The word Brahman or Sat has no proper equivalent in English. The nearest is the ultimate reality or the ultimate truth. The intellectuals however apply reality to individual objects or to the multiplicity of them all, whereas Advaitins apply it to the non-duality. Brahman is called "That" because it is something not known yet by the seeker.
The word Brahman means ultimate truth or reality which cannot be indicated by any word.
Rig Veda: ~ 'Prajnanam Brahma'- Consciousness is the ultimate reality or Brahman or God in truth.
God in truth is the Atman, the Self. Atman is present in the form of consciousness.
Do not accept any other God other than Atman not worship other than Atman.
Let these words be inscribed in your subconscious.
Nothing is real but God. Nothing Matters but love for God in truth. God in truth is everywhere and in everything.
God in truth is hidden by the illusory universe. God in truth alone is and all else is an illusion.
Reality has its source in Brahman. Reality has its grounding sustenance in Brahman. It is in Brahman that all reality has its ultimate repose. Vedas specifically, are consciously and exclusively aimed toward this reality termed Brahman.
In the 'Taittariya Upanishad' II.1:~ Brahman is described in the following manner: "Satyam jnanam anantam brahma", "Brahman is of the nature of truth, knowledge, and infinity." Infinite positive qualities and states have their existence secured solely by virtue of Brahman is the very reality. Brahman is a necessary reality, eternal (i.e., beyond the purview of temporality), fully independent, non-contingent, and the source and ground of all things. Brahman is both immanently present in the realm of materiality, interpenetrating the whole of reality as the sustaining essence that gives it structure, meaning, and existential being, yet Brahman is simultaneously the transcendent origin of all things (thus, panentheistic).
Advaitic Gnana is given neither from outside nor from any Guru. It can be realized by each and every one. The Gnana Guru of everyone is only the Soul, the Self that is always revealing when the seeker is ready and receptive.
Swami Vivekananda: ~ If religion and life depend upon books or upon the existence of any prophet whatsoever, then perish all religion and books! Religion is in us. No books or teachers can do more than help us to find it, and even without them, we can get all the truth within. You have gratitude for books and teachers without bondage to them, and worship your Guru as God, but do not obey him blindly; love him all you will, but think for yourself. No blind belief can save you, work out your own salvation. Have only one idea of God - that He is an eternal help.
Yoga Vasistha:~ "Teachers, interpretations of sacred texts, the force of religious merit--none of these lead to the realization of that Ultimate Truth which is revealed in the clear reflection of the heart, engendered from contact with the good."
Sage Sankara says: ~ Aparoksh Anubhuti: ~ A. A 5~ Atman (the seer) in itself is alone permanent, the seen is opposed to it (ie., transient) – such a settled conviction is truly known as discrimination.
A.A 19. Atman is all consciousness and holy, the body is all flesh and impure; and yet, etc.,
A.A 45. There exists no other material cause of this phenomenal universe except Brahman. Hence this whole universe is but Brahman and nothing else.
A.A 46. From such declaration (of the Shruti) as “All this is Atman”, it follows that the idea of the pervaded and the pervading is illusory. This supreme truth being realized, where is the room for any distinction between the cause and the effect?
A.A 47. Certainly, the Shruti has directly denied manifoldness in Brahman. The non-dual cause being an established fact, how could the phenomenal universe be different from It?
A.A 48. Moreover, the Shruti has condemned (the belief in variety) in the words, “The person who”, being deceived by Maya, “sees variety in this (Brahman), goes from death to death”.
A.A 49. Inasmuch as all beings are born of Brahman, the supreme Atman, they must be understood to be verily Brahman.
A.A 50. The Shruti has clearly declared that Brahman alone is the substratum of all varieties of names, forms, and actions.
A.A 51. Just as a thing made of gold ever has the nature of gold, so also a being born of Brahman has always the nature of Brahman.
A.A 53. When duality appears through ignorance, one sees another; but when everything becomes identified with the Atman, one does not perceive another even in the least.
A.A 54. In that state when one realizes all as identified with the Atman, there arises neither delusion nor sorrow, as a consequence of the absence of duality.
A.A 55. The Shruti in the form of the Brihadaranyaka has declared that this Atman, which is the Self of all, is verily Brahman.
A.A 56. This world, though an object of our daily experience and serving all practical purposes, is, like the dream world, of the nature of non-existence, inasmuch as it is contradicted the next moment.
A.A 57. The dream (experience) is unreal in waking, whereas the waking (experience) is absent in the dream. Both, however, are non-existent in deep sleep which, again, is not experienced in either.
A.A 58. Thus, all the three states are unreal inasmuch as they are the creation of the three Gunas, but their witness (the reality behind them) is, beyond all Gunas, eternal, one, and is Consciousness itself.
A.A 59. Just as (after the illusion has gone) one is no more deluded to see a jar in earth or silver in the nacre, so does one no more see Jiva in Brahman when the latter is realized (as one’s own self).
A.A 68. Atman, though ever pure (to a wise man), always appears to be impure (to an ignorant one), just as a rope always appears in two different ways to a knowing person and an ignorant one.
A.A. 87. Thus through ignorance arises in Atman the delusion of the body, which, again, through Self-realization, disappears in the supreme Atman.
A.A 88. When the whole universe, movable and immovable, is known to be Atman, and thus the existence of everything else is negated, where is then any room to say that the body is Atman?
A.A 96. The real nature of the rope being known, the appearance of the snake no longer persists; so the substratum being known, the phenomenal world disappears completely.
A.A 98. “And all the actions of a man perish when he realizes that (Atman) which is both the higher and the lower”. Here the clear use of the plural by the Shruti is to negate Prarabdha as well.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.