Text of the Bhagavagd Gita (Mother's Institute of Research) - Session 25: Jivatma; Chapter 7—Verses 6-18 (30 June 1999)
We had referred to those two verses in the 7th chapter, 4&5: 4, which describes Apara Prakriti, and 5, which describes Para Prakriti. Apara Prakriti is also called Prakriti of Avidya, and Para Prakriti is also called Prakriti of Vidya. To rise from Avidya to Vidya is the process of Moksha.
In the process of Moksha there are 3 elements: there is the individual who rises from ignorance to knowledge; secondly there is the higher nature, which aids in the process of rising from the lower to the higher; and there is the Purushottama, the Supreme with whom union is to be attained.
But there is another aspect of the process of Moksha, which is most prevalent in the world, and that is to rise from our present level to the immobility of the Self. Para Prakriti is both mobile and immobile; Purushottama is both mobile and immobile; and the Jiva, the individual, is himself capable of both mobility and immobility. But there is an immobile self, which can be experienced as simply immobile. And to rise from Avidya to the immobility of the self is generally regarded to be the royal road or the shortcut to Moksha. This immobile self is sometimes known by the word ‘Purusha’; sometimes it is also known by the word ‘Brahman’; it is also known as ‘Akshara’.
And this process consists of a positive method and a negative method. In the negative method, the process consists of saying: “I am not the body, I am not the life, I am not the mind, I am not the ego”. All that refers to Apara Prakriti is negated by a constant meditation upon these four propositions. When one meditates, one meditates by saying: “I am not the body, I am not the life, I am not the mind, I am not the ego”. By constant repetition, there is a memory of what one is.
By negating these four propositions one enters into a positive statement, which says: “I am Purusha”, which is immobile, or “I am the Brahman”, which is immobile, or “I am Akshara”, which is immobile. This is the positive statement. “I am the Brahman”: a constant repetition of this statement and constant meditation on it lifts you away from our occupation with the outer objects, with the body, life, mind, and ego. And it is suggested that by constant meditation, there is a complete reversal of consciousness, and by this reversal you attain a state of complete silence, complete immobility. When this state of immobility is reached, the ego vanishes and even the body, life and mind seem to be as it were appendages without any foundation or reality: almost like a dream. Some of the Yogis remain in this state of a dream with regard to the whole world, and they feel that the whole world itself is a dream and illusion having no power upon the immobile self.
Now, this experience is a valid experience. And when ego falls away, one really becomes free from attachment, because the hook is thrown away. There is now no hook on which you are hanging in the Apara Prakriti; and you are lifted away into the state of immobility. And in the state of immobility, even you as an individual, you can feel that you are transcended and that individuality becomes laya (dissolution, disappearance), there is a complete fusion, it disappears, even the individuality disappears. According to this experience it is felt that the individual even in the beginning was an illusion, ego was an illusion and all that has disappeared now and what remains is only the immobility of the Brahman.
Very often when you read accounts of Moksha, it is this account, which is predominantly stated. This is called liberation by self-knowledge: “the self, which was regarding itself to be ego”, ‘that’ is found to be ignorance. To regard oneself as ego is an ignorance belonging to the Apara Prakriti; you lift yourself from it and enter into a self-knowledge in which you find to be immobile self: that is called self-knowledge. It is also called knowledge because this self is found to be the only reality, and there is the sense of oneness: immobility and oneness are the special characteristics of this experience of Moksha.
But this is only one aspect of Moksha in the terms of the Gita; because the Gita speaks of Jiva, not as an illusion. Ego is an illusion, it belongs to Apara Prakriti and can be wiped out; it can be abolished. Jiva is Para Prakriti jīvabhūtā. Jiva is a product of Para Prakriti. Para Prakriti is the divine nature: it is the higher nature. Any thing that is produced by the higher nature is as Sri Krishna says: this Jiva mamaivāṁśo…sanātanaḥ(15.7); this word will come later on in another subsequent verse: sanātanaḥ. This individual is eternal, as much eternal as the Supreme. Therefore, this experience of the individual as an illusion is true only with regard to the ego as an individual. But there is an individual, according to the Bhagavad Gita, who remains as an individual and yet free from egoism. In other words the Bhagavad Gita makes a distinction between ego and the individual.
What is the distinction? The egoistic consciousness is finite consciousness but regard itself to be self-existent and independent of everything else. This is the special mark of the egoistic consciousness. It knows itself to be finite, but regards itself to be self-existent, and completely independent of the others. Now, this egoistic consciousness is an illusion because there is nothing corresponding to it in reality. There is nothing in the world which is finite and which can be regarded as self-existent and independent of all the others. Therefore, very often egoistic sense is called only a ‘sense’: one is a sense when one is free from all others, independent of all the others, one is self-existent…really speaking there is no such thing in the world: it does not correspond to any entity. In other words egoism is not an entity, it is only an idea, only a sense, and this sense is destructible because it is something for which there is no corresponding reality. So, when the reality is known, the error is eliminated, and error no more exists.
The individual on the other hand, the Jiva, Jiva is not ahaṁbhāva; Jiva is a real individual and entity, which is finite, but which does not regard itself to be self-existent, which does not regard itself to be independent of all the others. When you enter into the true individual consciousness, it always finds itself to be dependent upon the Supreme. Therefore, there is no egoism in it. It is a sense of liberation, which comes to you by unity with the Supreme: this is the second kind of Moksha. Moksha is of two kinds: Moksha by self-knowledge, in which you enter into the immobility of the self; or you realise the individual’s dependence upon the Supreme; and when you recover this dependence on the Supreme, ego falls away, but the individual remains united with the Supreme. This is another experience of Moksha. This second process of Moksha is often connected with what is called ‘Bhakti Yoga’. The individual attains to unity with the Supreme by uniting and therefore by surrendering, by dependence on the Supreme.
Now, this dependence is also a part of Karma yoga, because in Karma yoga also there is the element of offering, sacrifice, and ultimately union with the Divine even though you may be acting in the world. So, unity with the Divine, and Moksha by unity with the Divine are obtained both by Karma yoga and by Bhakti yoga. Moksha by self-knowledge is obtained by Jnana yoga. These are the 3 paths and this is the result ultimately that we obtain; and all the 3 paths are accepted in the Bhagavad Gita. That is why Bhagavad Gita’s liberation is not one-sided; it is by both ways, by unity and by self-knowledge and therefore it is called ‘an integral liberation’. It is not only liberation by self-knowledge, but also liberation by union with the Divine.
Now, when you have the process of unity, then the totality of the Divine, not only in His aspect of self-knowledge, but as one who unites both staticity and dynamism is realised. Therefore, to realise the Divine as both static and dynamic: Divine as a supporter, in whom you can seat your dependence; the Divine as the doer of action who inspires your action, who acts through you, when all the 3 realisations come together, that is an integral realisation of the Divine and integral Moksha.
You then have another sight of Moksha, which also arises out of this integral realisation. After the state of Moksha, which is reached by self-knowledge and unity, what happens to Apara Prakriti? According to one view, Apara Prakriti vanishes because it was an illusion as a whole and it no more remains: body, life, mind, ego, all of them are destroyed and nothing remains: there is only one supreme Brahman, which is immobile: this is one view. The other view is that Apara Prakriti is not alone but there is also Para Prakriti, and Para Prakriti is at the root of Apara Prakriti. Now, if it is at the root of Apara Prakriti, then there is the possibility of something of Apara Prakriti getting joined with Para Prakriti. According to the Bhagavad Gita, this is what begins to happen. The Apara Prakriti itself gets so transformed that Apara Prakriti as Apara Prakriti does not remain; but whatever truth was there in Apara Prakriti gets transmuted into the higher truth of Para Prakriti. Now, when we speak of integral liberation, this also is included in the integral liberation: the liberation of Apara Prakriti from its own limitations into the perfection of the Para Prakriti.
Moksha therefore, is threefold: Moksha by self-knowledge, Moksha by unity, and Moksha by the liberation of the limitations of Apara Prakriti by entering into Para Prakriti. Now, when you enter into Para Prakriti, there are stages of development. And when Apara Prakriti becomes completely transformed into Para Prakriti, it is called complete perfection; not only liberation but also perfection. Now, these terms are necessary to remember because through out from chapter 7 to 18, we shall be revolving round this process of Mukti by self-knowledge, Mukti by unity, Mukti by liberation of the Apara Prakriti into Para Prakriti, and perfection that can be attained by transforming fully Apara Prakriti into Para Prakriti. From chapter 13 to chapter 18 is given to this last process: what is Apara Prakriti, and how this Apara Prakriti is so trained that there is a transformation available on the highest peaks of Para Prakriti? This in substance is the summary of the entire process of Moksha and what is given in the Bhagavad Gita, in which we have a complete synthesis of the path of Knowledge, path of Devotion, path of Action and the path of Self-Perfection: how all of them are united.
Now, I would like to read with you two passages, just to conclude on this very important subject, so that everything in our consciousness becomes completely fixed. So, I have brought with me two passages; they are taken from “The Synthesis of Yoga”, to describe this entire process of Moksha: what exactly is Moksha, and what are the experiences that we experience when there is Moksha.
Question: Independence from others and from God, are both due to ignorance deluded by the egoistic consciousness?
Yes, one does not recognise God first of all. In the state of ignorance, one only recognises others, and feels that one is independent from all the others. God hardly appears…in the ignorance you don’t see anywhere God. Most of the people who are egoistic, they live only in the consciousness of ahaṁbhāva, manas, and buddhi, and nothing farther than that. Even if they hear about God, it is only an idea. Even if they speak of their surrender to God, it is only the surrender to an idea of God, but there is no palpable reality experienced about God, no presence of God experienced. Therefore, in the egoistic consciousness normally it is not the experience of independence, but a sense of independence from all the rest, the world and the other human beings and other creatures of the world and other things in the world. But there is a sense in which somebody may have an experience of God from time to time. And in the egoistic consciousness, if it is Rajasic, there is a competition between the ego and God. When you experience God sometimes, and when you feel that God is so powerful, egoistic consciousness also wants to be as powerful as God.
This is what Asuras do very often: the more they hear about the greatness of God, the more they feel “why am I not like God, and should I not be as independent, as supreme, as majestic as God”. As we hear the story of Prahlad’s father, he wanted to be worshiped as God; he had known something about God, but he wanted that instead of that God, it is ‘he’ who should be enthroned as God. So, even there, there is a sense that well, “I am independent of that God”; and “I can be as big as that God”; and “I should be worshiped as that God”.
In other words, normally the experience of God is absent in the egoistic consciousness and this sense of independence is only with regard to the creatures, things and others. But even if God happens to come in the experience in some way or the other, the ego feels a competitor of that God and wants to establish himself to be independent of Him, and wants to be enthroned as God. Is that clear?
Question: Is there a realisation of God and then you feel that you are independent of the others?
This is not a realisation. There is a difference between an experience and realisation: if you realise there is no problem. Experience: you can get an experience and you forget about it. Or you get a glimpse of it, but it is not held permanently. The important point in Moksha is: this permanence. When you realise God it is not like a fleeting experience of God, which comes and goes like the breeze, but it is something so established that it is afterwards impossible for you to view the world except in the perception of unity with the Supreme.
So, let us read now this statement (The Synthesis of Yoga p.419):
This individual being of ours is that by which ignorance is possible to self-conscious mind, but it is also that by which liberation into the spiritual being is possible and the enjoyment of divine immortality.
Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga - I: The Soul and Its Liberation
This sentence wants to emphasise that an individual is not an illusion. The individual like the Bhagavad Gita is saying that the jīvabhūta is Para Prakriti therefore and sanātanaḥ: it is an eternal portion of the Supreme. And if individual being is an illusion then, who experiences bondage, and who experiences liberation? If an individual is nothing then who is it that becomes ignorant? Who is suffering? And when you become liberated, who becomes liberated? If an individual is an illusion, then who becomes liberated? It cannot be the Supreme who becomes liberated because the Supreme was never bound; it cannot be the cosmic self who is liberated because it was not bound. One who is bound becomes liberated. Now, who becomes bound? One who becomes ignorant. So, Sri Aurobindo says: it is the individual, the individual being of ours is that by which ignorance is possible. The one who becomes ignorant is the individual. It is also that by which liberation into the spiritual being is possible, and the enjoyment of divine immortality. Who enjoys divine immortality? It is the individual who, having gone beyond ignorance enjoys immortality. Therefore it emphasises that the individual is not an illusion. Ego is an illusion but not the individual. This is one of the fundamental principles of the Bhagavad Gita. There are many theories which believe that individual is an illusion, but Bhagavad Gita’s teaching is that individual is sanātanaḥ aṃšaḥ, it is the eternal portion of the Supreme; and sanātanaḥ means eternal, it is not wiped out.
Now, Sri Aurobindo will explain:
It is not the Eternal in His transcendence or in His cosmic being who arrives at this immortality; it is the individual who rises into self-knowledge, in him it is possessed and by him it is made effective. All life, spiritual, mental or material, is the play of the soul with the possibilities of its nature; for without this play there can be no self-expression and no relative self-experience. Even, then, in our realisation of all as our larger self and in our oneness with God and other beings, this play can and must persist, unless we desire to cease from all self-expression and all but a tranced and absorbed self-experience. But then it is in the individual being that this trance or this liberated play is realised; the trance is this mental being’s immersion in the sole experience of unity, the liberated play is the taking up of his mind into the spiritual being for the free realisation and delight of oneness. For the nature of the divine existence is to possess always its unity, but to possess it also in an infinite experience, from many standpoints, on many planes, through many conscious powers or selves of itself, individualities—in our limited intellectual language—of the one conscious being. Each one of us is one of these individualities. To stand away from God in limited ego, limited mind is to stand away from ourselves, to be unpossessed of our true individuality, to be the apparent and not the real individual; it is our power of ignorance. To be taken up into the divine Being and be aware of our spiritual, infinite and universal consciousness as that in which we now live, is to possess our supreme and integral self, our true individuality; it is our power of self-knowledge.
By knowing the eternal unity of these three powers of the eternal manifestation, God, Nature and the individual self, and their intimate necessity to each other, we come to understand existence itself and all that in the appearances of the world now puzzles our ignorance. Our self-knowledge abolishes none of these things, it abolishes only our ignorance and those circumstances proper to the ignorance which made us bound and subject to the egoistic determinations of our nature. When we get back to our true being, the ego falls away from us; its place is taken by our supreme and integral self, the true individuality. As this supreme self it makes itself one with all beings and sees all world and Nature in its own infinity. What we mean by this is simply that our sense of separate existence disappears into a consciousness of illimitable, undivided, infinite being in which we no longer feel bound to the name and form and the particular mental and physical determinations of our present birth and becoming and are no longer separate from anything or anyone in the universe.
Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga - I: The Soul and Its Liberation
I will read this last sentence again because it is the most important sentence: when can you say that you have the experience of Moksha? When ‘this’ happens, namely:
What we mean by this is simply that our sense of separate existence disappears into a consciousness of illimitable, undivided, infinite being in which we no longer feel bound to the name and form and the particular mental and physical determinations of our present birth and becoming and are no longer separate from anything or anyone in the universe.
Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga - I: The Soul and Its Liberation
This sentence requires to be studied in depth again and again, because so much is packed in this sentence. Let us analyse three things in this: first of all there is a disappearance of separate existence: there is no Moksha as long as there is a sense of separate existence. In other words as long as ego sense remains there is no Moksha. Sense of separate existence is the sense of ego. So, in Moksha the egoistic consciousness disappears. Then there is at the same time a consciousness of illimitable, undivided, infinite being; there is an experience of a being that is illimitable, undivided, and infinite; without this experience there is no Moksha: even if you see that you are not separate from others, but if you don’t experience this, there is no Moksha. Then, we no longer feel bound: this is the third experience. We no longer feel bound to the name and form: “I am “x”, by this name; I am this body, this form and I have got this character, and I have got this mentality.” None of these things remains valid to you; you are no more experiencing: “I am this body, or I am confined to this body”. As long as you feel that you are this body, you are identified with it, there is no Moksha. When there is a real Moksha, you do not feel that you are in this body, that you are this body. Even if you feel that there is a body here, it is like an appendage to you.
Later on Sri Krishna will say that with regard to Apara Prakriti, you do not experience that you are in it. Apara Prakriti is in the Supreme, but the Supreme is not in it. The body may be in your spirit, but you are not in the body: it is ‘this’ experience. We no longer feel bound to the name and form and the particular mental and physical determinations of our present birth and becoming. And we are no longer separate from anything or anyone in the universe. These are three things that we experience: no separation from anyone, we experience the illimitable being and we feel that this body, this name, this mentality, which is the result of our present birth, is not ourselves.
This was what the ancient thing was called: the non-birth. If you read the Isha Upanishad, there was a word, which was ‘asambhūti’ (Isha Upn. 12): sambhūti is “taking birth”; asambhūti is “non-birth”. This is really the meaning of Nirvana. When you feel that you are no more in this body; when you feel infinite being; and when you feel no separation from the others. At the same time…now, this is one aspect of Moksha. Now, there is another aspect of the Moksha condition…at the same time we continue to live and act throughout our individual birth: this very body is our instrument; you are not identified with it, but you are able to use this body as an instrument. At the same time we continue to live and act through our individual birth and becoming, but with a different knowledge and quite another kind of experience. The world also continues, but we see it in our own being and not as something external to it and other than ourselves. To be able to live permanently in this new consciousness of our real, our integral being is to attain liberation and enjoy immortality.
I think you should keep this with you because it is a statement which has to be studied again and again so that we know exactly what Moksha means; because many people today in the world claim to be already to be in the state of Moksha; but you can see that these are very difficult conditions which…and that too permanently, it is not merely a question of experiencing it.
Now, to re-emphasise it, I will give you another statement. So, here also we have the description of Moksha, what is Moksha and what is perfection (The Synthesis of Yoga p. 425 & 426):
The state of the liberated soul is that of the Purusha who is for ever free. Its consciousness is a transcendence and an all-comprehending unity. Its self-knowledge does not get rid of all the terms of self-knowledge, but unifies and harmonises all things in God and in the divine nature. The intense religious ecstasy which knows only God and ourselves and shuts out all else, is only to it an intimate experience which prepares it for sharing in the embrace of the divine Love and Delight around all creatures. A heavenly bliss which unites God and ourselves and the blest, but enables us to look with a remote indifference on the unblest and their sufferings is not possible to the perfect soul; for these also are its selves; free individually from suffering and ignorance, it must naturally turn to draw them also towards its freedom. On the other hand any absorption in the relations between self and others and the world to the exclusion of God and the Beyond is still more impossible, and therefore it cannot be limited by the earth or even by the highest and most altruistic relations of man with man. Its activity or its culmination is not to efface and utterly deny itself for the sake of others, but to fulfil itself in God-possession, freedom and divine bliss that in and by its fulfilment others too may be fulfilled. For it is in God alone, by the possession of the Divine only that all the discords of life can be resolved, and therefore the raising of men towards the Divine is in the end the one effective way of helping mankind. All the other activities and realisations of our self-experience have their use and power, but in the end these crowded sidetracks or these lonely paths must circle round to converge into the wideness of the integral way by which the liberated soul transcends all, embraces all and becomes the promise and the power of the fulfilment of all in their manifested being of the Divine.
Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga - I: The Soul and Its Liberation
Purushottama and Para Prakriti, God and the divine Nature: all things are held to be united. This sense of unity is fundamental in Moksha.
The state of the liberated soul is that of the Purusha who is for ever free. Its consciousness is a transcendence and an all-comprehending unity. Its self-knowledge does not get rid of all the terms of self-knowledge, but unifies and harmonises all things in God and in the divine nature. The intense religious ecstasy which knows only God and ourselves and shuts out all else, is only to it an intimate experience which prepares it for sharing in the embrace of the divine Love and Delight around all creatures. A heavenly bliss which unites God and ourselves and the blest, but enables us to look with a remote indifference on the unblest and their sufferings is not possible to the perfect soul; for these also are its selves; free individually from suffering and ignorance, it must naturally turn to draw them also towards its freedom. On the other hand any absorption in the relations between self and others and the world to the exclusion of God and the Beyond is still more impossible, and therefore it cannot be limited by the earth or even by the highest and most altruistic relations of man with man. Its activity or its culmination is not to efface and utterly deny itself for the sake of others, but to fulfil itself in God-possession, freedom and divine bliss that in and by its fulfilment others too may be fulfilled. For it is in God alone, by the possession of the Divine only that all the discords of life can be resolved, and therefore the raising of men towards the Divine is in the end the one effective way of helping mankind. All the other activities and realisations of our self-experience have their use and power, but in the end these crowded sidetracks or these lonely paths must circle round to converge into the wideness of the integral way by which the liberated soul transcends all, embraces all and becomes the promise and the power of the fulfilment of all in their manifested being of the Divine.
Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga - I: The Soul and Its Liberation
Sri Aurobindo refers to that experience of a Bhakta, when he feels united with the supreme Lord, and finds himself alone with the supreme Lord: it is an ecstasy, but this is not a perfect experience. Perfect experience comes when this experience expands so as to embrace all; not merely you and God, alone, but in which all are united: that is the integral experience of liberation.
The state of the liberated soul is that of the Purusha who is for ever free. Its consciousness is a transcendence and an all-comprehending unity. Its self-knowledge does not get rid of all the terms of self-knowledge, but unifies and harmonises all things in God and in the divine nature. The intense religious ecstasy which knows only God and ourselves and shuts out all else, is only to it an intimate experience which prepares it for sharing in the embrace of the divine Love and Delight around all creatures. A heavenly bliss which unites God and ourselves and the blest, but enables us to look with a remote indifference on the unblest and their sufferings is not possible to the perfect soul; for these also are its selves; free individually from suffering and ignorance, it must naturally turn to draw them also towards its freedom. On the other hand any absorption in the relations between self and others and the world to the exclusion of God and the Beyond is still more impossible, and therefore it cannot be limited by the earth or even by the highest and most altruistic relations of man with man. Its activity or its culmination is not to efface and utterly deny itself for the sake of others, but to fulfil itself in God-possession, freedom and divine bliss that in and by its fulfilment others too may be fulfilled. For it is in God alone, by the possession of the Divine only that all the discords of life can be resolved, and therefore the raising of men towards the Divine is in the end the one effective way of helping mankind. All the other activities and realisations of our self-experience have their use and power, but in the end these crowded sidetracks or these lonely paths must circle round to converge into the wideness of the integral way by which the liberated soul transcends all, embraces all and becomes the promise and the power of the fulfilment of all in their manifested being of the Divine.
Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga - I: The Soul and Its Liberation
There is another experience where you feel one with God and also in union with others who are also like you, who are blest and who live in the presence of God, but who do not feel sympathy or union with all others who are still unblest. That kind of limitation is not present in the mukta ātmā: one who is free, one who has attain to Moksha feels union with God, feels union with all others who are also blest, but also feels union who are not blest. His heart goes out to all the others and wants to uplift them also.
“For these are also its selves;”
Even those who are unblest are also for this liberated soul its own selves.
..free individually from suffering and ignorance, it must naturally turn to draw them also towards its freedom. On the other hand any absorption in the relations between self and others and the world to the exclusion of God and the Beyond is still more impossible, and therefore it cannot be limited by the earth or even by the highest and most altruistic relations of man with man.
Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga - I: The Soul and Its Liberation
There is another kind of experience in which you may feel union with all, but without God. Surely, this is an impossibility: you can truly feel union with all only when you are united with God. But many people today in this world…there is a new formula: “Service to man is service to God.” Now, this sentence is not false but it can be taken falsely in the sense that if you serve man, you don’t need to serve God. To serve man is to serve God, therefore if you serve man then it is accounted that you have served God: now, this mistake we should not commit. You can serve man, and see God in man and therefore you can say ‘I am serving God’. But at the same time, this proposition is true if you are aware that God is all, and it is by serving God that you are serving all.
Its activity or its culmination is not to efface and utterly deny itself for the sake of others, but to fulfil itself in God-possession, freedom and divine bliss that in and by its fulfilment others too may be fulfilled. For it is in God alone, by the possession of the Divine only that all the discords of life can be resolved, and therefore the raising of men towards the Divine is in the end the one effective way of helping mankind.
Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga - I: The Soul and Its Liberation
Now, this statement is extremely important because very often people ask this question: what is the best way of helping mankind? Particularly today, when mankind has become a very important ideal, ‘service of mankind’, the question is often raised: in what best way can I serve mankind? And very often people who have a lot of wealth and a lot of capacities, begin to spend their time in building hospitals, in building activities of charity of various kinds. This is of course not to be discouraged, but the point is that, merely this, minuses the real work, namely: to raise people to the divine consciousness. If you minus this out, then it will only help people to become more and more sick; because now sickness is being tendered, and being tendered is welcomed by hospitals.
Therefore as somebody said: if you become very charitable, you encourage poverty because you will have no business if people do not remain too poor. If you are charitable all the time, and your whole business is to help others, if others become rich you become useless: you have nothing more to give to others. So, this statement is extremely important because while serving people, you should see whether you are really serving to uplift them to divinity. It is in serving man to realise the divine within and in all that the highest service to mankind can be tendered.
For it is in God alone, by the possession of the Divine only that all the discords of life can be resolved, and therefore the raising of men towards the Divine is in the end the one effective way of helping mankind. All the other activities and realisations of our self-experience have their use and power, but in the end these crowded sidetracks or these lonely paths must circle round to converge into the wideness of the integral way by which the liberated soul transcends all, embraces all and becomes the promise and the power of the fulfilment of all in their manifested being of the Divine.
Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga - I: The Soul and Its Liberation
I think these two statements give you a complete idea of the state of Moksha, and also by implication, ‘the perfection’.
Now, having stated this, we now come back to the 7th chapter. The rest of the chapter is not as difficult as these two last verses were. These two verses that we discussed just now are the key verses, and until you come to the last two verses of this chapter, these verses are more or less easy to understand. In fact up to verse 15, we have the description of the reality of the supreme Being of the Para Prakriti and Apara Prakriti; and from 15 to 28 is the method by which this supreme Reality can be known, this Para Prakriti can be known, and in this process how both Knowledge and Devotion can be combined together: this is the substance of this chapter. The description of the supreme reality of the Para Prakriti, of the Jiva, the description of the Apara Prakriti of ignorance, the relationship between the two: this is the substance from verse 1 to 15. From verse 15 to 28 is the description of the method by which this knowledge can be attained. First is the description of the knowledge, but then how this knowledge can be attained is given from verse 15 to 28.
The 29 & 30, these two verses are extremely difficult. And we shall not touch these two verses today; we shall leave them because also these two verses are connected with the 8th chapter. So, during the 8th chapter, we shall take up these last two verses. But now, what comes here is much easier, and we shall rapidly path through.
etadyonīni bhūtāni sarvāṇīty upadhāraya |
ahaṁ kṛtsnasya jagatah prabhavaḥ pralayas tathā ||7.6||
“I am the beginner, prabhavaḥ’ I am the beginner, I am the creator; pralayas, of the dissolution: I am the beginner and the dissolver of this world. And all that is here in this world, you realise it is nothing but that which comes out of these two Apara Prakriti and Para Prakriti”.
So, I am the originator; this Apara Prakriti is lower than Para Prakriti. Para Prakriti belongs to Me, and everything therefore in this world is circumscribed within these three terms: Myself, the Supreme; Para Prakriti and Apara Prakriti. If these three things are known then the whole world is known.
mattaḥ parataraṁ nānyat kiñcid asti dhanañjaya |
“Beyond Me, there is nothing else.”
mayi sarvam idaṁ protaṁ sūtre maṇigaṇā iva ||7.7||
Now, this sentence is one of the most important sentences in this chapter, (just like the 4th & 5th verses), this one: mayi sarvam idaṁ protaṁ sūtre maṇigaṇā iva.
If there is Para Prakriti and if there is Apara Prakriti, and they are two different things, then how are they united? What is the connection, what is the link between the two? So, Sri Krishna says: “I am the link between the higher and the lower, just as if you have a garland of pearls, then these pearls are all woven together by a thread, and therefore they become united, similarly by My Presence, both Apara Prakriti and Para Prakriti are united.”
Now, Sri Krishna explains this in detail: “in what way am I present, even in the Apara Prakriti how I am present”. So, He says (7.8):
raso ’ham apsu: “you take all the liquid things and you look at the rasa: that rasa I am”. Therefore, even rasa, which belongs to the Apara Prakriti, but in Apara Prakriti there is rasa: “that rasa is Myself”; and without rasa waters don’t exist; therefore: “without Me Apara Prakriti cannot exists”.
raso ’ham apsu kaunteya: “O Kaunteya, I am rasa in all the waters.”
prabhāsmi śaśisūryayoḥ: śaśi is the moon; sūrya is the sun. These belong to Apara Prakriti, “But in them is prabhā, is the light, that light is Myself.”
praṇavaḥ sarvavedeṣu: “Among all the Vedas,(if you want to find the real link between Me and the Vedas), it is praṇavaḥ, it is the ‘AUM’”.
śabdaḥ khe: “In the Akasha, in the ether, if you want Me to see where I am, the sound, I am the sound.”
pauruṣaṁ nṛṣu: “If you want to see the manhood of man, men are all Apara Prakriti, but if you want to see Me there, pauruṣaṁ, without which pauruṣa cannot exists, therefore pauruṣaṁ is Myself.”
puṇyo gandhaḥ pṛthivyāṁ ca tejaś cāsmi vibhāvasau |
jīvanaṁ sarvabhūteṣu tapaś cāsmi tapasviṣu ||7.9||
“The smell, the fragrant smell, the puṇyo gandhaḥ, the sacred smell in the pṛthivi, in the earth, (earth is Apara Prakriti), but its puṇyo gandhaḥ is Myself.”
tejaś cāsmi vibhāvasau: “In the agni is tejas, the real light in the fire is Myself.”
sarvabhūteṣu: “All the creatures belong to the Apara Prakriti, but what they live for by is jīvana, that jīvana is Myself.”
jīvanaṁ sarvabhūteṣu tapaś cāsmi tapasviṣu: “All Tapaswis at present they belong to Apara Prakriti, but even then they are striving towards Para Prakriti by power of Tapas: that Tapas is Myself.”
bījaṁ māṁ sarvabhūtānāṁ viddhi pārtha sanātanam |
“I am the eternal seed of all the beings; these beings they belong to Apara Prakriti, but all of them arise out of seed, that seed is Myself.”
buddhir buddhimatām asmi: “Those who are intelligent they belong to Apara Prakriti, but their essence is buddhi, that Buddhi I am.”
tejas tejasvinām aham: “Those who are luminous, their light I am”. (7.10)
balaṁ balavatāṁ: “I am the strength of the strong.”
cāhaṁ kāma-rāga-vivarjitam: “I am even the kāma, but rāga-vivarjitam, I am even the passion, but in which all attachment is devoid of it, that kāma…”
Very often there is a big question mark: how can the divine Himself be kāma, when it is said earlier that these kāma and krodha are the two enemies and they have to be killed; that is why here Sri Krishna says: kāma-rāga-vivarjitam; kāma not as it is understood in our ordinary consciousness, but rāga-vivarjitam, that, kāma, which is devoid, which is free from all attachment, ‘that’ kāma.
In other words, there is a distinction, which is made between ‘desire’, ‘will’, and ‘aspiration’. The desire is a movement in which you try to grasp what you don’t possess, that is desire. Will is a condition in which you manifest what you have; there is no grasping at what you don’t have, you manifest what you have. Now, when you manifest what you have, there is a will to manifest, but in doing so, you are perfect when you manifest, you are perfect even when you don’t manifest, because you are manifesting what you already have. When you already have and you manifest it, then whether you manifest or you don’t manifest makes no difference because you already have it.
Now, this kāma refers to ‘this’ condition of will. In Sanskrit there is a difficulty because kāma is used both for ‘desire’ and for ‘will’. That is why to distinguish the word ‘desire’ in Sanskrit, Sri Krishna uses this word: kāma-rāga-vivarjitam: kāma, ‘that’ will in which attachment and desire is avoided, is destroyed, in which it does not exist. Aspiration is a third movement, in which you try to rise from ‘desire’ to ‘will’: that is aspiration. When we have desire, but I want to rise into a condition of will, then this upward movement is called aspiration. So, the distinction between the three words is very important; otherwise we mix up the three together, and you say: “well, I desire God”, even that you should not have; in a sense you should not have it, but you should have aspiration, because it is by going to God that all desires are lost. The real 'will' arises only when you reach God. Therefore, your movement from desire to the will is ‘aspiration’ and that is perfectly justified. What is not justified is the desire to possess what you don’t have.
balaṁ balavatāṁ cāhaṁ kāmarāgavivarjitam |
dharmāviruddho bhūteṣu kāmo ’smi bharatarṣabha ||7.11||
Now, Sri Krishna further explains that, ‘that’ kāma, what kāma is Me? dharmāviruddho, that which is not opposed to dharmā: that means the real divine will. The divine will is the only will which is dharmāviruddho, which is not opposed to the Divine’s consciousness.
ye caiva sāttvikā bhāvā rājasās tāmasāś ca ye |
matta eveti tān viddhi na tv ahaṁ teṣu te mayi ||7.12||
Now, He says that “All that is tamasic, all that is rajasic, all that is sattwic, all that is Apara Prakriti; that Apara Prakriti is in Me, but I am not in them.” Up till now He describes where ‘I am’ in all the movements of Apara Prakriti, all the rest tamas, and rajas and sattwa, ‘in none of them’, He says, ‘I am present’. Wherever He is present, He has described, even in Apara Prakriti. But there are in Apara Prakriti: sattwa, rajas, and tamas. He says: “These are in Me, but I am not in them”.
This is a very difficult sentence to understand, the first line. In a certain sense, if Divine is all, if Divine is present everywhere, if Divine is omnipresent, how can you say that: ‘He is not in them’, or ‘these only are in Him but He is not in them’?
These sentences have to be understood in two senses: one is that the Divine is transcendental; sattwa, rajas, and tamas do not reach the transcendental, because the moment they reach, they are destroyed; they are no more sattwa, rajas, and tamas. Like ego: egoistic consciousness when it tries to reach the Divine, ego is destroyed. So, ego cannot exist…the Divine cannot exist in the ego. The moment ego becomes one with the Supreme, that ego is destroyed: that is one sense.
Another sense is…we very often say: a small glass can be contained in a bigger glass. So smaller glass is in the bigger glass; but can we say the bigger glass is in the smaller glass? Although there is a point of conjunction of the two somewhere because the lower is in the higher; similarly, the Supreme is greater than the Apara Prakriti, therefore, it can be said that the Supreme is not in the Apara Prakriti: you cannot put the bigger into the smaller. It is in that sense He says: na tv ahaṁ teṣu te mayi, “They are in Me, but I am not in them”.
tribhir guṇamayair bhāvair ebhiḥ sarvam idaṁ jagat |
mohitaṁ nābhijānāti mām ebhyaḥ param avyayam ||7.13||
‘All these’ is a world which is full of three Gunas: sattwa, rajas, and tamas. And by these three gunas, everybody is deluded; everybody is living in Apara Prakriti by the power of these three gunas, and therefore they do not realise Me, I who am above all these, and I am indestructible. Other things are destructible but I am not destructible.
daivī hy eṣā guṇamayī mama māyā duratyayā |
And yet this Apara Prakriti is daivī, is still divine. Why? Because its origin is in Para Prakriti; if there was no origin in Para Prakriti, this daivībhav would not be there.
daivī hy eṣā guṇamayī mama māyā duratyayā |
This māyā, this particular Apara Prakriti, which is guṇamayī, which has got all the three Gunas is my own Maya, it is daivī, but duratyayā; it is something very difficult to cross and penetrate.
mām eva ye prapadyante māyām etāṁ taranti te ||7.14||
Only those who worship Me, only those who turn to Me, the supreme Divine, only ‘they’ taranti te, only ‘they’ can cross over these three Gunas of the Apara Prakriti.
na māṁ duṣkṛtino mūḍhāḥ prapadyante narādhamāḥ |
māyayāpahṛtajñānā āsuraṁ bhāvam āśritāḥ ||7.15||
“Those who are mūḍhāḥ, dull; duṣkṛtino, those who are engaged in wrong actions; narādhamāḥ, they are mean human beings; namāṁ prapadyante, they do not attain to Me.”
māyayāpahṛta-jñānā āsuraṁ bhāvam āśritāḥ
“They are completely overpowered by Maya; and all the knowledge is gone because of that spell, and therefore they live in Asuric Prakriti, and they are therefore unable to reach Me.”
Now comes the method by which Supreme can be achieved. Up till now we were only given the description of what Reality is. Reality is the Supreme who has two natures: the higher nature, and the lower nature. The lower nature has been described as consisting of eight elements: the five pañca mahābhūtas, and manas, buddhi, and ahaṁkāra. These three constitute Apara Prakriti. Para Prakriti is that of which Jiva is made.
Then, Sri Krishna describes that even in Apara Prakriti where ‘I am to be found’. So, He gives the knowledge that wherever these elements are to be found, ‘recognise Me to be present there’, even in the Apara Prakriti, and because of My presence there, Apara Prakriti becomes joined up with the higher Prakriti. Then He explains that this Apara Prakriti is a very difficult process to cross over: “Only they can cross over who can turn to Me. But those who do not turn to Me, they remain in the condition of Asuric Maya. They become narādhamāḥ, mūḍhāḥ: they are dull and from whom knowledge is completely taken away.”
Now, Sri Krishna says what is the method by which you can enter into a relationship with the Divine. So, from here to verse 28, these 15 verses describe the method, the application, the ‘Yoga’. In this Yoga, Sri Krishna now expounds for the first time, what is called “Bhakti Yoga”. Up till now there was only some hint of Bhakti. Only Jnana and Karma were expounded in the earlier 6 chapters. Now, in the 7th chapter the description that is given to us is of Bhakti Yoga. But you will see also that in this process of Bhakti Yoga, Sri Krishna unites Bhakti with Jnana. Now, let us see:
caturvidhā bhajante māṁ janāḥ sukṛtino ’rjuna |
ārto jijñāsur arthārthī jñānī ca bharatarṣabha ||7.16||
“There are four kinds of people who turn to Me”: catur-vidhā bhajante māṁ janāḥ sukṛtino; these four kinds of people are sukṛtino, they are ‘noble-actioned people’; sukṛtino, but they are four kinds of people: ārtaḥ, one who is ārta, (ārta means afflicted); jijñāsur, one who is inquisitive; arthārthī, one who is in need of wealth; jñānī ca, and one who knows, a knower.
teṣāṁ jñānī niyayukta ekabhaktir viśiṣyate |
“Among these four, the supreme…jñānī niya-yukta eka-bhaktir, the supreme among these three is one who knows Me and yet who devotes itself fully to Me.” This is the synthesis of Jnana and Bhakti. In the three other ones, this synthesis does not happen: one who is afflicted, one who is only inquisitive and one who is in need of wealth, these three people for them to combine knowledge and devotion is not easy. It is only when they turn into the state of knowledge, it is only when you really come to know the Divine that you become the lover of the Divine: that is the highest condition. There is also the other way round also: if you really come to love the Divine, you will come to know the Divine, this is the inter-relationship between the two: knowledge is the crown of devotion, and devotion is the crown of knowledge.
teṣāṁ jñānī niyayukta ekabhaktir viśiṣyate |
priyo hi jñānino ’tyartham ahaṁ sa ca mama priyaḥ ||7.17||
“It is to jñānī that I am of the highest importance, and it is the jñānī who is to Me the most beloved.” Now, the question is: why ārto, jijñāsur, arthārthī? Normally these three people, three kinds of people…why are they called as in the next one it is said ‘udārāḥ’? If you open the 18th verse, they are described as ‘udārāḥ’, they are all noble: one who is arthārthī, ārto, jijñāsur. The jñānī is of course udārāḥ, the jñānī is the one who knows the Supreme, he is already the noble one. But why is it the other 3 are also regarded as udārāḥ? Why are they also noble? Afflicted; jijñāsur, one who is curious; and one who is arthārthī, one who is seeking wealth.
udārāḥ sarva evaite jñānī tv ātmaiva me matam |
“All others are noble, but the jñānī is my verily self; others may be all noble but if you want to know where I am fully devoted, it is in the one who is a jñānī, and who is turned to Me.”
āsthitaḥ sa hi yuktātmā mām evānuttamāṁ gatim ||7.18||
“One who is seated in Me, it is He who attains to the highest condition of consciousness.”
Now, this question is very often raised: why arthārthī, ārto, jijñāsuḥ? Why are they also udārāḥ? The reason is that it is in affliction you are at most serious and sincere: nobody can pretend to be in pain. To be in pain, you have to be sincerely painful otherwise there is no pain. When somebody really weeps truly, out of great affliction, there is a great sincerity in it; he may be ignorant, he may be crying for nothing, crying for wrong things, but in his consciousness, there is a tremendous sincerity: it is that sincerity which is noble. Therefore ārta is regarded as very noble. And once you cry out in pain, it woos the Divine, even though you may not be crying out for the Divine, but the moment you cry out, this cry, it reaches the Divine, it melts the Divine and brings you forth, He comes nearer you because you are in a state of affliction. Therefore, very often even it is said that you should remain sorrowful because if you have sorrow God is very near you. In fact, one of the important teachings of Christianity is that it is by suffering, it is when you suffer that the Divine is near you; therefore, you participate in the suffering, even when you are not suffering participate in it…
Comment: (laughter)…that is manipulating, is it?
…but really be suffering otherwise there is no sincerity, don’t manipulate. But be near the suffering and therefore you really feel suffering, and when you really suffer, the Divine is with you.
Similarly, arthārthī: when you sincerely…even a miser when he wants money, he sincerely wants it, (laughter), therefore arthārthī also is able to move with the Divine; he sincerely wants it, he sincerely pursues it.
And jijñāsuḥ: you cannot be really jijñāsuḥ unless you are really hankering after knowledge, truly.
Therefore all the three are udārāḥ, all the three are noble and these are all the right ways of approach to God. And even when you reach God…supposing these three even in the beginning you may be doing only for your own purposes, and not for God, but once God comes into your life, you begin to be transformed because God’s presence and you remain the same as before is not possible. And when you attain to God, then you begin to suffer for the sake of God, because others are not in the presence of God. So, that suffering is also noble. When you are in the Divine, and when you see that others are not in the Divine, then, you suffer for them. Therefore, that kind of suffering is also noble; similarly, when you reach knowledge and you find that others are not in the knowledge, then you want all people to be really jijñāsuḥ, you encourage people to know the Divine: that also is noble. When you have reached the Divine, you don’t need any wealth for yourself but for the work of the Divine you want wealth, and you seek wealth: that is also noble. So, before reaching God, these three are noble; after reaching God also these three activities are noble. But one who is jñānī, and one who is seated in knowledge, and one who seeks nothing but the Divine is the most beloved of God.