the ways of God to man” as Milton put it.

This more philosophical task--to explain logically the unique point of view of the sampradāya--fell to Jiva Goswāmī to work out.

For example: Gaudiya Vaishnavism is theistic: it accepts a personal deity. Personalism seems to contradict the Vedantic version. All the established schools of thought and spiritualism in India have traditionally explained their position with a commentary on the Vedanta-sutras. Vedanta is a deep reflection on spiritual reality. How does the school of Śrī Caitanya handle the ideas expressed in Vedanta? Does Śrī Caitanya reject Vedanta? To do so would be to live outside the traditional wisdom of India. Or does he have a particular way of adjusting the sutras; a philosophical justification of the Personal God?

The dominant school of Vedanta at the time was that of Shankar. But his view, while influential, is not unrivaled. Shankar tries to establish “one-ness” or “nondualism.” For Shankar, the world of temporary being is only an illusion. Only the soul really exists. In the eternal sense the element of matter falls away leaving us only soul energy which merges into Brahman--the divine ocean of spiritual light.

Many other schools have attempted to refute Shankar. For example there was Madhva of South India. Madhvācārya’s view is closer to the Cartesian mind-body problem where duality is absolute. For Madhva, God is God, soul is soul. Never the twain shall mix. He explains that there are three factors: God, the soul, and the world. He establishes “dualism” by holding that there are distinctions: God is not the world, God is not the soul. The soul is not the world, the soul is not God. Madhva is determined to demonstrate an eternal and absolute distinction between these ideas.

Another South Indian school is that of Rāmanuja. His “Vishishtadwaita-vada” allows for a certain overlap between potent and potency, between energetic and energy. His most famous analogy is that of the sun and its rays. The sun’s rays are not the sun--and they they are the sun’s energy. There is a one-ness of quality--and yet an important distinction. A ray of sunlight is never equal to the sun. In the same way, the soul--while an energetic emanation from the Divine--can never equal God Himself.

Ramānuja’s view has had much influence throughout India and even in the modern world. Rudolph Otto, the great German theologian, adopted much of Ramānuja’s theism in his defense of Christianity against the inroads made by Kant.

These two, Madhva and Ramanuja were really the most potent alternatives to the Vedantic philosophy of Shankara. And yet, while taking sannyāsa in the line of Madhva and showing sympathy for Ramanuja, Śrī Caitanya’s views are more subtle.

Caitanya Mahāprabhu developed a more flexible dualism, called “acintya-bhedābheda-vāda,” borrowing some elements from the mystical bheda-ābheda-vāda or dwaita-adwaita of Nimbarka, an ancient Vaishnava preceptor. Nimbarka argued for dualistic nondualism. The idea is that while a certain “one-ness” may be directly observable, this nondualism is not existential but phenomenal.

Śrī Caitanya adds the concept of acintya meaning “beyond comprehension.” Oddly enough this squares with much of twentieth century philosophical thought surrounding relativity and quantum physics. On one level we live in a world of Newtonian physics and Euclidean geometry. On a different level conscious observation seems to have an effect on reality. Is the world in the mind or is the mind in the world?

Berkeleyan idealism, the idea that only mind exists is extreme; so too is the materialist view that only matter exists. There must be some common ground, some room for flexibility between the reality that matter possesses certain qualities of consciousness and the notion that consciousness appears to be no more than an epiphenomenon of material causation.

Since Śrī Caitanya instructed his followers through the oral tradition of the guru-disciple relationship he left no written teachings on the subject. Sanātana and Rūpa Goswāmi’s writings deal more with the ontology of divine love. Who then would write a significant philosophical treatise defending the Vedantic views of the Gaudiya Vaishnava school?

Again, this duty fell to Jīva Goswāmī.

In his Laghu-toṣanī commentary Jīva Goswāmī gives some biographical information. One of his ancestors was a respectable brahmaṇa of Karṇāṭaka in South India named Sarvajña. Sarvajña was king of the region in 1381 AD. His learning was renowned and he was known as jagad-guru, or “universal teacher. Sarvajña’s son and successor was Aniruddha who became King in 1416. His sons were Rūpeśvara and Harihara. Harihara eventually succeeded Aniruddha through some political machinations, exiling his brother Rūpeśvara who was forced to leave Karṇāṭaka.

Rūpeśvara was well-learned in the scriptures and taught them to his son, Padmanābha who finally settled at Navahaṭṭa or Naihati in Bengal.

Padmanābha’s son was Mukunda who moved to Yesohar or Jessore in Bāklā Chandradwip Paragana.

His son was Kumaradeva. Among the many sons of Kumaradeva were Sanātana, Rūpa, and Vallabha, who is also known as Anupama. These three brother grew up and were educated in a village called Sakurma near the capital of Gauḍa, Bengal, and lived at the house of their maternal uncle after the passing of their father, Kumaradeva.

Of the three brothers, Sanātana was the oldest son of Kumaradeva. Rūpa was his second son and Vallabha was the youngest. According to Śrīla Bhaktisiddhānta Saraswati’s commentary on Śrī Caitanya Caritamṛta, Śrī Sanātana Goswāmī was born in 1488, while Rūpa Goswami was born 5 years later in 1493.

While “Sanātana” and “Rūpa” were their spiritual names given by Chaitanya Mahaprabhu to the two brothers when they later became his disciples, their former names are not conclusively known. Some say that their original names were Amara and Santosha respectively.

The brothers served as ministers to Hussain Shah, who was the ruler of Gauda or King of Bengal. At that time, Sanātana was appointed Revenue Officer or “Sākar Mallik” and was known by this name, where Rūpa was made “Dabir Khās” or private secretary to the king. Both Rūpa and Sanātana Goswāmī met with Śrī Caitanya and became his disciples. Unfortunately, Vallabha or Anupama never met Śrī Caitanya, but died tragically on the way to Jagannātha Pruī.

So it was that Jīva lost his father when very young. He had a tendency towards self-abnegation from early childhood. Jīva had personally met Nityānanda Prabhu at Nabadwip and by his mercy was instructed to go to Vrindaban. Jīva studied Sanskrit grammar, Smṛti and the six philosophical systems of India at Vārānāsī under the guidance of Madhusudana Vachaspati. He became erudite in all the scriptures and when he finished his studies went to Vrindaban, following the order of Nityānanda Prabhu.

In Vrindaban he studied the Bhāgavata and other scriptural works with his uncles, Rūpa and Sanātana, who trained him in the teachings of Śrī Caitanya Mahāprabhu.

In this way, Jīva Goswāmī soon became the deepest scholar of both the divine precepts of Śrī Caitanya and the devotional literature of the Goswāmis. He is considered the topmost authority on all doctrinal matters especially those concerning the theology of Caitanya Vaishnavism.

Later in life, when Jīva Goswāmī was an old man, he taught Śyāmananda Paṇḍita, Śrīnivāsa Ācārya, and Narottama Dās Ṭhakura who propagated the written works of Rūpa, Sanātana, and Jīva Goswāmī throught India.

Jīva Goswāmī was initiated by Rūpa Goswāmī. His work includes commentaries on Rūpa Goswāmi’s Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu and Ujjvala-nīlamaṇi. At the request of Sanātana Goswāmī, Jīva Goswāmī revised his Bhagavat commentary called the Bṛhad-Vaiṣṇava-toṣaṇi. Both Rūpa and Sanātana Goswāmī had great regard for his enthusiasm, scholarship and realization.

Jīva Goswāmi’s defining master work is his “Six Sandarbhas.” According to Jiva Goswami, Gopala Bhatta Goswami had already done the preliminary work on the Six Sandarbhas but did not complete it. Jiva took the work of Gopala Bhatta and expanded it into six parts, systematically presenting the philosophy of Chaitanya Mahaprabhu and providing scriptural evidences in support of his views.

It was Sri Jiva Goswami's genius to clearly define the Six Topics of the Sandarbhas which are:

1. Bhagavat Sandarbha.

Here Jīva Goswāmi elaborates on the epistemology of Vaishavism as revealed in the Bhagavat Purana.

2. Krishna Sandarbha. https://theharekrishnamovement.files.wordpress.com/2014/09/sri-krishna-sandarbha-kusakratha.pdf

The second of the six famous “Sat-Sandarbhas” A logical and sastric establishment of bhakti unto Lord Sri Krishna by Srila Jiva Goswami A scriptural treatise the highest theistic truths on the nature, quality and pastimes of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Reality the Beautiful, Śrī Kṛṣṇa. Here's a link to a translation: http://www.krishnapath.org/Library/Goswami-books/Jiva/Jiva_Goswami_Sri_Bhagavat_Sandarbha.pdf

3. Paramātmā Sandarbha:

Here Jīva Goswāmī expounds an elaborate essay on the nature of Paramātmā. The distinction between Absolute Reality’s manifestations as Paramātmā and Bhagavān is relatively unknown, even to specialists in the field of Vedānta. These two specific designations are often used synonymously to refer to a single aspect of the tattva. It was Śrī Jīva Gosvāmī’s genius to clearly define them and enumerate their characteristics and functions in detail. There is no other work in the entire gamut of Indian theological and philosophical literature that throws light on this subject so lucidly. A link to an English language translation follows for those interested in further understanding.

http://www.krishnapath.org/Library/Goswami-books/Jiva/Jiva_Goswami_Sri_Paramatma_Sandarbha.pdf

4. Tattva-Sandarbha: Of the Six Sandarbhas, Tattva Sandarbha is the smallest in size, but not in importance. As its name suggests, it discusses the Reality (tattva) that is the ultimate subject to be understood and realized. Tattva also means “essence,” and thus Tattva Sandarbha provides the essence of what is to be elaborated upon in the rest of the Sandarbhas. Thus, it serves as an introduction to them. Here's a link to a translation. http://www.krishnapath.org/Library/Goswami-books/Jiva/Jiva_Goswami_Sri_Tattva_Sandarbha.pdf

It may be said that Tattva Sandarbha lays the foundation for entry into the subject matter of Bhāgavata Purāṇa, a detailed analysis of which follows in the rest of the Sandarbhas. It does so particularly by providing the epistemological viewing frame through which Bhagavān is directly intuited, devotionally served, and established ultimately as the supreme object of divine love.

5. Bhakti-Sandarbha:

This work establishes the practice of bhakti or divine love as the highest theistic form of religion. Here's the link: http://www.gokulbhajan.com/all-books/books-gaudiya/Sri%20Bhakti%20Sandarbha.pdf

6. Priti-Sandarbha:

Jīva Goswāmī’s final treatise, the Priti Sandarbha describes the highest kind of divine love.

I will try to add more to this article as time permits. It must be noted that while the literature of Jīva Goswāmī is highly valuable as source material, many of the terms used involve special language which is best interpreted with the help of a living spiritual guide or guru. The guru’s guidance is indispensable for understanding the true nature of bhakti. Since much has been lost through the ravages of time and language is often misunderstood especially in translation book-reading is no substitute for the help of a realized spiritual guide or guru. The online references above are merely that: references and cannot be definitive unless read with the help of a teacher who will help us separate the evolution of theological doctrine from the time of Jīva Goswāmī from proper daily practice in our own personal devotional life. A link: http://www.krishnapath.org/Library/Goswami-books/Jiva/Jiva_Goswami_Sri_Priti_Sandarbha.pdf

I hope readers find this information edifying.

Peace and Love

Hare Krishna vs. Hippie Death Cults

I’m working on a novel based in the 1960s. It was a volatile time. I’m trying to reconstruct the era from memory, but sometimes research is needed. Looking back on that time perhaps no one captured it better than Joan Didion. Didion is arguably the best writer of her time. She wrote a book of essays called “Slouching Towards Bethlehem. It’s a classic and assigned reading in any writing course. Didion is a “writer’s writer.” Slouching Towards Bethlehem documents a few days in the Summer of Love of 1967 and does a great job.

And yet...

Didion, while a product of both California and the Deep South is a quintessentially “New Yorker” writer. She has the East Coast snide attitude towards all things California. And it is through this lens of polished cynicism that we are made to view the “Summer of Love.”

Included in her collection of essays is a brief story about one of the members of the so-called “Manson family.”

Didion’s acceptance in the canon of great writers means her “take” on the Summer of Love is the one that is canonized as conventional wisdom. And so it is that hippies are forever welded in the American psyche not as flower children, but as the children of the Manson family.

The Manson "family"

The conventional wisdom holds that the hippies were co-opted by hard drugs and cynical hustlers; the innocence of 1967s “Summer of Love” was lost after the 1968 killing of Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy. The Woodstock Nation was a dream that died at Altamont, when the Rolling Stones celebrated nihilism and “Sympathy for the Devil” as the Hell’s Angels beat a man to death. Charles Manson’s hippie death cult was the final nail in the coffin of peace and love.

"Hippies?"

Charles Manson died a couple of weeks ago. The mainstream media trotted out the trite old memes, just as I have repeated them, chapter and verse. These memes were repeated in the echo chambers of blogs and twitter pages until anyone who paid attention had got the message, the received wisdom.

I mention this, because I am a member of an alternative religion. I believe in Krishna and like to chant the holy name. It is odd that my spiritual teacher, Swami Prabhupad, had nothing to do with the so-called hippies. And yet, since a few famous hippies liked him, the Hare Krishna movement has somehow been associated with the hippies.

The most prominent hippie to endorse the Hare Krishna movement was, of course, the poet Allen Ginsberg. Ginsberg was a Beat Poet, not a hippie. But even before his opposition to the Vietnam War, He was branded a subversive and his poetry censored as obscene. Ginsberg found refuge in the holy name of Krishna. He met Prabhupada in New York.

He liked him and tried to help his Hare Krishna movement. When Prabhupada visited San Francisco in 1967, Ginsberg arranged for him to speak at a concert event at the Avalon Ballroom. Prabhupada preached Krishna consciousness during the intermission of a Rock concert there which featured the Grateful Dead.

Didion’s book mentions all this and ties together in the public mind the chanting of the Hare Krishna mantra and the hippie movement of the Summer of Love. Since the followers of Prabhupada had the temerity to preach the Hare Krishna mantra to Christians the public was alarmed. “Hare Krishna Hippie Death Cult” was a perfect newspaper headline. Of course there was no such thing as a Hippie Death Cult, much less a Hare Krishna one. But then along came Charles Manson. His drug-crazed “hippie” followers murdered a family in cold blood not far from where I lived in Hollywood.

The publicity surrounding the case seemed to prove what God-fearing Christian America wanted to hear: Hippies were not innocent flower-children. Hippies were drug-crazed murderers and cult members. The worst of these were certainly the Hare Krishnas, who shaved their heads and paraded around chanting weird mantras and pounding on drums as they worked themselves into a state of ecstasy.

Never mind that Charles Manson was a Christian. Working at Guardian of Devotion Press years after Manson was imprisoned I received a letter from a prisoner who had read one of our publications, The Search for Śrī Kṛṣṇa by Śrīdhar Mahārāja. It was from a prisoner on Death Row, who lived in the same cell block as Charles Manson. He thanked us for the book which he had found in the prison library. It gave him much inspiration he wrote, asking if we had any other publications. I sent him a catalogue but never received a reply. Some time later I saw an article in the newspaper. Charles Manson had been attacked by a fellow prisoner. It seems that he had prohibited another man from practicing his religion and chanting Hare Krishna. There was a fight and Manson had been injured. That Charles Manson himself hated the Hare Krishna devotees, however, doesn’t matter. Hippies are hippies. Manson was the “leader” of the hippies. The Hare Krishnas were hippies. Therefore Hare Krishnas are part of the whole hippie death cult thing. Case closed.

Later on in the 1970s there was the strange case of Jim Jones, a self-proclaimed prophet. He had convinced his cult members to follow him to Guyana where he had established his own community, Jonestown. Convinced that the end of the world had come he had his followers drink poisoned Koolaid in a mass suicide pact.

Soon after this, the Hare Krishnas were again attacked for being a “death cult.” It doesn’t matter that all these death cults were Christian. Never mind that Krishna Consciousness is a form of Vaishnavism, practiced for thousands of years in India and other parts of Asia as far away as Thailand and Cambodia.

I can’t really hold Joan Didion responsible. She was merely another cynical writer trying to impress her readers with some strange and salacious material. Manson himself never told anyone to chant Hare Krishna. But it doesn’t matter. Propaganda is powerful. Chess champion and social critic Gary Kasparov has said: "The point of modern propaganda isn't only to misinform or push an agenda. It is to exhaust your critical thinking, to annihilate truth."
Hannah Arendt, writing in the Origins of Totalitarianism, observes:  “The ideal subject of totalitarian rules is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists.”

The purpose of propaganda is not to convince or persuade. Argument meant to persuade is logical. Propaganda exists to crush one’s capacity for critical thinking. Propaganda blurs the line between right and wrong to the point where we can no longer distinguish good and bad. We accept the invented “enemy” as the cause of our troubles. If Hitler blamed Germany’s problems on the Jews, Nixon had “dissidents, communist agitators and hippie death cults.” Nixon has since been rehabilitated, but it is prudent to remember he kept a black list of enemies and that John Lennon was on his “enemies list.”

I’m glad Charles Manson is gone. I hope he rots in hell. But I’m also impressed at how memes are created, turned into “history” and used as propaganda.

I’m not trying to advocate for the “hippies,” either. But I do remember that Woodstock Nation, for a brief shining moment gave us a glimpse at the idea that we could all get along despite our differences. I still believe that we can have a little peace and love, and yes chant Hare Krishna and be happy.

Chant Hare Krishna and Be Happy.

New Web Page

The Mahabharat Project has a new web page: http://mbharata.com

They also serve who only stand and wait.

I was recently writing on the subject of good and evil and quoted a few lines from John Milton's Paradise Lost.

Śrīla Śrīdhar Mahārāja was quite erudite and knew Milton's work.  He often quoted from Paradise Lost, especially the part where Satan expresses his rebellion in the lines:



Here at least
we shall be free; the Almighty hath not built
Here for his envy, will not drive us hence:
Here we may reign secure, and in my choice
to reign is worth ambition though in Hell:
Better to reign in Hell, than serve in Heaven.

He knew many of the English poets. One of Śrīdhar Maharaj's favorite poems was Milton's Sonnet on his Blindness and the line: "Doth God demand day labour, light denied?"

Sometimes we wait for service. Waiting is another kind of service, as Milton says in the last line.

Sonnet 19: When I consider how my light is spent

BY JOHN MILTON

When I consider how my light is spent, 

   Ere half my days, in this dark world and wide, 

   And that one Talent which is death to hide 

   Lodged with me useless, though my Soul more bent 

To serve therewith my Maker, and present 

   My true account, lest he returning chide; 

   “Doth God exact day-labour, light denied?” 

   I fondly ask. But patience, to prevent 

That murmur, soon replies, “God doth not need 

   Either man’s work or his own gifts; who best 

   Bear his mild yoke, they serve him best. His state 

Is Kingly. Thousands at his bidding speed 

   And post o’er Land and Ocean without rest: 

   They also serve who only stand and wait.”

Milton's reference here is to his amanuensis, his daughter. In his blindness he would write by dictating to his daughter.  His writing was his "day labour, light denied." His scribe was obliged to "stand and wait" his dictation, which depended on Milton's inspiration. But to "stand and wait" was also service.  So, some of us await patiently the opportunity to render some valuable service, but  the expectation of service is also a kind of service, according to Milton.

La Maleta

Ahora que nos acerca la temporada Navideña muchas piensan que es hora de hacer compras, de aumentar las pertenencias.

Una reflexion sobre las pertenencias.

La maleta

-Un hombre murió, al darse cuenta vio que se acercaba Dios y que llevaba una maleta consigo.

_Dios le dijo: _bien hijo es hora de irnos.

_El hombre asombrado pregunto: _Ya? Tan pronto?

Tenia muchos planes …._ lo siento pero es el momento de tu partida.

_ Que traes en la maleta? Pregunto el hombre y Dios le respondio :_ Tus pertenencias.

_ Mis pertenencias?? _Traes mis cosas, mi ropa, mi dinero?

_Dios le respondio: _ Eso nunca te pertenecio, eran de la tierra.

_Traes mis recuerdos? _Esos nunca te pertenecieron, eran del tiempo.

_Traes mis talentos? _ Esos no te pertenecieron, eran de las circunstancias.

_Traes a mis familiares y amigos?  _Lo siento, ellos nunca te pertenecieron, eran del camino.

_Traes a mi mujer y a mis hijos? _Ellos nunca te pertenecieron, eran de tu corazón.

_ Traes mi cuerpo? _Nunca te pertenecio, ese era del polvo.

_ Entonces traes mi alma? _ No! Esa era mia.

_Entonces el hombre lleno de miedo, le arrebato a Dios la maleta y al abrirla se dio cuenta que estaba vacia.

_Con una lagrima de desamparo brotando de sus ojos, el hombre dijo: Nunca tuve nada?

_Asi es, cada uno de los momentos que viviste fueron solo tuyos.

_ La vida es solo un momento…!!Un momento tuyo!!

Por eso, mientras estes a tiempo disfrutala en su totalidad.

Que nada de que crees que te pertenece te detenga…

Vive el ahora.!! _ Vive tu vida!!

No te olvides de SER FELIZ, es lo único que realmente vale la pena!

_Las cosas materiales y todo lo demás por lo que luchaste, se queda aquí.

_ NO TE LLEVAS NADA! Valora a quienes te valoran, no pierdas el tiempo con alguien que no tiene tiempo para ti.

The Enemy Within

The Face of Evil and the Devil Problem

“Please allow me to introduce myself, I'm a man of wealth and taste.” Sympathy for the Devil--Rolling Stones

“Mas vale diablo conocido que diablo por conocer” Mexican Proverb

“A friend of the devil is a friend of mine” Jerry Garcia

The other day I had a question from a friend:

The ‘Devil’ question.

Dear Mahayogi Prabhu can you help me with the ‘Devil’ question. Is there a Vedic Personality similar to the personification of ‘evil’ or lets say all things bad. King of the Demons maybe?? Thank you

This is a delicate question. I have no intimate knowledge of the devil. I would only be an expert on the devil if I had met him and made a pact with him. I assure you that I have done no such thing. And so, lacking intimate knowledge of the devil, I might demure from answering your query.

And yet, I seem to have a flair for considering such questions, so I shall essay an answer. I write to discover what I don’t know; sometimes I discover what I know.

The short answer to this question, as I understand it, is “No.” There is no such thing as a Vedic “Devil.” That is devil with a capital “D.” While there are a great number of small “d” devils and demons, ghouls and fiends, and even demonic “gods,” there is no personality in the Vedas or subsequent Puranic traditions quite like Satan.

So, before we go looking at the Vedic traditions of India for a parallel, perhaps it might be best to explore the Western Biblical and cultural traditions that have given us Satan.

First stop on our tour would be Manichaeism. This was a dualistic heresy started in the third century in ancient Persia. Its founder, Manichaeus (215-75) was considered divinely inspired by his numerous followers. He posits a universe balanced between two forces: Good and Evil. While good is personified by Almighty God, evil is incarnate in the devil. The universe is a conflict between good and evil; a timeless struggle between dark and light.

According to the online Catholic Dictionary, Manichaeism teaches that God is the creator of all that is good, and Satan of all that is evil. Man's spirit is from God, his body is from the devil. There is a constant struggle between the forces of good and those of evil. Good triumphs over evil only insofar as spirit rises superior to the body. In practice Manichaeism denies human responsibility for the evil that one does, on the premise that this is not due to one's own free will but to the dominance of Satan's power in one's life. https://www.catholicculture.org/culture/library/dictionary/index.cfm?id=34725

While Manichaeism was a dualistic religious system that began with the idea of harmonizing Christian, Gnostic, and pagan elements, the system was rejected as a heresy.

The idea of an Evil Power contra-poised against God is heresy since the All-powerful Almighty can have no rival. And yet this doctrine has a strange way of hanging on. St. Augustine of Hippo, arguably the most important of the founding Church fathers followed this system. He faithfully records in his “Confessions,” that as a young man, he was a Manichean for nine years.  He later took pains to write a refutation of their ideas. http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1402.htm

And yet Manichaeism lives on, in modern fundamentalist Christianity and even in Islam where adherents speak of the “Great Satan.” In modern fanaticism wherever the universe is considered a battlefield for control between an evil material god, and a good spiritual god there are elements of this ancient point of view.

Manicheaism was exorcised as heresy since while Christians might see Satan as an evil influence, even an evil “god” they couldn’t countenance the view that Satan was as powerful as Jehovah. The One God could have no rival in an Evil Being. Doctrine holds that Satan is a created being, unlike God, who is primordial. And yet, while a heretical point of view, many religion maintain the concept of a primordial struggle between good and evil.

The different strands of doctrine and faith were gathered together by the Italian poet Dante, who wove them together in his great poem La Divina Commedia with such dexterity that his view of heaven and hell tempers our own. Dante in turn influenced Milton who gave us the English view of Satan.

In his heroic attempt to “justify the ways of God to Man,” Milton may avoid the sin of Manicheaism--His Satan is never a true rival to God--and yet as a poet he well understood the need to create a compelling antagonist.

Writing sometime after Milton, the wild visionary artistic poet William BBlake went so far as to claim that Milton had unconsciously, but justly, sided with the Devil. Milton’s Satan defies the decrepit Nobodaddy of creation, saying that he prefers independence to service: “Rather rule in hell than serve in heaven.”

For Blake, the dark angel’s rebellious energy against the oppressive rule of Jehovah is purport of human existence. This view was echoed by the literary critic William Hazlitt, who decided that Milton’s Satan was “the most heroic subject that ever was chosen for a poem.”

English literary tradition from Milton to Mick Jagger has often found that the rebel angel’s Heaven-defying resistance was the mirror image of man’s own rebellion against tyranny, political or religious. The poet Shelley agreed with Blake. While allowing that Satan’s character is flawed, he maintained that Milton’s Satan is the moral superior to his tyrannical God.

This “Romantic” criticism of Milton’s Satan led to what is called the “Byronic” hero or “anti-hero” found everywhere in literature and popular culture as the “bad boy” or ambivalent hero. Examples of Byronic or Satanic heros abound from Napoleon to Batman, the “Dark Knight.”

Catholic Theologian Elaine Pagels points out in her excellent “The Origin of Satan” that Satan is not a personality. The word satan references obstacles on the path to enlightenment. According to Pagels, the traditions that have arisen around Satan is more folklore than Biblical. I quote her work extensively as follows:

“In the Hebrew Bible, as in mainstream Judaism to this day, Satan never appears as Western Christendom has come to know him, as the leader of an “evil empire,” an army of hostile spirits who make war on God and humankind alike. As he first appears in the Hebrew Bible, Satan is not necessarily evil, much less opposed to God. On the contrary, he appears in the book of Numbers and in Job as one of God’s obedient servants—a messenger, or angel, a word that translates the Hebrew term for messenger (mal’āk) into Greek (angelos). In Hebrew, the “angels were often called “sons of God” (benē ’elōhīm), and were envisioned as the hierarchical ranks of a great army, or the staff of a royal court.

In biblical sources the Hebrew term the satan describes an adversarial role. It is not the name of a particular character. Although Hebrew storytellers as early as the sixth century B.C.E. occasionally introduced a supernatural character whom they called the satan, what they meant was any one of the angels sent by God for the specific purpose of blocking or obstructing human activity. The root śṭn means “one who opposes, obstructs, or acts as adversary.” (The Greek term diabolos, later translated “devil,” literally means “one who throws something across one’s path.”)

“The satan’s presence in a story could help account for unexpected obstacles or reversals of fortune. Hebrew storytellers often attribute misfortunes to human sin. Some, however, also invoke this supernatural character, the satan, who, by God’s own order or permission, blocks or opposes human plans and desires. But this messenger is not necessarily malevolent. God sends him, like the angel of death, to perform a specific task, although one that human beings may not appreciate; as the literary scholar Neil Forsyth says of the satan, “If the path is bad, an obstruction is good.” Thus the satan may simply have been sent by the Lord to protect a person from worse harm.”

Excerpt From: Elaine Pagels. “The Origin of Satan.”

I hope I have not strayed too far from the original question by considering the development of the Devil’s “character” in Western myth and cultural tradition. But what we see in Western Christianity is a movement away metaphor. The idea of dark angels as metaphor for dark impulses hardens into a kind of comic book character: “the devil.”

This becomes all too often an escape mechanism for personal responsibility: “The Devil made me do it.”

But the Devil does not lead us into temptation. The modernist Pope Francis is leading a movement to change the Lord’s Prayer: instead of saying, “Lead us not into temptation,” he wants the prayer to read, “Let us not fall into temptation.” The idea is that “temptation” is internal. It is not caused by an external force like the Devil. In our desperation to escape responsibility for our own sins, we look for bogeymen who can take the blame. The Devil with his horns is a convenient scapegoat.

Still I am escaping my friend’s question, which was about the Vedic Personality of Evil. My intention was to first get a grip on what we mean by “Personality of Evil.”

Is there a Vedic Devil? As I have said, the short answer is “No.” There may be some good candidates. Various figures and personalities in the Puranic stories might be said to embody evil. There are many powerful demons mentioned in the histories, from the Mahabharata and Ramayana to the Bhagavat Purana. There are demons like Kumbakarana and Ravana who challenges Ram himself. Hiranyagarbha and Hiranyakashipu are good candidates. But Ram pauses in the middle of the battle to hear instructions about good government from the demon Ravana. And the Bhagavat teaches us that even such terrible demons have come to earth to teach us a lesson about the Lord’s pastimes and avatars.

After all, there is no Ram without Ravana. Without the terrible demon Hiranyakashipu there can be no deliverance of Prahlada at the hands of Nṛsimhadeva.

It has been argued that without the betrayal of Judas there would have been no sacrifice by Christ and no salvation for mankind, thereby making Judas the greatest of the apostles.

The Satanic era of dark mills and factories decried by the poet William Blake is supposed to be presided over by Kali, the dark spirit of the iron age. But only in the Age of Kali does Caitanya Mahaprabhu appear to save the fallen souls with the power of the holy name.

And if Kali is not the embodiment of sin, then who is responsible for the darkness of this age of evil? If there is no personality who causes us to do evil, then who is the culprit?

It’s an old atheist trick to accuse God of evil. If God exists, why doesn’t he do something? How can he condone the terrors of this world? Who is the source of all this horror?

To find the face of evil there is no need to seek out a devil’s mask; we have only to look in the mirror. God has not created evil as a scourge to man; we need only look within to find the fault.

God is not at fault for creating a universe filled with evil. Evil is our own creation.

To understand this, we may now turn for a moment from the problem of the personification of evil and the Devil Himself. Let’s look at the problem of evil as it is seen in the most ancient of scriptures, the Vedas.

If Western Christianity considers Evil as nascent with the Fall, a product of Adam’s temptation, a stain that blackens the soul from birth, the Vedas have distinct point of view.

“Evil” as such is seen from different perspectives. If dharma is religion and duty, then the opposite is “evil” in a sense. Adharma is bad conduct, avoidance of duty, irreligious behavior. On a social level this means rule-breaking and criminality. On a higher, more spiritual, level adharma means forgetfulness of one’s true spiritual nature or self-interest. Ignorance of self-realization is a kind of adharma. Forgetfulness of one’s eternal nature as spiritual energy is the root of all evil. Such forgetfulness is the beginning of ahaṁkara or false ego. Ego begets a dark kind of intelligence based on a perverted sense of self. This in turn engenders mental “selfishness” and choices based on lust, anger, greed, pride, illusion and envy. The point of dharma as a life-principle is to correct this forgetfulness and ignorance. But Evil as such is not an innate principle of Vedic teaching. It is not that darkness is a force opposed to light. Darkness is the absence of light--not a rival entity. Englightenment is turning toward illumination-the divine light, especially the light of God Himself, the Divine Personality of Godhead, Śrī Kṛṣṇa, Reality the Beautiful.

It is our ignorance that turns us away from light--not some supernatural angel or demon. As we reject our identity as divine light, servants of the divine God, our misidentification draws us into the shadows of false ego. And it is through false ego, misdirected intelligence, and are mind driven by false choices that we embrace the dark side. We become involved with the shadows of a kind of holographic puppet show that we accept as reality.

While the supreme may have enabled this illusion through the agency of his divine energy, called Maya, he is not responsible personally for the evils that befall us. Neither is Maya the devil. Once again, it is not that an evil force contra poised to God has created evil as an objective reality. God himself has no hand in forcing us to participate in the illusion. He has not “led us into temptation”.

According to Vedic knowledge, Maya or illusion acts as a kind of stage director providing us with the props to put on our show. Under the illusion of false ego we act as the protagonists in a shadow reality. the holographic universe projected through kind of mass hypnosis, aided and abetted by the illusory energy, and confirmed by the immanent God as Paramatma is certainly real. And yet because of its temporal nature it is unreal. The duality of the material world is real, but if the only reality is eternal, then only God and souls exist.

Maya, then, helps in the creation of our dream like existence. But Maya is not the devil.

Vedic knowledge offers us no convenient devil. If there is any devil, then, he is within us. The problem of good and evil is one of remembering our true self-interest. Spiritual life begins with understanding this principle the soul is eternal. And if the soul is eternal what relation has a living soul with the living God.

The most ancient of discussions on the nature of evil is found in the Book of Manu. in this ancient law book, Manu speaks as the primordial Man, the conscience of humanity giving the law. But while he prescribes a list of punishments for a host of evil deeds he reserves judgment on the problem of evil itself, since evil has already been defined as simply a turning away from good.

In the Christian universe there is only one life. At birth we understand with original sin. We have one short life to reform ourselves by turning away from the devil and accepting a life of redemption with Jesus Christ. If we are successful, and eternal life in heaven awaits. But if we fail, we are condemned to an eternal life in hell.

The Vedic conception has no such simple analysis. Heaven and hell and life on earth are part of an eternal cycle: the circle of birth and death. One may rise and fall on the wheel of karma, but as long as one is concerned with mortal happiness and unhappiness one is condemned to constant birth and rebirth on the wheel. Only by discovering one’s true spiritual self-interest does one become liberated from the wheel of karma. And while liberation in a general sense means becoming transcendental to the wheel of karma, there is a higher sense. True liberation means discovering one’s complete identity as an eternal servant of God, Krishna, and participation in the divine pastimes of the sweet absolute.

There is a dichotomy in the problem of Dharma. For Dharma simply means good conduct within one’s own society. Dharma can mean good participation in the world of birth and death. Insofar as good karma and good participation in the system of heaven and hell is temporary good behavior in the material world is something like good behavior in a prison. The prisoner achieves benefits through good behavior, but these benefits accrue only within the prison system. According to the Bhagavat even the merits of heaven and hell belong to the world of karma. So in a higher sense, Dharma must go beyond the good conduct required to achieve the merits of heaven.Law aims only at the good conduct aspect of Dharma. His law looks at evil and violence in terms of bad conduct which must be punished. But essential to his teaching is really the idea of “hate the sin, not the sinner.” The idea that evil is in the world is found nowhere in his philosophy. How then could there be a personification of evil? In the round cycle of eternity every soul may find redemption and no one is consigned to the flames of hell forever. The Vedic law as it pertains to the world of karma is concerned with what is to be done and what is not to be done. It contains no concept of ultimate evil and so no one personifies evil.

In general Vedic Dharma promotes compassion and mercy as virtues. Good Dharma involves moral propriety, social responsibility, compassion and generosity. Higher Dharma appeals to self-sacrifice, self abnegation, and finally dedication to God himself

if we find the ancient law of Dharma in the book of Manu, a higher analysis of spiritual principles may be found in the Bhagavad-Gita. There, Krishna defines evil as a function of different influences. This analysis is subtle.

While much Christian theology seems to view the problem of evil in terms of black-and-white hell hot and sin black, God vs. the devil Krishna not only sees scales of gray but different hues of color.

Just as all color is seen by human eyes is an effective light and shadow that can be broken into three primary colors, Krishna explains that all phenomenon falls under the influence of three primordial qualities. These qualities will develop into all the varieties of mental and physical phenomena. If evil is a function of darkness and darkness of facet of light the different colors and shadows present in our material phenomena as the stuff of matter are a consequence of the presence or absence of these different influences called gunas. The “influences” are the threads from which the holograph of material phenomenon are woven.

When the predominating influence is that of tama-guna, or that of ignorance, evil is more present than good. So the problem of human life becomes elimination of darker influences.

Insofar as we fall under the power of bad influences, we may be subject to temptation or evil. But Vedic knowledge informs us that our descent into darkness is ultimately our own personal choice. We may not blame our lack of enlightenment on any devil, natural or supernatural. Temptation, like false ego and ignorance is internal. In this sense, the enemy is within.

In a talk given on 28 November 2013

Śrīla Bhakti Rakṣak Śrīdhar Dev-Goswāmī Mahārāj advises how we can avoid our six enemies.

Śrīla Mādhavendra Purī perhaps said,

kāmādināṁ kati na katidhā pālitā durnideśās
teṣāṁ jātā mayi na karuṇā na trapā nopaśāntiḥ
utsṛjyaitān atha yadu-pate sāmprataṁ labdha-buddhis
tvām āyātaḥ śaraṇam abhayaṁ māṁ niyuṅkṣvātma-dāsye
(Śrī Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu: Paśchima-vibhāga, 2.35)

“O Lord of the Yadu dynasty, Kṛṣṇa, I have come to Your feet to explain my position. Please consider it.”

What is that position? “Kāmādināṁ kati na katidhā pālitā durnideśās: for so long I have left no stone unturned to satisfy my masters: kāma, krodha, lobha, moha, mada, and mātsarya. These inner six enemies have very cruelly and harshly exacted such a great amount of service from me. But I have not received any remuneration from them, not a drop of peace. I have not been paid anything. From time immemorial, I have been rendering service to these enemies, but up till now, I have not seen any satisfaction in their faces. They are as hard as before.

“Pālitā durnideśās: and what have I not done? Whatever they have ordered, instantaneously I have obeyed that. In the middle of night, my lord said, ‘Oh, you must go there and steal something, some fruit from there.’ ‘You must charge your enemy with a bomb.’ Krodha, anger, roused me at midnight to kill someone, and I obeyed. So what have I not done to carry out the order of these enemies living within me?

“Now I am disgusted, my Lord. I am now fully disgusted.

kāmādināṁ kati na katidhā pālitā durnideśās
teṣāṁ jātā mayi na karuṇā

“I could not satisfy or propitiate them. Na trapā nopaśāntiḥ: and in my own self, I also find that no reaction has yet come in me for that. Na trapā: I am not ashamed. Nopaśāntiḥ: I have not made any reactionary or temporary truce: ‘I will stop. I can’t do this for the time being. Give me some rest.’

“But somehow,  I don’t know why, or how, I have run to You. I have run to You! Utsṛjyaitān, somehow I have avoided their vigilant eyes and run to You.

utsṛjyaitān atha yadu-pate sāmprataṁ labdha-buddhis
tvām āyātaḥ

“I have approached You. Śaraṇam abhayaṁ māṁ niyuṅkṣvātma-dāsye: You are the real shelter who can save me from these enemies. I have felt this dictation from inside. Māṁ niyuṅkṣvātma-dāsye: please give me some engagement. If You engage me, then they will all fly away in fear. If only they hear that You have given me shelter and engagement, then, whatever their account book may say, they will fly away.”

If we can make any contact with that plane, with the nirguṇa bhūmi [land of dedication], then other plenary influences will withdraw at once.

nehābhikrama-nāśo ’sti pratyavāyo na vidyate
svalpam apy asya dharmasya trāyate mahato bhayāt
(Śrīmad Bhagavad-gītā: 2.40)

And we will be saved from great disaster.

“Please, grant me some shelter.”

That is the advice, instruction, of our Guru Mādhavendra Purī: “Anyhow, run. When they are a little unmindful of you, at that moment run, take shelter.”