classes ::: knowledge, Sanskrit,
children :::
branches ::: Veda

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object:Veda
object:the Vedas
class:knowledge

0:Threefold are those supreme births of this divine force that is in the world, they are true, they are desirable; he moves there wide-overt within the Infinite and shines pure, luminous and fulfilling. . . . That which is immortal in mortals and possessed of the truth, is a god and established inwardly as an energy working out in our divine powers. . . . Become high-uplifted, O Strength, pierce all veils, manifest in us the things of the Godhead. Vamadeva - Rig Veda.2

language class:Sanskrit
Sacred Texts - Hinduism
Sri Aurobindo - The Secret Of The Veda

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now begins generated list of local instances, definitions, quotes, instances in chapters, wordnet info if available and instances among weblinks


OBJECT INSTANCES [0] - TOPICS - AUTHORS - BOOKS - CHAPTERS - CLASSES - SEE ALSO - SIMILAR TITLES

TOPICS
SEE ALSO


AUTH

BOOKS
Collected_Poems
Essays_On_The_Gita
Evolution_II
God_Exists
Infinite_Library
Isha_Upanishad
Kena_and_Other_Upanishads
Letters_On_Yoga
Letters_On_Yoga_II
Liber_157_-_The_Tao_Teh_King
Life_without_Death
My_Burning_Heart
old_bookshelf
On_Thoughts_And_Aphorisms
Questions_And_Answers_1955
Rig_Veda
Savitri
Self_Knowledge
The_Life_Divine
The_Secret_Doctrine
The_Secret_Of_The_Veda
The_Yoga_Sutras
Thought_Power
Toward_the_Future
Vedic_and_Philological_Studies
Vishnu_Purana
Writings_In_Bengali_and_Sanskrit

IN CHAPTERS TITLE
10.02_-_Beyond_Vedanta
1.04_-_The_Gods_of_the_Veda
1.08_-_The_Gods_of_the_Veda_-_The_Secret_of_the_Veda
1.08_-_The_Methods_of_Vedantic_Knowledge
1.10_-_The_Secret_of_the_Veda
1955-11-02_-_The_first_movement_in_Yoga_-_Interiorisation,_finding_ones_soul_-_The_Vedic_Age_-_An_incident_about_Vivekananda_-_The_imaged_language_of_the_Vedas_-_The_Vedic_Rishis,_involutionary_beings_-_Involution_and_evolution
29.06_-_There_is_also_another,_similar_or_parallel_story_in_the_Veda_about_the_God_Agni,_about_the_disappearance_of_this
3.1.14_-_Vedantin.s_Prayer
3.2.02_-_The_Veda_and_the_Upanishads
36.07_-_An_Introduction_To_The_Vedas
36.08_-_A_Commentary_on_the_First_Six_Suktas_of_Rigveda

IN CHAPTERS CLASSNAME

IN CHAPTERS TEXT
00.02_-_Mystic_Symbolism
00.03_-_Upanishadic_Symbolism
00.04_-_The_Beautiful_in_the_Upanishads
00.05_-_A_Vedic_Conception_of_the_Poet
0.00_-_INTRODUCTION
0.00_-_Publishers_Note_C
0.00_-_The_Book_of_Lies_Text
0.00_-_THE_GOSPEL_PREFACE
0.03_-_The_Threefold_Life
0.05_-_The_Synthesis_of_the_Systems
01.01_-_The_New_Humanity
01.02_-_Sri_Aurobindo_-_Ahana_and_Other_Poems
01.03_-_Mystic_Poetry
01.05_-_Rabindranath_Tagore:_A_Great_Poet,_a_Great_Man
01.06_-_Vivekananda
01.08_-_Walter_Hilton:_The_Scale_of_Perfection
01.10_-_Nicholas_Berdyaev:_God_Made_Human
01.11_-_The_Basis_of_Unity
01.12_-_Three_Degrees_of_Social_Organisation
0_1957-07-03
0_1958-07-06
0_1958-09-16_-_OM_NAMO_BHAGAVATEH
0_1958-11-04_-_Myths_are_True_and_Gods_exist_-_mental_formation_and_occult_faculties_-_exteriorization_-_work_in_dreams
0_1960-10-08
0_1960-11-12
0_1961-01-22
0_1961-01-24
0_1961-01-27
0_1961-01-31
0_1961-02-18
0_1961-03-07
0_1961-03-11
0_1961-03-27
0_1961-04-07
0_1961-04-08
0_1961-04-15
0_1961-04-18
0_1961-05-12
0_1961-06-06
0_1961-08-02
0_1961-09-10
0_1961-09-23
0_1961-10-30
0_1961-11-05
0_1961-11-06
0_1961-11-07
0_1961-12-20
0_1962-03-11
0_1962-06-30
0_1962-07-21
0_1962-07-31
0_1962-09-26
0_1962-11-27
0_1962-12-28
0_1963-03-16
0_1963-05-11
0_1963-05-15
0_1963-08-07
0_1964-01-22
0_1964-02-05
0_1964-10-17
0_1965-03-20
0_1965-05-19
0_1967-04-05
0_1970-04-11
0_1971-11-24
0_1972-05-27
02.01_-_A_Vedic_Story
02.01_-_Metaphysical_Thought_and_the_Supreme_Truth
02.01_-_Our_Ideal
02.01_-_The_World_War
02.02_-_Lines_of_the_Descent_of_Consciousness
02.02_-_Rishi_Dirghatama
02.05_-_Robert_Graves
02.06_-_The_Integral_Yoga_and_Other_Yogas
02.08_-_Jules_Supervielle
02.11_-_Hymn_to_Darkness
03.01_-_Humanism_and_Humanism
03.01_-_The_Evolution_of_Consciousness
03.04_-_The_Body_Human
03.05_-_Some_Conceptions_and_Misconceptions
03.05_-_The_Spiritual_Genius_of_India
03.06_-_Divine_Humanism
03.09_-_Buddhism_and_Hinduism
03.10_-_The_Mission_of_Buddhism
03.14_-_Mater_Dolorosa
03.15_-_Towards_the_Future
04.01_-_The_March_of_Civilisation
04.02_-_A_Chapter_of_Human_Evolution
04.02_-_Human_Progress
04.04_-_Evolution_of_the_Spiritual_Consciousness
04.05_-_The_Immortal_Nation
04.06_-_Evolution_of_the_Spiritual_Consciousness
04.06_-_To_Be_or_Not_to_Be
04.09_-_Values_Higher_and_Lower
05.01_-_Man_and_the_Gods
05.02_-_Gods_Labour
05.02_-_Satyavan
05.03_-_Bypaths_of_Souls_Journey
05.04_-_The_Immortal_Person
05.05_-_Man_the_Prototype
05.07_-_The_Observer_and_the_Observed
05.09_-_Varieties_of_Religious_Experience
05.10_-_Knowledge_by_Identity
05.12_-_The_Soul_and_its_Journey
06.11_-_The_Steps_of_the_Soul
10.01_-_Cycles_of_Creation
1.001_-_The_Aim_of_Yoga
10.02_-_Beyond_Vedanta
10.03_-_Life_in_and_Through_Death
10.04_-_Lord_of_Time
10.04_-_Transfiguration
1.007_-_Initial_Steps_in_Yoga_Practice
10.07_-_The_Demon
10.07_-_The_World_is_One
1.01_-_Adam_Kadmon_and_the_Evolution
1.01_-_Foreward
1.01_-_Isha_Upanishad
1.01_-_Maitreya_inquires_of_his_teacher_(Parashara)
1.01_-_MASTER_AND_DISCIPLE
1.01_-_Our_Demand_and_Need_from_the_Gita
1.01_-_Prayer
1.01_-_SAMADHI_PADA
1.01_-_THAT_ARE_THOU
1.01_-_The_Cycle_of_Society
1.01_-_The_Four_Aids
1.01_-_The_Human_Aspiration
1.01_-_The_Ideal_of_the_Karmayogin
1.01_-_The_Unexpected
1.02.2.1_-_Brahman_-_Oneness_of_God_and_the_World
1.02.2.2_-_Self-Realisation
1.02.3.1_-_The_Lord
1.02.4.1_-_The_Worlds_-_Surya
1.02.4.2_-_Action_and_the_Divine_Will
1.024_-_Affiliation_With_Larger_Wholes
10.26_-_A_True_Professor
1.02.9_-_Conclusion_and_Summary
1.02_-_IN_THE_COMPANY_OF_DEVOTEES
1.02_-_Isha_Analysis
1.02_-_Karmayoga
1.02_-_MAPS_OF_MEANING_-_THREE_LEVELS_OF_ANALYSIS
1.02_-_Prana
1.02_-_Prayer_of_Parashara_to_Vishnu
1.02_-_SADHANA_PADA
1.02_-_The_Development_of_Sri_Aurobindos_Thought
1.02_-_The_Divine_Teacher
1.02_-_The_Doctrine_of_the_Mystics
1.02_-_The_Eternal_Law
1.02_-_THE_NATURE_OF_THE_GROUND
1.02_-_The_Philosophy_of_Ishvara
1.02_-_The_Two_Negations_1_-_The_Materialist_Denial
1.02_-_Where_I_Lived,_and_What_I_Lived_For
10.36_-_Cling_to_Truth
1.03_-_Hymns_of_Gritsamada
1.03_-_PERSONALITY,_SANCTITY,_DIVINE_INCARNATION
1.03_-_Reading
1.03_-_The_End_of_the_Intellect
1.03_-_The_Human_Disciple
1.03_-_The_Sephiros
1.03_-_The_Two_Negations_2_-_The_Refusal_of_the_Ascetic
1.03_-_VISIT_TO_VIDYASAGAR
1.03_-_YIBHOOTI_PADA
1.045_-_Piercing_the_Structure_of_the_Object
1.04_-_ADVICE_TO_HOUSEHOLDERS
1.04_-_KAI_VALYA_PADA
1.04_-_Narayana_appearance,_in_the_beginning_of_the_Kalpa,_as_the_Varaha_(boar)
1.04_-_The_Gods_of_the_Veda
1.04_-_The_Sacrifice_the_Triune_Path_and_the_Lord_of_the_Sacrifice
1.04_-_The_Silent_Mind
1.04_-_What_Arjuna_Saw_-_the_Dark_Side_of_the_Force
1.052_-_Yoga_Practice_-_A_Series_of_Positive_Steps
1.053_-_A_Very_Important_Sadhana
1.057_-_The_Four_Manifestations_of_Ignorance
1.05_-_Adam_Kadmon
1.05_-_Bhakti_Yoga
1.05_-_CHARITY
1.05_-_Consciousness
1.05_-_Qualifications_of_the_Aspirant_and_the_Teacher
1.05_-_Ritam
1.05_-_The_Ascent_of_the_Sacrifice_-_The_Psychic_Being
1.05_-_The_Destiny_of_the_Individual
1.05_-_The_Magical_Control_of_the_Weather
1.05_-_THE_MASTER_AND_KESHAB
1.05_-_Vishnu_as_Brahma_creates_the_world
1.05_-_Yoga_and_Hypnotism
1.06_-_Agni_and_the_Truth
1.06_-_Being_Human_and_the_Copernican_Principle
1.06_-_Man_in_the_Universe
1.06_-_Origin_of_the_four_castes
1.06_-_THE_MASTER_WITH_THE_BRAHMO_DEVOTEES
1.070_-_The_Seven_Stages_of_Perfection
1.07_-_Bridge_across_the_Afterlife
1.07_-_Note_on_the_word_Go
1.07_-_Production_of_the_mind-born_sons_of_Brahma
1.07_-_Raja-Yoga_in_Brief
1.07_-_The_Ego_and_the_Dualities
1.07_-_THE_MASTER_AND_VIJAY_GOSWAMI
1.07_-_The_Psychic_Center
1.07_-_The_Three_Schools_of_Magick_2
1.08_-_Adhyatma_Yoga
1.08_-_Independence_from_the_Physical
1.08_-_Origin_of_Rudra:_his_becoming_eight_Rudras
1.08_-_RELIGION_AND_TEMPERAMENT
1.08_-_The_Depths_of_the_Divine
1.08_-_The_Gods_of_the_Veda_-_The_Secret_of_the_Veda
1.08_-_The_Historical_Significance_of_the_Fish
1.08_-_THE_MASTERS_BIRTHDAY_CELEBRATION_AT_DAKSHINESWAR
1.08_-_The_Methods_of_Vedantic_Knowledge
1.08_-_Worship_of_Substitutes_and_Images
1.09_-_A_System_of_Vedic_Psychology
1.09_-_Concentration_-_Its_Spiritual_Uses
1.09_-_Legend_of_Lakshmi
1.09_-_Saraswati_and_Her_Consorts
1.09_-_Sri_Aurobindo_and_the_Big_Bang
1.09_-_The_Chosen_Ideal
1.09_-_The_Pure_Existent
1.1.01_-_The_Divine_and_Its_Aspects
1.1.02_-_Sachchidananda
11.05_-_The_Ladder_of_Unconsciousness
1.1.05_-_The_Siddhis
11.06_-_The_Mounting_Fire
1.107_-_The_Bestowal_of_a_Divine_Gift
11.07_-_The_Labours_of_the_Gods:_The_five_Purifications
1.10_-_The_descendants_of_the_daughters_of_Daksa_married_to_the_Rsis
1.10_-_The_Image_of_the_Oceans_and_the_Rivers
1.10_-_THE_MASTER_WITH_THE_BRAHMO_DEVOTEES_(II)
1.10_-_The_Methods_and_the_Means
1.10_-_Theodicy_-_Nature_Makes_No_Mistakes
1.10_-_The_Secret_of_the_Veda
1.10_-_The_Yoga_of_the_Intelligent_Will
11.15_-_Sri_Aurobindo
1.11_-_Correspondence_and_Interviews
1.11_-_Delight_of_Existence_-_The_Problem
1.11_-_Higher_Laws
1.11_-_Oneness
1.11_-_Powers
1.1.1_-_Text
1.11_-_The_Seven_Rivers
1.11_-_WITH_THE_DEVOTEES_AT_DAKSHINEWAR
1.11_-_Woolly_Pomposities_of_the_Pious_Teacher
1.11_-_Works_and_Sacrifice
1.1.2_-_Commentary
1.12_-_Delight_of_Existence_-_The_Solution
1.12_-_Dhruva_commences_a_course_of_religious_austerities
1.12_-_The_Divine_Work
1.12_-_THE_FESTIVAL_AT_PNIHTI
1.12_-_The_Herds_of_the_Dawn
1.12_-_The_Significance_of_Sacrifice
1.12_-_The_Superconscient
1.13_-_Dawn_and_the_Truth
1.13_-_Gnostic_Symbols_of_the_Self
1.13_-_Posterity_of_Dhruva
1.13_-_The_Divine_Maya
1.13_-_The_Lord_of_the_Sacrifice
1.13_-_THE_MASTER_AND_M.
1.14_-_Bibliography
1.14_-_IMMORTALITY_AND_SURVIVAL
1.14_-_INSTRUCTION_TO_VAISHNAVS_AND_BRHMOS
1.14_-_The_Secret
1.14_-_The_Stress_of_the_Hidden_Spirit
1.14_-_The_Supermind_as_Creator
1.14_-_The_Victory_Over_Death
1.15_-_Index
1.15_-_LAST_VISIT_TO_KESHAB
1.15_-_The_Possibility_and_Purpose_of_Avatarhood
1.15_-_The_Supramental_Consciousness
1.15_-_The_Transformed_Being
1.15_-_The_world_overrun_with_trees;_they_are_destroyed_by_the_Pracetasas
1.16_-_Man,_A_Transitional_Being
1.16_-_The_Season_of_Truth
1.16_-_The_Suprarational_Ultimate_of_Life
1.16_-_The_Triple_Status_of_Supermind
1.16_-_WITH_THE_DEVOTEES_AT_DAKSHINESWAR
1.17_-_Legend_of_Prahlada
1.17_-_M._AT_DAKSHINEWAR
1.17_-_The_Divine_Birth_and_Divine_Works
1.17_-_The_Divine_Soul
1.17_-_The_Seven-Headed_Thought,_Swar_and_the_Dashagwas
1.17_-_The_Transformation
1.18_-_Hiranyakasipu's_reiterated_attempts_to_destroy_his_son
1.18_-_M._AT_DAKSHINESWAR
1.18_-_The_Human_Fathers
1.19_-_Dialogue_between_Prahlada_and_his_father
1.19_-_Equality
1.19_-_Life
1.19_-_THE_MASTER_AND_HIS_INJURED_ARM
1.19_-_The_Victory_of_the_Fathers
1.2.01_-_The_Call_and_the_Capacity
12.01_-_This_Great_Earth_Our_Mother
1.2.03_-_The_Interpretation_of_Scripture
1.20_-_Death,_Desire_and_Incapacity
1.20_-_Equality_and_Knowledge
1.20_-_RULES_FOR_HOUSEHOLDERS_AND_MONKS
1.20_-_The_Hound_of_Heaven
1.21_-_A_DAY_AT_DAKSHINESWAR
1.21_-_Families_of_the_Daityas
1.21_-_The_Ascent_of_Life
1.22_-_ADVICE_TO_AN_ACTOR
1.22__-_Dominion_over_different_provinces_of_creation_assigned_to_different_beings
1.240_-_1.300_Talks
1.240_-_Talks_2
1.24_-_RITUAL,_SYMBOL,_SACRAMENT
1.25_-_ADVICE_TO_PUNDIT_SHASHADHAR
1.25_-_SPIRITUAL_EXERCISES
1.25_-_The_Knot_of_Matter
1.26_-_FESTIVAL_AT_ADHARS_HOUSE
1.26_-_Mental_Processes_-_Two_Only_are_Possible
1.26_-_The_Ascending_Series_of_Substance
1.27_-_AT_DAKSHINESWAR
1.27_-_CONTEMPLATION,_ACTION_AND_SOCIAL_UTILITY
1.27_-_Structure_of_Mind_Based_on_that_of_Body
1.27_-_The_Sevenfold_Chord_of_Being
1.28_-_Need_to_Define_God,_Self,_etc.
1.28_-_Supermind,_Mind_and_the_Overmind_Maya
1.2_-_Katha_Upanishads
1.300_-_1.400_Talks
1.3.04_-_Peace
1.3.1.02_-_The_Object_of_Our_Yoga
1.3.2.01_-_I._The_Entire_Purpose_of_Yoga
1.35_-_The_Tao_2
1.3_-_Mundaka_Upanishads
1.400_-_1.450_Talks
1.4.02_-_The_Divine_Force
14.08_-_A_Parable_of_Sea-Gulls
1.439
1.450_-_1.500_Talks
1.4_-_Readings_in_the_Taittiriya_Upanishad
15.07_-_Souls_Freedom
15.08_-_Ashram_-_Inner_and_Outer
1.52_-_Family_-_Public_Enemy_No._1
1.550_-_1.600_Talks
17.01_-_Hymn_to_Dawn
17.02_-_Hymn_to_the_Sun
17.03_-_Agni_and_the_Gods
17.04_-_Hymn_to_the_Purusha
17.05_-_Hymn_to_Hiranyagarbha
17.06_-_Hymn_of_the_Supreme_Goddess
17.07_-_Ode_to_Darkness
17.08_-_Last_Hymn
17.09_-_Victory_to_the_World_Master
17.11_-_A_Prayer
18.05_-_Ashram_Poets
1915_11_26p
1951-02-22_-_Surrender,_offering,_consecration_-_Experiences_and_sincerity_-_Aspiration_and_desire_-_Vedic_hymns_-_Concentration_and_time
1951-02-26_-_On_reading_books_-_gossip_-_Discipline_and_realisation_-_Imaginary_stories-_value_of_-_Private_lives_of_big_men_-_relaxation_-_Understanding_others_-_gnostic_consciousness
1955-10-19_-_The_rhythms_of_time_-_The_lotus_of_knowledge_and_perfection_-_Potential_knowledge_-_The_teguments_of_the_soul_-_Shastra_and_the_Gurus_direct_teaching_-_He_who_chooses_the_Infinite...
1955-11-02_-_The_first_movement_in_Yoga_-_Interiorisation,_finding_ones_soul_-_The_Vedic_Age_-_An_incident_about_Vivekananda_-_The_imaged_language_of_the_Vedas_-_The_Vedic_Rishis,_involutionary_beings_-_Involution_and_evolution
1955-12-14_-_Rejection_of_life_as_illusion_in_the_old_Yogas_-_Fighting_the_adverse_forces_-_Universal_and_individual_being_-_Three_stages_in_Integral_Yoga_-_How_to_feel_the_Divine_Presence_constantly
1956-06-20_-_Hearts_mystic_light,_intuition_-_Psychic_being,_contact_-_Secular_ethics_-_True_role_of_mind_-_Realise_the_Divine_by_love_-_Depression,_pleasure,_joy_-_Heart_mixture_-_To_follow_the_soul_-_Physical_process_-_remember_the_Mother
1956-06-27_-_Birth,_entry_of_soul_into_body_-_Formation_of_the_supramental_world_-_Aspiration_for_progress_-_Bad_thoughts_-_Cerebral_filter_-_Progress_and_resistance
1956-08-29_-_To_live_spontaneously_-_Mental_formations_Absolute_sincerity_-_Balance_is_indispensable,_the_middle_path_-_When_in_difficulty,_widen_the_consciousness_-_Easiest_way_of_forgetting_oneself
1958-03-19_-_General_tension_in_humanity_-_Peace_and_progress_-_Perversion_and_vision_of_transformation
1958-08-15_-_Our_relation_with_the_Gods
1960_06_29
1963_05_15
1969_10_01?_-_166
1969_11_16
1970_02_07
1970_03_02
1970_03_03
1.bs_-_Bulleh!_to_me,_I_am_not_known
1.kbr_-_Abode_Of_The_Beloved
1.kbr_-_Poem_9
1.kbr_-_The_light_of_the_sun,_the_moon,_and_the_stars_shines_bright
1.pbs_-_Mont_Blanc_-_Lines_Written_In_The_Vale_of_Chamouni
1.pbs_-_Song_For_Tasso
1.pbs_-_The_Revolt_Of_Islam_-_Canto_I-XII
1.rb_-_Fra_Lippo_Lippi
1.rb_-_Sordello_-_Book_the_Sixth
1.rmd_-_Raga_Basant
1.rmpsd_-_Meditate_on_Kali!_Why_be_anxious?
1.rmpsd_-_Tell_me,_brother,_what_happens_after_death?
1.rt_-_Brahm,_Viu,_iva
1.rwe_-_Quatrains
1.srm_-_The_Marital_Garland_of_Letters
1.whitman_-_Passage_To_India
1.whitman_-_Song_At_Sunset
1.whitman_-_Song_of_Myself
1.whitman_-_Song_Of_Myself-_XLIII
1.whitman_-_With_Antecedents
1.ww_-_Book_Sixth_[Cambridge_and_the_Alps]
20.01_-_Charyapada_-_Old_Bengali_Mystic_Poems
2.00_-_BIBLIOGRAPHY
2.01_-_AT_THE_STAR_THEATRE
2.01_-_Isha_Upanishad__All_that_is_world_in_the_Universe
2.01_-_Mandala_One
2.01_-_On_Books
2.01_-_The_Two_Natures
2.01_-_The_Yoga_and_Its_Objects
2.02_-_Brahman,_Purusha,_Ishwara_-_Maya,_Prakriti,_Shakti
2.02_-_Indra,_Giver_of_Light
2.02_-_Meeting_With_the_Goddess
2.02_-_On_Letters
2.02_-_THE_DURGA_PUJA_FESTIVAL
2.02_-_The_Ishavasyopanishad_with_a_commentary_in_English
2.02_-_The_Status_of_Knowledge
2.02_-_Yoga
2.03_-_Indra_and_the_Thought-Forces
2.03_-_Karmayogin__A_Commentary_on_the_Isha_Upanishad
2.03_-_On_Medicine
2.03_-_The_Eternal_and_the_Individual
2.03_-_THE_MASTER_IN_VARIOUS_MOODS
2.03_-_The_Supreme_Divine
2.04_-_ADVICE_TO_ISHAN
2.04_-_Agni,_the_Illumined_Will
2.05_-_On_Poetry
2.05_-_The_Cosmic_Illusion;_Mind,_Dream_and_Hallucination
2.05_-_VISIT_TO_THE_SINTHI_BRAMO_SAMAJ
2.06_-_The_Higher_Knowledge_and_the_Higher_Love_are_one_to_the_true_Lover
2.06_-_The_Synthesis_of_the_Disciplines_of_Knowledge
2.06_-_WITH_VARIOUS_DEVOTEES
2.06_-_Works_Devotion_and_Knowledge
2.07_-_BANKIM_CHANDRA
2.07_-_On_Congress_and_Politics
2.07_-_The_Knowledge_and_the_Ignorance
2.07_-_The_Supreme_Word_of_the_Gita
2.07_-_The_Upanishad_in_Aphorism
2.08_-_ALICE_IN_WONDERLAND
2.08_-_God_in_Power_of_Becoming
2.08_-_Memory,_Self-Consciousness_and_the_Ignorance
2.08_-_On_Non-Violence
2.08_-_The_Sword
2.09_-_Memory,_Ego_and_Self-Experience
2.09_-_On_Sadhana
2.09_-_THE_MASTERS_BIRTHDAY
2.1.01_-_God_The_One_Reality
21.02_-_Gods_and_Men
2.1.02_-_Nature_The_World-Manifestation
2.10_-_Knowledge_by_Identity_and_Separative_Knowledge
2.10_-_On_Vedic_Interpretation
2.10_-_THE_MASTER_AND_NARENDRA
2.10_-_The_Realisation_of_the_Cosmic_Self
2.11_-_On_Education
2.11_-_The_Boundaries_of_the_Ignorance
2.11_-_The_Modes_of_the_Self
2.11_-_The_Vision_of_the_World-Spirit_-_The_Double_Aspect
2.12_-_The_Origin_of_the_Ignorance
2.12_-_The_Way_and_the_Bhakta
2.13_-_Exclusive_Concentration_of_Consciousness-Force_and_the_Ignorance
2.13_-_On_Psychology
2.13_-_THE_MASTER_AT_THE_HOUSES_OF_BALARM_AND_GIRISH
2.14_-_On_Movements
2.14_-_The_Origin_and_Remedy_of_Falsehood,_Error,_Wrong_and_Evil
2.14_-_The_Passive_and_the_Active_Brahman
2.14_-_The_Unpacking_of_God
2.1.5.1_-_Study_of_Works_of_Sri_Aurobindo_and_the_Mother
2.15_-_On_the_Gods_and_Asuras
2.15_-_Reality_and_the_Integral_Knowledge
2.15_-_The_Cosmic_Consciousness
2.16_-_Oneness
2.16_-_The_15th_of_August
2.16_-_The_Integral_Knowledge_and_the_Aim_of_Life;_Four_Theories_of_Existence
2.17_-_December_1938
2.17_-_THE_MASTER_ON_HIMSELF_AND_HIS_EXPERIENCES
2.17_-_The_Progress_to_Knowledge_-_God,_Man_and_Nature
2.17_-_The_Soul_and_Nature
2.18_-_January_1939
2.18_-_SRI_RAMAKRISHNA_AT_SYAMPUKUR
2.18_-_The_Evolutionary_Process_-_Ascent_and_Integration
2.19_-_Feb-May_1939
2.19_-_Out_of_the_Sevenfold_Ignorance_towards_the_Sevenfold_Knowledge
2.19_-_THE_MASTER_AND_DR._SARKAR
2.19_-_The_Planes_of_Our_Existence
2.2.01_-_The_Problem_of_Consciousness
2.2.02_-_Consciousness_and_the_Inconscient
2.2.03_-_The_Science_of_Consciousness
22.04_-_On_The_Brink(I)
2.20_-_Nov-Dec_1939
2.20_-_THE_MASTERS_TRAINING_OF_HIS_DISCIPLES
2.20_-_The_Philosophy_of_Rebirth
2.21_-_1940
2.21_-_IN_THE_COMPANY_OF_DEVOTEES_AT_SYAMPUKUR
2.21_-_The_Ladder_of_Self-transcendence
2.21_-_The_Order_of_the_Worlds
2.2.1_-_The_Prusna_Upanishads
2.22_-_Rebirth_and_Other_Worlds;_Karma,_the_Soul_and_Immortality
2.22_-_The_Supreme_Secret
2.22_-_Vijnana_or_Gnosis
2.23_-_Man_and_the_Evolution
2.23_-_THE_MASTER_AND_BUDDHA
2.2.4_-_Taittiriya_Upanishad
2.24_-_The_Evolution_of_the_Spiritual_Man
2.24_-_THE_MASTERS_LOVE_FOR_HIS_DEVOTEES
2.25_-_AFTER_THE_PASSING_AWAY
2.25_-_List_of_Topics_in_Each_Talk
2.25_-_The_Triple_Transformation
2.26_-_The_Ascent_towards_Supermind
2.27_-_Hathayoga
2.27_-_The_Gnostic_Being
2.28_-_The_Divine_Life
2.3.01_-_Concentration_and_Meditation
2.3.02_-_Mantra_and_Japa
2.3.10_-_The_Subconscient_and_the_Inconscient
23.11_-_Observations_III
2.3.1.54_-_An_Epic_Line
2.3.1_-_Svetasvatara_Upanishad
2.3.2_-_Chhandogya_Upanishad
2.4.2_-_Interactions_with_Others_and_the_Practice_of_Yoga
27.01_-_The_Golden_Harvest
28.01_-_Observations
29.05_-_The_Bride_of_Brahman
29.06_-_There_is_also_another,_similar_or_parallel_story_in_the_Veda_about_the_God_Agni,_about_the_disappearance_of_this
29.07_-_A_Small_Talk
2_-_Other_Hymns_to_Agni
30.04_-_Intuition_and_Inspiration_in_Art
30.08_-_Poetry_and_Mantra
30.09_-_Lines_of_Tantra_(Charyapada)
30.11_-_Modern_Poetry
30.12_-_The_Obscene_and_the_Ugly_-_Form_and_Essence
30.17_-_Rabindranath,_Traveller_of_the_Infinite
3.02_-_Mysticism
3.04_-_The_Spirit_in_Spirit-Land_after_Death
3.05_-_The_Divine_Personality
31.01_-_The_Heart_of_Bengal
3.1.01_-_The_Problem_of_Suffering_and_Evil
3.1.02_-_A_Theory_of_the_Human_Being
3.1.02_-_Spiritual_Evolution_and_the_Supramental
31.02_-_The_Mother-_Worship_of_the_Bengalis
3.1.03_-_A_Realistic_Adwaita
31.04_-_Sri_Ramakrishna
3.1.04_-_Transformation_in_the_Integral_Yoga
31.05_-_Vivekananda
31.09_-_The_Cause_of_Indias_Decline
3.1.14_-_Vedantin.s_Prayer
3.2.01_-_The_Newness_of_the_Integral_Yoga
3.2.02_-_The_Veda_and_the_Upanishads
3.2.03_-_Jainism_and_Buddhism
3.2.04_-_Sankhya_and_Yoga
3.2.04_-_The_Conservative_Mind_and_Eastern_Progress
32.04_-_The_Human_Body
3.2.05_-_Our_Ideal
3.2.05_-_The_Yoga_of_the_Bhagavad_Gita
3.2.06_-_The_Adwaita_of_Shankaracharya
32.06_-_The_Novel_Alchemy
3.2.07_-_Tantra
32.07_-_The_God_of_the_Scientist
3.2.08_-_Bhakti_Yoga_and_Vaishnavism
3.2.09_-_The_Teachings_of_Some_Modern_Indian_Yogis
3.2.4_-_Sex
33.03_-_Muraripukur_-_I
33.07_-_Alipore_Jail
33.10_-_Pondicherry_I
33.11_-_Pondicherry_II
33.18_-_I_Bow_to_the_Mother
3.3.1_-_Agni,_the_Divine_Will-Force
3.3.2_-_Doctors_and_Medicines
3.4.01_-_Evolution
34.01_-_Hymn_To_Indra
34.02_-_Hymn_To_All-Gods
3.4.02_-_The_Inconscient
34.03_-_Hymn_To_Dawn
34.04_-_Hymn_of_Aspiration
34.05_-_Hymn_to_the_Mental_Being
34.06_-_Hymn_to_Sindhu
34.07_-_The_Bride_of_Brahman
34.08_-_Hymn_To_Forest-Range
34.09_-_Hymn_to_the_Pillar
3.4.1.01_-_Poetry_and_Sadhana
34.10_-_Hymn_To_Earth
34.11_-_Hymn_to_Peace_and_Power
35.06_-_Who_Seeks_Holy_Places?
3.6.01_-_Heraclitus
36.07_-_An_Introduction_To_The_Vedas
36.08_-_A_Commentary_on_the_First_Six_Suktas_of_Rigveda
36.09_-_THE_SIT_SUKTA
37.02_-_The_Story_of_Jabala-Satyakama
37.03_-_Satyakama_And_Upakoshala
37.04_-_The_Story_Of_Rishi_Yajnavalkya
37.05_-_Narada_-_Sanatkumara_(Chhandogya_Upanishad)
3.7.1.02_-_The_Reincarnating_Soul
3.7.1.06_-_The_Ascending_Unity
3.7.1.07_-_Involution_and_Evolution
3.7.1.08_-_Karma
3.8.1.02_-_Arya_-_Its_Significance
3.8.1.05_-_Occult_Knowledge_and_the_Hindu_Scriptures
3_-_Commentaries_and_Annotated_Translations
4.01_-_The_Principle_of_the_Integral_Yoga
4.03_-_Prayer_to_the_Ever-greater_Christ
4.1.1_-_The_Difficulties_of_Yoga
4.1_-_Jnana
4.2.1_-_The_Right_Attitude_towards_Difficulties
4.22_-_The_supramental_Thought_and_Knowledge
4.2_-_Karma
4.3.1.04_-_The_Disappearance_of_the_I_Sense
4.3.1.09_-_The_Self_and_Life
4.3.1_-_The_Hostile_Forces_and_the_Difficulties_of_Yoga
4.4.4.04_-_The_Descent_of_Silence
5.1.03_-_The_Hostile_Forces_and_Hostile_Beings
5.3.04_-_Roots_in_M
5.4.01_-_Notes_on_Root-Sounds
5.4.02_-_Occult_Powers_or_Siddhis
6.07_-_THE_MONOCOLUS
6.0_-_Conscious,_Unconscious,_and_Individuation
7.12_-_The_Giver
7.16_-_Sympathy
9.99_-_Glossary
APPENDIX_I_-_Curriculum_of_A._A.
BOOK_II._--_PART_I._ANTHROPOGENESIS.
BOOK_II._--_PART_III._ADDENDA._SCIENCE_AND_THE_SECRET_DOCTRINE_CONTRASTED
BOOK_II._--_PART_II._THE_ARCHAIC_SYMBOLISM_OF_THE_WORLD-RELIGIONS
BOOK_I._--_PART_I._COSMIC_EVOLUTION
BOOK_I._--_PART_III._SCIENCE_AND_THE_SECRET_DOCTRINE_CONTRASTED
BOOK_I._--_PART_II._THE_EVOLUTION_OF_SYMBOLISM_IN_ITS_APPROXIMATE_ORDER
Conversations_with_Sri_Aurobindo
Diamond_Sutra_1
Guru_Granth_Sahib_first_part
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The_Act_of_Creation_text
The_Anapanasati_Sutta__A_Practical_Guide_to_Mindfullness_of_Breathing_and_Tranquil_Wisdom_Meditation
The_Coming_Race_Contents
the_Eternal_Wisdom
The_Riddle_of_this_World
Verses_of_Vemana

PRIMARY CLASS

knowledge
SIMILAR TITLES
Rig Veda
The Secret Of The Veda
Veda

DEFINITIONS


TERMS STARTING WITH

Veda an image of the Gods, the male power in Nature. Again, the bull is vihana ‱ of Siva.

Veda-knower

Vedana: Feeling; sensation; knowledge; percept (a Buddhistic terminology).

Vedanasakti: Power of cognition or sensation.

Vedana (Sanskrit) Vedanā [from the verbal root vid to know] Perception or knowledge conveyed by the senses, sensation. The sixth nidana and the second skandha.

Vedanaskandha: Group of feeling (a Buddhistic term).

Vedanga: An auxiliary to the Vedas. The Vedangas are six in number: 1. Siksha The science of proper articulation and pronunciation. 2. Kalpa Rituals and ceremonies. 3. Vyakarana Grammar. 4. Nirukta Etymological explanation of different Vedic words. 5. Chhandas The science of prosody. 6. Jyotisha Astronomy.

Vedanta: (lit.) The end of the Vedas; the Upanishads; the school of Hindu thoughts (based primarily on the Upanishads) upholding the doctrine of either pure non-dualism or conditional non-dualism; (the original text of this school is Vedanta-darsana or Uttaramimamsa or the Brahma-sutras compiled by sage Vyasa.)

Vedanta(Sanskrit) ::: From the Upanishads and from other parts of the wonderful cycle of Vedic literature, theancient sages of India produced what is called today the Vedanta -- a compound word meaning "the end(or completion) of the Veda" -- that is to say, instruction in the final and most perfect exposition of themeaning of the Vedic tenets.The Vedanta is the highest form that the Brahmanical teachings have taken, and under the name of theUttara-Mimamsa attributed to Vyasa, the compiler of the Vedas, the Vedanta is perhaps the noblest ofthe six Indian schools of philosophy. The Avatara Sankaracharya has been the main popularizer of theVedantic system of philosophical thought, and the type of Vedantic doctrine taught by him is what istechnically called the Advaita-Vedanta or nondualistic.The Vedanta may briefly be described as a system of mystical philosophy derived from the efforts ofsages through many generations to interpret the sacred or esoteric meaning of the Upanishads. In itsAdvaita form the Vedanta is in many, if not all, respects exceedingly close to, if not identical with, someof the mystical forms of Buddhism in central Asia. The Hindus call the Vedanta Brahma-jnana.

Vedanta (Sanskrit) Vedānta The end or completion of the Veda; the final, most perfect exposition of the Vedic tenets. As Uttara-mimansa, one of the six Darsanas or Hindu schools of philosophy, it is said to have been founded by the compiler of the Vedas, Vyasa. Sankaracharya is the main popularizer of the Advaita or nondualistic Vedantic philosophy, which is virtually identical with Central Asian Buddhism.

Vedanta Sutra ::: see Brahmasutra

Vedantasutras: See Brahmasutras. Vedantic: Adjective, "belonging to the Vedanta" (q.v.). Vedic: (Skr.) Adjective, referring to the Vedas (q.v.) or the period that generated them, considered closed about 500 B.C. -- K.F.L.

Vedanta: The best known and most popular formulation of Hindu mystic philosophy, which teaches that the phenomenal world is mere illusion and has only seeming reality, as have also the apparent individual selves of the world, and there is but one self, Brahman-Atman; he who knows “that, soul art thou,” attains moksha and is released from the wheel of existence.

Vedanta: The "end of the Veda" (q.v.), used both in the literal sense and that of final goal, or meaning. Applied to the Upanishads (q.v.) and various systems of thought based upon them. Specifically the doctrine elaborated in the Brahmasutras of Badarayana, restated, reinterpreted, and changed by later philosophers, notably Sankara, Ramanuja, Nimbarka, Madhva, and Vallabha (which see). The central theme is that enunciated in the Upanishads of the relation between world soul and individual soul or self. Within the Vedanta, a number of solutions were found and taught with varying success. Sankara supposed God and soul identical (see advaita), Madhva different (see dvaita), Ramanuja different yet identical (see visistadvaita), Vallabha had a theory of obscuration, etc. -- K.F.L.

Vedanti: One who follows the path of Vedantic Sadhana.

Veda, plural Vedas: (Skr. knowledge) Collectively the ancient voluminous, sacred literature of India (in bulk prior to 1000 B.C.), composed of Rigveda (hymns to gods), Samaveda (priests' chants), Yajurveda (sacrificial formulae), and Atharvaveda (magical chants), which among theosophic speculations contain the first philosophic insights. Generally recognized as an authority even in philosophy, extended and supplemented later by sutras (q.v.) and various accessory textbooks on grammar, astronomy, medicine, etc., called Vedangas ("members of the Veda") and the philosophical treatises, such as the Upanishads (q.v.). -- K.F.L.

Vedas and Upanishads

Veda (Sanskrit) Veda [from the verbal root vid to know] Knowledge; the most ancient and sacred Sanskrit works of the Hindus. Almost every hymn or division of a Veda is ascribed to various authors. It is generally believed that these subdivisions were revealed orally to the rishis or sages whose respective names they bear; hence the body of the Veda is known as sruti (what was heard) or divine revelation. The very names of these Vedic sages, such as Vasishtha, Visvamitra, and Narada, all of which belong to men born in far distant ages, shows that millennia must have elapsed between the different dates of their composition. Krishna Sastri Godbole proves by astronomical data and mathematics that the Vedas must have been taught at least 25,000 years ago (cf Theosophist 2:238). Hindus claim that the Veda was taught orally for thousands of years, and then finally compiled by Veda-Vyasa 3,200 years ago, on the shores of the sacred lake Manasa-sarovara beyond the Himalayas in what is now Tibet (TG 362). Though compiled at that date their previous antiquity is sufficiently proved by the fact that they are written in an ancient form of Sanskrit, different from the Sanskrit of known later writings.

Vedas, dating from 1000 BC, consisting of spells, prayers, charms, and hymns &

Vedas, dating from 2000 BC or earlier, consisting of several mythological and poetical accounts of the origin of the world, hymns praising the gods, and ancient prayers for life and prosperity; "praise verse"

Vedas, dating from between 1400-1000 BC, consisting of formulas &

Vedas, detailing the proper performance of rituals

Veda(s)(Sanskrit) ::: From a verbal root vid signifying "to know." These are the most ancient and the most sacredliterary and religious works of the Hindus. Veda as a word may be described as "divine knowledge." TheVedas are four in number: the Rig-Veda, the Yajur-Veda, the Sama-Veda, and the Atharva-Veda, thislast being commonly supposed to be of later date than the former three.Manu in his Work on Law always speaks of the three Vedas, which he calls "the ancient triple Brahman"-- sanatanam trayam brahma." Connected with the Vedas is a large body of other works of variouskinds, liturgical, ritualistic, exegetical, and mystical, the Veda itself being commonly divided into twogreat portions, outward and inner: the former called the karma-kanda, the "Section of Works," and thelatter called jnana-kanda or "Section of Wisdom."The authorship of the Veda is not unitary, but almost every hymn or division of a Veda is ascribed to adifferent author or rather to various authors; but they are supposed to have been compiled in their presentform by Veda-Vyasa. There is no question in the minds of learned students of theosophy that the Vedasrun back in their origins to enormous antiquity, thousands of years before the beginning of what is knownin the Occident as the Christian era, whatever Occidental scholars may have to say in objection to thisstatement. Hindu pandits themselves claim that the Veda was taught orally for thousands of years, andthen finally compiled on the shores of the sacred lake Manasa-Sarovara, beyond the Himalayas in adistrict of what is now Tibet.

Vedas, she is the Mother of the gods from whose cosmic matrix the heavenly bodies were born

Vedas

Vedas, the drink and the plant refer to the same entity, and is perceived as a giver of immortality, a healthy and long life, offspring, happiness, courage, strength, victory over enemies, wisdom, understanding and creativity

Veda: The generic name for the most ancient sacred literature of the Hindus, consisting of the four collections called (1) Rig Veda, hymns to gods, (2) Sama Veda, priests’ chants, (3) Yajur Veda, sacrificial formulae in prose, and (4) Atharva Veda, magical chants; each Veda is divided into two broad divisions, viz. (1) Mantra, hymns, and (2) Brahmana, precepts, which include (a) Aranyakas, theology, and (b) Upanishads, philosophy; the Vedas are classified as revealed literature; they contain the first philosophical insights and are regarded as the final authority; tradition makes Vyasa the compiler and arranger of the Vedas in their present form; the Vedic period is conservatively estimated to have begun about 1500 to 1000 B.C.

Veda: The highest authority among the Aryans of India; it is held that this was never written by anyone and it is, therefore, free from the imperfections to which human productions are subject. When it is forgotten, it is reproduced by Rishis by doing meditation. As the sounds forming the text of the Veda occur in the same order and are pronounced in the same manner, it is said to be eternal; it teaches who and what Brahman is, and how He should be worshipped. Smritis, Itihasas and Puranas only amplify its teaching. It is the most ancient, authentic scripture of the Hindus.

Veda-vyasa. See VYASA

vedaisca vedyah ::: that which is known by all the books of Knowledge. [Gita 15.15]

veda-knower

veda ::: knowledge; knowledge of the Divine; the book of knowledge; [especially, Veda: a generic name for the most ancient Indian sacred literature, i.e. the Rg-veda, Yajur-veda,Sama-veda and Atharva-veda, each of these being divided into two portions, mantra and brahmana; the term " Veda" is generally reserved for the mantras or metrical hymns, especially those of the Rg-veda].

veda ::: knowledge, true or sacred knowledge; knowledge of sacred ritual; sacred scriptures of the Hindus (Rig-Veda, Yajur-Veda, Sama-Veda and Atharva-Veda).

veda. ::: knowledge; wisdom; understanding; revealed scripture

vedalla

vedalla. (S. vaidalya). In Pāli, "extended" scriptures. See VAIPULYA.

vedanā

vedanā. (T. tshor ba; C. shou; J. ju; K. su 揗). In Sanskrit and Pāli, "sensation" or "sensory feeling"; the physical or mental sensations that accompany all moments of sensory consciousness. Sensations are always understood as being one of three: pleasurable, painful, or neutral (lit. "neither pleasant nor unpleasant"). Sensation is listed as one of the ten "mental factors of wide extent" (MAHĀBHuMIKA) in the SARVĀSTIVĀDA ABHIDHARMA, one of the five "omnipresent" (SARVATRAGA) "mental constituents" (CAITTA) in the YOGĀCĀRA system, and one of the seven universal mental factors (lit. mental factors common to all) (sabbacittasādhārana cetasika) in the Pāli ABHIDHAMMA. It is said universally to accompany all moments of sensory consciousness. Sensation is also listed as the second of the five aggregates (SKANDHA) and the seventh constituent in the twelvefold chain of dependent origination (PRATÄȘTYASAMUTPĀDA). The "contemplation of sensations" (S. vedanānupasyanā, P. vedanānupassanā) is the second of the four foundations of mindfulness (S. SMáčšTYUPASTHĀNA, P. satipatthāna) and involves being mindful (see S. SMáčšTI, P. sati) of physical and mental sensations that are pleasurable, painful, and neutral.

vedanga ::: [a "limb of the Veda", one of six sciences auxiliary to the Veda: chanting, ritual, grammar, etymological interpretation, prosody, astrology].

vedanta ::: n. --> A system of philosophy among the Hindus, founded on scattered texts of the Vedas, and thence termed the "Anta," or end or substance.

vedanta. ::: "the end of the Vedas"; the philosophy based primarily on the

vedanta ::: the "end or culmination of the Veda", the Upanisads (which occur at the end of the Veda) ; a system of philosophy based on the Upanisads teaching the culminating knowledge of the Absolute, considered (sometimes under the name uttara-mimamsa) to be one of the six darsanas].

veda ::: n. --> The ancient sacred literature of the Hindus; also, one of the four collections, called Rig-Veda, Yajur-Veda, Sama-Veda, and Atharva-Veda, constituting the most ancient portions of that literature.

vedantic ::: a. --> Of or pertaining to the Vedas.

vedantin. ::: a follower of vedanta

vedantist ::: n. --> One versed in the doctrines of the Vedantas.

vedas. ::: the most ancient Hindu scriptures which state that all matter is derived from consciousness; the system of knowledge which perceives the universe as an intelligent, conscious whole; the four Vedas are the

vedavada ::: [the gospel of the (ritualistic) Veda, as opposed to the brahmavada]

vedavid vedantakrt ::: knower of Veda and the author of Vedanta. [cf. Gita 15.15]


TERMS ANYWHERE

2. In the Veda, the All-pervading Godhead, the Eternal Personality of Consciousness, the wide-moving One, that which has gone abroad triply extending himself as Seer, Thinker, and Former in the superconscient Bliss.

2. The divine enjoyment, bhaga, typified by the god Bhaga, the Enjoyer in the power of the Truth.” The Secret of the Veda

2. This view has affinities with, and has occasionally developed into, the notion of a World Mind or Absolute Mind as posited in Vedantic and Buddhist idealism, patristic and scholastic Christian theism, objective idealism, and absolute idealism. See Idealism, The Absolute. -- W.L.

a (ahitena chid arvatá) ::: even without urging on the war-horse (symbol of vehement nervous tapas). [R . g Veda 8.62.3]

a ::: all the boons of inspired knowledge. [R .g Veda 1.149.5]

Abhava (Sanskrit) Abhāva [from a not + bhava being from the verbal root bhĆ« to be, become] Nonexistence, nonentity, negation; applied to the material universe, noumenal substance, or subjectivity. In Kanada’s system of negation of individual beings or objects, abhava is classed as seventh in his categories. In Vedanta philosophy, first of the six pramanas (means of obtaining knowledge), and as such corresponds to the fifth pramana, abhava-pratyaksha, nonperception when applied to the physical, but more accurately apprehension of subjective or spiritual being.

abhvapihita (tucchyena abhwapihita) ::: universal being (abhu) concealed by fragmentation or littleness. [R.g Veda 10.129.3]

a ::: by the greatness of its energy. [R.g Veda 10.129.3]

Adbhuta-Brahmana (Sanskrit) Adbhuta-brāhmaáč‡a [from adbhuta wonderful, marvelous + brāhmaáč‡a portion of the Vedas treating of ritual, prayer, sacrifices, and mantra] One of the eight Brahmanas belonging to the Sama-Veda, dealing with omens, auguries, and extraordinary wonders.

Adhyaropa (Sanskrit) Adhyāropa [from adhi above, over + āropa superimposition from ā-rup to confound, disturb] Usually, erroneous deduction. In Vedantic philosophy, a wrong attribution or misconception, e.g., to conceive of silver as being innate in mother-of-pearl, the sheen common to both being an adhyaropa. The mind in its absorption in the unreal (avidya, “ignorance”) superimposes a world of duality and plurality on the real — on Brahman — and as a result there is a multiplicity of confusing and often conflicting goals.

adhyaropa. ::: the superimposition of something unreal on something real &

Aditi (Sanskrit) Aditi [from a not + diti bound from the verbal root da to bind] Unbounded, free; as a noun, infinite and shoreless expanse. In the Vedas, Aditi is devamatri (mother of the gods) as from and in her cosmic matrix all the heavenly bodies were born. As the celestial virgin and mother of every existing form and being, the synthesis of all things, she is highest akasa. Aditi is identified in the Rig-Veda with Vach (mystic speech) and also with the mulaprakriti of the Vedanta. As the womb of space, she is a feminized form of Brahma. The line in the Rig-Veda: “Daksha sprang from Aditi and Aditi from Daksha” has reference to “the eternal cyclic re-birth of the same divine Essence” (SD 2:247n). In one of its most mystic aspects Aditi is divine wisdom.

“Aditi, the infinite Consciousness, Mother of the worlds.” The Secret of the Veda

Adityas (Sanskrit) Āditya-s [belonging to, issuing from aditi unbounded expanse] Sons of Aditi, space; in the Vedas a name for the sun; also referred to variously as five, seven, eight, and twelve in number. The eighth aditya (Marttanda) was rejected by Aditi, leaving seven son-suns, each manifesting a particular solar energy (cf RV 10, 72, 8-9). “ ‘The Seven allow the mortals to see their dwellings, but show themselves only to the Arhats,’ says an old proverb, ‘their dwellings’ standing here for planets” (SD 1:100).

advaita (Adwaita) ::: [non-duality], One-Existence; Monism, Monistic vedanta.

ADVAITA. :::One Existence; the One without a second; non-dual, absolute and indivisible unity; Monism.
People are apt to speak of the Advaita as if it were identical with Mayavada monism, just as they speak of Vedanta as if it were identical with Advaita only; that is not the case. There are several forms of Indian philosophy which base themselves upon the One Reality, but they admit also the reality of the world, the reality of the Many, the reality of the differences of the Many as well as the sameness of the One (bhedābheda). But the Many exist in the One and by the One, the differences are variations in manifestation of that which is fundamentally ever the same. This we actually see in the universal law of existence where oneness is always the basis with an endless multiplicity and difference in the oneness; as for instance there is one mankind but many kinds of man, one thing called leaf or flower, but many forms, patterns, colours of leaf and flower. Through this we can look back into one of the fundamental secrets of existence, the secret which is contained in the one reality itself. The oneness of the Infinite is not something limited, fettered to its unity; it is capable of an infinite multiplicity. The Supreme Reality is an Absolute not limited by either oneness or multiplicity but simultaneously capable of both; for both are its aspects, although the oneness is fundamental and the multiplicity depends upon the oneness.
Wide Realistic Advaita.


Advaita (Sanskrit) Advaita [from a not + dvaita dual from dvi two] Nondual; the Advaita or nondualistic form of Vedanta [from veda knowledge + anta end] expounded by Sankaracharya teaches the oneness of Brahman or the paramatman of the universe with the human spirit-soul or jivatman, and the identity of spirit and matter; also that the divine spirit of the universe is the all-efficient, all-productive cause of the periodic coming into being, continuance, and dissolutions of the universe; and that this divine cosmic spirit is the ultimate truth and sole reality — hence the term advaita (without a second). All else is maya, in proportion to its distance from the divine source.

Advaita: Sanskrit for non-dualism. The Vedantic doctrine of monism advocated by Samkara, which contends that only the Ultimate Principle (Brahman) has any actual existence, and that all phenomenal existence is an illusion (maya).

Advaita: (Skr. "non-duality") The Vedantic (q.v.) doctrine of monism advocated by Sankara (q.v.) which holds the Absolute to be personal in relation to the world, especially the philosophically untutored, but supra-personal in itself (cf. nirguna, saguna); the world and the individual to be only relatively, or phenomenally, real; and salvation to consist in insight or jnana (q.v.) after dispelling the maya (q.v.) of separateness from the divine. -- K.F.L.

advaitin (Adwaitin) ::: a Vedantic Monist.

Advaitin (Sanskrit) Advaitin An adherent of the Advaita philosophy. Also written Advaitee or Advaita-Vedantist

Agasti, Agastya (Sanskrit) Agasti, Agastya [from aga mountain + the verbal root as to throw, cast off] Mountain-thrower; a celebrated muni and the reputed author of a number of hymns in the Rig-Veda; he also appears in the Mahabharata and Ramayana. Agastya is said to have been born in a water jar, to have been of short stature, to have swallowed the ocean, and compelled the Vindhya Mountain to prostrate itself before him. Hence his name: mountain-thrower.

Agni2 (Agni; Agnih) ::: the god of Fire; in Sri Aurobindo"s interpretation of the Veda, the deva as the master of tapas, "the divine Consciousness formulating itself in universal energy"; he is the "secret inhabitant of Matter and its forms" and "the power of conscious Being, called by us will, effective behind the workings of mind and body"; his "divine birth-place and home, ::: though he is born everywhere and dwells in all things, ::: is the Truth, the Infinity, the vast cosmic Intelligence in which Knowledge and Force are unified".

  Agni first, for without him the sacrificial flame cannot burn on the altar of the soul. That flame of Agni is the seven-tongued power of the Will, a Force of God instinct with knowledge. This conscious and forceful will is the immortal guest in our mortality, a pure priest and a divine worker, the mediator between earth and heaven. It carries what we offer to the higher Powers and brings back in return their force and light and joy into our humanity.” *The Secret of the Veda

Agni first, for without him the sacrificial flame cannot burn on the altar of the soul. That flame of Agni is the seven-tongued power of the Will, a Force of God instinct with knowledge. This conscious and forceful will is the immortal guest in our mortality, a pure priest and a divine worker, the mediator between earth and heaven. It carries what we offer to the higher Powers and brings back in return their force and light and joy into our humanity.” The Secret of the Veda

“Agni is the Deva, the All-Seer, manifested as conscious-force or, as it would be called in modern language, Divine or Cosmic Will, first hidden and building up the eternal worlds, then manifest, ``born’’, building up in man the Truth and the Immortality.” The Secret of the Veda

“Agni is the leader of the sacrifice and protects it in the great journey against the powers of darkness. The knowledge and purpose of this divine Puissance can be entirely trusted; he is the friend and lover of the soul and will not betray it to evil gods. Even for the man sitting far off in the night, enveloped by the darkness of the human ignorance, this flame[Agni] is a light which, when it is perfectly kindled and in proportion as it mounts higher and higher, enlarges itself into the vast light of the Truth. Flaming upward to heaven to meet the divine Dawn, it rises through the vital or nervous mid-world and through our mental skies and enters at last the Paradise of Light, its own supreme home above where joyous for ever in the eternal Truth that is the foundation of the sempiternal Bliss the shining Immortals sit in their celestial sessions and drink the wine of the infinite beatitude.” The Secret of the Veda

Agni (Sanskrit) Agni [from the verbal root ag to move tortuously, wind] Fire; as god of fire, one of the most revered of Vedic deities. As mediator between gods and humans, from whose body issue “a thousand streams of glory and seven tongues of flame,” Agni represents the divine essence or celestial fire present in every atom of the universe. Often used synonymously with the adityas. The three chief gods of Vedas are Agni, Vayu, and Surya — fire, air, and the sun — whose elements respectively are earth, air, and sky. One of the four lokapalas or world-protectors, Agni is guardian of the southeast quarter, and in the Rig-Veda as Matarisvan, messenger of Vivasvat, the sun, Agni brought down the “hidden fire” for humankind. To “kindle a fire,” therefore, is synonymous to evoking one of the three great fire-powers or “to call on God” (SD 2:114).

*[Agni]. Sri Aurobindo: "Agni is the leader of the sacrifice and protects it in the great journey against the powers of darkness. The knowledge and purpose of this divine Puissance can be entirely trusted; he is the friend and lover of the soul and will not betray it to evil gods. Even for the man sitting far off in the night, enveloped by the darkness of the human ignorance, this flame[Agni] is a light which, when it is perfectly kindled and in proportion as it mounts higher and higher, enlarges itself into the vast light of the Truth. Flaming upward to heaven to meet the divine Dawn, it rises through the vital or nervous mid-world and through our mental skies and enters at last the Paradise of Light, its own supreme home above where joyous for ever in the eternal Truth that is the foundation of the sempiternal Bliss the shining Immortals sit in their celestial sessions and drink the wine of the infinite beatitude.” *The Secret of the Veda

aham brahmasmi. ::: "I am Brahman"; "I am absolute Reality"; "The core of my being is the ultimate Reality, the root and ground of the universe, the Source of all that exists"; one of the Mahavakyas to be found in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad of the Yajur Veda

Ahi (Sanskrit) Ahi [from the verbal root aáčƒh to press together, strangle] A serpent; in the Rig-Veda, the serpent of the sky, also called Vritra, mythologically referred to as the demon of darkness and drought who absorbed the cosmic waters. Indra, god of the sky and rainmaker, battles with Ahi and finally slays him, releasing the waters across the land.

ah. ::: unmanifested energies of the sacrifice. [R . g Veda 4.48.1]

Ahura (Avestan) [from the verbal root ahu conscious life; cf Sanskrit asura] The lord of life, the one life from whom all proceed; as daevas who were originally gods of the Aryans changed to demons among the Iranian branch of the Aryans, asura also changed to demons among the Indians. In the earlier Vedas, asura is especially used for Varuna, the ruler of the heavenly sphere. “The Mazdean Scriptures of the Zend Avesta, the Vendidad and others correct and expose the later cunning shuffling of the gods in the Hindu Pantheon, and restore through Ahura the Asuras to their legitimate place in Theogony . . .” (SD 2:60-1).

. ah. (vamih suvira ishah) ::: delightful impulsions full of a perfect energy. [Cf. R.g Veda 3.53.1]

Aitareya (Sanskrit) Aitareya [from itara other; also from itarā mother of Aitareya] Name of a Brahmana or literary work attached to the Rig-Veda; also of Mahidasa, author of a Brahmana and an Aranyaka. The Aitareya-Brahmana (or Aitareyaka) contains forty adhyayas (sections) in which the duties of a hotri (priest) are enumerated. The Aitareya-Aranyaka consists of five books or aranyakas, the second and third of which are called the Aitareya-Upanishad (although sometimes the last four sections of the second book alone are so designated).

ajante arcayah. (Agner bhrajante archayah) ::: the ïŹ‚aming radiances of Agni2 blaze forth. [R . g Veda 1.44.12]

Aja (Sanskrit) Aja [from a not + the verbal root jan to be born, produced] Unborn; title given to many of the primordial gods. In the Rig-Veda, the equivalent of the First Logos, which is a radiation or first manifestation on the plane of illusion of the cosmic One — the Absolute or cosmic paramatman. The Purusha-Sukta or Hymn of Man (RV 10:90) states that the thousand-headed Purusha is dismembered at the foundation of the world so that from his remains the universe might arise. This is the foundation of the later Christian symbol of the sacrificial lamb, for there is here a play on words: Aja the “unborn” — Purusha or manvantaric spirit — may also be derived from the verbal root aj (to drive, propel), whose meanings include a he-goat, a ram, and the sign Aries. Spirit disappears — dies, metaphorically — the more it becomes involved in cosmic matter, and hence the sacrifice of the unborn, the lamb, or the ram (cf TBL 56).

Akshanvat, Akshanvanta (Sanskrit) AkáčŁanvat, AkáčŁanvanta One furnished with eyes; used in the Vedas (10:71:7), where friends emulate each other in singing. Connected by Blavatsky with the development of sight, hearing, and human language, and with the fact that words for light and sound originate from the same roots. (BCW 7:67)

Alaya-vijnana (Sanskrit) Ālaya-vijñāna [from ālaya abode, dwelling from ā-lÄ« to settle upon, come close to + vijñāna discernment, knowledge from vi-jñā to distinguish, know, understand] Abode of discriminative knowledge; the cognizing or discerning faculty, the mental power of making distinctions, hence the higher reasoning. When used mystically as “a receptacle or treasury of knowledge or wisdom,” it corresponds very closely to the Vedantic vijnanamaya-kosa, the “thought-made sheath” of the human constitution, the higher manas or reincarnating ego.

". . . all creation is a formation of the Spirit, . . . .” The Secret of the Veda*

“
 all creation is a formation of the Spirit, 
” The Secret of the Veda

All Indian doctrines orient themselves by the Vedas, accepting or rejecting their authority. In ranging from materialism to acosmism and nihilism, from physiologism to spiritualism, realism to idealism, monism to pluralism, atheism and pantheism, Hindus believe they have exhausted all possible philosophic attitudes (cf. darsana), which they feel supplement rather than exclude each other. A unnersal feature is the fusion of religion, metaphysics, ethics and psychology, due to the universal acceptance of a psycho-physicalism, further exemplified in the typical doctrines of karma and samsara (q.v.). Rigorous logic is nevertheless applied in theology where metaphvsics passes into eschatology (cf., e.g., is) and the generally accepted belief in the cyclic nature of the cosmos oscillating between srsti ("throwing out") and pralaya (dissolution) of the absolute reality (cf. abhasa), and in psychology, where epistemology seeks practical outlets in Yoga (q.v.). With a genius for abstraction, thinkers were and are almost invariably hedonistically motivated by the desire to overcome the evils of existence in the hope of attaining liberation (cf. moksa) and everlasting bliss (cf. ananda, nirvana). -- K.F.L.

"All the limitlessly wise immortals desired and found the Child within us who is everywhere around us.” The Secret of the Veda

“All the limitlessly wise immortals desired and found the Child within us who is everywhere around us.” The Secret of the Veda

"All world is expression or manifestation, creation by the Word.” The Secret of the Veda

“All world is expression or manifestation, creation by the Word.” The Secret of the Veda

Amal: “When Ashwapati enters the occult cave he finds among other wonders hidden from the outer consciousness an orderly guide, as in an index, to all the mysteries of existence, mysteries such as the Rig Veda offers though its system of ordinary objects like those we find in outer life—especially cows which were a very important part of the Vedic peoples day to day career.”

Ambhamsi (Sanskrit) Ambhāáčƒsi [from ambhas water, from the verbal root bhā to shine] Water; in the Vedas the celestial waters and also a synonym for gods, but in the Brahmanas and Puranas the four orders of beings that variously “shine” or flourish: deva-manushyah (gods and men), pitris (fathers or manes), and asuras (demons, not-gods). This is “because they are all the product of waters (mystically), of the Akasic Ocean . . . If the student of Esoteric philosophy thinks deeply over the subject he is sure to find out all the suggestiveness of the term Ambhamsi, in its manifold relations to the Virgin in Heaven, to the Celestial Virgin of the Alchemists, and even to the ‘Waters of Grace’ of the modern Baptist” (SD 1:458n).

ana ::: (intuitive) knowledge of the Veda.

anam ::: "safe enjoyment of our havings", assured possession of our (spiritual) riches. [Cf. R.g Veda 1.4.9]

Anandamayakosa (Sanskrit) Ānandamayakoƛa [from ānanda bliss, joy + maya built of, formed of from the verbal root mā to measure, form + koƛa sheath] Bliss-built sheath; in the Vedantic classification, the first of the panchakosa (five sheaths) of the human constitution which enclose the divine monad (atman); it corresponds to the spiritual soul (buddhi). Anandamayakosa is sometimes mystically referred to as the sheath of the sun. See also KOSA

Angiras (Angirasa) ::: the rsi who represents the seer-will, in later times regarded as one of the original sages, progenitor of a clan of rsis that went by his name, however it is clear that the word is used in the Veda not merely as a name of a certain family of rsis, but with a distinct meaning inherent in the word: it must have meant flaming, glowing; used as an epithet, a name of Agni, etc. [Ved.]

Āṅgirasas ::: an ancient clan of r.s.is in the Veda, the "human fathers" who discovered the Light, also portrayed as heavenly seers or as powers of Agni2, "forces of the symbolic Light and Flame"; along with the Bhr.gus, identified in the Record of Yoga with the Judeo-Christian "seraphim", the highest order of angels.

Angirasas (Sanskrit) Aáč…girasa-s [from aáč…g to go, move tortuously] The descendants of Angiras through his son, Agni; a name occurring in Vedic hymns addressed to luminous deities, and later extended to all phenomena connected with light. Specifically, the hymns of the Atharva-Veda are called Angirasa, as are those priests who recite them and perform the sacrifices according to the Atharva-vedic rules. “ ‘Angirases’ was one of the names of the Dhyanis, or Devas instructors (‘guru-deva’), of the late Third, the Fourth, and even of the Fifth Race Initiates” (SD 2:605n).

Aniyamsam Aniyasam (Sanskrit) Aáč‡Ä«yāáčƒsam aáč‡Ä«yasāáčƒ [from aáč‡u atom, minuteness; aáč‡Ä«yāáčƒsam, accusative of aáč‡Ä«yas, comparative of adjective aáč‡u + aáč‡Ä«yasām genitive plural of aáč‡u] Philosophically, atomic of the atomic; otherwise the smallest of the small. A phrase lifted from one of the Hindu scriptures (cf VP 1:15n), without changing the first word to its nominative case. It is applied to the universal divinity whose vital intelligent essence is everywhere, to the absolutely spiritual atom which is the divine monad of every entity, great and small, in the cosmos. In Vedantic philosophy, often used as a name of Brahman, conceived as being smaller than the smallest atom and equivalently as greater than the greatest sphere or universe. The conception applies equally well to paramatman. This universality whether in infinitesimals or in cosmic reaches is expressed in the almost equivalent phrase anor aniyamsam (smaller than an atom) (BG 8:9); likewise, anor aniyan (smaller than the small) in combination with mahato mahiyan (greater than the great) in the Upanishads (Katha 1:2, 20; Svetasvatara 3:21).

an kaman karate sis.vidanah. ::: "who with sweat of effort creates little fragmentary desires". [R.g Veda 5.42.10]

Annamayakosa (Sanskrit) Annamayakoƛa [from anna food + maya from the verbal root mā to measure, delimit + koƛa sheath, treasury] Food-built sheath; according to the Vedantic classification of the human constitution, the fifth and grossest of the panchakosa (five sheaths) which enclose the atman (divine monad), corresponding to the sthula-sarira (physical body) in the sevenfold theosophical division.

ano (samo diva dadrishe rochamano) ::: to. se rocam gether with heaven (the illumined mind) he appears shining. [R . g Veda 7.62.1]

Antahkarana (Sanskrit) Antaáž„karaáč‡a [from antar interior, within + karaáč‡a sense organ] Interior organ or instrument; defined variously as the seat of thought and feeling, the thinking faculty, the heart, mind, soul, and conscience. In Vedanta philosophy, it is looked upon as a fourfold inner instrument or intermediary between spirit and body, with mind being the go-between or bridge. One could say that there are several antahkaranas in the human septenary constitution: one for every path or bridge between any two monadic centers. Man is a unity in diversity, and the antahkaranas are the links of vibrating consciousness-substance uniting these various centers (cf OG 5). Blavatsky describes it as “the path that lies between thy Spirit and thy self, the highway of sensations, the rude arousers of Ahankara” (the sense of egoity); and that when the two have merged into the One and the personal sacrificed to self impersonal, then the antahkarana vanishes because no longer useful as a functioning bridge between the two. Further, the antahkarana is “the lower Manas, the Path of communication or communion between the personality and the higher Manas or human Soul. At death it is destroyed as a Path or medium of communication, and its remains survive in a form as the Kamarupa — the ‘shell’ ” (VS 56, 88-9).

Antariksha, Antariksha (Sanskrit) AntarÄ«káčŁa, AntarikáčŁa [from antar within, interior + Ä«káčŁa from the verbal root Ä«káčŁ to behold, see] The mid-region; the firmament or space between earth and heaven, the abode of apsaras (nymphs), gandharvas (celestial musicians), and yakshas (nature sprites of many types) along with the mythical wish-granting cow of plenty, Kamadhenu. In the Vedas, antariksha is the middle or second of three lokas (spheres) usually enumerated as bhur, bhuvar, and svar. Above these rise in serial order the four higher lokas of the ordinary Brahmanical hierarchy. Hierarchically, taking the bhurloka as the physical sphere, bhuvarloka or antariksha corresponds with the astral plane. In the Vishnu-Purana (3:3), Antariksha is named as the Vyasa (arranger of the Veda) in the 13th dvapara yuga in the Vaivasvata manvantara, our present world cycle.

A number of hymns in the Rig-Veda are attributed to Angiras, and in one of his births he is famed for his supreme virtue and as an expounder of brahma-vidya (divine or transcendental wisdom). In the Vayu-Purana and elsewhere in Puranic literature some of the descendants of Angiras were said to be Kshattriya by birth and Brahmins by calling (VP 4:8n p.39).

anus.a ::: the mental thought [Cf. R . g Veda 2.2.10]

Apamnapat (Sanskrit) Apāáčƒnapāt [from apām of waters from ap water + napāt child, son, offspring] Son of the waters; in the Vedas one name of Agni (cosmic and terrestrial fire), as having issued as lightning from the firmament or cosmic spaces, so frequently called waters in ancient scriptures. This connects Apamnapat with fohat: just as fohat is cosmic vitality manifest in one of its forms as fire (agni) or as electricity and magnetism in their manifold appearances, so is fohat or apamnapat the child or offspring of cosmic space or the cosmic waters. But these waters “are not the liquid we know, but Ether — the fiery waters of space” (SD 2:400n). Fohat likewise is called the son of ether in the latter’s highest aspect, akasa.

Aparavidya (Sanskrit) Aparāvidyā [from a not + parā supreme + vidyā knowledge from the verbal root vid to see, know, percieve] Nonsupreme knowledge; in Vedanta philosophy the lower wisdom of Brahman, relative knowledge acquired by the intellect and through the performance of ritual worship and duties, in contradistinction to paravidya (supreme wisdom), the transcendental knowledge of Brahman attainable by him who has achieved moksha (liberation) during life. This distinction between the exoteric and esoteric tradition and doctrine is found in practically all cultures.

Apas-tattva (Sanskrit) Apas-tattva [from ap water + tattva thatness, reality] Also Āpas-tattva. The water principle; sixth in the descending scale of the seven tattvas, the principles or categories of nature. In the Upanishads and Vedanta only five tattvas are enumerated.

a pramati ::: happy state of mind. [R . g Veda 1.94.1]

Apsaras (Sanskrit) Apsaras [from ap water + saras flowing from the verbal root sáč› to flow, glide, blow (as of wind)] Moving in the waters; a class of feminine divinities known as celestial water nymphs, whose location is commonly placed in the sky between the clouds rather than in the waters of earth, although they are often described as visiting earth. These fairy-like wives of the gandharvas (celestial musicians) can change their shape at will, often appearing as aquatic birds. In Manu they are held to be the creations of the seven manus, but in the Puranas and the Ramayana their origin is attributed to the churning of the cosmic waters, and it is said that neither gods nor asuras would have them for wives. Since mythologically they were common to all, they are called Sumadatmajas (self-willed pleasurers) — 35 million of them, of whom Kama, god of love, is lord and king. One of their roles is to act as temptresses to those too ardent for divine status. Only the individual who can withstand the perfumed entreaties of the apsarasas is worthy of full enlightenment. In the Yajur-Veda the apsarasas are called sunbeams because of their connection with the gandharva who personifies the sun.

Aran.yani ::: the Vedic goddess of the forest (aran.ya, wilderness, perAranyani haps equivalent in the esoteric sense of the Veda to vana, forest, symbolising for Sri Aurobindo "the growths of the earth, our material ...22 existence").

arayan.a (Nara-Narayana; NaraNarayana; Nara Narayana) —(in mythology) the names of two sages, Nara and Narayan.a, "the seers who do tapasya together for the knowledge", a "double figure" which in the "Vaishnava form of Vedantism . . . expresses the relation of God in man to man in God", Nara being "the human soul which, eternal companion of the Divine, finds itself only when it awakens to that companionship", while Narayan.a "is the divine Soul always present in our humanity, the secret guide, friend and helper of the human being"; an intermediate bhava of brahmadarsana in which there is a dualistic perception of Nara and Narayan.a in all, the "bodha of Narayana" not being extended "into the whole consciousness of the Nara", but kept "as a thing apart & containing & informing, but not identical with the Nara".

asamvedana&

“As the Sun is image and godhead of the golden Light of the divine Truth, so Dawn is image and godhead of the opening out of the supreme illumination on the night of our human ignorance. Dawn daughter of Heaven and Night her sister are obverse and reverse sides of the same eternal Infinite.” The Secret of the Veda

Astika: A Sanskrit term, denoting an individual who acknowledges the authority of the Veda (q.v.).

Astika: (Skr.) "Orthodox"; one acknowledging the authority of the Veda (q.v,). -- K.F.L.

asura ::: (in the Veda) "the mighty Lord", an epithet of the supreme deva; a Titan (daitya); a kind of anti-divine being of the mentalised vital plane; the sixth of the ten types of consciousness (dasa-gavas) in the evolutionary scale: mind concentrated on the buddhi; (on page 1280) a being of a world of "might & glory".

asura ::: [Ved.]: the Lord; used in the Veda as in the Avesta for the deva, but also for the gods, his manifestations; it is only in a few hymns that it is used for the dark Titans; [Later] : the strong or mighty one, Titan; a [hostile] being of the mentalised vital.

asus.e mayas (dasushe mayas) ::: bliss for the giver (of the sacrifice).[R . g Veda 1.93.1]

asva(h.) patvabhih. saphanam (aswá patwabhih saphánám) ::: horses asva(h)(symbolic of vital energies) with tramplings of their hooves. [Cf. R .g Veda 5.6.7]

asvapesasam (goagram aswapeshasam) ::: in whose front is the cow (symbol of Light) and whose form is the horse (symbol of vital energy). [R . g Veda 2.1.16]

asvattha (aswattha) ::: fig tree (Vedantic symbol of the cosmic maniasvattha festation).

Aswapati ::: Purani: “Aswapathy, the father of Savitri, has been significantly called by the poet ‘the Lord of Life’. (book II, Canto XV). The name suggests an affinity to Vedic symbolism. In the Veda, Aswa, the horse, is the symbol of life-energy or vital power. Aswa + aty, Lord, would mean the ‘Lord of Life’. In the poem King Aswapathy is the symbol of the aspiring soul of man as manifested in life on earth.”Savitri”—An Approach and a Study

Atharva Veda: The latest of the four Vedas (q.v.), containing many magic charms and incantations, as well as hymns and prayers similar to those in the Rig Veda. (It is often referred to as the “Veda of Occult Powers.”)

Atharvan (Atharva) ::: the rsi of the journeying on the Path; [the seer of the Atharva-veda]. [Ved.]

Atharva-veda ::: [the fourth Veda, composed by Atharvan].

atharvaveda. :::the fourth of the four

"Atman and Brahman are the same"; "The Self is one and the same with the Absolute"; one of the Mahavakyas to be found in the Mandukya Upanishad of the Atharva Veda

atri ::: literally "devourer", a type of hostile being in the Veda.

Atris ::: "eaters, travellers", the name of a family of rsis in the Veda.

avyakta ::: unmanifest, latent, concealed; the unmanifestation, unmanifest principle; [in samkhya]: the primary unmanifest seed-state of the manifest active eightfold nature of things; [in vedanta]: the power involved or inherent in unmanifest Spirit or Self out of which cosmos comes and into which it returns.

ayurveda. ::: "Science of Life"; a 5000 year old vedic system of natural medecine which seeks to balance the three humors within the body, known as kapha &

barhih. ::: in the Veda, the seat of sacred grass on which the gods are invited to sit at the sacrifice.

being, Master of ::: Sri Aurobindo: " Vamadeva goes on to say, "Let us give expression to this secret name of the clarity, — that is to say, let us bring out this Soma wine, this hidden delight of existence; let us hold it in this world-sacrifice by our surrenderings or submissions to Agni, the divine Will or Conscious-Power which is the Master of being.” The Secret of the Veda

Bhrgus (Bhrigus) ::: solar powers of Surya, burning powers of the Sun; a family of rsis in the Veda, [descendants of Bhrgu]. [Ved.]

bird ::: Sri Aurobindo: "The Bird in the Veda is the symbol, very frequently, of the soul liberated and upsoaring, at other times of energies so liberated and upsoaring, winging upwards towards the heights of our being, winging widely with a free flight, no longer involved in the ordinary limited movement or labouring gallop of the Life-energy, the Horse, Ashwa.” *The Secret of the Veda

bird ::: “The Bird in the Veda is the symbol, very frequently, of the soul liberated and upsoaring, at other times of energies so liberated and upsoaring, winging upwards towards the heights of our being, winging widely with a free flight, no longer involved in the ordinary limited movement or labouring gallop of the Life-energy, the Horse, Ashwa.” The Secret of the Veda

Brahma eva idam visvam: (Skr.) "Brahman, indeed, is this world-all", famous passage of Mundaka Upanishad 2.2.11, foreshadowing the complete monism of Sankara's Vedanta (q.v.). -- K.F.L.

brahman.a ::: by the soul-thought (brahman in the Vedic sense). [Cf. brahmana R . g Veda 2.2.10]

brahman.a ::: perfect energy by the war-horse (symbolising "active nervous power") or by the soul-thought (brahman in the Vedic sense). [Cf. R . g Veda 2.2.10]

Brahmanaspati: (1) A deity in the Rig-Veda. Known in Vedic mythology as Brihaspati, signifying the power of prayer. (2) The Hindu name for the planet Jupiter.

Brahmanas ::: [the portion of the Veda, distinct from its mantra (hymnal) portion, which contains rules for the employment of the mantras at various sacrifices, and also detailed explanations of the origin and meaning of the mantras and numerous old legends].

brahman ::: (in the Veda) "the soul or soul-consciousness emerging from the secret heart of things" or "the thought, inspired, creative, full of the secret truth, which emerges from that consciousness and becomes thought of the mind"; (in Vedanta) the divine Reality, "the One [eka1] besides whom there is nothing else existent", the Absolute who is "at the same time the omnipresent Reality in which all that is relative exists as its forms or its movements". Its nature is saccidananda, infinite existence (sat), consciousness (cit) and bliss (ananda), whose second element can also be described as consciousness-force (cit-tapas), making four fundamental principles of the integral Reality; brahman seen in all things in terms of these principles is called in the Record of Yoga the fourfold brahman, whose aspects form the brahma catus.t.aya. The complete realisation of brahman included for Sri Aurobindo not only the unification of the experiences of the nirgun.a brahman (brahman without qualities) and sagun.a brahman (brahman with qualities), but the harmonisation of the impersonal brahman which is "the spiritual material and conscious substance of all the ideas and forces and forms of the universe" with the personal isvara in the consciousness of parabrahman, the brahman in its supreme status as "a transcendent Unthinkable too great for any manifestation", which "is at the same time the living supreme Soul of all things" (purus.ottama) and the supreme Lord (paramesvara) and supreme Self (paramatman), "and in all these equal aspects the same single and eternal Godhead". Brahman is represented in sound by the mystic syllable OM.

Brahmanism: The predominant form of philosophical, theological, and esoteric speculation of India, sponsored by the Brahman caste which traces its doctrines back to the Vedas (q.v.) and Upanishads (q.v.).

Brahmanism: The predominant form of philosophical, theological, and ethical speculation of India, sponsored by the Brahman caste which traces its doctrines back to the Vedas (q.v.) and Upanishads (q.v.) without ever having attained uniformity in regard to the main doctrines. -- K.F.L.

brahman ::: [Ved.]: the sacred or inspired word, expression of the heart or soul; heart; the Vedic word or mantra in its profoundest aspect as the expression of the intuition arising out of the depths of the soul or being; the Soul that emerges out of the subconscient in Man and rises towards the superconscient and also word of creative Power welling upward out of the soul. [Vedanta]: the Reality; the Eternal; the Absolute; the Spirit; the Supreme Being; the One besides whom there is nothing else existent; in relation to the universe [cf. atman] the Supreme is brahman, the one Reality which is not only the spiritual, material and conscious substance of all the ideas and forces and forms of the universe, but their origin, support and possessor, the cosmic and supracosmic Spirit. ::: brahma [nominative] ::: brahmana [instrumental], by the hymn. ::: brahmani [locative], into the brahman. [cf. Brahma]

Brahmasutra (Brahma Sutras) ::: [a well-known aphoristic work treating of the brahman; it is one of the main texts of the vedanta philosophy; also called Vedanta-sutra].

brahma sutras. ::: a treatise by Vyasa on vedanta philosophy in the form of aphorisms

brahmavada ::: [the gospel of the brahman], the Vedantic philosophy [as opposed to the vedavada].

br.hat (satyam ritam brihat) ::: "consciousness of essential truth of being (satyam), of ordered truth of active being (r.tam) and the vast self-awareness (br.hat) in which alone this consciousness is possible"; these three terms express the nature of vijñana. [Cf. Atharva Veda 12.1.1, satyaṁ br.had r.tam]

Bruno, Giordano: (1548-1600) A Dominican monk, eventually burned at the stake because of his opinions, he was converted from Christianity to a naturalistic and mystical pantheism by the Renaissance and particularly by the new Copernican astronomy. For him God and the universe were two names for one and the same Reality considered now as the creative essence of all things, now as the manifold of realized possibilities in which that essence manifests itself. As God, natura naturans, the Real is the whole, the one transcendent and ineffable. As the Real is the infinity of worlds and objects and events into which the whole divides itself and in which the one displays the infinite potentialities latent within it. The world-process is an ever-lasting going forth from itself and return into itself of the divine nature. The culmination of the outgoing creative activity is reached in the human mind, whose rational, philosophic search for the one in the many, simplicity in variety, and the changeless and eternal in the changing and temporal, marks also the reverse movement of the divine nature re-entering itself and regaining its primordial unity, homogeneity, and changelessness. The human soul, being as it were a kind of boomerang partaking of the ingrowing as well as the outgrowing process, may hope at death, not to be dissolved with the body, which is borne wholly upon the outgoing stream, but to return to God whence it came and to be reabsorbed in him. Cf. Rand, Modern Classical Philosophers, selection from Bruno's On Cause, The Principle and the One. G. Bruno: De l'infinito, universo e mundo, 1584; Spaccio della bestia trionfante, 1584; La cena delta ceneri, 1584; Deglieroici furori, 1585; De Monade, 1591. Cf. R. Honigswald, Giordano Bruno; G. Gentile, Bruno nella storia della cultura, 1907. -- B.A.G.F. Brunschvicg, Leon: (1869-) Professor of Philosophy at the Ecole Normale in Paris. Dismissed by the Nazis (1941). His philosophy is an idealistic synthesis of Spinoza, Kant and Schelling with special stress on the creative role of thought in cultural history as well as in sciences. Main works: Les etapes de la philosophie mathematique, 1913; L'experience humaine et la causalite physique, 1921; De la connaissance de soi, 1931. Buddhism: The multifarious forms, philosophic, religious, ethical and sociological, which the teachings of Gautama Buddha (q.v.) have produced. They centre around the main doctrine of the catvari arya-satyani(q.v.), the four noble truths, the last of which enables one in eight stages to reach nirvana (q.v.): Right views, right resolve, right speech, right conduct, right livelihood, right effort, right mindfulness, right concentration. In the absence of contemporary records of Buddha and Buddhistic teachings, much value was formerly attached to the palm leaf manuscripts in Pali, a Sanskrit dialect; but recently a good deal of weight has been given also the Buddhist tradition in Sanskrit, Tibetan, and Chinese. Buddhism split into Mahayanism and Hinayanism (q.v.), each of which, but particularly the former, blossomed into a variety of teachings and practices. The main philosophic schools are the Madhyamaka or Sunyavada, Yogacara, Sautrantika, and Vaibhasika (q.v.). The basic assumptions in philosophy are a causal nexus in nature and man, of which the law of karma (q.v.) is but a specific application; the impermanence of things, and the illusory notion of substance and soul. Man is viewed realistically as a conglomeration of bodily forms (rupa), sensations (vedana), ideas (sanjna), latent karma (sanskaras), and consciousness (vijnana). The basic assumptions in ethics are the universality of suffering and the belief in a remedy. There is no god; each one may become a Buddha, an enlightened one. Also in art and esthetics Buddhism has contributed much throughout the Far East. -- K.F.L.

Veda an image of the Gods, the male power in Nature. Again, the bull is vihana ‱ of Siva.

Veda-knower

Vedanta(Sanskrit) ::: From the Upanishads and from other parts of the wonderful cycle of Vedic literature, theancient sages of India produced what is called today the Vedanta -- a compound word meaning "the end(or completion) of the Veda" -- that is to say, instruction in the final and most perfect exposition of themeaning of the Vedic tenets.The Vedanta is the highest form that the Brahmanical teachings have taken, and under the name of theUttara-Mimamsa attributed to Vyasa, the compiler of the Vedas, the Vedanta is perhaps the noblest ofthe six Indian schools of philosophy. The Avatara Sankaracharya has been the main popularizer of theVedantic system of philosophical thought, and the type of Vedantic doctrine taught by him is what istechnically called the Advaita-Vedanta or nondualistic.The Vedanta may briefly be described as a system of mystical philosophy derived from the efforts ofsages through many generations to interpret the sacred or esoteric meaning of the Upanishads. In itsAdvaita form the Vedanta is in many, if not all, respects exceedingly close to, if not identical with, someof the mystical forms of Buddhism in central Asia. The Hindus call the Vedanta Brahma-jnana.

Vedanta Sutra ::: see Brahmasutra

Vedantasutras: See Brahmasutras. Vedantic: Adjective, "belonging to the Vedanta" (q.v.). Vedic: (Skr.) Adjective, referring to the Vedas (q.v.) or the period that generated them, considered closed about 500 B.C. -- K.F.L.

Vedanta: The best known and most popular formulation of Hindu mystic philosophy, which teaches that the phenomenal world is mere illusion and has only seeming reality, as have also the apparent individual selves of the world, and there is but one self, Brahman-Atman; he who knows “that, soul art thou,” attains moksha and is released from the wheel of existence.

Vedanta: The "end of the Veda" (q.v.), used both in the literal sense and that of final goal, or meaning. Applied to the Upanishads (q.v.) and various systems of thought based upon them. Specifically the doctrine elaborated in the Brahmasutras of Badarayana, restated, reinterpreted, and changed by later philosophers, notably Sankara, Ramanuja, Nimbarka, Madhva, and Vallabha (which see). The central theme is that enunciated in the Upanishads of the relation between world soul and individual soul or self. Within the Vedanta, a number of solutions were found and taught with varying success. Sankara supposed God and soul identical (see advaita), Madhva different (see dvaita), Ramanuja different yet identical (see visistadvaita), Vallabha had a theory of obscuration, etc. -- K.F.L.

Veda, plural Vedas: (Skr. knowledge) Collectively the ancient voluminous, sacred literature of India (in bulk prior to 1000 B.C.), composed of Rigveda (hymns to gods), Samaveda (priests' chants), Yajurveda (sacrificial formulae), and Atharvaveda (magical chants), which among theosophic speculations contain the first philosophic insights. Generally recognized as an authority even in philosophy, extended and supplemented later by sutras (q.v.) and various accessory textbooks on grammar, astronomy, medicine, etc., called Vedangas ("members of the Veda") and the philosophical treatises, such as the Upanishads (q.v.). -- K.F.L.

Vedas and Upanishads

Vedas, dating from 1000 BC, consisting of spells, prayers, charms, and hymns &

Vedas, dating from 2000 BC or earlier, consisting of several mythological and poetical accounts of the origin of the world, hymns praising the gods, and ancient prayers for life and prosperity; "praise verse"

Vedas, dating from between 1400-1000 BC, consisting of formulas &

Vedas, detailing the proper performance of rituals

Veda(s)(Sanskrit) ::: From a verbal root vid signifying "to know." These are the most ancient and the most sacredliterary and religious works of the Hindus. Veda as a word may be described as "divine knowledge." TheVedas are four in number: the Rig-Veda, the Yajur-Veda, the Sama-Veda, and the Atharva-Veda, thislast being commonly supposed to be of later date than the former three.Manu in his Work on Law always speaks of the three Vedas, which he calls "the ancient triple Brahman"-- sanatanam trayam brahma." Connected with the Vedas is a large body of other works of variouskinds, liturgical, ritualistic, exegetical, and mystical, the Veda itself being commonly divided into twogreat portions, outward and inner: the former called the karma-kanda, the "Section of Works," and thelatter called jnana-kanda or "Section of Wisdom."The authorship of the Veda is not unitary, but almost every hymn or division of a Veda is ascribed to adifferent author or rather to various authors; but they are supposed to have been compiled in their presentform by Veda-Vyasa. There is no question in the minds of learned students of theosophy that the Vedasrun back in their origins to enormous antiquity, thousands of years before the beginning of what is knownin the Occident as the Christian era, whatever Occidental scholars may have to say in objection to thisstatement. Hindu pandits themselves claim that the Veda was taught orally for thousands of years, andthen finally compiled on the shores of the sacred lake Manasa-Sarovara, beyond the Himalayas in adistrict of what is now Tibet.

Vedas, she is the Mother of the gods from whose cosmic matrix the heavenly bodies were born

Vedas

Vedas, the drink and the plant refer to the same entity, and is perceived as a giver of immortality, a healthy and long life, offspring, happiness, courage, strength, victory over enemies, wisdom, understanding and creativity

Veda: The generic name for the most ancient sacred literature of the Hindus, consisting of the four collections called (1) Rig Veda, hymns to gods, (2) Sama Veda, priests’ chants, (3) Yajur Veda, sacrificial formulae in prose, and (4) Atharva Veda, magical chants; each Veda is divided into two broad divisions, viz. (1) Mantra, hymns, and (2) Brahmana, precepts, which include (a) Aranyakas, theology, and (b) Upanishads, philosophy; the Vedas are classified as revealed literature; they contain the first philosophical insights and are regarded as the final authority; tradition makes Vyasa the compiler and arranger of the Vedas in their present form; the Vedic period is conservatively estimated to have begun about 1500 to 1000 B.C.

"Veda, then, is the creation of an age anterior to our intellectual philosophies. In that original epoch thought proceeded by other methods than those of our logical reasoning and speech accepted modes of expression which in our modern habits would be inadmissible. The wisest then depended on inner experience and the suggestions of the intuitive mind for all knowledge that ranged beyond mankind"s ordinary perceptions and daily activities. Their aim was illumination, not logical conviction, their ideal the inspired seer, not the accurate reasoner. Indian tradition has faithfully preserved this account of the origin of the Vedas. The Rishi was not the individual composer of the hymn, but the seer (drashtñ ) of an eternal truth and an impersonal knowledge. The language of Veda itself is shruti, a rhythm not composed by the intellect but heard, a divine Word that came vibrating out of the Infinite to the inner audience of the man who had previously made himself fit for the impersonal knowledge.” The Secret of the Veda

“Veda, then, is the creation of an age anterior to our intellectual philosophies. In that original epoch thought proceeded by other methods than those of our logical reasoning and speech accepted modes of expression which in our modern habits would be inadmissible. The wisest then depended on inner experience and the suggestions of the intuitive mind for all knowledge that ranged beyond mankind’s ordinary perceptions and daily activities. Their aim was illumination, not logical conviction, their ideal the inspired seer, not the accurate reasoner. Indian tradition has faithfully preserved this account of the origin of the Vedas. The Rishi was not the individual composer of the hymn, but the seer (drashtñ ) of an eternal truth and an impersonal knowledge. The language of Veda itself is shruti, a rhythm not composed by the intellect but heard, a divine Word that came vibrating out of the Infinite to the inner audience of the man who had previously made himself fit for the impersonal knowledge.” The Secret of the Veda

cars.an.ipra (charshanipra) ::: "filling the actions" (see the sortilege of carsanipra 13 December 1912 from R . g Veda 1.177.1).

Con* and milk ::: Vcdic image. In the Veda the Cow is the

cosmic Will ::: Sri Aurobindo: "Agni is the Deva, the All-Seer, manifested as conscious-force or, as it would be called in modern language, Divine or Cosmic Will, first hidden and building up the eternal worlds, then manifest, ``born"", building up in man the Truth and the Immortality.” *The Secret of the Veda

dadasa (sutuko dadásha) ::: a Vedic phrase, occurring in the sortilege on page 460, whose precise interpretation is problematic; Sri Aurobindo translates sutukah. elsewhere as "swift", but connects it here with "samata & ananda", while he takes dadasa, "he has given", to refer to "complete dasya subjective & objective". [R . g Veda 1.149.5]

daks.a (jyotir daksha) ::: light and discernment. [Cf. R . g Veda 9.61.18]

dakshinamurti. :::name for Lord Shiva as the silent teacher; the Vedas declare that in every cycle of creation Reality manifests as Dakshinamurti and becomes the Guru of the first human beings, those who were most spiritually evolved in the previous creation, teaching them the path to liberation

darsana (Darshan, Darshana) ::: seeing; the self-revelation of the Deity to the devotee; [an occasion when a spiritual personality in India allows himself to be seen]; [the six darsanas: the six systems of orthodox Indian philosophy: purva-mimamsa, uttara-mimamsa (vedanta), nyaya, vaisesika, samkhya, yoga].

dasa ::: (in the Veda) a destructive power, enemy of the arya. dasa

dasbodh. ::: 17th century advaita vedanta spiritual text orally narrated in 1654 by Saint Samarth Ramdas &

dasyu ::: (in the Veda) an enemy, plunderer or destroyer; any of various powers of darkness and ignorance who oppose the seeker of truth and immortality.

Dawn ::: Tehmi: “Dawn in the Veda is the goddess symbolic of new openings of divine illumination on man’s physical consciousness.”

“Day and Night,—the latter the state of Ignorance that belongs to our material Nature, the former the state of illumined Knowledge that belongs to the divine Mind of which our mentality is a pale and dulled reflection.” The Secret of the Veda

delight ::: “
 the divine Ananda, the principle of Bliss [is that] from which, in the Vedic conception, the existence of Man, this mental being, is drawn. A secret Delight is the base of existence, its sustaining atmosphere and almost its substance. This Ananda is spoken of in the Taittiriya Upanishad as the ethereal atmosphere of bliss without which nothing could remain in being. In the Aitareya Upanishad Soma, as the lunar deity, is born from the sense-mind in the universal Purusha and, when man is produced, expresses himself again as sense-mentality in the human being. For delight is the raison d’ĂȘtre of sensation, or, we may say, sensation is an attempt to translate the secret delight of existence into the terms of physical consciousness.” The Secret of the Veda

divedapper ::: n. --> A water fowl; the didapper. See Dabchick.

dragon of the dark foundation ::: Sri Aurobindo: "All this action and struggle and ascension is supported by Heaven our Father and Earth our Mother, Parents of the Gods, who sustain respectively the purely mental and psychic and the physical consciousness. Their large and free scope is the condition of our achievement. Vayu, Master of life, links them together by the mid-air, the region of vital force. And there are other deities, — Parjanya, giver of the rain of heaven; Dadhikravan, the divine war-horse, a power of Agni; the mystic Dragon of the Foundations; Trita Aptya who on the third plane of existence consummates our triple being; and more besides.” The Secret of the Veda

dūn.asa (dunasha) ::: "oppressed in hope" (in Sri Aurobindo"s interdunasa pretation of R.g Veda 1.176.4).

dvaita (Dwaita) ::: dualism; dualistic vedanta.

dvayavin (dwayavin) ::: "dualiser"; a type of hostile being in the Veda. dvayavin

ebhih. stomebhih. ::: by these hymns of affirmation. [R.g Veda 7.62.2]

::: **". . . for all falsehood is merely a wrong placing of the Truth.” The Secret of the Veda*

“
 for all falsehood is merely a wrong placing of the Truth.” The Secret of the Veda

:::   " . . . for Dawn is the illumination of the Truth rising upon the mentality to bring the day of full consciousness into the darkness or half-lit night of our being.” The Secret of the Veda


for since the nature of the Knowledge is to find the Truth and the fundamental Truth is the One, —the Veda speaks repeatedly of it as "That Truth" and "That One",—Vidya, Knowledge in its highest spiritual sense, came to mean purely and trenchantly the knowledge of the One.
   Ref: CWSA Vol. 21-22, Page: 508


:::   "For there seems to be no reason why Life should evolve out of material elements or Mind out of living form, unless we accept the Vedantic solution that Life is already involved in Matter and Mind in Life because in essence Matter is a form of veiled Life, Life a form of veiled Consciousness.” The Life Divine

“For there seems to be no reason why Life should evolve out of material elements or Mind out of living form, unless we accept the Vedantic solution that Life is already involved in Matter and Mind in Life because in essence Matter is a form of veiled Life, Life a form of veiled Consciousness.” The Life Divine

gantasi nirvedam srotavyasya strutasya ca ::: thou shalt become indifferent to Scripture heard or that which thou hast yet to hear. [Gita 2.52]

gantasi nirvedam ::: thou shalt become indifferent. [see the following]

gayatri mantra. ::: a sacred Sanskrit mantra or hymn from the Rigveda invoking the solar powers of evolution and enlightenment, recited daily by hindus of the three upper castes for the unfoldment of the intellectual powers leading to enlightenment

Gayatri or Savitri(Sanskrit) ::: A verse of the Rig-Veda (iii.62.10) which from immemorial time in India has been surroundedwith the attributes of quasi-divinity. The Sanskrit words of this verse are: Tat savitur varenyam bhargodevasya dhimahi, dhiyo yo nah prachodayat. Every orthodox Brahmana is supposed to repeat this archaichymn, at least mentally, at both his morning and evening religious exercises or devotions. A translationin explanatory paraphrase, giving the essential esoteric meaning of the Gayatri or Savitri, is thefollowing: "Oh thou golden sun of most excellent splendor, illumine our hearts and fill our minds, so thatwe, recognizing our oneness with the Divinity which is the heart of the universe, may see the pathwaybefore our feet, and tread it to those distant goals of perfection, stimulated by thine own radiant light."

gnah. ::: (in the Veda) the female powers who are "the energies of gnah Nature".

Gnostic Being ::: In the supra-intellectual consciousness, dominated by the Truth or causal Idea (called in Veda Satyam, Ritam, Brihat, the True, the Right, the Vast), Atman becomes the ideal being or great Soul, vijnanamaya purusa or mahat atman.
   Ref: CWSA Vol. 17, Page: 33


gonam ::: (the steeds of life-energy) gallop to the pens of the luminous cows (the illuminations of the divine Truth). [R . g Veda 5.6.7]

heart ::: Sri Aurobindo: "The heart in Vedic psychology is not restricted to the seat of the emotions; it includes all that large tract of spontaneous mentality, nearest to the subconscient in us, out of which rise the sensations, emotions, instincts, impulses and all those intuitions and inspirations that travel through these agencies before they arrive at form in the intelligence.” *The Secret of the Veda

heart ::: “The heart in Vedic psychology is not restricted to the seat of the emotions; it includes all that large tract of spontaneous mentality, nearest to the subconscient in us, out of which rise the sensations, emotions, instincts, impulses and all those intuitions and inspirations that travel through these agencies before they arrive at form in the intelligence.” The Secret of the Veda

hindu ::: n. --> A native inhabitant of Hindostan. As an ethnical term it is confined to the Dravidian and Aryan races; as a religious name it is restricted to followers of the Veda.
Same as Hindoo.


If we regard the Powers of the Reality as so many Godheads, we can say that the Overmind releases a million Godheads into action, each empowered to create its own world, each world capable of relation, communication and interplay with the others. There are in the Veda different formulations of the nature of the Gods: it is said they are all one Existence to which the sages give different names; yet each God is worshipped as if he by himself is that Existence, one who is all the other Gods together or contains them in his being; and yet again each is a separate Deity acting sometimes in unison with companion deities, sometimes separately, sometimes even in apparent opposition to other Godheads of the same Existence. In the Supermind all this would be held together as a harmonised play of the one Existence; in the Overmind each of these three conditions could be a separate action or basis of action and have its own principle of development and consequences and yet each keep the power to combine with the others in a more composite harmony. As with the One Existence, so with its Consciousness and Force. The One Consciousness is separated into many independent forms of consciousness and knowledge; each follows out its own line of truth which it has to realise. The one total and many-sided Real-Idea is split up into its many sides; each becomes an independent Idea-Force with the power to realise itself. The one Consciousness-Force is liberated into its million forces, and each of these forces has the right to fulfil itself or to assume, if needed, a hegemony and take up for its own utility the other forces. So too the Delight of Existence is loosed out into all manner of delights and each can carry in itself its independent fullness or sovereign extreme. Overmind thus gives to the One Existence-Consciousness-Bliss the character of a teeming of infinite possibilities which can be developed into a multitude of worlds or thrown together into one world in which the endlessly variable


"Ignorance, this matrix of sin, has in its substantial effect the appearance of a triple cord of limited mind, inefficient life, obscure physical animality, the three ropes with which the Rishi Shunahshepa in the parable was bound as a victim to the sacrificial post.” The Secret of the Veda

“Ignorance, this matrix of sin, has in its substantial effect the appearance of a triple cord of limited mind, inefficient life, obscure physical animality, the three ropes with which the Rishi Shunahshepa in the parable was bound as a victim to the sacrificial post.” The Secret of the Veda

In Vedantic philosophy, the third word of the phrase sat-chit-ananda (sachchidananda): the three attributes given to atman or Brahman, or the cosmic Logos. See also CHIT; SAT.

In China: the Wu Chi (Non-Being), T'ai Chi (Being), and, on occasion, Tao. In India: the Vedantic Atman (Self) and Brahman (the Real), the Buddhist Bhutatathata (indeterminate Thatness), Vignaptimatra (the One, pure, changeless, eternal consciousness grounding all appearances), and the Void of Nagarjuna.

inconscient ::: Sri Aurobindo: "The Inconscient and the Ignorance may be mere empty abstractions and can be dismissed as irrelevant jargon if one has not come in collision with them or plunged into their dark and bottomless reality. But to me they are realities, concrete powers whose resistance is present everywhere and at all times in its tremendous and boundless mass.” *Letters on Savitri

". . . in its actual cosmic manifestation the Supreme, being the Infinite and not bound by any limitation, can manifest in Itself, in its consciousness of innumerable possibilities, something that seems to be the opposite of itself, something in which there can be Darkness, Inconscience, Inertia, Insensibility, Disharmony and Disintegration. It is this that we see at the basis of the material world and speak of nowadays as the Inconscient — the Inconscient Ocean of the Rigveda in which the One was hidden and arose in the form of this universe — or, as it is sometimes called, the non-being, Asat.” Letters on Yoga

"The Inconscient itself is only an involved state of consciousness which like the Tao or Shunya, though in a different way, contains all things suppressed within it so that under a pressure from above or within all can evolve out of it — ‘an inert Soul with a somnambulist Force".” Letters on Yoga

"The Inconscient is the last resort of the Ignorance.” Letters on Yoga

"The body, we have said, is a creation of the Inconscient and itself inconscient or at least subconscient in parts of itself and much of its hidden action; but what we call the Inconscient is an appearance, a dwelling place, an instrument of a secret Consciousness or a Superconscient which has created the miracle we call the universe.” Essays in Philosophy and Yoga :::

"The Inconscient is a sleep or a prison, the conscient a round of strivings without ultimate issue or the wanderings of a dream: we must wake into the superconscious where all darkness of night and half-lights cease in the self-luminous bliss of the Eternal.” The Life Divine

"Men have not learnt yet to recognise the Inconscient on which the whole material world they see is built, or the Ignorance of which their whole nature including their knowledge is built; they think that these words are only abstract metaphysical jargon flung about by the philosophers in their clouds or laboured out in long and wearisome books like The Life Divine. Letters on Savitri :::

   "Is it really a fact that even the ordinary reader would not be able to see any difference between the Inconscient and Ignorance unless the difference is expressly explained to him? This is not a matter of philosophical terminology but of common sense and the understood meaning of English words. One would say ‘even the inconscient stone" but one would not say, as one might of a child, ‘the ignorant stone". One must first be conscious before one can be ignorant. What is true is that the ordinary reader might not be familiar with the philosophical content of the word Inconscient and might not be familiar with the Vedantic idea of the Ignorance as the power behind the manifested world. But I don"t see how I can acquaint him with these things in a single line, even with the most. illuminating image or symbol. He might wonder, if he were Johnsonianly minded, how an Inconscient could be teased or how it could wake Ignorance. I am afraid, in the absence of a miracle of inspired poetical exegesis flashing through my mind, he will have to be left wondering.” Letters on Savitri

  **inconscient, Inconscient"s.**


India. Intimations of advanced theism, both in a deistic and immanentistic form, are to be found in the Rig Veda. The early Upanishads in general teach variously realistic deism, immanent theism, and, more characteristically, mystical, impersonal idealism, according to which the World Ground (brahman) is identified with the universal soul (atman) which is the inner or essential self within each individual person. The Bhagavad Gita, while mixing pantheism, immanent theism, and deism, inclines towards a personahstic idealism and a corresponding ethics of bhakti (selfless devotion). Jainism is atheistic dualism, with a personalistic recognition of the reality of souls. Many of the schools of Buddhism (see Buddhism) teach idealistic doctrines. Thus a monistic immaterialism and subjectivism (the Absolute is pure consciousness) was expounded by Maitreya, Asanga, and Vasubandhu. The Lankavatarasutra combined monistic, immaterialistic idealism with non-absolutistic nihilism. Subjectivistic, phenomenalistic idealism (the view that there is neither absolute Pure Consciousness nor substantial souls) was taught by the Buddhists Santaraksita and Kamalasila. Examples of modern Vedantic idealism are the Yogavasistha (subjective monistic idealism) and the monistic spiritualism of Gaudapada (duality and plurality are illusion). The most influential Vedantic system is the monistic spiritualism of Sankara. The Absolute is pure indeterminate Being, which can only be described as pure consciousness or bliss. For the different Vedantic doctrines see Vedanta and the references there. Vedantic idealism, whether in its monistic and impersonalistic form, or in that of a more personalistic theism, is the dominant type of metaphysics in modern India. Idealism is also pronounced in the reviving doctrines of Shivaism (which see).

Indian Aesthetics: Art in India is one of the most diversified subjects. Sanskrit silpa included all crafts, fine art, architecture and ornament, dancing, acting, music and even coquetry. Behind all these endeavors is a deeprooted sense of absolute values derived from Indian philosophy (q.v.) which teaches the incarnation of the divine (Krsna, Shiva, Buddha), the transitoriness of life (cf. samsara), the symbolism and conditional nature of the phenomenal (cf. maya). Love of splendour and exaggerated greatness, dating back to Vedic (q.v.) times mingled with a grand simplicity in the conception of ultimate being and a keen perception and nature observation. The latter is illustrated in examples of verisimilous execution in sculpture and painting, the detailed description in a wealth of drama and story material, and the universal love of simile. With an urge for expression associated itself the metaphysical in its practical and seemingly other-worldly aspects and, aided perhaps by the exigencies of climate, yielded the grotesque as illustrated by the cave temples of Ellora and Elephanta, the apparent barbarism of female ornament covering up all organic beauty, the exaggerated, symbol-laden representations of divine and thereanthropic beings, a music with minute subdivisions of scale, and the like. As Indian philosophy is dominated by a monistic, Vedantic (q.v.) outlook, so in Indian esthetics we can notice the prevalence of an introvert unitary, soul-centric, self-integrating tendency that treats the empirical suggestively and by way of simile, trying to stylize the natural in form, behavior, and expression. The popular belief in the immanence as well as transcendence of the Absolute precludes thus the possibility of a complete naturalism or imitation. The whole range of Indian art therefore demands a sharing and re-creation of absolute values glimpsed by the artist and professedly communicated imperfectly. Rules and discussions of the various aspects of art may be found in the Silpa-sastras, while theoretical treatments are available in such works as the Dasarupa in dramatics, the Nrtya-sastras in dancing, the Sukranitisara in the relation of art to state craft, etc. Periods and influences of Indian art, such as the Buddhist, Kushan, Gupta, etc., may be consulted in any history of Indian art. -- K.F.L.

“
 in its actual cosmic manifestation the Supreme, being the Infinite and not bound by any limitation, can manifest in Itself, in its consciousness of innumerable possibilities, something that seems to be the opposite of itself, something in which there can be Darkness, Inconscience, Inertia, Insensibility, Disharmony and Disintegration. It is this that we see at the basis of the material world and speak of nowadays as the Inconscient—the Inconscient Ocean of the Rigveda in which the One was hidden and arose in the form of this universe—or, as it is sometimes called, the non-being, Asat.” Letters on Yoga

  (In later Hinduism) “The Preserver.” The second member of the Trimurti, along with Brahma the Creator and Shiva the Destroyer. 2. (In popular Hinduism) a deity believed to have descended from heaven to earth in several incarnations, or avatars, varying in number from nine to twenty-two, but always including animals. His most important human incarnation is the Krishna of the Bhagavad-Gita. 3. “The Pervader,” one of a half-dozen solar deities in the Rig-Veda, daily traversing the sky in three strides, morning, afternoon, and night.

In orthodox Buddhism it does mean a disintegration, not of the soul — for that does not exist — but of a mental compound or stream of associations or samskaras which we mistake for our self. In illusionist Vedanta it means not a disintegration but a disappearance of a false and unreal individual self into the one real Self or Brahman j it is the idea and experience of indivi- duality that so disappears and ceases — we may say a false light that is extinguished {nirvana) in the true Light. In spiritual experience it is sometimes the loss of all sense of individuality in a boundless cosmic consciousness ; what was the individual remains only as a centre or a channel for the flow of a cosmic consciousness and cosmic force and action. Or it may be the experience of the loss of individuality in a transcendent being and consciousness in which the sense of the cosmos as well as the individual disappears. Or again, it may be in a transcend- ence which is aware of and supports the cosmic action. But what do we mean by the individual ? What we usually call by that name is a natural ego, a device of nature which holds together her action in the mind and body. This ego has to be extinguished, otherwise there is no complete liberation possible ; but the individual self is not this ego. The individual soul Is a spiritual being which is sometimes described as an eternal por- tion of the Divine but can also be described as the Divine him- self supporting his manifestation as the Many. This is the true spiritual individual which appears in its complete truth when we get rid of the ego and our false separative sense of individuality, realise our oneness with the transcendent and cosmic Divine and with all beings. It is this which makes possible the Divine Life.

INTEGRAL YOGA ::: This yoga accepts the value of cosmic existence and holds it to be a reality; its object is to enter into a higher Truth-Consciousness or Divine Supramental Consciousness in which action and creation are the expression not of ignorance and imperfection, but of the Truth, the Light, the Divine Ānanda. But for that, the surrender of the mortal mind, life and body to the Higher Consciousnessis indispensable, since it is too difficult for the mortal human being to pass by its own effort beyond mind to a Supramental Consciousness in which the dynamism is no longer mental but of quite another power. Only those who can accept the call to such a change should enter into this yoga.

Aim of the Integral Yoga ::: It is not merely to rise out of the ordinary ignorant world-consciousness into the divine consciousness, but to bring the supramental power of that divine consciousness down into the ignorance of mind, life and body, to transform them, to manifest the Divine here and create a divine life in Matter.

Conditions of the Integral Yoga ::: This yoga can only be done to the end by those who are in total earnest about it and ready to abolish their little human ego and its demands in order to find themselves in the Divine. It cannot be done in a spirit of levity or laxity; the work is too high and difficult, the adverse powers in the lower Nature too ready to take advantage of the least sanction or the smallest opening, the aspiration and tapasyā needed too constant and intense.

Method in the Integral Yoga ::: To concentrate, preferably in the heart and call the presence and power of the Mother to take up the being and by the workings of her force transform the consciousness. One can concentrate also in the head or between the eye-brows, but for many this is a too difficult opening. When the mind falls quiet and the concentration becomes strong and the aspiration intense, then there is the beginning of experience. The more the faith, the more rapid the result is likely to be. For the rest one must not depend on one’s own efforts only, but succeed in establishing a contact with the Divine and a receptivity to the Mother’s Power and Presence.

Integral method ::: The method we have to pursue is to put our whole conscious being into relation and contact with the Divine and to call Him in to transform Our entire being into His, so that in a sense God Himself, the real Person in us, becomes the sādhaka of the sādhana* as well as the Master of the Yoga by whom the lower personality is used as the centre of a divine transfiguration and the instrument of its own perfection. In effect, the pressure of the Tapas, the force of consciousness in us dwelling in the Idea of the divine Nature upon that which we are in our entirety, produces its own realisation. The divine and all-knowing and all-effecting descends upon the limited and obscure, progressively illumines and energises the whole lower nature and substitutes its own action for all the terms of the inferior human light and mortal activity.

In psychological fact this method translates itself into the progressive surrender of the ego with its whole field and all its apparatus to the Beyond-ego with its vast and incalculable but always inevitable workings. Certainly, this is no short cut or easy sādhana. It requires a colossal faith, an absolute courage and above all an unflinching patience. For it implies three stages of which only the last can be wholly blissful or rapid, - the attempt of the ego to enter into contact with the Divine, the wide, full and therefore laborious preparation of the whole lower Nature by the divine working to receive and become the higher Nature, and the eventual transformation. In fact, however, the divine strength, often unobserved and behind the veil, substitutes itself for the weakness and supports us through all our failings of faith, courage and patience. It” makes the blind to see and the lame to stride over the hills.” The intellect becomes aware of a Law that beneficently insists and a Succour that upholds; the heart speaks of a Master of all things and Friend of man or a universal Mother who upholds through all stumblings. Therefore this path is at once the most difficult imaginable and yet in comparison with the magnitude of its effort and object, the most easy and sure of all.

There are three outstanding features of this action of the higher when it works integrally on the lower nature. In the first place, it does not act according to a fixed system and succession as in the specialised methods of Yoga, but with a sort of free, scattered and yet gradually intensive and purposeful working determined by the temperament of the individual in whom it operates, the helpful materials which his nature offers and the obstacles which it presents to purification and perfection. In a sense, therefore, each man in this path has his own method of Yoga. Yet are there certain broad lines of working common to all which enable us to construct not indeed a routine system, but yet some kind of Shastra or scientific method of the synthetic Yoga.

Secondly, the process, being integral, accepts our nature such as it stands organised by our past evolution and without rejecting anything essential compels all to undergo a divine change. Everything in us is seized by the hands of a mighty Artificer and transformed into a clear image of that which it now seeks confusedly to present. In that ever-progressive experience we begin to perceive how this lower manifestation is constituted and that everything in it, however seemingly deformed or petty or vile, is the more or less distorted or imperfect figure of some elements or action in the harmony of the divine Nature. We begin to understand what the Vedic Rishis meant when they spoke of the human forefathers fashioning the gods as a smith forges the crude material in his smithy.

Thirdly, the divine Power in us uses all life as the means of this integral Yoga. Every experience and outer contact with our world-environment, however trifling or however disastrous, is used for the work, and every inner experience, even to the most repellent suffering or the most humiliating fall, becomes a step on the path to perfection. And we recognise in ourselves with opened eyes the method of God in the world, His purpose of light in the obscure, of might in the weak and fallen, of delight in what is grievous and miserable. We see the divine method to be the same in the lower and in the higher working; only in the one it is pursued tardily and obscurely through the subconscious in Nature, in the other it becomes swift and selfconscious and the instrument confesses the hand of the Master. All life is a Yoga of Nature seeking to manifest God within itself. Yoga marks the stage at which this effort becomes capable of self-awareness and therefore of right completion in the individual. It is a gathering up and concentration of the movements dispersed and loosely combined in the lower evolution.

Key-methods ::: The way to devotion and surrender. It is the psychic movement that brings the constant and pure devotion and the removal of the ego that makes it possible to surrender.

The way to knowledge. Meditation in the head by which there comes the opening above, the quietude or silence of the mind and the descent of peace etc. of the higher consciousness generally till it envelops the being and fills the body and begins to take up all the movements.
Yoga by works ::: Separation of the Purusha from the Prakriti, the inner silent being from the outer active one, so that one has two consciousnesses or a double consciousness, one behind watching and observing and finally controlling and changing the other which is active in front. The other way of beginning the yoga of works is by doing them for the Divine, for the Mother, and not for oneself, consecrating and dedicating them till one concretely feels the Divine Force taking up the activities and doing them for one.

Object of the Integral Yoga is to enter into and be possessed by the Divine Presence and Consciousness, to love the Divine for the Divine’s sake alone, to be tuned in our nature into the nature of the Divine, and in our will and works and life to be the instrument of the Divine.

Principle of the Integral Yoga ::: The whole principle of Integral Yoga is to give oneself entirely to the Divine alone and to nobody else, and to bring down into ourselves by union with the Divine Mother all the transcendent light, power, wideness, peace, purity, truth-consciousness and Ānanda of the Supramental Divine.

Central purpose of the Integral Yoga ::: Transformation of our superficial, narrow and fragmentary human way of thinking, seeing, feeling and being into a deep and wide spiritual consciousness and an integrated inner and outer existence and of our ordinary human living into the divine way of life.

Fundamental realisations of the Integral Yoga ::: The psychic change so that a complete devotion can be the main motive of the heart and the ruler of thought, life and action in constant union with the Mother and in her Presence. The descent of the Peace, Power, Light etc. of the Higher Consciousness through the head and heart into the whole being, occupying the very cells of the body. The perception of the One and Divine infinitely everywhere, the Mother everywhere and living in that infinite consciousness.

Results ::: First, an integral realisation of Divine Being; not only a realisation of the One in its indistinguishable unity, but also in its multitude of aspects which are also necessary to the complete knowledge of it by the relative consciousness; not only realisation of unity in the Self, but of unity in the infinite diversity of activities, worlds and creatures.

Therefore, also, an integral liberation. Not only the freedom born of unbroken contact of the individual being in all its parts with the Divine, sāyujya mukti, by which it becomes free even in its separation, even in the duality; not only the sālokya mukti by which the whole conscious existence dwells in the same status of being as the Divine, in the state of Sachchidananda ; but also the acquisition of the divine nature by the transformation of this lower being into the human image of the divine, sādharmya mukti, and the complete and final release of all, the liberation of the consciousness from the transitory mould of the ego and its unification with the One Being, universal both in the world and the individual and transcendentally one both in the world and beyond all universe.

By this integral realisation and liberation, the perfect harmony of the results of Knowledge, Love and Works. For there is attained the complete release from ego and identification in being with the One in all and beyond all. But since the attaining consciousness is not limited by its attainment, we win also the unity in Beatitude and the harmonised diversity in Love, so that all relations of the play remain possible to us even while we retain on the heights of our being the eternal oneness with the Beloved. And by a similar wideness, being capable of a freedom in spirit that embraces life and does not depend upon withdrawal from life, we are able to become without egoism, bondage or reaction the channel in our mind and body for a divine action poured out freely upon the world.

The divine existence is of the nature not only of freedom, but of purity, beatitude and perfection. In integral purity which shall enable on the one hand the perfect reflection of the divine Being in ourselves and on the other the perfect outpouring of its Truth and Law in us in the terms of life and through the right functioning of the complex instrument we are in our outer parts, is the condition of an integral liberty. Its result is an integral beatitude, in which there becomes possible at once the Ānanda of all that is in the world seen as symbols of the Divine and the Ānanda of that which is not-world. And it prepares the integral perfection of our humanity as a type of the Divine in the conditions of the human manifestation, a perfection founded on a certain free universality of being, of love and joy, of play of knowledge and of play of will in power and will in unegoistic action. This integrality also can be attained by the integral Yoga.

Sādhanā of the Integral Yoga does not proceed through any set mental teaching or prescribed forms of meditation, mantras or others, but by aspiration, by a self-concentration inwards or upwards, by a self-opening to an Influence, to the Divine Power above us and its workings, to the Divine Presence in the heart and by the rejection of all that is foreign to these things. It is only by faith, aspiration and surrender that this self-opening can come.

The yoga does not proceed by upadeƛa but by inner influence.

Integral Yoga and Gita ::: The Gita’s Yoga consists in the offering of one’s work as a sacrifice to the Divine, the conquest of desire, egoless and desireless action, bhakti for the Divine, an entering into the cosmic consciousness, the sense of unity with all creatures, oneness with the Divine. This yoga adds the bringing down of the supramental Light and Force (its ultimate aim) and the transformation of the nature.

Our yoga is not identical with the yoga of the Gita although it contains all that is essential in the Gita’s yoga. In our yoga we begin with the idea, the will, the aspiration of the complete surrender; but at the same time we have to reject the lower nature, deliver our consciousness from it, deliver the self involved in the lower nature by the self rising to freedom in the higher nature. If we do not do this double movement, we are in danger of making a tamasic and therefore unreal surrender, making no effort, no tapas and therefore no progress ; or else we make a rajasic surrender not to the Divine but to some self-made false idea or image of the Divine which masks our rajasic ego or something still worse.

Integral Yoga, Gita and Tantra ::: The Gita follows the Vedantic tradition which leans entirely on the Ishvara aspect of the Divine and speaks little of the Divine Mother because its object is to draw back from world-nature and arrive at the supreme realisation beyond it.

The Tantric tradition leans on the Shakti or Ishvari aspect and makes all depend on the Divine Mother because its object is to possess and dominate the world-nature and arrive at the supreme realisation through it.

This yoga insists on both the aspects; the surrender to the Divine Mother is essential, for without it there is no fulfilment of the object of the yoga.

Integral Yoga and Hatha-Raja Yogas ::: For an integral yoga the special methods of Rajayoga and Hathayoga may be useful at times in certain stages of the progress, but are not indispensable. Their principal aims must be included in the integrality of the yoga; but they can be brought about by other means. For the methods of the integral yoga must be mainly spiritual, and dependence on physical methods or fixed psychic or psychophysical processes on a large scale would be the substitution of a lower for a higher action. Integral Yoga and Kundalini Yoga: There is a feeling of waves surging up, mounting to the head, which brings an outer unconsciousness and an inner waking. It is the ascending of the lower consciousness in the ādhāra to meet the greater consciousness above. It is a movement analogous to that on which so much stress is laid in the Tantric process, the awakening of the Kundalini, the Energy coiled up and latent in the body and its mounting through the spinal cord and the centres (cakras) and the Brahmarandhra to meet the Divine above. In our yoga it is not a specialised process, but a spontaneous upnish of the whole lower consciousness sometimes in currents or waves, sometimes in a less concrete motion, and on the other side a descent of the Divine Consciousness and its Force into the body.

Integral Yoga and other Yogas ::: The old yogas reach Sachchidananda through the spiritualised mind and depart into the eternally static oneness of Sachchidananda or rather pure Sat (Existence), absolute and eternal or else a pure Non-exist- ence, absolute and eternal. Ours having realised Sachchidananda in the spiritualised mind plane proceeds to realise it in the Supramcntal plane.

The suprcfhe supra-cosmic Sachchidananda is above all. Supermind may be described as its power of self-awareness and W’orld- awareness, the world being known as within itself and not out- side. So to live consciously in the supreme Sachchidananda one must pass through the Supermind.

Distinction ::: The realisation of Self and of the Cosmic being (without which the realisation of the Self is incomplete) are essential steps in our yoga ; it is the end of other yogas, but it is, as it were, the beginning of outs, that is to say, the point where its own characteristic realisation can commence.

It is new as compared with the old yogas (1) Because it aims not at a departure out of world and life into Heaven and Nir- vana, but at a change of life and existence, not as something subordinate or incidental, but as a distinct and central object.

If there is a descent in other yogas, yet it is only an incident on the way or resulting from the ascent — the ascent is the real thing. Here the ascent is the first step, but it is a means for the descent. It is the descent of the new coosdousness attain- ed by the ascent that is the stamp and seal of the sadhana. Even the Tantra and Vaishnavism end in the release from life ; here the object is the divine fulfilment of life.

(2) Because the object sought after is not an individual achievement of divine realisation for the sake of the individual, but something to be gained for the earth-consciousness here, a cosmic, not solely a supra-cosmic acbievement. The thing to be gained also is the bringing of a Power of consciousness (the Supramental) not yet organised or active directly in earth-nature, even in the spiritual life, but yet to be organised and made directly active.

(3) Because a method has been preconized for achieving this purpose which is as total and integral as the aim set before it, viz., the total and integral change of the consciousness and nature, taking up old methods, but only as a part action and present aid to others that are distinctive.

Integral Yoga and Patanjali Yoga ::: Cilia is the stuff of mixed mental-vital-physical consciousness out of which arise the movements of thought, emotion, sensation, impulse etc.

It is these that in the Patanjali system have to be stilled altogether so that the consciousness may be immobile and go into Samadhi.

Our yoga has a different function. The movements of the ordinary consciousness have to be quieted and into the quietude there has to be brought down a higher consciousness and its powers which will transform the nature.


In the Veda it is symbolised by the case of the Panis.

". . . in the Veda, Lord of the hosts of delight; in later mythology, the Gandharvas are musicians of heaven, ‘beautiful, brave and melodious beings, the artists, musicians, poets and shining warriors of heaven". . . .” Glossary and Index of Proper Names in Sri Aurobindo"s Works ::: *Gandharvas.

“
 in the Veda, Lord of the hosts of delight; in later mythology, the Gandharvas are musicians of heaven, ‘beautiful, braveand melodiousbeings, the artists, musicians, poets and shining warriors of heaven’
.” Glossary and Index of Proper Names in Sri Aurobindo’s Works. Gandharvas

In the Vedas, amrita is applied to the mystical soma juice, which makes a new man of the initiate and enables his spiritual nature to overcome and govern the lower elements of his nature. It is beyond any guna (quality), for it is unconditioned per se (cf SD 1:348). Mystically speaking, therefore, amrita is the “drinking” of the water of supernal wisdom and the spiritual bathing in its life-giving power. It means the rising above all the unawakened or prakritic elements of the constitution, and becoming at one with and thus living in the kosmic life-intelligence-substance.

  In the Veda, the All-pervading Godhead, the Eternal Personality of Consciousness, the wide-moving One, that which has gone abroad triply extending himself as Seer, Thinker, and Former in the superconscient Bliss.

“In the Veda the Cow is the Divine Light—
.” Letters on Yoga

In the Veda the Cow is the Divine Light. The milk is the

"In the inner sense of the Veda Surya, the Sun-God, represents the divine Illumination of the Kavi which exceeds mind and forms the pure self-luminous Truth of things. His principal power is self-revelatory knowledge, termed in the Veda ``Sight"". His realm is described as the Truth, the Law, the Vast. He is the Fosterer or Increaser, for he enlarges and opens man"s dark and limited being into a luminous and infinite consciousness. He is the sole Seer, Seer of Oneness and Knower of the Self, and leads him to the highest Sight.” The Upanishads*

“In the inner sense of the Veda Surya, the Sun-God, represents the divine Illumination of the Kavi which exceeds mind and forms the pure self-luminous Truth of things. His principal power is self-revelatory knowledge, termed in the Veda ``Sight’’. His realm is described as the Truth, the Law, the Vast. He is the Fosterer or Increaser, for he enlarges and opens man’s dark and limited being into a luminous and infinite consciousness. He is the sole Seer, Seer of Oneness and Knower of the Self, and leads him to the highest Sight.” The Upanishads

“Is it really a fact that even the ordinary reader would not be able to see any difference between the Inconscient and Ignorance unless the difference is expressly explained to him? This is not a matter of philosophical terminology but of common sense and the understood meaning of English words. One would say ‘even the inconscient stone’ but one would not say, as one might of a child, ‘the ignorant stone’. One must first be conscious before one can be ignorant. What is true is that the ordinary reader might not be familiar with the philosophical content of the word Inconscient and might not be familiar with the Vedantic idea of the Ignorance as the power behind the manifested world. But I don’t see how I can acquaint him with these things in a single line, even with the most. illuminating image or symbol. He might wonder, if he were Johnsonianly minded, how an Inconscient could be teased or how it could wake Ignorance. I am afraid, in the absence of a miracle of inspired poetical exegesis flashing through my mind, he will have to be left wondering.” Letters on Savitri

It is the cryptic verses of the Veda that help us here; for they contain, though concealed, the gospel of the divine and immortal Supermind and through the veil some illumining flashes come to us. We can see through these utterances the conception of this Supermind as a vastness beyond the ordinary firmaments of our consciousness in which truth of being is luminously one with all that expresses it and assures inevitably truth of vision, formulation, arrangement, word, act and movement and therefore truth also of result of movement, result of action and expression, infallible ordinance or law. Vast all-comprehensiveness; luminous truth and harmony of being in that vastness and not a vague chaos or self-lost obscurity; truth of law and act and knowledge expressive of that harmonious truth of being: these seem to be the essential terms of the Vedic description.” *The Life Divine

It is the cryptic verses of the Veda that help us here; for they contain, though concealed, the gospel of the divine and immortal Supermind and through the veil some illumining flashes come to us. We can see through these utterances the conception of this Supermind as a vastness beyond the ordinary firmaments of our consciousness in which truth of being is luminously one with all that expresses it and assures inevitably truth of vision, formulation, arrangement, word, act and movement and therefore truth also of result of movement, result of action and expression, infallible ordinance or law. Vast all-comprehensiveness; luminous truth and harmony of being in that vastness and not a vague chaos or self-lost obscurity; truth of law and act and knowledge expressive of that harmonious truth of being: these seem to be the essential terms of the Vedic description.” The Life Divine

jainism ::: n. --> The heterodox Hindoo religion, of which the most striking features are the exaltation of saints or holy mortals, called jins, above the ordinary Hindoo gods, and the denial of the divine origin and infallibility of the Vedas. It is intermediate between Brahmanism and Buddhism, having some things in common with each.

jatavedas ::: knower of all things born (a Vedic epithet of Agni2). jatavedas

Jatavedas ::: knower of the births (the worlds); [a Vedic epithet of Agni].

jnanakanda ::: the section of knowledge [of the Veda], identified with the Upanisads. [cf. karmakanda]

Karanopadhi(Sanskrit) ::: A compound meaning the "causal instrument" or "instrumental cause" in the long series ofreimbodiments to which human and other reimbodying entities are subject. Upadhi, the second elementof this compound, is often translated as "vehicle"; but while this definition is accurate enough for popularpurposes, it fails to set forth the essential meaning of the word which is rather "disguise," or certainnatural properties or constitutional characteristics supposed to be the disguises or clothings or masks inand through which the spiritual monad of man works, bringing about the repetitive manifestations uponearth of certain functions and powers of this monad, and, indeed, upon the other globes of the planetarychain; and, furthermore, intimately connected with the peregrinations of the monad through the variousspheres and realms of the solar kosmos. In one sense of the word, therefore, karanopadhi is almostinterchangeable with the thoughts set forth under the term maya, or the illusory disguises through whichspirit works, or rather through which spiritual monadic entities work and manifest themselves.Karanopadhi, as briefly explained under the term "causal body," is dual in meaning. The first and moreeasily understood meaning of this term shows that the cause bringing about reimbodiment is avidya,nescience rather than ignorance; because when a reimbodying entity through repeated reimbodiments inthe spheres of matter has freed itself from the entangling chains of the latter, and has risen intoself-conscious recognition of its own divine powers, it thereby shakes off the chains or disguises of mayaand becomes what is called a jivanmukta. It is only imperfect souls, or rather monadic souls, speaking ina general way, which are obliged by nature's cyclic operations and laws to undergo the repetitivereimbodiments on earth and elsewhere in order that the lessons of self-conquest and mastery over all theplanes of nature may be achieved. As the entity advances in wisdom and knowledge, and in the acquiringof self-conscious sympathy for all that is, in other words, as it grows more and more like unto itsdivine-spiritual counterpart, the less is it subject to avidya. It is, in a sense, the seeds of kama-manas leftin the fabric or being of the reincarnating entity, which act as the karana or reproducing cause, orinstrumental cause, of such entity's reincarnations on earth.The higher karanopadhi, however, although in operation similar to the lower karanopadhi, orkarana-sarira just described, nevertheless belongs to the spiritual-intellectual part of man's constitution,and is the reproductive energy inherent in the spiritual monad bringing about its re-emergence after thesolar pralaya into the new activities and new series of imbodiments which open with the dawn of thesolar manvantara following upon the solar pralaya just ended. This latter karanopadhi or karana-sarira,therefore, is directly related to the element-principle in man's constitution called buddhi -- a veil, as itwere, drawn over the face or around the being of the monadic essence, much as prakriti surroundsPurusha, or pradhana surrounds Brahman, or mulaprakriti surrounds and is the veil or disguise or sakti ofparabrahman. Hence, in the case of man, this karanopadhi or causal disguise or vehicle corresponds in ageneral way to the buddhi-manas, or spiritual soul, in which the spiritual monad works and manifestsitself.It should be said in passing that the doctrine concerning the functions and operations of buddhi in thehuman constitution is extremely recondite, because in buddhi lie the causal impulses or urges bringingabout the building of the constitution of man, and which, when the latter is completed, and when formingman as a septenary entity, express themselves as the various strata or qualities of the auric egg.Finally, the karana-sarira, the karanopadhi or causal body, is the vehicular instrumental form orinstrumental body-form, produced by the working of what is perhaps the most mysterious principle orelement, mystically speaking, in the constitution not only of man, but of the universe -- the verymysterious spiritual bija.The karanopadhi, the karana-sarira or causal body, is explained with minor differences of meaning invarious works of Hindu philosophy; but all such works must be studied with the light thrown upon themby the great wisdom-teaching of the archaic ages, esoteric theosophy. The student otherwise runs everyrisk of being led astray.I might add that the sushupti state or condition, which is that of deep dreamless sleep, involving entireinsensibility of the human consciousness to all exterior impressions, is a phase of consciousness throughwhich the adept must pass, although consciously pass in his case, before reaching the highest state ofsamadhi, which is the turiya state. According to the Vedanta philosophy, the turiya (meaning "fourth") isthe fourth state of consciousness into which the full adept can self-consciously enter and wherein hebecomes one with the kosmic Brahman. The Vedantists likewise speak of the anandamaya-kosa, whichthey describe as being the innermost disguise or frame or vehicle surrounding the atmic consciousness.Thus we see that the anandamaya-kosa and the karana-sarira, or karanopadhi, and the buddhi inconjunction with the manasic ego, are virtually identical.The author has been at some pains to set forth and briefly to develop the various phases of occult andesoteric theosophical thought given in this article, because of the many and various misunderstandingsand misconceptions concerning the nature, characteristics, and functions of the karana-sarira or causalbody.

Karmakanda: (Skr., see Karma above) That portion of the Veda (q.v.) with which the priests are concerned. -- K.F.L.

karmakanda ::: the section of (ritual) works [of the Veda], identified with the hymns. [cf. jnanakanda]

kavi ::: poet; (in the Veda) seer, one who is "possessed of the Truthconsciousness and using its faculties of vision, inspiration, intuition, discrimination".

kavi ::: seer; poet (in classical Sanskrit the word is applied to any maker of verse or even of prose, but in the Veda it meant the poet-seer who saw and found the inspired word of his vision). ::: kavayah [plural] ::: kavibhih [instrumental plural]

kevala advaita. ::: the pure non-dualistic school of vedanta of which the great sage Adi Shankara was an adept

"Knowing absolute Reality is the supreme knowledge"; one of the Mahavakyas to be found in the Aitareya Upanishad of the Rigveda

Kosa: Sanskrit for sheath. One of the envelopes of the soul or self concealing its real nature, which is pure consciousness. The Vedanta knows three: the anandamaya, vijnanamaya, and annamaya kosas, i.e., the sheaths of pleasure, intellect, and food, composing respectively the karana, suksma, and sthula sharira, meaning the causal, subtle, and gross frame or body.

Kosa: (Skr.) "Sheath", one of the envelopes of the soul or self concealing its real nature, which is pure consciousness. The Vedanta knows three: the anandamaya, vijnanamaya, and annamaya koias, i.e., the sheaths of pleasure, intellect, and food, composing respectively the karana, suksma, and sthula larira, meaning the causal, subtile, and gross frame or body. -- K.F.L.

Krsnadvaipayana (Krishna Dvypaiana) ::: "Krsna of the Island", [the name of the author of the original Mahabharata and compiler of the Vedas, also called Vyasa].

Kutsa ::: a Vedic r.s.i, companion of Indra; his name is interpreted in the translation of a sortilege from R . g Veda 5.31.9 to mean "SensePleasure", explained as the intensity of subjective ananda in relation to sensory experience... 96L

leafcup ::: n. --> A coarse American composite weed (Polymnia Uvedalia).

:::   "Liberty in one shape or another ranks among the most ancient and certainly among the most difficult aspirations of our race: it arises from a radical instinct of our being and is yet opposed to all our circumstances, it is our eternal good and our condition of perfection, but our temporal being has failed to find its key. That perhaps is because true freedom is only possible if we live in the infinite, live, as the Vedanta bids us, in and from our self-existent being; but our natural and temporal energies seek for it first not in ourselves, but in our external conditions. This great indefinable thing, liberty, is in its highest and ultimate sense a state of being; it is self living in itself and determining by its own energy what is shall be inwardly and, eventually, by the growth of a divine spiritual power within determining too what it shall make of its external circumstances and environment." War and Self-Determination

“Liberty in one shape or another ranks among the most ancient and certainly among the most difficult aspirations of our race: it arises from a radical instinct of our being and is yet opposed to all our circumstances, it is our eternal good and our condition of perfection, but our temporal being has failed to find its key. That perhaps is because true freedom is only possible if we live in the infinite, live, as the Vedanta bids us, in and from our self-existent being; but our natural and temporal energies seek for it first not in ourselves, but in our external conditions. This great indefinable thing, liberty, is in its highest and ultimate sense a state of being; it is self living in itself and determining by its own energy what is shall be inwardly and, eventually, by the growth of a divine spiritual power within determining too what it shall make of its external circumstances and environment.” War and Self-Determination

Light above, others as an infinite ocean i of Power above. If certain schools of Buddhists felt it in their experience as a limit- less Siinya, the Vedantists ou the contrary sec it as a positive

light, divine ::: Sri Aurobindo: ". . . there is a Divine Light that leans over the world and is not only a far-off incommunicable Lustre.” *Letters on Yoga

"The opening of the consciousness to the Divine Light and Truth and Presence is always the one important thing in the yoga.” *Letters on Yoga

"In the Veda the Cow is the Divine Light — . . . .” Letters on Yoga*


Madhav: “Aswapathy: Life is symbolised by Horse, aswa in the old tradition of the Vedas. The Book of the Divine Mother

Madhav: “In the Vedas, the power of intuition is named the hound of heaven. . . The ‘questing hound’ is a Vedic imagery always denoting the power of intuition which at one bound finds out where is the light, where is the truth that has been stolen and covered by the adversaries.” Sat-Sang Vol. IX

Madhav: “The House of Flame is the plenary manifestation of Agni, the Mystic Fire of which the Seers of the Veda speak. Here blazes the Divine Consciousness in its incandescent purity.” The Book of the Divine Mother

Madhav: “There is discernment of the heart, discernment of the mind, discernment of reason and a discernment of intuition. This is called dakshina in the Veda. You do not try to separate the right from the wrong, the white from the dark; there is an automatic intuitive separation of the one from the other. It acts like a sky-flare showing up the region around.” 
”These are the different actions of the intuitive discernment—separating the true from the false, exposing falsehood pretending to be truth, examining how far the appearances in life correspond to realities.” Sat-Sang Vol. IX

Madhva: An Indian dualistic philosopher of the 13th century A.D., a Vedantist and Vishnuite who held that world and soul, as well as the highest reality are entities different in their essence, and non-commutable. -- K.F.L.

maghoni (Dakshina maghoni) ::: Daks.in.a (the Vedic goddess . in.a maghoni "whose function is to discern rightly, dispose the action and the offering and distribute in the sacrifice to each godhead its portion") in her plenitude; "the discernment in its fullness". [R.g Veda 2.11.21, etc.]

manana. ::: deep contemplation; subtle enquiry; hearing and profound reflection; meditation on the eternal verities; second of the three stages of vedantic realisation

mandala ::: circle, a "book" of the Rg-veda; [a district or province of a large kingdom].

man.d.ala ::: circle, orb; any of the ten books of the R mandala . g Veda.

Mantra: A Sanskrit term meaning an incantation consisting of a sacred formula, usually a quotation from the Vedas. The word has come, especially in occult usage, to mean a spell or charm. In Shaktism and elsewhere, the holy syllables to which, as manifestations of the eternal word or sound, great mystic significance and power is ascribed.

mantra ::: sacred syllable, name or mystic formula; the intuitive and inspired rhythmic utterance; any of the verses of the Veda, revealed verses of power not of an ordinary but of a divine inspiration and source.

Mantra: (Skr.) Pious thought couched in repeated prayerful utterances, for meditation or charm. Also the poetic portion of the Veda (q.v.). In Shaktism (q.v.) and elsewhere the holy syllables to which as manifestations of the eternal word or sound (cf. iabda, vac, aksara) is ascribed great mystic significance and power. -- K.F.L.

mantra&

.Maruts ::: the Vedic storm-gods, "luminous and violent gods of the storm and the lightning", representing in the esoteric sense of the Veda "the powers of Thought which by the strong and apparently destructive motion of their progress break down that which is established and help to the attainment of new formations".

“Masters of the Truth-Light who make the Truth grow by the Truth.” Rig Veda. The Life Divine

maya ::: (in the Veda) "originally a formative power of knowledge, maya the true magic of the supreme Mage, the divine Magician, but . . . also used for the adverse formative power of a lower knowledge, the deceit, illusion and deluding magic of the Rakshasa"; measuring and limiting consciousness, "a selective faculty of knowledge commissioned to shape finite appearance out of the infinite Reality" (brahman); the power of phenomenal creation by which "out of the supreme being in which all is all without barrier of separative consciousness emerges the phenomenal being in which all is in each and each is in all for the play of existence with existence, consciousness with consciousness, force with force, delight with delight"; illusion, "a bewildering partial consciousness which loses hold of the complete reality, lives in the phenomenon of mobile Nature [prakr.ti] and has no sight of the Spirit [purus.a] of which she is the active Power".

Maya(Sanskrit) ::: The word comes from the root ma, meaning "to measure," and by a figure of speech it alsocomes to mean "to effect," "to form," and hence "to limit." There is an English word mete, meaning "tomeasure out," from the same IndoEuropean root. It is found in the Anglo-Saxon as the root met, in theGreek as med, and it is found in the Latin also in the same form.Ages ago in the wonderful Brahmanical philosophy maya was understood very differently from what it isnow usually understood to be. As a technical term, maya has come to mean the fabrication by man's mindof ideas derived from interior and exterior impressions, hence the illusory aspect of man's thoughts as heconsiders and tries to interpret and understand life and his surroundings; and thence was derived thesense which it technically bears, "illusion." It does not mean that the exterior world is nonexistent; if itwere, it obviously could not be illusory. It exists, but is not. It is "measured out" or is "limited," or itstands out to the human spirit as a mirage. In other words, we do not see clearly and plainly and in theirreality the vision and the visions which our mind and senses present to the inner life and eye.The familiar illustrations of maya in the Vedanta, which is the highest form that the Brahmanicalteachings have taken and which is so near to our own teaching in many respects, were such as follows: Aman at eventide sees a coiled rope on the ground, and springs aside, thinking it a serpent. The rope isthere, but no serpent. The second illustration is what is called the "horns of the hare." The animal calledthe hare has no horns, but when it also is seen at eventide, its long ears seem to project from its head insuch fashion that it appears even to the seeing eye as being a creature with horns. The hare has no horns,but there is then in the mind an illusory belief that an animal with horns exists there.That is what maya means: not that a thing seen does not exist, but that we are blinded and our mindperverted by our own thoughts and our own imperfections, and do not as yet arrive at the realinterpretation and meaning of the world or of the universe around us. By ascending inwardly, by risingup, by inner aspiration, by an elevation of soul, we can reach upwards or rather inwards towards thatplane where truth abides in fullness.H. P. Blavatsky says on page 631 of the first volume of The Secret Doctrine:Esoteric philosophy, teaching an objective Idealism -- though it regards the objectiveUniverse and all in it as Maya, temporary illusion -- draws a practical distinction betweencollective illusion, Mahamaya, from the purely metaphysical standpoint, and the objectiverelations in it between various conscious Egos so long as this illusion lasts.The teaching is that maya is thus called from the action of mulaprakriti or root-nature, the coordinateprinciple of that other line of coactive consciousness which we call parabrahman. From the momentwhen manifestation begins, it acts dualistically, that is to say that everything in nature from that pointonwards is crossed by pairs of opposites, such as long and short, high and low, night and day, good andevil, consciousness and nonconsciousness, etc., and that all these things are essentially mayic or illusory-- real while they last, but the lasting is not eternal. It is through and by these pairs of opposites that theself-conscious soul learns truth. It might be said, in conclusion, that another and very convenient way ofconsidering maya is to understand it to mean "limitation," "restriction," and therefore imperfect cognitionand recognition of reality. The imperfect mind does not see perfect truth. It labors under an illusioncorresponding with its own imperfections, under a maya, a limitation. Magical practices are frequentlycalled maya in the ancient Hindu books.

maya ::: signified originally in the Veda the comprehensive and creative knowledge, wisdom that is from of old, afterwards taken in its second and derivative sense, cunning, magic, illusion; phenomenal consciousness, the power of self-illusion in brahman. ::: mayabhih [instrumental plural], by (his) workings of knowledge. ::: mayah[plural], forms of knowledge.

Maya: (Skr.) The power of obscuring or state producing error and illusion; the "veil" covering reality, the experience of manifoldness when only the One is real; natura naturans; appearance or phenomenon, as opposed to reality and noumenon. A condition generally acknowledged in Indian philosophy and popular Hindu thinking due to the ascendency of the Vedanta (q.v.) which can be overcome principally by knowledge or insight. See Jnana. -- K.F.L.

mimamsa. ::: "investigation"; an orthodox school of hindu philosophy whose primary enquiry is into the nature of dharma based on close hermeneutics of the Vedas &

Mimamsa: Short for Purva-Mimamsa, one of the six major systems of Indian philosophy, founded by Jaimini, rationalizing Vedic ritual and upholding the authority of the Vedas by a philosophy of the word (see vac). In metaphysics it professes belief in the reality of the phenomenal, a plurality of eternal souls, but is indifferent to a concept of God though assenting to the superhuman and eternal nature of the Vedas. There is also an elaborate epistemology supporting Vedic truths, an ethics which makes observance of Vedic ritual and practice a condition of a good and blissful life.

Mimamsi: Short for Purva-Mimamsa, one of the six major systems of Indian philosophy (q. v.), founded by Jaimini, rationalizing Vedic ritual and upholding the authority of the Vedas by a philosophy of the word (see vac). In metaphysics it professes belief in the reality of the phenomenal, a plurality of eternal souls, but is indifferent to a concept of God though assenting to the superhuman and eternal nature of the Vedas. There is also an elaborate epistemology supporting Vedic truths, an ethics which makes observance of Vedic ritual and practice a condition of a good and blissful life. -- KS.L.

mind, Ideal Mind ::: Sri Aurobindo: "The link between the spiritual and the lower planes of the being is that which is called in the old Vedantic phraseology the vijñùna and which we may describe in our modern turn of language as the Truth-plane or the ideal mind or supermind. There the One and the Many meet and our being is freely open to the revealing light of the divine Truth and the inspiration of the divine Will and Knowledge.” *The Synthesis of Yoga

mother of the worlds ::: Sri Aurobindo: "Aditi, the infinite Consciousness, Mother of the worlds.” *The Secret of the Veda

" She is the first Radiance, Aditi, the infinite Consciousness of the infinite conscious Being which is the mother of the worlds.” The Secret of the Veda*


ṁ sasamanasya nindat ::: "who confines the work when man seeks his self-expression". [R . g Veda 5.42.10] yo . . . suptes suptesu

mumukshutva. ::: the desire for liberation; one of the four prerequisites for qualification as a spiritual aspirant of vedanta

“My researches first convinced me that words, like plants, like animals, are in no sense artificial products, but growths,—living growths of sound with certain seed-sounds as their basis. Out of these seed-sounds develop a small number of primitive root-words with an immense progeny which have their successive generations and arrange themselves in tribes, clans, families, selective groups each having a common stock and a common psychological history. For the factor which presided over the development of language was the association, by the nervous mind of primitive man, of certain general significances or rather of certain general utilities and sense-values with articulate sounds. The process of this association was also in no sense artificial but natural, governed by simple and definite psychological laws.” The Secret of the Veda

. n.am (apasi swasrinam) ::: in the work of the sisters (the divine Waters). [R . g Veda 3.1.3]

narada. ::: a primeval sage to whom some of the verses of the Rigveda are attributed

naryapas ::: strong in action. [R naryapas . g Veda 8.93.1] nasikya n asikya asv asvada

Nastika: (Skr.) "Not orthodox", not acknowledging the authority of the Veda (s.v.) -- K.F.L.

nibhr.s.t.a-tavis.i (nibhrishta-tavishi) ::: distressed by its force. [Cf. R nibhrsta-tavisi .g Veda 2.25.4]

nidah. ::: "the Restrainers", a kind of hostile being in the Veda.

nididhyasana. :::constancy in the Self; ::: one-pointedness of the mind; cultivation of equanimity in the Self; unwavering, perpetual meditation; third of the three stages of vedantic realisation

Nimbarka: An Indian thinker and theologian of the 12th century A.D., of Vedantic (q.v.), Vishnuite persuasion, who assumed the world and the human soul to be essentially and eternally different from Vishnu, yet constituting a certain unity with him because of: complete dependence. -- K.F.L.

nirveda ::: despondency, indifference. nirvij ñana

nirveda. ::: indifference

nirvedam. ::: indifference; non-reaction; non-susceptibility; the state of being unmoved or not influenced by something

Nitya-vada: (Skr.) The Vedantic (q.v.) theory (vada) which asserts that reality is eternal (nitya), change being unreal. -- K.F.L.

Nitya-vada: The Vedantic (see Veda) theory (vada) which asserts that reality is eternal (nitya), change being unreal.

"Nothing can be more remarkable and suggestive than the extent to which modern Science confirms in the domain of Matter the conceptions and even the very formulae of language which were arrived at, by a very different method, in the Vedanta, — the original Vedanta, not of the schools of metaphysical philosophy, but of the Upanishads. And these, on the other hand, often reveal their full significance, their richer contents only when they are viewed in the new light shed by the discoveries of modern Science, — for instance, that Vedantic expression which describes things in the Cosmos as one seed arranged by the universal Energy in multitudinous forms.(1) Significant, especially, is the drive of Science towards a Monism which is consistent with multiplicity, towards the Vedic idea of the one essence with its many becomings.” The Life Divine

“Nothing can be more remarkable and suggestive than the extent to which modern Science confirms in the domain of Matter the conceptions and even the very formulae of language which were arrived at, by a very different method, in the Vedanta,—the original Vedanta, not of the schools of metaphysical philosophy, but of the Upanishads. And these, on the other hand, often reveal their full significance, their richer contents only when they are viewed in the new light shed by the discoveries of modern Science,—for instance, that Vedantic expression which describes things in the Cosmos as one seed arranged by the universal Energy in multitudinous forms.(1) Significant, especially, is the drive of Science towards a Monism which is consistent with multiplicity, towards the Vedic idea of the one essence with its many becomings.” The Life Divine

nr̄.h. (nrih) ::: (apparently the plural of nr., whose more regular forms nrh are narah. [nominative] or nr̄.n [accusative]) literally "men", a term used in the Veda for "the gods as the male powers or Purushas presiding over the energies of Nature".

numbers ::: Sri Aurobindo: "Fifty, hundred, a thousand are numbers symbolic of completeness.” The Secret of the Veda

One who knows the body of Hindu sacred writings, the Vedas.

one who knows the body of Hindu sacred writings, the Vedas.

pajah. ::: create a massive strength. [R . g Veda 4.4.1]. n.us.va pajah

Parabrahman(Sanskrit) ::: Para is a word meaning "beyond." Brahman (neuter) is sometimes used as the universal self orspirit; also called paramatman. Beyond Brahman is the para-Brahman. Note the deep philosophicalmeaning of this -- there is no attempt here to limit the illimitable, the ineffable, by adjectives. In theSanskrit Vedas and in the works deriving therefrom and belonging to the Vedic literary cycle, this"beyond" is called tat, "THAT," as this world of manifestations is called idam, "This."Parabrahman is intimately connected with mulaprakriti. Their interaction and intermingling cause thefirst nebulous thrilling, if the words will pass, of the universal life when spiritual desire first arose in it inthe beginnings of things. Parabrahman, therefore, literally means "beyond Brahman"; and strictlyspeaking it is Brahman to which the Occidental term Absolute should be applied. Parabrahman is noentity, is no individual or individualized being. It is a convenient technical word with conveniently vaguephilosophical significancy, implying whatever is beyond the Absolute or Brahman of any hierarchy. Justas Brahman is the summit of a kosmic hierarchy, so, following the same line of thought, the parabrahmanis "whatever is beyond Brahman."

Paranirvana: Sanskrit for beyond Nirvana. The ultimate Nirvana (q.v.) of the Vedantic philosophers. In occult philosophy, absolute non-being, yet equivalent to absolute sat (q.v.).

parayana. ::: the chanting of the Vedas

Philosophic speculations, heavily shrouded by "pre-logical" and symbolic language, started with the poetic, ritualistic Vedas (q.v.), luxuriating in polytheism and polyanthropoism, was then fostered by the Brahman caste in treatises called Aranyakas (q.v.) and Brahmanas (q.v.) and strongly promoted by members of the ruling caste who instituted philosophic congresses in which peripatetic teachers and women participated, and of which we know through the Upanishads (q.v.). Later, the main bulk of Indian Philosophy articulated itself organically into systems forming the nucleus for such famous schools as the Mimamsa and Vedanta, Sankhya and Yoga, Nyaya and Vaisesika, and those of Buddhism and Jainism (all of which see). Numerous other philosophic and quasi philosophic systems are found in the epic literature and elsewhere (cf., e.g., Shaktism, Shivaism, Trika, Vishnuism), or remain to be discovered. Much needs to be translated by competent philosophers.

pracetas ::: conscious thinker (seems to correspond to the Vedantic prajnana). [Ved.] ::: pracetah [nominative, feminine], she who has the perceptive knowledge.

pradhana. ::: the potential but unmanifest ingredients of the material world; prakriti; the chief; the root base of all elements; undifferentiated matter; the material cause of the world in the Sankhya philosophy, corresponding to maya in vedanta &

Prajapati: Sanskrit for lord of creatures. A term originally applied to various Vedic gods; it assumed, as early as the Rig Veda, the importance of a first philosophical principle of creation, and later of time as suggestive of gestation and productive periodicity.

Prajapati: (Skr.) "Lord of creatures", originally applied to various Vedic (q.v.) gods, it assumed as early as the Rig Veda the importance of a first philosophical principle of creation, and later of time as suggestive of gestation and productive periodicity. -- K.F.L.

prakriyas. ::: basic teaching methodologies used in teaching vedanta

purana ::: legend and apologue; the Puranas: [a class of sacred writings written in an easy form of Sanskrit (more modem than that of the Veda and Vedanta) composed of legends, apologues, etc.].

Purani: “Aswapathy, the father of Savitri, has been significantly called by the poet ‘the Lord of Life’. (book II, Canto XV). The name suggests an affinity to Vedic symbolism. In the Veda, Aswa, the horse, is the symbol of life-energy or vital power. Aswa + aty, Lord, would mean the ‘Lord of Life’. In the poem King Aswapathy is the symbol of the aspiring soul of man as manifested in life on earth.”Savitri”—An Approach and a Study

Purani: “He [Sri Aurobindo] does the same [improving spontaneously upon the original in the alchemy of his poetical process] with several Vedic symbols which he employs. It [gold-horned herds] indicates the descent of the ‘gold-horned’ Cows—symbolising the richly-laden Rays of Knowledge—into the Inconscient of the earth, its ‘cave-heart’. Generally in the Veda the action is that of breaking open the Cave of the inconscient and releasing the pen of Cows, the imprisoned Rays of Life for the conscious possessions by the seeker. Here is how a Vedic hymn speaks about it: ‘They drove upwards, the luminous ones,—the good milch-cows, in their stone-pen within the hiding cave.’ Rig Veda IV, 1-13. One sees in Savitri the process reversed and the Master’s vision lays open the original act of involution of the Light into the darkness of the Inconscient.” Sri Aurobindo’s”Savitri”: An Approach and a Study.

Purani: “The ‘Dwarf’ here brings to our mind the Vamana—‘The divine Dwarf’, an incarnation of Vishnu who measured the three worlds—the material, the vital and the mental—in his three steps. In the Rig Veda there is a symbolic reference to this which is enlarged as usual, in the Puranas.”“Savitri”—An Approach and a Study

Purani: “ The growth of the divine potentialities in man is spoken of in Veda as the growth of a Child. The Master takes the symbol straight and employs it thus: ‘where the God-child lies on the lap of Night and Dawn.’ The idea is that through the state of ignorance and through the state of awakening that is Dawn,—through the alterations of two—, the God-child in man attains its growth. Ignorance is not thus something anti-divine. It contributes to the growth of the Divine in man. This certainly reminds one of the hymn in the Veda which runs as follows: ‘Two are joined together, powers of truth, powers of May, they have built the child and given him birth and they nourish his growth’. (Rig Veda X, 5. 3). Sri Aurobindo’s Savitri: An Approach and a Study

Purani: “The ‘python coils’ reminds us of Ahi-Vritra of the Rig Veda where it is symbolic of the coils of Ignorance enveloping the human being restricting his freedom and knowledge.”

purusa evedam sarvam karma tapo brahma paramrtam ::: it is the divine soul that is all this, even all action and all active force and brahman and the supreme immortality. [cf. Mund. 2.1.10]

Purusa: (Skr.) "Man", a symbol for the world in the Veda (q.v.). One of the two cardinal principles of the Sankhya (q.v.) and Yoga (q.v.), representing pure spirituality, consciousness, and self. Various theories prevail in Indian philosophy, some semi-physical, others psycho-physical, or logical, taking the term to denote a real self or an entity produced by maya (q.v.). -- K.F.L.

purva-mimamsa (Purva Mimansa) ::: [a system of philosophy (one of the six darsanas), the enquiry into the first or mantra portion of the Veda; it is concerned chiefly with Vedic ritual]; the vedavada.

rajaṁsi (rajansi) ::: "active forcefulnesses"; activities of tapas (in the interpretation of a sortilege from R . g Veda 1.180.1).

rajas ::: (etymologically) "the shining"; (in the Veda) the antariks.a,"the middle world, the vital or dynamic plane" between heaven (the mental plane) and earth (the physical); "luminous power" established in this intermediate realm; (post-Vedic) the second of the three modes (trigun.a) of the energy of the lower prakr.ti, the gun.a that is "the seed of force and action" and "creates the workings of energy"; it is a deformation of tapas or pravr.tti, the corresponding quality in the higher prakr.ti, and is converted back into pure tapas or pravr.tti in the process of traigun.yasiddhi. This kinetic force "has its strongest hold on the vital nature", where it "turns always to action and desire", but "finding itself in a world of matter which starts from the principle of inconscience and a mechanical driven inertia, has to work against an immense contrary force; therefore its whole action takes on the nature of an effort, a struggle, a besieged and an impeded conïŹ‚ict for possession which is distressed in its every step by a limiting incapacity, disappointment and suffering".

raks.as (rakshas) ::: (in the Veda) a type of hostile entity, "the detainer". raksas

raks.asvi (rakshaswi) ::: (in the Veda) a hostile entity, one of "the raksasvi powers who detain"; same as raks.as.

Ramanuja: A renowned Indian thinker and theologian of the 11th cent A.D. who restated within the tradition of Vishnuism (q.v.) the doctrines of the Vedanta (q.v.) in that he assumed world and soul to be a transformation of God variously articulated. -- K.F.L.

ratna ::: (in the Veda) delight; the second intensity of each of the three states of bhukti called rasagrahan.a, bhoga and ananda.

Rg-veda (Rig-veda) ::: [the Veda of the rks, the most ancient of the sacred books of India, composed of metrical hymns arranged in ten books (mandalas)].

Rig Veda: The oldest part of the Vedas (q.v.), consisting of hymns to the gods.

rig-veda ::: --> See Veda.

Rig-veda ::: see Rg-veda

rigveda. :::the most ancient collection of hindu sacred verses and the first of the four

Rigveda, Yajurveda, Samaveda and Atharvaveda

r.k (rik) ::: a verse of the R rk . g Veda.

rk (Rik) ::: the word of illumination which lights up the mind with the rays of knowledge; [a verse of the Rg-veda].

rocana (rochana) ::: (in the Veda) the three "shining realms" of svar, forming the luminous summit of the mental plane, where "a divine Light radiates out towards our mentality" from "the vast regions of the Truth".

Rudras ::: the fierce, impetuous ones; [a group of Gods, in the Veda sometimes identified with the Maruts, later eleven (or thirty-three) minor deities led by Rudra (Siva)].

. s.a (Indo vrisha) ::: O Indu (Soma ), strong and abundant. [R Veda 1.176.1]

Sama Veda

Sama Veda: That part of the Vedas (q.v.) which consists of priests’ ritual chants.

samadhana. ::: perfect concentration of the mind on the one Reality; concentration and contemplation upon the vedantic texts and the words of the Guru

Samanya: (Skr. similar, generic, etc.) Generality, universality, the universal in contrast to the particular. The universal is understood in the realist manner by the Nyaya- Vaisesika to be eternal and distinct from, yet inherent in the particular, in the nominalist manner, by the Buddhists, to have no intrinsic existence; in the manner of universalia in re by the Jainas and Advaita Vedanta. -- K.F.L.

Sama-veda ::: [the Veda of the samans].

samaveda. ::: the third of the four Vedas, dating from 1700 BC, consisting of hymns, portions of hymns, and detached verses to be sung &

Sambara ::: [the name of a demon in the Veda].

samhita. ::: "compilation of knowledge"; a collection of vedic mantras or hymns mainly concerned with nature and deities; the Samhitas form the first part of each of the four Vedas; one of the two primary sections of each of the Vedas, containing hymns and sacred formulae, the other section being the Brahmanas

samhita (Sanhita) ::: ["conjunction"; the text of the Veda treated with respect to the rules of euphonic combination, the real continuous text of the Veda (cf. padapatha)].

samvedana&

sanhita ::: n. --> A collection of vedic hymns, songs, or verses, forming the first part of each Veda.

San kang: The Three Standards, i.e., the sovereign is the standard of the minister, the father the standard of the son, and the husband the standard of the wife, on the ground that the active or male cosmic principle of the universe (yang), to which the sovereign, the father, and the husband correspond, is the standard of the passive or female cosmic principle (yin) to which is his commentary on the Vedanta (q.v.) respond. (Tung Chung-shu, 177-104 B.C.) -- W.T.C.

Sankara: One of the greatest of Indian philosophers, defender of Brahamism, who died about 820 AD., after having led a manysided, partly legendary, life as peripatetic teacher and author of numerous treatises, the most influential of which is his commentary on the Vedanta (s.v.) in which he established the doctrine of advaita (q.v.). -- K.F.L.

sanskrit ::: n. --> The ancient language of the Hindoos, long since obsolete in vernacular use, but preserved to the present day as the literary and sacred dialect of India. It is nearly allied to the Persian, and to the principal languages of Europe, classical and modern, and by its more perfect preservation of the roots and forms of the primitive language from which they are all descended, is a most important assistance in determining their history and relations. Cf. Prakrit, and Veda.

Sanskrit: The ancient language of India, language of the Vedas and other sacred and classical texts of Hinduism; the linguistic ancestor of the mode prakritas or vernaculars.

sarvair vedair aham eva vedyah ::: I am that which is known by all the Vedas. [cf. Gita 15.15]

Sarvam khalv idam brahma: (Skr.) "Indeed, all this is brahman", a famous dictum of Chan-dogya Upanishad 3.14.1, symptomatic of the monistic attitude later elaborated in Sankara's Vedanta (q.v.). -- K.F.L.

SASTRA. ::: The supreme SSstra of the integral yoga is the eternal Veda secret in the heart of every thinking and living being.

sat brahman (sat brahman; sat-brahman) ::: brahman as universal Being, same as sarvaṁ brahma; "Existence pure, indefinable, infinite, absolute, . . . the fundamental Reality which Vedantic experience discovers behind all the movement and formation which constitute the apparent reality".

Sat-cit-ananda, saccidananda: (Skr.) "Being-awareness-bliss", a Vedantic (s.v.) definition of the highest, all-inclusive reality, also of the atman (q.v.) insofar as it has attained its full realization. -- K.F.L.

satyam rtam brhat (Satyam Ritam Brihat) ::: the Truth, the Right, the Vast. [Atharva-veda 12.1.1]

Savitri ::: Purani: “The word ‘Savitri’ is derived from the word ‘Savitru’ which in its turn is derived from the root ‘su’ = ‘to give birth to’. The word ‘Soma’ which indicates an ‘exhilarating drink’, symbolising spiritual ecstasy or delight, is also derived from the same root ‘su’. It links therefore the creation and the delight of creation. Savitru therefore, means the Divine Creator One who gives birth to or brings forth from himself into existence, the creation. In the Veda, Savita is the God of illumination, the God of Creation. Usually, he is represented by the material sun which also illuminates the solar system and is its creator and sustainer in the material sense. Savitri therefore would mean etymologically ‘some one descended from the Sun’, ‘one belonging to the Sun’, ‘an energy derived from the Sun, the Divine Creator’. In our poem, Savitri is the princess who embodies the Divine Grace descended in human birth to work out with the aspiring soul of humanity his divine destiny.”“Savitri“—An Approach and a Study

seed-sounds ::: Sri Aurobindo: "My researches first convinced me that words, like plants, like animals, are in no sense artificial products, but growths, — living growths of sound with certain seed-sounds as their basis. Out of these seed-sounds develop a small number of primitive root-words with an immense progeny which have their successive generations and arrange themselves in tribes, clans, families, selective groups each having a common stock and a common psychological history. For the factor which presided over the development of language was the association, by the nervous mind of primitive man, of certain general significances or rather of certain general utilities and sense-values with articulate sounds. The process of this association was also in no sense artificial but natural, governed by simple and definite psychological laws.” *The Secret of the Veda

shardhatah) ::: "may we cast out the passion of him of evil impulse when he putteth forth his force." [R . g Veda 2.23.12]

shastra ::: n. --> A treatise for authoritative instruction among the Hindoos; a book of institutes; especially, a treatise explaining the Vedas.

shatkasampatti &

sheaths ::: the oldest Vedantic knowledge tells us of five degrees of our being, the material, the vital, the mental, the ideal, the spiritual or beatific and to each of these grades of our soul there corresponds a grade of our substance, a sheath as it was called in the ancient figurative language.

“ She is the first Radiance, Aditi, the infinite Consciousness of the infinite conscious Being which is the mother of the worlds.” The Secret of the Veda

Shiva ::: “The ‘auspicious one’; a name of the third deity of the Hindu Trinity; . . . represented mostly as ‘the pure and white, the ascetic, the still, contemplative Yogin’. The name Shiva is not found in the Vedas; however, the name Rudra occurs both in the singular and the plural. This Rudra of the Vedas developed in the course of time into Shiva, considered in the Puranic tradition mainly as the destroying or dissolving Power. He has a third eye in the middle of the forehead, a fiery glance from which once reduced Kamadeva to ashes. In his creative aspect he is represented as a Linga (phallus), symbolising the male procreative energy in nature. It is under the form of the Linga that Shiva is mostly worshipped. His abode is on Mt. Kailash, Parvati is his spouse and the Trisula (the trident) his weapon.” Glossary and Index of Proper Names in Sri Aurobindo’s Works

shiva ::: "The ‘auspicious one"; a name of the third deity of the Hindu Trinity; . . . represented mostly as ‘the pure and white, the ascetic, the still, contemplative Yogin". The name Shiva is not found in the Vedas; however, the name Rudra occurs both in the singular and the plural. This Rudra of the Vedas developed in the course of time into Shiva, considered in the Puranic tradition mainly as the destroying or dissolving Power. He has a third eye in the middle of the forehead, a fiery glance from which once reduced Kamadeva to ashes. In his creative aspect he is represented as a Linga (phallus), symbolising the male procreative energy in nature. It is under the form of the Linga that Shiva is mostly worshipped. His abode is on Mt. Kailash, Parvati is his spouse and the Trisula (the trident) his weapon.” *Glossary and Index of Proper Names in Sri Aurobindo"s Works

&

smriti &

"Soma is the Gandharva, the Lord of the hosts of delight, and guards the true seat of the Deva, the level or plane of the Ananda; gandharva itthñ padam asya rakshati. He is the Supreme, standing out from all other beings and over them, other than they and wonderful, adbhuta, and as the supreme and transcendent, present in the worlds but exceeding them, he protects in those worlds the births of the gods, pñti devñnñm janimñni adbhutah. The ‘births of the gods" is a common phrase in the Veda by which is meant the manifestation of the divine principles in the cosmos and especially the formation of the godhead in its manifold forms in the human being.” The Secret of the Veda

“Soma is the Gandharva, the Lord of the hosts of delight, and guards the true seat of the Deva, the level or plane of the Ananda; gandharva itthñ padam asya rakshati. He is the Supreme, standing out from all other beings and over them, other than they and wonderful, adbhuta, and as the supreme and transcendent, present in the worlds but exceeding them, he protects in those worlds the births of the gods, pñti devñnñm janimñni adbhutah. The ‘births of the gods’ is a common phrase in the Veda by which is meant the manifestation of the divine principles in the cosmos and especially the formation of the godhead in its manifold forms in the human being.” The Secret of the Veda

“Soma is the Gandharva, the Lord of the hosts of delight, and guards the true seat of the Deva, the level or plane of the Ananda; gandharvaitthñpadamasyarakshati. He is the Supreme, standing out from all other beings and over them, other than they and wonderful, adbhuta, and as the supreme and transcendent, present in the worlds but exceeding them, he protects in those worlds the births of the gods, pñtidevñnñmjanimñniadbhutah. The ‘births of the gods’ is a common phrase in the Veda by which is meant the manifestation of the divine principles in the cosmos and especially the formation of the godhead in its manifold forms in the human being.” The Secret of the Veda

Soma: One of the three important gods of the Vedic religion, about whom the ninth book of the Rig-Veda centers. This god is associated with the plant growing in northern India which was made into an intoxicating liquor. The effects of this drink became associated with supernatural powers. -- V.F.

sravana &

sravayatpatim ::: the Master of things who opens our ears to the sravayatpatim knowledge. [R . g Veda 5.25.5]

*Sri Aurobindo: "Dawn always means an opening of some kind — the coming of something that is not yet fully there.” Letters on Yoga ::: "As the Sun is image and godhead of the golden Light of the divine Truth, so Dawn is image and godhead of the opening out of the supreme illumination on the night of our human ignorance. Dawn daughter of Heaven and Night her sister are obverse and reverse sides of the same eternal Infinite.” The Secret of the Veda

Sri Aurobindo: "Day and Night, – the latter the state of Ignorance that belongs to our material Nature, the former the state of illumined Knowledge that belongs to the divine Mind of which our mentality is a pale and dulled reflection.” The Secret of the Veda

Sri Aurobindo: "Fifty, hundred, a thousand are numbers symbolic of completeness.” The Secret of the Veda

Sri Aurobindo: "Finally, we have the goddess Dakshina who may well be a female form of Daksha, himself a god and afterwards in the Purana one of the Prajapatis, the original progenitors, — we have Dakshina associated with the manifestation of knowledge and sometimes almost identified with Usha, the divine Dawn, who is the bringer of illumination. I shall suggest that Dakshina like the more famous Ila, Saraswati and Sarama, is one of four goddesses representing the four faculties of the Ritam or Truth-consciousness, — Ila representing truth-vision or revelation, Saraswati truth-audition, inspiration, the divine word, Sarama intuition, Dakshina the separative intuitional discrimination.” *The Secret of the Veda

Sri Aurobindo: "Masters of the Truth-Light who make the Truth grow by the Truth.” Rig Veda. *The Life Divine

Sri Aurobindo: “So too when the seer of the house of Atri cries high to Agni, ‘O Agni, O Priest of the offering, loose from us the cords,’ he is using not only a natural, but a richly-laden image. He is thinking of the triple cord of mind, nerves and body by which the soul is bound as a victim in the great world-sacrifice, the sacrifice of the Purusha; he is thinking of the force of the divine Will already awakened and at work within him, a fiery and irresistible godhead that shall uplift his oppressed divinity and cleave asunder the cords of its bondage; he is thinking of the might of that growing Strength and inner Flame which receiving all that he has to offer carries it to its own distant and difficult home, to the high-seated Truth, to the Far, to the Secret, to the Supreme.” The Secret of the Veda

*Sri Aurobindo: ". . . the divine Ananda, the principle of Bliss [is that] from which, in the Vedic conception, the existence of Man, this mental being, is drawn. A secret Delight is the base of existence, its sustaining atmosphere and almost its substance. This Ananda is spoken of in the Taittiriya Upanishad as the ethereal atmosphere of bliss without which nothing could remain in being. In the Aitareya Upanishad Soma, as the lunar deity, is born from the sense-mind in the universal Purusha and, when man is produced, expresses himself again as sense-mentality in the human being. For delight is the raison d"ĂȘtre of sensation, or, we may say, sensation is an attempt to translate the secret delight of existence into the terms of physical consciousness.” The Secret of the Veda

Sri Aurobindo: "The Divine and no other is the flame of life that sustains the physical body of living creatures and turns its food into sustenance of their vital force. He is lodged in the heart of every breathing thing; from him are memory and knowledge and the debates of the reason. He is that which is known by all the Vedas and by all forms of knowing; he is the knower of Veda and the maker of Vedanta. In other words, the Divine is at once the Soul of matter and the Soul of life and the Soul of mind as well as the Soul of the supramental light that is beyond mind and its limited reasoning intelligence.” *Essays on the Gita

Sri Aurobindo: “The Divine and no other is the flame of life that sustains the physical body of living creatures and turns its food into sustenance of their vital force. He is lodged in the heart of every breathing thing; from him are memory and knowledge and the debates of the reason. He is that which is known by all the Vedas and by all forms of knowing; he is the knower of Veda and the maker of Vedanta. In other words, the Divine is at once the Soul of matter and the Soul of life and the Soul of mind as well as the Soul of the supramental light that is beyond mind and its limited reasoning intelligence.” Essays on the Gita

Sri Aurobindo: ".The Herds and the Waters are the two principal images of the Veda; the former are the trooping Rays of the divine Sun, herds of the luminous Consciousness;” The Secret of the Veda

Sri Aurobindo: “The link between the spiritual and the lower planes of the being is that which is called in the old Vedantic phraseology the vijñùna and which we may describe in our modern turn of language as the Truth-plane or the ideal mind or supermind. There the One and the Many meet and our being is freely open to the revealing light of the divine Truth and the inspiration of the divine Will and Knowledge.” The Synthesis of Yoga

Sri Aurobindo: "The Rishi hymns the Sun-God as the source of divine knowledge and the creator of the inner worlds.” *The Secret of the Veda

Sri Aurobindo: "The robbers are as in the Veda vital beings who come to steal away the good condition or else to steal the gains of the sadhana.” Letters on Yoga

  Sri Aurobindo: "Vishnu the all-pervading, the cosmic Deity, the Lover and Friend of our souls, the Lord of the transcendent existence and the transcendent delight.” *The Secret of the Veda

Sri Aurobindo: “Vishnu the all-pervading, the cosmic Deity, the Lover and Friend of our souls, the Lord of the transcendent existence and the transcendent delight.” The Secret of the Veda

srutamagha ::: full in inspiration. [R . g Veda 8.93.1]

sukta ::: [a hymn of the Veda].

Sunahsepa (Shunahshepa) ::: [the name of a rsi, described in the Rgveda as bound to the sacrificial post by a threefold cord (representing man's mentality, vitality and corporality) ].

suparn.a ::: literally "beautifully winged"; a bird, especially a large bird suparna such as an eagle; a symbol of the soul in the Veda and Upanishads.

sūrih. ::: (nominative of sūri) illumined; "luminous with the solar light surih of the ideal knowledge". [R . g Veda 1.176.4]1 ssurya

svarvatir apah. (swarvatir apah; swarwatir apah) ::: waters (apas) that carry in them the light of svar; the ïŹ‚oods of a "higher consciousness pouring on the mortal mind". [R . g Veda 1.10.8, etc.] svarvati sakti svarvati

tad esa rcabhyukta ::: this is that word which was spoken by the Rg-veda. [cf. Tait. 2.1; Brhad. 4.4.23 etc.]

Tantra(s)(Sanskrit) ::: A word literally meaning a "loom" or the warp or threads in a loom, and, by extension ofmeaning, signifying a rule or ritual for ceremonial rites. The Hindu Tantras are numerous works orreligious treatises teaching mystical and magical formulae or formularies for the attainment of magical orquasi-magical powers, and for the worship of the gods. They are mostly composed in the form of dialogsbetween Siva and his divine consort Durga, these two divinities being the peculiar objects of theadoration of the Tantrins.In many parts of India the authority of the Tantras seems almost to have superseded the clean andpoetical hymns of the Vedas.Most tantric works are supposed to contain five different subjects: (1) the manifestation or evolution ofthe universe; (2) its destruction; (3) the worship or adoration of the divinities; (4) the achievement orattainment of desired objects and especially of six superhuman faculties; (5) modes or methods of union,usually enumerated as four, with the supreme divinity of the kosmos by means of contemplativemeditation.Unfortunately, while there is much of interest in the tantric works, their tendency for long ages has beendistinctly towards what in occultism is known as sorcery or black magic. Some of the rites or ceremoniespracticed have to do with revolting details connected with sex.Durga, the consort of Siva, his sakti or energy, is worshiped by the Tantrins as a distinct personifiedfemale power.The origin of the Tantras unquestionably goes back to a very remote antiquity, and there seems to belittle doubt that these works, or their originals, were heirlooms handed down from originally debased ordegenerate Atlantean racial offshoots. There is, of course, a certain amount of profoundly philosophicaland mystical thought running through the more important tantric works, but the tantric worship in manycases is highly licentious and immoral.

Tehmi: “The hour just before dawn. The Gods awake with the dawn in the Veda. The Gods are called ‘Ushabuddha, ‘those who awake with the dawn’. All the gods are sons of light except Agni who burns also in the light and the darkness.”

The Agni- or Agneya-Purana is so named because Agni imparted to the sage Vasishtha the twofold knowledge of Brahman: that acquired through study of the “word,” the Vedas; and that higher apprehension attained through mystical contemplation (cf VP preface lviii; also 6:5).

:::   "The ancient Vedanta presents us with . . . the conception and experience of Brahman as the one universal and essential fact and of the nature of Brahman as Sachchidananda [Existence, Consciousness, Bliss]. In this view the essence of all life is the movement of a universal and immortal existence, the essence of all sensation and emotion is the play of a universal and self-existent delight in being, the essence of all thought and perception is the radiation of a universal and all-pervading truth, the essence of all activity is the progression of a universal and self-effecting good.” The Life Divine

“The ancient Vedanta presents us with . . . the conception and experience of Brahman as the one universal and essential fact and of the nature of Brahman as Sachchidananda [Existence, Consciousness, Bliss]. In this view the essence of all life is the movement of a universal and immortal existence, the essence of all sensation and emotion is the play of a universal and self-existent delight in being, the essence of all thought and perception is the radiation of a universal and all-pervading truth, the essence of all activity is the progression of a universal and self-effecting good.” The Life Divine

"The Veda is a book of esoteric symbols, almost of spiritual formulae, which masks itself as a collection of ritual poems.” The Secret of the Veda

“The Veda is a book of esoteric symbols, almost of spiritual formulae, which masks itself as a collection of ritual poems.” The Secret of the Veda

"The Veda is the knowledge of the Divine, the Eternal, . . . .” Essays on the Gita

“The Veda is the knowledge of the Divine, the Eternal, 
” Essays on the Gita

"The Veda is thus the spiritual and psychological seed of Indian culture . . . ." The Renaissance in India

“The Veda is thus the spiritual and psychological seed of Indian culture . . . .“ The Renaissance in India

  "The Vedas are the oldest holy books of India, perhaps the oldest of such works in the world. They are the foundation of the Hindu religion. The hymns they contain, written in an old form of Sanskrit, are said to have been ‘revealed" to the Rishis and subsequently were transmitted orally from generation to generation. They continued to be so handed down even after they had been collected and arranged by Krishna Dwaipayana (Veda Vyasa). It is not known when they were committed to writing. The Vedas are four in number: Rig, Yajur, Sama, and Atharva. In reality the Rig-Veda is the Veda; many of its hymns occur with a different arrangement in the other three Vedas. According to some scholars, each Veda is divided into four parts: Samhita, Brahmana, Aranyaka, and Upanisad. But generally the term ‘Veda" is reserved for the Samhita, the metrical hymns. (Dow)” *Glossary and Index of Proper Names in Sri Aurobindo"s Works

“The Vedas are the oldest holy books of India, perhaps the oldest of such works in the world. They are the foundation of the Hindu religion. The hymns they contain, written in an old form of Sanskrit, are said to have been ‘revealed’ to the Rishis and subsequently were transmitted orally from generation to generation. They continued to be so handed down even after they had been collected and arranged by Krishna Dwaipayana (Veda Vyasa). It is not known when they were committed to writing. The Vedas are four in number: Rig, Yajur, Sama, and Atharva. In reality the Rig-Veda is the Veda; many of its hymns occur with a different arrangement in the other three Vedas. According to somescholars, each Veda is divided into four parts: Samhita, Brahmana, Aranyaka, and Upanisad. But generally the term ‘Veda’ is reserved for the Samhita, the metrical hymns. (Dow)” Glossary and Index of Proper Names in Sri Aurobindo’s Works

"The Chhandogya,
 is to be a work in the right and perfect way of devoting oneself to the Brahman; its subject is the Brahman, but the Brahman as symbolised in the OM, the sacred syllable of the Veda, not therefore, the pure state of existence only, but that existence in all its parts
 OM is the symbol and the thing symbolised.

“The Chhandogya,
 is to be a work in the right and perfect way of devoting oneself to the Brahman; its subject is the Brahman, but the Brahman as symbolised in the OM, the sacred syllable of the Veda, not therefore, the pure state of existence only, but that existence in all its parts
 OM is the symbol and the thing symbolised.

“The Chhandogya,
 is to be a work in the right and perfect way of devoting oneself to the Brahman; its subject is the Brahman, but the Brahman as symbolised in the OM, the sacred syllable of the Veda, not therefore, the pure state of existence only, but that existence in all its parts
 OM is the symbol and the thing symbolised.”the basic syllable OM, which is the foundation of all the perfect creative sounds of the revealed word; OM is the one universal formulation of the energy of sound and speech, that which contains and sums up, synthesises and releases, all the spiritual power and all the potentiality of Vak (speech, the goddess Speech) and Shabda (sound, vibration, word). The mantra of the divine consciousness brings its light of revelation, the Mantra of the divine Power, its will of effectuation, the Mantra of the divine Ananda is equal fulfilment of the spiritual delight of existence. All word and thought are an outflowing of he great OM,—OM, the Word, the Eternal Manifest in the forms of sensible objects; manifest in that conscious play of creative self-conception of which forms and objects are the figures, manifest behind in the self-gathered superconscient power of the Infinite, OM is the sovereign source, seed, womb of thing and idea, form and name—it is itself, integrally, the supreme Intangible, the original Unity, the timeless Mystery self—existent above all manifestation in supernal being.” SABCL Volume 13—Page 315

“The Divine and no other is the flame of life that sustains the physical body of living creatures and turns its food into sustenance of their vital force. He is lodged in the heart of every breathing thing; from him are memory and knowledge and the debates of the reason. He is that which is known by all the Vedas and by all forms of knowing; he is the knower of Veda and the maker of Vedanta. In other words, the Divine is at once the Soul of matter and the Soul of life and the Soul of mind as well as the Soul of the supramental light that is beyond mind and its limited reasoning intelligence.” Essays on the Gita

  The divine enjoyment, bhaga, typified by the god Bhaga, the Enjoyer in the power of the Truth.” The Secret of the Veda

"The Gita in later chapters speaks highly of the Veda and the Upanishads. They are divine Scriptures, they are the Word. The Lord himself is the knower of Veda and the author of Vedanta, vedavid vedñntakrt; the Lord is the one object of knowledge in all the Vedas, sarvair vedair aham eva vedyah, a language which implies that the word Veda means the book of knowledge and that these Scriptures deserve their appellation.” Essays on the Gita

“The Gita in later chapters speaks highly of the Veda and the Upanishads. They are divine Scriptures, they are the Word. The Lord himself is the knower of Veda and the author of Vedanta, vedavid vedñntakrt; the Lord is the one object of knowledge in all the Vedas, sarvair vedair aham eva vedyah, a language which implies that the word Veda means the book of knowledge and that these Scriptures deserve their appellation.” Essays on the Gita

“The Gita in later chapters speaks highly of the Veda and the Upanishads. They are divine Scriptures, they are the Word. The Lord himself is the knower of Veda and the author of Vedanta, vedavidvedñntakrt; the Lord is the one object of knowledge in all the Vedas, sarvairvedairahamevavedyah, a language which implies that the word Veda means the book of knowledge and that these Scriptures deserve their appellation.” Essays on the Gita

“The Godhead has built this universe in a complex system of worlds which we find both within us and without, subjectively cognised and objectively sensed. It is a rising tier of earths and heavens; it is a stream of diverse waters; it is a Light of seven rays, or of eight or nine or ten; it is a Hill of many plateaus. The seers often image it in a series of trios; there are three earths and three heavens. More, there is a triple world below,—Heaven, Earth and the intervening mid-region; a triple world between, the shining heavens of the Sun; a triple world above, the supreme and rapturous abodes of the Godhead.” The Secret of the Veda

"The gods are the powers of Light, the children of Infinity, forms and personalities of the one Godhead who by their help and by their growth and human workings in man raise him to the truth and the immortality.” The Secret of the Veda

“The gods are the powers of Light, the children of Infinity, forms and personalities of the one Godhead who by their help and by their growth and human workings in man raise him to the truth and the immortality.” The Secret of the Veda

  "The gospel of the Gita reposes upon this fundamental Vedantic truth that all being is the one Brahman and all existence the wheel of Brahman, a divine movement opening out from God and returning to God. All is the expressive activity of Nature and Nature a power of the Divine which works out the consciousness and will of the divine Soul master of her works and inhabitant of her forms.” Essays on the Gita

“The gospel of the Gita reposes upon this fundamental Vedantic truth that all being is the one Brahman and all existence the wheel of Brahman, a divine movement opening out from God and returning to God. All is the expressive activity of Nature and Nature a power of the Divine which works out the consciousness and will of the divine Soul master of her works and inhabitant of her forms.” Essays on the Gita

The greatest initiates and yogis since Sankaracharya’s time are reputed to have come from the ranks of the Advaita-Vedantists. “Yet the root philosophy of both Adwaita and Buddhist scholars is identical, and both have the same respect for animal life, for both believe that every creature on earth, however small and humble, ‘is an immortal portion of the immortal matter’ — for matter with them has quite another significance than it has with either Christian or materialist — and that every creature is subject to Karma” (SD 1:636; cf 2:637).

"The greatest motion of poetry comes when the mind is still and the ideal principle works above and outside the brain, above even the hundred petalled lotus of the ideal mind, in its proper empire; for then it is Veda that is revealed, the perfect substance and expression of eternal truth.” Essays Divine and Human*

“The greatest motion of poetry comes when the mind is still and the ideal principle works above and outside the brain, above even the hundred petalled lotus of the ideal mind, in its proper empire; for then it is Veda that is revealed, the perfect substance and expression of eternal truth.” Essays Divine and Human

"The ideation of the gnosis is radiating light-stuff of the consciousness of the eternal Existence; each ray is a truth. The will in the gnosis is a conscious force of eternal knowledge; it throws the consciousness and substance of being into infallible forms of truth-power, forms that embody the idea and make it faultlessly effective, and it works out each truth-power and each truth-form spontaneously and rightly according to its nature. Because it carries this creative force of the divine Idea, the Sun, the lord and symbol of the gnosis, is described in the Veda as the Light which is the father of all things, Surya Savitri, the Wisdom-Luminous who is the bringer-out into manifest existence.” The Synthesis of Yoga*

“The ideation of the gnosis is radiating light-stuff of the consciousness of the eternal Existence; each ray is a truth. The will in the gnosis is a conscious force of eternal knowledge; it throws the consciousness and substance of being into infallible forms of truth-power, forms that embody the idea and make it faultlessly effective, and it works out each truth-power and each truth-form spontaneously and rightly according to its nature. Because it carries this creative force of the divine Idea, the Sun, the lord and symbol of the gnosis, is described in the Veda as the Light which is the father of all things, Surya Savitri, the Wisdom-Luminous who is the bringer-out into manifest existence.” The Synthesis of Yoga

"The illumining Godhead is himself the Veda and that which is made known by the Veda. He is both the knowledge and the object of the knowledge.” Essays on the Gita

“The illumining Godhead is himself the Veda and that which is made known by the Veda. He is both the knowledge and the object of the knowledge.” Essays on the Gita

The Inconscience is an inverse reproduction of the supreme superconscience: it has the same absoluteness of being and automatic action, but in a vast involved trance; it is being lost in itself, plunged in its own abyss of infinity. Instead of a luminous absorption in self-existence there is a tenebrous involution in it, the darkness veiled within darkness of the Rig Veda, tamaasit tamasa gudham, which makes it look like Non-Existence; instead of a luminous inherent self-awareness there is a consciousness plunged into an abyss of self-oblivion, inherent in being but not awake in being. Yet is this involved consciousness still a concealed knowledge by identity; it carries in it the awareness of all the truths of existence hidden in its dark infinite and, when it acts and creates,—but it acts first as Energy and not as Consciousness,—everything is arranged with the precision and perfection of an intrinsic knowledge. In all material things reside a mute and involved Real-Idea, a substantial and self-effective intuition, an eyeless exact perception, an automatic intelligence working out its unexpressed and unthought conceptions, a blindly seeing sureness of sight, a dumb infallible sureness of suppressed feeling coated in insensibility, which effectuate all that has to be effected. All this state and action of the Inconscient corresponds very evidently with the same state and action of the pure Superconscience, but translated into terms of self-darkness in place of the original self-light. Intrinsic in the material form, these powers are not possessed by the form, but yet work in its mute subconscience.
   Ref: CWSA Vol. 21-22, Page: 570


"The Non-Manifestation is not a Non-Existence. Non-Existence is a term created by the mind and has no absolute significance; there is no such thing as an absolute Nihil or Zero. It is agreed even by the philosophies of the Nihil, Tao or Zero (Sunya) that the Non-Existence of which they speak is a Nought in which all is and from which all comes. Tao, Nihil or Zero is not different from the Absolute or the Supreme Brahman of Vedanta; it is only another way of describing or naming it. The Supreme is an Existence beyond what we know of our existence and therefore only it can seem to our mind as a Zero, a Nihil, a Non-Existence.” Essays Divine and Human*

“The Non-Manifestation is not a Non-Existence. Non-Existence is a term created by the mind and has no absolute significance; there is no such thing as an absolute Nihil or Zero. It is agreed even by the philosophies of the Nihil, Tao or Zero (Sunya) that the Non-Existence of which they speak is a Nought in which all is and from which all comes. Tao, Nihil or Zero is not different from the Absolute or the Supreme Brahman of Vedanta; it is only another way of describing or naming it. The Supreme is an Existence beyond what we know of our existence and therefore only it can seem to our mind as a Zero, a Nihil, a Non-Existence.” Essays Divine and Human

"The real source of knowledge is the Lord in the heart; ‘I am seated in the heart of every man and from me is knowledge," says the Gita; the Scripture is only a verbal form of that inner Veda, of that self-luminous Reality, it is sabdabrahma: the mantra, says the Veda, has risen from the heart, from the secret place where is the seat of the truth, sadanñd rtasya, guhñyñm. That origin is its sanction; but still the infinite Truth is greater than its word. Nor shall you say of any Scripture that it alone is all-sufficient and no other truth can be admitted, as the Vedavadins said of the Veda, nñnyad astüti vñdinah. This is a saving and liberating word which must be applied to all the Scriptures of the world. Take all the Scriptures that are or have been, Bible and Koran and the books of the Chinese, Veda and Upanishads and Purana and Tantra and Shastra and the Gita itself and the sayings of thinkers and sages, prophets and Avatars, still you shall not say that there is nothing else or that the truth your intellect cannot find there is not true because you cannot find it there. That is the limited thought of the sectarian or the composite thought of the eclectic religionist, not the untrammelled truth-seeking of the free and illumined mind and God-experienced soul. Heard or unheard before, that always is the truth which is seen by the heart of man in its illumined depths or heard within from the Master of all knowledge, the knower of the eternal Veda.” Essays on the Gita*

“The real source of knowledge is the Lord in the heart; ‘I am seated in the heart of every man and from me is knowledge,’ says the Gita; the Scripture is only a verbal form of that inner Veda, of that self-luminous Reality, it is sabdabrahma: the mantra, says the Veda, has risen from the heart, from the secret place where is the seat of the truth, sadanñd rtasya, guhñyñm. That origin is its sanction; but still the infinite Truth is greater than its word. Nor shall you say of any Scripture that it alone is all-sufficient and no other truth can be admitted, as the Vedavadins said of the Veda, nñnyad astüti vñdinah. This is a saving and liberating word which must be applied to all the Scriptures of the world. Take all the Scriptures that are or have been, Bible and Koran and the books of the Chinese, Veda and Upanishads and Purana and Tantra and Shastra and the Gita itself and the sayings of thinkers and sages, prophets and Avatars, still you shall not say that there is nothing else or that the truth your intellect cannot find there is not true because you cannot find it there. That is the limited thought of the sectarian or the composite thought of the eclectic religionist, not the untrammelled truth-seeking of the free and illumined mind and God-experienced soul. Heard or unheard before, that always is the truth which is seen by the heart of man in its illumined depths or heard within from the Master of all knowledge, the knower of the eternal Veda.” Essays on the Gita

“The real source of knowledge is the Lord in the heart; ‘I am seated in the heart of every man and from me is knowledge,’ says the Gita; the Scripture is only a verbal form of that inner Veda, of that self-luminous Reality, it is sabdabrahma: the mantra, says the Veda, has risen from the heart, from the secret place where is the seat of the truth, sadanñdrtasya, guhñyñm. That origin is its sanction; but still the infinite Truth is greater than its word. Nor shall you say of any Scripture that it alone is all-sufficient and no other truth can be admitted, as the Vedavadins said of the Veda, nñnyadastütivñdinah. This is a saving and liberating word which must be applied to all the Scriptures of the world. Take all the Scriptures that are or have been, Bible and Koran and the books of the Chinese, Veda and Upanishads and Purana and Tantra and Shastra and the Gita itself and the sayings of thinkers and sages, prophets and Avatars, still you shall not say that there is nothing else or that the truth your intellect cannot find there is not true because you cannot find it there. That is the limited thought of the sectarian or the composite thought of the eclectic religionist, not the untrammelled truth-seeking of the free and illumined mind and God-experienced soul. Heard or unheard before, that always is the truth which is seen by the heartof man in its illumined depths or heard within from the Master of all knowledge, the knower of the eternal Veda.” Essays on the Gita

There is a close connection in thought with the theosophic and Hindu teaching of the atman or paramatman — Brahman, the egg out of which the universe is born, filling the universe with divine and spiritual inspirations and dwelling in and working through the innumerable hierarchies of minor beings which compose and build that hierarchy, and which indeed are the universe. Another parallel is the Pythagorean teaching of Monas monadum (monad of monads). In the Qabbalah itself the correspondence is to Kether the Crown, out of which all the other, lower hierarchical grades flow emanationally. This Kether, the highest of the Sephiroth, is the Macroprosopus (the great or immense cosmic face) — an intuition of which may be gained by looking into the violet dome of night begemmed with worlds and instinct with life; the Chaldean ’Arikh ’Anpin (the vast countenance of nature), hiding the indwelling spirit. Kether, Macroprosopus, ’Arikh ’Anpin, and ’Adam Qadmon are but different manners of expressing the same hierarchical acme or originant which thus is the manifested vehicle of the Qabbalistic ’eyn soph, the parabrahman of the Vedantists, or the Boundless. Speaking of this phrase, Blavatsky remarks that it “denotes the Elohim as androgynous at best, the feminine element almost predominating, as it would read, ‘One is She the Spirit of the Elohim of Life’ ” (SD 1:130n). See also ARBA-IL

“The Rishi hymns the Sun-God as the source of divine knowledge and the creator of the inner worlds.” The Secret of the Veda

“The robbers are as in the Veda vital beings who come to steal away the good condition or else to steal the gains of the sadhana.” Letters on Yoga

"The text of the Veda which we possess has remained uncorrupted for over two thousand years. It dates, so far as we know, from that great period of Indian intellectual activity, contemporaneous with the Greek efflorescence, but earlier in its beginnings, which founded the culture and civilisation recorded in the classical literature of the land.” The Secret of the Veda

“The text of the Veda which we possess has remained uncorrupted for over two thousand years. It dates, so far as we know, from that great period of Indian intellectual activity, contemporaneous with the Greek efflorescence, but earlier in its beginnings, which founded the culture and civilisation recorded in the classical literature of the land.” The Secret of the Veda

  "The triple principle was doubly recognised, first in the threefold divine principle answering to the later Sachchidananda, the divine existence, consciousness and bliss, and secondly in the threefold mundane principle, Mind, Life, Body, upon which is built the triple world of the Veda and Puranas.” *The Secret of the Veda

“The triple principle was doubly recognised, first in the threefold divine principle answering to the later Sachchidananda, the divine existence, consciousness and bliss, and secondly in the threefold mundane principle, Mind, Life, Body, upon which is built the triple world of the Veda and Puranas.” The Secret of the Veda

"The Word has its seed-sounds — suggesting the eternal syllable of the Veda, A U M, and the seed-sounds of the Tantriks — which carry in them the principles of things; it has its forms which stand behind the revelatory and inspired speech that comes to man"s supreme faculties, and these compel the forms of things in the universe; it has its rhythms, — for it is no disordered vibration, but moves out into great cosmic measures, — and according to the rhythm is the law, arrangement, harmony, processes of the world it builds. Life itself is a rhythm of God.” The Upanishads

“The Word has its seed-sounds—suggesting the eternal syllable of the Veda, A U M, and the seed-sounds of the Tantriks—which carry in them the principles of things; it has its forms which stand behind the revelatory and inspired speech that comes to man’s supreme faculties, and these compel the forms of things in the universe; it has its rhythms,—for it is no disordered vibration, but moves out into great cosmic measures,—and according to the rhythm is the law, arrangement, harmony, processes of the world it builds. Life itself is a rhythm of God.” The Upanishads

The Word has its seed-sounds—suggesting the eternal syllable of the Veda, AUM.

The Word has its seed-sounds – suggesting the eternal syllable of the Veda, AUM. ::: Sri Aurobindo - A note on the Chhandogya Upanishad *

:::   "This is the omniscient who knows the law of our being and is sufficient to his works; let us build the song of his truth by our thought and make it as if a chariot on which he shall mount. When he dwells with us, then a happy wisdom becomes ours. With him for friend we cannot come to harm.” The Secret of the Veda

“This is the omniscient who knows the law of our being and is sufficient to his works; let us build the song of his truth by our thought and make it as if a chariot on which he shall mount. When he dwells with us, then a happy wisdom becomes ours. With him for friend we cannot come to harm.” The Secret of the Veda

This primary, ultimate and eternal Existence, as seen by the Vedantins, is not merely bare existence, or a conscious existence whose consciousness is crude force or power; it is a conscious existence the very term of whose being, the very term of whose consciousness is bliss.
   Ref: CWSA Vol. 21-22, Page: 1025


. thviṁ prasitim ::: same as pr.thvi prasiti. pr prthvi trsvi . g Veda 4.4.1]. thvi tr

. thvi prasiti ::: wide movement. [Cf. R.g Veda 4.4.1] pr prthvim

traiguayavisaya vedah ::: the triple guna is the subject of the Vedas. [Gita 2.45]

triple cord of mind ::: Sri Aurobindo: "So too when the seer of the house of Atri cries high to Agni, ‘O Agni, O Priest of the offering, loose from us the cords," he is using not only a natural, but a richly-laden image. He is thinking of the triple cord of mind, nerves and body by which the soul is bound as a victim in the great world-sacrifice, the sacrifice of the Purusha; he is thinking of the force of the divine Will already awakened and at work within him, a fiery and irresistible godhead that shall uplift his oppressed divinity and cleave asunder the cords of its bondage; he is thinking of the might of that growing Strength and inner Flame which receiving all that he has to offer carries it to its own distant and difficult home, to the high-seated Truth, to the Far, to the Secret, to the Supreme.” *The Secret of the Veda

triple heavens ::: Sri Aurobindo: "Vishnu is the wide-moving one. He is that which has gone abroad — as it is put in the language of the Isha Upanishad, sa paryagñt, — triply extending himself as Seer, Thinker and Former, in the superconscient Bliss, in the heaven of mind, in the earth of the physical consciousness, tredhñ vicakramñnah. In those three strides he has measured out, he has formed in all their extension the earthly worlds; for in the Vedic idea the material world which we inhabit is only one of several steps leading to and supporting the vital and mental worlds beyond. In those strides he supports upon the earth and mid-world, — the earth the material, the mid-world the vital realms of Vayu, Lord of the dynamic Life-principle, — the triple heaven and its three luminous summits, trüni rocanñ. These heavens the Rishi describes as the higher seat of the fulfilling. Earth, the mid-world and heaven are the triple place of the conscious being"s progressive self-fulfilling, trishadhastha, earth the lower seat, the vital world the middle, heaven the higher. All these are contained in the threefold movement of Vishnu.” The Secret of the Veda

triple world ::: Sri Aurobindo: "The Godhead has built this universe in a complex system of worlds which we find both within us and without, subjectively cognised and objectively sensed. It is a rising tier of earths and heavens; it is a stream of diverse waters; it is a Light of seven rays, or of eight or nine or ten; it is a Hill of many plateaus. The seers often image it in a series of trios; there are three earths and three heavens. More, there is a triple world below, — Heaven, Earth and the intervening mid-region; a triple world between, the shining heavens of the Sun; a triple world above, the supreme and rapturous abodes of the Godhead.” *The Secret of the Veda

Trita Aptya ::: the Third or Triple, apparently the purusa of the mental plane; in the tradition he is a rsi, in the Veda he seems rather to be a god.

Trita ::: "the Third or Triple, apparently the Purusha of the mental plane", the companion of Eka2 and Dvita: "the god or Rishi of the third plane, full of luminous mental kingdoms unknown to the physical mind". trsvi tr . g Veda 4.4.1]

Truth-consciousness ::: There must be in the nature of things a faculty or principle which sees the Truth unveiled, an eternal faculty of knowledge which corresponds to the eternal fact of the Truth. There is, says the Veda, such a principle; it is the Truth-Consciousness which sees the truth directly and is in possession of it spontaneously.
   Ref: CWSA Vol. 18, Vol. 21-22, Page: 38


udgitha ::: the chant of Sama-veda.

uhate ::: "so that he bears up thy activities" (Sri Aurobindo"s interpretation of ohate in R . g Veda 1.176.4).

upadhi. ::: "limited by"; limitation; external imposition; a term used in vedanta philosophy for any superimposition that gives a limited view of the true Reality and makes It appear as the relative, like the body of a man or animal is the upadhi of its spirit; one of many conditions of body and mind obscuring the true Self which needs to be removed for the attainment of liberation

upanisad (Upanishad) ::: inner knowledge, the secret teaching which enters into the final truth and settles in it, [one of a class of Hindu sacred writings, regarded as the source of the Vedanta-philosophy].

Upanishad(Sanskrit) ::: A compound, composed of upa "according to," "together with," ni "down," and the verbal rootsad, "to sit," which becomes shad by Sanskrit grammar when preceded by the particle ni: the entirecompound thus signifying "following upon or according to the teachings which were received when wewere sitting down." The figure here is that of pupils sitting in the Oriental style at the feet of the teacher,who taught them the secret wisdom or rahasya, in private and in forms and manners of expression thatlater were written and promulgated according to those teachings and after that style.The Upanishads are examples of literary works in which the rahasya -- a Sanskrit word meaning"esoteric doctrine" or "mystery" -- is imbodied. The Upanishads belong to the Vedic cycle and areregarded by orthodox Brahmans as a portion of the sruti or "revelation." It was from these wonderfulquasi-esoteric and very mystical works that was later developed the highly philosophical and profoundsystem called the Vedanta. The Upanishads are usually reckoned today as one hundred and fifty innumber, though probably only a score are now complete without evident marks of literary change oradulteration in the way of excision or interpolation.The topics treated of in the Upanishads are highly transcendental, recondite, and abstruse, and in orderproperly to understand the Upanishadic teaching one should have constantly in mind the master-keys thattheosophy puts into the hand of the student. The origin of the universe, the nature of the divinities, therelations between soul and ego, the connections of spiritual and material beings, the liberation of theevolving entity from the chains of maya, and kosmological questions, are all dealt with, mostly in asuccinct and cryptic form. The Upanishads, finally, may be called the exoteric theosophical works ofHindustan, but contain a vast amount of genuine esoteric information.

Upanishad: Sanskrit for secret teaching or Esoteric Doctrine. The Upanishads form the third section of the Vedas, recording the speculations of the Hindu sages and esoteric adepts on the nature of the world and ultimate reality and the way to spiritual union with The Absolute. The principal basis of Hindu philosophy. More than one hundred Upanishads are mentioned, but thirteen are generally listed as the oldest ones, viz. Chandogya, Brhadaranyaka, Aitareya, Taittiriya, Katha, Isa, Munda, Kausitaki, Kena, Prasna, Svetasvatara, Mandukya, and Maitri; they probably date from the 8th century B.C.

Upanishads :::which leads to the end of knowledge; there are three main schools of vedanta

Upasanakanda: (Skr.) That portion of the Veda (q.v.) dealing with worship. -- K.F.L.

"Usha is the divine illumination and Dakshina is the discerning knowledge that comes with the dawn and enables the Power in the mind, Indra, to know aright and separate the light from the darkness, the truth from the falsehood, the straight from the crooked, vrinüta vijñnan.” The Secret of the Veda*

uttara-mimamsa ::: [a system of philosophy (one of the six darsanas) : the enquiry into the latter portion of the Veda (i.e. the Upanisads ) ; it is usually called vedanta]; the brahmavada.

Uttara-Mimamsa: Same as Vedanta (q.v.). Uttarapaksa: (Skr.) "Subsequent view", the second, or the thinker's own view, stated after the refutation (Khandana) of the opponent's view (see prvapaksa). -- K.F.L.

Vac: (Skr.) Speech, voice, word. In Vedic (q.v.) philosophy vac and sabda (q.v.) have a similar role as the Logos in Greek philosophy (see e.g. Rigveda 10.125). It appears personified (feminine) and close to primeval reality in the hierarchy of emanations. -- K.F.L.

vairagya. ::: dispassion; absence of worldly desires; detachment; desirelessness; disinterest; indifference towards and disgust for all worldly things and enjoyments; one of the four prerequisites for qualification as a spiritual aspirant of vedanta

Vajasaneyi-samhitopanisad (Vajasaneyi) ::: [a name of the Isa Upanisad (because it occurs as part of the Vajasaneyi-samhita of the Yajur-veda) ].

Vallabha: An Indian thinker and theologian of the 15th century A.D., a follower of the Vedanta (q.v.) and of Vishnuism (q.v.), who interpreted all to be the divine reality with its threefold aspect of sat-cit-ananda, the human soul ananda. -- K.F.L.

“Vamadeva goes on to say,”Let us give expression to this secret name of the clarity,—that is to say, let us bring out this Soma wine, this hidden delight of existence; let us hold it in this world-sacrifice by our surrenderings or submissions to Agni, the divine Will or Conscious-Power which is the Master of being.” The Secret of the Veda

Vayu, Master of life, links them together by the mid-air, the region of vital force. And there are other deities,—Parjanya, giver of the rain of heaven; Dadhikravan, the divine war-horse, a power of Agni; the mystic Dragon of the Foundations; Trita Aptya who on the third plane of existence consummates our triple being; and more besides.” The Secret of the Veda

Vayuputra ::: son of Vayu2.Vayuputra Veda-j ñana

vedaisca vedyah ::: that which is known by all the books of Knowledge. [Gita 15.15]

veda-knower

veda ::: knowledge; knowledge of the Divine; the book of knowledge; [especially, Veda: a generic name for the most ancient Indian sacred literature, i.e. the Rg-veda, Yajur-veda,Sama-veda and Atharva-veda, each of these being divided into two portions, mantra and brahmana; the term " Veda" is generally reserved for the mantras or metrical hymns, especially those of the Rg-veda].

veda. ::: knowledge; wisdom; understanding; revealed scripture

vedanga ::: [a "limb of the Veda", one of six sciences auxiliary to the Veda: chanting, ritual, grammar, etymological interpretation, prosody, astrology].

vedanta ::: n. --> A system of philosophy among the Hindus, founded on scattered texts of the Vedas, and thence termed the "Anta," or end or substance.

vedanta. ::: "the end of the Vedas"; the philosophy based primarily on the

vedanta ::: the "end or culmination of the Veda", the Upanisads (which occur at the end of the Veda) ; a system of philosophy based on the Upanisads teaching the culminating knowledge of the Absolute, considered (sometimes under the name uttara-mimamsa) to be one of the six darsanas].

veda ::: n. --> The ancient sacred literature of the Hindus; also, one of the four collections, called Rig-Veda, Yajur-Veda, Sama-Veda, and Atharva-Veda, constituting the most ancient portions of that literature.

vedantic ::: a. --> Of or pertaining to the Vedas.

vedantin. ::: a follower of vedanta

vedantist ::: n. --> One versed in the doctrines of the Vedantas.

vedas. ::: the most ancient Hindu scriptures which state that all matter is derived from consciousness; the system of knowledge which perceives the universe as an intelligent, conscious whole; the four Vedas are the

vedavada ::: [the gospel of the (ritualistic) Veda, as opposed to the brahmavada]

vedavid vedantakrt ::: knower of Veda and the author of Vedanta. [cf. Gita 15.15]

Vedic: An adjective, meaning referring to the Vedas (q.v.) or the period that generated them, considered closed about 500 B.C.

Vedic Hinduism: The religion and philosophy of the Vedas. It is basically optimistic and life-loving. The four Vedas and the Atharva-Veda are the literature of this period which later changed into Brahmanic Hinduism (q.v.).

Vedic ::: Of or relating to the Veda or Vedas, the variety of Sanskrit in which they are written, or the Hindu culture that produced them.

vedic ::: of or relating to the Veda or Vedas, the variety of Sanskrit in which they are written, or the Hindu culture that produced them.

Vedic Religion: Or the Religion of the Vedas (q.v.). It is thoroughly cosmological, inspirational and ritualistic, priest and sacrifice playing an important role. It started with belief in different gods, such as Indra, Agni, Surya, Vishnu, Ushas, the Maruts, usually interpreted as symbolizing the forces of nature, but with the development of Hinduism it deteriorated into a worship of thousands of gods corresponding to the diversification of function and status in the complex social organism. Accompanying there was a pronounced tendency toward magic even in Vedic times, while the more elevated thoughts which have found expression in magnificent praises of the one or the other deity finally became crystallized in the philosophic thought of the Upanishads (q.v.). There is a distinct break, however, between Vedic culture with its free and autochthonous religious consciousness and the rigidly caste and custom controlled religion as we know it in India today, as also the religion of bhakti (q.v.). -- K.F.L.

vicetas ::: (one) completely conscious, (one) wide in consciousness: (a Vedic word corresponding to the Vedantic vijnana) .

vid.uhars.in (viduharshin) ::: exulting in its strength. [Cf. R viduharsin . g Veda 2.23.11] vidvan vidv

Vidya(Sanskrit) ::: The word (derived from the same verbal root vid from which comes the noun Veda) for"knowledge," "philosophy," "science." This is a term very generally used in theosophical philosophy,having in a general way the three meanings just stated. It is frequently compounded with other words,such as: atma-vidya -- "knowledge of atman" or the essential Self; Brahma-vidya -- "knowledge ofBrahman," knowledge of the universe, a term virtually equivalent to theosophy; or, again, guhya-vidya -signifying the "secret knowledge" or the esoteric wisdom. Using the word in a collective but neverthelessspecific sense, vidya is a general term for occult science.

vishnu ::: 1. (In later Hinduism) "The Preserver.” The second member of the Trimurti, along with Brahma the Creator and Shiva the Destroyer. 2. (In popular Hinduism) a deity believed to have descended from heaven to earth in several incarnations, or avatars, varying in number from nine to twenty-two, but always including animals. His most important human incarnation is the Krishna of the Bhagavad-Gita. 3. "The Pervader,” one of a half-dozen solar deities in the Rig-Veda, daily traversing the sky in three strides, morning, afternoon, and night.

“Vishnu is the wide-moving one. He is that which has gone abroad—as it is put in the language of the Isha Upanishad, sa paryagñt,—triply extending himself as Seer, Thinker and Former, in the superconscient Bliss, in the heaven of mind, in the earth of the physical consciousness, tredhñ vicakramñnah. In those three strides he has measured out, he has formed in all their extension the earthly worlds; for in the Vedic idea the material world which we inhabit is only one of several steps leading to and supporting the vital and mental worlds beyond. In those strides he supports upon the earth and mid-world,—the earth the material, the mid-world the vital realms of Vayu, Lord of the dynamic Life-principle,—the triple heaven and its three luminous summits, trüni rocanñ. These heavens the Rishi describes as the higher seat of the fulfilling. Earth, the mid-world and heaven are the triple place of the conscious being’s progressive self-fulfilling, trishadhastha, earth the lower seat, the vital world the middle, heaven the higher. All these are contained in the threefold movement of Vishnu.” The Secret of the Veda

Vishnu ::: “Vishnu the all-pervading, the cosmic Deity, the Lover and Friend of our souls, the Lord of the transcendent existence and the transcendent delight.” The Secret of the Veda

Visistadvaita: (Skr.) "Qualified non-duality", the Vedantic (q.v.) doctrine of qualified monism advocated by Ramanuja (q.v.) which holds the Absolute to be personal, world and individuals to be real and distinct (visista), and salvation attainable only by grace of God earned through bhakti (q.v.). -- K.F.L.

visistadvaita (Vishishtadwaita etc.) ::: Qualified Monism; modified monistic vedanta.

visva janima manus.an.am (puru viçvâ janima manushânam) ::: all the many births of men. [R . g Veda 7.62.1]

Vivarta: (Skr. turning, whirling) The Cyclonic process of manifestation by which the One becomes the (illusory) Many, an essentially Vedantic (q.v.) concept of cosmogonic as well as psychologico-philosophical implications. -- K.F.L.

viveka. ::: wisdom; discrimination between the Real and the unreal, between the Self and the non-Self, between the permanent and the impermanent; right intuitive discrimination; one of the four prerequisites for qualification as a spiritual aspirant of vedanta; the foremost quality required for a fruitful enquiry

vr.ka (vrika) ::: wolf; "tearer"; a type of hostile being in the Veda. vrka

vyasa ::: compiler; [Vyasa: a name given to Krsna Dvaipayana, the compiler of the Vedas and author of the Mahabharata and many other works].

"We now begin to have reason for concluding that the Flame, which is only another aspect of Light, is the Vedic symbol for the Force of the divine consciousness, of the supramental Truth.” The Secret of the Veda

“We now begin to have reason for concluding that the Flame, which is only another aspect of Light, is the Vedic symbol for the Force of the divine consciousness, of the supramental Truth.” The Secret of the Veda

"We speak of the evolution of Life in Matter, the evolution of Mind in Matter; but evolution is a word which merely states the phenomenon without explaining it. For there seems to be no reason why Life should evolve out of material elements or Mind out of living form, unless we accept the Vedantic solution that Life is already involved in Matter and Mind in Life because in essence Matter is a form of veiled Life, Life a form of veiled Consciousness.” The Life Divine

“We speak of the evolution of Life in Matter, the evolution of Mind in Matter; but evolution is a word which merely states the phenomenon without explaining it. For there seems to be no reason why Life should evolve out of material elements or Mind out of living form, unless we accept the Vedantic solution that Life is already involved in Matter and Mind in Life because in essence Matter is a form of veiled Life, Life a form of veiled Consciousness.” The Life Divine

Whatever verbal or ideative logic one may bring to support it, this way of seeing the universe explains nothing ; it only erects a mental formula of the inexplicable. It is only if you approach the Supreme through his double aspect of Sat and Chlt-Sbakri, double but inseparable, that the total truth of things can become manifest to the inner experience. The other side was developed by the Shakta Tantrics. The two together, the Vedantlc and the

*What is meant here is the Divine in its essential manifestation which reveals itself to us as Light and Consciousness, Power, Love and Beauty. But in its actual cosmic manifestation the Supreme, being the Infinite and not bound by any limitation, can manifest in itself, in its consciousness of innumerable possibilities, something that seems to be the opposite of itself, something in which there can be Darkness, Inconscience, Inertia, Insensibility, Disharmony and Disintegration. It is this that we see at the basis of the material world and speak of nowadays as the Inconscient—the inconscient Ocean of the Rigveda in which the One was hidden and arose in the form of this Universe,— or, as it is sometimes called, the non-being, Asat. The Ignorance which is the characteristic of our mind and life is the result of this origin in the Inconscience. Moreover, in the evolution out of inconscient existence there rise up naturally powers and beings which are interested in the maintenance of all negations of the Divine, error and unconsciousness, pain, suffering, obscurity, death, weakness, illness, disharmony, evil. Hence the perversion of the manifestation here, its inability to reveal the true essence of the Divine. Yet in the very base of this evolution all that is divine is there involved and pressing to evolve, Light, Consciousness, Power, Perfection, Beauty, Love. For in the Inconscient itself and behind the perversions of the Ignorance Divine Consciousness lies concealed and works and must more and more appear, throwing off in the end its disguises. That is why it is said that the world is called to express the Divine.

Ya evam veda: (Skr.) "He who knows this", a common Upanishadic (q.v.) refrain suggesting compensation of some nature for one conversant with philosophic truth. -- K.F.L.

Yajur Veda: One of the four Vedas, highly ritualistic in character.

yajur-veda ::: n. --> See Veda.

yajurveda. ::: the second of the four

Yama ::: 1. Controller, Ordainer, Lord of the Law; in the Rg-veda he seems to have been originally a form of the Sun, then one of the twin children of the wide-shining Lord of the Truth; he is the guardian of the dharma, the law of the Truth, which is a condition of immortality, and therefore himself the guardian of immortality; in the later ideas [post-Vedic] he is the God of Death. ::: 2. yama [in raja-yoga]: a rule of moral self-control.

Yama and Yami: In the Vedas, twin brother and sister who are the parents of the human race.

yata ::: assail the raks.as powers. [R . g Veda 5.42.10]. aso ni yata



QUOTES [58 / 58 - 169 / 169]


KEYS (10k)

   24 Sri Aurobindo
   13 Rig Veda
   5 Swami Vivekananda
   2 Sri Aurobindo
   2 Sri Ramana Maharshi
   2 Sri Ramakrishna
   1 Swami Vivehananda
   1 Swami Veda Bharati
   1 Swami Sivananda Saraswati
   1 SWAMI ABHEDANANDA
   1 Sri Ramana Maharshi
   1 Sankara
   1 Rupert Spira
   1 From "The Shveteshvatara Upanishad
   1 Friedrich Nietzsche
   1 A C Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada

NEW FULL DB (2.4M)

   33 Luis Sep lveda
   24 Alveda King
   15 A C Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhup da
   14 A C Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada
   13 Rig Veda
   12 Swami Vivekananda
   9 Sri Aurobindo
   4 Anonymous
   2 Wendy Doniger
   2 Om Swami
   2 Mehmet Murat ildan
   2 J Robert Oppenheimer
   2 Devdutt Pattanaik

1:if it is granted to me. ~ Swami Veda Bharati,
2:I purify earth and heaven by the Truth. ~ Rig Veda,
3:Whence come these beings? What is this creation? ~ Rig Veda,
4:Who knoweth these things? Who can speak of them? ~ Rig Veda,
5:The Being that is one, sages speak of in many terms. ~ Rig Veda,
6:O seeing Flame, thou carriest man of the crooked ways into the abiding truth and the knowledge. ~ Rig Veda,
7:Whence come these beings? What is this creation? ~ Rig Veda, the Eternal Wisdom
8:Who knoweth these things? Who can speak of them? ~ Rig Veda, the Eternal Wisdom
9:The Being that is one, sages speak of in many terms. ~ Rig Veda, the Eternal Wisdom
10:Limitation is mortality. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, The Doctrine of the Mystics,
11:The Ancestors fashioned the gods as a workman fashions iron. ~ Rig Veda, the Eternal Wisdom
12:Mortal delight has its mortal danger. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, The Guardians of the Light,
13:Limited and divided being is ignorance. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, The Doctrine of the Mystics,
14:By Truth is the progress towards the Truth. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, The Ashwins, Lords of Bliss,
15:The gods have been created by Him, but of Him who knows the manner of His being? ~ Rig Veda, the Eternal Wisdom
16:Falsehood is merely a wrong placing of the Truth. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, The Victory of the Fathers,
17:All our existence is a constant creation. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, Surya Savitri, Creator and Increaser,
18:Truth is followed as the path to the divine beatitude. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, To Bhaga Savitri, the Enjoyer,
19:They also are triple, tisraáž„ páč›thivÄ«áž„, the three earths. And of all these worlds Surya Savitri is the creator.
~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda,
20:All world is expression or manifestation, creation by the Word. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, Brihaspati, Power of the Soul,
21:It is not today nor tomorrow; who knoweth That which is Supreme? When It is approached, It vanishes. ~ Rig Veda, the Eternal Wisdom
22:When that is removed, sight replaces mental thought, the all-embracing truth-ideation mahas, veda, dáč›áčŁáč­i, replaces the fragmentary mental activity. ~ Sri Aurobindo,
23:That which refuses to give itself, is still the food of the cosmic Powers ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, Agni, the Illumined Will,
24:Self-fulfilment by self-immolation, to grow by giving is the universal law. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, Agni, the Illumined Will,
25:Force and Love united and both illumined by Knowledge fulfil God in the world. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, Agni, the Illumined Will,
26:Love illuminated fulfils the harmony which is the goal of the divine movement. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, Agni, the Illumined Will,
27:Restore to heaven and earth that which thou owest unto them...But of this dead man there is a portion that is immortal. ~ Rig Veda, the Eternal Wisdom
28:Extended within the Infinite,...headless and footless, concealing his two ends. - Rig Veda
   ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine, The Boundaries of the Ignorance,
29:Equality of soul created by the surrender to the universal Wisdom gives us a supreme peace and calm. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, Agni, the Illumined Will,
30:Nothing has to be rejected, all has to be raised to the pure levels of the divine consciousness. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, Indra and the Thought-Forces,
31:All things have their justifiable cause of being, their good use and their right enjoyment. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, Surya Savitri, Creator and Increaser,
32:A Veda-knower of the unwritten book
Perusing the mystic scripture of her forms,
He had caught her hierophant significances, ~ Sri Aurobindo, Savitri, Satyavan,
33:Surya Savitri, who is Bhaga, stands between the Infinite and the created worlds within us and without. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, Selected Hymns, To Bhaga Savitri - the Enjoyer,
34:Once the Ananda, the divine delight in all things is attained, it sets right all the distortions, all the evil of the world. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, To Bhaga Savitri, the Enjoyer,
35:Man cannot seize or hold at once all that the illumination brings to him; it has to be repeated constantly so that he may grow in the light. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, The Ashwins, Lords of Bliss,
36:Whence this creation came into being, whether He established it or did not establish it, He who regards it from above in the supreme ether, He knows,-or perhaps He knows it not. ~ Rig Veda, the Eternal Wisdom
37:The source of all error is misapplication, wrong placing of truth, wrong arrangement, wrong relation, wrong positing in time and place, object and order. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, To Bhaga Savitri, the Enjoyer,
38:Heaven is my father and begot me; I have for my family all this heavenly circle. My mother is the boundless earth. But I-know not to what all this mysterious universe is like, my eyes are troubled and I move as if enchained in my own thought. ~ Rig Veda, the Eternal Wisdom
39:In the same Upanishad, Agni is invoked for purely moral functions as the purifier from sin, the leader of the soul by the good path to the divine Bliss, and he seems to be identified with the power of the will and responsible for human actions
   ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret Of The Veda, [7],
40:The Master of Wisdom in his first coming to birth in the supreme ether of the great Light, - many his births, seven his mouths of the Word, seven his Rays, - scatters the darknesses with his cry. Rig Veda.3 ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine, Out of the Sevenfold Ignorance towards the Sevenfold Knowledge,
41:368. The Vedanta is God's lamp to lead thee out of this night of bondage and egoism; but when the light of Veda has dawned in thy soul, then even that divine lamp thou needest not, for now thou canst walk freely and surely in a high and eternal sunlight.
   ~ Sri Aurobindo, Essays Divine And Human, Karma, [T8],
42:Because it carries this creative force of the divine Idea, the Sun, the lord and symbol of the gnosis, is described in the Veda as the Light which is the father of all things, Surya Savitri, the Wisdom-Luminous who is the bringer-out into manifest existence. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, Vijnana or Gnosis,
43:...the conception of a Truth-consciousness supramental and divine, the invocation of the gods as powers of the Truth to raise man out of the falsehoods of the mortal mind, the attainment in and by this Truth of an immortal state of perfect good and felicity and the inner sacrifice and offering of what one has and is by the mortal to the Immortal as the means of the divine consummation.
   ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret Of The Veda, [68],
44:Agni is the power of conscious Being, called by us will, effective behind the workings of mind and body. Agni is the strong God within (maryah, the strong, the masculine) who puts out his strength against all assailing powers, who forbids inertia, who repels every failing of heart and force, who spurns out all lack of manhood. Agni actualises what otherwise remain as an ineffectual thought or aspiration.
   ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret Of The Veda,
45:Threefold are those supreme births of this divine force that is in the world, they are true, they are desirable; he moves there wide-overt within the Infinite and shines pure, luminous and fulfilling. . . . That which is immortal in mortals and possessed of the truth, is a god and established inwardly as an energy working out in our divine powers. . . . Become high-uplifted, O Strength, pierce all veils, manifest in us the things of the Godhead. Vamadeva - Rig Veda.2 ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine,
46:She follows to the goal of those that are passing on beyond, she is the first in the eternal succession of the dawns that are coming, - Usha widens bringing out that which lives, awakening someone who was dead. . . . What is her scope when she harmonises with the dawns that shone out before and those that now must shine? She desires the ancient mornings and fulfils their light; projecting forwards her illumination she enters into communion with the rest that are to come.
   ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine, [Kutsu Angirasa - Rig Veda I. 113. 8, 10,
47:We have in this figure of various psychological levels, each considered as a world in itself, a key to the conceptions of the Vedic Rishis.
And it is the causal Truth, represented in the person of Surya Savitri, that is the creator of all its forms. For it is the causal Idea in the infinite being,—the idea, not abstract, but real and dynamic,—that originates the law, the energies, the formations of things and the working out of their potentialities in determined forms by determined processes. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, Selected Hymns, Surya Savitri - Creator and Increaser,
48:They climb Indra like a ladder. As one mounts peak after peak, there becomes clear the much that has still to be done. Indra brings consciousness of That as the goal.

Like a hawk, a kite He settles on the Vessel and upbears it; in His stream of movement He discovers the Rays, for He goes bearing his weapons: He cleaves to the ocean surge of the waters; a great King, He declares the fourth status. Like a mortal purifying his body, like a war-horse galloping to the conquest of riches He pours calling through all the sheath and enters these vessels. Rig Veda.2 ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 1.26,
49:As Saraswati represents the truth-audition, sruti, which gives the inspired word, so Ila represents dr.s.t.i, the truthvision. If so, since dr.s.t.i and sruti are the two powers of the Rishi, the Kavi, the Seer of the Truth, we can understand the close connection of Ila and Saraswati. Bharati or Mahi is the largeness of the Truth-consciousness which, dawning on man's limited mind, brings with it the two sister Puissances. We can also understand how these fine and living distinctions came afterwards to be neglected as the Vedic knowledge declined and Bharati, Saraswati, Ila melted into one. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret Of The Veda, 1.09 - Saraswati and Her Consorts,
50:Visitor. I am taught that Mantra Japam is very potent in practice.
Bhagavan. The Self is the greatest of all mantras and goes on automatically and eternally. If you are not aware of this internal mantra, you should take to do it consciously as japam, which is attended with effort, to ward off all other thoughts.

By constant attention to it, you will eventually become aware of the internal mantra, which is the state of Realisation and is effortless. Firmness in this awareness will keep you continually and effortlessly in the current, however much you may be engaged on other activities.
Listening to Veda chanting and mantras has the same result as conscious repetitions of japam - its rhythm is the japam. ~ Sri Ramana Maharshi,
51:the central notion of the Veda :::
   The sense of the first two verses is clear enough when we know Saraswati to be that power of the Truth which we call inspiration. Inspiration from the Truth purifies by getting rid of all falsehood, for all sin according to the Indian idea is merely falsehood, wrongly inspired emotion, wrongly directed will and action. The central idea of life and ourselves from which we start is a falsehood and all else is falsified by it. Truth comes to us as a light, a voice, compelling a change of thought, imposing a new discernment of ourselves and all around us. Truth of thought creates truth of vision and truth of vision forms in us truth of being, and out of truth of being (satyam) flows naturally truth of emotion, will and action. This is indeed the central notion of the Veda.
   ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret Of The Veda,
52:He found the vast Thought with seven heads that is born of the Truth; he created some fourth world and became universal. . . .
The Sons of Heaven, the Heroes of the Omnipotent, thinking the straight thought, giving voice to the Truth, founded the plane of illumination and conceived the first abode of the Sacrifice. . . . The Master of Wisdom cast down the stone defences and called to the Herds of Light, . . . the herds that stand in the secrecy on the bridge over the Falsehood between two worlds below and one above; desiring Light in the darkness, he brought upward the Ray-Herds and uncovered from the veil the three worlds; he shattered the city that lies hidden in ambush, and cut the three out of the Ocean, and discovered the Dawn and the Sun and the Light and the Word of Light. Rig Veda.2 ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine, Out of the Sevenfold Ignorance towards the Sevenfold Knowledge,
53:If we regard the Powers of the Reality as so many Godheads, we can say that the Overmind releases a million Godheads into action, each empowered to create its own world, each world capable of relation, communication and interplay with the others.
There are in the Veda different formulations of the nature of the Gods: it is said they are all one Existence to which the sages give different names; yet each God is worshipped as if he by himself is that Existence, one who is all the other Gods together or contains them in his being; and yet again each is a separate Deity acting sometimes in unison with companion deities, sometimes separately, sometimes even in apparent opposition to other Godheads of the same Existence. In the Supermind all this would be held together as a harmonised play of the one Existence; in the Overmind each of these three conditions could be a separate action or basis of action and have its own principle of development and consequences and yet each keep the power to combine with the others in a more composite harmony. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine, Supermind Mind and the Overmind Maya,
54:[the first aid, shastra, the lotus of the eternal knowledge:]
   The supreme Shastra of the Integral Yoga is the eternal Veda secret in the heart of every thinking and living being. The lotus of the eternal knowledge and the eternal perfection is a bud closed and folded up within us. It opens swiftly or gradually, petal by petal, through successive realisations, once the mind of man begins to turn towards the Eternal, once his heart, no longer compressed and confined by attachment to finite appearances, becomes enamoured, in whatever degree, of the Infinite. All life, all thought, all energising of the faculties, all experiences passive or active, become thenceforward so many shocks which disintegrate the teguments of the soul and remove the obstacles to the inevitable efflorescence. He who chooses the Infinite has been chosen by the Infinite. He has received the divine touch without which there is no awakening, no opening of the spirit; but once it is received, attainment is sure, whether conquered swiftly in the course of one human life or pursued patiently through many stadia of the cycle of existence in the manifested universe.
   Nothing can be taught to the mind which is not already concealed as potential knowledge in the unfolding soul of the creature. So also all perfection of which the outer man is capable, is only a realising of the eternal perfection of the Spirit within him. We know the Divine and become the Divine, because we are That already in our secret nature. All teaching is a revealing, all becoming is an unfolding. Self-attainment is the secret; self-knowledge and an increasing consciousness are the means and the process.
   ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis Of Yoga, The Four Aids [53] [T1],
55:But usually the representative influence occupies a much larger place in the life of the sadhaka. If the Yoga is guided by a received written Shastra, - some Word from the past which embodies the experience of former Yogins, - it may be practised either by personal effort alone or with the aid of a Guru. The spiritual knowledge is then gained through meditation on the truths that are taught and it is made living and conscious by their realisation in the personal experience; the Yoga proceeds by the results of prescribed methods taught in a Scripture or a tradition and reinforced and illumined by the instructions of the Master. This is a narrower practice, but safe and effective within its limits, because it follows a well-beaten track to a long familiar goal.

For the sadhaka of the integral Yoga it is necessary to remember that no written Shastra, however great its authority or however large its spirit, can be more than a partial expression of the eternal Knowledge. He will use, but never bind himself even by the greatest Scripture. Where the Scripture is profound, wide, catholic, it may exercise upon him an influence for the highest good and of incalculable importance. It may be associated in his experience with his awakening to crowning verities and his realisation of the highest experiences. His Yoga may be governed for a long time by one Scripture or by several successively, - if it is in the line of the great Hindu tradition, by the Gita, for example, the Upanishads, the Veda. Or it may be a good part of his development to include in its material a richly varied experience of the truths of many Scriptures and make the future opulent with all that is best in the past. But in the end he must take his station, or better still, if he can, always and from the beginning he must live in his own soul beyond the limitations of the word that he uses. The Gita itself thus declares that the Yogin in his progress must pass beyond the written Truth, - sabdabrahmativartate - beyond all that he has heard and all that he has yet to hear, - srotavyasya srutasya ca. For he is not the sadhaka of a book or of many books; he is a sadhaka of the Infinite. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis Of Yoga, The Four Aids,
56:Who could have thought that this tanned young man with gentle, dreamy eyes, long wavy hair parted in the middle and falling to the neck, clad in a common coarse Ahmedabad dhoti, a close-fitting Indian jacket, and old-fashioned slippers with upturned toes, and whose face was slightly marked with smallpox, was no other than Mister Aurobindo Ghose, living treasure of French, Latin and Greek?" Actually, Sri Aurobindo was not yet through with books; the Western momentum was still there; he devoured books ordered from Bombay and Calcutta by the case. "Aurobindo would sit at his desk," his Bengali teacher continues, "and read by the light of an oil lamp till one in the morning, oblivious of the intolerable mosquito bites. I would see him seated there in the same posture for hours on end, his eyes fixed on his book, like a yogi lost in the contemplation of the Divine, unaware of all that went on around him. Even if the house had caught fire, it would not have broken this concentration." He read English, Russian, German, and French novels, but also, in ever larger numbers, the sacred books of India, the Upanishads, the Bhagavad Gita, the Ramayana, although he had never been in a temple except as an observer. "Once, having returned from the College," one of his friends recalls, "Sri Aurobindo sat down, picked up a book at random and started to read, while Z and some friends began a noisy game of chess. After half an hour, he put the book down and took a cup of tea. We had already seen him do this many times and were waiting eagerly for a chance to verify whether he read the books from cover to cover or only scanned a few pages here and there. Soon the test began. Z opened the book, read a line aloud and asked Sri Aurobindo to recite what followed. Sri Aurobindo concentrated for a moment, and then repeated the entire page without a single mistake. If he could read a hundred pages in half an hour, no wonder he could go through a case of books in such an incredibly short time." But Sri Aurobindo did not stop at the translations of the sacred texts; he began to study Sanskrit, which, typically, he learned by himself. When a subject was known to be difficult or impossible, he would refuse to take anyone's word for it, whether he were a grammarian, pandit, or clergyman, and would insist upon trying it himself. The method seemed to have some merit, for not only did he learn Sanskrit, but a few years later he discovered the lost meaning of the Veda. ~ Satprem, Sri Aurobindo Or The Adventure of Consciousness,
57:Vijnana, true ideation, called ritam, truth or vedas, knowledge in the Vedas, acts in human mind by four separate functions; revelation, termed drishti, sight; inspiration termed sruti,hearing; and the two faculties of discernment, smriti, memory,which are intuition, termed ketu, and discrimination, termed daksha, division, or viveka, separation. By drishti we see ourselves the truth face to face, in its own form, nature or self-existence; by sruti we hear the name, sound or word by which the truth is expressed & immediately suggested to the knowledge; by ketu we distinguish a truth presented to us behind a veil whether of result or process, as Newton discovered the law of gravitation hidden behind the fall of the apple; by viveka we distinguish between various truths and are able to put them in their right place, order and relation to each other, or, if presented with mingled truth & error, separate the truth from the falsehood. Agni Jatavedas is termed in the Veda vivichi, he who has the viveka, who separates truth from falsehood; but this is only a special action of the fourth ideal faculty & in its wider scope, it is daksha, that which divides & rightly distributes truth in its multiform aspects. The ensemble of the four faculties is Vedas or divine knowledge. When man is rising out of the limited & error-besieged mental principle, the faculty most useful to him, most indispensable is daksha or viveka. Drishti of Vijnana transmuted into terms of mind has become observation, sruti appears as imagination, intuition as intelligent perception, viveka as reasoning & intellectual judgment and all of these are liable to the constant touch of error. Human buddhi, intellect, is a distorted shadow of the true ideative faculties. As we return from these shadows to their ideal substance viveka or daksha must be our constant companion; for viveka alone can get rid of the habit of mental error, prevent observation being replaced by false illumination, imagination by false inspiration, intelligence by false intuition, judgment & reason by false discernment. The first sign of human advance out of the anritam of mind to the ritam of the ideal faculty is the growing action of a luminous right discernment which fixes instantly on the truth, feels instantly the presence of error. The fullness, the manhana of this viveka is the foundation & safeguard of Ritam or Vedas. The first great movement of Agni Jatavedas is to transform by the divine will in mental activity his lower smoke-covered activity into the bright clearness & fullness of the ideal discernment. Agne adbhuta kratw a dakshasya manhana.
   ~ Sri Aurobindo, Hymns To The Mystic Fire, 717,
58:64 Arts
   1. Geet vidya: art of singing.
   2. Vadya vidya: art of playing on musical instruments.
   3. Nritya vidya: art of dancing.
   4. Natya vidya: art of theatricals.
   5. Alekhya vidya: art of painting.
   6. Viseshakacchedya vidya: art of painting the face and body with color
   7. Tandula­kusuma­bali­vikara: art of preparing offerings from rice and flowers.
   8. Pushpastarana: art of making a covering of flowers for a bed.
   9. Dasana­vasananga­raga: art of applying preparations for cleansing the teeth, cloths and painting the body.
   10. Mani­bhumika­karma: art of making the groundwork of jewels.
   11. Aayya­racana: art of covering the bed.
   12. Udaka­vadya: art of playing on music in water.
   13. Udaka­ghata: art of splashing with water.
   14. Citra­yoga: art of practically applying an admixture of colors.
   15. Malya­grathana­vikalpa: art of designing a preparation of wreaths.
   16. Sekharapida­yojana: art of practically setting the coronet on the head.
   17. Nepathya­yoga: art of practically dressing in the tiring room.
   18. Karnapatra­bhanga: art of decorating the tragus of the ear.
   19. Sugandha­yukti: art of practical application of aromatics.
   20. Bhushana­yojana: art of applying or setting ornaments.
   21. Aindra­jala: art of juggling.
   22. Kaucumara: a kind of art.
   23. Hasta­laghava: art of sleight of hand.
   24. Citra­sakapupa­bhakshya­vikara­kriya: art of preparing varieties of delicious food.
   25. Panaka­rasa­ragasava­yojana: art of practically preparing palatable drinks and tinging draughts with red color.
   26. Suci­vaya­karma: art of needleworks and weaving.
   27. Sutra­krida: art of playing with thread.
   28. Vina­damuraka­vadya: art of playing on lute and small drum.
   29. Prahelika: art of making and solving riddles.
   30. Durvacaka­yoga: art of practicing language difficult to be answered by others.
   31. Pustaka­vacana: art of reciting books.
   32. Natikakhyayika­darsana: art of enacting short plays and anecdotes.
   33. Kavya­samasya­purana: art of solving enigmatic verses.
   34. Pattika­vetra­bana­vikalpa: art of designing preparation of shield, cane and arrows.
   35. Tarku­karma: art of spinning by spindle.
   36. Takshana: art of carpentry.
   37. Vastu­vidya: art of engineering.
   38. Raupya­ratna­pariksha: art of testing silver and jewels.
   39. Dhatu­vada: art of metallurgy.
   40. Mani­raga jnana: art of tinging jewels.
   41. Akara jnana: art of mineralogy.
   42. Vrikshayur­veda­yoga: art of practicing medicine or medical treatment, by herbs.
   43. Mesha­kukkuta­lavaka­yuddha­vidhi: art of knowing the mode of fighting of lambs, cocks and birds.
   44. Suka­sarika­pralapana: art of maintaining or knowing conversation between male and female cockatoos.
   45. Utsadana: art of healing or cleaning a person with perfumes.
   46. Kesa­marjana­kausala: art of combing hair.
   47. Akshara­mushtika­kathana: art of talking with fingers.
   48. Dharana­matrika: art of the use of amulets.
   49. Desa­bhasha­jnana: art of knowing provincial dialects.
   50. Nirmiti­jnana: art of knowing prediction by heavenly voice.
   51. Yantra­matrika: art of mechanics.
   52. Mlecchita­kutarka­vikalpa: art of fabricating barbarous or foreign sophistry.
   53. Samvacya: art of conversation.
   54. Manasi kavya­kriya: art of composing verse
   55. Kriya­vikalpa: art of designing a literary work or a medical remedy.
   56. Chalitaka­yoga: art of practicing as a builder of shrines called after him.
   57. Abhidhana­kosha­cchando­jnana: art of the use of lexicography and meters.
   58. Vastra­gopana: art of concealment of cloths.
   59. Dyuta­visesha: art of knowing specific gambling.
   60. Akarsha­krida: art of playing with dice or magnet.
   61. Balaka­kridanaka: art of using children's toys.
   62. Vainayiki vidya: art of enforcing discipline.
   63. Vaijayiki vidya: art of gaining victory.
   64. Vaitaliki vidya: art of awakening master with music at dawn.
   ~ Nik Douglas and Penny Slinger, Sexual Secrets,

*** WISDOM TROVE ***

1:A verse from the Veda says, &
2:The language of the Veda itself is sruti, a rhythm not composed by the intellect but heard, a divine Word that same vibrating out of the Infinite to the inner audience of the man who had previously made himself fit fot the impersonal knowledge. ~ sri-aurobindo, @wisdomtrove
3:I shall no longer be instructed by the Yoga Veda or the Aharva Veda, or the ascetics, or any other doctrine whatsoever. I shall learn from myself, be a pupil of myself; I shall get to know myself, the mystery of Siddhartha. He looked around as if he were seeing the world for the first time. ~ hermann-hesse, @wisdomtrove
4:All fanaticism is false, because it is a contradiction of the very nature of God and of Truth. Truth cannot be shut up in a single book, Bible or Veda or Koran, or in a single religion. The Divine Being is eternal and universal and infinite and cannot be the sole property of the Mussulmans or of the Semitic religions only, - those that happened to be in a line from the Bible and to have Jewish or Arabian prophets for their founders. ~ sri-aurobindo, @wisdomtrove

*** NEWFULLDB 2.4M ***

1:I purify earth and heaven by the Truth. ~ Rig Veda,
2:Whence come these beings? What is this creation? ~ Rig Veda,
3:Who knoweth these things? Who can speak of them? ~ Rig Veda,
4:Whence come these beings? What is this creation? ~ Rig Veda,
5:Who knoweth these things? Who can speak of them? ~ Rig Veda,
6:The Being that is one, sages speak of in many terms. ~ Rig Veda,
7:The Being that is one, sages speak of in many terms. ~ Rig Veda,
8:the Veda for the priests, the Vedanta for the sages. ~ Sri Aurobindo,
9:The Ancestors fashioned the gods as a workman fashions iron. ~ Rig Veda,
10:According to the Veda, before all things came desire. ~ Devdutt Pattanaik,
11:Women were forbidden to study the most ancient sacred text, the Veda, ~ Wendy Doniger,
12:Women were forbidden to study the most ancient sacred text, the Veda. ~ Wendy Doniger,
13:Bence ne kadar ileri gidebileceğini bilmeden bu yaƟama veda etmemelisin. ~ Paulo Coelho,
14:The gods have been created by Him, but of Him who knows the manner of His being? ~ Rig Veda,
15:Limitation is mortality. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, The Doctrine of the Mystics,
16:When there is harmony between the mind, heart and resolve then nothing is impossible. ~ Rig Veda,
17:or as Sayana interprets it, "by sacrifice lasting for a year". ~ Sri AurobindoThe Secret of the Veda,
18:Disconcerting as it is to pious Hindus, the Rig Veda has its heartland in Pakistan. From ~ Alice Albinia,
19:Mortal delight has its mortal danger. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, The Guardians of the Light,
20:O seeing Flame, thou carriest man of the crooked ways into the abiding truth and the knowledge. ~ Rig Veda,
21:Limited and divided being is ignorance. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, The Doctrine of the Mystics,
22:The Sama Veda of India contains the world’s earliest writings on musical science. The ~ Paramahansa Yogananda,
23:It is not today nor tomorrow; who knoweth That which is Supreme? When It is approached, It vanishes. ~ Rig Veda,
24:By Truth is the progress towards the Truth. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, The Ashwins, Lords of Bliss,
25:Falsehood is merely a wrong placing of the Truth. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, The Victory of the Fathers,
26:All our existence is a constant creation. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, Surya Savitri, Creator and Increaser,
27:India's openness to new ideas is manifest in the Rig Veda: Let noble thoughts come to us from all sides. ~ Narendra Modi,
28:Forgiveness is Truth itself. It is Righteousness, it is the Veda. It is the supreme virtue in this world. ~ Sathya Sai Baba,
29:Stelle, nascondete i vostri fuochi; Che la luce non veda i miei oscuri e profondi desideri. Shakespeare, Macbeth ~ Anonymous,
30:Truth is followed as the path to the divine beatitude. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, To Bhaga Savitri, the Enjoyer,
31:Restore to heaven and earth that which thou owest unto them...But of this dead man there is a portion that is immortal. ~ Rig Veda,
32:In fact, in the Rig Veda there is one hymn that is an invocation of Vāc, speech itself. Here are two of its verses: ~ Nicholas Ostler,
33:All world is expression or manifestation, creation by the Word. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, Brihaspati, Power of the Soul,
34:That which refuses to give itself, is still the food of the cosmic Powers ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, Agni, the Illumined Will,
35:Self-fulfilment by self-immolation, to grow by giving is the universal law. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, Agni, the Illumined Will,
36:Do you wake up in the morning and first thing, centre yourself by looking at your palms together? Thereby have a nice day. ~ Swami Veda Bharati,
37:I am Sama Veda among the Vedas; I am Indra among the Devas; I am the mind among the senses; I am the consciousness in living beings. ~ Anonymous,
38:Force and Love united and both illumined by Knowledge fulfil God in the world. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, Agni, the Illumined Will,
39:Love illuminated fulfils the harmony which is the goal of the divine movement. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, Agni, the Illumined Will,
40:What are you talking about?’ Cora said. Veda had a sudden image of her standing over a small child with her hands on her hips and a scowl. ~ Jessica Lave,
41:Amidst all your cries and laughter let your mind take a moment off, and go still. Look at this moment, this moment alone, and go still. ~ Swami Veda Bharati,
42:She was speaking in tongues?"
"What da f**k else she gonna speak with?" Veda rolled her eyes. I saw no reason to explai, so I let her go on. ~ Sierra Dean,
43:The Atharvaveda and the Itihasa-Veda are also Vedas. ~ Kautilya's Arthasastra,, quoted in S. Talageri, The Aryan Invasion Theory and Indian Nationalism (1993),
44:Extended within the Infinite,...headless and footless, concealing his two ends. - Rig Veda
   ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine, The Boundaries of the Ignorance,
45:Two things are easiest to do. One, to carry water in a sieve. Two, to still the mind. Freeze water. Breathe calm. Only two secrets to learn. ~ Swami Veda Bharati,
46:A Veda-knower of the unwritten book
Perusing the mystic scripture of her forms,
He had caught her hierophant significances, ~ Sri Aurobindo, Savitri, Satyavan,
47:Equality of soul created by the surrender to the universal Wisdom gives us a supreme peace and calm. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, Agni, the Illumined Will,
48:Nothing has to be rejected, all has to be raised to the pure levels of the divine consciousness. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, Indra and the Thought-Forces,
49:All things have their justifiable cause of being, their good use and their right enjoyment. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, Surya Savitri, Creator and Increaser,
50:Bir bebekten bir katil yaratan karanlığı sorgulamadan
hiçbir Ɵey yapılamaz kardeƟlerim
” Rakel Dink.
23 Ocak 2007, Hrant Dink‘e Veda KonuƟması’ndan
 ~ Emrah Serbes,
51:She has something in her that I thought I had, and now I find I haven’t. Pride, or whatever it is. Nothing on earth could make Veda do what I’m going to do. ~ James M Cain,
52:Vedalar sizi kederlendirmesin.
Tekrar buluƟabilmeniz için bir veda gereklidir.
Ve arkadaƟ olanlar, dakikalar veya ömĂŒrler sonra, mutlaka tekrar buluƟur. ~ Richard Bach,
53:There was something unnatural, a little unhealthy, about the way she inhaled Veda's smell as she dedicated the rest of her life to this child who had been spared. ~ James M Cain,
54:Whence this creation came into being, whether He established it or did not establish it, He who regards it from above in the supreme ether, He knows,—or perhaps He knows it not. ~ Rig Veda,
55:A verse from the Veda says, 'What you see, you become.' In other words, just the experience of perceiving the world makes you what you are. This is a quite literal statement. ~ Deepak Chopra,
56:These chants relieved vedana, the yearning of the restless human soul, hence became collectively known as the Veda. Those who heard them first came to be known as the Rishis. ~ Devdutt Pattanaik,
57:Once the Ananda, the divine delight in all things is attained, it sets right all the distortions, all the evil of the world. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, To Bhaga Savitri, the Enjoyer,
58:Our Master was a man of direct perception. He saw everything; He knew everything. His words are the words of the Veda. What will you do if you do not believe in His words? ~ Holy Mother Sri Sarada Devi,
59:[Veda:] 'Sure. Let me put these [books] back and we can go.'
Cora looked at the number of volumes on the table and sat back. ‘I should have brought my iPod,’ she said, folding her arms. ~ Jessica Lave,
60:The Rig Veda defines yoga as a union or "yoking" of the material and spiritual worlds, and it doesn't describe any physical postures other than the traditional cross-legged meditation pose. ~ Deepak Chopra,
61:You may ask, “Who wrote the Vedas?” They were not written. The words are the Vedas. A word is Veda, if I can pronounce it rightly. Then it will immediately produce the [desired] effect. ~ Swami Vivekananda,
62:Man cannot seize or hold at once all that the illumination brings to him; it has to be repeated constantly so that he may grow in the light. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, The Ashwins, Lords of Bliss,
63:burada beraberiz ve bir gĂŒn, er ya da geç, birbirimze veda etmek zorunda kalacağız. doğru dĂŒzgĂŒn tanÄ±ĆŸmasak ve her konuda anlaƟmamÄ±ĆŸ olsak da hayatın esrarengiz bir cilvesi sonucunda burada beraberiz. ~ Paulo Coelho,
64:Gece, tam onun Atlantik'te numara yaptığı sıralarda, kendisini telefona çağırmak, rahatsız ettiğim için af diledikten sonra, kısaca veda ederek, mikrofon baĆŸÄ±nda kafama bir kurƟun sıkmak, ne gĂŒzel olurdu! ~ Anonymous,
65:[Cora:]‘Michael—that guy from the restaurant the other night—he works over there. He runs the prehistoric department.’
‘I’m surprised,’ Veda said.
‘At what?’
‘That you’re dating someone who reads. ~ Jessica Lave,
66:In Sanskrit this ardent, one-pointed, self-transcending passion is called tapas, and the Vedas revere it as an unsurpassable creative force. From the tapas of God, the Rig Veda says, the cosmos itself was born. ~ Anonymous,
67:To find what the Rig Veda describes in a hymn to the funeral pyre: ‘Carry him, O Fire, in your arms gently. Carry him where the fathers live, where there is no more sorrow, where there is no more death.’15 ~ Hindol Sengupta,
68:The source of all error is misapplication, wrong placing of truth, wrong arrangement, wrong relation, wrong positing in time and place, object and order. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret of the Veda, To Bhaga Savitri, the Enjoyer,
69:El carruaje partiĂł inmediatamente, y aprovechando Artagnan la oscuridad que reinaba en la bĂłveda bajo la cual pasaba, se arrojĂł en brazos del prisionero exclamando:
- ÂĄRochefort! ÂżSois vos? ÂĄNo me equivoco...! ~ Alexandre Dumas,
70:Puedo chillar de risa a las dos y cuarto y de tristeza a las dos y dieciocho. Y al revés, por qué no. Supongo que si metes toda la información en una misma bóveda, los llantos y las risas van aprendiendo a hacerse compa ~ Xavier Velasco,
71:Both the Mahabharata and the Ramayana survive in several versions, the earliest of which are at least five hundred years later than the Vedas. Yet their core narratives seem to relate to events from a period prior to all but the Rig Veda. ~ John Keay,
72:Learning from books and teachers is like traveling by carriage, so we are told in the Veda. But, the carriage will serve only while one is on the highroad. He who reaches the end of the highroad will leave the carriage and walk afoot. ~ Johannes Itten,
73:Heaven is my father and begot me; I have for my family all this heavenly circle. My mother is the boundless earth. But I-know not to what all this mysterious universe is like, my eyes are troubled and I move as if enchained in my own thought. ~ Rig Veda,
74:The language of the Veda itself is sruti, a rhythm not composed by the intellect but heard, a divine Word that same vibrating out of the Infinite to the inner audience of the man who had previously made himself fit fot the impersonal knowledge. ~ Sri Aurobindo,
75:VisĆł pirma sakoma, kad kančios veda ĆŸmogĆł ÄŻ tobulybę, o antra, jei ĆŸmonija tikrai iĆĄmoks piliulėmis ir laĆĄais savo kančias lengvinti, tai jo visai uĆŸmirĆĄ religiją ir filosofiją, kuri iki ĆĄiol rasdavo sau ne tik apsigynimą nuo visokiĆł bėdĆł, bet netgi laimę. ~ Anton Chekhov,
76:The Veda says that as long as we do not accept life for what it is, as long as we try to control and change things, there will always be conflict. Conflict ends when we realize that beyond tangible material reality, there is intangible spiritual reality. ~ Devdutt Pattanaik,
77:In the same Upanishad, Agni is invoked for purely moral functions as the purifier from sin, the leader of the soul by the good path to the divine Bliss, and he seems to be identified with the power of the will and responsible for human actions
   ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret Of The Veda, [7],
78:The Master of Wisdom in his first coming to birth in the supreme ether of the great Light, - many his births, seven his mouths of the Word, seven his Rays, - scatters the darknesses with his cry. Rig Veda.3 ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine, Out of the Sevenfold Ignorance towards the Sevenfold Knowledge,
79:Hinduism professes no false certitudes. Its capacity to express wonder at Creation and simultaneously scepticism about the omniscience of the Creator are unique to Hinduism. Both are captured beautifully in this verse from the 3,500-year-old Rig Veda, the Nasadiya Sukta or Creation Hymn: ~ Shashi Tharoor,
80:[Veda:] Twenty years of thinking that vampires and witches and all things supernatural were nothing but a bedtime story: a myth, thought up by ignorant people and told to children to keep them from straying after dark. Now, when it was right in front of her, it still felt like a fairy tale. ~ Jessica Lave,
81:I shall no longer be instructed by the Yoga Veda or the Aharva Veda, or the ascetics, or any other doctrine whatsoever. I shall learn from myself, be a pupil of myself; I shall get to know myself, the mystery of Siddhartha." He looked around as if he were seeing the world for the first time. ~ Hermann Hesse,
82:368. The Vedanta is God's lamp to lead thee out of this night of bondage and egoism; but when the light of Veda has dawned in thy soul, then even that divine lamp thou needest not, for now thou canst walk freely and surely in a high and eternal sunlight.
   ~ Sri Aurobindo, Essays Divine And Human, Karma, [T8],
83:Mildred sat quite still, and when she heard Veda drive off she was consumed by a fury so cold that it almost seemed as though she felt nothing at all. It didn't occur to her that she was acting less like a mother than like a lover who had unexpectedly discovered an act of faithlessness, and avenged it. ~ James M Cain,
84:The translation of the Veda will hereafter tell to a great extent on the fate of India and on the growth of millions of souls in that country. It is the root of their religion, and to show them what the root is, I feel sure, is the only way of uprooting all that has sprung from it during the last 3000 years. ~ Max Muller,
85:[Veda:] 'The media presence and inability of people to keep anything to themselves anymore is working for *us*. He can’t cover his tracks as well as he used to.'
'No, I guess he can’t,' Dax said. 'Maybe we can do something with that.'
'Like what? Tell people to tweet us if they see a demon?' Ted said. ~ Jessica Lave,
86:In the beginning, There was neither existence nor nonexistence, All this world was unmanifest energy 
 The One breathed, without breath, by Its own power Nothing else was there.
 RIG-VEDA In modern terms, this verse tells us that God can only be found in a virtual state, where all energy is stored before creation. ~ Deepak Chopra,
87:Per gyvenimą tave veda tavyje esanti, iĆĄtroĆĄkusi mokymosi, ĆŸaisminga dvasinė bĆ«tybė, kuri ir yra tavo asmenybės esmė. NenusigrÄ™ĆŸk nuo jokios galimos ateities prieĆĄ tai neÄŻsitikinęs, kad iĆĄ jos nėra ko iĆĄmokti. Tu visuomet gali laisvai apsispręsti. Gali persigalvoti ir pasirinkti kitokią ateitÄŻ arba kitokią praeitÄŻ. ~ Richard Bach,
88:The Atharva Veda points out that the quest for awareness, the search for answers, the journey towards self-realization, never ceases: How does the wind not cease to blow?
How does the mind take no repose?
Why do the waters, seeking to reach the truth,
Never at any time cease to flow? —Atharva Veda, X.7.3731 ~ Shashi Tharoor,
89:[ ... ] fa che lo sappia, che veda, che esprima il suo giudizio, se vuole... basta che non lo dica al mondo intero - anche se adesso tu sei il mondo per me, anche se nei tuoi occhi vedo un mondo inorridito e sprezzante. Quel tuo sguardo d'acciaio, Oliver, preferirei morire piuttosto che affrontarlo dopo averti detto tutto. ~ Andr Aciman,
90:The sacred books of Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, and the Veda are the best repositories of the ideas that mattered most to our ancestors, and to ignore them is an act of childish conceit. But it is equally naive to believe that whatever was written down in the past contains an absolute truth that lasts forever. ~ Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi,
91:Orada öylece takılmamın nedeni; kendimce bir çeƟit veda duygusu yaƟamaya çalÄ±ĆŸmamdı. Birçok okuldan, birçok yerden ayrıldım, ayrıldığımı anlayamadım. Bundan nefret ediyorum. AyrılÄ±ĆŸlarım acıklı, hatta kötĂŒ olabilir, ama bir yerden artık ayrılıyorsam bunu anlamak istiyorum. Bunu anlamadığınız zaman kendinizi daha kötĂŒ hissediyorsunuz. ~ J D Salinger,
92:André Pieyre de Mandiargues rompe una nuez:
-AsĂ­ es tu cerebro, Leonora.
-No, el mĂ­o va mucho mĂĄs lejos, perfora la bĂłveda celeste. Poseer un telescopio sin su otra mitad esencial, el microscopio, es un sĂ­mbolo de la mĂĄs negra incomprensiĂłn. La tarea del ojo derecho es ver en telescopio mientras el ojo izquierdo se asoma al microscopio. ~ Elena Poniatowska,
93:[Veda:] History is the best kind of story. We each write our own stories about good versus evil, failure and success, love and hate. It’s all about people and the choices we make. Wars are started; laws are passed; conversations are held. We decide through our actions and the choices we make whether we are the hero or the villain in our chapter of history. ~ Jessica Lave,
94:Then she got up, went to Monty's mirror, and began combing her hair, while little cadenzas absentmindedly cascaded out of her throat, and cold drops cascaded over Mildred's heart. For Veda was stark naked. From the massive, singer's torso, with the Dairy quaking in front, to the slim hips, to the lovely legs, there wasn't so much as a garter to hide a path of skin. ~ James M Cain,
95:Many verses of the holy books, above all the Upanishads of Sama-Veda spoke of this innermost thing. It is written: “Your soul is the whole world.” It says that when a man is asleep, he penetrates his innermost and dwells in Atman. There was wonderful wisdom in these verses; all the knowledge of the sages was told here in enchanting language, pure as honey collected by the bees. ~ Hermann Hesse,
96:I have no ambition. I just have a very loving duty given to me in my spiritual heritage of the Himalayan Masters who have passed down this duty from generation to generation, perhaps for thousands of generations: The world has misery, the world has suffering. Do what you can to reduce the pain. Do what you can to soothe people's minds. Don't just counsel, Mr. Therapist ... console. ~ Swami Veda Bharati,
97:Would you say that any one sacred book is superior to all others in the world? ... I say the New Testament, after that, I should place the Koran, which in its moral teachings, is hardly more than a later edition of the New Testament. Then would follow according to my opinion the Old Testament, the Southern Buddhist Tripitaka, the Tao-te-king of Laotze, the Kings of Confucius, the Veda and the Avesta. ~ Max Muller,
98:Ci sono soltanto quattro punti che bruciano abbastanza da farmi sentire simile alla persona che era una volta: tua madre, tuo padre, Lucie e tu. Voi amate, tremate e bruciate. Non lasciare che sia qualcun altro a dirti chi sei. Tu sei la fiamma che non puĂČ essere estinta. Sei la stella che non si puĂČ smarrire. Sei chi sei sempre stato, e questo basta e avanza. Chiunque ti guardi e veda il buio Ăš cieco ~ Cassandra Clare,
99:When Mildred went to bed her stomach hurt from laughter, her heart ached from happiness. Then she remembered that while Veda had kissed her, that first moment when she had entered the house, she still hadn't kissed Veda. She tiptoed into the room she had hoped Veda would occupy, knelt beside the bed as she had knelt so many times in Glendale, took the lovely creature in her arms and kissed her, hard, on the mouth. ~ James M Cain,
100:As razĂ”es prĂĄticas invocadas contra o aborto legal nĂŁo tĂȘm qualquer peso; quanto Ă s razĂ”es morais, reduzem-se ao velho argumento catĂłlico: o feto possui uma alma a que se veda o paraĂ­so, suprimindo-o antes do baptismo. É de observar que a igreja autoriza, ocasionalmente, a morte de homens feitos: nas guerras ou quando se trata de condenados Ă  morte; reserva, porĂ©m, para o feto, um humanitarismo intransigente. ~ Simone de Beauvoir,
101:- Sí -respondió el profesor sonriendo- la carga es pesada, pero la bóveda es sólida. El sabio arquitecto, autor del universo, la construyó con buenos materiales, y jamås hubieran podido los hombres darle dimensiones tan grandes. ¿Qué son los arcos de los puentes y las bóvedas de las catedrales al lado de esta nave de tres leguas de radio, bajo la cual puede desarrollarse libremente un océano con todas sus tempestades? ~ Jules Verne,
102:...the conception of a Truth-consciousness supramental and divine, the invocation of the gods as powers of the Truth to raise man out of the falsehoods of the mortal mind, the attainment in and by this Truth of an immortal state of perfect good and felicity and the inner sacrifice and offering of what one has and is by the mortal to the Immortal as the means of the divine consummation.
   ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret Of The Veda, [68],
103:Atgal nėra apskritai jokio kelio — nei ÄŻ vilką, nei ÄŻ vaiką. DaiktĆł pradĆŸia neturi nei nekaltumo, nei paprastumo; visa, kas sukurta, net tai, kas iĆĄ paĆŸiĆ«ros paprasčiausia, jau yra kalta, jau yra ÄŻvairu, ÄŻmesta ÄŻ purviną tapsmo srovę ir niekad, niekad negali plaukti prieĆĄ srovę. Kelias ÄŻ nekaltumą, ÄŻ tai, kas nesukurta, ÄŻ Dievą veda ne atgal, o pirmyn, bet ne ÄŻ vilką ar vaiką, o vis toliau ÄŻ kaltę, vis giliau ÄŻ ĆŸmogėjimą. ~ Hermann Hesse,
104:Agni is the power of conscious Being, called by us will, effective behind the workings of mind and body. Agni is the strong God within (maryah, the strong, the masculine) who puts out his strength against all assailing powers, who forbids inertia, who repels every failing of heart and force, who spurns out all lack of manhood. Agni actualises what otherwise remain as an ineffectual thought or aspiration.
   ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret Of The Veda,
105:All fanaticism is false, because it is a contradiction of the very nature of God and of Truth. Truth cannot be shut up in a single book, Bible or Veda or Koran, or in a single religion. The Divine Being is eternal and universal and infinite and cannot be the sole property of the Mussulmans or of the Semitic religions only, - those that happened to be in a line from the Bible and to have Jewish or Arabian prophets for their founders. ~ Sri Aurobindo,
106:Both greed and outrage stem from insecurity; insecurity is the result of a poor understanding of, and a lack of faith in, one’s true nature and the true nature of the world around us. The Veda says that as long as we do not accept life for what it is, as long as we try to control and change things, there will always be conflict. Conflict ends when we realize that beyond tangible material reality, there is intangible spiritual reality. ~ Devdutt Pattanaik,
107:Pandit, you've got it wrong.
There's no creator or creation there,
no gross or fine, no wind or fire,
no sun, moon, earth or water,
no radiant form, no time there,
no word, no flesh, no faith,
no cause and effect, nor any thought
of the Veda. No Hari or Brahma,
no Shiva or Shakti, no pilgrimage
and no rituals. No mother, father
or guru there. Is it two or one?
Kabir says, if you understand now,
you're guru, I'm disciple. ~ Kabir,
108:The true history of the world must always be the history of the few; and as we measure the Himalaya by the height of Mount Everest, we must take the true measure of India from the poets of the Veda, the sages of the Upanishads, the founders of the Vedanta and Sankhya philosophies, and the authors of the oldest law-books, and not from the millions who are born and die in their villages, and who have never for one moment been roused out of their drowsy dream of life. ~ F Max M ller,
109:Veda began it, but when she finished it, or whether she finished it, Mildred never quite knew. Little quivers went through her and they kept going through her the rest of the night, during the supper party, when Veda sat with the white scarf wound around her throat, during the brief half hour, while she undressed Veda, and put the costume away; in the dark, while she lay there alone, trying to sleep, not wanting to sleep.

This was the climax of Mildred's life. ~ James M Cain,
110:Jainas have always taken vegetarianism to the greatest extremes, taking pains to avoid injuring even tiny insects, and this too heavily influenced Hindus. The breakaway groups not only abhorred sacrifice but also rejected the Veda as revelation and disregarded Brahminical teachings and Brahminical claims to divine authority,32 three more crucial points that distinguished them from Hindus, even from those Hindus who were beginning to take up some of the new doctrines and practices. ~ Wendy Doniger,
111:Threefold are those supreme births of this divine force that is in the world, they are true, they are desirable; he moves there wide-overt within the Infinite and shines pure, luminous and fulfilling. . . . That which is immortal in mortals and possessed of the truth, is a god and established inwardly as an energy working out in our divine powers. . . . Become high-uplifted, O Strength, pierce all veils, manifest in us the things of the Godhead. Vamadeva - Rig Veda.2 ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine,
112:Nel mondo ci sono pochissima luce e poco calore per me. Io sono molto distante da tutti voi. Ci sono soltanto quattro punti che bruciano abbastanza da farmi sentire simile alla persona che era una volta: tua madre, tuo padre, Lucie e tu. Voi amate, tremate e bruciate. Non lasciare che sia qualcun altro a dirti chi sei. Tu sei la fiamma che non puĂČ essere estinta. Sei la stella che non si puĂČ smarrire. Sei chi sei sempre stato, e questo basta e avanza. Chiunque ti guardi e veda il buio Ăš cieco. ~ Cassandra Clare,
113:Surround yourself with those who are moving very quickly towards Unity. Be in the presence of those who are running forward. Besides the knowledge the Veda, the greatest thing we can do is be surrounded by those who are living and seeking the highest value of life, Brahmi Chetana. This is why yogic flying with groups is so much greater than flying alone. To live and work with others who are moving and aspiring fast towards Unity consciousness is the great force to help you achieve Unity. ~ Maharishi Mahesh Yogi,
114:Who knows whence this creation had its origin?
He, whether He fashioned it or whether He did not,
He, who surveys it all from the highest heaven,
He knows—or maybe even He does not know.
— Rig Veda, X.129 1
‘Maybe even He does not know!’ I love a faith that raises such a fundamental
question about no less a Supreme Being than the Creator of the Universe
Himself. Maybe He does not know, indeed. Who are we mere mortals to claim a
knowledge of which even He cannot be certain? ~ Shashi Tharoor,
115:the selection panels had thrown away the Veda, the Bible, the Tripitaka, the Qur’an, and all the immense body of literature—fiction and nonfiction—that was based upon them. Despite all the wealth of beauty and wisdom these works contained, they could not be allowed to reinfect virgin planets with the ancient poisons of religious hatred, belief in the supernatural, and the pious gibberish with which countless billions of men and women had once comforted themselves at the cost of addling their minds. ~ Arthur C Clarke,
116:As explained by David Frawley, “Dravidian history does not contradict Vedic history either. It credits the invention of the Tamil language, the oldest Dravidian tongue, to the rishi Agastya, one of the most prominent sages in the Rig Veda. Dravidian kings historically have called themselves Aryans and trace their descent through Manu (who in the Matsya Purana is regarded as originally a south Indian king). Apart from language, moreover, both north and south India share a common religion and culture.” 2 ~ Stephen Knapp,
117:Perché non vuoi che viva con te? Niente cazzate questa volta, Isaac. Voglio la verità"
Il mio cuore quasi si fermĂČ. Non ero sicuro di voler sentire la risposta, ma sembrava che i miei piedi non riuscissero a muoversi.
La voce di Isaac era bassa "Non voglio che veda quanto sono cieco, quanto posso essere un peso. Se vivesse qui, vedrebbe quanto vado avanti a fatica"
"Oh, Isaac" disse Hannah "State insieme da un anno! Ti conosce"
Lui rispose cosĂŹ piano che quasi non lo sentii "Voglio essere normale per lui ~ N R Walker,
118:She tugged the sleeves down over her hands, stretching the fabric until the seams reached her fingernails. Then she locked her fingers around them to ensure they stayed down.
Veda fought the urge to rip those sleeves from Coco’s grip and force her to wear them appropriately, or at the very least roll them up so she wouldn’t be tempted to yank at them. She could remember a time when she’d had the same habit, back in middle school. As if hiding her hands behind a thin piece of fabric would protect her from the world. ~ Trevion Burns,
119:She follows to the goal of those that are passing on beyond, she is the first in the eternal succession of the dawns that are coming, - Usha widens bringing out that which lives, awakening someone who was dead. . . . What is her scope when she harmonises with the dawns that shone out before and those that now must shine? She desires the ancient mornings and fulfils their light; projecting forwards her illumination she enters into communion with the rest that are to come.
   ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine, [Kutsu Angirasa - Rig Veda I. 113. 8, 10,
120:The division created by the English educated scholars who separate the Vedas and the Upanishads from the Puranas and thus make a distinction between the Vedic dharma and the Puranic dharma is a mistake born of ignorance. The Puranas are accepted as an authority on the Hindu dharma because they explain the knowledge contained in the Veda and the Upanishads to the average man, comment upon it, discuss it at great length and endeavour to apply it to the commonplace details of life. ~ Sri Aurobindo, in "Sri Aurobindo Writings in Bengali Translated into English".,
121:Over centuries and in different centers they composed a collection of to28 hymns in their Sanskrit language and as they had no method of writing, of course they learned to sing them by heart. The collection was called the Rig Veda and the Rig Veda was permeated by Sonia. From the hymns it was clear that the Soma was pressed, then mixed with other ordinary potable fluids such as milk but not alcohol, and drunk by the Brahmans and perhaps a few- others, who thereupon passed some hours in what we now call the bliss of an entheogenic experience. ~ R Gordon Wasson,
122:Me paro a contemplar con creciente fascinaciĂłn la catarata que atraviesa rĂĄpida el desfiladero. De salto en salto, forma ahora mil remolinos y luego se derrama en mil torrentes que borbotean lanzando al aire su espuma que cae sobre mĂĄs espuma. Aprovechando esta caĂ­da, se tensa en bĂłveda, magnĂ­fico, el cambiante y permanente arco iris, tan pronto nĂ­tido como difuminado en el aire, que va difundiendo una lluvia fresca y olorosa. Con Ă©l se simboliza el esfuerzo del hombre. Reflexiona sobre este y comprenderĂĄs que en el colorido reflejo de la luz estĂĄ la vida. ~ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe,
123:Per i credenti l’ora della morte Ăš l’ora in cui si vede Dio, non piĂč in modo oscuro, come dentro uno specchio, ma faccia a faccia. Perfino i non credenti credono in qualcosa di simile: che nel momento del trapasso si veda scorrere in un lampo la pellicola della propria vita, finalmente intelligibile. Per i vecchi Romand, questa visione, anzichĂ© rappresentare il pieno coronamento, aveva segnato il trionfo della menzogna e del male. Avrebbero dovuto vedere Dio e al suo posto avevano visto, sotto le sembianze dell’amato figlio, colui che la Bibbia chiama Satana: l’Avversario. ~ Emmanuel Carr re,
124:They climb Indra like a ladder. As one mounts peak after peak, there becomes clear the much that has still to be done. Indra brings consciousness of That as the goal.

Like a hawk, a kite He settles on the Vessel and upbears it; in His stream of movement He discovers the Rays, for He goes bearing his weapons: He cleaves to the ocean surge of the waters; a great King, He declares the fourth status. Like a mortal purifying his body, like a war-horse galloping to the conquest of riches He pours calling through all the sheath and enters these vessels. Rig Veda.2 ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine, 1.26,
125:The 18 Mahapuranas (great Puranas), as the origins of the Puranas, may have overlapped to some extent with the Vedas, but their composition stretched forward into the 4th-5th centuries,... the earliest parts of the Puranic genealogies are either entirely or partly w:Mythicalmythical. The oldest of the Puranas are the Matsya, Vayu and the Brahmanda and for our purposes, the Vishnu Purana, somewhat later than the first three 
 the Vedic link also goes back to the earlier statement that the itihasa-purana was the fifth Veda. ~ Upinder Singh, in A History of Ancient and Early Medieval India: From the Stone Age to the ..., p. 22,
126:Evladım, Ɵimdi senin bunu anlaman zordur ama bizler TĂŒrk'ĂŒ, KĂŒrt'ĂŒ, MĂŒslĂŒman'ı, Ermeni'si, Rum'u, Yahudi'si, Bulgar'ı, Sırp'ı, Arap'ıyla tek millettik. BĂŒyĂŒk devletler bizi yıkmak için hepimizi birbirimize dĂŒĆŸĂŒrdĂŒler. KardeƟi kardeƟe öldĂŒrttĂŒler. Senin Ɵimdi okuduğun lise 1915 yılında hiç mezun vermedi. Neden biliyor musun? Ă‡ĂŒnkĂŒ bĂŒtĂŒn talebeleri; TĂŒrk'ĂŒ, Yahudi'si, Ermeni'si, Rum'uyla Çanakkale'de Ɵehit dĂŒĆŸmĂŒĆŸtĂŒ.

SavaƟ, kahrolmak demektir oğlum. Açlık, susuzluk, dizanteri, hastalık, aklını oynatmak demektir. Gece gĂŒndĂŒz burnuna dolan ölĂŒm kokusundan yıllar boyu kurtulamamak demektir.

Veda: Bir Dostluğun ÖykĂŒsĂŒ Sayfa:41 ~ O Z Livaneli,
127:Herkesin matematiğe veda ettiği bir an vardır. Kiminin ilk x’i, y’i gördĂŒÄŸĂŒnde, kiminin ilk karekökĂŒ gördĂŒÄŸĂŒnde beti benzi atar. Kimi de limit ve tĂŒrevle karĆŸÄ±laƟtığında “Sanırım bu iƟ buraya kadar” diye içinden geçirir. O olmayan, “iƟe yaramayan” kavramları zihninde zaten zar zor bi yere oturtabilmiƟken, Ɵimdi de onlara yeni kavramlar eklenmiƟtir. Matematikten anlamadığınızı kemiklerinize kadar hissedersiniz. Hocanın anlattığı fog(x)’lere, Z’lere, cot(x)’lere bĂŒyĂŒk bir ciddiyetle bakarken beyninizin içinde tridi efekti ile yapılmÄ±ĆŸ bir bebek neƟeyle dans ediyordur. Anlatılanların kafanızın içinde hiçbir karĆŸÄ±lığı yoktur, resmen bi s.k anlamıyorsunuzdur. ~ Anonymous,
128:infine l'antichissima sapienza indiana dice: "È Maya, il velo ingannatore, che avvolge gli occhi dei mortali e fa loro vedere un mondo del quale non puĂČ dirsi nĂ© che esista, nĂ© che non esista; perchĂ© ella rassomiglia al sogno, rassomiglia al riflesso del sole sulla sabbia, che il pellegrino da lontano scambia per acqua; o anche rassomiglia alla corda gettata a terra, che egli prende per un serpente" (Questi paragoni si trovano ripetuti in luoghi innumerevoli dei Veda e dei Purana). Ma ciĂČ che tutti costoro pensavano, e di cui parlano, non Ăš altro se non quel che anche noi ora, appunto, consideriamo: il mondo come rappresentazione, sottomesso al principio della ragione. ~ Arthur Schopenhauer,
129:A year and a half had indeed made some changes in Veda's appearance. She was still no more than medium height, but her haughty carriage made her seem taller. The hips were as slim as ever, but had taken on some touch of voluptuousness. The legs were Mildred's, to the last graceful contour. But the most noticeable change was what Monty brutally called the Dairy: two round, swelling protuberances that had appeared almost overnight on the high, arching chest. They would have been large, even for a woman: but for a child of thirteen they were positively startling. Mildred had a mystical feeling about them: they made her think tremulously of Love, Motherhood, and similar milky concepts. ~ James M Cain,
130:Belli bir yaĆŸÄ± geçince yaƟam dediğin, sahip olduğun Ɵeyleri sĂŒrekli kaybettiğin bir sĂŒreçten öteye geçmez. YaƟamın için önemli olan Ɵeyler, bir tarağın diƟlerinin birer birer kırılıp gitmesi gibi insanın elinden kayıp dĂŒĆŸĂŒverir. Bunların yerine eline geçense değersiz, tuhaf Ɵeyler olur. VĂŒcudun yetenekleri, arzular, hayaller, idealler, kendine gĂŒven, anlam, hatta aĆŸÄ±k olduğun insanlar, peƟ peƟe yok olup gider. Veda ederek ayrılanlar, hatta bir gĂŒn hiçbir Ɵey söylemeden ortadan yok olanlar olur ve bir kez yitirince bunları bir daha asla tekrar elde edemezsin. Yerine koyacak bir Ɵeyler de bulamazsın. Bazen vĂŒcudunu lime lime doğranıyormuƟ gibi hissedersin. Bu, çok acı veren bir Ɵeydir. ~ Haruki Murakami,
131:Visitor. I am taught that Mantra Japam is very potent in practice.
Bhagavan. The Self is the greatest of all mantras and goes on automatically and eternally. If you are not aware of this internal mantra, you should take to do it consciously as japam, which is attended with effort, to ward off all other thoughts.

By constant attention to it, you will eventually become aware of the internal mantra, which is the state of Realisation and is effortless. Firmness in this awareness will keep you continually and effortlessly in the current, however much you may be engaged on other activities.
Listening to Veda chanting and mantras has the same result as conscious repetitions of japam – its rhythm is the japam. ~ Sri Ramana Maharshi,
132:La camera si Ăš riempita di buio, solo con grande fatica si puĂČ distinguere il biancore del letto, e tutto il resto Ăš nero. Fra poco dovrebbe levarsi la luna. FarĂ  in tempo, Drogo, a vederla o dovrĂ  andarsene prima? La porta della camera palpita con uno scricchiolio leggero. Forse Ăš un soffio di vento, un semplice risucchio d'aria di queste inquiete notti di primavera. Forse Ăš invece lei che Ăš entrata, con passo silenzioso, e adesso sta avvicinandosi alla poltrona di Drogo. Facendosi forza, Giovanni raddrizza un po' il busto, si assesta con una mano il colletto dell'uniforme, dĂ  ancora uno sguardo fuori della finestra, una brevissima occhiata, per l'ultima sua porzione di stelle. Poi nel buio, benchĂ© nessuno lo veda, sorride. ~ Dino Buzzati,
133:But he, Siddhartha, was not a source of joy for himself, he found no delight in himself. Walking the rosy paths of the fig tree garden, sitting in the bluish shade of the grove of contemplation, washing his limbs daily in the bath of repentance, sacrificing in the dim shade of the mango forest, his gestures of perfect decency, everyone's love and joy, he still lacked all joy in his heart. Dreams and restless thoughts came into his mind, flowing from the water of the river, sparkling from the stars of the night, melting from the beams of the sun, dreams came to him and a restlessness of the soul, fuming from the sacrifices, breathing forth from the verses of the Rig-Veda, being infused into him, drop by drop, from the teachings of the old Brahmans. ~ Hermann Hesse,
134:Le anime hanno un loro particolar modo d'intendersi, d'entrare in intimitĂ , fino a darsi del tu, mentre le nostre persone sono tuttavia impacciate nel commercio delle parole comuni, nella schiavitĂč delle esigenze sociali. Han bisogni lor proprii e le loro proprie aspirazioni le anime, di cui il corpo non si dĂ  per inteso, quando veda l'impossibilitĂ  di soddisfarli e di tradurle in atto. E ogni qualvolta due che comunichino fra loro cosĂŹ, con le anime soltanto, si trovano soli in qualche luogo, provano un turbamento angoscioso e quasi una repulsione violenta d'ogni minimo contatto materiale, una sofferenza che li allontana, e che cessa subito, non appena un terzo intervenga. Allora, passata l'angoscia, le due anime sollevate si ricercano e tornano a sorridersi da lontano. ~ Luigi Pirandello,
135:The etymological meaning of Veda is sacred knowledge or wisdom. There are four Vedas: Rig, Yajur, Sama, and Atharva. Together they constitute the samhitas that are the textual basis of the Hindu religious system. To these samhitas were attached three other kinds of texts. These are, firstly, the Brahmanas, which is essentially a detailed description of rituals, a kind of manual for the priestly class, the Brahmins. The second are the Aranyakas; aranya means forest, and these ‘forest manuals’ move away from rituals, incantations and magic spells to the larger speculations of spirituality, a kind of compendium of contemplations of those who have renounced the world. The third, leading from the Aranyakas, are the Upanishads, which, for their sheer loftiness of thought are the foundational texts of Hindu philosophy and metaphysics. ~ Pavan K Varma,
136:the central notion of the Veda :::
   The sense of the first two verses is clear enough when we know Saraswati to be that power of the Truth which we call inspiration. Inspiration from the Truth purifies by getting rid of all falsehood, for all sin according to the Indian idea is merely falsehood, wrongly inspired emotion, wrongly directed will and action. The central idea of life and ourselves from which we start is a falsehood and all else is falsified by it. Truth comes to us as a light, a voice, compelling a change of thought, imposing a new discernment of ourselves and all around us. Truth of thought creates truth of vision and truth of vision forms in us truth of being, and out of truth of being (satyam) flows naturally truth of emotion, will and action. This is indeed the central notion of the Veda.
   ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Secret Of The Veda,
137:He wondered if he would live to see the blossom on his apple trees and felt an answering pop inside himself. Ah, so it would not be long now. It began to snow lightly, the last flakes to fall before the spring. He put on his wedding finery, the clothes he had worn so long ago when he married his beloved Pamposh, and which he had kept all this time wrapped in tissue paper in a trunk. As a bridegroom he went outdoors and the snowflakes caressed his grizzled cheeks. His mind was alert, he was ambulatory and nobody was waiting for him with a club. He had his body and his mind and it seemed he was to be spared a brutal end. That at least was kind. He went into his apple orchard, seated himself cross-legged beneath a tree, closed his eyes, heard the verses of the Rig-Veda fill the world with beauty and ceased upon the midnight with no pain. ~ Salman Rushdie,
138:It goes without saying that it is the traditionally minded Hindu we have in view, and not one whose hereditary dispositions have deviated in an anti-traditional direction, to the point of proving that "corruptio optimi pessima." Hinduism, strictly speaking, has no "dogmas" in the sense that every concept may be denied, on condition that the argument used is intrinsically true; which amounts to saying that concepts can be denied from the standpoint of a higher level of truth, metaphysics standing above cosmology and realization above theory as such. However, on their own level, the scriptural symbols of Hinduism are just as immovable as the Semitic dogmas, and this excludes any fallacious comparison of Hindu doctrine with the opinions of philosophers. No orthodox Hindu can maintain that the Veda has been mistaken on any point whatsoever. ~ Frithjof Schuon,
139:Me lleva de la mano, la aprieta. Camino a su lado sin miedo. Dentro de mí centellean las estrellas; dentro de mí, una gran bóveda azul donde hace un momento batían los moteros furiosamente. Se puede esperar toda una vida por un momento así. La mujer que esperabas conocer estå ahora sentada enfrente de ti, y habla y tiene el mismo aspecto exactamente que la persona con quien soñabas. Pero lo mås extraño de todo es que nunca antes te habías dado cuenta de que habías soñado con ella. Todo tu pasado es como haber estado durmiendo durante mucho tiempo y no lo habías recordado, si no hubieras soñado. Y también el sueño podría haber quedado olvidado, si no hubiese habido memoria, pero el recuerdo estå ahí, en la sangre, y la sangre es como un océano en que todo se va arrastrado, salvo lo que es nuevo y mås sustancial incluso que la vida: LA REALIDAD. ~ Henry Miller,
140:tahiya hote pavan nahin pani, tahiya srishti kown utpati;
tahiya hote kali nahin phula, tahiya hote garbh nahi mula;
tahiya hote vidya nahin Veda, tahiya hote shabd nahin swada;
tahiya hote pind nahin basu,
nahin dhar dharni na pavan akasu;
tahiya hote guru nahin chela, gamya agamya na panth duhela.

Sakhi: avigati ki gati ka kahown, jake gawn na thawn
gun bihuna pekhana, ka kahi lijai nawn

In that state there is no air or water, and no creation or creator; There is no bud or flower, and no fetus or semen; There is no education or Vedas, and no word or taste; There is no body or settlement, and no earth, air or space; There is no guru or disciple, and no easy or difficult path.

Sakhi: That state is very strange. I cannot explain it. It has no village or resting place. That state is without gunas (qualities). What name can on give it? ~ Kabir,
141:tahiya hote pavan nahin pani, tahiya srishti kown utpati;
tahiya hote kali nahin phula, tahiya hote garbh nahi mula;
tahiya hote vidya nahin Veda, tahiya hote shabd nahin swada;
tahiya hote pind nahin basu,
nahin dhar dharni na pavan akasu;
tahiya hote guru nahin chela, gamya agamya na panth duhela.

Sakhi: avigati ki gati ka kahown, jake gawn na thawn
gun bihuna pekhana, ka kahi lijai nawn

In that state there is no air or water, and no creation or creator; There is no bud or flower, and no fetus or semen; There is no education or Vedas, and no word or taste; There is no body or settlement, and no earth, air or space; There is no guru or disciple, and no easy or difficult path.

Sakhi: That state is very strange. I cannot explain it. It has no village or resting place. That state is without gunas (qualities). What name can on give it? ~ Kabir,
142:He found the vast Thought with seven heads that is born of the Truth; he created some fourth world and became universal. . . .
The Sons of Heaven, the Heroes of the Omnipotent, thinking the straight thought, giving voice to the Truth, founded the plane of illumination and conceived the first abode of the Sacrifice. . . . The Master of Wisdom cast down the stone defences and called to the Herds of Light, . . . the herds that stand in the secrecy on the bridge over the Falsehood between two worlds below and one above; desiring Light in the darkness, he brought upward the Ray-Herds and uncovered from the veil the three worlds; he shattered the city that lies hidden in ambush, and cut the three out of the Ocean, and discovered the Dawn and the Sun and the Light and the Word of Light. Rig Veda.2 ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine, Out of the Sevenfold Ignorance towards the Sevenfold Knowledge,
143:I ragazzini sono degli stronzetti. A scuola tutti pensano solo all’apparenza. È cosĂŹ che funziona. Hai degli amici in polizia? A loro non importa che aspetto hai. Gli interessa se fai il tuo lavoro e se gli copri le spalle quando serve.” Si allungĂČ un po’ in avanti e gli sorrise. “Ti renderai conto che Ăš anche quello che vogliono un compagno o un amante. A loro importa come sei come amante. Se ti importa di loro, se li ami, se li ascolti. In altre parole, quanto bene fai il lavoro di essere il compagno di qualcuno, e sĂŹ, vogliono anche sapere che gli coprirai le spalle quando serve. Tu tutto questo sai farlo. Fai in modo che si veda. E piantala di ascoltare quella vocina che continua a dirti che tu non sei abbastanza, perchĂ© lo sei.”
“Vorrei che fosse cosĂŹ facile,” mormorĂČ Red. Dio, lo voleva piĂč di qualsiasi altra cosa.
“Niente che valga la pena di ottenere ù facile, lo sai, quindi ci dovrai lavorare. Ma se Terry ti piace quanto penso, ne varrà la pena ~ Andrew Grey,
144:Alenas: Bet prieĆĄ iĆĄvykdamas, mieli draugai, pateiksiu jums nedidelę alegoriją. BĆ«relis ĆŸmoniĆł gyvena tamsioje oloje. Jie net neÄŻsivaizduoja, kad lauke ĆĄviečia saulė. Vienintelė jiems paĆŸÄŻstama ĆĄviesa - tai mirgančios keliĆł ĆŸvakiĆł, kuris jie neĆĄiojasi, liepsnelės.
Agatonas: O iĆĄ kur jie gavo ĆŸvakiĆł?
Alenas: Nesvarbu. Tarkime, kad jie jas tiesiog turi.
Agatonas: Gyvena oloje ir turi ĆŸvakiĆł? Atrodo netikroviĆĄkai...
Alenas: Juk sakau - tarkime, kad jie jas tieisog turi.
Agatonas: Gerai jau gerai, pasakok toliau.
Alenas: Tai ĆĄtai, vieną dieną kaĆŸkuris iĆĄ olos gyventojĆł iĆĄlenda ÄŻ lauką ir pamato visą iĆĄorinÄŻ pasaulÄŻ.
Simijas: AiĆĄkiai ir visu graĆŸumu.
Alenas: BĆ«tent. AiĆĄkiai ir visu graĆŸumu.
Agatonas: Paskui jis mėgina visa tai nupasakoti kitiems, bet niekas juo nepatiki?
Alenas: Na jau ne. Kitiems jis nieko nepasakoja.
Agatonas: Nieko nepasakoja?
Alenas: Ne, jis atsidaro deĆĄrĆł parduotuvė, veda ĆĄokėją ir bĆ«damas keturiasdeĆĄimt dvejĆł mirĆĄta nuo insulto. ~ Woody Allen,
145:Max had a book with her and began leafing through it, looking for something. "There's a passage our conversation reminds me of ..."
"What?"
"In the Upanishads -- a series of Sanskrit works which are part of the Veda. Here it is Pol, listen: In this body, in this town of Spirit, there is a little house shaped like a lotus, and in that house there is a little space. There is as much in that little space within the heart as there is in the whole world outside. Maybe that little space is the realty of your you and my me?"
"Could I copy that?" I asked.
"Of course. I've been watching that little space within your heart enlarging all year as more and more ideas are absorbed into it. Some people close their doors and lock them so that nothing can come in, and the space cannot hold anything as long as the heart clutches in self-protection or lust or greed. But if we're not afraid, that little space can be so large that one could put a whole universe in it and still have room for more. ~ Madeleine L Engle,
146:If we regard the Powers of the Reality as so many Godheads, we can say that the Overmind releases a million Godheads into action, each empowered to create its own world, each world capable of relation, communication and interplay with the others.
There are in the Veda different formulations of the nature of the Gods: it is said they are all one Existence to which the sages give different names; yet each God is worshipped as if he by himself is that Existence, one who is all the other Gods together or contains them in his being; and yet again each is a separate Deity acting sometimes in unison with companion deities, sometimes separately, sometimes even in apparent opposition to other Godheads of the same Existence. In the Supermind all this would be held together as a harmonised play of the one Existence; in the Overmind each of these three conditions could be a separate action or basis of action and have its own principle of development and consequences and yet each keep the power to combine with the others in a more composite harmony. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine, Supermind Mind and the Overmind Maya,
147:Erroneous assumptions about what the ancients meant when they spoke of the sky and its denizens have thus proliferated, assisted unfortunately by certain Eastern writers who reason that if the Veda is infallible everything of value must be mentioned within it. These people, who subscribe to a different but no less deluded version of literal history, vainly strain to discover somewhere in the Vedic corpus evidence of every modern advancement. In its extreme form this school even identifies some of India’s deities with alien spacemen. Both the materialist and the fundamentalist approaches, by mistaking wisdom’s vessels for the wisdom itself, consign the original significations of the Vedic wisdom to history’s dustbin, retaining only myth’s hides for their trophies. As an example of how far away from mythic reality literal history can stray, consider the literalist assumption that the ‘underworld’ must needs be underfoot. Though this may seem eminently reasonable and commonsensical to the average modern individual, suppose for a moment that the ancients had instead placed the underworld in some nether corner of the sky. ~ Robert E Svoboda,
148:Tenente colonnello Abbati: – Io mi difendo bevendo. Altrimenti, sarei giĂ  al manicomio. Contro le scelleratezze del mondo, un uomo onesto si difende bevendo. È da oltre un anno che io faccio la guerra, un po’ su tutti i fronti, e finora non ho visto in faccia un solo austriaco. Eppure ci uccidiamo a vicenda, tutti i giorni. Uccidersi senza conoscersi, senza neppure vedersi! È orribile! È per questo che ci ubriachiamo tutti, da una parte e dall’altra. Ha mai ucciso nessuno lei? Lei, personalmente, con le sue mani? [
] Io, nessuno. GiĂ , non ho visto nessuno. Eppure se tutti, di comune accordo, lealmente, cessassimo di bere, forse la guerra finirebbe. Ma, se bevono gli altri, bevo anch’io. Veda, io ho una lunga esperienza, non Ăš l’artiglieria che ci tiene in piedi, noi di fanteria. Anzi, il contrario. La nostra artiglieria ci mette spesso a terra, tirandoci addosso. [
] Abolisca l’artiglieria, d’ambo le parti, la guerra continua. Ma provi ad abolire il vino e i liquori. Provi un po’. Si provi. [
] Nessuno di noi si muoverĂ  piĂč. L’anima del combattente di questa guerra Ăš l’alcool. Il primo motore Ăš l’alcool. PerciĂČ i soldati, nella loro infinita sapienza, lo chiamano benzina. ~ Emilio Lussu,
149:bir genç kızın geceyi nerede geçirdiğini kim bilebilir? Sanırım hayaller ĂŒlkesinde; ama her sabah geri dönĂŒyordur, gençlik dolu tazeliği bu yĂŒzdendir. Nasıl da böylesine genç, ama yine de yetiƟkin görĂŒnĂŒyor; sanki Doğa, sevecen ve bereketli bir ana gibi tam o anda bırakmÄ±ĆŸ onu elinden. Bu veda sahnesine nerdeyse tanık olmuƟtum sanki; sevecen annenin veda ederken ona bir kez daha nasıl sarıldığını gördĂŒm, dediklerim duydum. “Artık dĂŒnyaya çıkabilirsin yavrum, senin için yapabileceğim her Ɵeyi yaptım; bu öpĂŒcĂŒÄŸĂŒ dudaklarında bir mĂŒhĂŒr olarak kabul et, mabedi koruyan mĂŒhĂŒrdĂŒr o; kendin istemedikçe kimse bozamaz onu, ama doğru erkek geldiğinde onu tanırsın.” Ve ana, kızın dudaklarından kuvvetle öptĂŒ, bu öpĂŒĆŸ insanların öpĂŒĆŸĂŒ gibi ondan bir Ɵeyleri almadı, ilahi bir öpĂŒĆŸ gibi her Ɵeyi verdi, kıza öpĂŒĆŸĂŒn gĂŒcĂŒnĂŒ verdi. MuhteƟem Doğa, nasıl da derin ve gizemlisin! Erkeğe kelimeyi, kıza da öpĂŒĆŸlerin kandırıcı dilini verdin! Bu öpĂŒĆŸ onun dudaklarında, veda kutsaması ahunda, sevinçli selamlar gözlerindeydi; bu yĂŒzden o andaki bakÄ±ĆŸÄ±yla öylesine evinde gibiydi, Ă§ĂŒnkĂŒ sonuçta evin kızıydı, ama aynı zamanda öylesine de yabancıydı, Ă§ĂŒnkĂŒ görĂŒnmeden onu gözleyen tutkun annesinin dÄ±ĆŸÄ±ndaki dĂŒnyayı tanımıyordu. ~ Anonymous,
150:Vaishampayana said, “I shall recount the entire history, that which was composed by the great-souled maharshi Vyasa, whose powers are infinite and who is worshipped in all the worlds. This contains 100,000 sacred shlokas, composed by Satyavati’s son, Vyasa, of infinite powers. The learned man who recites it to others and also those who hear its recital attain the world of Brahma and become the equals of the gods. This is equal to the Vedas. It is sacred and supreme. It is the best of all that can be heard. It is a purana worshipped by the rishis. It contains all the useful instructions on artha and kama. This immensely sacred history makes the mind desire to attain salvation. The learned man who recites Krishna’s33 Veda to those who are noble, generous, truthful and faithful, will attain great fortune. Even sins like the killing of embryos in wombs are destroyed. On hearing it, the most evil is freed from the most evil of sins. This history, called jaya, should be heard by those who wish to attain victory. On hearing it, a king can bring the entire world under his subjugation and defeat all his enemies. This is the best way to obtain a son and the great path to ensure welfare. It should be heard several times by heirs apparent and their wives. ~ Krishna Dwaipayana Vyasa,
151:Statemi a sentire: il lunedĂŹ fa schifo perchĂš sei arrabbiato per non aver potuto dormire fino a tardi, inoltre Ăš anche il giorno in cui avviene il sessanta per cento delle riunioni che ti rovinano la vita. Il martedĂŹ fa schifo perchĂš ci sono ancora quattro giorni lavorativi da superare; odi te stesso e il mondo perchĂš sei intrappolato nella ruota per criceti chiamata vita, schiavo della paga. Il mercoledĂŹ Ăš terribile perchĂš ti rendi conto, verso mezzogiorno, che Ăš finita metĂ  della settimana lavorativa ma il fatto che tu veda la vita in questo modo significa che non sei nient'altro che la terza vignetta di quel vecchio fumetto che non faceva ridere, Cathy, quella in cui lei si rende conto di essere una grassa zitella solitaria e le si drizzano i capelli in testa e fa un grido tipo aughhhhhh! Il venerdĂŹ Ăš terribile perchĂš ti senti come un topolino da laboratorio che aspetta che il cibo venga messo nella sua gabbia, e in questo caso il cibo Ăš il weekend. Il sabato va bene ma appena bene. E la domenica, come ho giĂ  detto, Ăš la giornata dimenticata dal tempo, in cui non succede niente e ti ritrovi, perversamente, a desiderare che sia di nuovo lunedĂŹ. Per cui, il massimo sarebbe una settimana fatta di giovedĂŹ. Tutti sono di buonumore, la gente fa davvero quello che deve e un luccichio di sabato rende tutto piĂč brillante. ~ Douglas Coupland,
152:Then there was neither non-existence nor existence,
Then there was neither space, nor the sky beyond.
What covered it? Where was it? What sheltered it?
Was there water, in depths unfathomed? Then there was neither death nor immortality
Nor was there then the division between night and day.
That One breathed, breathlessly and self-sustaining.
There was that One then, and there was no other. In the beginning there was only darkness, veiled in darkness,
In profound darkness, a water without light.
All that existed then was void and formless.
That One arose at last, born of the power of heat. In the beginning arose desire,
That primal seed, born of the mind.
The sages who searched their hearts with wisdom,
Discovered the link of the existent to the non-existent. And they stretched their cord of vision across the void,
What was above? What was below?
Then seeds were sown and mighty power arose,
Below was strength, Above was impulse. Who really knows? And who can say?
Whence did it all come? And how did creation happen?
The gods themselves are later than creation,
So who knows truly whence this great creation sprang? Who knows whence this creation had its origin?
He, whether He fashioned it or whether He did not,
He, who surveys it all from the highest heaven,
He knows—or maybe even He does not know. —Rig Veda, X.129 ~ Shashi Tharoor,
153:In realtĂ  il patibolo, quando Ăš lĂŹ, drizzato, ha alcunchĂ© d'allucinante. Si puĂČ avere una certa indifferenza a proposito della pena di morte, non pronunciarsi, dire di sĂŹ e no, fino a quando non si Ăš visto coi propri occhi una ghigliottina; ma se avviene d'incontrarne una, la scossa Ăš violenta e bisogna decidersi a prendere partito pro o contro di essa. Taluni, come il De Maistre, ammirano; altri, come il Beccaria, esecrano. La ghigliottina concreta la legge: si chiama vendetta, ma non Ăš neutra e non vi permette di restar neutro. Chi la scorge freme del piĂč misterioso dei fremiti. Tutte le questioni sociali drizzano intorno alla mannaia il loro punto interrogativo. Il patibolo Ăš una visione; ma non Ăš una costruzione, ma non Ăš una macchina, ma non Ăš un inerte meccanismo fatto di legno, di ferro e di corde. Sembra ch'esso sia una specie d'essere con non so qual cupa iniziativa; si direbbe che quella costruzione veda, che quella macchina senta, che quel meccanismo capisca, che quel legno, quel ferro e quelle corde vogliano. Nella spaventosa fantasticheria in cui la sua presenza getta l'anima, il patibolo appare terribile e sembra partecipe di quello che fa.
È il complice del carnefice: divora, mangia la carne,
beve il sangue. Il patibolo Ăš una specie di mostro fabbricato dal giudice e dal falegname, uno spettro che sembra vivere d'una specie di vita spaventevole, fatta di tutta la morte che ha dato. ~ Victor Hugo,
154:Does rough weather choose men over women? Does the sun beat on men, leaving women nice and cool?' Nyawira asked rather sharply. 'Women bear the brunt of poverty. What choices does a woman have in life, especially in times of misery? She can marry or live with a man. She can bear children and bring them up, and be abused by her man. Have you read Buchi Emecheta of Nigeria, Joys of Motherhood? Tsitsi Dangarembga of Zimbabwe, say, Nervous Conditions? Miriama Ba of Senegal, So Long A Letter? Three women from different parts of Africa, giving words to similar thoughts about the condition of women in Africa.'

'I am not much of a reader of fiction,' Kamiti said. 'Especially novels by African women. In India such books are hard to find.'

'Surely even in India there are women writers? Indian women writers?' Nyawira pressed. 'Arundhati Roy, for instance, The God of Small Things? Meena Alexander, Fault Lines? Susie Tharu. Read Women Writing in India. Or her other book, We Were Making History, about women in the struggle!'

'I have sampled the epics of Indian literature,' Kamiti said, trying to redeem himself. 'Mahabharata, Ramayana, and mostly Bhagavad Gita. There are a few others, what they call Purana, Rig-Veda, Upanishads 
 Not that I read everything, but 
'

'I am sure that those epics and Puranas, even the Gita, were all written by men,' Nyawira said. 'The same men who invented the caste system. When will you learn to listen to the voices of women? ~ Ng g wa Thiong o,
155:The basic recurring theme in Hindu mythology is the creation of the world by the self-sacrifice of God—"sacrifice" in the original sense of "making sacred"—whereby God becomes the world which, in the end, becomes again God. This creative activity of the Divine is called lila, the play of God, and the world is seen as the stage of the divine play. Like most of Hindu mythology, the myth of lila has a strong magical flavour. Brahman is the great magician who transforms himself into the world and then performs this feat with his "magic creative power", which is the original meaning of maya in the Rig Veda. The word maya—one of the most important terms in Indian philosophy—has changed its meaning over the centuries. From the might, or power, of the divine actor and magician, it came to signify the psychological state of anybody under the spell of the magic play. As long as we confuse the myriad forms of the divine lila with reality, without perceiving the unity of Brahman underlying all these forms, we are under the spell of maya. (...) In the Hindu view of nature, then, all forms are relative, fluid and ever-changing maya, conjured up by the great magician of the divine play. The world of maya changes continuously, because the divine lila is a rhythmic, dynamic play. The dynamic force of the play is karma, important concept of Indian thought. Karma means "action". It is the active principle of the play, the total universe in action, where everything is dynamically connected with everything else. In the words of the Gita Karma is the force of creation, wherefrom all things have their life. ~ Fritjof Capra,
156:Bir kadın olarak benden nefret ediyor, yetenekli bir kadın olarak benden korkuyor; zeki bir kadın olarak beni seviyor. Bu çeliƟkiyi onun ruhunda ilk kez Ɵimdi oluƟturdum. Gururum, direncim, soğuk kĂŒĂ§ĂŒmsemelerim, acımasız alaylarım etkiledi onu; ama beni sevmeyi istermiƟ gibi değil - hayır, onda bu tĂŒr duygulardan iz yok, hele bana yönelik hiç yok. Benimle yarÄ±ĆŸmak istiyor. Onu etkileyen, insanların gururlu bağımsızlığı, çöl Araplarınınki gibi bir özgĂŒrlĂŒk. Benim gĂŒlĂŒĆŸĂŒm ve garip özelliklerim her tĂŒrlĂŒ erotik tahriği tesirsiz kılıyor. Kız bana karĆŸÄ± oldukça rahat, bir sakınma varsa da bu, diƟilikten daha çok entelektĂŒel kaynaklı bir Ɵey. Ä°liƟkimiz beni bir sevgili olarak görmenin çok ötesinde, gĂŒĂ§lĂŒ iki zekĂą arasındaki bir iliƟki gibi. Elimi tutup biraz sıkıyor, gĂŒlĂŒyor; bana karĆŸÄ±Â salt platonik anlamda ilgili. Daha sonra alaylar ve kĂŒĂ§ĂŒmsemeler onu yeterince kandırdığında eski bir Ɵiirde bulunan talimatı izleyeceğim: â€œĆžĂ¶valye yere yayar pelerinini kıpkırmızı ve gĂŒzel kıza yalvarır ĂŒstĂŒne otursun diye.” Fakat ben pelerinimi onunla birlikte çimenlere oturmak için değil, dĂŒĆŸĂŒncenin kanatlarında onunla birlikte gözden kaybolmak için seriyorum. Ya da onu yanıma almıyor, ama kendim bir dĂŒĆŸĂŒncenin ĂŒstĂŒne binip el sallayarak veda ediyor, bir öpĂŒcĂŒk yolluyor ve yalnızca kanatlanmÄ±ĆŸ sözcĂŒklerin mırıltısında iƟitilerek onun gözĂŒnden kayboluyorum; Yehova gibi sesiyle gittikçe daha çok değil, daha az görĂŒnĂŒyorum, Ă§ĂŒnkĂŒ ne kadar çok konuƟursam o kadar yĂŒkseğe çıkıyorum. Sonra o da benimle birlikte, cesur dĂŒĆŸĂŒncelerin kanatlan ĂŒstĂŒnde uçup gitmek istiyor. Yine de, bu yalnızca bir an sĂŒrer, akabinde ben yine soğuk ve duygusuz olurum. ~ Anonymous,
157:Then there is the life-force, the Prana, that works in our vital being and nervous system. The Upanishad speaks of it as the first or supreme Breath; elsewhere in the sacred writings it is spoken of as the chief Breath or the Breath of the mouth, mukhya, asanya; it is that which carries in it the Word, the creative expression. In the body of man there are said to be five workings of the life-force called the five Pranas. One specially termed Prana moves in the upper part of the body and is pre-eminently the breath of life, because it brings the universal life-force into the physical system and gives it there to be distributed. A second in the lower part of the trunk, termed Apana, is the breath of death; for it gives away the vital force out of the body. A third, the Samana, regulates the interchange of these two forces at their meeting-place, equalises them and is the most important agent in maintaining the equilibrium of the vital forces and their functions. A fourth, the Vyana, pervasive, distributes the vital energies throughout the body. A fifth, the Udana, moves upward from the body to the crown of the head and is a regular channel of communication between the physical life and the greater life of the spirit. None of these are the first or supreme Breath, although the Prana most nearly represents it; the Breath to which so much importance is given in the Upanishads, is the pure life-force itself, - first, because all the others are secondary to it, born from it and only exist as its special functions. It is imaged in the Veda as the Horse; its various energies are the forces that draw the chariots of the Gods. ~ Sri Aurobindo,
158:[the first aid, shastra, the lotus of the eternal knowledge:]
   The supreme Shastra of the Integral Yoga is the eternal Veda secret in the heart of every thinking and living being. The lotus of the eternal knowledge and the eternal perfection is a bud closed and folded up within us. It opens swiftly or gradually, petal by petal, through successive realisations, once the mind of man begins to turn towards the Eternal, once his heart, no longer compressed and confined by attachment to finite appearances, becomes enamoured, in whatever degree, of the Infinite. All life, all thought, all energising of the faculties, all experiences passive or active, become thenceforward so many shocks which disintegrate the teguments of the soul and remove the obstacles to the inevitable efflorescence. He who chooses the Infinite has been chosen by the Infinite. He has received the divine touch without which there is no awakening, no opening of the spirit; but once it is received, attainment is sure, whether conquered swiftly in the course of one human life or pursued patiently through many stadia of the cycle of existence in the manifested universe.
   Nothing can be taught to the mind which is not already concealed as potential knowledge in the unfolding soul of the creature. So also all perfection of which the outer man is capable, is only a realising of the eternal perfection of the Spirit within him. We know the Divine and become the Divine, because we are That already in our secret nature. All teaching is a revealing, all becoming is an unfolding. Self-attainment is the secret; self-knowledge and an increasing consciousness are the means and the process.
   ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis Of Yoga, The Four Aids [53] [T1],
159:Krishna told Arjuna that Veda’s (holy rules) can guide a person to reach the demigods (Sun, moon, other forms of gods) and to get a good life, however the one who has attained the Yogic state is not pleased with them  nor impressed by the power it gives. He who is in Yogic state can control the senses and still be living a normal life. When he meets the supreme power, he also loses the worldly interests and reaches the god without any obstacles. For that yogic person, Veda’s serve no purpose. "Our Life: We have seen, most of us don’t understand Veda’s clearly and their purpose. There are few, who has learnt Veda’s, but I am not including them here... Most of us do lots of ceremonies/rituals in our house/temple without knowing the purpose, but with the belief it’s god's language or ceremony and he will be pleased with that. We always forget, that solely thinking about him in our mind/heart and perform our duty, will please him more than anything! But the truth is, we believe rituals alone will bring peace and harmony to us and our kin. How untrue this is! We also see, there are some VIP's/rich people who enter in to temple/church/mosque and get high priority for them and get some recommendations from the priests and they think that god has blessed them. God is equal of every living being here and no need of any mediator here (the concept of Guru is different) and the importance given to them is a manual happening and it’s not from god. The first thing, believe your god is knowledgeable. Don’t think he can be fooled! Similarly we see some temples/churches/mosques getting high donations; I am sure more the money comes from Sin and as part of the share for the Sin. We believe God will reduce our punishment, if we give him some share :) ~ Vishnuvarthanan Moorthy,
160:Arjuna, there is a banyan tree that grows upside down, its roots in the sky and its trunk below. The wise know that Veda constitutes its leaves. The branches go up and down, as a consequence of nature’s tendencies, nourished by experiences. The aerial roots that grow down are actions born of desire that bind it to the realm of men. Wisdom alone can cut these downward roots, enabling discovery of the reverse banyan tree, with its primal roots, before enchantment of the senses began and obscured the view.—Bhagavad Gita: Chapter 15, verses 1 to 4 (paraphrased). The banyan tree is sacred to the Hindus. It symbolizes immortality (akshaya). But it is unique in that it has primary roots and secondary roots. The latter grow from its branches and eventually become so thick that it becomes impossible to distinguish them from the main tree trunk. In this verse, Krishna visualizes a banyan tree growing from the sky, its primary roots rising up into the sky, its secondary roots growing down to the earth. Thus, it is being nourished from above and below. The primary root rising from the sky is nourished by inner mental reality. The secondary roots going down to the earth are nourished by external material reality. The tree is who we are. We are nourished from within as well as without. Within is the atma that is immortal and infinite, and so does not suffer from the anxieties of the mortal and the finite. It is neither hungry nor frightened, nor does it yearn for validation. Without is the world of things, people, our relationships, our desires and frustrations. When we derive value from the outside, we assume that our identity is the anxious aham. So Krishna advises Arjuna to use the axe of knowledge (gyana) to cut down all secondary roots, take refuge in the primary root of atma and liberate himself. This is moksha, liberation, where we no longer seek validation from the outside, but feel eternally validated from the inside. Moksha is liberation from fear. ~ Devdutt Pattanaik,
161:In India, music as well as painting and the drama is considered a divine art. Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva—the Eternal Trinity—were the first musicians. The Divine Dancer Shiva is scripturally represented as having worked out the infinite modes of rhythm in His cosmic dance of universal creation, preservation and dissolution, while Brahma accentuated the time-beat with the clanging cymbals and Vishnu sounded the holy mridanga or drum. Krishna, an incarnation of Vishnu, is always shown in Hindu art with a flute, on which he plays the enrapturing song that recalls to their true home the human souls wandering in maya delusion. Saraswati, Goddess of Wisdom, is symbolised as performing on the vina, mother of all stringed instruments. The Sama Veda of India contains the world’s earliest writings on musical science. The foundation stone of Hindu music is the ragas or fixed melodic scales. The six basic ragas branch out into 126 derivative raginis (wives) and putras (sons). Each raga has a minimum of five notes: a leading note (vadi or king), a secondary note (samavadi or prime minister), helping notes (anuvadi, attendants) and a dissonant note (vivadi, the enemy). Each one of the six basic ragas has a natural correspondence with a certain hour of the day, season of the year and a presiding deity who bestows a particular potency. Thus (1) the Hindole Raga is heard only at dawn in the spring, to evoke the mood of universal love; (2) Deepaka Raga is played during the evening in summer, to arouse compassion; (3) Megha Raga is a melody for midday in the rainy season, to summon courage; (4) Bhairava Raga is played in the mornings of August, September, October, to achieve tranquillity; (5) Sri Raga is reserved for autumn twilights, to attain pure love; (6) Malkounsa Raga is heard at midnights in winter, for valour. The ancient rishis discovered these laws of sound alliance between nature and man. Because nature is an objectification of Aum, the Primal Sound or Vibratory Word, man can obtain control over all natural manifestations through the use of certain mantras or chants. ~ Paramahansa Yogananda,
162:But usually the representative influence occupies a much larger place in the life of the sadhaka. If the Yoga is guided by a received written Shastra, - some Word from the past which embodies the experience of former Yogins, - it may be practised either by personal effort alone or with the aid of a Guru. The spiritual knowledge is then gained through meditation on the truths that are taught and it is made living and conscious by their realisation in the personal experience; the Yoga proceeds by the results of prescribed methods taught in a Scripture or a tradition and reinforced and illumined by the instructions of the Master. This is a narrower practice, but safe and effective within its limits, because it follows a well-beaten track to a long familiar goal.

For the sadhaka of the integral Yoga it is necessary to remember that no written Shastra, however great its authority or however large its spirit, can be more than a partial expression of the eternal Knowledge. He will use, but never bind himself even by the greatest Scripture. Where the Scripture is profound, wide, catholic, it may exercise upon him an influence for the highest good and of incalculable importance. It may be associated in his experience with his awakening to crowning verities and his realisation of the highest experiences. His Yoga may be governed for a long time by one Scripture or by several successively, - if it is in the line of the great Hindu tradition, by the Gita, for example, the Upanishads, the Veda. Or it may be a good part of his development to include in its material a richly varied experience of the truths of many Scriptures and make the future opulent with all that is best in the past. But in the end he must take his station, or better still, if he can, always and from the beginning he must live in his own soul beyond the limitations of the word that he uses. The Gita itself thus declares that the Yogin in his progress must pass beyond the written Truth, - sabdabrahmativartate - beyond all that he has heard and all that he has yet to hear, - srotavyasya srutasya ca. For he is not the sadhaka of a book or of many books; he is a sadhaka of the Infinite. ~ Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis Of Yoga, The Four Aids,
163:Who could have thought that this tanned young man with gentle, dreamy eyes, long wavy hair parted in the middle and falling to the neck, clad in a common coarse Ahmedabad dhoti, a close-fitting Indian jacket, and old-fashioned slippers with upturned toes, and whose face was slightly marked with smallpox, was no other than Mister Aurobindo Ghose, living treasure of French, Latin and Greek?" Actually, Sri Aurobindo was not yet through with books; the Western momentum was still there; he devoured books ordered from Bombay and Calcutta by the case. "Aurobindo would sit at his desk," his Bengali teacher continues, "and read by the light of an oil lamp till one in the morning, oblivious of the intolerable mosquito bites. I would see him seated there in the same posture for hours on end, his eyes fixed on his book, like a yogi lost in the contemplation of the Divine, unaware of all that went on around him. Even if the house had caught fire, it would not have broken this concentration." He read English, Russian, German, and French novels, but also, in ever larger numbers, the sacred books of India, the Upanishads, the Bhagavad Gita, the Ramayana, although he had never been in a temple except as an observer. "Once, having returned from the College," one of his friends recalls, "Sri Aurobindo sat down, picked up a book at random and started to read, while Z and some friends began a noisy game of chess. After half an hour, he put the book down and took a cup of tea. We had already seen him do this many times and were waiting eagerly for a chance to verify whether he read the books from cover to cover or only scanned a few pages here and there. Soon the test began. Z opened the book, read a line aloud and asked Sri Aurobindo to recite what followed. Sri Aurobindo concentrated for a moment, and then repeated the entire page without a single mistake. If he could read a hundred pages in half an hour, no wonder he could go through a case of books in such an incredibly short time." But Sri Aurobindo did not stop at the translations of the sacred texts; he began to study Sanskrit, which, typically, he learned by himself. When a subject was known to be difficult or impossible, he would refuse to take anyone's word for it, whether he were a grammarian, pandit, or clergyman, and would insist upon trying it himself. The method seemed to have some merit, for not only did he learn Sanskrit, but a few years later he discovered the lost meaning of the Veda. ~ Satprem, Sri Aurobindo Or The Adventure of Consciousness,
164:KĆ«nas sudarytas iĆĄ penkiĆł skandĆł: pavidalo, jausmĆł, suvokimo, valios ir sąmonės.
Pavidalas yra fizinis kƫnas.
Jausmai - tai kĆ«no gėrio ir blogio, tiesos ir melo, liĆ«desio ir dĆŸiaugsmo, skausmo ir malonumo supratimas.
Suvokimas reiĆĄkia pomėgius. Tai neapykanta blogiui, gėrio troĆĄkimas, bėgimas nuo liĆ«desio, dĆŸiaugsmo viltis, skausmo vengimas ir malonumo troĆĄkimas.
Valia reiĆĄkia kĆ«no valdymą atsiĆŸvelgiant ÄŻ jausmus ir nuovokas - nekenčiant skausmo patirti malonumą, nekenčiant blogio daryti gera.
Sąmonė yra juslė, kuri atsirenka, kas yra gera, o kas bloga, teisinga ar neteisinga, kas yra skausmas ar malonumas, dĆŸiaugsmas ar liĆ«desys. Klausydami sąmonės suĆŸinome, jog blogis yra blogis, gėris - gėris, skausmas - skausmas, o malonumas - malonumas.
Dėl to, jog pasąmonė atrinkinėja ir formuoja nusistatymus, ji bjaurisi blogiu ir gėrisi groĆŸiu, o pagal ĆĄias nuostatas veikia fizinis kĆ«nas.
Todėl, kad egzistuoja fizinis kĆ«nas, yra ir jausmai.
Dėl to, kad yra jausmai, yra ir suvokimas.
Suvokimas savo buvimu leidĆŸia veikti valiai.
Ir todėl, kad veikia valia, yra ir sąmonė.
Turėdami sąmonę mes skiriame blogÄŻ nuo gėrio, teisybę nuo neteisybės, bjaurumą nuo groĆŸio. Ć ie dalykai kyla dėl priėmimo ir atmetimo, kaip iĆĄ minties kyla fizinis kĆ«nas. Tai lyg saulė ar mėnulis, atsispindintys vandens inde. Buda paaiĆĄkino, jog "Pavidalas - tai atsakas medĆŸiaginiam pasauliui, tai lyg mėnulio atspindys vandenyje." (IĆĄ Aukso ĆĄviesos sutros: "Budos kĆ«nas lyg tuĆĄtuma, pavidalas - tai atsakas medĆŸiaginiam pasauliui, tai lyg mėnulio atspindys vandenyje.")
Pavidalas, jausmai, suvokimas, valia ir sąmonė - nuo pavidalo iki sąmonės ir vėl atgal iki pavidalo - tai PenkiĆł skandĆł jungtis, pagal Dvylikos sąsajĆł tėkmę gyvybės grandinėje. KĆ«no atsiradimas prasideda nuo vienintelės minties mĆ«sĆł sąmonėje. (Dvylika sąsajĆł egzistencijos grandinėje - neiĆĄmanymas, veiksmas, sąmonė, pavadinimas ir forma, ĆĄeĆĄiĆł pojĆ«ÄiĆł organai, sąlytis, pojĆ«tis, troĆĄkimas, prisiriĆĄimas, egzistencija, gimimas, senatvė ir mirtis. Pradedant neiĆĄmanymu, kiekviena sąsaja veda ÄŻ kitą, tad jei paĆĄalintume neiĆĄmanymą, senatvė ir mirtis niekada neateitĆł. Taip pat tai vadinama prieĆŸasčiĆł grandine.)
Sąmonė vis dėlto irgi yra geismas. Ć is geismas, ĆĄi sąmonė, leidĆŸia atsirasti kĆ«nui. KĆ«nas yra tas kaĆŸkas, sutvirtintas aistros. Kai vienintelis plaukas nukrenta nuo galvos, kyla mintys, pilnos troĆĄkimĆł. Kai paliečiamas tik pirĆĄto galiukas, geismo mintys irgi kyla. Net kai paliečiamas kojos pirĆĄto nagas, kyla mintys, kupinos geismĆł. Visas kĆ«nas sujungtas aistros. ~ Takuan Soho,
165:Vijnana, true ideation, called ritam, truth or vedas, knowledge in the Vedas, acts in human mind by four separate functions; revelation, termed drishti, sight; inspiration termed sruti,hearing; and the two faculties of discernment, smriti, memory,which are intuition, termed ketu, and discrimination, termed daksha, division, or viveka, separation. By drishti we see ourselves the truth face to face, in its own form, nature or self-existence; by sruti we hear the name, sound or word by which the truth is expressed & immediately suggested to the knowledge; by ketu we distinguish a truth presented to us behind a veil whether of result or process, as Newton discovered the law of gravitation hidden behind the fall of the apple; by viveka we distinguish between various truths and are able to put them in their right place, order and relation to each other, or, if presented with mingled truth & error, separate the truth from the falsehood. Agni Jatavedas is termed in the Veda vivichi, he who has the viveka, who separates truth from falsehood; but this is only a special action of the fourth ideal faculty & in its wider scope, it is daksha, that which divides & rightly distributes truth in its multiform aspects. The ensemble of the four faculties is Vedas or divine knowledge. When man is rising out of the limited & error-besieged mental principle, the faculty most useful to him, most indispensable is daksha or viveka. Drishti of Vijnana transmuted into terms of mind has become observation, sruti appears as imagination, intuition as intelligent perception, viveka as reasoning & intellectual judgment and all of these are liable to the constant touch of error. Human buddhi, intellect, is a distorted shadow of the true ideative faculties. As we return from these shadows to their ideal substance viveka or daksha must be our constant companion; for viveka alone can get rid of the habit of mental error, prevent observation being replaced by false illumination, imagination by false inspiration, intelligence by false intuition, judgment & reason by false discernment. The first sign of human advance out of the anritam of mind to the ritam of the ideal faculty is the growing action of a luminous right discernment which fixes instantly on the truth, feels instantly the presence of error. The fullness, the manhana of this viveka is the foundation & safeguard of Ritam or Vedas. The first great movement of Agni Jatavedas is to transform by the divine will in mental activity his lower smoke-covered activity into the bright clearness & fullness of the ideal discernment. Agne adbhuta kratw a dakshasya manhana.
   ~ Sri Aurobindo, Hymns To The Mystic Fire, 717,
166:The key point here is Macaulay’s belief that “knowledge and reflection” on the part of the Hindus, especially the Brahmanas, would cause them to give up their age-old belief in anything Vedic in favor of Christianity. The purpose was to turn the strength of Hindu intellectuals against their own kind by utilizing their commitment to scholarship in uprooting their own tradition, which Macaulay viewed as nothing more than superstitions. His plan was to educate the Hindus to become Christians and turn them into collaborators. He persisted with this idea for fifteen years until he found the money and the right man for turning his utopian idea into reality. He needed someone who would translate and interpret the Vedic texts in such a way that the newly educated Indian elite would see the superiority of the Bible and choose that over everything else. Upon his return to England, after a good deal of effort he found a talented but impoverished young German Vedic scholar by name Friedrich Max Muller who was willing to take on the arduous job. Macaulay used his influence with the East India Company to find funds for Max Muller’s translation of the Rig Veda. Though an ardent German nationalist, Max Muller agreed for the sake of Christianity to work for the East India Company, which in reality meant the British Government of India. He also badly needed a major sponsor for his ambitious plans, which he felt he had at last found. The fact is that Max Muller was paid by the East India Company to further its colonial aims, and worked in cooperation with others who were motivated by the superiority of the German race through the white Aryan race theory. This was the genesis of his great enterprise, translating the Rig Veda with Sayana's commentary and the editing of the fifty-volume Sacred Books of the East. In this way, there can be no doubt regarding Max Muller’s initial aim and commitment to converting Indians to Christianity. Writing to his wife in 1866 he observed: “It [the Rig Veda] is the root of their religion and to show them what the root is, I feel sure, is the only way of uprooting all that has sprung from it during the last three thousand years.” Two years later he also wrote the Duke of Argyle, then acting Secretary of State for India: “The ancient religion of India is doomed. And if Christianity does not take its place, whose fault will it be?” This makes it very clear that Max Muller was an agent of the British government paid to advance its colonial interests. Nonetheless, he still remained an ardent German nationalist even while working in England. This helps explain why he used his position as a recognized Vedic and Sanskrit scholar to promote the idea of the “Aryan race” and the “Aryan nation,” a theory amongst a certain class of so-called scholars, which has maintained its influence even until today. ~ Stephen Knapp,
167:Sempre piĂč lento andava il pensieroso e si chiedeva frattanto: « Ma che Ăš dunque ciĂČ che avevi voluto apprendere dalle dottrine e dai maestri, e che essi, pur avendoti rivelato tante cose, non sono riusciti a insegnarti? ». Ed egli trovĂČ: « L'Io era, ciĂČ di cui volevo apprendere il senso e l'essenza. L'Io era, ciĂČ di cui volevo liberarmi, ciĂČ che volevo superare. Ma non potevo superarlo, potevo soltanto ingannarlo, potevo soltanto fuggire o nascondermi davanti a lui. In veritĂ , nessuna cosa al mondo ha tanto occupato i miei pensieri come questo mio Io, questo enigma ch'io vivo, d'essere uno, distinto e separato da tutti gli altri, d'essere Siddharta! E su nessuna cosa al mondo so tanto poco quanto su di me, Siddharta!».
Colpito da questo pensiero s'arrestĂČ improvvisamente nel suo lento cammino meditativo, e tosto da questo pensiero ne balzĂČ fuori un altro, che suonava: « Che io non sappia nulla di me, che Siddharta mi sia rimasto cosĂŹ estraneo e sconosciuto, questo dipende da una causa fondamentale, una sola: io avevo paura di me, prendevo la fuga davanti a me stesso! L'Atman cercavo, Brahma cercavo, e volevo smembrare e scortecciare il mio Io, per trovare nella sua sconosciuta profonditĂ  il nocciolo di tutte le cortecce, l'Atman, la vita, il divino, l'assoluto. Ma proprio io, intanto, andavo perduto a me stesso ».
Siddharta schiuse gli occhi e si guardĂČ intorno, un sorriso gli illuminĂČ il volto, e un profondo sentimento, come di risveglio da lunghi sogni, lo percorse fino alla punta dei piedi. E appena si rimise in cammino, correva in fretta, come un uomo che sa quel che ha da fare.
« Oh! » pensava respirando profondamente « ora Siddharta non me lo voglio piĂč lasciar scappare! Basta! cominciare il pensiero e la mia vita con l'Atman e col dolore del mondo! Basta! uccidermi e smembrarmi, per scoprire un segreto dietro le rovine! Non sarĂ  piĂč lo Yoga-Veda a istruirmi, nĂ© l'Atharva-Veda, nĂ© gli asceti, nĂ© alcuna dottrina. Dal mio stesso Io voglio andare a scuola, voglio conoscermi, voglio svelare quel mistero che ha nome Siddharta ».
Si guardĂČ attorno come se vedesse per la prima volta il mondo. Bello era il mondo, variopinto, raro e misterioso era il mondo! Qui era azzurro, lĂ  giallo, piĂč oltre verde, il cielo pareva fluire lentamente come i fiumi, immobili stavano il bosco e la montagna, tutto bello, tutto enigmatico e magico, e in mezzo v'era lui, Siddharta, il risvegliato, sulla strada che conduce a se stesso. Tutto ciĂČ, tutto questo giallo e azzurro, fiume e bosco penetrava per la prima volta attraverso la vista in Siddharta, non era piĂč l'incantesimo di Mara, non era piĂč il velo di Maya, non era piĂč insensata e accidentale molteplicitĂ  del mondo delle apparenze, spregevole agli occhi del Brahmino, che, tutto dedito ai suoi profondi pensieri, scarta la molteplicitĂ  e solo dell'unitĂ  va in cerca. L'azzurro era azzurro, il fiume era fiume, e anche se nell'azzurro e nel fiume vivevan nascosti come in Siddharta l'uno e il divino, tale era appunto la natura e il senso del divino, d'esser qui giallo, lĂ  azzurro, lĂ  cielo, lĂ  bosco e qui Siddharta. Il senso e l'essenza delle cose erano non in qualche cosa oltre e dietro loro, ma nelle cose stesse, in tutto.
« Come sono stato sordo e ottuso! » pensava, e camminava intanto rapidamente. «Quand'uno legge uno scritto di cui vuoi conoscere il senso, non ne disprezza i segni e le lettere, né li chiama illusione, accidente e corteccia senza valore, bensÏ li decifra, li studia e li ama, lettera per lettera. Io invece, io che volevo leggere il libro del mondo e il libro del mio proprio Io, ho disprezzato i segni e le lettere, a favore d'un significato congetturato in precedenza, ho chiamato illusione il mondo delle apparenze, ho chiamato il mio occhio e la mia lingua fenomeni accidentali e senza valore. No, tutto questo Ú finito, ora son desto, mi sono risvegliato nella realtà e oggi nasco per la prima volta. ~ Hermann Hesse,
168:I THE DARK

In a worldless timeless lightless great emptiness
   Four-faced Brahma broods.

nasad asin, no sad asit tadanim;
nasid raja no vioma paro yat.
kim avarivah? kuha? kasya sarmann?
Ambhah kim asid, gahanam gabhiram?

na mytur asid, amrtam na tarhi.
na ratria ahna asit pratekh.
anid avatam svadhaya tad ekam.
tasmad dhanyan na parah kim canasa.

tama asit tamasa gudham agre;
apraketam salilam sarvam a idam.
tuchyenabhu apihitam yad asit,
tapasas tan mahinajayataikam.

Of a sudden sea of joy surges through his heart
   The ur-god opens his eyes.
   Speech from four mouths
   Speeds from each quarter.
   Through infinite dark,
   Through limitless sky,
   Like a growing sea-storm,
   Like hope never sated,
   His Word starts to move.

Stirred by joy         his breathing quickens,
   His eight eyes quiver with flame.
His fire-matted hair    sweeps the horizon,
   Bright as a million suns.

From the towering source of the world
   In a thousand streams
Cascades the primeval blazing fountain,
   Fragmenting silence,
   Splitting its stone heart.

kamas tad agre sam avartatadhi
manaso retah prathamam yad asit?
sato bandhum asati nir avindan
hrdi pratisya kavayo manisa

II THE MUSIC

   In a universe rampant
   With new life exhalant,
   With new life exultant,
   Vishnu spreads wide
   His four-handed blessing.
   He raises his conch
   And all things quake
   At its booming sound.
   The frenzy dies down,
   The furnace expires,
   The planets douse
   Their flames with tears,
   The worlds Divine Poet
   Constructs its history,
   From wild cosmic song
   Its epic is formed.
   Stars in their orbits,
   Moon sun and planets
   He binds with his mace
   All things to Law,
   Imposes the discipline
   Of metre and rhyme.

   In the Manasa depths
   Vishnu watches -
   Beauties arise
   From the light of lotuses.
   Lakshmi strews smiles -
   Clouds show a rainbow,
   Gardens show flowers.
   The roar of Creation
   Resolves into music.
   Softness hides rigour,
   Forms cover power.

tirascino vitato rasmir esam:
adhah svid asid, upari svid asit?
retodha asan, mahimana asan;
svadha avasat, prayatih parastat.

Age after age after age is slave to a mighty rhythm
   At last the world-frame
   Tires in its body,
   Sleep in its eyes
   Slackens its structure,
   Diffuses its energy.
   From the heart of all matter
   Comes the anguished cry
   Wake, wake, great Shiva,
   Our body grows weary
   Of its law-fixed path,
   Give us new form.
   Sing our destruction,
   That we gain new life.

III THE FIRE

   The great god awakes,
   His three eyes open,
   He surveys all horizons.
He lifts his bow,      his fell pinaka,
   He pounds the world with his tread.
From first things to last  it trembles and shakes
         And shudders.
The bonds of nature are ripped.
The sky is rocked by the roar
Of a wave of ecstatic release.
   An inferno soars
   The pyre of the universe.

Shattered sun and moon, smashed stars and planets,
   Rain down from all angles,
   A blackness of all particles
   To be swallowed by flame,
   Absorbed in an instant.
   At the start of Creation
   There was a dark without origin,
   At the breaking of Creation
   There is fire without end
In an all-pervading sky-engulfing sea of burning
   Shiva shuts his three eyes.
   He begins his great trance.

ko adha veda? Ka iha pravocat,
kuta ajata, kuta iyam visrstih?
arvag deva asya visajanena:
atha ko veda yata ababhuva?

iyam visrstir yata ababhuva;
yadi vasa dadhe yadi van na:
yo asyadhyaksah parame vioman
so anga veda, yadi va na veda.

~ Rabindranath Tagore, Brahm, Viu, iva
,
169:64 Arts
   1. Geet vidya: art of singing.
   2. Vadya vidya: art of playing on musical instruments.
   3. Nritya vidya: art of dancing.
   4. Natya vidya: art of theatricals.
   5. Alekhya vidya: art of painting.
   6. Viseshakacchedya vidya: art of painting the face and body with color
   7. Tandula­kusuma­bali­vikara: art of preparing offerings from rice and flowers.
   8. Pushpastarana: art of making a covering of flowers for a bed.
   9. Dasana­vasananga­raga: art of applying preparations for cleansing the teeth, cloths and painting the body.
   10. Mani­bhumika­karma: art of making the groundwork of jewels.
   11. Aayya­racana: art of covering the bed.
   12. Udaka­vadya: art of playing on music in water.
   13. Udaka­ghata: art of splashing with water.
   14. Citra­yoga: art of practically applying an admixture of colors.
   15. Malya­grathana­vikalpa: art of designing a preparation of wreaths.
   16. Sekharapida­yojana: art of practically setting the coronet on the head.
   17. Nepathya­yoga: art of practically dressing in the tiring room.
   18. Karnapatra­bhanga: art of decorating the tragus of the ear.
   19. Sugandha­yukti: art of practical application of aromatics.
   20. Bhushana­yojana: art of applying or setting ornaments.
   21. Aindra­jala: art of juggling.
   22. Kaucumara: a kind of art.
   23. Hasta­laghava: art of sleight of hand.
   24. Citra­sakapupa­bhakshya­vikara­kriya: art of preparing varieties of delicious food.
   25. Panaka­rasa­ragasava­yojana: art of practically preparing palatable drinks and tinging draughts with red color.
   26. Suci­vaya­karma: art of needleworks and weaving.
   27. Sutra­krida: art of playing with thread.
   28. Vina­damuraka­vadya: art of playing on lute and small drum.
   29. Prahelika: art of making and solving riddles.
   30. Durvacaka­yoga: art of practicing language difficult to be answered by others.
   31. Pustaka­vacana: art of reciting books.
   32. Natikakhyayika­darsana: art of enacting short plays and anecdotes.
   33. Kavya­samasya­purana: art of solving enigmatic verses.
   34. Pattika­vetra­bana­vikalpa: art of designing preparation of shield, cane and arrows.
   35. Tarku­karma: art of spinning by spindle.
   36. Takshana: art of carpentry.
   37. Vastu­vidya: art of engineering.
   38. Raupya­ratna­pariksha: art of testing silver and jewels.
   39. Dhatu­vada: art of metallurgy.
   40. Mani­raga jnana: art of tinging jewels.
   41. Akara jnana: art of mineralogy.
   42. Vrikshayur­veda­yoga: art of practicing medicine or medical treatment, by herbs.
   43. Mesha­kukkuta­lavaka­yuddha­vidhi: art of knowing the mode of fighting of lambs, cocks and birds.
   44. Suka­sarika­pralapana: art of maintaining or knowing conversation between male and female cockatoos.
   45. Utsadana: art of healing or cleaning a person with perfumes.
   46. Kesa­marjana­kausala: art of combing hair.
   47. Akshara­mushtika­kathana: art of talking with fingers.
   48. Dharana­matrika: art of the use of amulets.
   49. Desa­bhasha­jnana: art of knowing provincial dialects.
   50. Nirmiti­jnana: art of knowing prediction by heavenly voice.
   51. Yantra­matrika: art of mechanics.
   52. Mlecchita­kutarka­vikalpa: art of fabricating barbarous or foreign sophistry.
   53. Samvacya: art of conversation.
   54. Manasi kavya­kriya: art of composing verse
   55. Kriya­vikalpa: art of designing a literary work or a medical remedy.
   56. Chalitaka­yoga: art of practicing as a builder of shrines called after him.
   57. Abhidhana­kosha­cchando­jnana: art of the use of lexicography and meters.
   58. Vastra­gopana: art of concealment of cloths.
   59. Dyuta­visesha: art of knowing specific gambling.
   60. Akarsha­krida: art of playing with dice or magnet.
   61. Balaka­kridanaka: art of using children's toys.
   62. Vainayiki vidya: art of enforcing discipline.
   63. Vaijayiki vidya: art of gaining victory.
   64. Vaitaliki vidya: art of awakening master with music at dawn.
   ~ Nik Douglas and Penny Slinger, Sexual Secrets,

IN CHAPTERS [150/649]



  326 Integral Yoga
   67 Yoga
   21 Hinduism
   14 Poetry
   11 Philosophy
   10 Occultism
   3 Psychology
   3 Mysticism
   2 Sufism
   1 Theosophy
   1 Thelema
   1 Science
   1 Philsophy
   1 Mythology
   1 Education
   1 Christianity


  301 Sri Aurobindo
  100 Nolini Kanta Gupta
   59 The Mother
   58 Satprem
   45 Sri Ramakrishna
   18 A B Purani
   17 Vyasa
   12 Swami Vivekananda
   10 Aldous Huxley
   9 Swami Krishnananda
   8 Sri Ramana Maharshi
   8 Aleister Crowley
   7 George Van Vrekhem
   3 Walt Whitman
   3 Kabir
   3 Henry David Thoreau
   2 Swami Sivananda Saraswati
   2 Ramprasad
   2 Patanjali
   2 Nirodbaran
   2 Mahendranath Gupta
   2 Ken Wilber
   2 Carl Jung


   85 Record of Yoga
   46 The Life Divine
   44 The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna
   36 The Synthesis Of Yoga
   22 Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 07
   22 Agenda Vol 02
   19 Essays On The Gita
   19 Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02
   18 Evening Talks With Sri Aurobindo
   17 Vishnu Purana
   17 Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01
   16 Letters On Yoga II
   16 Essays In Philosophy And Yoga
   14 The Secret Of The Veda
   12 Sri Aurobindo or the Adventure of Consciousness
   12 Isha Upanishad
   12 Essays Divine And Human
   12 Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 04
   11 Talks
   11 Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 03
   10 The Perennial Philosophy
   9 Vedic and Philological Studies
   9 The Study and Practice of Yoga
   9 Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 08
   8 Kena and Other Upanishads
   7 Preparing for the Miraculous
   6 The Secret Doctrine
   6 Magick Without Tears
   6 Letters On Yoga I
   6 Bhakti-Yoga
   5 On Thoughts And Aphorisms
   5 Letters On Yoga IV
   5 Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 05
   5 Agenda Vol 03
   5 Agenda Vol 01
   4 Raja-Yoga
   4 Hymns to the Mystic Fire
   4 Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 06
   3 Whitman - Poems
   3 Walden
   3 The Integral Yoga
   3 Questions And Answers 1956
   3 On the Way to Supermanhood
   3 Letters On Yoga III
   3 Agenda Vol 04
   2 Writings In Bengali and Sanskrit
   2 Words Of Long Ago
   2 Twelve Years With Sri Aurobindo
   2 The Human Cycle
   2 Songs of Kabir
   2 Sex Ecology Spirituality
   2 Questions And Answers 1957-1958
   2 Questions And Answers 1955
   2 Questions And Answers 1950-1951
   2 Patanjali Yoga Sutras
   2 Liber ABA
   2 Agenda Vol 06
   2 Agenda Vol 05


00.02 - Mystic Symbolism, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   We can make a distinction here between two types of expression which we have put together indiscriminately, figures and symbols. Figures, we may say, are those that are constructed by the rational mind, the intellect; they are mere metaphors and similes and are not organically related to the thing experienced, but put round it as a robe that can be dropped or changed without affecting the experience itself. Thus, for example, when the Upanishad says, tmnam rathinam viddhi (Know that the soul is the master of the chariot who sits within it) or indriyi haynhu (The senses, they say, are the horses), we have here only a comparison or analogy that is common and natural to the poetic manner. The particular figure or simile used is not inevitable to the idea or experience that it seeks to express, its part and parcel. On the other hand, take this Upanishadic perception: hirayamayena patrea satyasyphitam mukham (The face of the Truth lies hidden under the golden orb). Here the symbol is not mere analogy or comparison, a figure; it is one with the very substance of the experience the two cannot be separated. Or when the Vedas speak of the kindling of the Fire, the rushing of the waters or the rise of the Dawn, the images though taken from the material world, are not used for the sake of mere comparison, but they are the embodiments, the living forms of truths experienced in another world.
   When a Mystic refers to the Solar Light or to the Fire the light, for example, that struck down Saul and transformed him into Saint Paul or the burning bush that visited Moses, it is not the physical or material object that he means and yet it is that in a way. It is the materialization of something that is fundamentally not material: some movement in an inner consciousness precipitates itself into the region of the senses and takes from out of the material the form commensurable with its nature that it finds there.

00.03 - Upanishadic Symbolism, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Now, as regards the interpretation of the story cited, should not a suspicion arise naturally at the very outset that the dog of the story is not a dog but represents something else? First, a significant epithet is given to itwhite; secondly, although it asks for food, it says that Om is its food and Om is its drink. In the Vedas we have some references to dogs. Yama has twin dogs that "guard the path and have powerful vision." They are his messengers, "they move widely and delight in power and possess the vast strength." The Vedic Rishis pray to them for Power and Bliss and for the vision of the Sun1. There is also the Hound of Heaven, Sarama, who comes down and discovers the luminous cows stolen and hidden by the Panis in their dark caves; she is the path-finder for Indra, the deliverer.
   My suggestion is that the dog is a symbol of the keen sight of Intuition, the unfailing perception of direct knowledge. With this clue the Upanishadic story becomes quite sensible and clear and not mere abracadabra. To the aspirant for Knowledge came first a purified power of direct understanding, an Intuition of fundamental value, and this brought others of the same species in its train. They were all linked together organically that is the significance of the circle, and formed a rhythmic utterance and expression of the supreme truth (Om). It is also to be noted that they came and met at dawn to chant, the Truth. Dawn is the opening and awakening of the consciousness to truths that come from above and beyond.
   It may be asked why the dog has been chosen as the symbol of Intuition. In the Vedas, the cow and the horse also play a large part; even the donkey and the frog have their own assigned roles. These objects are taken from the environment of ordinary life, and are those that are most familiar to the external consciousness, through which the inner experiences have to express themselves, if they are to be expressed at all. These material objects represent various kinds of forces and movements and subtle and occult and spiritual dynamisms. Strictly speaking, however, symbols are not chosen in a subtle or spiritual experience, that is to say, they are not arbitrarily selected and constructed by the conscious intelligence. They form part of a dramatization (to use a term of the Freudian psychology of dreams), a psychological alchemy, whose method and process and rationale are very obscure, which can be penetrated only by the vision of a third eye.
   I. The Several Lights
  --
   Indeed, it was to this godhead that Nachiketas turned and he wanted to know of it and find it, when faith seized on his pure heart and he aspired for the higher spiritual life. The very opening hymn of the Rig Veda, too, is addressed to Agni, who is invoked as the vicar seated in the front of the sacrifice, the giver of the supreme gifts.
   King Yama initiated Nachiketas into the mystery of Fire Worship and spoke of three fires that have to be kindled if one aspires to enter the heaven of immortality.
  --
   Of the three fires one is the upholderhe who gives the firm foundation, the stable house where the Sacrifice is performed and Truth realised; the second is the Knower, often called in the Veda jtaved, who guides and directs; and the third the Doer, the effective Power, the driving Energyvaivnara.
   V. The Five Great Elements
  --
   TheChhandyogya12 gives a whole typal scheme of this universal reality and explains how to realise it and what are the results of the experience. The Universal Brahman means the cosmic movement, the cyclic march of things and events taken in its global aspect. The typical movement that symbolises and epitomises the phenomenon, embodies the truth, is that of the sun. The movement consists of five stages which are called the fivefold sma Sma means the equal Brahman that is ever present in all, the Upanishad itself says deriving the word from sama It is Sma also because it is a rhythmic movement, a cadencea music of the spheres. And a rhythmic movement, in virtue of its being a wave, consists of these five stages: (i) the start, (ii) the rise, (iii) the peak, (iv) the decline and (v) the fall. Now the sun follows this curve and marks out the familiar divisions of the day: dawn, forenoon, noon, afternoon and sunset. Sometimes two other stages are added, one at each end, one of preparation and another of final lapse the twilights with regard to the sun and then ,we have seven instead of five smas Like the Sun, the Fire that is to say, the sacrificial Firecan also be seen in its fivefold cyclic movement: (i) the lighting, (ii) the smoke, (iii) the flame, (iv) smouldering and finally (v) extinction the fuel as it is rubbed to produce the fire and the ashes may be added as the two supernumerary stages. Or again, we may take the cycle of five seasons or of the five worlds or of the deities that control these worlds. The living wealth of this earth is also symbolised in a quintetgoat and sheep and cattle and horse and finally man. Coming to the microcosm, we have in man the cycle of his five senses, basis of all knowledge and activity. For the macrocosm, to I bring out its vast extra-human complexity, the Upanishad refers to a quintet, each term of which is again a trinity: (i) the threefold Veda, the Divine Word that is the origin of creation, (ii) the three worlds or fieldsearth, air-belt or atmosphere and space, (iii) the three principles or deities ruling respectively these worldsFire, Air and Sun, (iv) their expressions, emanations or embodimentsstars and birds and light-rays, and finally, (v) the original inhabitants of these worldsto earth belong the reptiles, to the mid-region the Gandharvas and to heaven the ancient Fathers.
   Now, this is the All, the Universal. One has to realise it and possess in one's consciousness. And that can be done only in one way: one has to identify oneself with it, be one with it, become it. Thus by losing one's individuality one lives the life universal; the small lean separate life is enlarged and moulded in the rhythm of the Rich and the Vast. It is thus that man shares in the consciousness and energy that inspire and move and sustain the cosmos. The Upanishad most emphatically enjoins that one must not decry this cosmic godhead or deny any of its elements, not even such as are a taboo to the puritan mind. It is in and through an unimpaired global consciousness that one attains the All-Life and lives uninterruptedly and perennially: Sarvamanveti jyok jvati.
   Still the Upanishad says this is not the final end. There is yet a higher status of reality and consciousness to which one has to rise. For beyond the Cosmos lies the Transcendent. The Upanishad expresses this truth and experience in various symbols. The cosmic reality, we have seen, is often conceived as a septenary, a unity of seven elements, principles and worlds. Further to give it its full complex value, it is considered not as a simple septet, but a threefold heptad the whole gamut, as it were, consisting of 21 notes or syllables. The Upanishad says, this number does not exhaust the entire range; I for there is yet a 22nd place. This is the world beyond the Sun, griefless and deathless, the supreme Selfhood. The Veda I also sometimes speaks of the integral reality as being represented by the number 100 which is 99 + I; in other words, 99 represents the cosmic or universal, the unity being the reality beyond, the Transcendent.
   Elsewhere the Upanishad describes more graphically this truth and the experience of it. It is said there that the sun has fivewe note the familiar fivemovements of rising and setting: (i) from East to West, (ii) from South to North, (iii) from West to East, (iv) from North to South and (v) from abovefrom the Zenithdownward. These are the five normal and apparent movements. But there is a sixth one; rather it is not a movement, but a status, where the sun neither rises nor sets, but is always visible fixed in the same position.
  --
   It would be interesting to know what the five ranges or levels or movements of consciousness exactly are that make up the Universal Brahman described in this passage. It is the mystic knowledge, the Upanishad says, of the secret delight in thingsmadhuvidy. The five ranges are the five fundamental principles of delightimmortalities, the Veda would say that form the inner core of the pyramid of creation. They form a rising tier and are ruled respectively by the godsAgni, Indra, Varuna, Soma and Brahmawith their emanations and instrumental personalities the Vasus, the Rudras, the Adityas, the Maruts and the Sadhyas. We suggest that these refer to the five well-known levels of being, the modes or nodi of consciousness or something very much like them. The Upanishad speaks elsewhere of the five sheaths. The six Chakras of Tantric system lie in the same line. The first and the basic mode is the physical and the ascent from the physical: Agni and the Vasus are always intimately connected with the earth and -the earth-principles (it can be compared with the Muladhara of the Tantras). Next, second in the line of ascent is the Vital, the centre of power and dynamism of which the Rudras are the deities and Indra the presiding God (cf. Swadhishthana of the Tantras the navel centre). Indra, in the Vedas, has two aspects, one of knowledge and vision and the other of dynamic force and drive. In the first aspect he is more often considered as the Lord of the Mind, of the Luminous Mind. In the present passage, Indra is taken in his second aspect and instead of the Maruts with whom he is usually invoked has the Rudras as his agents and associates.
   The third in the line of ascension is the region of Varuna and the Adityas, that is to say, of the large Mind and its lightsperhaps it can be connected with Tantric Ajnachakra. The fourth is the domain of Soma and the Marutsthis seems to be the inner heart, the fount of delight and keen and sweeping aspirations the Anahata of the Tantras. The fifth is the region of the crown of the head, the domain of Brahma and the Sadhyas: it is the Overmind status from where comes the descending inflatus, the creative Maya of Brahma. And when you go beyond, you pass into the ultimate status of the Sun, the reality absolute, the Transcendent which is indescribable, unseizable, indeterminate, indeterminable, incommensurable; and once there, one never returns, neverna ca punarvartate na ca punarvartate.
  --
   "How many Gods are there?" Yajnavalkya was once asked.13 The Rishi answered, they say there are three thousand and three of them, or three hundred and three, or again, thirty-three; it may be said too there are six or three or two or one and a half or one finally. Indeed as the Upanishad says elsewhere, it is the One Unique who wished to be many: and all the gods are the various glories (mahim) or emanations of the One Divine. The ancient of ancient Rishis had declared long long ago, in the earliest Veda, that there is one indivisible Reality, the seers name it in various ways.
   In Yajnavalkya's enumeration, however, it is to be noted, first of all, that he stresses on the number three. The principle of triplicity is of very wide application: it permeates all fields of consciousness and is evidently based upon a fundamental fact of reality. It seems to embody a truth of synthesis and comprehension, points to the order and harmony that reigns in the cosmos, the spheric music. The metaphysical, that is to say, the original principles that constitute existence are the well-known triplets: (i) the superior: Sat, Chit, Ananda; and (ii) the inferior: Body, Life and Mindthis being a reflection or translation or concretisation of the former. We can see also here how the dual principle comes in, the twin godhead or the two gods to which Yajnavalkya refers. The same principle is found in the conception of Ardhanarishwara, Male and Female, Purusha-Prakriti. The Upanishad says 14 yet again that the One original Purusha was not pleased at being alone, so for a companion he created out of himself the original Female. The dual principle signifies creation, the manifesting activity of the Reality. But what is this one and a half to which Yajnavalkya refers? It simply means that the other created out of the one is not a wholly separate, independent entity: it is not an integer by itself, as in the Manichean system, but that it is a portion, a fraction of the One. And in the end, in the ultimate analysis, or rather synthesis, there is but one single undivided and indivisible unity. The thousands and hundreds, very often mentioned also in the Rig Veda, are not simply multiplications of the One, a graphic description of its many-sidedness; it indicates also the absolute fullness, the complete completeness (prasya pram) of the Reality. It includes and comprehends all and is a rounded totality, a full circle. The hundred-gated and the thousand-pillared cities of which the ancient Rishis chanted are formations and embodiments of consciousness human and divine, are realities whole and entire englobing all the layers and grades of consciousness.
   Besides this metaphysics there is also an occult aspect in numerology of which Pythagoras was a well-known adept and in which the Vedic Rishis too seem to take special delight. The multiplication of numbers represents in a general way the principle of emanation. The One has divided and subdivided itself, but not in a haphazard way: it is not like the chaotic pulverisation of a piece of stone by hammer-blows. The process of division and subdivision follows a pattern almost as neat and methodical as a genealogical tree. That is to say, the emanations form a hierarchy. At the top, the apex of the pyramid, stands the one supreme Godhead. That Godhead is biune in respect of manifestation the Divine and his creative Power. This two-in-one reality may be considered, according to one view of creation, as dividing into three forms or aspects the well-known Brahma, Vishnu and Rudra of Hindu mythology. These may be termed the first or primary emanations.
  --
   Rig Veda, X. 14-11, 12.
   Brihadaranyaka Upanishad, V. 8. i.
  --
   Divva cakurtatamRig Veda
   Katha, I.1.14.

00.04 - The Beautiful in the Upanishads, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Only, to some perhaps the beauty may not appear as evident and apparent. The Spirit of beauty that resides in the Upanishadic consciousness is more retiring and reticent. It dwells in its own privacy, in its own home, as it were, and therefore chooses to be bare and austere, simple and sheer. Beauty means usually the beauty of form, even if it be not always the decorative, ornamental and sumptuous form. The early Vedas aimed at the perfect form (surpaktnum), the faultless expression, the integral and complete embodiment; the gods they envisaged and invoked were gleaming powers carved out of harmony and beauty and figured close to our modes of apprehension (spyan). But the Upanishads came to lay stress upon what is beyond the form, what the eye cannot see nor the vision reflect:
   na sandi tihati rpamasya

00.05 - A Vedic Conception of the Poet, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   'Kavi' is an invariable epithet of the gods. The Vedas mean by this attribute to bring out a most fundamental character, an inalienable dharma of the heavenly host. All the gods are poets; and a human being can become a poet only in so far as he attains to the nature and status of a god. Who is then a kavi? The Poet is he who by his poetic power raises forms of beauty in heavenkavi kavitv divi rpam sajat.1Thus the essence of poetic power is to fashion divine Beauty, to reveal heavenly forms. What is this Heaven whose forms the Poet discovers and embodies? HeavenDyaushas a very definite connotation in the Veda. It means the luminous or divine Mind 2the mind purified of its obscurity and limitations, due to subjection to the external senses, thus opening to the higher Light, receiving and recording faithfully the deeper and vaster movements and vibrations of the Truth, giving them a form, a perfect body of the right thought and the right word. Indra is the lord of this world and he can be approached only with an enkindled intelligence, ddhay man,3a faultless understanding, sumedh. He is the supreme Artisan of the poetic power,Tash, the maker of perfect forms, surpa ktnum.4 All the gods turn towards Indra and become gods and poets, attain their Great Names of Supreme Beauty.5 Indra is also the master of the senses, indriyas, who are his hosts. It is through this mind and the senses that the poetic creation has to be manifested. The mind spreads out wide the Poet's weaving;6 the poet is the priest who calls down and works out the right thinking in the sacrificial labour of creation.7 But that creation is made in and through the inner mind and the inner senses that are alive to the subtle formation of a vaster knowledge.8 The poet envisages the golden forms fashioned out of the very profundity of the consciousness.9 For the substance, the material on which the Poet works, is Truth. The seat of the Truth the poets guard, they uphold the supreme secret Names.10 The poet has the expressive utterance, the creative word; the poet is a poet by his poetic creation-the shape faultlessly wrought out that unveils and holds the Truth.11The form of beauty is the body of the Truth.
   The poet is a trinity in himself. A triune consciousness forms his personality. First of all, he is the Knower-the Seer of the Truth, kavaya satyadrara. He has the direct vision, the luminous intelligence, the immediate perception.12 A subtle and profound and penetrating consciousness is his,nigam, pracetas; his is the eye of the Sun,srya caku.13 He secures an increased being through his effulgent understanding.14 In the second place, the Poet is not only Seer but Doer; he is knower as well as creator. He has a dynamic knowledge and his vision itself is power, ncak;15 he is the Seer-Will,kavikratu.16 He has the blazing radiance of the Sun and is supremely potent in his self-Iuminousness.17 The Sun is the light and the energy of the Truth. Even like the Sun the Poet gives birth to the Truth, srya satyasava, satyya satyaprasavya. But the Poet as Power is not only the revealer or creator,savit, he is also the builder or fashioner,ta, and he is the organiser,vedh is personality. First of all, he is the Knower-the Seer of the Truth, kavaya satyadrara, of the Truth.18 As Savita he manifests the Truth, as Tashta he gives a perfected body and form to the Truth, and as Vedha he maintains the Truth in its dynamic working. The effective marshalling and organisation of the Truth is what is called Ritam, the Right; it is also called Dharma,19 the Law or the Rhythm, the ordered movement and invincible execution of the Truth. The Poet pursues the Path of the Right;20 it is he who lays out the Path for the march of the Truth, the progress of the Sacrifice.21 He is like a fast steed well-yoked, pressing forward;22 he is the charger that moves straight and unswerving and carries us beyond 23into the world of felicity.
  --
   Rig Veda, X. 124. 7
   The Secret of the Veda, by Sri Aurobindo
   Rig Veda, III. 38. 1.
   Rig Veda., I. 4.1.
   Rig Veda., III. 54. 17.
   Rig Veda., X. 5. 3.
   Rig Veda., I. 151. 7.
   Rig Veda., IV. 16. 3.
   Rig Veda.,VIII. 8. 2.
   Rig Veda, X. 5. 2.
   Rig Veda, IX. 96. 17.
   Rig Veda., I. 71. 10; kavim ketum-VII. 6. 2.
   Rig Veda., IX. 10. 8-9.
   Rig. Veda, VIII. 44.12.
   Rig. Veda., III. 54. 6.
   Rig. Veda.,I. 1. 5.
   Rig Veda., VII.59. 11.
   Rig Veda., V. 52. 13.
   Rig Veda., III. 38. 2.
   Rig Veda., VIII. 8. 23.
   Taittiriya Samhita, III. 55. 3.
   Rig Veda, III. 38. 1.
   Rig Veda., IV. 16. 11*.
   Rig Veda, V. 5. 2.
   Rig Veda, IX. 25. 2.
   Rig Veda, IX. 25. 6.
   Rig Veda, IX. 25. 4.
   Rig Veda, IX. 25. 5.
   Rig Veda.,III. 54. 6.
   Rig Veda, 111. 38. 2. 3.
   Rig Veda, 1. 24. 1.
   The Vedic term Kavi means literally 'a seer', 'one who has the vision', as the word 'poet' means etymologically 'a doer', 'a creator'. I have combined the two senses to equate the terms and bring out the meaning involved in their more current acceptation.

0.00 - INTRODUCTION, #The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna, #Sri Ramakrishna, #Hinduism
   The Christian missionaries gave the finishing touch to the process of transformation. They ridiculed as relics of a barbarous age the images and rituals of the Hindu religion. They tried to persuade India that the teachings of her saints and seers were the cause of her downfall, that her Vedas, Puranas, and other scriptures were filled with superstition. Christianity, they maintained, had given the white races position and power in this world and assurance of happiness in the next; therefore Christianity was the best of all religions. Many intelligent young Hindus became converted. The man in the street was confused. The majority of the educated grew materialistic in their mental outlook. Everyone living near Calcutta or the other strong-holds of Western culture, even those who attempted to cling to the orthodox traditions of Hindu society, became infected by the new uncertainties and the new beliefs.
   But the soul of India was to be resuscitated through a spiritual awakening. We hear the first call of this renascence in the spirited retort of the young Gadadhar: "Brother, what shall I do with a mere bread-winning education?"
  --
   The whole symbolic world is represented in the temple garden — the Trinity of the Nature Mother (Kali), the Absolute (Siva), and Love (Radhakanta), the Arch spanning heaven and earth. The terrific Goddess of the Tantra, the soul-enthralling Flute-Player of the Bhagavata, and the Self-absorbed Absolute of the Vedas live together, creating the greatest synthesis of religions. All aspects of Reality are represented there. But of this divine household, Kali is the pivot, the sovereign Mistress. She is Prakriti, the Procreatrix, Nature, the Destroyer, the Creator. Nay, She is something greater and deeper still for those who have eyes to see. She is the Universal Mother, "my Mother" as Ramakrishna would say, the All-powerful, who reveals Herself to Her children under different aspects and Divine Incarnations, the Visible God, who leads the elect to the Invisible Reality; and if it so pleases Her, She takes away the last trace of ego from created beings and merges it in the consciousness of the Absolute, the undifferentiated God. Through Her grace "the finite ego loses itself in the illimitable Ego — Atman — Brahman". (Romain Holland, Prophets of the New India, p. 11.)
   Rani Rasmani spent a fortune for the construction of the temple garden and another fortune for its dedication ceremony, which took place on May 31, 1855.
  --
   According to the Tantra, the Ultimate Reality is Chit, or Consciousness, which is identical with Sat, or Being, and with Ananda, or Bliss. This Ultimate Reality, Satchidananda, Existence-Knowledge-Bliss Absolute, is identical with the Reality preached in the Vedas. And man is identical with this Reality; but under the influence of maya, or illusion, he has forgotten his true nature. He takes to be real a merely apparent world of subject and object, and this error is the cause of his bondage and suffering. The goal of spiritual discipline is the rediscovery of his true identity with the divine Reality.
   For the achievement of this goal the Vedanta prescribes an austere negative method of discrimination and renunciation, which can be followed by only a few individuals endowed with sharp intelligence and unshakable will-power. But Tantra takes into consideration the natural weakness of human beings, their lower appetites, and their love for the concrete. It combines philosophy with rituals, meditation with ceremonies, renunciation with enjoyment. The underlying purpose is gradually to train the aspirant to meditate on his identity with the Ultimate.
   The average man wishes to enjoy the material objects of the world. Tantra bids him enjoy these, but at the same time discover in them the presence of God. Mystical rites are prescribed by which, slowly, the sense-objects become spiritualized and sense attraction is transformed into a love of God. So the very "bonds" of man are turned into "releasers". The very poison that kills is transmuted into the elixir of life. Outward renunciation is not necessary. Thus the aim of Tantra is to sublimate bhoga, or enjoyment into yoga, or union with Consciousness. For, according to this philosophy, the world with all its manifestations is nothing but the sport of Siva and Sakti, the Absolute and Its inscrutable Power.
  --
   To develop the devotee's love for God, Vaishnavism humanizes God. God is to be regarded as the devotee's Parent, Master, Friend, Child, Husband, or Sweetheart, each succeeding relationship representing an intensification of love. These bhavas, or attitudes toward God, are known as santa, dasya, sakhya, vatsalya, and madhur. The rishis of the Vedas, Hanuman, the cow-herd boys of Vrindavan, Rama's mother Kausalya, and Radhika, Krishna's sweetheart, exhibited, respectively, the most perfect examples of these forms. In the ascending scale the-glories of God are gradually forgotten and the devotee realizes more and more the intimacy of divine communion. Finally he regards himself as the mistress of his Beloved, and no artificial barrier remains to separate him from his Ideal. No social or moral obligation can bind to the earth his soaring spirit. He experiences perfect union with the Godhead. Unlike the Vedantist, who strives to transcend all varieties of the subject-object relationship, a devotee of the Vaishnava path wishes to retain both his own individuality and the personality of God. To him God is not an intangible Absolute, but the Purushottama, the Supreme Person.
   While practising the discipline of the madhur bhava, the male devotee often regards himself as a woman, in order to develop the most intense form of love for Sri Krishna, the only purusha, or man, in the universe. This assumption of the attitude of the opposite sex has a deep psychological significance. It is a matter of common experience that an idea may be cultivated to such an intense degree that every idea alien to it is driven from the mind. This peculiarity of the mind may be utilized for the subjugation of the lower desires and the development of the spiritual nature. Now, the idea which is the basis of all desires and passions in a man is the conviction of his indissoluble association with a male body. If he can inoculate himself thoroughly with the idea that he is a woman, he can get rid of the desires peculiar to his male body. Again, the idea that he is a woman may in turn be made to give way to another higher idea, namely, that he is neither man nor woman, but the Impersonal Spirit. The Impersonal Spirit alone can enjoy real communion with the Impersonal God. Hence the highest est realization of the Vaishnava draws close to the transcendental experience of the Vedantist.
   A beautiful expression of the Vaishnava worship of God through love is to be found in the Vrindavan episode of the Bhagavata. The gopis, or milk-maids, of Vrindavan regarded the six-year-old Krishna as their Beloved. They sought no personal gain or happiness from this love. They surrendered to Krishna their bodies, minds, and souls. Of all the gopis, Radhika, or Radha, because of her intense love for Him, was the closest to Krishna. She manifested mahabhava and was united with her Beloved. This union represents, through sensuous language, a supersensuous experience.
  --
   Totapuri was the bearer of a philosophy new to Sri Ramakrishna, the non-dualistic Vedanta philosophy, whose conclusions Totapuri had experienced in his own life. This ancient Hindu system designates the Ultimate Reality as Brahman, also described as Satchidananda, Existence-Knowledge-Bliss Absolute. Brahman is the only Real Existence. In It there is no time, no space, no causality, no multiplicity. But through maya, Its inscrutable Power, time, space, and causality are created and the One appears to break into the many. The eternal Spirit appears as a manifold of individuals endowed with form and subject to the conditions of time. The Immortal becomes a victim of birth and death. The Changeless undergoes change. The sinless Pure Soul, hypnotized by Its own maya, experiences the joys of heaven and the pains of hell. But these experiences based on the duality of the subject-object relationship are unreal. Even the vision of a Personal God
   is, ultimately speaking, as illusory as the experience of any other object. Man attains his liberation, therefore, by piercing the veil of maya and rediscovering his total identity with Brahman. Knowing himself to be one with the Universal Spirit, he realizes ineffable Peace. Only then does he go beyond the fiction of birth and death; only then does he become immortal. 'And this is the ultimate goal of all religions — to dehypnotize the soul now hypnotized by its own ignorance.
   The path of the Vedantic discipline is the path of negation, "neti", in which, by stern determination, all that is unreal is both negated and renounced. It is the path of jnana, knowledge, the direct method of realizing the Absolute. After the negation of everything relative, including the discriminating ego itself, the aspirant merges in the One without a Second, in the bliss of nirvikalpa samadhi, where subject and object are alike dissolved. The soul goes beyond the realm of thought. The domain of duality is transcended. Maya is left behind with all its changes and modifications. The Real Man towers above the delusions of creation, preservation, and destruction. An avalanche of indescribable Bliss sweeps away all relative ideas of pain and pleasure, good and evil. There shines in the heart the glory of the Eternal Brahman, Existence-Knowledge-Bliss Absolute. Knower, knowledge, and known are dissolved in the Ocean of one eternal Consciousness; love, lover, and beloved merge in the unbounded Sea of supreme Felicity; birth, growth, and death vanish in infinite Existence. All doubts and misgivings are quelled for ever; the oscillations of the mind are stopped; the momentum of past actions is exhausted. Breaking down the ridge-pole of the tabernacle in which the soul has made its abode for untold ages, stilling the body, calming the mind, drowning the ego, the sweet joy of Brahman wells up in that superconscious state. Space disappears into nothingness, time is swallowed in eternity, and causation becomes a dream of the past. Only Existence is. Ah! Who can describe what the soul then feels in its communion with the Self?
   Even when man descends from this dizzy height, he is devoid of ideas of "I" and "mine"; he looks on the body as a mere shadow, an outer sheath encasing the soul. He does not dwell on the past, takes no thought for the future, and looks with indifference on the present. He surveys everything in the world with an eye of equality; he is no longer touched by the infinite variety of phenomena; he no longer reacts to pleasure and pain. He remains unmoved whether he — that is to say, his body — is worshipped by the good or tormented by the wicked; for he realizes that it is the one Brahman that manifests Itself through everything. The impact of such an experience devastates the body and mind. Consciousness becomes blasted, as it were, with an excess of Light. In the Vedanta books it is said that after the experience of nirvikalpa samadhi the body drops off like a dry leaf. Only those who are born with a special mission for the world can return
   from this height to the valleys of normal life. They live and move in the world for the welfare of mankind. They are invested with a supreme spiritual power. A divine glory shines through them.
  --
   Totapuri arrived at the Dakshineswar temple garden toward the end of 1864. Perhaps born in the Punjab, he was the head of a monastery in that province of India and claimed leadership of seven hundred sannyasis. Trained from early youth in the disciplines of the Advaita Vedanta, he looked upon the world as an illusion. The gods and goddesses of the dualistic worship were to him mere fantasies of the deluded mind. Prayers, ceremonies, rites, and rituals had nothing to do with true religion, and about these he was utterly indifferent. Exercising self-exertion and unshakable will-power, he had liberated himself from attachment to the sense-objects of the relative universe. For forty years he had practised austere discipline on the bank of the sacred Narmada and had finally realized his identity with the Absolute. Thenceforward he roamed in the world as an unfettered soul, a lion free from the cage. Clad in a loin-cloth, he spent his days under the canopy of the sky alike in storm and sunshine, feeding his body on the slender pittance of alms. He had been visiting the estuary of the Ganges. On his return journey along the bank of the sacred river, led by the inscrutable Divine Will, he stopped at Dakshineswar.
   Totapuri, discovering at once that Sri Ramakrishna was prepared to be a student of Vedanta, asked to initiate him into its mysteries. With the permission of the Divine Mother, Sri Ramakrishna agreed to the proposal. But Totapuri explained that only a sannyasi could receive the teaching of Vedanta. Sri Ramakrishna agreed to renounce the world, but with the stipulation that the ceremony of his initiation into the monastic order be performed in secret, to spare the feelings of his old mother, who had been living with him at Dakshineswar.
   On the appointed day, in the small hours of the morning, a fire was lighted in the Panchavati. Totapuri and Sri Ramakrishna sat before it. The flame played on their faces. "Ramakrishna was a small brown man with a short beard and beautiful eyes, long dark eyes, full of light, obliquely set and slightly veiled, never very wide open, but seeing half-closed a great distance both outwardly and inwardly. His mouth was open over his white teeth in a bewitching smile, at once affectionate and mischievous. Of medium height, he was thin to emaciation and extremely delicate. His temperament was high-strung, for he was supersensitive to all the winds of joy and sorrow, both moral and physical. He was indeed a living reflection of all that happened before the mirror of his eyes, a two-sided mirror, turned both out and in." (Romain Rolland, Prophets of the New India, pp. 38-9.) Facing him, the other rose like a rock. He was very tall and robust, a sturdy and tough oak. His constitution and mind were of iron. He was the strong leader of men.
  --
   The teacher and the disciple repaired to the meditation room near by. Totapuri began to impart to Sri Ramakrishna the great truths of Vedanta.
   "Brahman", he said, "is the only Reality, ever pure, ever illumined, ever free, beyond the limits of time, space, and causation. Though apparently divided by names and forms through the inscrutable power of maya, that enchantress who makes the impossible possible, Brahman is really One and undivided. When a seeker merges in the beatitude of samadhi, he does not perceive time and space or name and form, the offspring of maya. Whatever is within the domain of maya is unreal. Give it up. Destroy the prison-house of name and form and rush out of it with the strength of a lion. Dive deep in search of the Self and realize It through samadhi. You will find the world of name and form vanishing into void, and the puny ego dissolving in Brahman-Consciousness. You will realize your identity with Brahman, Existence-Knowledge-Bliss Absolute." Quoting the Upanishad, Totapuri said: "That knowledge is shallow by which one sees or hears or knows another
  --
   Totapuri asked the disciple to withdraw his mind from all objects of the relative world, including the gods and goddesses, and to concentrate on the Absolute. But the task was not easy even for Sri Ramakrishna. He found it impossible to take his mind beyond Kali, the Divine Mother of the Universe. "After the initiation", Sri Ramakrishna once said, describing the event, "Nangta began to teach me the various conclusions of the Advaita Vedanta and asked me to withdraw the mind completely from all objects and dive deep into the Atman. But in spite of all my attempts I could not altogether cross the realm of name and form and bring my mind to the unconditioned state. I had no difficulty in taking the mind from all the objects of the world. But the radiant and too familiar figure of the Blissful Mother, the Embodiment of the essence of Pure Consciousness, appeared before me as a living reality. Her bewitching smile prevented me from passing into the Great Beyond. Again and again I tried, but She stood in my way every time. In despair I said to Nangta: 'It is hopeless. I cannot raise my mind to the unconditioned state and come face to face with Atman.' He grew excited and sharply said: 'What? You can't do it? But you have to.' He cast his eyes around. Finding a piece of glass he took it up and stuck it between my eyebrows. 'Concentrate the mind on this point!' he thundered. Then with stern determination I again sat to meditate. As soon as the gracious form of the Divine Mother appeared before me, I used my discrimination as a sword and with it clove Her in two. The last barrier fell. My spirit at once soared beyond the relative plane and I lost myself in samadhi."
   Sri Ramakrishna remained completely absorbed in samadhi for three days. "Is it really true?" Totapuri cried out in astonishment. "Is it possible that he has attained in a single day what it took me forty years of strenuous practice to achieve? Great God! It is nothing short of a miracle!" With the help of Totapuri, Sri Ramakrishna's mind finally came down to the relative plane.
  --
   Sri Ramakrishna, on the other hand, though fully aware, like his guru, that the world is an illusory appearance, instead of slighting maya, like an orthodox monist, acknowledged its power in the relative life. He was all love and reverence for maya, perceiving in it a mysterious and majestic expression of Divinity. To him maya itself was God, for everything was God. It was one of the faces of Brahman. What he had realized on the heights of the transcendental plane, he also found here below, everywhere about him, under the mysterious garb of names and forms. And this garb was a perfectly transparent sheath, through which he recognized the glory of the Divine Immanence. Maya, the mighty weaver of the garb, is none other than Kali, the Divine Mother. She is the primordial Divine Energy, Sakti, and She can no more be distinguished from the Supreme Brahman than can the power of burning be distinguished from fire. She projects the world and again withdraws it. She spins it as the spider spins its web. She is the Mother of the Universe, identical with the Brahman of Vedanta, and with the Atman of Yoga. As eternal Lawgiver, She makes and unmakes laws; it is by Her imperious will that karma yields its fruit. She ensnares men with illusion and again releases them from bondage with a look of Her benign eyes. She is the supreme Mistress of the cosmic play, and all objects, animate and inanimate, dance by Her will. Even those who realize the Absolute in nirvikalpa samadhi are under Her jurisdiction as long as they still live on the relative plane.
   Thus, after nirvikalpa samadhi, Sri Ramakrishna realized maya in an altogether new role. The binding aspect of Kali vanished from before his vision. She no longer obscured his understanding. The world became the glorious manifestation of the Divine Mother. Maya became Brahman. The Transcendental Itself broke through the Immanent. Sri Ramakrishna discovered that maya operates in the relative world in two ways, and he termed these "avidyamaya" and "vidyamaya". Avidyamaya represents the dark forces of creation: sensuous desires, evil passions, greed, lust, cruelty, and so on. It sustains the world system on the lower planes. It is responsible for the round of man's birth and death. It must be fought and vanquished. But vidyamaya is the higher force of creation: the spiritual virtues, the enlightening qualities, kindness, purity, love, devotion. Vidyamaya elevates man to the higher planes of consciousness. With the help of vidyamaya the devotee rids himself of avidyamaya; he then becomes mayatita, free of maya. The two aspects of maya are the two forces of creation, the two powers of Kali; and She stands beyond them both. She is like the effulgent sun, bringing into existence and shining through and standing behind the clouds of different colours and shapes, conjuring up wonderful forms in the blue autumn heaven.
  --
   One day, when guru and disciple were engaged in an animated discussion about Vedanta, a servant of the temple garden came there and took a coal from the sacred fire that had been lighted by the great ascetic. He wanted it to light his tobacco. Totapuri flew into a rage and was about to beat the man. Sri Ramakrishna rocked with laughter. "What a shame!" he cried. "You are explaining to me the reality of Brahman and the illusoriness of the world; yet now you have so far forgotten yourself as to be about to beat a man in a fit of passion. The power of maya is indeed inscrutable!" Totapuri was embarrassed.
   About this time Totapuri was suddenly laid up with a severe attack of dysentery. On account of this miserable illness he found it impossible to meditate. One night the pain became excruciating. He could no longer concentrate on Brahman. The body stood in the way. He became incensed with its demands. A free soul, he did not at all care for the body. So he determined to drown it in the Ganges. Thereupon he walked into the river. But, lo! He walks to the other bank." (This version of the incident is taken from the biography of Sri Ramakrishna by Swami Saradananda, one of the Master's direct disciples.) Is there not enough water in the Ganges? Standing dumbfounded on the other bank he looks back across the water. The trees, the temples, the houses, are silhouetted against the sky. Suddenly, in one dazzling moment, he sees on all sides the presence of the Divine Mother. She is in everything; She is everything. She is in the water; She is on land. She is the body; She is the mind. She is pain; She is comfort. She is knowledge; She is ignorance. She is life; She is death. She is everything that one sees, hears, or imagines. She turns "yea" into "nay", and "nay" into "yea". Without Her grace no embodied being can go beyond Her realm. Man has no free will. He is not even free to die. Yet, again, beyond the body and mind She resides in Her Transcendental, Absolute aspect. She is the Brahman that Totapuri had been worshipping all his life.
  --
   From now on Sri Ramakrishna began to seek the company of devotees and holy men. He had gone through the storm and stress of spiritual disciplines and visions. Now he realized an inner calmness and appeared to others as a normal person. But he could not bear the company of worldly people or listen to their talk. Fortunately the holy atmosphere of Dakshineswar and the liberality of Mathur attracted monks and holy men from all parts of the country. Sadhus of all denominations — monists and dualists, Vaishnavas and Vedantists, Saktas and worshippers of Rama — flocked there in ever increasing numbers. Ascetics and visionaries came to seek Sri Ramakrishna's advice. Vaishnavas had come during the period of his Vaishnava sadhana, and Tantriks when he practised the disciplines of Tantra. Vedantists began to arrive after the departure of Totapuri. In the room of Sri Ramakrishna, who was then in bed with dysentery, the Vedantists engaged in scriptural discussions, and, forgetting his own physical suffering, he solved their doubts by referring directly to his own experiences. Many of the visitors were genuine spiritual souls, the unseen pillars of Hinduism, and their spiritual lives were quickened in no small measure by the sage of Dakshineswar. Sri Ramakrishna in turn learnt from them anecdotes concerning the ways and the conduct of holy men, which he subsequently narrated to his devotees and disciples. At his request Mathur provided him with large stores of food-stuffs, clothes, and so forth, for distribution among the wandering monks.
   "Sri Ramakrishna had not read books, yet he possessed an encyclopedic knowledge of religions and religious philosophies. This he acquired from his contacts with innumerable holy men and scholars. He had a unique power of assimilation; through meditation he made this knowledge a part of his being. Once, when he was asked by a disciple about the source of his seemingly inexhaustible knowledge, he replied; "I have not read; but I have heard the learned. I have made a garland of their knowledge, wearing it round my neck, and I have given it as an offering at the feet of the Mother."
   Sri Ramakrishna used to say that when the flower blooms the bees come to it for honey of their own accord. Now many souls began to visit Dakshineswar to satisfy their spiritual hunger. He, the devotee and aspirant, became the Master. Gauri, the great scholar who had been one of the first to proclaim Sri Ramakrishna an Incarnation of God, paid the Master a visit in 1870 and with the Master's blessings renounced the world. Narayan Shastri, another great pundit, who had mastered the six systems of Hindu philosophy and had been offered a lucrative post by the Maharaja of Jaipur, met the Master and recognized in him one who had realized in life those ideals which he himself had encountered merely in books. Sri Ramakrishna initiated Narayan Shastri, at his earnest request, into the life of sannyas. Pundit Padmalochan, the court pundit of the Maharaja of Burdwan, well known for his scholarship in both the Vedanta and the Nyaya systems of philosophy, accepted the Master as an Incarnation of God. Krishnakishore, a Vedantist scholar, became devoted to the Master. And there arrived Viswanath Upadhyaya, who was to become a favourite devotee; Sri Ramakrishna always addressed him as "Captain". He was a high officer of the King of Nepal and had received the title of Colonel in recognition of his merit. A scholar of the Gita, the Bhagavata, and the Vedanta philosophy, he daily performed the worship of his Chosen Deity with great devotion. "I have read the Vedas and the other scriptures", he said. "I have also met a good many monks and devotees in different places. But it is in Sri Ramakrishna's presence that my spiritual yearnings have been fulfilled. To me he seems to be the embodiment of the truths of the scriptures."
   The Knowledge of Brahman in nirvikalpa samadhi had convinced Sri Ramakrishna that the gods of the different religions are but so many readings of the Absolute, and that the Ultimate Reality could never be expressed by human tongue. He understood that all religions lead their devotees by differing paths to one and the same goal. Now he became eager to explore some of the alien religions; for with him understanding meant actual experience.
  --
   Keshab was the leader of the Brahmo Samaj, one of the two great movements that, during the latter part of the nineteenth century, played an important part in shaping the course of the renascence of India. The founder of the Brahmo movement had been the great Raja Rammohan Roy (1774-1833). Though born in an orthodox brahmin family, Rammohan Roy had shown great sympathy for Islam and Christianity. He had gone to Tibet in search of the Buddhist mysteries. He had extracted from Christianity its ethical system, but had rejected the divinity of Christ as he had denied the Hindu Incarnations. The religion of Islam influenced him, to a great extent, in the formulation of his monotheistic doctrines. But he always went back to the Vedas for his spiritual inspiration. The Brahmo Samaj, which he founded in 1828, was dedicated to the "worship and adoration of the Eternal, the Unsearchable, the Immutable Being, who is the Author and Preserver of the Universe". The Samaj was open to all without distinction of colour, creed, caste, nation, or religion.
   The real organizer of the Samaj was Devendranath Tagore (1817-1905), the father of the poet Rabindranath. His physical and spiritual beauty, aristocratic aloofness, penetrating intellect, and poetic sensibility made him the foremost leader of the educated Bengalis. These addressed him by the respectful epithet of Maharshi, the "Great Seer". The Maharshi was a Sanskrit scholar and, unlike Raja Rammohan Roy, drew his inspiration entirely from the Upanishads. He was an implacable enemy of image worship ship and also fought to stop the infiltration of Christian ideas into the Samaj. He gave the movement its faith and ritual. Under his influence the Brahmo Samaj professed One Self-existent Supreme Being who had created the universe out of nothing, the God of Truth, Infinite Wisdom, Goodness, and Power, the Eternal and Omnipotent, the One without a Second. Man should love Him and do His will, believe in Him and worship Him, and thus merit salvation in the world to come.
  --
   The other movement playing an important part in the nineteenth-century religious revival of India was the Arya Samaj. The Brahmo Samaj, essentially a movement of compromise with European culture, tacitly admitted the superiority of the West. But the founder of the Arya Samaj was a ' pugnacious Hindu sannyasi who accepted the challenge of Islam and Christianity and was resolved to combat all foreign influence in India. Swami Dayananda (1824-1883) launched this movement in Bombay in 1875, and soon its influence was felt throughout western India. The Swami was a great scholar of the Vedas, which he explained as being strictly monotheistic. He preached against the worship of images and re-established the ancient Vedic sacrificial rites. According to him the Vedas were the ultimate authority on religion, and he accepted every word of them as literally true. The Arya Samaj became a bulwark against the encroachments of Islam and Christianity, and its orthodox flavour appealed to many Hindu minds. It also assumed leadership in many movements of social reform. The caste-system became a target of its attack. Women it liberated from many of their social disabilities. The cause of education received from it a great impetus. It started agitation against early marriage and advocated the remarriage of Hindu widows. Its influence was strongest in the Punjab, the battle-ground of the Hindu and Islamic cultures. A new fighting attitude was introduced into the slumbering Hindu society. Unlike the Brahmo Samaj, the influence of the Arya Samaj was not confined to the intellectuals. It was a force that spread to the masses. It was a dogmatic movement intolerant of those who disagreed with its views, and it emphasized only one way, the Arya Samaj way, to the realization of Truth. Sri Ramakrishna met Swami Dayananda when the latter visited Bengal.
   --- KESHAB CHANDRA SEN
  --
   Pratap Chandra Mazumdar, the right-hand man of Keshab and an accomplished Brahmo preacher in Europe and America, bitterly criticized Sri Ramakrishna's use of uncultured language and also his austere attitude toward his wife. But he could not escape the spell of the Master's personality. In the course of an article about Sri Ramakrishna, Pratap wrote in the "Theistic Quarterly Review": "What is there in common between him and me? I, a Europeanized, civilized, self-centred, semi-sceptical, so-called educated reasoner, and he, a poor, illiterate, unpolished, half-idolatrous, friendless Hindu devotee? Why should I sit long hours to attend to him, I, who have listened to Disraeli and Fawcett, Stanley and Max Muller, and a whole host of European scholars and divines? . . . And it is not I only, but dozens like me, who do the same. . . . He worships Siva, he worships Kali, he worships Rama, he worships Krishna, and is a confirmed advocate of Vedantic doctrines. . . . He is an idolater, yet is a faithful and most devoted meditator on the perfections of the One Formless, Absolute, Infinite Deity. . . . His religion is ecstasy, his worship means transcendental insight, his whole nature burns day and night with a permanent fire and fever of a strange faith and feeling. . . . So long as he is spared to us, gladly shall we sit at his feet to learn from him the sublime precepts of purity, unworldliness, spirituality, and inebriation in the love of God. . . . He, by his childlike bhakti, by his strong conceptions of an ever-ready Motherhood, helped to unfold it [God as our Mother] in our minds wonderfully. . . . By associating with him we learnt to realize better the divine attributes as scattered over the three hundred and thirty millions of deities of mythological India, the gods of the Puranas."
   The Brahmo leaders received much inspiration from their contact with Sri Ramakrishna. It broadened their religious views and kindled in their hearts the yearning for God-realization; it made them understand and appreciate the rituals and symbols of Hindu religion, convinced them of the manifestation of God in diverse forms, and deepened their thoughts about the harmony of religions. The Master, too, was impressed by the sincerity of many of the Brahmo devotees. He told them about his own realizations and explained to them the essence of his teachings, such as the necessity of renunciation, sincerity in the pursuit of one's own course of discipline, faith in God, the performance of one's duties without thought of results, and discrimination between the Real and the unreal.
  --
   In the year 1879 occasional writings about Sri Ramakrishna by the Brahmos, in the Brahmo magazines, began to attract his future disciples from the educated middle-class Bengalis, and they continued to come till 1884. But others, too, came, feeling the subtle power of his attraction. They were an ever shifting crowd of people of all castes and creeds: Hindus and Brahmos, Vaishnavas and Saktas, the educated with university degrees and the illiterate, old and young, maharajas and beggars, journalists and artists, pundits and devotees, philosophers and the worldly-minded, jnanis and yogis, men of action and men of faith, virtuous women and prostitutes, office-holders and vagabonds, philanthropists and self-seekers, dramatists and drunkards, builders-up and pullers-down. He gave to them all, without stint, from his illimitable store of realization. No one went away empty-handed. He taught them the lofty .knowledge of the Vedanta and the soul
  -melting love of the Purana. Twenty hours out of twenty-four he would speak without out rest or respite. He gave to all his sympathy and enlightenment, and he touched them with that strange power of the soul which could not but melt even the most hardened. And people understood him according to their powers of comprehension.
  --
   Mahimacharan and Pratap Hazra were two devotees outstanding for their pretentiousness and idiosyncrasies. But the Master showed them his unfailing love and kindness, though he was aware of their shortcomings. Mahimacharan Chakravarty had met the Master long before the arrival of the other disciples. He had had the intention of leading a spiritual life, but a strong desire to acquire name and fame was his weakness. He claimed to have been initiated by Totapuri and used to say that he had been following the path of knowledge according to his guru's instructions. He possessed a large library of English and Sanskrit books. But though he pretended to have read them, most of the leaves were uncut. The Master knew all his limitations, yet enjoyed listening to him recite from the Vedas and other scriptures. He would always exhort Mahima to meditate on the meaning of the scriptural texts and to practise spiritual discipline.
   Pratap Hazra, a middle-aged man, hailed from a village near Kamarpukur. He was not altogether unresponsive to religious feelings. On a moment's impulse he had left his home, aged mother, wife, and children, and had found shelter in the temple garden at Dakshineswar, where he intended to lead a spiritual life. He loved to argue, and the Master often pointed him out as an example of barren argumentation. He was hypercritical of others and cherished an exaggerated notion of his own spiritual advancement. He was mischievous and often tried to upset the minds of the Master's young disciples, criticizing them for their happy and joyous life and asking them to devote their time to meditation. The Master teasingly compared Hazra to Jatila and Kutila, the two women who always created obstructions in Krishna's sport with the gopis, and said that Hazra lived at Dakshineswar to "thicken the plot" by adding complications.
  --
   The Master wanted to train Narendra in the teachings of the non-dualistic Vedanta philosophy. But Narendra, because of his Brahmo upbringing, considered it wholly blasphemous to look on man as one with his Creator. One day at the temple garden he laughingly said to a friend: "How silly! This jug is God! This cup is God! Whatever we see is God! And we too are God! Nothing could be more absurd." Sri Ramakrishna came out of his room and gently touched him. Spellbound, he immediately perceived that everything in the world was indeed God. A new universe opened around him. Returning home in a dazed state, he found there too that the food, the plate, the eater himself, the people around him, were all God. When he walked in the street, he saw that the cabs, the horses, the streams of people, the buildings, were all Brahman. He could hardly go about his day's business. His parents became anxious about him and thought him ill. And when the intensity of the experience abated a little, he saw the world as a dream. Walking in the public square, he would strike his head against the iron railings to know whether they were real. It took him a number of days to recover his normal self. He had a foretaste of the great experiences yet to come and realized that the words of the Vedanta were true.
   At the beginning of 1884 Narendra's father suddenly died of heart-failure, leaving the family in a state of utmost poverty. There were six or seven mouths to feed at home. Creditors were knocking at the door. Relatives who had accepted his father's unstinted kindness now became enemies, some even bringing suit to deprive Narendra of his ancestral home. Actually starving and barefoot, Narendra searched for a job, but without success. He began to doubt whether anywhere in the world there was such a thing as unselfish sympathy. Two rich women made evil proposals to him and promised to put an end to his distress; but he refused them with contempt.
  --
   Harinath had led the austere life of a brahmachari even from his early boyhood — bathing in the Ganges every day, cooking his own meals, waking before sunrise, and reciting the Gita from memory before leaving bed. He found in the Master the embodiment of the Vedanta scriptures. Aspiring to be a follower of the ascetic Sankara, he cherished a great hatred for women. One day he said to the Master that he could not allow even small girls to come near him. The Master scolded him and said: "You are talking like a fool. Why should you hate women? They are the manifestations of the Divine Mother. Regard them as your own mother and you will never feel their evil influence. The more you hate them, the more you will fall into their snares." Hari said later that these words completely changed his attitude toward women.
   The Master knew Hari's passion for Vedanta. But he did not wish any of his disciples to become a dry ascetic or a mere bookworm. So he asked Hari to practise Vedanta in life by giving up the unreal and following the Real. "But it is not so easy", Sri Ramakrishna said, "to realize the illusoriness of the world. Study alone does not help one very much. The grace of God is required. Mere personal effort is futile. A man is a tiny creature after all, with very limited powers. But he can achieve the impossible if he prays to God for His grace." Whereupon the Master sang a song in praise of grace. Hari was profoundly moved and shed tears. Later in life Hari achieved a wonderful synthesis of the ideals of the Personal God and the Impersonal Truth.
   --- GANGADHAR
  --
   Doubt, however, dies hard. After one or two days Narendra said to himself, "If in the midst of this racking physical pain he declares his Godhead, then only shall I accept him as an Incarnation of God." He was alone by the bedside of the Master. It was a passing thought, but the Master smiled. Gathering his remaining strength, he distinctly said, "He who was Rama and Krishna is now, in this body, Ramakrishna — but not in your Vedantic sense." Narendra was stricken with shame.
   --- MAHASAMADHI

0.00 - Publishers Note C, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 05, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Rig Veda, 1.113.1
   ***

0.00 - The Book of Lies Text, #The Book of Lies, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
     Vedantism.
     Tahuti, or Thoth, the Egyptian God of Wisdom.

0.05 - The Synthesis of the Systems, #The Synthesis Of Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  If, however, we leave aside, here also, the actual methods and practices and seek for the central principle, we find, first, that Tantra expressly differentiates itself from the Vedic methods of Yoga. In a sense, all the schools we have hitherto examined are Vedantic in their principle; their force is in knowledge, their method is knowledge, though it is not always discernment by the intellect, but may be, instead, the knowledge of the heart expressed in love and faith or a knowledge in the will working out through action. In all of them the lord of the Yoga is the Purusha, the Conscious Soul that knows, observes, attracts, governs. But in Tantra it is rather Prakriti, the Nature-Soul, the Energy, the
  Will-in-Power executive in the universe. It was by learning and applying the intimate secrets of this Will-in-Power, its method, its Tantra, that the Tantric Yogin pursued the aims of his discipline, - mastery, perfection, liberation, beatitude. Instead of drawing back from manifested Nature and its difficulties, he confronted them, seized and conquered. But in the end, as is the general tendency of Prakriti, Tantric Yoga largely lost its principle in its machinery and became a thing of formulae and occult mechanism still powerful when rightly used but fallen from the clarity of their original intention.
  We have in this central Tantric conception one side of the truth, the worship of the Energy, the Shakti, as the sole effective force for all attainment. We get the other extreme in the Vedantic conception of the Shakti as a power of Illusion and in the search after the silent inactive Purusha as the means of liberation from the deceptions created by the active Energy. But in the integral conception the Conscious Soul is the Lord, the Nature-Soul is his executive Energy. Purusha is of the nature of Sat, the being of conscious self-existence pure and infinite; Shakti or Prakriti is of the nature of Chit, - it is power of the Purusha's self-conscious existence, pure and infinite. The relation of the two exists between the poles of rest and action. When the Energy is absorbed
  44

01.01 - The New Humanity, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   This mastery will be effected not merely in will, but in mind and heart also. For the New Man will know not by the intellect which is egocentric and therefore limited, not by ratiocination which is an indirect and doubtful process, but by direct vision, an inner communion, a soul revelation. The new knowledge will be vast and profound and creative, based as it will be upon the reality of things and not upon their shadows. Truth will shine through every experience and every utterance"a truth shall have its seat on our speech and mind and hearing", so have the Vedas said. The mind and intellect will not be active and constructive agents but the luminous channel of a self-luminous knowledge. And the heart too which is now the field of passion and egoism will be cleared of its noise and obscurity; a serener sky will shed its pure warmth and translucent glow. The knot will be rent asunderbhidyate hridaya granthih and the vast and mighty streams of another ocean will flow through. We will love not merely those to whom we are akin but God's creatures, one and all; we will love not with the yearning and hunger of a mortal but with the wide and intense Rasa that lies in the divine identity of souls.
   And the new society will be based not upon competition, nor even upon co-operation. It will not be an open conflict, neither will it be a convenient compromise of rival individual interests. It will be the organic expression of the collective soul of humanity, working and achieving through each and every individual soul its most wide-winging freedom, manifesting the godhead that is, proper to each and every one. It will be an organisation, most delicate and subtle and supple, the members of which will have no need to live upon one another but in and through one another. It will be, if you like, a henotheistic hierarchy in which everyone will be the greatest, since everyone is all and all everyone simultaneously.

01.02 - Sri Aurobindo - Ahana and Other Poems, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Take these Vedantic lines that in their limpidity and harmonious flow beat anything found in the fine French poet Lamartine:
   It is He in the sun who is ageless and deathless,

01.03 - Mystic Poetry, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   This is what I was trying to make out as the distinguishing trait of the real spiritual consciousness that seems to be developing in the poetic creation of tomorrow, e.g., it has the same rationality, clarity, concreteness of perception as the scientific spirit has in its own domain and still it is rounded off with a halo of magic and miracle. That is the nature of the logic of the infinite proper to the spiritual consciousness. We can have a Science of the Spirit as well as a Science of Matter. This is the Thought element or what corresponds to it, of which I was speaking, the philosophical factor, that which gives form to the formless or definition to that which is vague, a nearness and familiarity to that which is far and alien. The fullness of the spiritual consciousness means such a thing, the presentation of a divine name and form. And this distinguishes it from the mystic consciousness which is not the supreme solar consciousness but the nearest approach to it. Or, perhaps, the mystic dwells in the domain of the Divine, he may even be suffused with a sense of unity but would not like to acquire the Divine's nature and function. Normally and generally he embodies all the aspiration and yearning moved by intimations and suggestions belonging to the human mentality, the divine urge retaining still the human flavour. We can say also, using a Vedantic terminology, that the mystic consciousness gives us the tatastha lakshana, the nearest approximative attribute of the attri buteless; or otherwise, it is the hiranyagarbha consciousness which englobes the multiple play, the coruscated possibilities of the Reality: while the spiritual proper may be considered as prajghana, the solid mass, the essential lineaments of revelatory knowledge, the typal "wave-particles" of the Reality. In the former there is a play of imagination, even of fancy, a decorative aesthesis, while in the latter it is vision pure and simple. If the spiritual poetry is solar in its nature, we can say, by extending the analogy, that mystic poetry is characteristically lunarMoon representing the delight and the magic that Mind and mental imagination, suffused, no doubt, with a light or a reflection of some light from beyond, is capable of (the Upanishad speaks of the Moon being born of the Mind).
   To sum up and recapitulate. The evolution of the poetic expression in man has ever been an attempt at a return and a progressive approach to the spiritual source of poetic inspiration, which was also the original, though somewhat veiled, source from the very beginning. The movement has followed devious waysstrongly negative at timeseven like man's life and consciousness in general of which it is an organic member; but the ultimate end and drift seems to have been always that ideal and principle even when fallen on evil days and evil tongues. The poet's ideal in the dawn of the world was, as the Vedic Rishi sang, to raise things of beauty in heaven by his poetic power,kavi kavitv divi rpam sajat. Even a Satanic poet, the inaugurator, in a way, of modernism and modernistic consciousness, Charles Baudelaire, thus admonishes his spirit:

01.05 - Rabindranath Tagore: A Great Poet, a Great Man, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Socrates is said to have brought down Philosophy from Heaven to live among men upon earth. A similar exploit can be ascribed to Tagore. The Spirit, the bare transcendental Reality contemplated by the orthodox Vedantins, has been brought nearer to our planet, close to human consciousness in Tagore's vision, being clothed in earth and flesh and blood, made vivid with the colours and contours of the physical existence. The Spirit, yes and by all means, but not necessarily asceticism and monasticism. So Tagore boldly declared in those famous lines of his:
   Mine is not the deliverance achieved through mere renunciation. Mine rather the freedom that tastes itself in a thousand associations.1

01.06 - Vivekananda, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   The gospel of strength that Vivekananda spread was very characteristic of the man. For it is not mere physical or nervous bravery, although that too is indispensable, and it is something more than moral courage. In the speeches referred to, the subject-matter (as well as the manner to a large extent) is philosophical, metaphysical, even abstract in outlook and treatment: they are not a call to arms, like the French National Anthem, for example; they are not merely an ethical exhortation, a moral lesson either. They speak of the inner spirit, the divine in man, the supreme realities that lie beyond. And yet the words are permeated through and through with a vibration life-giving and heroic-not so much in the explicit and apparent meaning as in the style and manner and atmosphere: it is catching, even or precisely when he refers, for example, to these passages in the Vedas and the Upanishads, magnificent in their poetic beauty, sublime in their spiritual truth,nec plus ultra, one can say, in the grand style supreme:
   Yasyaite himavanto mahitv

01.08 - Walter Hilton: The Scale of Perfection, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Indeed, it would be interesting to compare and contrast the Eastern and Western approach to Divine Love, the Christian and the Vaishnava, for example. Indian spirituality, whatever its outer form or credal formulation, has always a background of utter unity. This unity, again, is threefold or triune and is expressed in those great Upanishadic phrases,mahvkyas,(1) the transcendental unity: the One alone exists, there is nothing else than theOneekamevdvityam; (2) the cosmic unity: all existence is one, whatever exists is that One, thereare no separate existences:sarvam khalvidam brahma neha nnsti kincaa; (3) That One is I, you too are that One:so' ham, tattvamasi; this may be called the individual unity. As I have said, all spiritual experiences in India, of whatever school or line, take for granted or are fundamentally based upon this sense of absolute unity or identity. Schools of dualism or pluralism, who do not apparently admit in their tenets this extreme monism, are still permeated in many ways with that sense and in some form or other take cognizance of the truth of it. The Christian doctrine too says indeed, 'I and my Father in Heaven are one', but this is not identity, but union; besides, the human soul is not admitted into this identity, nor the world soul. The world, we have seen, according to the Christian discipline has to be altogether abandoned, negatived, as we go inward and upward towards our spiritual status reflecting the divine image in the divine company. It is a complete rejection, a cutting off and casting away of world and life. One extreme Vedantic path seems to follow a similar line, but there it is not really rejection, but a resolution, not the rejection of what is totally foreign and extraneous, but a resolution of the external into its inner and inmost substance, of the effect into its original cause. Brahman is in the world, Brahman is the world: the world has unrolled itself out of the Brahmansi, pravttiit has to be rolled back into its, cause and substance if it is to regain its pure nature (that is the process of nivitti). Likewise, the individual being in the world, "I", is the transcendent being itself and when it withdraws, it withdraws itself and the whole world with it and merges into the Absolute. Even the Maya of the Mayavadin, although it is viewed as something not inherent in Brahman but superimposed upon Brahman, still, has been accepted as a peculiar power of Brahman itself. The Christian doctrine keeps the individual being separate practically, as an associate or at the most as an image of God. The love for one's neighbour, charity, which the Christian discipline enjoins is one's love for one's kind, because of affinity of nature and quality: it does not dissolve the two into an integral unity and absolute identity, where we love because we are one, because we are the One. The highest culmination of love, the very basis of love, according to the Indian conception, is a transcendence of love, love trans-muted into Bliss. The Upanishad says, where one has become the utter unity, who loves whom? To explain further our point, we take two examples referred to in the book we are considering. The true Christian, it is said, loves the sinner too, he is permitted to dislike sin, for he has to reject it, but he must separate from sin the sinner and love him. Why? Because the sinner too can change and become his brother in spirit, one loves the sinner because there is the possibility of his changing and becoming a true Christian. It is why the orthodox Christian, even such an enlightened and holy person as this mediaeval Canon, considers the non-Christian, the non-baptised as impure and potentially and fundamentally sinners. That is also why the Church, the physical organisation, is worshipped as Christ's very body and outside the Church lies the pagan world which has neither religion nor true spirituality nor salvation. Of course, all this may be symbolic and it is symbolic in a sense. If Christianity is taken to mean true spirituality, and the Church is equated with the collective embodiment of that spirituality, all that is claimed on their behalf stands justified. But that is an ideal, a hypothetical standpoint and can hardly be borne out by facts. However, to come back to our subject, let us ow take the second example. Of Christ himself, it is said, he not only did not dislike or had any aversion for Judas, but that he positively loved the traitor with a true and sincere love. He knew that the man would betray him and even when he was betraying and had betrayed, the Son of Man continued to love him. It was no make-believe or sham or pretence. It was genuine, as genuine as anything can be. Now, why did he love his enemy? Because, it is said, the enemy is suffered by God to do the misdeed: he has been allowed to test the faith of the faithful, he too has his utility, he too is God's servant. And who knows even a Judas would not change in the end? Many who come to scoff do remain to pray. But it can be asked, 'Does God love Satan too in the same way?' The Indian conception which is basically Vedantic is different. There is only one reality, one truth which is viewed differently. Whether a thing is considered good or evil or neutral, essentially and truly, it is that One and nothing else. God's own self is everywhere and the sage makes no difference between the Brahmin and the cow and the elephant. It is his own self he finds in every person and every objectsarvabhtsthitam yo mm bhajati ekatvamsthitah"he has taken his stand upon oneness and loves Me in all beings."2
   This will elucidate another point of difference between the Christian's and the Vaishnava's love of God, for both are characterised by an extreme intensity and sweetness and exquisiteness of that divine feeling. This Christian's, however, is the union of the soul in its absolute purity and simplicity and "privacy" with her lord and master; the soul is shred here of all earthly vesture and goes innocent and naked into the embrace of her Beloved. The Vaishnava feeling is richer and seems to possess more amplitude; it is more concrete and less ethereal. The Vaishnava in his passionate yearning seeks to carry as it were the whole world with him to his Lord: for he sees and feels Him not only in the inmost chamber of his soul, but meets Him also in and I through his senses and in and through the world and its objects around. In psychological terms one can say that the Christian realisation, at its very source, is that of the inmost soul, what we call the "psychic being" pure and simple, referred to in the book we are considering; as: "His sweet privy voice... stirreth thine heart full stilly." Whereas the Vaishnava reaches out to his Lord with his outer heart too aflame with passion; not only his inmost being but his vital being also seeks the Divine. This bears upon the occult story of man's spiritual evolution upon earth. The Divine Grace descends from the highest into the deepest and from the deepest to the outer ranges of human nature, so that the whole of it may be illumined and transformed and one day man can embody in his earthly life the integral manifestation of God, the perfect Epiphany. Each religion, each line of spiritual discipline takes up one limb of manone level or mode of his being and consciousness purifies it and suffuses it with the spiritual and divine consciousness, so that in the end the whole of man, in his integral living, is recast and remoulded: each discipline is in charge of one thread as it were, all together weave the warp and woof in the evolution of the perfect pattern of a spiritualised and divinised humanity.

01.10 - Nicholas Berdyaev: God Made Human, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Nicholas Berdyaev is an ardent worker, as a Russian is naturally expected to be, in the cause of the spiritual rehabilitation of mankind. He is a Christian, a neo-Christian: some of his conclusions are old-world truths and bear repetition and insistence; others are of a more limited, conditional and even doubtful nature. His conception of the value of human person, the dignity and the high reality he gives to it, can never be too welcome in a world where the individual seems to have gone the way of vanished empires and kings and princes. But even more important and interesting is the view he underlines that the true person is a spiritual being, that is to say, it is quite other than the empirical ego that man normally is"not this that one worships" as the Upanishads too declare. Further, in his spiritual being man, the individual, is not simply a portion or a fraction; he is, on the contrary, an integer, a complete whole, a creative focus; the true individual is a microcosm yet holding in it and imaging the macrocosm. Only perhaps greater stress is laid upon the aspect of creativity or activism. An Eastern sage, a Vedantin, would look for the true spiritual reality behind the flux of forces: Prakriti or Energy is only the executive will of the Purusha, the Conscious Being. The personality in Nature is a formulation and emanation of the transcendent impersonality.
   There is another aspect of personality as viewed by Berdyaev which involves a bias of the more orthodox Christian faith: the Christ is inseparable from the Cross. So he says: "There is no such thing as personality if there is no capacity for suffering. Suffering is inherent in God too, if he is a personality, and not merely an abstract idea. God shares in the sufferings of men. He yearns for responsive love. There are divine as well as human passions and therefore divine or creative personality must always suffer to the end of time. A condition of anguish and distress is inherent in it." The view is logically enforced upon the Christian, it is said, if he is to accept incarnation, God becoming flesh. Flesh cannot but be weak. This very weakness, so human, is and must be specially characteristic of God also, if he is one with man and his lover and saviour.

01.11 - The Basis of Unity, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   However, coming to historical times, we see wave after wave of the most heterogeneous and disparate elementsSakas and Huns and Greeks, each bringing its quota of exotic materialenter into the oceanic Indian life and culture, lose their separate foreign identity and become part and parcel of the common whole. Even so,a single unitary body was formed out of such varied and shifting materialsnot in the political, but in a socio-religious sense. For a catholic religious spirit, not being solely doctrinal and personal, admitted and embraced in its supple and wide texture almost an infinite variety of approaches to the Divine, of forms and norms of apprehending the Beyond. It has been called Hinduism: it is a vast synthesis of multiple affiliations. It expresses the characteristic genius of India and hence Hinduism and Indianism came to be looked upon as synonymous terms. And the same could be defined also as Vedic religion and culture, for its invariable basis the bed-rock on which it stood firm and erectwas the Vedas, the Knowledge seen by the sages. But there had already risen a voice of dissidence and discord that of Buddha, not so much, perhaps, of Buddha as of Buddhism. The Buddhistic enlightenment and discipline did not admit the supreme authority of the Vedas; it sought other bases of truth and reality. It was a great denial; and it meant and worked for a vital schism. The denial of the Vedas by itself, perhaps, would not be serious, but it became so, as it was symptomatic of a deeper divergence. Denying the Vedas, the Buddhistic spirit denied life. It was quite a new thing in the Indian consciousness and spiritual discipline. And it left such a stamp there that even today it stands as the dominant character of the Indian outlook. However, India's synthetic genius rose to the occasion and knew how to bridge the chasm, close up the fissure, and present again a body whole and entire. Buddha became one of the Avataras: the discipline of Nirvana and Maya was reserved as the last duty to be performed at the end of life, as the culmination of a full-length span of action and achievement; the way to Moksha lay through Dharma and Artha and Kama, Sannyasa had to be built upon Brahmacharya and Garhasthya. The integral ideal was epitomized by Kalidasa in his famous lines about the character of the Raghus:
   They devoted themselves to study in their boyhood, in youth they pursued the objects of life; when old they took to spiritual austerities, and in the end they died united with the higher consciousness.

01.12 - Three Degrees of Social Organisation, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   The principle of Dharma then inculcates that each individual must, in order to act, find out his truth of being, his true soul and inmost consciousness: one must entirely and integrally merge oneself into that, be identified with it in such a manner that all acts and feelings and thoughts, in fact all movements, inner and outerspontaneously and irrepressibly well out of that fount and origin. The individual souls, being made of one truth-nature in its multiple modalities, when they live, move and have their being in its essential law and dynamism, there cannot but be absolute harmony and perfect synthesis between all the units, even as the sun and moon and stars, as the Veda says, each following its specific orbit according to its specific nature, never collide or haltna me thate na tas thatuh but weave out a faultless pattern of symphony.
   The future society of man is envisaged as something of like nature. When the mortal being will have found his immortal soul and divine self, then each one will be able to give full and free expression to his self-nature (swabhava); then indeed the utmost sweep of dynamism in each and all will not cause clash or conflict; on the contrary, each will increase the other and there will be a global increment and fulfilmentparasparam bhavayantah. The division and conflict, the stress and strain that belong to the very nature of the inferior level of being and consciousness will then have been transcended. It is only thus that a diviner humanity can be born and replace all the other moulds and types that can never lead to anything final and absolutely satisfactory.

0 1958-07-06, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
   So'ham, the traditional mantra of the Vedantic path, which declares that the world is an illusion.
   ***

0 1958-09-16 - OM NAMO BHAGAVATEH, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
   I have a whole stock of mantras; they have all come spontaneously, never from the head. They sprang forth spontaneously, as the Veda is said to have sprung forth.
   I dont know when it begana very long time ago, before I came here, although some of them came while I was here. But in my case, they were always very short. For example, when Sri Aurobindo was here in his body, at any moment, in any difficulty, for anything, it always came like this: My Lord!simply and spontaneouslyMy Lord! And instantly, the contact was established. But since He left, it has stopped. I can no longer say it, for it would be like saying My Lord, My Lord! to myself.

0 1958-11-04 - Myths are True and Gods exist - mental formation and occult faculties - exteriorization - work in dreams, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
   He said he had received initiation in India (he knew a little Sanskrit and the Rig- Veda thoroughly), and then he formulated a tradition which he called the cosmic tradition and which he claimed to have received I dont know howfrom a tradition anterior to that of the Cabala and the Vedas. But there were many things (Madame Theon was the clairvoyant one, and she received visions; oh, she was wonderful!), many things that I myself had seen and known before knowing them which were then substantiated.
   So personally, I am convinced that there was indeed a tradition anterior to both these traditions containing a knowledge very close to an integral knowledge. Certainly, there is a similarity in the experiences. When I came here and told Sri Aurobindo certain things I knew from the occult standpoint, he always said that it conformed to the Vedic tradition. And as for certain occult practices, he told me that they were entirely tantric and I knew nothing at that time, absolutely nothing, neither the Vedas nor the Tantras.
   So very probably there was a tradition anterior to both. I have recollections (for me, these are always things I have LIVED), very clear, very distinct recollections of a time that was certainly VERY anterior to the Vedic times and to the Cabala, to the Chaldean tradition.

0 1960-10-08, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
   I also read On the Veda where Sri Aurobindo speaks of the difference between the modern mind and the ancient mind; and its quite obvious, especially from the linguistic point of view. Sanskrit was certainly much more fluid, a better instrument for a more global, more comprehensive light, a light containing more things within itself.
   In these modern languages, its as if things are passed through a sieve and broken up into separate little bits, so then you have all the work of putting them back together. And something is always lost.

0 1960-11-12, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
   Its a lack of plasticity in the mind, and they are bound by the expression of things; for them, words are rigid. Sri Aurobindo explained it so well in The Secret of the Veda; he shows how language evolves and how, before, it was very supple and evocative. For example, one could at once think of a river and of inspiration. Sri Aurobindo also gives the example of a sailboat and the forward march of life. And he says that for those of the Vedic age it was quite natural, the two could go together, superimposed; it was merely a way of looking at the same thing from two sides, whereas now, when a word is said, we think only of this word all by itself, and to get a clear picture we need a whole literary or poetic imagery (with explanations to boot!). Thats exactly the case with these children; theyre at a stage where everything is rigid. Such is the product of modern education. It even extracts the subtlest nuance between two words and FIXES it: And above all, dont make any mistake, dont use this word for that word, for otherwise your writings no good. But its just the opposite.
   (silence)

0 1961-01-22, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   Later, on the 27th, Mother remarked: 'I was reading about this very thing yesterday in The Secret of the Veda, in the first hymn translated by Sri Aurobindo (the reference is to the colloquy between Indra and Agastya, Rig Veda I.170cf. The Secret of the Veda, Cent. Ed., X.241 ff.), and it helped me put my finger on the problem. In this hymn there is a dispute between Indra and the Rishi because the Rishi wants to progress too quickly without first passing through Indra [the god of the Mind], and Indra stops him; finally they reach an agreement. Sri Aurobindo's commentary is quite interesting: when one has the INDIVIDUAL power to go directly, but neglects the steps which are still necessary for the whole, for the universal movement, then one is stopped short. That is absolutely my experience.'
   ***

0 1961-01-24, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   I must say that after this, when I read The Secret of the Veda as I do each evening. In fact, I am in very close contact with the entire Vedic world since Ive been reading that book: I see beings, hear phrases. It comes up in a sort of subliminal consciousness, a lot of things are from the ancient Vedic tradition. (By the way, I have even come to see that the pink marble bathtub I told you about last time, which Nature had offered me, belongs to the Vedic world, to a civilization of that epoch.3) There werethere are alwaysSanskrit words coming up, sentences, bits of dialogue. This is of interest, because I realized that what I had seen the other day (I told you about it) and then what I saw yesterday that whole domainwas connected to what the Vedas call the dasyus the panis and the dasyus4the enemies of the Light. And this Force that came was very clearly a power like Indras5 (though something far, far greater), and at war with darkness everywhere, like this (Mother sketches in space a whirling force touching points here and there throughout the world), this Force attacked all darkness: ideas, people, movements, events, whatever made stains, patches of shadow. And it kept on going, a formidable power, so great that my hands were like this (Mother clenches her fists). Later when I read (I happened to be reading just the chapter concerning the fight against the dasyus), this proximity to my own experience became interesting, for it was not at all intellectual or mental there was no idea, no thought involved.
   The remainder of the evening passed as usual. I went to bed, and at exactly a quarter to twelve I got up with the feeling that this presence in me had increased even further and really become rather formidable. I had to instill a great deal of peace and confidence into my body, which felt as though it wasnt so easy to bear. So I concentrated, I told my body to be calm and to let itself go completely.
  --
   A few days later, Mother rectified: 'I have looked at the experience again and realized that it's not Vedic but pre-Vedic. The experience put me into contact with a civilization prior to the Vedas the Rishis and the Vedas are a kind of transition between that vanished civilization and the Indian civilization which grew out of the Vedic Age. It was yesterday [January 26] that I perceived this, and it was quite interesting.'
   In the Vedas, the panis and dasyus represent beings or forces hidden in subterranean caves who have stolen the 'Riches' or the 'Lights', symbolized by herds of cows. With the help of the gods, the Aryan warrior must recover these lost riches, the 'sun in the darkness,' by igniting the flame of sacrifice. It is the path of subterranean descent.
   Indra represents the king of the gods, the master of mental power freed from the limitations and obscurities of the physical consciousness.

0 1961-01-27, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   Well, yesterday I saw R. He was asking me questions about his work and particularly about the knowledge of languages (hes a scholar, you know, and very familiar with the old traditions). This put me in contact with that whole world and I began speaking to him a little about what I had already said to you concerning my experience with the Vedas. And all at once, in the same [absolute] way as I told you, when I entered into contact with that world a whole domain seemed to open up, a whole field of knowledge from the standpoint of languages, of the Word, of the essential Vibration, that vibration which would be able to reproduce the supramental consciousness. It all came, so clear, so clear, luminous, indisputable but unfortunately there was no tape recorder!
   It was about the Word, the primal sound. Sri Aurobindo speaks of it in Savitri: the essence of the Word and how it will express itself, how it will bring in the possibility of a supramental expression that will take the place of languages. I began by speaking to him about the different languages, their limitations and possibilities; and I warned him against the deformations imposed on languages with the idea of making them a more flexible means of expressing something else. I told him how completely ridiculous it all was, and that it didnt correspond at all to the truth. Then little by little I began ascending to the Origin. So yesterday again, I had this same experience: a whole world of knowledge, of consciousness and of CERTAINTYprecluding the least possibility of contradiction, discussion, or opposition; the possibility DOES NOT EXIST, it doesnt exist. And the mind was absolutely silent and immobile, listening with obvious pleasure because these things had never before come into my consciousness; I had never been concerned with them in that way. It was completely newnot new in principle but completely new in action.

0 1961-01-31, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   cf. On the Veda, Cent. Ed., X.241, ff.
   Once again, Satprem was doing seven hours of japa daily.

0 1961-02-18, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   And part of The Secret of the Veda, as well as two other things because they contain many of Sri Aurobindos letters: I re-read Zs book on Sri Aurobindo, since there are many letters in it, and.
   Yes, only unfortunately he has tampered with it.

0 1961-03-07, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   I have brought you a whole discourse! (Mother gives Satprem some flowers) First, the goal of the Vedas: Immortality.1 That was their goal: the Truth that led to Immortality. Immortality was their ambition. I dont think it was physical immortality but I am not sure, because they do speak of the forefa thers and this refers to the initiatory tradition prior to the Vedas as well as the Kabbala, and immortality on earth is spoken of there: the earth transformedSri Aurobindos idea. So although they didnt explicitly state it, perhaps they knew.
   (Mother gives more flowers) This one is more on the personal side: Friendship with the Divine2, the friendly relationship you can have with the Divineyou understand each other, you dont fear each other, youre good friends! And this one is a wonder! (Mother gives Divine Love Governing the World3) What strength! Its generous, expansive, without narrowness, pettiness, or limitationswhen that comes.
  --
   I knew when I caught it: it was at the Playground.4 Certain people poisoned me with a mosquito bite the instant the mosquito bit me, I knew, because it so happens I am a little bit conscious! But I controlled it like this (gesture of holding the disease in abeyance and under control), so it couldnt stir. Probably it would never have stirred if I hadnt had that experience of January 24 and the body didnt need to be made ready. For the body to be ready, a host of things belonging to the dasyus, as the Vedas say, cant be stored inside it! These are very nasty little dasyus (laughing), they have to be chased away!
   When the disease came back, I said to myself, Very well, this means it must be dealt with in a new way.

0 1961-03-11, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   It was certainly with the progress of evolution, the march of evolution, when the mind began to develop for and in itself, that ALL the complications, all the deformations began. Indeed, this story of Genesis that seems so childish does contain a truth. The old traditions like Genesis resembled the Vedas in that each letter6 was the symbol of a knowledge; it was the pictorial rsum of a traditional knowledge, just as the Veda contains a pictoral rsum of the knowledge of its time. But whats more, even the symbol had a reality in the sense that there was truly a period when life upon earth (the first manifestation of mentalized Matter in human forms) was still in complete harmony with all that preceded it. It was only later that.
   The tree of knowledge symbolizes this kind of knowledge a material knowledge, no longer divine because its origin was the sense of division and this is what began to spoil everything. How long did this period last? I am unable to say. (Because my recollection is of an almost immortal life; it seems that it was through some sort of evolutionary accident that the destruction of forms became necessary for progress.) And where did it take place? From certain impressions (but these are only impressions), it would seem that it was in the vicinity of either this side of Ceylon and India or the other, I dont know exactly (Mother indicates the Indian Ocean either west of Ceylon and India or to the east between Ceylon and Java), although certainly the place no longer exists; it must have been swallowed up by the sea. I have a very clear vision of the place and a consciousness of that life and its forms, but I cant give precise material details. Did it last for centuries, was it ? I dont know. To tell the truth, when I was reliving those moments I wasnt curious about such details (for one is in another mental state where there is no curiosity about material details: all things turn into psychological facts). It was something so simple, luminous, harmonious, far removed from all our usual preoccupationsthose very preoccupations with time and space. It was a spontaneous life, extremely beautiful, and so close to Naturea natural flowering of animal life. There were no oppositions or contradictions, nothing of the kindeverything happened in the best way possible.

0 1961-03-27, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   Yesterday, while waiting for X, I was as usual in communion with the Supreme in his aspect of Love. Suddenly I felt X arriving and spontaneously, like a Veda, a movement of gratitude for his great goodwill arose from my heart, and it was formulated as a prayer to the Supreme: Give him [X] the bliss of Your Love and the joys of Your Truth.
   For a long time X has said nothing about his meditations with me, but just yesterday he told N. that he had some difficulty at the start of the meditation due to the presence of an adverse force, and it took him five minutes to overcome it!

0 1961-04-07, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   I am continuing my reading of the Veda. I had to stop for some days because of a sore throat. But anyway, Im starting again.
   The Vedas, after all, were written by people who remembered a radical experience, which must have taken place on earth at a given moment, as an example of what was to come. (This always happens in the yoga: a first radical experience comes like a herald of the future realization.) So in the terrestrial yogain the yoga of the earth, of the planet earththere was a moment when it came; they who are called the forefa thers must have created, through their effort and their yoga, at least an image of the supramental realization. And those who wrote the Vedas, who composed all these hymns, remembered or kept the tradition of that experience. And oh, mon petit, it had the same effect on me as when I read the Yoga of Self-Perfection in The Synthesis of Yoga (Mother catches her breath): there is such a gulf between what we are, what life on earth and human consciousness now are, even among the most enlightened, the most advanced, and THAT!
   I dont know if its because I have been so violently attackedbludgeonedby all these malevolent energies, but in any case, I sensed acutely the FORMIDABLE immensity of what has to be done in order for THAT to be realized.

0 1961-04-08, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   After more than a month I have resumed my translation [of The Synthesis of Yoga], and I fell exactlyits splendid!exactly on the passage that helped me understand what has happened, why there are all these difficulties. And the Synthesis and the Veda go hand in hand, so reading that passage brought some improvement; its like being able to shift position, you know, so that now its a bit better. Anyway.
   ***

0 1961-04-15, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   And in the evening before going to sleep I read the Vedas, which aggravates the situation. Because those people rememberei ther they have heard of it, or they remember it themselvesa supramental realization; and they describe it all so beautifully that it makes you feel very far from it, so very, very far.
   After that, I spend hours concentrated in prayernot exactly prayer but (gesture palms turned upwards), like that, beseeching.

0 1961-04-18, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   I go on reading the Vedas and I see quite well how beautiful it is and how effective it must have been for those people, what a power for realization these hymns must have had! But for me.
   Yet for a time I was in contact with all these gods and all these things, and they had an entirely concrete reality for me; but now I read and I understand, but I cannot live it. And I dont know why. It still hasnt triggered the experience. You see, experience for me the constant, total and permanent Experienceis that there is nothing other than the Supremeonly the Supreme that the Supreme alone exists. So when they speak of Agni or Varuna or Indra it doesnt strike a chord. However, what the Vedas succeed in doing very well is to give you the perception of your infirmity and ineptitude, of the dismal state we are in now; it succeeds wonderfully in doing that!
   Yesterday, this ardor of the Flame was thereburning all to offer all. It was absolutely concrete, an intensity of vibrations; I could see the vibrationsall the movements of obscurity and ignorance were cast into that. And I recall a time when I was translating these hymns to Agni with Sri Aurobindo, and Agni was real for me. Well, yesterday it wasnt that, it wasnt the god Agni, it was a STATE OF BEING. It was a state of the Supreme, and as such, it was intimate, clear, intense, vibrant and living.
  --
   Well, obviously to establish contact with and manifest what the people of the Vedas called the Truth, I still have a lot of things to change a lot.
   And yet its a fact that I am in the state where nothing exists any longer but the Divine, the Supreme the Supreme in every vibration, in everything I do, everything I feel. But in some way it must still be conditioned by my consciousness, since since its not yet THE Truth.

0 1961-05-12, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   I have finished my reading of the Veda. I have really tried my best, but I cannot manage to recapture that consciousness; do what I will, it seems childish to me, I dont know why. Or else I am in the presence of a realization so far removed from what we are capable of now but to enter into that we have to go behind the words, which requires a mighty effort.
   If they really had that experience, it is admirable.

0 1961-06-06, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   No. I had finished reading the Veda and wanted to take up The Life Divine, but as I had never read On Himself,1 I chose it instead. I read the first chapter dealing with his life in England and to me it all seemed. Oh, why speak of all these things in connection with Sri Aurobindo? Why? I know quite well that he himself has repliedor rather rectified inexact things people had said about him but it made such a painful impression on me! Such a painful impression.
   Something must definitely be done which is free of that whole useless jumble about who his father was and so forthpah! I dont like that sort of thing.

0 1961-08-02, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   In the Vedas, for example, its plain that the forefa thers spoken of were men who had realized immortality upon earth. (Who knows, they may still be alive!) Their conception of things was similar to Sri Aurobindos.
   The other tradition Theon said it was the origin of both the Kabbala and the Vedasalso held the same concept of divine life and a divine world as Sri Aurobindo: that the summit of evolution would be the divinization of everything objectified, along with an unbroken progression from that moment on. (As things are now, one goes forward and then backwards, then forward and backwards again; but in this divine world, retrogression wont be necessary: there will be a continuous ascent.) This concept was held in that ancient tradition Theon spoke to me very clearly of it, and Sri Aurobindo hadnt yet written anything when I met Theon. Theon had written all kinds of thingsnot philosophy, but stories, fantastic stories! Yet this same knowledge was behind them, and when asked about the source of this knowledge he used to say that it antedated both the Kabbala and the Vedas (he was well-versed in the Rig- Veda).
   But Theon had no idea of the path of bhakti,5 none whatsoever. The idea of surrender to the Divine was absolutely alien to him. Yet he did have the idea of the Divine Presence here (Mother indicates the heart center), of the immanent Divine and of union with That. And he said that by uniting with That and letting That transform the being one could arrive at the divine creation and the transformation of the earth.

0 1961-09-10, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   I dont know, but Sri Aurobindo spoke of it at the end of the book on the Vedas, in the chapter on the origin of languages. He seems to be saying that its better if one goes back to the origin of the vibrations. Ultimately, as a language grows more intellectual, it hardens and dries up. Perhaps when we had only sounds (the As and the Os; the Os especially are very flexible, the whole gamut of Os), perhaps it was more supple.
   I feel this so often now. How to put it. I always try not to talktalking bothers me. Yes, its a real nuisance. When I see someone, the first thing I do is to avoid talking. Then, when the Vibration comes, its good; there is a sort of communication, and if the person is the least bit receptive, what comes is like a its subtler than music; its a vibration bringing its own principle of harmony. But people usually get impatient after a while and, wanting something more concrete, oblige me to talk. They always insist on it. Then, being in a certain atmosphere, a certain vibration, I immediately feel something going like this (gesture of a fall to another level), and then hardening. Even when I babble (you see, the very effort of trying to be more subtle makes me babble), even my babblings (laughing) become dry by comparison. There are all sorts of things that are so much fullerfull, packed with an inner richnessand as soon as this is put into words, oh!

0 1961-09-23, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   I have the right to 150 pages! The publisher is giving me 150 pages in his collection. Terrible. But in this Sri Aurobindo, you understand, I would like to make his whole poetic aspect stand out, that poetry which is like the Veda, like a revelation, so a bit of space is required: it cant be squeezed into a few lines, or reduced to a skeleton.
   This analogy between the ancient form of spiritual revelations and Savitri, this blossoming into poetry of his prophetic revelation is what could be called the most exceptional part of his work. And what is remarkable (I saw him do it) is that he changed Savitri: he went along changing it as his experience changed.

0 1961-10-30, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   (The day before and at the beginning of this conversation, Satprem read aloud some passages of his manuscript relating to the Veda. Then Mother chose the photograph of Sri Aurobindo for the frontispiece. She speaks slowly, as though from a great distance, in a semi-trance.)
   Thats how I first saw him, at the head of the staircase.
  --
   The Secret of the Veda
   (Extracts from the passage in Sri Aurobindo and the Transformation of the World read to Mother by Satprem. This unpublished manuscript would become the first rough draft of The Adventure of Consciousness)
  --
   When he first read the Vedastranslated by Western Sanskritists or Indian pandits they appeared to Sri Aurobindo as an important document of [Indian] history, but seemed of scant value or importance for the history of thought or for a living spiritual experience.2 Fifteen years later, however, Sri Aurobindo would reread the Vedas in the original Sanskrit and find there a constant vein of the richest gold of thought and spiritual experience.3 Meanwhile, Sri Aurobindo had had certain psychological experiences of my own for which I had found no sufficient explanation either in European psychology or in the teachings of Yoga or of Vedanta, and which the mantras of the Veda illuminated with a clear and exact light.4 And it was through these experiences of his own that Sri Aurobindo came to discover, from within, the true meaning of the Vedas (and especially the most ancient of the four, the Rig- Veda, which he studied with special care). What the Vedas brought him was no more than a confirmation of what he had received directly. But didnt the Rishis themselves speak of Secret words, clairvoyant wisdoms, that reveal their inner meaning to the seer (Rig- Veda IV, 3.16)?
   It is not surprising, therefore, that exegetes have seen the Vedas primarily as a collection of propitiatory rites centered around sacrificial fires and obscure incantations to Nature divinities (water, fire, dawn, the moon, the sun, etc.), for bringing rain and rich harvests to the tribes, male progeny, blessings upon their journeys or protection against the thieves of the sunas though these shepherds were barbarous enough to fear that one inauspicious day their sun might no longer rise, stolen away once and for all. Only here and there, in a few of the more modern hymns, was there the apparently inadvertent intrusion of a few luminous passages that might have justifiedjust barely the respect which the Upanishads, at the beginning of recorded history, accorded to the Veda. In Indian tradition, the Upanishads had become the real Veda, the Book of Knowledge, while the Veda, product of a still stammering humanity, was a Book of Worksacclaimed by everyone, to be sure, as the venerable Authority, but no longer listened to. With Sri Aurobindo we might ask why the Upanishads, whose depth of wisdom the whole world has acknowledged, could claim to take inspiration from the Veda if the latter contained no more than a tapestry of primitive rites; or how it happened that humanity could pass so abruptly from these so-called stammerings to the manifold richness of the Upanishadic Age; or how we in the West were able to evolve from the simplicity of Arcadian shepherds to the wisdom of Greek philosophers. We cannot assume that there was nothing between the early savage and Plato or the Upanishads.5
   ***
  --
   But we have not yet reached the heart of the Vedic secret. The birth of Agni, the soul (and so many men are still unborn) is merely the start of the voyage. This inner flame seeks, it is the seeker within us, for it is a spark of the great primordial Fire and will never be satisfied until it has recovered its solar totality, the lost sun of which the Veda incessantly speaks. Yet even when we have risen from plane to plane and the Flame has taken successive births in the triple world of our lower existence (the physical, vital and mental world), it will still remain unsatisfiedit wants to ascend, ascend further. And soon we reach a mental frontier where there seems to be nothing to grasp any longer, nor even to see, and nothing remains but to abolish everything and leap into the ecstasy of a great Light. At this point, we feel almost painfully the imprisoning carapace of matter all around us, preventing that apotheosis of the Flame; then we understand the cry, My kingdom is not of this world, and the insistence of Indias Vedantic sagesand perhaps the sages of all worlds and all religions that we must abandon this body to embrace the Eternal. Will our flame thus forever be truncated here below and our quest always end in disappointment? Shall we always have to choose one or the other, to renounce earth to gain heaven?
   Yet beyond the lower triple world, the Rishis had discovered a certain fourth, touryam svid; they found the vast dwelling place, the solar world, Swar: I have arisen from earth to the mid-world [life], I have arisen from the mid-world to heaven [mind], from the level of the firmament of heaven I have gone to the Sun-world, the Light (Yajur- Veda 17.67). And it is said, Mortals, they achieved immortality (Rig- Veda I.110.4). What then was their secret? How did they pass from a heaven of mind to the great heaven without leaving the body, without, as it were, going off into ecstasies?
  --
   The day before, Mother had listened to the passage of the manuscript concerning 'The Secret of the Veda.' Several extracts from it are included in the Addendum to this conversation.
   The Secret of the Veda, Cent. Ed., Vol. X, p. 34.
   Ibid., p. 38.
  --
   The Secret of the Veda, p. 25.
   In the preceding conversation, Mother was alluding particularly to this passage.

0 1961-11-05, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   About the discovery of the Supermind in the Veda and by Sri Aurobindo. There is something I dont quite grasp.
   Because in the Veda its incomplete.
   No, they had a hint, like a vision of the thing, but there is no proof that they realized it. Whats more, had they realized it, it seems to me that we would certainly have found some traces but no traces remain.

0 1961-11-06, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   When I read the Veda I thought I understood that the Rishis, finding the passage blocked above (since they would fall into ecstasy and lose their hold over the body), set out to find the Supermind by the downward path.
   But reading Sri Aurobindo, I seemed to understand the opposite: that FIRST he rose up, and then made the Light redescend to open the passage, and that the pressure of the Light from above is what opens the doors below, in Matter.

0 1961-11-07, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   (Regarding Satprem's letter to Mother on the Veda:)
   This has confronted me with a problem.
  --
   My impression from the Veda is not the same as yours. You say that when they reached the heights they went into trance and then tried the other method. When I read the Veda at least what Sri Aurobindo translates for us, because otherwise I have no direct knowledge.
   But they say nothing about this.
  --
   There is also what Theon and Madame Theon used to say. They never spoke of Supermind, but they said the same thing as the Vedas, that the world of Truth must incarnate on earth and create a new world. They even picked up the old phrase from the Gospels, new heavens and a new earth,1 which is the same thing the Vedas speak of. Madame Theon had this experience and she gave me the indication (she didnt actually teach me) of how it was to be done. She would go out of her body and become conscious in the vital world (there were many intermediary states, too, if one cared to explore them). After the vital came the mental: you consciously went out of the vital body, you left it behind (you could see it) and you entered the mental world. Then you left the mental body and entered into. They used different words, another classification (I dont remember it), but even so, the experience was identical. And like that, she successively left twelve different bodies, one after another. She was extremely developed, you seeindividualized, organized. She could leave one body and enter the consciousness of the next plane, fully experience the surroundings and all that was there, describe it and so on, twelve times.
   I learned to do the same thing, and with great dexterity; I could halt on any plane, do what I had to do there, move around freely, see, observe, and then speak about what I had seen. And my last stage, which Theon called pathtisme,2 a very barbaric but very expressive word, bordered on the Formlesshe sometimes used the Jewish terminology, calling the Supreme The Formless. (From this last stage one passed to the Formless there was no further body to leave behind, one was beyond all possible forms, even all thoughtforms.) In this domain [the last stage before the Formless] one experienced total unityunity in something that was the essence of Love; Love was a manifestation more dense, he would always say (there were all sorts of different densities); and Love was a denser expression of That, the sense of perfect Unityperfect unity, identitywith no longer any forms corresponding to those of the lower worlds. It was a Light! An almost immaculate white light, yet with something of a golden-rose in it (words are crude). This Light and this Experience were truly wonderful, inexpressible in words.
  --
   Besides, according to what Ive been told (not physically), I believe that the Rishis practiced going into trance. But I suppose they wanted to achieve what Sri Aurobindo speaks of: a PHYSICAL transformation of the physical body permitting one to LIVE this consciousness instead of the ordinary consciousness. Did they ever do it? I dont know. The Veda simply recounts what the forefa thers have done. But who are these forefa thers?
   But surely this supramental consciousness is something to be found in the body?8

0 1961-12-20, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   Dear Sir I must begin by telling you that although this text is an excellent essay, it is not, in its present form, a book for the Spiritual Masters series. Let us enumerate the reasons for this. First of all, the general impression is of an ABSTRACT text. I can straight-away imagine your reaction to this and I dread misunderstandings! But putting myself in the readers place, since, once again, it does involve a collection intended for a wide public that we are beginning to know well, I can assure you that this public will not be able to follow page after page of reflections upon what one is bound to call a philosophical and spiritual system. Obviously this impression is caused primarily by the fact that you have begun with twenty-one pages where the reader is assumed to already know of Sri Aurobindos historical existence and the content of the Vedas and the Upanishads, plus I dont know how many other notions of rite, truth, divinity, wisdom, etc., etc. In my view, and the solution is going to appear cruel to you, for you certainly value these twenty-one pages [on the Secret of the Veda], they should purely and simply be deleted, for everything you say there, which is very rich in meaning, can only become clear when one has read what follows. There are many books in which readers can be asked to make the effort entailed in not understanding the beginning until they have read the end: but not books of popular culture. One could envisage an introduction of three or four pages to situate the spiritual climate and cultural world in which Sri Aurobindos thought has taken place, provided, however, that it is sufficiently descriptive, and not a pre-synthesis of everything to be expounded upon in what follows. In a general way you are going to smile, finding me quite Cartesian! But the readership we address is more or less permeated by a widespread Cartesianism, and you can help them, if you like, to reverse their methodology, but on the condition that you make yourself understood right from the start. Generally, you dont make enough use of analysis and, even before analysis, of a description of the realities being analyzed. That is why the sections of pure philosophical analysis seem much too long to us, and, even apart from the abstract character of the chapter on evolution (which should certainly be shorter), one feels at a positive standstill! After having waited patiently, and sometimes impatiently, for some light to be thrown on Sri Aurobindos own experience, one reads with genuine amazement that one can draw on energies from above instead of drawing on them from the material nature around oneself, or from an animal sleep, or that one can modify his sleep and render it conscious master illnesses before they enter the body. All of that in less than a page; and you conclude that the spirit that was the slave of matter becomes again the master of evolution. But how Sri Aurobindo was led to think this, the experiences that permitted him to verify it, those that permit other men to consider the method transmittable, the difficulties, the obstacles, the realizationsdoesnt this constitute the essence of what must be said to make the reader understand? Once again, it is the question of a pedagogy intimately tied in with the spirit of the collection. Let me add as well that I always find it deplorable when a thought is not expressed purely for its own sake, but is accompanied by an aggressive irony towards concepts which the author does not share. This is pointless and harms the ideas being presented, all the more so because they are expressed in contrast with caricatured notions: the allusions you make to such concepts as you think yourself capable of evoking the soul, creation, virtue, sin, salvationwould only hold some interest if the reader could find those very concepts within himself. But, as they are caricatured by your pen, the reader is given the impression of an all too easily obtained contrast between certain ideas admired and others despised. Whereas it would be far more to the point if they corresponded to something real in the religious consciousness of the West. I have too much esteem for you and the spiritual world in which you live to avoid saying this through fear of upsetting you.
   Amen.

0 1962-06-30, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   Human experience, with this direct incarnation of the Supreme,9 is ultimately a UNIQUE experience, which has given a new orientation to universal history. Sri Aurobindo speaks of thishe speaks of the difference between the Vedic era, the Vedic way of relating to the Supreme, and the advent of Vedanta (I think its Vedanta): devotion, adoration, bhakti, the God within.10 Well, this aspect of rapport with the Supreme could exist ONLY WITH MAN, because man is a special being in universal History the divine Presence is in him. And several of those great gods have taken human bodies JUST TO HAVE THAT.11 But not many of themthey were so fully aware of their own perfect independence and their almightiness that they didnt NEED anything (unlike man, you see, struggling to escape his slavery): they were absolutely free.
   And thats why. How many times Durga came! She would always come, and I had my eye on her (!), because in her presence I could clearly sense that there wasnt that rapport with the Supreme (she just didnt need it, she didnt need anything). And it wasnt that something acted on her consciously, deliberately, to obtain that result: it has been a contagion. I remember how she used to come, and my aspiration would be so intense, my inner attitude so concentrated and one day there was such a sense of power, of immensity, of ineffable bliss in the contact with the Supreme (it was a day when Durga was there), and she seemed to be taken and absorbed in it. And through that bliss she made her surrender.
  --
   Vedism is in contact with the gods and, THROUGH THE GODS, with the Supreme; but it is not in direct contact with the Supreme there is no inner, psychic contact. That's what Sri Aurobindo says (I myself know nothing about it!). But with the Vedanta and the devotees of Krishna, it is the god within: they had a direct contact with the god within (as in the Gita).
   Shortly afterwards, Satprem asked:

0 1962-07-21, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   I know very well that Bengal is not really ready. The spiritual flood which has come is for the most part a new form of the old. It is not the real transformation. However this too was needed. Bengal has been awakening in itself the old yogas and exhausting their samskaras [old habitual tendencies], extracting their essence and with it fertilizing the soil. At first it was the time of VedantaAdwaita, Sannyasa, Shankaras Maya and the rest. It is now the turn of Vaishnava DharmaLila, love, the intoxication of emotional experience. All this is very old, unfitted for the new age and will not endure for such excitement has no capacity to last. But the merit of the Vaishnava Bhava [emotional enthusiasm] is that it keeps a connexion between God and the world and gives a meaning to life; but since it is a partial bhava the whole connexion, the full meaning is not there. The tendency to create sects which you have noticed was inevitable. The nature of the mind is to take a part and call it the whole and exclude all other parts. The Siddha [illuminated being] who brings the bhava, although he leans on its partial aspect, yet keeps some knowledge of the integral whole, even though he may not be able to give it form. But his disciples do not get that knowledge precisely because it is not in a form. They are tying up their little bundles, let them. The bundles will open of themselves when God manifests himself fully. These things are the signs of incompleteness and immaturity. I am not disturbed by them. Let the force of spirituality play in the country in whatever way and in as many sects as may be. Afterwards we shall see. This is the infancy or the embryonic condition of the new age. It is a first hint, not even the beginning.
   The peculiarity of this yoga is that until there is siddhi above the foundation does not become perfect. Those who have been following my course had kept many of the old samskaras; some of them have dropped away, but others still remain. There was the samskara of Sannyasa, even the wish to create an Aravinda Math [Sri Aurobindo monastery]. Now the intellect has recognized that Sannyasa is not what is wanted, but the stamp of the old idea has not yet been effaced from the prana [breath, life energy]. And so there was next this talk of remaining in the midst of the world, as a man of worldly activities and yet a man of renunciation. The necessity of renouncing desire has been understood, but the harmony of renunciation of desire with enjoyment of Ananda has not been rightly seized by the mind. And they took up my Yoga because it was very natural to the Bengali temperament, not so much from the side of Knowledge as from the side of Bhakti and Karma [Works]. A little knowledge has come in, but the greater part has escaped; the mist of sentimentalism has not been dissipated, the groove of the sattwic bhava [religious fervor] has not been broken. There is still the ego. I am not in haste, I allow each to develop according to his nature. I do not want to fashion all in the same mould. That which is fundamental will indeed be one in all, but it will express itself in many forms. Everybody grows, forms from within. I do not want to build from outside. The basis is there, the rest will come.

0 1962-07-31, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   Agni: the fire of inner aspiration. In the Vedas it is represented by a particular god.
   ***

0 1962-09-26, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   I am unfamiliar with the purely Hindu traditions, but the gods are the beings the Vedas and people of Vedic times were in touch wi that least I think so. I learned what I know about the gods before coming here, through the other tradition, the Chaldean. But Thon used to say that this tradition and the Vedic (which he knew well) were outgrowths of a more ancient tradition common to both. The story goes, according to him, that the first Emanations, who were perfectly independent, separated themselves from the Supreme in their action, creating all the disorder thats what caused the creations disorder. Afterwards the gods were emanated, to repair the evil that had been wrought and to organize the world according to the supreme Will. Of course, this is a childlike way of putting it, but its comprehensible. So all these gods work in harmony and order. Thats what the ancient tradition says.
   As far as Ive understood, the Indian tradition has embraced everything that came from the first Emanations, since all the gods of destruction, of unconsciousness and of suffering are included in its pantheon.
  --
   But its better not to emphasize this [in your book]. As I have said, we can bypass that plane, or even pass through without knowing it. It interested me to read in the Vedas that if you dont ascend the way youre supposed to, if you try to bypass the gods, then unpleasant things happen to you and your way is blockeddo you remember that?1 That gives you an idea of what it is. Its like an intermediary zone, far superior to the earth, but still intermediary. Some have tried to cross it without stopping; and there, they say, you run into trouble. Personally, I am not sure, I can only speak of my own experience: there was always a sense of fraternityas you can imagine! I knew them, I was on friendly terms with them, so there was no question of bypassing them or not!
   But I have a strong impression that that world is still a magnified version of our own, and part of the old path; it has nothing to do with the Supramental Creation, which will bring to earth the sense of the Supreme and the Unique.
  --
   This must refer to the colloquy of Rishi Agastya and Indra (The Secret of The Veda, Cent. Ed., X. 241), commented on by Mother in the 1961 Agenda (Vol. II, p. 37).
   ***

0 1962-11-27, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   One day, I dont remember on what occasion, I saw what had motivated the forefa thers who wrote the Vedas: it was the need for immortality; they were in quest of immortality.6 From there, I went on to Buddha and saw what had set the Buddha on his way: this kind of need for permanence, purely and simply; the vision of the impermanence of things had profoundly troubled him, and he felt the need for Permanence. His whole quest was to find the Permanent (why was he so anxious to have the Permanent?). There are a few things like that in human nature, in the deep human need. And then I saw another such need: a need for the Certitude which is security. I dont know how to explain it. Because I had the experience of it, I saw it was one of the human needs; and I understood it very intensely, for when I met Sri Aurobindo, this Certitude is what made me feel I had found the Truth I needed. And I didnt realize how DEEP this need was until he left his bodyjust then, at the moment of the transition. Then the entire physical consciousness felt its certitude and security collapse. At that moment I saw (we spoke about it with Nolini a year later and he had had exactly the same impression), I saw this was similar to Buddhas experience when he realized that everything was impermanent and so all of life collapsed in other words, Something Else HAD to be found. Well, at that moment. Id already had all my experiences, but with Sri Aurobindo, for the thirty years I lived with him (a little more than thirty years), I lived in an absolute, an absolute of securitya sense of total security, even physical, even the most material security. A sense of absolute security, because Sri Aurobindo was there. And it held me up, you know, like this (gesture of being carried): not for ONE MINUTE in those thirty years did it leave me. That was why I could do my work with a Base, really, a Base of absolutenessof eternity and absoluteness. I realized it when he left: THAT suddenly collapsed.
   And then I understood that it is one of lifes needs (there are several); and its what spurs the human being to get out of his present state and find another one. These needs are (whats the word?) the seeds, the germs of evolution. They compel us to progress. The whole time Sri Aurobindo was here, as I said, individual progress was automatic: all the progress Sri Aurobindo made, I made. But I was in a state of eternity, of absoluteness, with a feeling of such security, in every circumstance. Nothing, nothing unfortunate could happen, for he was there. So when he left, all at oncea fall into a pit. And thats what projected me wholly (Mother gestures forward).

0 1963-05-11, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   And this (the diagram) is meant to prepare for the second birth mentioned in the Vedas, the spiritual birth. Through it one becomes a complete being, consciously complete.
   Of course, its the beginning of realization. But for many people its the ultimate term.

0 1963-05-15, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   There is a particular aspect of the creation (a very modern aspect, maybe): a need to get out of disorder and confusionof disharmony and confusion. A confusion, a disorder which assumes all forms, turns into struggles, pointless efforts and wasted energy. It depends on which level you stand on, but materially, in action, it means unnecessary complications, wasted energy and materials, waste of time, incomprehension, misunderstanding, confusion, disorderwhat in ancient days they called deforma in sharp and unnecessary zigzags). Its one of the things farthest from the harmony of a purely divine actionwhich is somethition, crookedness in the Vedas (I dont know the French word for it, its something crooked which, instead of shooting straight to the goal, weaves its wayng so simple. It looks like childs play and directdirect, without those absurd and completely useless twists and turns. Well, it is clearly the same phenomenon: that disorder is a way to stimulate the need for pure and divine simplicity.
   The body feels strongly, very strongly that everything could be so simple, so simple!

0 1963-08-07, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   All sorts of things come that way; at one period one thing, at another period another thingthose are periods of inner transformation. For instance, the sense of a universal duplicity (what in the Vedas they call crookedness): the impression that nothing goes straight. I have extraordinary examples of writing a sentence with a clear, precise will, and it was understood (by someone with perfect goodwill) in quite another way, according to his own vision of things. It happened a few days ago. But it happens all the time! I say something, which to me is as clear as can be, and its understood absolutely differently, sometimes the very opposite! So theres the feeling, the sensation that EVERYTHING is that way, all life is that way, all consciousnesses are that way, all vibrations are that wayinstead of going straight, everything is crooked. Its so strong that, as you say, it almost makes you feel sort of ill-at-ease. You are disgusted, it makes you feel sick.
   And at another time, its something else that comes.

0 1964-02-05, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   Now, I dont know if Sri Aurobindo had in mind the Indian Scriptures. The Upanishads, then? Or the Vedas but no, the Vedas were oral.
   They BECAME Scriptures.

0 1964-10-17, #Agenda Vol 05, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   Perhaps the conscious effort of the Vedas came after thousands and thousands of years of research, studies, civilizations that didnt leave any trace? Because they have more or less calculated the time of the coming of man on the eartha few million years, no? How much?
   One million, I think.3

0 1965-03-20, #Agenda Vol 06, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   And naturally, the ancient Vedas and all the old traditions announced a new earth, thats well known.
   But even the Christians.

0 1965-05-19, #Agenda Vol 06, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   Thats why certain minds have postulated that the creation was the result of an error. But we find all the possible conceptions: the perfect creation, then a fault that introduced the error; the creation itself as a lower movement, which must end since it began; then the conception of the Vedas according to what Sri Aurobindo told us about it, which was a progressive and infinite unfolding or discoveryindefinite and infiniteof the All by Himself. Naturally, all these are human translations. For the moment, as long as we express ourselves humanly, its a human translation; but depending on the initial stand of the human translator (that is, a stand that accepts the primordial error, or the accident in the creation, or the conscious supreme Will since the beginning, in a progressive unfolding), the conclusions or the descents in the yogic attitude are different. There are the nihilists, the Nirvanists and the illusionists, there are all the religions (like Christianity) that accept the devils intervention in one form or another; and then pure Vedism, which is the Supremes eternal unfolding in a progressive objectification. And depending on your taste, you are here or there or here, and there are nuances. But according to what Sri Aurobindo felt to be the most total truth, according to that conception of a progressive universe, you are led to say that, every minute, what takes place is the best possible for the unfolding of the whole. The logic of it is absolute. And I think that all the contradictions can only stem from a more or less pronounced tendency for this or that position, that other position; all the minds that accept the intrusion of a fault or an error and the resulting conflict between forces pulling backward and forces pulling forward, can naturally dispute the possibility. But you are forced to say that for someone who is spiritually attuned to the supreme Will or the supreme Truth, what happens is necessarily, every instant, the best for his personal realizationthis is true in all cases. The unconditioned best can only be accepted by one who sees the universe as an unfolding, the Supreme growing more and more conscious of Himself.
   (silence)

0 1967-04-05, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   Then and then onlyyou will be able to discern, from time to time, from place to place, an intuition that something else is possible: in the Vedas, for instance (the injunction to descend deep into the cave of the Panis); in the Tantras also a little light burning.
   I may add that you could adopt as motto for your first project this quotation of Sri Aurobindo:

0 1970-04-11, #Agenda Vol 11, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   The physical Nature does not mean the body alone but the phrase includes the transformation of the whole physical mind, vital, material naturenot by imposing Siddhis [occult powers] on them, but by creating a new physical nature which is to be the habitation of the supramental being in a new evolution. I am not aware that this has been done by any Hathayogic or other process. Mental or vital occult power can only bring Siddhis of the higher plane into the individual lifelike the Sannyasi who could take any poison without harm, but he died of a poison after all when he forgot to observe the conditions of the Siddhi. The working of the supramental power envisaged is not an influence on the physical giving it abnormal faculties but an entrance and permeation changing it wholly into a supramentalised physical. I did not learn the idea from Veda or Upanishad, and I do not know if there is anything of the kind there. What I received about the Supermind was a direct, not a derived knowledge given to me; it was only afterwards that I found certain confirmatory revelations in the Upanishad and Veda.
   11 September 1936

0 1971-11-24, #Agenda Vol 12, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   Again, you say that you ask only for the Truth and yet you speak like a narrow and ignorant fanatic who refuses to believe in anything but the religion in which he was born. All fanaticism is false, because it is a contradiction of the very nature of God and of Truth. Truth cannot be shut up in a single book, Bible or Veda or Koran, or in a single religion. The Divine Being is eternal and universal and infinite and cannot be the sole property of the Mussulmans or of the Semitic religions only,those that happened to be in a line from the Bible and to have Jewish or Arabian prophets for their founders. Hindus and Confucians and Taoists and all others have as much right to enter into relation with God and find the Truth in their own way. All religions have some truth in them, but none has the whole truth; all are created in time and finally decline and perish. Mahomed himself never pretended that the Koran was the last message of God and there would be no other. God and Truth outlast these religions and manifest themselves anew in whatever way or form the Divine Wisdom chooses. You cannot shut up God in the limitations of your own narrow brain or dictate to the Divine Power and Consciousness how or where or through whom it shall manifest; you cannot put up your puny barriers against the divine Omnipotence. These again are simple truths which are now being recognised all over the world; only the childish in mind or those who vegetate in some formula of the past deny them.
   You have insisted on my writing and asked for the Truth and I have answered. But if you want to be a Mussulman, no one prevents you. If the Truth I bring is too great for you to understand or to bear, you are free to go and live in a half-truth or in your own ignorance. I am not here to convert anyone; I do not preach to the world to come to me and I call no one. I am here to establish the divine life and the divine consciousness in those who of themselves feel the call to come to me and cleave to it and in no others. I am not asking you and the Mother is not asking you to accept us. You can go any day and live either the worldly life or a religious life according to your own preference. But as you are free, so also are others free to stay here and follow their own way.

0 1972-05-27, #Agenda Vol 13, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
   (Rig Veda, I.62.7)
   ***

02.01 - A Vedic Story, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   (Rig VedaX. 51.)
   The gods are in a great fix. Where is Agni? How is it that the comrade has disappeared all on a sudden? The Sacrifice the great work has to be undertaken. And he is to be the leader, for he alone can take up the burden. There is no time to be lost, everything is ready for the ceremony to start and just at the moment the one needed most is nowhere. So the gods organise a search party to find out the whereabouts of the runaway god.

02.01 - Metaphysical Thought and the Supreme Truth, #The Integral Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  This, you will see, answers your point about the Western thinkers, Bradley and others, who have arrived through intellectual thinking at the idea of an "Other beyond Thought" or have even, like Bradley, tried to express their conclusions about it in terms that recall some of the expressions in the Arya. The idea in itself is not new; it is as old as the Vedas. It was repeated in other forms in Buddhism, Christian Gnosticism, Sufism. Originally, it was not discovered by intellectual speculation, but by the mystics following an inner spiritual discipline. When, somewhere between the seventh and fifth centuries B.C., men began both in the East and West to intellectualise knowledge, this Truth survived in the East; in the West, where the intellect began to be accepted as the sole or highest instrument for the discovery of
  Truth, it began to fade. But still it has there too tried constantly to return; the Neo-Platonists brought it back, and now, it appears, the Neo-Hegelians and others (e.g., the Russian Ouspensky and one or two German thinkers, I believe) seem to be reaching after it. But still there is a difference.

02.01 - The World War, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Modern thinkers do not speak of the Asura the Demon or the Titanalthough the religiously minded sometimes refer to the Anti-Christ; but the real, the inner significance of the terms, is lost to a mind nurtured in science and empiricism; they are considered as more or less imaginative symbols for certain undesirable qualities of nature and character. Yet some have perceived and expressed the external manifestation and activities of the Asura in a way sufficient to open men's eyes to the realities involved. Thus they have declared that the present war is a conflict between two ideals, to be sure, but also that the two ideals are so different that they do not belong to the same plane or order; they belong to different planes and different orders. On one side the whole endeavour is to bring man down from the level to which he has arisen in the course of evolution to something like his previous level and to keep him imprisoned there. That this is really their aim, the protagonists and partisans themselves have declared frankly and freely and loudly enough, without any hesitation or reservation. Hitler's 'Mein Kampf' has become the Scripture of the New Order; it has come with a more categorical imperative, a more supernal authority than the Veda, the Bible or the Koran.
   When man was a dweller of the forest,a jungle man,akin to his forbear the ape, his character was wild and savage, his motives and impulsions crude, violent, egoistic, almost wholly imbedded in, what we call, the lower vital level; the light of the higher intellect and intelligence had not entered into them. Today there is an uprush of similar forces to possess and throw man back to a similar condition. This new order asks only one thing of man, namely, to be strong and powerful, that is to say, fierce, ruthless, cruel and regimented. Regimentation can be said to be the very characteristic of the order, the regimentation of a pack of wild dogs or wolves. A particular country, nation or raceit is Germany in Europe and, in her wake, Japan in Asiais to be the sovereign nation or master race (Herrenvolk); the rest of mankindo ther countries and peoplesshould be pushed back to the status of servants and slaves, mere hewers of wood and drawers of water. What the helots were in ancient times, what the serfs were in the mediaeval ages, and what the subject peoples were under the worst forms of modern imperialism, even so will be the entire mankind under the new overlordship, or something still worse. For whatever might have been the external conditions in those ages and systems, the upward aspirations of man were never doubted or questioned they were fully respected and honoured. The New Order has pulled all that down and cast them to the winds. Furthermore in the new regime, it is not merely the slaves that suffer in a degraded condition, the masters also, as individuals, fare no better. The individual here has no respect, no freedom or personal value. This society or community of the masters even will be like a bee-hive or an ant-hill; the individuals are merely functional units, they are but screws and bolts and nuts and wheels in a huge relentless machinery. The higher and inner realities, the spontaneous inspirations and self-creations of a free soulart, poetry, literaturesweetness and light the good and the beautifulare to be banished for ever; they are to be regarded as things of luxury which enervate the heart, diminish the life-force, distort Nature's own virility. Man perhaps would be the worshipper of Science, but of that Science which brings a tyrannical mastery over material Nature, which serves to pile up tools and instruments, arms and armaments, in order to ensure a dire efficiency and a grim order in practical life.

02.02 - Lines of the Descent of Consciousness, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 03, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   All the ancient legends about a principle and a personalityof Denial and Ignorance, of an Everlasting Nayrefer to this fact of a descending consciousness, a Fall. The Vedantic my, spoken of sometimes as the Dark Mother, seems to be the personification of the lower Overmind, Jehovah and Satan of the Hebrews, Olympians and Titans of the Greeks, Ahriman and Ahura Mazda of old Iran, the sons of Diti and Aditi the Indian Puranas speak of, are powers and personalities of consciousness when it has descended entirely into the mind and the vital where the division is complete. These lower reaches have completely lost the unitary consciousness; still there are beings even here that have succeeded in maintaining it as a memory or an aspiration, although in a general way the living reality of the oneness is absent. It is significant that the term asura which came to mean in classical and mythological ages a + sura, not-god, the Titan, had originally a different connotation and etymology, asu + ra, one having force or strength, and was used as a general attri bute of all the gods. The degradation in the sense of the word is a pointer to the spiritual Fall: Satan was once Lucifer, the bringer or bearer of light. We may mention in this connection that these beings of which we are speaking, dwelling in unseen worlds, are of two broad categories(1) beings that are native to each plane and immutably confined and bound to that plane, and (2) those that extend their existence through many or all planes and assume on each plane the norm and form appropriate to that plane. But this is a problem of individual destiny with which we are not concerned at present.
   We were speaking of the descent into the Vital, the domain of dynamism, desire and hunger. The Vital is also the field of some strong creative Powers who follow, or are in secret contact with the line of unitary consciousness, who are open to influences from a deeper or higher or subtler consciousness. Along with the demons there is also a line of daimona, guardian angels, in the hierarchy of vital beings. Much of what is known as aesthetic or artistic creation derives its spirit from this sphere. Many of the gods of beauty and delight are denizens of this heaven. Gandharvas and Kinnaras are here, Dionysus and even Apollo perhaps (at least in their mythological aspectin their occult reality they properly belong to the Overmind which is the own home of the gods), many of the angels, seraphs and cherubs dwell here. In fact, the mythological heaven for the most part can be located in this region.

02.02 - Rishi Dirghatama, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Today I will speak of one of the Vedic rishis. Some names of great Vedic rishis must have reached your earsVashishtha, Vishwamitra, Atri, Parasara, Kanwa (I do not know if it is the same Kanwa of whom Kalidasa speaks in his Shakuntala), Madhuchchanda. All of them are seers of mantra, hearers of mantra, creators of mantra; all of them occupy a large place in the Veda. Each one of them has his speciality, each one delivers a mantra that is in its tone, temper and style his own although the subject matter, the substance, the fundamental realisation is everywhere the same. For example, Vashishtha is characterised by a happy clarity, Vishwamitra has force and energy, Kutsa is sweetness, Dirghatama is well known for his oblique utterances, his paradoxical apopthegms.1
   Today precisely it is of Dirghatama that we will speak. Dirghatama does not mean as the word would indicate to the layman, one who is verytalllaprmurmahbhuja in Kalidasa's phrase. Tama is not the superlative suffix (most), it istamas, darkness. So, from the name itself one may naturally expect that the person was not of an ordinary category. Indeed the amount of stories and legends that have been woven around the name is fantasticqueer, odd, unbelievable, impossible in every way. I need not open that chapter.
  --
   Now in conclusion I will just speak of the fundamental vision of the rishi. His entire realisation, the whole Veda of his life, he has, it appears, pressed into one single k We have heard it said that the entire range of all scriptures is epitomised in the Gita and the Gita' itself is epitomised in one slokasarvadharmn parityajya... Even so we may say that Rishi Dirghatama has summarised his experience, at least the fundamental basic one, and put it into a sutra. It is the famous k with which he opens his long hymn to Surya:
   Lo, this delightful ancient Priest and Summoner; he has a second brother who is the devourer. There is a third brother with a dazzling luminous facetthere I saw the Master of the worlds along with his seven sons.8
  --
   Rig Veda, 1. 164. 5.
   Rig Veda, 1. 164. 16.
   Rig Veda, I. 164. 17.
   Rig Veda, 1. 164. 32.
   Rig Veda, 1. 164. 34.
   Rig Veda , 1. 164. 35.
   Rig Veda, I. 164. 1.
   ***

02.05 - Robert Graves, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   The birth of Shilindhra resembles the birth of Dionysus. When King Zeus took the form of thunder and lightning and entered the womb of Semele, Dionysus was born. Similar is the story of the appearance of the toadstool, in the midst of rain and thunder and lightning and on the lap of mother earth. We have already said that there are two categories of gods or two types of themone belongs to heaven and the other to earth. The Vedic Rishis announced that heaven was our father and earth themotherdaurme pit mt pthvimahyam. The Vedantins usually and mainly worship the father, and Tantriks, the mother. Svarga, Dyaus, is the world of light, and earth or bhu is that of delight and enjoyment. We have already said that high above, up there, dwell Apollo and Zeus and Juno, and below here on earth, Dionysus and Bacchus and Semele and Aphrodite.
   However the poet says that as the toadstool is born in the midst of thunder and lightning, his strength and capacity are of the nature of thunderenduring and hard and powerful. Born thus it spreads everywhere and lasts through all time. From the beginning of creation this god has sprouted up everywhere, as giver of pleasure and ecstasy and intoxication. To worship him is to worship earth, to worship Dionysus himself. But one needs to worship this god in the right way, to give oneself away wholly to him. Once upon a time the demons for some selfish interest wanted to capture and imprison him. The result was disastroushe thought of depriving them of their power of movement and drowning them into the ocean. On the contrary, to the devoted which world does he reveal, which delight bring? Let us listen to the poet:
  --
   Yatrnandca modca muda pramuda sate kmasya yatrpt km[Rig Veda, IX. 113.11*.](https://the Veda.org.in/rig Veda/09/113)
   ***

02.06 - The Integral Yoga and Other Yogas, #The Integral Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  From where did you get this singular attitude towards the old Yogas and Yogis? Is the wisdom of the Vedanta and Tantra a small and trifling thing? Have then the sadhaks of this Asram attained to self-realisation and are they liberated Jivan-muktas, free from ego and ignorance? If not, why then do you say, "it is not a very difficult stage", "their goal is not high", "is it such a long process?"
  I have said that this Yoga was "new" because it aims at the integrality of the Divine in this world and not only beyond it and at a supramental realisation. But how does that justify a superior contempt for the spiritual realisation which is as much the aim of this Yoga as of any other?

02.08 - Jules Supervielle, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   His poetry is very characteristic and adds almost a new vein to the spirit and manner of French poetry. He has bypassed the rational and emotional tradition of his adopted country, brought in a mystic way of vision characteristic of the East. This mysticism is not however the normal spiritual way but a kind of oblique sight into what is hidden behind the appearance. By the oblique way I mean the sideway to enter into the secret of things, a passage opening through the side. The mystic vision has different ways of approachone may look at the thing straight, face to face, being level with it with a penetrating gaze, piercing a direct entry into the secrets behind. This frontal gaze is also the normal human way of knowing and understanding, the scientific way. It becomes mystic when it penetrates sufficiently behind and strikes a secret source of another light and sight, that is, the inner sight of the soul. The normal vision which I said is the scientist's vision, stops short at a certain distance and so does not possess the key to the secret knowledge. But an aspiring vision can stretch itself, drill into the surface obstacle confronting it, and make its contact with the hidden ray behind. There is also another mystic way, not a gaze inward but a gaze upward. The human intelligence and the higher brain consciousness seeks a greater and intenser light, a vaster knowledge and leaps upward as it were. There develops a penetrating gaze towards heights up and above, to such a vision the mystery of the spirit slowly reveals itself. That is Vedantic mysticism. There is a look downward also below the life-formation and one enters into contact with forces and beings and creatures of another type, a portion of which is named Hell or Hades in Europe, and in India Ptl and rastal. But here we are speaking of another way, not a frontal or straight movement, but as I said, splitting the side and entering into it, something like opening the shell of a mother of pearl and finding the pearl inside. There is a descriptive mystic: the suprasensuous experience is presented in images and feeling forms. That is the romantic way. There is an explanatory mysticism: the suprasensuous is set in intellectual or mental terms, making it somewhat clear to the normal understanding. That is I suppose classical mysticism. All these are more or less direct ways, straight approaches to the mystic reality. But the oblique is differentit is a seeking of the mind and an apprehension of the senses that are allusive, indirect, that move through contraries and negations, that point to a different direction in order just to suggest the objective aimed at. The Vedantic (and the Scientific too) is the straight, direct, rectilinear gaze the Vedantin says, May I look at the Sun with a transfixed gaze'; whether he looks upward or inward or downward. But the modem mystic is of a different mould. He has not that clear absolute vision, he has the apprehension of an aspiring consciousness. His is not religious poetry for that matter, but it is an aspiration and a yearning to perceive and seize truth and reality that eludes the senses, but seems to be still there. We shall understand better by taking a poem of his as example. Thus:
   Alter Ego

02.11 - Hymn to Darkness, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Here, for example, is a hymn from the Rig Veda, a whole hymn addressed by Rishi Kushika to Night. Listen how the Rishi invokes his black goddess: Night and Light are unified almost one -in his consciousness. The Vedic Rishis considered Night as only another form or function of Daynaktoasa samans *virpeNight and Dawn have the same mind although the forms are different.
   Ode to Darkness

03.01 - Humanism and Humanism, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   The Indian sage is not and cannot be human in the human way. For the end of his whole spiritual effort is to transcend the human way and establish himself in the divine way, in the way of the Spirit. The feeling he has towards his fellow beingsmen and animals, the sentient or the insentient, the entire creation in factis one of identity in the One Self. And therefore he does not need to embrace physically his brother, like the Christian saint, to express or justify the perfect inner union or unity. The basis of his relation with the world and its objects is not the human heart, however purified and widened, but something behind it and hidden by it, the secret soul and self. It was Vivekananda who very often stressed the point that the distinctive characteristic of the Vedantist was that he did not look upon created beings as his brethren but as himself, as the one and the same self. The profound teaching of the Upanishadic Rishi iswhat may appear very egoistic and inadmissible to the Christian saint that one loves the wife or the I son or anybody or anything in the world not for the sake of the wife or the son or that body or thing but for the sake of the self, for the sake of oneself that is in the object which one seems to love.
   The pragmatic man requires an outward gesture, an external emotion to express and demonstrate his kinship with creation. Indeed the more concrete and tangible the expression the more human it is considered to be and all the more worthy for it. There are not a few who think that giving alms to the poor is more nobly human than, say, the abstract feeling of a wide commonalty, experienced solely in imagination or contemplation in the Wordsworthian way.
  --
   And yet there can be a status even beyond. For beyond the cosmic reality, lies the transcendent reality. It is the Absolute, neti, neti, into which individual and cosmos, all disappear and vanish. In compassion, the cosmic communion, there is a trace and an echo of humanismit is perhaps one of the reasons why Europeans generally are attracted to Buddhism and find it more congenial than Hinduism with its dizzy Vedantic heights; but in the status of the transcendent Selfhood humanism is totally transcended and transmuted, one dwells then in the Bliss that passeth all feeling.
   The Upanishadic summit is not suffused with humanism or touched by it, because it is supra-human, not because there is a lack or want or deficiency in the human feeling, but because there is a heightening and a transcendence in the consciousness and being. To man, to human valuation, the Boddhisattwa may appear to be greater than the Buddha; even so to the sick a physician or a nurse may seem to be a diviner angel than any saint or sage or perhaps God Himself but that is an inferior viewpoint, that of particular or local interest.

03.01 - The Evolution of Consciousness, #The Integral Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  Life, of conscious mind first in animal life and then fully in conscious and thinking man, the highest present achievement of evolutionary Nature. The achievement of mental being is at present her highest and tends to be regarded as her final work; but it is possible to conceive a still further step of the evolution: Nature may have in view beyond the imperfect mind of man a consciousness that passes out of the mind's ignorance and possesses truth as its inherent right and nature. There is a truth-consciousness as it is called in the Veda, a supermind, as I have termed it, possessing Knowledge, not having to seek after it and constantly miss it. In one of the Upanishads a being of knowledge is stated to be the next step above the mental being; into that the soul has to rise and through it to attain the perfect bliss of spiritual existence. If that could be achieved as the next evolutionary step of Nature here, then she would be fulfilled and we could conceive of the perfection of life even here, its attainment of a full spiritual living even in this body or it may be in a perfected body. We could even speak of a divine life on earth; our human dream of perfectibility would be accomplished and at the same time the aspiration to a heaven on earth common to several religions and spiritual seers and thinkers.
  The ascent of the human soul to the supreme Spirit is that soul's highest aim and necessity, for that is the supreme reality; but there can be too the descent of the Spirit and its powers into the world and that would justify the existence of the material world also, give a meaning, a divine purpose to the creation and solve its riddle. East and West could be reconciled in the pursuit of the highest and largest ideal, Spirit embrace Matter and Matter find its own true reality and the hidden Reality in all things in the Spirit.

03.04 - The Body Human, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 03, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Vaishnavism sees the Divine as a human person, the human person par excellence. Krishna's body is a radiant form of consciousness (cinmaya), no doubt, but it is as definite, determinate, and concrete as the physical body, it is the physical itself but in its true substance. And its exquisiteness consists in its being human in form. The Vedantin's Maya does not touch it, it is beyond the illusory consciousness. For they say Goloka stands above Brahmaloka.
   The Christian conception of God-man is also extremely beautiful and full of meaning. God became man: He sent down upon earth his own and only Son to live among men as man. This indeed is His supreme Grace, His illimitable love for mankind. It is thus, in the words of the Offertory, that He miraculously created the dignity of human substance, holding Himself worthy to partake of our humanity. This carnal sinful body has been sanctified by the Christ having assumed it. In and through Himhis divine consciousness it has been strained and purified, uplifted and redeemed. He has anointed it and given it a place in Heaven even by the side of the Father. Again, Marysymbolising the earth or body consciousness, as Christian mystics themselves declarewas herself taken up bodily into the heavenly abode. The body celestial is this very physical human body cleared of its dross and filled with the divine substance. This could have been so precisely because it was originally the projection, the very image of God here below in the world of Matter. The mystery of Transubstantiation repeats and confirms the same symbology. The bread and wine of our secular body become the flesh and blood of the God-Man's body. The human frame is, as it were, woven into the very fabric of God's own truth and substance. The human form is inherent in the Divine's own personality. Is it mere anthropomorphism to say like this? We know the adage that the lion were he self-conscious and creative, would paint God as a super-lion, that is to say, in his own image. Well, the difference is precisely here, that the lion is not self-conscious and creative. Man createsnot man the mere imaginative artist but man the seer, the Rishihe expresses and embodies, represents faithfully the truth that he sees, the truth that he is. It is because of this conscious personality, referred to in the parable of the Aitareya Upanishad,-that God has chosen the human form to inhabit.

03.05 - Some Conceptions and Misconceptions, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 03, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   A question is asked, where, at what stage or level of Involution does the principle of exclusive concentration (the principle of Ignorance) come in? If, as Sri Aurobindo says, it comes subsequently at a later stage, where was it then before? Was it not in the Absolute Reality itself? There can be nothing that is not inherent in the Absolute Reality. We all know, nothing comes out of nothing. Then, if it is in the original Reality already, why should it come out at a later stage and not be active from the very beginning? This standpoint seems to have been anticipated by some schools (Visishtadwaita Vedanta, for example) who describe in consequence the Reality (Brahman) as consisting, when viewed as a totality, of both Knowledge and Ignorancecit-acit; the Ignorance is a sort of peripheral reality not touching or affecting the Knowledge, but connected with or depending upon the nuclear reality, something like the physical body coexisting with and depending on the soul or self. One can also remember in this connection the Purusha-Prakriti relation in Sankhya. Such a standpoint, I suppose, is the precursor or philosophical background of what is well known as the Manichean principle.
   Sri Aurobindo's view is different. It is something like this I am putting the thing as simply as possible, without entering into details or mysteries that merely confuse the brain. The Absolute Reality contains all, nothing can be outside it, pain and sin and all; true. But these do not exist as such in the supreme status, they are resolved each into its ultimate and fundamental force of consciousness. When we say I all things, whatever they are, exist in the Divine Consciousness, the Absolute, we have an idea that they exist there as they do here as objects or entities; it goes without saying, they do not. Naturally we have to make a distinction between things of Knowledge and things of Ignorance. Although there is a gradation between the twoKnowledge rolls or wraps itself gradually into Ignorance and Ignorance unrolls or unfolds itself slowly into Knowledgestill in the Divine Consciousness things of Knowledge alone exist, things of Ignorance cannot be said to exist there on the same title, because, as I have said, the original truths of things alone are therenot their derivations and deformations. One can say, indeed, that in the supreme Light darkness exists as a possibility; but this is only a figure of speech. Possibility does not mean that it is there like a seedor even a chromosome rodto sprout and grow. Possibility really means just a chance of the consciousness acting in a certain way, developing in a particular direction under certain conditions.

03.05 - The Spiritual Genius of India, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Other peoples may be the arms and the feet and the head of Humanity, but India is its heart, its soul for she cherishes always within her the Truth that lives for ever, the flaming God-head, the Immortal awake in mortality, as say the Vedas, amto martyeu tv .
   ***

03.06 - Divine Humanism, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   The Indian sage is not and cannot be human in the human way. For the end of his whole spiritual effort is to transcend the human way and establish himself in the divine way, in the way of the Spirit. The feeling he has towards his fellow-beingsmen and animals, the sentient and the insentient, the entire creation, in factis one of identity in the One Self. And, therefore, he does not need to embrace physically his brother, like the Christian saint, to express or justify the perfect inner union or unity. The basis of his relation with the world and its objects is not the human heart, however purified and widened, but something behind it and hidden by it, the secret soul and self. It was Vivekananda who very often stressed the point that the distinctive characteristic of the Vedantin was that he did not look upon created beings as his brethren, but as himself, as the one and the same self. The profound teaching of the Upanishadic Rishi iswhat may appear very egoistic and inadmissible to the Christian saint that one loves the wife or the son or anybody or anything in the world, not for the sake of the wife or the son or that body or that thing, but for the sake of the self, for the sake of one's own self that is in the object which one seems to love.
   The pragmatic man requires an outward gesture, an external emotion to express and demonstrate his kinship with the creation. Indeed the more concrete and tangible the expression, the more human it is considered to be and all the more worthy for it. There are not a few who think that giving alms to the poor is more nobly human than, say, to have the abstract feeling of a wide commonalty, experienced solely in imagination or contemplation in the Wordsworthian way.
  --
   And yet there can be a status even beyond. For, beyond the cosmic reality lies the transcendent reality. It is the Absolute, neti, neti, into which individual and cosmos, all disappear and vanish. In compassion, the cosmic communion, there is a trace and an echo of humanismit is perhaps one of the reasons why Europeans generally are attracted to Buddhism and find it more congenial than Hinduism with its dizzy Vedantic heights. But in the status of the transcendent Self-hood, humanism is totally transcended and transmuted; one dwells there in the Bliss that passeth all feeling.
   The Upanishadic summit is not suffused with humanism or touched by it, because it is supra-human, not because there is a lack or deficiency in the human feeling, but because there is a heightening and a transcendence in the consciousness and being. To man, to human valuation, the Bodhisattva may appear to be greater than the Buddha; even so to the sick a physician or a nurse may seem to be a diviner angel than any saint or sage or perhaps God himself but that is an inferior view-point, that of particular or local interest.

03.09 - Buddhism and Hinduism, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   The original and primeval Indianism was built upon the Vedic realisation of the Everlasting Yes. That luminous body of an integral realisation, which means the Veda, came to be covered over by a more strenuous demand of immediate necessity, by an over-emphasis on one side or aspect or line of growth of the human consciousness; a negative approach was needed for man to rise out of its too earthly a tenement to glimpse his divine possibility beyond, before he could hope to build it here below. The long reign of Siva was a necessary preparation for the advent of Vishnu.
   And yet Mayavada even while it reigned supreme, was never the be-all and end-all of the inner Indian spirit. Always there was along with it the other strain; in the background, driven underground its presence is felt persistently. The Shunyam, the Asat, the Akshara Brahman could never totally obliterate the Sat Purusha, the Purushottama or the Mahashakti. The Line of the Everlasting Yes was kept living and vibrant in the Tantric discipline, for example, although at times it also suffered a change under the compelling impact of the Great Negation.
  --
   (I) Hinduism is based upon the Veda. Buddhism rejects the Veda.
   Veda means revealed knowledge; a body of ascertained truths already in existence which one has to accept in order to grow and progress in knowledge. Buddhism enjoins to take nothing on trust, but to test everything by one's own reason and experience.
   (II) The first principle that Vedic Knowledge posits is Sat, Being, Pure Existence, Reality. The first principle according to Buddhism is Asat, Non-Being, Non-Reality.

03.10 - The Mission of Buddhism, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Buddhism came as a blaze of lightning across the sky of India's tradition; it was almost a fiery writing on the wall, bearing the doom of a world. Buddhism opposed and denied some of the very fundamental principles upon which the old world rested. It was perhaps the greatest iconoclastic movement ever thrown up by the human consciousness. First of all, it denied the tradition itself; it did not recognise the authority and sanctity of the prve pitara, the ancient fathers, nor their revealed knowledge, the Veda. Buddhism enjoined the priority and supremacy of the individual's own consciousness, own effort and own realisation. Be thou thy own light. Work out thy own salvation. That was the injunction given. Not to take anything for grantednot even God or Brahman but to judge and see for yourself where and what is the truth. It was the first protestant reaction recorded in human history.
   Buddhism has sometimes been called the rebel child of Hinduism. The word need not be a term of abuse. A rebel is not always a mere destroyer, a pure negator. A negation can be only a form of stating something positive, an affirmation of a truth and reality. Not unoften a rebel means a call back to a truth that has been neglected, inadequately treated or completely omitted and by-passed; it is an urgent demand that that which has been forgotten and left behind, uncared for and undeveloped, must now be taken up again and brought forward, made a full-grown and mature element in a greater and more perfect organisation of human consciousness.
  --
   Yes, it was the age, almost a golden age, when man lived with his sense married to the Dawn, spontaneous in his reflexes, prime-sautier, intuitive and imaginative, full of a natural, unspoilt, unsophisticated happiness and hopefulness. But the Age of Reason had to come, and man's maturer nature, perhaps some "sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought". Such an age of Reason and Ratiocination and pure brain power was ushered in by Buddha in India, and almost contemporaneously by Socrates in Greece and Confucius in China. The rational, that is to say, the scientific or analytical attitude to things appeared in the human consciousness for the first time in its fullness and almost exclusive sway. Neither the Vedas nor the Upanishads knew of logic as an instrumenta necessary instrument for knowledge and expression. The old-world method was, as I said, intuitive, experiential, empirical, dogmatic. Also the atmosphere of that world, the stress of the consciousness was theocratic; what the new world brought in was what is called humanistic.
   We say then that it was a necessity: it was a necessity that the rational, logical, ratiocinative, analytic mentality should be brought out and given its play and place. It is perhaps an inferior power of the mind or consciousness, but it is a strong power and has its use and utility. It is the power that gives the form and pattern for the display of consciousness and intelligence in outward expression and external living; it is a firm weapon that gives control over these inferior ranges of consciousness. The leap from the sense-consciousness or the elements of consciousness, from a mental growth just adequate and not too specialised, straight into the supra-sensuous and the transcendent had been an inevitable necessity, so that the human consciousness might get the first taste of its supreme status and value: a similar necessity brought to the fore this element of the mind, the mind's own powerof judgement and willso that there might be a greater and wider integration of human nature and also that the higher realities may be captured in our normal consciousness. Even for the withdrawal of the mind from the outer objects to the inner sources, the mind itself can be used with much effect. And Buddha showed it magnificently. And of course, Shankara too who followed in his footsteps.
  --
   As it took man as a rational animal, at least as a starting-point, even so it gave a sober human value to things human. A rationalist's eye made him see and recognise the normal misery of mankind; and the great compassion goaded him to find the way out of the misery. It was not a dispassionate quest into the ultimate truth and reality nor an all-consuming zeal to meet the Divine that set Buddha on the Path; it was the everyday problem of the ordinary man which troubled his mind, and for which he sought a solution, a permanent radical solution. The Vedanist saw only delight and ecstasy and beatitude; forhim the dark shadow did not exist at all or did not matter; it was the product of illusion or wrong view of things; one was asked to ignore or turn away from this and look towards That. Such was not the Buddha's procedure.
   These are the two primarytruthsrya saryawhichBuddha's illumination meant and for which he has become one of the great divine leaders of humanity. First, he has discovered man's rationality, and second, he has discovered man's humanity. Since his advent two thousand and five hundred years ago till the present day, in this what may pertinently be called the Buddhist age of humanity, the entire growth, development and preoccupation of mankind was centred upon the twofold truth. Science and religion today are the highest expressions of that achievement.

03.14 - Mater Dolorosa, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 03, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   The action of the three gunas is the subject matter of the Veda: but do thou become free from the triple guna, O Arjuna.The Gita, II.45
   ***

03.15 - Towards the Future, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 02, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Pursuing the mathematical imagery we may describe the Buddhist equation as desire raised to the power of zero equals Nirvana: D=Zero. Buddha thought like that. He thought annihilation of desire means annihilation of existence, for he equated desire with existence. But mathematics tells us that anything raised to the power of zero is not zero but one, that is, the unit, the pure existenceSat (or Sachchidananda as the Vedantists say.
   Science and mathematics tell us today of a truth or just point to a truth which a spiritual realisation reveals. It is, as I have already said, the mystery of transformation, or transubstantiation as the Christian faith figures it.

04.01 - The March of Civilisation, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Turning to India we find a fuller and completerif not a globalpicture of the whole movement. India, we may say, is the spiritual world itself: and she epitomised the curve of human progress in a clearer and more significant manner. Indian history, not its political but its cultural and spiritual history, divides itself naturally into great movements with corresponding epochs each dwelling upon and dealing with one domain in the hierarchy of man's consciousness. The stages and epochs are well known: they are(l) Vedic, (2) Upanishadic, (3) Darshanasroughly from Buddha to Shankara, (4) Puranic, (5) Bhagavataor the Age of Bhakti, and finally (6) the Tantric. The last does not mean that it is the latest revelation, the nearest to us in time, but that it represents a kind of complementary movement, it was there all along, for long at least, and in which the others find their fruition and consummation. We shall explain presently. The force of consciousness that came and moved and moulded the first and the earliest epoch was Revelation. It was a power of direct vision and occult will and cosmic perception. Its physical seat is somewhere behind and or just beyond the crown of the head: the peak of man's manifest being that received the first touch of Surya Savitri (the supreme Creative Consciousness) to whom it bowed down uttering the invocation mantra of Gayatri. The Ray then entered the head at the crown and illumined it: the force of consciousness that ruled there is Intuition, the immediate perception of truth and reality, the cosmic consciousness gathered and concentrated at that peak. That is Upanishadic knowledge. If the source and foundation of the Vedic initiation was occult vision, the Upanishad meant a pure and direct Ideation. The next stage in the coming down or propagation of the Light was when it reached further down into the brain and the philosophical outlook grew with rational understanding and discursive argumentation as the channel for expression, the power to be cultivated and the limb to be developed. The Age of the Darshanas or Systems of Philosophy started with the Buddha and continued till it reached its peak in Shankaracharya. The age sought to give a bright and strong mental, even an intellectual body to the spiritual light, the consciousness of the highest truth and reality. In the Puranic Age the vital being was touched by the light of the spirit and principally on the highest, the mental level of that domain. It meant the advent of the element of feeling and emotiveness and imagination into the play of the Light, the beginning of their reclamation. This was rendered more concrete and more vibrant and intense in the next stage of the movement. The whole emotional being was taken up into the travailing crucible of consciousness. We may name it also as the age of the Bhagavatas, god-lovers, Bhaktas. It reached its climax in Chaitanya whose physical passion for God denoted that the lower ranges of the vital being (its physical foundations) were now stirred in man to awake and to receive the Light. Finally remains the physical, the most material to be worked upon and made conscious and illumined. That was the task of the Tantras. Viewed in that light one can easily understand why especial stress was laid in that system upon the esoteric discipline of the five m's (pancha makra),all preoccupied with the handling and harnessing of the grossest physical instincts and the most material instruments. The Tantric discipline bases itself upon Nature Power coiled up in Matter: the release of that all-conquering force through a purification and opening into the consciousness of the Divine Mother, the transcendent creatrix of the universe. The dynamic materialising aspect of consciousness was what inspired the Tantras: the others forming the Vedantic line, on the whole, were based on the primacy of the static being, the Purusha, aloof and withdrawing.
   The Indian consciousness, we say, presented the movement as an intensive and inner, a spiritual process: it dealt with the substance itself, man's very nature and sought to know it from within and shape it consciously. In Europe where the frontal consciousness is more stressed and valued, the more characteristic feature of its history is the unfoldment and metamorphosis of the forms and expressions, the residuary powers, as it were, of man's evolving personality, individual and social.
   To sum up then. Man progresses through cycles of crest movements. They mark an ever-widening circle of the descent of Light, the growth of consciousness. Thus there is at first a small circle of elite, a few chosen people at the top, then gradually the limited aristocracy is widened out into a larger and larger democracy. One may describe the phenomenon in the Indian terms of the Four Orders. In the beginning there is the Brahminic culture, culture confined only to the highest and the fewest possible select representatives. Then came the wave of Kshatriya culture which found a broader scope among a larger community. In India, after the age of the Veda and the Upanishad, came the age of the Ramayana and the Mahabharata which was pre-eminently an age of Kshatriya-hood. In Europe too it was the bards and minstrels, sages and soothsayers who originally created, preserved and propagated the cultural movement: next came the epoch of the Arthurian legends, the age of chivalry, of knights and templars with their heroic code of conduct and high living. In the epoch that followed, culture was still further broad-based and spread to the Vaishya order. It is the culture of the bourgeoisie: it was brought about, developed and maintained by that class in society preoccupied with the production or earning of wealth. The economic bias of the literature of the period has often been pointed out. Lastly the fourth dimension of culture has made its appearance today when it seeks to be coterminous with the proletariate. With the arrival of the Sudra, culture has extended to the very base of the social pyramid in its widest commonalty.
   This movement of extension, looked at from the standpoint of intensiveness, is also a movement of devolution, of reclamation. The Brahminic stage represents culture that is knowledge; it touches the mind, it is the brain that is the recipient and instrument of the Light. The Kshatriya comes into the field when the light, the vibration of awakening, from the mind comes down into the vital energies, from the brain to the heart region. The Vaishya spirit has taken up man still at a lower region, the lower vital: the economic man that has his gaze fixed upon his stomach and entrails. Lastly, the final stage is reached when physical work, bodily labour, material service have attained supreme importance and are considered almost as the only values worth the name for a human being. To walk and work firmly upon Earth the Light needs a strong pair of feet. Therefore, the Veda says, Padbhym sudro ajyata, out of the feet of the Cosmic Godhead the Sudra was born.
   That is how man has become and is becoming integrally consciousconscious in and of all parts of his being. He is awakening and opening to the light that descends from above: indeed the true light, the light of truth is something transcendent and it is that that comes down and slowly inhabits the world and possesses humanity. Its progress marks the steps of evolution. It means the gradual enlightening and illumining of the various layers of our being, the different strands of consciousness from the higher to the lower, from the less dense to the more dense, from mind to the body. It means also in the same process a canalisation, materialisation and fixing upon earth and in the physical being of the increasing powers of the Light.

04.02 - A Chapter of Human Evolution, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   In India we meet a characteristic movement. As I said the Vedas represented the Mythic Age, the age when knowledge was gained or life moulded and developed through Vision and Revelation (Sruti, direct Hearing). The Upanishadic Age followed next. Here we may say the descending light touched the higher reaches of the Mind, the mind of pure, fundamental, typical ideas. The consciousness divested itself of much of the mythic and parabolic apparel and, although supremely immediate and intuitive, yet was bathed with the light of the day, the clear sunshine of the normal wakeful state. The first burgeoning of the Rational Mind proper, the stress of intellect and intellectuality started towards the end of the Upanishadic Age with the Mahabharata, for example and the Brahmanas. It flowered in full vigour, however, in the earlier philosophical schools, the Sankhyas perhaps, and in the great Buddhist illuminationBuddha being, we note with interest, almost a contemporary of Socrates and also of the Chinese philosopher or moralist Confuciusa triumvirate almost of mighty mental intelligence ruling over the whole globe and moulding for an entire cycle human culture and destiny. The very name Buddha is significant. It means, no doubt, the Awakened, but awakened in and through the intelligence, the mental Reason, buddhi. The Buddhist tradition is that the Buddhist cycle, the cycle over which Buddha reigns is for two thousand and five hundred years since his withdrawal which takes us, it seems, to about 1956 A.D.
   The Veda speaks of Indra who became later on the king of the gods. And Zeus too occupies the same place in Greek Pantheon. Indra is, as has been pointed out by Sri Aurobindo, the Divine Mind, the leader of thought-gods (Maruts), the creator of perfect forms, in which to clo the our truth-realisations in life. The later traditional Indra in India and the Greek Zeus seem to be formulations on a lower level of the original archetypal Indra, where the consciousness was more mentalised, intellectualised, made more rational, sense-bound, external, pragmatic. The legend of Athena being born straight out of the head of Zeus is a pointer as to the nature and character of the gods. The Roman name for Athena, Minerva, is significantly derived by scholars from Latin mens, which means, as we all know, mind.
   The Greek Mind, as I said, is the bridge thrown across the gulf existing between the spiritual, the occult, the intuitive and the sensuous, the physical, the material. Since the arrival of the Hellenes a highway has been built up, a metalled macada-mised road connecting these two levels of human experience and there is possible now a free and open communication from the one to the other. We need not speak any more of God and the gods and the divine principles indirectly through symbols and similes, but in mental terms which are closer to our normal understanding and we can also utilise the form of our intellection and reasoning to represent and capture something of what lies beyond intellect and reason.

04.02 - Human Progress, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 03, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   So it is argued that man may have built up more and more efficient organisation in his outer life, he may have learnt to wield a greater variety and wealth of tools and instruments in an increasing degree of refinement and power; but this does not mean that his character, his nature or even the broad mould of his intelligence has changed or progressed. The records and remains of Pre-dynastic Egypt or of Proto-Aryan Indus valley go to show that those were creations of civilised men, as civilised as any modern people. The mind that produced the Rig Veda or the Book of the Dead or conceived the first pyramid is, in essential power of intelligence, no whit inferior to any modern scientific brain. Hence a distinction is sometimes made between culture and civilisation; what the moderns have achieved is progress with regard to civilisation, that is to say, the outer paraphernalia; but as regards culture a Plato, a Lao-tse, a Yajnavalkya are names to which we still bow down.
   One can answer, however, that even if in the last eight or ten thousand years which, they say, is the extent of the present cycle, the civilised or cultural life of humanity has not changed much, this does not mean that it cannot, will not change. The paleolithic age, it appears, covered a period of thirty to forty thousand years; the neolithic age also must have lasted some fifteen thousand years. The metal age is now not more than ten thousand years. So it does not seem to be too late; perhaps it is just time for another radical and crucial change to come as the chronological scheme would seem to demand.

04.04 - Evolution of the Spiritual Consciousness, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 03, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Indeed, the tradition in the domain of spiritual discipline seems to have been always to realise once again what has already been realised by others, to rediscover what has already been discovered, to re-establish ancient truths. Others have gone before on the Path, we have only to follow. The teaching, the realisation is handed down uninterruptedly through millenniums from Master to disciple. In other words, the idea is that the fundamental spiritual realisation remains the same always and everywhere: the name and the form only vary according to the age and the surroundings. The one reality is called variously, says the Veda. Who can say when was the first dawn! The present dawn has followed the track of the infinite series that has gone by and is the first of the I infinite series that is to come. So sings Rishi Kanwa. For the core of spiritual realisation is to possess the consciousness, attain the status of the Spirit. This Spirit may be called God by the theist or Nihil by the Negativist or Brahman (the One) by the Positivist (spiritual). But the essential experience of a cosmic and transcendental reality does not differ very much. So it is declared that there is only one goal and aim, and there are, at the most, certain broad principles, clear pathways which one has to follow if one is to move in the right direction, advance smoothly and attain infallibly: but these have been well marked out, surveyed and charted and do not admit of serious alterations and deviations. The spiritual aspiration is a very definite and unitary movement and its fulfilment is also a definite and invariable status of the consciousness. The spiritual is a typal domain, one may say, there is no room here for sudden unforeseen variation or growth or evolution.
   Is it so in fact? For, if one admits and accepts the evolutionary character of human nature and consciousness, the outlook becomes somewhat different. According to this view, human civilisation is seen as moving through progressive stages: man at the outset was centrally lodged in and occupied with his body consciousness, he was an annamaya purua; then he raised himself and centred in the vital consciousness and so became fundamentally a prnamaya purua; next he climbed into the mental consciousness and became a maomaya purua; from that level again he has been attempting to go further beyond. On each plane the normal life is planned according to the central character, the lawdharmaof that plane. One can have the religious or spiritual experience on each of these planes, representing various degrees of growth and evolution according to the plane to which it is attached. It is therefore that the Tantra refers to three gradations of spiritual seekers and accordingly three types or lines of spiritual discipline: the animal (pau bhva), the heroic (vra bhva) and the godly or divine (deva bhva). The classification is not merely typal but also hierarchical and evolutionary in character.
  --
   Thus, the highest and most comprehensive description of the Divine is perhaps the formula Sat-chit-ananda. But even so, it is a very general and, after all, an inadequate description. It has to be filled in and supplemented by other categories as well, if one may say so. For Sat-chit-ananda presents to us the Sat Brahman. There is also the Asat Brahman. And again we must accept a reality which is neither Sat nor Asatnsadsnno sadst, says the Veda. And as for the filling up of the details in an otherwise almost blank and featureless infinity, Sri Aurobindo's charting of that vast unknownwith the categories of the Supermind and its various levels, of the Overmind and its levels too, all forming the Divine Status and Consciousness is a new, almost a revolutionary revelation, just the required science which the present world needs and demands and for which it has been prepared through all the cycles of evolution.
   This means to say that with the knowledge that is given us today, one can determine more or less definitely the altitudes to which the various spiritual realisations of the past rose and one can see also the degrees or graded stages of the evolution of the spiritual consciousness. A broad landmark can be noted here which concerns us at the present moment. The spiritual consciousness has been rising to higher and higher peaks and possessing them one after another. At the present moment we are at a crisis, at a crucial crossing. The spiritual consciousness attained till now and securely held in human possession (in man's inner nature) is confined to the highest level of the mind with some infiltration from the Overmind and through that, as a springing board, a leap into an indefinite, almost a blank Beyond. Now the time is come and the conditions are ready for the spiritual consciousness in humanity to arrive at the status above the Overmind to the Supermind, and make that a living reality and build in and through that its normal consciousness.

04.05 - The Immortal Nation, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Viewed from this standpoint India stands as a case sui generis. She did not stop short satisfied with the lesser gods. She aspired for the highest One, the supreme spiritual reality and it was her mission, her destiny, to foster it and keep guard over it for the sake of humanity. Whatever the outer vicissitudes, she maintained throughout the inner continuity of her spiritual life and realisation. That is where she drank of the nectar of immortality and that is how she could always revive and renew herself after a period of decline and almost disintegration, because she possessed the mystery of the self. Other peoples were busy about many other things important or unimportant in some measure, but here was a race that never forgot the one thing needful. India of today, we repeat, is fundamentally and essentially the India of the Vedas, even in a more literal sense than that China of Mao-tse- Tung (or Sun-yat-Sen) is the China of Lao-tse.
   A race dies out altogether or continues to lead a superficial mechanical existence, that is to say, vegetates as an inchoate mass, when it knows to live only in its body, confined only to the demands of the barest physical necessities. The life of a race gains a meaning and a new vitality when a higher light and aspiration inspire and move its spirit; when a deeper and finer sensibility, a nobler ambition stir its affections, when a superior intelligence and understanding illumine its mental horizon, its lease of life is increased by that and also its power of recuperation and renewal. And the further it enters into these basic constants of existence the greater that power of rejuvenation. 1

04.06 - Evolution of the Spiritual Consciousness, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Indeed, the tradition in the domain of spiritual discipline seems to have been always to realise once again what has already been realised by others, to rediscover what has already been discovered, to re-establish ancient truths. Others have gone before on the Path, we have only to follow. The teaching, the realisation is handed down uninterruptedly through millenniums from Master to disciple. In other words, the idea is that the fundamental spiritual realisation remains the same always and everywhere: the name and the form only vary according to the age and the surroundings. The one Reality is called variously, says the Veda. Who can say when was the first dawn! The present dawn has followed the track of the infinite series that has gone by and is the first of the infinite series that is to come. So sings Rishi Kanwa. For the core of spiritual realisation is to possess the consciousness, attain the status of the Spirit. This Spirit may be called God by the theist or Nihil by the Negativist or Brahman (the One) by the Positivist (spiritual). But the essential experience, of a cosmic and transcendental reality, does not differ very much. So it is declared that there is only one goal and aim, and there are, at the most, certain broad principles, clear pathways which one has to follow if one is to move in the right direction, advance smoothly and attain infallibly: but these have been well marked out, surveyed and charted and do not admit of serious alterations and deviations. The spiritual aspiration is a very definite and unitary movement and its fulfilment is also a definite and invariable status of the consciousness. The spiritual is a type domain, one may say, there is no room here for sudden unforeseen variation or growth or evolution.
   Is it so in fact? For if one admits and accepts the evolutionary character of human nature and consciousness, the outlook becomes somewhat different. According to this view, human civilisation is seen as moving through progressive stages: man at the outset was centrally lodged in and occupied with his body consciousness, he was an annamaya purua; then he raised himself and was centred in the vital consciousness and so became fundamentally a pramaya purua ; next the climbed into the mental consciousness and became the manomaya purua; from that level again he has been attempting to go further beyond. On each plane the normal life is planned' according to the central character, the lawdharmaof that plane. One can have the religious or spiritual experience on each of these planes, representing various degrees of grow and evolution according to the plane to which it is attached. It is therefore that the Tantra refers to three gradations of spiritual seekers and accordingly three types or lines of spiritual discipline: the animal (pau bhva) the heroic (Vra bhva) and the godly or divine (deva bhva). The classification is not merely typal but also hierarchical and evolutionary in character.
  --
   Thus, the highest and most comprehensive description of the Divine is perhaps the formula Sat-chit-ananda. But even so, it is a very general and, after all, an inadequate description. It has to be filled in and supplemented by other categories as well, if one may say so. For Sat-chit-ananda presents to us the Sat Brahman. There is also the Asat Brahman. And again we must accept a reality which is neither Sat nor Asatnsadsnno sadst, says the Veda. And as for the filling up of the details in an otherwise almost blank and featureless infinity, Sri Aurobindo's charting of that vast unknownwith the categories of the Supermind and its various levels, of the Overmind and its levels too, all forming the Divine Status and Consciousness is a new, almost a revolutionary revelation, just the required science which the present world needs and demands and for which it has been prepared through all the cycles of evolution.
   This means that with the knowledge that is given us today one can determine more or less definitely the altitudes to which the various spiritual realisations of the past rose and one can see also the degrees or graded stages of the evolution of the spiritual consciousness. A broad landmark can be noted here which concerns us at the present moment. The spiritual consciousness has been rising to higher and higher peaks and possessing them one after another. At the present moment we are at a crisis, at a crucial crossing. The spiritual consciousness attained till now and securely held in human possession (in man's inner nature) is confined to the highest level of the mind with some infiltration from the Overmind and through that, as a springing board, a leap into an indefinite, almost a blank Beyond. Now the time is come and the conditions are ready for the spiritual consciousness in humanity to arrive at the status above the Overmind, the Supermind, and make that a living reality and build in and through that its normal consciousness.

04.06 - To Be or Not to Be, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 03, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Rig Veda, IX. 126
   Here lies the secret and the solution of the problem. It is, indeed, the solution given for all ages by the Gita. There will always be a problem, a difficult decision to makea division in the consciousnessso long as one is in the realm of dualities, in one's mental being and consciousness, ruled by relativities and contingencies. There one cannot but have a divided loyalty. A part of you, for example, is loyal to your family, another to your country, a third to yourself or to some ideal which you have set up. And naturally man feels confused in the midst of their conflicting claims and is at a loss to choose. Therefore, the Gita says, the highest law, the supreme code of conduct, is the Divine Will. And the only work and labour for man is to discover and identify oneself with this Divine Will. Abandon all other standards of conduct, take refuge in Me alone.5 That is the supreme secret of human lifeas well as of the Life Divine.

04.09 - Values Higher and Lower, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Value refers to the particular poise or status, the mode of being or function of a thing. In its ultimate formulation we can say it is the rhythm or force of consciousness that vibrates in an object, it is the becomingof the being:but becoming does not cancel being, it only activises, energises, formulates. The debate brings us back to the ancient quarrel between the Buddhists and the Vedantists, the latter posits sat, being or existence, while the former considers sat as only an assemblage of asat. The object and its function, the thing-in-itself and its attribute (the fire and its burning power, as the Indian logicians used to cite familiarly as an example) are not to be separated they are not separated in fact but given together as one unified entity; it is the logical mind that separates them artificially.
   III

05.01 - Man and the Gods, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Man possesses characters that mark him as an entity sui generis and give him the value that is his. First, toil and suffering and more failures than success have given him the quality of endurance and patience, of humility and quietness. That is the quality of earth-natureearth is always spoken of by the poets and seers as all-bearing and all-forgiving. She never protests under any load put upon her, never rises in revolt, never in a hurry or in worry, she goes on with her appointed labour silently, steadily, calmly, unflinchingly. Human consciousness can take infinite pains, go through the infinite details of execution, through countless repetitions and mazes: patience and perseverance are the very badge and blazon of the tribe. Ribhus, the artisans of immortalitychildren of Mahasaraswatiwere originally men, men who have laboured into godhood. Human nature knows to wait, wait infinitely, as it has all the eternity before it and can afford and is prepared to continue and persist life after life. I do not say that all men can do it and are of this nature; but there is this essential capacity in human nature. The gods, who are usually described as the very embodiment of calmness and firmness, of a serene and concentrated will to achieve, nevertheless suffer ill any delay or hindrance to their work. Man has not perhaps the even tenor, the steadiness of their movement, even though intense and fast flowing; but what man possesses is persistence through ups and downshis path is rugged with rise and fall, as the poet says. The steadiness or the staying power of the gods contains something of the nature of indifference, something hard in its grain, not unlike a crystal or a diamond. But human patience, when it has formed and taken shape, possesses a mellowness, an understanding, a sweet reasonableness and a resilience all its own. And because of its intimacy with the tears of things, because of its long travail and calvary, human consciousness is suffused with a quality that is peculiarly human and humane that of sympathy, compassion, comprehension, the psychic feeling of closeness and oneness. The gods are, after all, egoistic; unless in their supreme supramental status where they are one and identical with the Divine himself; on the lower levels, in their own domains, they are separate, more or less immiscible entities, as it were; greater stress is laid here upon their individual functioning and fulfilment than upon their solidarity. Even if they have not the egoism of the Asuras that sets itself in revolt and antagonism to the Divine, still they have to the fullest extent the sense of a separate mission that each has to fulfil, which none else can fulfil and so each is bound rigidly to its own orbit of activity. There is no mixture in their workingsna me thate, as the Vedas say; the conflict of the later gods, the apple of discord that drove each to establish his hegemony over the rest, as narrated in the mythologies and popular legends, carry the difference to a degree natural to the human level and human modes and reactions. The egoism of the gods may have the gait of aristocracy about it, it has the aloofness and indifference and calm nonchalance that go often with nobility: it has a family likeness to the egoism of an ascetic, of a saintit is sttwic; still it is egoism. It may prove even more difficult to break and dissolve than the violent and ebullient rjasicpride of a vital being. Human failings in this respect are generally more complex and contain all shades and rhythms. And yet that is not the whole or dominant mystery of man's nature. His egoism is thwarted at every stepfrom outside, by, the force of circumstances, the force of counter-egoisms, and from inside, for there is there the thin little voice that always cuts across egoism's play and takes away from it something of its elemental blind momentum. The gods know not of this division in their nature, this schizophrenia, as the malady is termed nowadays, which is the source of the eternal strain of melancholy in human nature of which Matthew Arnold speaks, of the Shelleyan saddest thoughts: Nietzsche need not have gone elsewhere in his quest for the origin and birth of Tragedy. A Socrates discontented, the Christ as the Man of Sorrows, and Amitabha, the soul of pity and compassion are peculiarly human phenomena. They are not merely human weaknesses and failings that are to be brushed aside with a godlike disdain; but they contain and yield a deeper sap of life and out of them a richer fulfilment is being elaborated.
   Human understanding, we know, is a tangled skein of light and shademore shade perhaps than lightof knowledge and ignorance, of ignorance straining towards knowledge. And yet this limited and earthly frame that mind is has something to give which even the overmind of the gods does not possess and needs. It is indeed a frame, even though perhaps a steel frame, to hold and fix the pattern of knowledge, that arranges, classifies, consolidates effective ideas, as they are translated into facts and events. It has not the initiative, the creative power of the vision of a god, but it is an indispensable aid, a precious instrument for the canalisation and expression of that vision, for the intimate application of the divine inspiration to physical life and external conduct. If nothing else, it is a sort of blue print which an engineer of life cannot forego if he has to execute his work of building a new life accurately and beautifully and perfectly.
  --
   As the human aspiration is to reach out towards divinity, the gods too at times are not satisfied with their closed divine status. They lean down to help humanity, to bring it up into their consciousness; but also they seek this contact and unification for their own sake, for a change and transformation in themselves; they may seek to rise further in a higher status of consciousness or they may wish to participate in the earthly travail, in the human endeavour. In either case the channel lies through the human consciousness. In the Vedas the gods always look to men, almost depend upon them for their own fulfilment and enrichment. Men ask the gods for wealth and plentymaterial as well as spiritual the gods too ask from men the sacrifice, the sacrifice that pours out the substance of the human reality upon which they feed and grow. The Gita speaks of the same covenant the interchange of gifts between the two, each increasing the other and both attaining the highest good.
   Our dark destinies move under vast laws that nothing diverts, nothing softens. Thou canst not have sudden clemencies that disturb the world, O God, Spirit tranquil!Victor Hugo, A Villequier.

05.02 - Gods Labour, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   The root of the Cosmic Evil is in Matter. From there it shoots up and overshadows the upper layers of our being and consciousness. Even if the mind is cleaned, the vital cleared, still if the physical consciousness is not sufficiently probed into, purified and reclaimed, then nothing permanent is done, one would build upon sand. All efforts, spiritual or other, at the regeneration and reformation of mankind and a good many individual endeavours too have come to a sorry end, because the foundation was not laid sufficiently deep and secure. One must dig into Matter as far down as possiblelike Rishi Agastya in the Vedaeven to the other end. For there is another mystery there, perhaps the Mystery of mysteries. The deeper you go down into Matter, as you clear up the jungle and bring in the higher light, you discover and unlock strange and mighty energies of consciousness secreted there, even like the uranium pile in the atomic world. It is revealed to you that Inconscience is not total absence of consciousness, it is simply consciousness asleep, in-gathered, entranced. And this nether consciousness is, after all, one with the supreme Consciousness. It is itself the best weapon to bring about its own transformation. Not only the higher self, but the lower self too must be salvaged and saved by its own selftman tmnam uddharet.
   II

05.02 - Satyavan, #Savitri, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  A Veda-knower of the unwritten book
  Perusing the mystic scripture of her forms,

05.03 - Bypaths of Souls Journey, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   We say commonly souls are immortal. But in an occult sense souls are or may be mortal too. When the Vedantin speaks of laya or the Buddhist of nya, what else is it? It is nothing but the annihilation of the soul, even if it is in the Brahman or some Absolute. But we are not referring to that here. There is a merger of souls, and a dissolution of souls in a somewhat different manner, not on the highest metaphysical heights, but even here below among the growing developing souls embodied upon earth. That is to say, one soul may unite with another and both form one single entity and embodiment.
   This perhaps is not the general rule, especially on the higher levels, where the beings possess well developed and well organised individual personalities. It is more common in the earlier stages when the souls are just developing and are pliant and supple and can easily intermingle. But even on the higher reaches a merger is possible and does happen, when some special work has to be done. A god sometimes literally descends into a man, takes up the human soul within himself and becomes the man, transformed and transfigured, even as an Asura also may do the same thing. And human beings too on high altitudes of spiritual growth, major souls, can combine and fuse together to form a single soulsuch may be the demand of their individual lines of growth or the demand of a Higher Will and Purpose.

05.04 - The Immortal Person, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   And yet the building up of an abiding individual is the secret urge of Nature's evolution: it is the hidden spring of human aspiration and the purpose of God's creation. Not mere disparate particlesof substance or energy or consciousness breaking up constantly and scattering and finally dissolving into the void (the great law of Running Downor as the Veda figures it, tucchyena abwapihitamabsorbed by the infinitesimal)but a gathering of elements, integrating them into organic wholes, moulding definite forces into definite formssuch is the secret plan behind. Indeed, ego is the first formation, the original instrument which Nature fashioned to carry out this object of hers.
   Ego means a hardened core that is not easily broken by the impact of forces. It delimits, ,cuts out, endeavours to maintain its formation by a strong violent self-assertion. Ego is a helper, but also it is a bar. It assists the first formation but delays and obstructs the true and final formation. For the ego is a formation, an individual formation, but on the level of universal Nature: it is of a piece with the normal cosmic movement, only bounded by a peripheral line. In the general expanse it puts up enclosures and preserves and fencings; the constituting elements remaining the same in substance and quality. Even the delimitation is illusory in reality, it is something like the membrane in the body separating the different functional organs, rigid yet allowing interaction and interpenetration. That is why, when death removes the outward fencing, the individuality also cannot long maintain itself and merges into the general. We may look upon egoism as a kind of artificial or experimental individuality, a laboratory formation, as it were, tried and developed under given conditions. In fact, however, egoism is a shadow or an echo upon this side of our nature of the true individuality which lies and comes from elsewhere.

05.05 - Man the Prototype, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 03, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Indeed, all the luminaries of heaven have each its conscious personality, the planets, the moon and above all the great sun. It is not a fancy or idle imagination that made the astrologers ascribe definite influences to these heavenly bodies. In Hindu astrology, for example, they are considered as real persons, each with a definite form and character, a dhyna rpa. The so-called Nature-gods in the Vedas or in ancient mythology generally are in the same way not creations of mere poetic imagination: they are realities, more real in a sense than the real objects that represent and incarnate them.
   Not only so. Our limited mind and senses are accustomed to view and recognise individuals alone as persons. But there are group personalities too. Thus each species has a generic personality, a consciousness and an ideal or intrinsic form also: the individuals on the physical plane are its various incarnations, projections and formations. Old Plato was not so naive, as we of today are apt to believe, when he spoke of the real reality of general ideas. The attributes, qualities and functions of the generic personality are the source and pattern of what the individuals that form the group actually are. The group person is the king, he is also the body of the Dharma ruling the domain. Any change in the law of being of the group person is necessarily translated in a similar change in the nature and activity of the individuals of the species. What evolutionists describe as sudden variation or mutation and whose cause or genesis they are at a loss to trace, is precisely due to an occult change in the consciousness and will of the group soul.

05.07 - The Observer and the Observed, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Now, there are four positions possible with regard to the world and reality, depending on the relation between the observer and the observed, the subject and the object. They are:(I) subjective, (2) objective, (3) subjective objective and (4) objective subjective. The first two are extreme positions, one holding the subject as the sole or absolute reality, the object being a pure fabrication of its will and idea, an illusion, and the other considering the object as the true reality, the subject being an outcome, an epiphenomenon of the object itself, an illusion after all. The first leads to radical or as it is called monistic spirituality the type of which is Mayavada: the second is the highway of materialism, the various avataras of which are Marxism, Pragmatism, Behaviourism etc. In between lie the other two intermediate positions according to the stress or value given to either of the two extremes. The first of the intermediates is the position held generally by the idealists, by many schools of spirituality: it is a major Vedantic position. It says that the outside world, the object, is not an illusion, a mere fabrication of the mind or consciousness of the subject, but that it exists and is as real as the subject: it is dovetailed into the subject which is a kind of linchpin, holding together and even energising the object. The object can further be considered as an expression or embodiment of the subject. Both the subject and the object are made of the same stuff of consciousness the ultimate reality being consciousness. The subject is the consciousness turned on itself and the object is consciousness turned outside or going abroad. This is pre-eminently the Upanishadic position. In Europe, Kant holds a key position in this line: and on the whole, idealists from Plato to Bradley and Bosanquet can be said more or less to belong to this category. The second intermediate position views the subject as imbedded into the object, not the object into the subject as in the first one: the subject itself is part of the object something like its self-regarding or self-recording function. In Europe apart possibly from some of the early Greek thinkers (Anaxagoras or Democritus, for example), coming to more recent times, we can say that line runs fairly well-represented from Leibnitz to Bergson. In India the Sankhyas and the Vaisheshikas move towards and approach the position; the Tantriks make a still more near approach.
   Once again, to repeat in other terms the distinction which may sometimes appear to carry no difference. First, the subjective objective in which the subject assumes the preponderant position, not denying or minimising the reality of the object. The external world, in this view, is a movement in and of the consciousness of a universal subject. It is subjective in the sense that it is essentially a function of the subject and does not exist apart from it or outside it; it is objective in the sense that it exists really and is not a figment or imaginative construction of any individual consciousness, although it exists in and through the individual consciousness in so far as that consciousness is universalised, is one with the universal consciousness (or the transcendental, the two can be taken together in the present connection). Instead of the Kantian transcendental idealism we can name it transcendental realism.

05.09 - Varieties of Religious Experience, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 03, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   The Sufi doctrine also occupies an intermediate position, like the Christian, between the Chaldean and the Vedantic. The absolute identity of the human lover and the Divine Beloved, a complete fusion of the two at a particular stage or moment of consciousness is one of the cardinal experiences in the Sufi discipline. But that is an innermost state, not normal or habitual in life and activity, where the difference, the separation between the adorer and the adored is maintained exactly for the delight of play. But the dualism in the Indian discipline is more than compensated by the doctrine of Incarnation which obliterates fundamentally all difference between the human and the Divine. According to it, God does not become man only once, as in the Christian view, but that it is one of his constant functions. Indeed, the Indian tradition is that He is always the leader of terrestrial evolution; at each crisis, at each moment of need for guidance, He comes down in flesh and blood, in the form of an earthly creature to show the way, how to live and move and act.
   The special gift of the Chaldean line of discipline lay in another direction. It cultivated not so much the higher lines of spiritual realisation but was occupied with what may be called the mid regions, the occult world. This material universe is not moved by the physical, vital or mental forces that are apparent and demonstrable, but by other secret and subtle forces; in fact, these are the motive forces, the real agents that work out and initiate movements in Nature, while the apparent ones are only the external forms and even masks. This occultism was also practised very largely in ancient Egypt from where the Greeks took up a few threads. The MysteriesOrphic and Eleusiniancultivated the tradition within a restricted circle and in a very esoteric manner. The tradition continued into the Christian Church also and an inner group formed in its heart that practised and kept alive something of this ancient science. The external tenets and dogmas of the Church did not admit or tolerate this which was considered as black magic, the Devil's Science. The evident reason was that if one pursued this line of occultism and tasted of the power it gave, one might very likely deviate from the straight and narrow path leading to the Spirit and spiritual salvation. In India too the siddhis or occult powers were always shunned by the truly spiritual, although sought by the many who take to the spiritual lifeoften with disastrous results. In Christianity, side by side with the major saints, there was always a group or a line of practicants that followed the occult system, although outwardly observing the official creed. It is curious to note that often where the original text of the Bible speaks of gods, in the plural, referring to the deities or occult powers, the official version translates it as God, to give the necessary theistic value and atmosphere.

05.10 - Knowledge by Identity, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 01, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Prof. Das evidently holds the orthodox, rather rigid, Sankhya position, viz.,the Purusha or witness is always separate from Prakriti, its object. But after all this is only a standpoint, there are other standpoints equally valid and more comprehensive. Sri Aurobindo holds in this respect what may be generically called the Vedantic position where the basic epistemological principle is that the knower and the known (jt and jeya) are fused together in knowledge (jna). One Vedantic line, it is true however, seems to arrive at a different conclusion, for thus it is asserted, where there is absolute identity, who is it that sees or knows or what is it that is seen or known! But this is only one aspect of the phenomenon.
   When the Upanishad says, one who knows Brahman be comes Brahman, does it not mean that the very condition of knowing Brahman is to become it? Indeed, there is no contradiction or incommensurability between knowing and becoming, between (what is termed by the mystic as) Knowledge and Realisation. Consciousness has a twofold power, Sri Aurobindo says: the power of apprehension and the power of comprehensionprajna and vijna. Prajnana, the apprehending consciousness, sets the object in front, away and separate from itself and contemplates it: Vijnana, the comprehending consciousness, on the other hand, comprehends, embraces the object within itself, as part of its own being. The two are not distinct or incompatible movements, they go together and form one single movement of consciousness. It is the mind, the reason that makes the separation; it is not possible for the mind to view two things simultaneously. It is because of this incapacity of the mind, married to its logic of the finite, that Sri Aurobindo points out the way of correcting it by a higher supramental power which operates in a global way.
  --
   In seeking to disvalue the principle of identity as a fundamental element in knowing, Prof. Das brings in to witness on his side the logical copula. Some logicians, of course, assert a parallelism if not identity between the laws of thought and the laws of language, language being conceived as the very imagea photographof thought, but the truth of the matter is that it is and it is not so, as in many other things. However, here when it is stated that the copula disjoining the subject and the predicate is the very pattern of all process of knowledge, one mistakes, we are afraid, a scheme or a formula, for the thing itself, a way of understanding a fact for the fact itself. Such a formula for understanding, however it may be valid for more or less analytical languages, those of later growth, need not and did not have the same propriety in respect of other older languages. We know the evolution of language has been in the direction of more and more disjunction of its component limbs even like the progression of the human mind and intellect. The modern analytical languages with their army of independent prepositions have taken the place of the classical languages which were predominantly inflexional. The Greek and Latin started the independent prepositional forms in the form of a fundamentally inflexional structure. Still further back, in Sanskrit for example, the inflexional form reigns supreme. Prefixes and affixes served the role of prepositions. And if we move further backward, the synthetic movement is so complete that the logical components (the subject, the copula, the predicate) are fused together into one symbol (the Chinese ideogram). We are here nearer to the original nature and pattern of knowledgea single homogeneous movement of apperception. There is no sanctity or absoluteness in the logical disposition of thought structure; the Aristotelian makes it a triplicity, the Indian Nyaya would extend the dissection to five or seven limbs. But whatever the logical presentation, the original psychological movement is a single indivisible lan and the Vedantic fusion of the knower, the knowledge and the known in identity remains the fundamental fact.
   Calcutta Review, 1948 August-September.

05.12 - The Soul and its Journey, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 03, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   The higher Gods, like those, for example, envisaged in the Veda, may be considered each as an emanation of one or other of these Divine Aspects. They are dwellers of Swar or the Overmind. Varuna seems to be an emanation of Mahavira, a son of Maheshwari: for he is pre-eminently the god of the pure and vast consciousness who releases us from the triple bonds and shows us the winding way into the embrace of the infinite Mother. His associate, Mitra, is the lord of love and harmony, evidently an emanation of Pradyumna (or Mahalakshmi). Other gods of the same category are Bhaga and Soma. The Balarama or Mahakali aspect is manifested in Aryaman: Rudra being another form of the same. And Mahasaraswati (or Aniruddha) must have given birth to and inspired the Ribhus, who are artisans of divinity. The Puranic trinityBrahma, Vishnu and Shivawith lndra as the fourth member forms a parallel system embodying a similar conception.
   Another tradition gives the Four Supernals as (1) Light or Consciousness, (2) Truth or Knowledge, (3) Life and (4) Love. The tradition also says that the beings representing these four fundamental principles of creation were the first and earliest gods that emanated from the Supreme Divine, and that as they separated themselves from their source and from each other, each followed his own independent line of fulfilment, they lost their divinity and turned into their oppositesLight became obscurity, Consciousness unconsciousness or the inconscient, Truth became falsehood and Knowledge ignorance, Life became death and finally Love and Delight became suffering and hatred. These are the fallen angels, the Asuras that deny their divine essence and now rule the world. They have possessed mankind and are controlling earthly existence. They too have their emanations, forces and beings that are born out of them and serve them in their various degrees of power. Men talk and act inspired and impelled by these beings and when they do so, they lose their humanity and become worse than animals.

06.11 - The Steps of the Soul, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 03, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   The complexity arises not only in extension, but also in depth. Man does not live on a single plane but on many planes at the same time. There is a scale of gradation in human consciousness: the higher one rises in the scale the greater the number of elements or personalities that one possesses. Whether one lives mostly or mainly on the physical or vital or mental plane or on any particular section of these planes or on planes above and beyond, there will be accordingly differences in the constitution or psycho-physical make-up of the individual personality. The higher one stands the richer the personality, because it lives not only on its own normal level, but also on all that are below and which it has transcended. The complete or integral man, some occultists say, possesses 365 personalities; indeed it may be much more. (The Vedas speak of the three and thirty-three and thirty-three hundred and thirty-three thousand gods that may be housed in the human vehicle the basic three being evidently the triple status or world of Body, Life and Mind).
   What is the meaning of this self-contradiction, this division in man? To understand that we must know and remember that each person represents a certain quality or capacity, a particular achievement to be embodied. How best can it be done? What is the way by which one can acquire a quality at its purest, and highest and most perfect? It is by setting an opposition to it. That is how a power is increased and streng thenedby fighting against and overcoming all that weakens and contradicts it. The deficiencies in respect of a particular quality show you where you are to mend and reinforce and in what way to improve in order to make it perfectly perfect. It is the hammer that beats the weak and soft iron to transform it into hard steel. The preliminary discord is useful and necessary to be utilised for a higher harmony. This is the secret of self-conflict in man. You are weakest precisely in that element which is destined to be your greatest asset.

10.01 - Cycles of Creation, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 04, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   The Mother on Herself Beyond Vedanta
   Other Authors Nolini Kanta Gupta Part TenCycles of Creation
  --
   The Mother on Herself Beyond Vedanta

1.001 - The Aim of Yoga, #The Study and Practice of Yoga, #Swami Krishnananda, #Yoga
  The ancient sages and masters, both of the East and the West, have deeply pondered over this question, and one of the most magnificent proclamations of a solution to these problems is found in the Veda. Among the many aspects of this solution that are presented before us by these mighty revelations, I can quote one which to my mind appears to be a final solution at least, I have taken it as a solution to all my problems - which comes in the Rig Veda, the Yajur Veda, the Sama Veda and the Atharva Veda. In all the four Vedas it occurs: tam eva viditv atimtyum eti nnya panth vidyate ayanya. This is a great proclamation. What is the meaning of this proclamation? There is no way of escape from this problem, says this mantra, other than knowing 'That'. This is a very simple aphoristic precept that is before us: Knowing 'That' is the solution, and we have no other solution. Now, knowing 'That' what is this 'That'.
  Knowing has been generally regarded as a process of understanding and accumulation of information, gathering intellectual or scientific definitive descriptions in respect of things. These days, this is what we call education. We gather definitions of things and try to understand the modes of their apparent functions in temporal life. This is what we call knowing, ordinarily speaking. I know that the sun is rising. This is a kind of knowledge. What do I mean by this knowledge? I have only a functional perception of a phenomenon that is taking place which I regard as the rise of the sun. This is not real knowledge. When I say, "I know that the sun is rising", I cannot say that I have a real knowledge of the sun, because, first of all, the sun is not rising it is a mistake of my senses. Secondly, the very idea of rising itself is a misconception in the mind. Unless I am static and immovable, I cannot know that something is moving. So when I say, "The sun is moving", I mean that I am not moving; it is understood there. But it is not true that I am not moving. I am also in a state of motion for other reasons which are not easily understandable. So it is not possible for a moving body to say that something else is moving. Nothing that is in a state of motion can say that something else is in motion. There is a relative motion of things, and so perception of the condition of any object ultimately would be impossible. This is a reason why scientific knowledge fails.
  --
  All our knowledge is insufficient, inadequate, temporal, empirical ultimately useless. It does not touch the core of life. Therefore, we will find that any learned person, whatever be the depth of his learning, whatever be the greatness of his scholarship, is miserable in the end. The reason is that life is different from this kind of knowledge. It is an all-comprehensive organic being in which the knowing individual is unfortunately included, a fact which misses the attention of every person. It is not possible for anyone to observe or see or know anything, inasmuch as the conditions which describe the object of observation also condition the subject of observation. The Veda points this out in a mystical formula:tam eva viditv atimtyum eti nnya panth vidyate ayanya. Now, when it is said, by knowing 'That', every problem is solved, the Veda does not mean knowing this object or that object, or this person or that person, or this thing or that thing, or this subject or that subject it is nothing of that kind. It is a 'That' with a capital 'T', which means to say, the true object of knowledge. The true object of knowledge is to be known, and when 'That' is known, all problems are solved.
  What are problems? A problem is a situation that has arisen on account of the irreconcilability of one person, or one thing, with the status and condition of another person, or another thing. I cannot reconcile my position with your position; this is a problem. You cannot reconcile your position with mine; this is a problem. Why should there be such a condition? How is it that it is not possible for me to reconcile myself with you? It is not possible because there is no clear perception of my relationship with you. I have a misconceived idea of my relationship with you and, therefore, there is a misconceived adjustment of my personality with yours, and a misconception cannot solve a problem. The problem is nothing but this misconception nothing else. The irreconcilability of one thing with another arises on account of the basic difficulty I mentioned, that the person who wishes to bring about this reconciliation, or establish a proper relationship, misses the point of one's own vital connection underline the word 'vital' with the object or the person with which, or with whom, this reconciliation is to be effected. Inasmuch as this kind of knowledge is beyond the purview or capacity of the ordinary human intellect, the knowledge of the Veda is regarded as supernormal, superhuman: apaurusheya not created or manufactured by an individual. This is not knowledge that has come out of reading books. This is not ordinary educational knowledge. It is a knowledge which is vitally and organically related to the fact of life. I am as much connected with the fact of life as you are, and so in my observation and study and understanding of you, in my relationship with you, I cannot forget this fact. The moment I disconnect myself from this fact of life which is unanimously present in you as well as in me, I miss the point, and my effort becomes purposeless.
  We are gradually led by this proclamation of the Veda into a tremendous vision of life which requires of us to have a superhuman power of will to grasp the interrelationship of things. This difficulty of grasping the meaning of the interrelationship of things is obviated systematically, stage by stage, gradually, by methods of practice. These methods are called yoga the practice of yoga. I have placed before you, perhaps, a very terrible picture of yoga; it is not as simple as one imagines. It is not a simple circus-master's feat, either of the body or the mind, but a superhuman demand of our total being. Mark this definition of mine: a superhuman demand which is made of our total being not an ordinary human demand of a part of our being, but of our total being. From that, a demand is made by the entire structure of life. The total structure of life requires of our total being to be united with it in a practical demonstration of thought, speech and action this is yoga. If this could be missed, and of course it can easily be missed as it is being done every day, then every effort, from the smallest to the biggest, becomes a failure. All our effort ends in no success, because it would be like decorating a corpse without a soul in it. The whole of life would look like a beautiful corpse with nicely dressed features, but it has no vitality, essence or living principle within it. Likewise, all our activities would look wonderful, beautiful, magnificent, but lifeless; and lifeless beauty is no beauty. There must be life in it only then has it a meaning. Life is not something dead; it is quite opposite of what is dead. We can bring vitality and life into our activity only by the introduction of the principle of yoga.
  Yoga is not a technique of sannyasins or monks, of mystics or monastic disciples it is a technique of every living being who wishes to succeed in life. Without the employment of the technique of yoga, no effort can be successful. Even if it is a small, insignificant act like cooking food, sweeping the floor, washing vessels, whatever it is even these would be meaningless and a boredom, a drudgery and a stupid effort if the principle of yoga is not applied.

10.02 - Beyond Vedanta, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 04, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
  object:10.02 - Beyond Vedanta
  author class:Nolini Kanta Gupta
  --
   Other Authors Nolini Kanta Gupta Part TenBeyond Vedanta
   Beyond Vedanta
   The first step in the spiritual life is the Vedantic experience that the world is an illusion, an absolute illusion. Rather it is the Buddhist experience of nihil, nothingness, extinction that is the first step, the very basic realisation of all spiritual life. It is not the summit the nee plus ultra, beyond which there is nothing but it is the very foundation, the absolute minimum of spiritualitysine qua non, without which it is not. The one experience with which you start your spiritual journey is the total negation of whatever exists, reducing existence to zero: world-existence being equated with Ignorance. Life is a falsehood, one has to reject it outright. The next step in Vedanta would be, when you have eliminated everything, reduced all to zero, to contemplate, to find what remains, the irreducible reality the unity, the One, Sat, Brahman.
   First, then, the total and absolute dissolution of this creation of ignorance, the Creation which is ignorance, and attaining a status of nothingness, absolute annihilation, then in that blank void emerges the Residue, the One True Realitya silent, infinite eternal immobility, a pure Existence. In the beginning the Non-Existence (Asat), then there arises the Pure Existence (Sat). That pure Existence is gradually found to possess or be Delight also. As Being is not the being in creation even so the Consciousness is not the normal or mental consciousness, and Delight too is not the joy of life; they are all of quite another quality and category.
  --
   The whole bifurcation between Tantra and Vedanta hinges upon one point. The Vedanta overlooked one term of the Truth and missed thereby a whole world of experience and reality. The central term of Vedanta is taken as Consciousness, Consciousness pure and simple. It omitted the fact that Consciousness is also Energy. That Chit is Tapas is the central principle in Tantra. The exclusive stress on Chit, Pure Consciousness, led to the realisation of the Pure Purusha as mere Witness, Observer, a passive consciousness. Subsequently it was also added that the Purusha is not merely a Witness, (sk), but the Upholder (bhart), even Enjoyer (bhokt) of the world and creation; finally it was added also that the Purusha may be a creator also (kart), but all this is somewhat outside the pale of orthodox Vedanta, Mayavada. Tantra equated Consciousness with Energy; for it Conscious Energy or Consciousness-Energy is the indivisible Mother-Reality.
   The Vedanta ends in Ananda, it is a static unitary Ananda. The Tantra posits a dynamic Ananda, a dual Ananda between Ishwara and Ishwari, Shiva and Shakti. The Vaishnava takes a further step and transmutes Ananda into Love, a terrestrial humanised love.
   An earlier form of this humanised love was given in Buddha's Compassion. The transcendent Delight (Ananda) was made terrestrial and human in Buddha. But Buddha's compassion was a universal feeling and had no personal frame as it were. Vaishnavism gave it a personal frame and a human form. Radha and Krishna are not figures of an allegory but concrete realities. Vrindavan is not merely the land of heart's desire, a garden of paradise but real habitation in a real and concrete consciousness and life. The human frame assumed by Radha and Krishna is not merely an assumption, an illusion but an eternal reality in an eternal domain. The gradation of the spiritual domains is thus sometimes given as (1) Brahmaloka of the Vedantin, (2) Shivaloka of the Tantrik and finally (3) Goloka of the Vaishnava.
   The relation between the Supreme (over and above the creation) and the individual in the creation representing the creation is sometimes described in human terms to give it a concrete and graphic form. This relationship characteristically indicates the fundamental nature of the Reality it deals with. Thus in the Vedantic tradition the Supreme is worshipped as the Father (pit no asi). It is also a relation of Master and disciple, the leader and the led. Ii brings out into prominence the Purusha aspect of the Reality. In the Tantra the relation is as between Mother and child. The supreme Reality is the Divine Mother holding the universe in her arms. The individual worships and adores the Supreme Prakriti as a human child does. The Vaishnava makes the relation as between the lover and the beloved, and the love depicted is intensely vital and even physical, as intense and poignant as the ordinary ignorant human passion. It is to show that the Love Divine can beat the human love on its own ground, that is to say, it can be or it is as passionately sweet and as intensely intimate as any human love. It is why Bhakta Prahlad said to his beloved Vishnu "O Lord, what ordinary men feel and enjoy in and through their physical senses, may I have the same enjoyment in and through Thee."
   Still the Vaishnava love in its concrete reality is a manifestation in a subtle world, the world of an inner physical consciousness.

10.03 - Life in and Through Death, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 04, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   Beyond Vedanta Transfiguration
   Other Authors Nolini Kanta Gupta Part TenLife in and Through Death
  --
   Beyond Vedanta Transfiguration

10.04 - Lord of Time, #Writings In Bengali and Sanskrit, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  6 in the Vedas of joy
  I found out in a deep joy

10.04 - Transfiguration, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 04, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   As of the Brahman, even so of the Brahman's qualities. They are various aspects, living aspects or personalities of the One Divine. The Vedas therefore consider them as Gods and Goddesses and give each one a name and a form. They are adored and worshipped as such so that they may enter into the worshipper and transmute him into something of His image. The Gods bring riches to man. But these riches are they themselves. Vasu is the richness of their substance, Ratna is the wealth of their delight.
   Agni is the energy of consciousness, Varuna is the vastness of consciousness, Mitra is the harmony. Ila is the revelation, Saraswati inspiration, Bharati is the Goddess of the Divine Word.
  --
   In this way we come very far from the Supreme Brahman, the Mayavadin's inane Unity. The Puranic multiplicity is perhaps a corrective of the Vedantin's empty Absolute.
   The Vedantin's negation of the world for the realisation of the Brahman, the Supreme Consciousness, is an effective way so far as it goes but it does not really negate the world. One only turns one's back to the world and says, "It is not there". We face the Sun and cast our shadow behind. The real solution is not to cut away or wipe off the shadow but instead of an obscure formulation, to make of it a luminous radiant image. The world is not abolished or eclipsed by the Sun but IS made luminous, in every particle a radiant and glorious body.
   This transfiguration is possible, nay, inevitable, because the higher realities, the truth-expressions of the Supreme Consciousness are there always self-existent in their total purity and pressing down upon earth and displacing the lower mayic shadow-realities. We need not seek to pull down what is already descending of itself. One must be open and receptive and welcoming in tranquillity the descending Godheads.

1.007 - Initial Steps in Yoga Practice, #The Study and Practice of Yoga, #Swami Krishnananda, #Yoga
  The principles called yamas and niyamas especially, or the sadhana chatustaya, as they say in the Vedanta philosophy, are intended to bring about the necessary adjustment of personality with those conditions and factors which are going to affect one's life, especially when they are meddled with or interfered with. Things look all right when we do not interfere with them. The moment we touch them, they then show their real nature. So it is necessary not to oppose these forces or really meddle with them. We are not going to meddle with them. We are going to adjust ourselves with them in the beginning, and later on we will find that they will adjust themselves with us. When we become friendly with one aspect, that aspect becomes friendly with us also. Later on there is a mutual adjustment of values. All these things are difficult for a single mind to understand at one stroke.
  A novitiate cannot comprehend all these things, because generally we are fired up with a kind of sudden enthusiasm. That is all we don't know anything else. "I want to realise God in this very birth now itself, if possible." This is all we say. But what are the things necessary for this purpose? How many difficulties are there? These things will not come to the mind easily, because every little event in this world is connected with many other events and conditions. There is no single, isolated event in this world. This is why we say that steps in the direction of the practice of yoga particularly, should be taken only under the guidance of a competent teacher, one who is an expert in this field. It is more dangerous and more difficult than flying an airplane, because we cannot know what is ahead of us. We also cannot know what influence our past will have upon our present, what effect external conditions will have upon us, and what sudden reactions will be set up from factors within nothing of the kind will be clear in the beginning. When we take a few steps in the practice of yoga, an all-round change will take place. There will be internal change, external change, and even a feeling that God Himself is getting related to us in a more tangible manner than it appeared earlier.

10.07 - The Demon, #Writings In Bengali and Sanskrit, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  Inferior people give birth to inferior offspring and, thus, propagate their inferiority Great Vedanta education
  Hypocrites are always distorted.

10.07 - The World is One, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 04, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   The sense of separated and isolated existence, the feeling of a closed system that one assumes in opposition to others is the Maya of which the Vedanta speaks. It is real so long as it is taken to be real. But it possesses no inherent or absolute reality. A re-orientation or a remodelling of the individual self is the way towards re-establishing in the forefront, the background unity. Egoism, as it happens to be now, is the broken-up and scattered unity. Polarisation means precisely re-ordering and re-orienting the dispersal movement of ignorance and bringing into a new purposeful existence the unity that already exists.
   Laser: Light amplifications due to the stimulated emission of Radiation.

1.01 - Adam Kadmon and the Evolution, #Preparing for the Miraculous, #George Van Vrekhem, #Integral Yoga
  shudras he mentions the Purushasukta of the Vedas where
  the four orders are described as having sprung from the
  --
  the unconditional conclusion from the Vedantic statement
  that All is That if All is That, the world too must be That,
  --
  synthesis evidently stem from Vedic and Vedantic roots,
  but he was also thoroughly aware of the great non-Indian
  --
  to incarnate. [The most ancient Vedanta] is the best previ-
  ous foundation of that which we seek now to rebuild and

1.01 - Foreward, #Hymns to the Mystic Fire, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  N ANCIENT times the Veda was revered as a sacred book
  of wisdom, a great mass of inspired poetry, the work of
  --
  of a seer of truth, - the Veda itself describes them as kavayah.
  satyasrutah., "seers who are hearers of the Truth" and the Veda
  itself was called sruti, a word which came to mean "revealed
  --
  the Veda and frequently appealed to its authority for the truths
  they themselves announced and these too afterwards came to be
  --
  of the Upanishads and in the Gita, but both look on the Veda as
  a Book of Knowledge. Even, the Sruti including both Veda and
  Upanishad was regarded as the supreme authority for spiritual
  --
  the spiritual authority of the Veda or deny that there is a higher
  truth contained in the Riks. This last development was left to
  --
  sought for in the Veda was the early history of India, its society,
  institutions, customs, a civilisation-picture of the times. They
  --
  The Vedic religion was in this account only a worship of NatureGods full of solar myths and consecrated by sacrifices and a sacrificial liturgy primitive enough in its ideas and contents, and it is these barbaric prayers that are the much vaunted, haloed and apotheosized Veda.
  There can be no doubt that in the beginning there was a worship of the Powers of the physical world, the Sun, Moon, Heaven and Earth, Wind, Rain and Storm etc., the Sacred Rivers and a number of Gods who presided over the workings of Nature.
  That was the general aspect of the ancient worship in Greece, Rome, India and among other ancient peoples. But in all these countries these gods began to assume a higher, a psychological function; Pallas Athene who may have been originally a Dawn-Goddess springing in flames from the head of Zeus, the Sky-God, Dyaus of the Veda, has in classical Greece a higher function and was identified by the Romans with their Minerva, the Goddess of learning and wisdom; similarly, Saraswati, a river Goddess, becomes in India the goddess of wisdom, learning and the arts and crafts: all the Greek deities have undergone a change in this direction - Apollo, the Sun-God, has become a god of poetry and prophecy, Hephaestus the Fire-God a divine smith, god of labour. In India the process was arrested half-way, and the Vedic Gods developed their psychological functions but retained more fixedly their external character and for higher purposes gave place to a new pantheon. They had to give precedence to Puranic deities who developed out of the early company but assumed larger cosmic functions, Vishnu, Rudra, Brahma - developing from the Vedic Brihaspati, or Brahmanaspati, - Shiva, Lakshmi, Durga. Thus in India the change in the gods was less complete, the earlier deities became the inferior divinities of the Puranic pantheon and this was largely due to the survival of the Rig Veda in which their psychological and their external functions co-existed and are both given a powerful emphasis; there was no such early literary record to maintain the original features of the Gods of Greece and Rome.
  This change was evidently due to a cultural development in these early peoples who became progressively more mentalised and less engrossed in the physical life as they advanced in civilisation and needed to read into their religion and their deities finer and subtler aspects which would support their more highly mentalised concepts and interests and find for them a true spiritual being or some celestial figure as their support and sanction.
  --
  It has been the tradition in India from the earliest times that the Rishis, the poet-seers of the Veda, were men of this type, men with a great spiritual and occult knowledge not shared by ordinary human beings, men who handed down this knowledge and their powers by a secret initiation to their descendants and chosen disciples. It is a gratuitous assumption to suppose that this tradition was wholly unfounded, a superstition that arose suddenly or slowly formed in a void, with nothing whatever to support it; some foundation there must have been however small or however swelled by legend and the accretions of centuries. But if it is true, then inevitably the poet-seers must have expressed something of their secret knowledge, their mystic lore in their writings and such an element must be present, however well-concealed by an occult language or behind a technique of symbols, and if it is there it must be to some extent discoverable.
  It is true that an antique language, obsolete words, - Yaska counts more than four hundred of which he did not know the meaning, - and often a difficult and out-of-date diction helped to obscure their meaning; the loss of the sense of their symbols, the glossary of which they kept to themselves, made them unintelligible to later generations; even in the time of the Upanishads the spiritual seekers of the age had to resort to initiation and meditation to penetrate into their secret knowledge, while the scholars afterwards were at sea and had to resort to conjecture and to concentrate on a mental interpretation or to explain by myths, by the legends of the Brahmanas themselves often symbolic and obscure. But still to make this discovery will be the sole way of getting at the true sense and the true value of the Veda. We must take seriously the hint of Yaska, accept the Rishi's description of the Veda's contents as "seer-wisdoms, secret words", and look for whatever clue we can find to this ancient wisdom. Otherwise the Veda must remain for ever a sealed book; grammarians, etymologists, scholastic conjectures will not open to us the sealed chamber.
  For it is a fact that the tradition of a secret meaning and a mystic wisdom couched in the Riks of the ancient Veda was as old as the Veda itself. The Vedic Rishis believed that their Mantras were inspired from higher hidden planes of consciousness and contained this secret knowledge. The words of the Veda could only be known in their true meaning by one who was himself a seer or mystic; from others the verses withheld their hidden knowledge. In one of Vamadeva's hymns in the fourth Mandala (IV.3.16) the Rishi describes himself as one illumined expressing through his thought and speech words of guidance, "secret words" - nin.ya vacamsi - "seer-wisdoms that utter their inner meaning to the seer" - kavyani kavaye nivacana. The Rishi Dirghatamas speaks of the Riks, the Mantras of the Veda, as existing "in a supreme ether, imperishable and immutable in which all the gods are seated", and he adds "one who knows not That what shall he do with the Rik?" (I.164.39) He further alludes to four planes from which the speech issues, three of them hidden in the secrecy while the fourth is human, and from there comes the ordinary word; but the word and thought of the Veda belongs to the higher planes (I.164.45).
  Elsewhere in the Riks the Vedic Word is described (X.71) as that which is supreme and the topmost height of speech, the best and the most faultless. It is something that is hidden in secrecy and from there comes out and is manifested. It has entered into the truth-seers, the Rishis, and it is found by following the track of their speech. But all cannot enter into its secret meaning. Those who do not know the inner sense are as men who seeing see not, hearing hear not, only to one here and there the Word desiring him like a beautifully robed wife to a husb and lays open her body. Others unable to drink steadily of the milk of the Word, the Vedic cow, move with it as with one that gives no milk, to him the Word is a tree without flowers or fruits. This is quite clear and precise; it results from it beyond doubt that even then while the Rig Veda was being written the Riks were regarded as having a secret sense which was not open to all. There was an occult and spiritual knowledge in the sacred hymns and by this knowledge alone, it is said, one can know the truth and rise to a higher existence. This belief was not a later tradition but held, probably, by all and evidently by some of the greatest Rishis such as Dirghatamas and Vamadeva.
  The tradition, then, was there and it was prolonged after the
  --
  the Veda. There was a sacrificial or ritualistic interpretation,
  Foreword
  --
  the knowledge and the inner sense of the Veda were almost
  lost and the Rishis who still knew had to save it by handing it
  --
  Nirukta and other Vedangas. But even then, he says, "the true
  sense of the Veda can be recovered directly by meditation and
  tapasya", those who can use these means need no outward aids
  --
  The tradition of a mystic element in the Veda as a source of
  Indian civilisation, its religion, its philosophy, its culture is more
  --
  more matter-of-fact intelligence. The ancient idea about the Veda
  could not fit into this picture; it was regarded as rather a part
  --
  the fact of a mystical element in the Veda fits in perfectly with
  this historical truth and takes its place in the history of Indian
  culture. The tradition of the Veda as the bed-rock of Indian
  civilisation - not merely a barbaric sacrificial liturgy - is more
  --
  teaching and knowledge. The whole of the Rig Veda, a small
  number of hymns perhaps excepted, becomes in its inner sense
  --
  realisations of every kind, - in the phrase common in the Veda
  itself, - both the human and the divine.
  But where is this body of esoteric meaning in the Veda? It is only discoverable if we give a constant and straightforward meaning to the words and formulas employed by the Rishis, especially to the key-words which bear as keystones the whole structure of their doctrine. One such word is the great word, Ritam, Truth; Truth was the central object of the seeking of the mystics, a spiritual or inner Truth, a truth of ourselves, a truth of things, a truth of the world and of the gods, a truth behind all we are and all that things are. In the ritualistic interpretation this master word of the Vedic knowledge has been interpreted in all kinds of senses according to the convenience or fancy of the interpreter, "truth", "sacrifice", "water", "one who has gone", even "food", not to speak of a number of other meanings; if we do that, there can be no certitude in our dealings with the Veda. But let us consistently give it the same master sense and a strange but clear result emerges. If we apply the same treatment to other standing terms of the Veda, if we give them their ordinary, natural and straightforward meaning and give it constantly and consistently, not monkeying about with their sense or turning them into purely ritualistic expressions, if we allow to certain important words, such as sravas, kratu, the psychological meaning of which they are capable and which they undoubtedly bear in certain passages as when the Veda describes Agni as kratur hr.di, then this result becomes all the more clear, extended, pervasive. If in addition we follow the indications which abound, sometimes the explicit statement of the Rishis about the inner sense of their symbols, interpret in the same sense the significant legends and figures on which they constantly return, the conquest over Vritra and the battle with the Vritras, his powers, the recovery of the Sun, the Waters, the Cows, from the Panis or other Dasyus, the whole Rig Veda reveals itself as a body of doctrine and practice, esoteric, occult, spiritual, such as might have been given by the mystics in any ancient country but which actually survives for us only in the Veda. It is there deliberately hidden by a veil, but the veil is not so thick as we first imagine; we have only to use our eyes and the veil vanishes; the body of the Word, the Truth stands out before us.
  Many of the lines, many whole hymns even of the Veda bear on their face a mystic meaning; they are evidently an occult form of speech, have an inner meaning. When the seer speaks of Agni as "the luminous guardian of the Truth shining out in his own home", or of Mitra and Varuna or other gods as "in touch with the Truth and making the Truth grow" or as "born in the Truth", these are words of a mystic poet, who is thinking of that inner Truth behind things of which the early sages were the seekers.
  He is not thinking of the Nature-Power presiding over the outer element of fire or of the fire of the ceremonial sacrifice. Or he speaks of Saraswati as one who impels the words of Truth and awakes to right thinkings or as one opulent with the thought: Saraswati awakes to consciousness or makes us conscious of the "Great Ocean and illumines all our thoughts." It is surely not the River Goddess whom he is thus hymning but the Power, theRiver if you will, of inspiration, the word of the Truth, bringing its light into our thoughts, building up in us that Truth, an inner knowledge. The Gods constantly stand out in their psychological functions; the sacrifice is the outer symbol of an inner work, an inner interchange between the gods and men, - man givingwhat he has, the gods giving in return the horses of power, the herds of light, the heroes of Strength to be his retinue, winning for him victory in his battle with the hosts of Darkness, Vritras, Dasyus, Panis. When the Rishi says, "Let us become conscious whether by the War-Horse or by the Word of a Strength beyond men", his words have either a mystic significance or they have no coherent meaning at all. In the portions translated in this book we have many mystic verses and whole hymns which, however mystic, tear the veil off the outer sacrificial images covering the real sense of the Veda. "Thought", says the Rishi, "has nourished for us human things in the Immortals, in the Great Heavens; it is the milch-cow which milks of itself the wealth of many forms" - the many kinds of wealth, cows, horses and the rest for which the sacrificer prays; evidently this is no material wealth, it is something which Thought, the Thought embodied in the Mantra, can give and it is the result of the same Thought that nourishes our human things in the Immortals, in the Great Heavens. A process of divinisation, and of a bringing down of great and luminous riches, treasures won from the Gods by the inner work of sacrifice, is hinted at in terms necessarily covert but still for one who knows how to read these secret words, nin.ya vacamsi, sufficiently expressive, kavaye nivacana. Again, Night and Dawn the eternal sisters are like "joyful weaving women weaving the weft of our perfected works into the form of a sacrifice."
  Again, words with a mystic form and meaning, but there
  --
  in the Light. The cows of the Veda were the Herds of the Sun,
  familiar in Greek myth and mystery, the rays of the Sun of Truth
  --
  Other standing words and symbols of the Veda invite a
  similar interpretation of their sense. As the Vedic "cow" is the
  --
  in the Veda is used as a symbol. It speaks of the inconscient
  ocean, salilam apraketam, in which the Godhead is involved
  --
  but the Veda speaks of the seven Mighty Ones of Heaven who
  flow down from Heaven; they are waters that know, knowers of
  --
  the release of the waters which takes so large a place in the Veda
  puts on the aspect of a symbolic myth. Along with it comes the
  --
  impel our thoughts. So too the enemies in the Veda are spoken
  of as robbers, dasyus, who steal the cows, or Vritras and are
  --
  understood the Rig Veda and justifies their belief in the inspired
  knowledge of their forerunners. "There is a Truth covered by a
  --
  in the Veda and frequently in the Upanishad, is the Godhead
  of the supreme Truth and Knowledge and his rays are the light
  --
  Upanishad had a truer sense of the meaning of the ancient Veda
  than the mediaeval ritualistic commentator with his gigantic
  --
  compare the passages in the Veda in which it occurs we can
  come to the conclusion that it meant a ray of perception or
  --
  rendering of the Veda. Agni is a seer-will, kavi-kratu, he is the
  "will in the heart", kratu hr.di. Finally the word sravas which
  is constantly in use in the Veda means fame, it is also taken by
  the commentators in the sense of food, but these significances
  --
  into the esoteric method of interpretation of the Veda.
  But what then is the secret meaning, the esoteric sense, which
  emerges by this way of understanding the Veda? It is what we
  would expect from the nature of the seeking of the mystics everywhere. It is also, as we should expect from the actual course of
  --
  knowledge of the Veda is the seed which is evolved later on
  into the Vedanta. The thought around which all is centred is the
  seeking after Truth, Light, Immortality. There is a Truth deeper
  --
  the outer sacrifice in the Veda are used as symbols of the inner
  sacrifice and self-offering; we give what we are and what we
  --
  the Rig Veda is the seed of the teaching of the Vedanta, so is
  its inner practice and discipline a seed of the later practice and
  --
  we must rise. But in the Veda this looks out still mostly from
  behind the veil. There is much else but this is the kernel of the
  --
  in a series of articles with the title "The Secret of the Veda"
  in the monthly philosophical magazine, Arya, some thirty years
  --
  18 The writings on and translations of the Veda that Sri Aurobindo published in the
  Arya are now published in The Secret of the Veda with Selected Hymns, volume 15 of
  THE COMPLETE WORKS OF SRI AUROBINDO. - Ed.
  --
  of the Mystics" have been included.20 The text of the Veda has
  been given for use by those who can read the original Sanskrit.
  --
  those who are inclined to see more in the Vedas than a superficial
  liturgy and would be interested in knowing what might be the
  --
  the hymns of the Rig Veda, magnificent in their colouring and
  images, noble and beautiful in rhythm, perfect in their diction,
  --
  has constantly to turn the concentrated speech of the Veda into
  a looser, more diluted English form. Another stumbling-block

1.01 - Isha Upanishad, #Isha Upanishad, #unset, #Zen
  Earth in the Veda and spoken of there as the Mother. It is a Vedic epithet of the God
  Vayu, who, representing the divine principle in the Life-energy, Prana, extends himself in Matter and vivifies its forms. Here, it signifies the divine Life-power that presides in all forms of cosmic activity.
  --
  10 In the inner sense of the Veda Surya, the Sun-God, represents the divine Illumination of the Kavi which exceeds mind and forms the pure self-luminous Truth of things. His principal power is self-revelatory knowledge, termed in the Veda "Sight". His realm is described as the Truth, the Law, the Vast. He is the Fosterer or Increaser, for he enlarges and opens man's dark and limited being into a luminous and infinite consciousness. He is the sole Seer, Seer of Oneness and Knower of the Self, and leads him to the highest Sight.
  He is Yama, Controller or Ordainer, for he governs man's action and manifested being by the direct Law of the Truth, satyadharma, and therefore by the right principle of our nature, ya thatathyatah.. A luminous power proceeding from the Father of all existence, he reveals in himself the divine Purusha of whom all beings are the manifestations.
  --
  13 Sin, in the conception of the Veda, from which this verse is taken bodily, is that which excites and hurries the faculties into deviation from the good path. There is a straight road or road of naturally increasing light and truth, r.juh. panthah., r.tasya panthah., leading over infinite levels and towards infinite vistas, vtani pr.s.t.hani, by which the law of our nature should normally take us towards our fulfilment. Sin compels it instead to travel with stumblings amid uneven and limited tracts and along crooked windings
  (duritani, vr.jinani).

1.01 - Maitreya inquires of his teacher (Parashara), #Vishnu Purana, #Vyasa, #Hinduism
  Having adored ViáčŁáč‡u[7], the lord of all, and paid reverence to Brahmā and the rest[8]; having also saluted the spiritual preceptor[9]; I will narrate a Purāáč‡a equal in sanctity to the Vedas.
  Maitreya[10], having saluted him reverentially, thus addressed Parāƛara, the excellent sage, the grandson of VaƛiáčŁáč­ha, who was versed in traditional history, and the Purāáč‡as; who was acquainted with the Vedas, and the branches of science dependent upon them; and skilled in law and philosophy; and who had performed the morning rites of devotion.
  Maitreya said, Master! I have been instructed by you in the whole of the Vedas, and in the institutes of law and of sacred science: through your favour, other men, even though they be my foes, cannot accuse me of having been remiss in the acquirement of knowledge. I am now desirous, oh thou who art profound in piety! to hear from thee, how this world was, and how in future it will be? what is its substance, oh Brahman, and whence proceeded animate and inanimate things? into what has it been resolved, and into what will its dissolution again occur? how were the elements manifested? whence proceeded the gods and other beings? what are the situation and extent of the oceans and the mountains, the earth, the sun, and the planets? what are the families of the gods and others, the Menus, the periods called Manvantaras, those termed Kalpas, and their subdivisions, and the four ages: the events that happen at the close of a Kalpa, and the terminations of the several ages[11]: the histories, oh great Muni, of the gods, the sages, and kings; and how the Vedas were divided into branches (or schools), after they had been arranged by Vyāsa: the duties of the Brahmans, and the other tribes, as well as of those who pass through the different orders of life? All these things I wish to hear from you, grandson of VaƛiáčŁáč­ha. Incline thy thoughts benevolently towards me, that I may, through thy favour, be informed of all I desire to know. Parāƛara replied, Well inquired, pious Maitreya. You recall to my recollection that which was of old narrated by my father's father, VaƛiáčŁáč­ha. I had heard that my father had been devoured by a RākáčŁas employed by Visvāmitra: violent anger seized me, and I commenced a sacrifice for the destruction of the RākáčŁasas: hundreds of them were reduced to ashes by the rite, when, as they were about to be entirely extirpated, my grandfather VaƛiáčŁáč­ha thus spake to me: Enough, my child; let thy wrath be appeased: the RākáčŁasas are not culpable: thy father's death was the work of destiny. Anger is the passion of fools; it becometh not a wise man. By whom, it may be asked, is any one killed? Every man reaps the consequences of his own acts. Anger, my son, is the destruction of all that man obtains by arduous exertions, of fame, and of devout austerities; and prevents the attainment of heaven or of emancipation. The chief sages always shun wrath: he not thou, my child, subject to its influence. Let no more of these unoffending spirits of darkness be consumed. Mercy is the might of the righteous[12].
  Being thus admonished by my venerable grandsire, I immediately desisted from the rite, in obedience to his injunctions, and VaƛiáčŁáč­ha, the most excellent of sages, was content with me. Then arrived Pulastya, the son of Brahmā[13], who was received by my grandfather with the customary marks of respect. The illustrious brother of Pulaha said to me; Since, in the violence of animosity, you have listened to the words of your progenitor, and have exercised clemency, therefore you shall become learned in every science: since you have forborne, even though incensed, to destroy my posterity, I will bestow upon you another boon, and, you shall become the author of a summary of the Purāáč‡as[14]; you shall know the true nature of the deities, as it really is; and, whether engaged in religious rites, or abstaining from their performance[15], your understanding, through my favour, shall be perfect, and exempt from). doubts. Then my grandsire VaƛiáčŁáč­ha added; Whatever has been said to thee by Pulastya, shall assuredly come to pass.
  --
  [1]: An address of this kind, to one or other Hindu divinity, usually introduces Sanscrit compositions, especially those considered sacred. The first term of this mantra or brief prayer, Om or Omkāra, is well known as a combination of letters invested by Hindu mysticism with peculiar sanctity. In the Vedas it is said to comprehend all the gods; and in the Purāáč‡as it is directed to be prefixed to all such formulĂŠ as that of the text. Thus in the Uttara Khaáč‡áža of the Pādma Purāáč‡a: 'The syllable Om, the mysterious name, or Brahma, is the leader of all prayers: let it therefore, O lovely-faced, (ƚiva addresses Durgā,) be employed in the beginning of all prayers:' According to the same authority, one of the mystical imports of the term is the collective enunciation of ViáčŁáč‡u expressed by A, of SrÄ« his bride intimated by U, and of their joint worshipper designated by M. A whole chapter of the Vāyu Purāáč‡a is devoted to this term. A text of the Vedas is there cited: 'Om, the monosyllable Brahma;' the latter meaning either the Supreme Being or the Vedas collectively, of which this monosyllable is the type. It is also said to typify the three spheres of the world, the three holy fires, the three steps of ViáčŁáč‡u, &c.-Frequent meditation upon it, and repetition of it, ensure release from worldly existence. See also Manu, II. 76. Vāsudeva, a name of ViáčŁáč‡u or Káč›áčŁáč‡a, is, according to its grammatical etymology, a patronymic derivative implying son of Vasudeva. The VaiáčŁáč‡ava Purāáč‡as, however, devise other explanations: see the next chapter, and again, b. VI. c. 5.
  [2]: In this stanza occurs a series of the appellations of ViáčŁáč‡u: 1. Puáč‡ážarÄ«kākáčŁa, having eyes like a lotus, or heart-pervading; or Puáč‡ážarÄ«ka is explained supreme glory, and AkáčŁa imperishable: the first is the most usual etymon. 2. VÄ«swabhāvana, the creator of the universe, or the cause of the existence of all things. 3. Háč›áčŁÄ«keƛa, lord of the senses. 4. Mahā puruáčŁa, great or supreme spirit; puruáčŁa meaning that which abides or is quiescent in body (puri sĂ©tĂ©), 5. PĆ«rvaja, produced or appearing before creation; the Orphic Ï€ÏÏ‰Ï„ÎżÎłáœčÎœÎżÏ‚. In the fifth book, c. 18, ViáčŁáč‡u is described by five appellations, which are considered analogous to these; or, 1. BhĆ«tātmā, one with created things, or Puáč‡ážarÄ«kākáčŁa; 2. Pradhānātmā, one with crude nature, or Viƛvabhāvana; 3. Indriyātmā, one with the senses, or Háč›áčŁikeƛa; 4. Paramātmā, supreme spirit, or MahāpuruáčŁa; and Ātmā, soul; living soul, animating nature and existing before it, or PĆ«rvaja.
  --
  [7]: ViáčŁáč‡u is commonly derived in the Purāáč‡as from the root Vis, to enter, entering into, or pervading the universe, agreeably to the text of the Vedas, 'Having created that (world), he then afterwards enters into it;' being, as our comment observes, undistinguished by place, time, or property. According to the Mātsya P. the name alludes to his entering into the mundane egg: according to the Padma P., to his entering into or combining with Prakriti, as PuruáčŁa or spirit. In the MokáčŁa Dharma of the Mahābhārata, s. 165, the word is derived from the root vÄ«, signifying motion, pervasion, production, radiance; or, irregularly, from krama, to go with the particle vi, implying, variously, prefixed.
  [8]: Brahmā and the rest is said to apply to the series of teachers through whom this Purāáč‡a was transmitted from its first reputed author, Brahmā, to its actual narrator, the sage Parāƛara. See also b. VI. c. 8.

1.01 - MASTER AND DISCIPLE, #The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna, #Sri Ramakrishna, #Hinduism
  "The Vedas speak of the homa bird. It lives high up in the sky and there it lays its egg.
  As soon as the egg is laid it begins to fall; but it is so high up that it continues to fall for many days. As it falls it hatches, and the chick falls. As the chick falls its eyes open; it grows wings. As soon as its eyes open, it realizes that it is falling and will be dashed to pieces on touching the earth. Then it at once shoots up toward the mother bird high in the sky."

1.01 - Our Demand and Need from the Gita, #Essays On The Gita, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  It may therefore be useful in approaching an ancient Scripture, such as the Veda, Upanishads or Gita, to indicate precisely the spirit in which we approach it and what exactly we think we may derive from it that is of value to humanity and its future. First of all, there is undoubtedly a Truth one and eternal which we are seeking, from which all other truth derives, by the light of which all other truth finds its right place, explanation and relation to the scheme of knowledge. But precisely for that reason it cannot be shut up in a single trenchant formula, it is not likely to be found in its entirety or in all its bearings in any single philosophy or scripture or uttered altogether and for ever by any one teacher, thinker, prophet or Avatar. Nor has it been wholly found by us if our view of it necessitates the intolerant exclusion of the truth underlying other systems; for when we reject passionately, we mean simply that we cannot appreciate and explain. Secondly, this Truth, though it is one and eternal, expresses itself in Time and through the mind of man; therefore every Scripture must necessarily contain two elements, one temporary, perishable, belonging to the ideas of the period and country in which it was produced, the other eternal and imperishable and applicable in all ages and countries. Moreover, in the statement of the Truth the actual form given to it, the system and arrangement, the metaphysical and intellectual mould, the precise expression used must be largely subject to the mutations of Time and cease to have the same force; for the human intellect modifies itself always; continually dividing and putting together it is obliged to shift its divisions continually and to rearrange its syntheses; it is always leaving old expression and symbol for new or, if it uses the old, it so changes its connotation or at least
  Our Demand and Need from the Gita
  --
  Nor shall we deal in any other spirit with the element of philosophical dogma or religious creed which either enters into the Gita or hangs about it owing to its use of the philosophical terms and religious symbols current at the time. When the Gita speaks of Sankhya and Yoga, we shall not discuss beyond the limits of what is just essential for our statement, the relations of the Sankhya of the Gita with its one Purusha and strong Vedantic colouring to the non-theistic or "atheistic" Sankhya that has come down to us bringing with it its scheme of many Purushas and one Prakriti, nor of the Yoga of the Gita, many-sided, subtle, rich and flexible to the theistic doctrine and the fixed, scientific, rigorously defined and graded system of the Yoga of Patanjali.
  In the Gita the Sankhya and Yoga are evidently only two convergent parts of the same Vedantic truth or rather two concurrent ways of approaching its realisation, the one philosophical, intellectual, analytic, the other intuitional, devotional, practical, ethical, synthetic, reaching knowledge through experience. The
  Gita recognises no real difference in their teachings. Still less need we discuss the theories which regard the Gita as the fruit of some particular religious system or tradition. Its teaching is universal whatever may have been its origins.
  --
   comprehensiveness. Its aim is precisely the opposite to that of the polemist commentators who found this Scripture established as one of the three highest Vedantic authorities and attempted to turn it into a weapon of offence and defence against other schools and systems. The Gita is not a weapon for dialectical warfare; it is a gate opening on the whole world of spiritual truth and experience and the view it gives us embraces all the provinces of that supreme region. It maps out, but it does not cut up or build walls or hedges to confine our vision.
  There have been other syntheses in the long history of Indian thought. We start with the Vedic synthesis of the psychological being of man in its highest flights and widest rangings of divine knowledge, power, joy, life and glory with the cosmic existence of the gods, pursued behind the symbols of the material universe into those superior planes which are hidden from the physical sense and the material mentality. The crown of this synthesis was in the experience of the Vedic Rishis something divine, transcendent and blissful in whose unity the increasing soul of man and the eternal divine fullness of the cosmic godheads meet perfectly and fulfil themselves. The Upanishads take up this crowning experience of the earlier seers and make it their starting-point for a high and profound synthesis of spiritual knowledge; they draw together into a great harmony all that had been seen and experienced by the inspired and liberated knowers of the Eternal throughout a great and fruitful period of spiritual seeking. The
  Gita starts from this Vedantic synthesis and upon the basis of its essential ideas builds another harmony of the three great means and powers, Love, Knowledge and Works, through which the soul of man can directly approach and cast itself into the Eternal.
  There is yet another, the Tantric,1 which though less subtle and spiritually profound, is even more bold and forceful than the synthesis of the Gita, - for it seizes even upon the obstacles to the spiritual life and compels them to become the means for a richer spiritual conquest and enables us to embrace the whole
  --
  We of the coming day stand at the head of a new age of development which must lead to such a new and larger synthesis. We are not called upon to be orthodox Vedantins of any of the three schools or Tantrics or to adhere to one of the theistic religions of the past or to entrench ourselves within the four corners of the teaching of the Gita. That would be to limit ourselves and to attempt to create our spiritual life out of the being, knowledge and nature of others, of the men of the past, instead of building it out of our own being and potentialities. We do not belong to the past dawns, but to the noons of the future. A mass of new material is flowing into us; we have not only to assimilate the influences of the great theistic religions of India and of the world and a recovered sense of the meaning of Buddhism, but to take full account of the potent though limited revelations of modern knowledge and seeking; and, beyond that, the remote and dateless past which seemed to be dead is returning upon us with an effulgence of many luminous secrets long lost to the consciousness of mankind but now breaking out again from behind the veil. All this points to a new, a very rich, a very vast synthesis; a fresh and widely embracing harmonisation of our gains is both an intellectual and a spiritual necessity of the future.
  But just as the past syntheses have taken those which preceded them for their starting-point, so also must that of the future,

1.01 - Prayer, #Bhakti-Yoga, #Swami Vivekananda, #Hinduism
  "He is the Soul of the Universe; He is Immortal; His is the Rulership; He is the All-knowing, the All-pervading, the Protector of the Universe, the Eternal Ruler. None else is there efficient to govern the world eternally. He who at the beginning of creation projected Brahm (i.e. the universal consciousness), and who delivered the Vedas unto him seeking liberation I go for refuge unto that effulgent One, whose light turns the understanding towards the tman."
  Shvetshvatara-Upanishad, VI. 17-18.
  --
  Bearing this in mind let us try to understand what the great Vedantic commentators have to say on the subject. In explaining the Sutra vrittirasakridupadesht (Meditation is necessary, that having been often enjoined.), Bhagavn Shankara says, "Thus people say, 'He is devoted to the king, he is devoted to the Guru'; they say this of him who follows his Guru, and does so, having that following as the one end in view. Similarly they say, 'The loving wife meditates on her loving husband'; here also a kind of eager and continuous remembrance is meant." This is devotion according to Shankara.
  "Meditation again is a constant remembrance (of the thing meditated upon) flowing like an unbroken stream of oil poured out from one vessel to another. When this kind of remembering has been attained (in relation to God) all bandages break. Thus it is spoken of in the scriptures regarding constant remembering as a means to liberation. This remembering again is of the same form as seeing, because it is of the same meaning as in the passage, 'When He who is far and near is seen, the bonds of the heart are broken, all doubts vanish, and all effects of work disappear' He who is near can be seen, but he who is far can only be remembered. Nevertheless the scripture says that he have to see Him who is near as well as Him who, is far, thereby indicating to us that the above kind of remembering is as good as seeing. This remembrance when exalted assumes the same form as seeing. . . . Worship is constant remembering as may be seen from the essential texts of scriptures. Knowing, which is the same as repeated worship, has been described as constant remembering. . . . Thus the memory, which has attained to the height of what is as good as direct perception, is spoken of in the Shruti as a means of liberation. 'This Atman is not to be reached through various sciences, nor by intellect, nor by much study of the Vedas. Whomsoever this Atman desires, by him is the Atman attained, unto him this Atman discovers Himself.' Here, after saying that mere hearing, thinking and meditating are not the means of attaining this Atman, it is said, 'Whom this Atman desires, by him the Atman is attained.' The extremely beloved is desired; by whomsoever this Atman is extremely beloved, he becomes the most beloved of the Atman. So that this beloved may attain the Atman, the Lord Himself helps. For it has been said by the Lord: 'Those who are constantly attached to Me and worship Me with love I give that direction to their will by which they come to Me.' Therefore it is said that, to whomsoever this remembering, which is of the same form as direct perception, is very dear, because it is dear to the Object of such memory perception, he is desired by the Supreme Atman, by him the Supreme Atman is attained. This constant remembrance is denoted by the word Bhakti." So says Bhagavn Rmnuja in his commentary on the Sutra Athto Brahma-jijns (Hence follows a dissertation on Brahman.).
  In commenting on the Sutra of Patanjali, Ishvara pranidhndv, i.e. "Or by the worship of the Supreme Lord" Bhoja says, "Pranidhna is that sort of Bhakti in which, without seeking results, such as sense-enjoyments etc., all works are dedicated to that Teacher of teachers." Bhagavan Vysa also, when commenting on the same, defines Pranidhana as "the form of Bhakti by which the mercy of the Supreme Lord comes to the Yogi, and blesses him by granting him his desires". According to Shndilya, "Bhakti is intense love to God." The best definition is, however, that given by the king of Bhaktas, Prahlda:

1.01 - SAMADHI PADA, #Patanjali Yoga Sutras, #Swami Vivekananda, #Hinduism
  this has attained to what is called in the Vedas bereft of
  body. He can think of himself as without his gross body; but
  --
  spoken of in the Vedas really means one of these free souls.
  Beyond them there is not an eternally free and blessed Creator
  --
  the Isvara of the Yogis, although, according to the Vedas,
  Isvara is the Creator of the universe. Seeing that the universe
  --
  religious ideas of the Vedas have gathered themselves round
  this word Om. What has that to do with America and England,
  --
  Seers of the thoughts recorded in the Scriptures the Vedas.
  According to them, the only proof of the Scriptures is that
  --
  the Vedas, and yet will not realise anything, but when we
  practise their teachings, then we attain to that state which

1.01 - THAT ARE THOU, #The Perennial Philosophy, #Aldous Huxley, #Philosophy
  When Svetaketu was twelve years old he was sent to a teacher, with whom he studied until he was twenty-four. After learning all the Vedas, he returned home full of conceit in the belief that he was consummately well educated, and very censorious.
  His father said to him, Svetaketu, my child, you who are so full of your learning and so censorious, have you asked for that knowledge by which we hear the unbearable, by which we perceive what cannot be perceived and know what cannot be known?
  --
  I am not competent, nor is this the place to discuss the doctrinal differences between Buddhism and Hinduism. Let it suffice to point out that, when he insisted that human beings are by nature non-Atman, the Buddha was evidently speaking about the personal self and not the universal Self. The Brahman controversialists, who appear in certain of the Pali scriptures, never so much as mention the Vedanta doctrine of the identity of Atman and Godhead and the non-identity of ego and Atman. What they maintain and Gautama denies is the substantial nature and eternal persistence of the individual psyche. As an unintelligent man seeks for the abode of music in the body of the lute, so does he look for a soul within the skandhas (the material and psychic aggregates, of which the individual mind-body is composed). About the existence of the Atman that is Brahman, as about most other metaphysical matters, the Buddha declines to speak, on the ground that such discussions do not tend to edification or spiritual progress among the members of a monastic order, such as he had founded. But though it has its dangers, though it may become the most absorbing, because the most serious and noblest, of distractions, metaphysical thinking is unavoidable and finally necessary. Even the Hinayanists found this, and the later Mahayanists were to develop, in connection with the practice of their religion, a splendid and imposing system of cosmological, ethical and psychological thought. This system was based upon the postulates of a strict idealism and professed to dispense with the idea of God. But moral and spiritual experience was too strong for philosophical theory, and under the inspiration of direct experience, the writers of the Mahayana sutras found themselves using all their ingenuity to explain why the Tathagata and the Bodhisattvas display an infinite charity towards beings that do not really exist. At the same time they stretched the framework of subjective idealism so as to make room for Universal Mind; qualified the idea of soullessness with the doctrine that, if purified, the individual mind can identify itself with the Universal Mind or Buddha-womb; and, while maintaining godlessness, asserted that this realizable Universal Mind is the inner consciousness of the eternal Buddha and that the Buddha-mind is associated with a great compassionate heart which desires the liberation of every sentient being and bestows divine grace on all who make a serious effort to achieve mans final end. In a word, despite their inauspicious vocabulary, the best of the Mahayana sutras contain an au thentic formulation of the Perennial Philosophya formulation which in some respects (as we shall see when we come to the section, God in the World) is more complete than any other.
  In India, as in Persia, Mohammedan thought came to be enriched by the doctrine that God is immanent as well as transcendent, while to Mohammedan practice were added the moral disciplines and spiritual exercises, by means of which the soul is prepared for contemplation or the unitive knowledge of the Godhead. It is a significant historical fact that the poet-saint Kabir is claimed as a co-religionist both by Moslems and Hindus. The politics of those whose goal is beyond time are always pacific; it is the idolaters of past and future, of reactionary memory and Utopian dream, who do the persecuting and make the wars.
  --
  Such, then, very briefly are the reasons for supposing that the historical traditions of oriental and our own classical antiquity may be true. It is interesting to find that at least one distinguished contemporary ethnologist is in agreement with Aristotle and the Vedantists. Orthodox ethnology, writes Dr. Paul Radin in his Primitive Man as Philosopher, has been nothing but an enthusiastic and quite uncritical attempt to apply the Darwinian theory of evolution to the facts of social experience. And he adds that no progress in ethnology will be achieved until scholars rid themselves once and for all of the curious notion that everything possesses a history; until they realize that certain ideas and certain concepts are as ultimate for man, as a social being, as specific physiological reactions are ultimate for him, as a biological being. Among these ultimate concepts, in Dr. Radins view, is that of monotheism. Such monotheism is often no more than the recognition of a single dark and numinous Power ruling the world. But it may sometimes be genuinely ethical and spiritual.
  The nineteenth centurys mania for history and prophetic Utopianism tended to blind the eyes of even its acutest thinkers to the timeless facts of eternity. Thus we find T. H. Green writing of mystical union as though it were an evolutionary process and not, as all the evidence seems to show, a state which man, as man, has always had it in his power to realize. An animal organism, which has its history in time, gradually becomes the vehicle of an eternally complete consciousness, which in itself can have no history, but a history of the process by which the animal organism becomes its vehicle. But in actual fact it is only in regard to peripheral knowledge that there has been a genuine historical development. Without much lapse of time and much accumulation of skills and information, there can be but an imperfect knowledge of the material world. But direct awareness of the eternally complete consciousness, which is the ground of the material world, is a possibility occasionally actualized by some human beings at almost any stage of their own personal development, from childhood to old age, and at any period of the races history.

1.01 - The Cycle of Society, #The Human Cycle, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  If we look at the beginnings of Indian society, the far-off Vedic age which we no longer understand, for we have lost that mentality, we see that everything is symbolic. The religious institution of sacrifice governs the whole society and all its hours and moments, and the ritual of the sacrifice is at every turn and in every detail, as even a cursory study of the Brahmanas and Upanishads ought to show us, mystically symbolic. The theory that there was nothing in the sacrifice except a propitiation of Nature-gods for the gaining of worldly prosperity and of Paradise, is a misunderstanding by a later humanity which had already become profoundly affected by an intellectual and practical bent of mind, practical even in its religion and even in its own mysticism and symbolism, and therefore could no longer enter into the ancient spirit. Not only the actual religious worship but also the social institutions of the time were penetrated through and through with the symbolic spirit. Take the hymn of the Rig Veda which is supposed to be a marriage hymn for the union of a human couple and was certainly used as such in the later Vedic ages. Yet the whole sense of the hymn turns about the successive marriages of Sury, daughter of the Sun, with different gods and the human marriage is quite a subordinate matter overshadowed and governed entirely by the divine and mystic figure and is spoken of in the terms of that figure. Mark, however, that the divine marriage here is not, as it would be in later ancient poetry, a decorative image or poetical ornamentation used to set off and embellish the human union; on the contrary, the human is an inferior figure and image of the divine. The distinction marks off the entire contrast between that more ancient mentality and our modern regard upon things. This symbolism influenced for a long time Indian ideas of marriage and is even now conventionally remembered though no longer understood or effective.
  We may note also in passing that the Indian ideal of the relation between man and woman has always been governed by the symbolism of the relation between the Purusha and Prakriti (in the Veda Nri and Gna), the male and female divine Principles in the universe. Even, there is to some degree a practical correlation between the position of the female sex and this idea. In the earlier Vedic times when the female principle stood on a sort of equality with the male in the symbolic cult, though with a certain predominance for the latter, woman was as much the mate as the adjunct of man; in later times when the Prakriti has become subject in idea to the Purusha, the woman also depends entirely on the man, exists only for him and has hardly even a separate spiritual existence. In the Tantrik Shakta religion which puts the female principle highest, there is an attempt which could not get itself translated into social practice,even as this Tantrik cult could never entirely shake off the subjugation of the Vedantic idea,to elevate woman and make her an object of profound respect and even of worship.
  Or let us take, for this example will serve us best, the Vedic institution of the fourfold order, caturvara, miscalled the system of the four castes,for caste is a conventional, vara a symbolic and typal institution. We are told that the institution of the four orders of society was the result of an economic evolution complicated by political causes. Very possibly;1 but the important point is that it was not so regarded and could not be so regarded by the men of that age. For while we are satisfied when we have found the practical and material causes of a social phenomenon and do not care to look farther, they cared little or only subordinately for its material factors and looked always first and foremost for its symbolic, religious or psychological significance. This appears in the Purushasukta of the Veda, where the four orders are described as having sprung from the body of the creative Deity, from his head, arms, thighs and feet. To us this is merely a poetical image and its sense is that the Brahmins were the men of knowledge, the Kshatriyas the men of power, the Vaishyas the producers and support of society, the Shudras its servants. As if that were all, as if the men of those days would have so profound a reverence for mere poetical figures like this of the body of Brahma or that other of the marriages of Sury, would have built upon them elaborate systems of ritual and sacred ceremony, enduring institutions, great demarcations of social type and ethical discipline. We read always our own mentality into that of these ancient forefa thers and it is therefore that we can find in them nothing but imaginative barbarians. To us poetry is a revel of intellect and fancy, imagination a plaything and caterer for our amusement, our entertainer, the nautch-girl of the mind. But to the men of old the poet was a seer, a revealer of hidden truths, imagination no dancing courtesan but a priestess in Gods house commissioned not to spin fictions but to image difficult and hidden truths; even the metaphor or simile in the Vedic style is used with a serious purpose and expected to convey a reality, not to suggest a pleasing artifice of thought. The image was to these seers a revelative symbol of the unrevealed and it was used because it could hint luminously to the mind what the precise intellectual word, apt only for logical or practical thought or to express the physical and the superficial, could not at all hope to manifest. To them this symbol of the Creators body was more than an image, it expressed a divine reality. Human society was for them an attempt to express in life the cosmic Purusha who has expressed himself otherwise in the material and the supraphysical universe. Man and the cosmos are both of them symbols and expressions of the same hidden Reality.
  From this symbolic attitude came the tendency to make everything in society a sacrament, religious and sacrosanct, but as yet with a large and vigorous freedom in all its forms,a freedom which we do not find in the rigidity of savage communities because these have already passed out of the symbolic into the conventional stage though on a curve of degeneration instead of a curve of growth. The spiritual idea governs all; the symbolic religious forms which support it are fixed in principle; the social forms are lax, free and capable of infinite development. One thing, however, begins to progress towards a firm fixity and this is the psychological type. Thus we have first the symbolic idea of the four orders, expressingto employ an abstractly figurative language which the Vedic thinkers would not have used nor perhaps understood, but which helps best our modern understanding the Divine as knowledge in man, the Divine as power, the Divine as production, enjoyment and mutuality, the Divine as service, obedience and work. These divisions answer to four cosmic principles, the Wisdom that conceives the order and principle of things, the Power that sanctions, upholds and enforces it, the Harmony that creates the arrangement of its parts, the Work that carries out what the rest direct. Next, out of this idea there developed a firm but not yet rigid social order based primarily upon temperament and psychic type2 with a corresponding ethical discipline and secondarily upon the social and economic function.3 But the function was determined by its suitability to the type and its helpfulness to the discipline; it was not the primary or sole factor. The first, the symbolic stage of this evolution is predominantly religious and spiritual; the other elements, psychological, ethical, economic, physical are there but subordinated to the spiritual and religious idea. The second stage, which we may call the typal, is predominantly psychological and ethical; all else, even the spiritual and religious, is subordinate to the psychological idea and to the ethical ideal which expresses it. Religion becomes then a mystic sanction for the ethical motive and discipline, Dharma; that becomes its chief social utility, and for the rest it takes a more and more other-worldly turn. The idea of the direct expression of the divine Being or cosmic Principle in man ceases to dominate or to be the leader and in the forefront; it recedes, stands in the background and finally disappears from the practice and in the end even from the theory of life.

1.01 - The Four Aids, #The Synthesis Of Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  2:The supreme Shastra of the integral Yoga is the eternal Veda secret in the heart of every thinking and living being. The lotus of the eternal knowledge and the eternal perfection is a bud closed and folded up within us. It opens swiftly or gradually, petal by petal, through successive realisations, once the mind of man begins to turn towards the Eternal, once his heart, no longer compressed and confined by attachment to finite appearances, becomes enamoured, in whatever degree, of the Infinite. All life, all thought, all energising of the faculties, all experiences passive or active, become thenceforward so many shocks which disintegrate the teguments of the soul and remove the obstacles to the inevitable efflorescence. He who chooses the Infinite has been chosen by the Infinite. He has received the divine touch without which there is no awakening, no opening of the spirit; but once it is received, attainment is sure, whether conquered swiftly in the course of one human life or pursued patiently through many stadia of the cycle of existence in the manifested universe.
  3:Nothing can be taught to the mind which is not already concealed as potential knowledge in the unfolding soul of the creature. So also all perfection of which the outer man is capable, is only a realising of the eternal perfection of the Spirit within him. We know the Divine and become the Divine, because we are That already in our secret nature. All teaching is a revealing, all becoming is an unfolding. Self-attainment is the secret; self-knowledge and an increasing consciousness are the means and the process.
  --
  7:For the Sadhaka of the Integral Yoga it is necessary to remember that no written Shastra, however great its authority or however large its spirit, can be more than a partial expression of the eternal Knowledge. He will use, but never bind himself even by the greatest Scripture. Where the Scripture is profound, wide, catholic, it may exercise upon him an influence for the highest good and of incalculable importance. It may be associated in his experience with his awakening to crowning verities and his realisation of the highest experiences. His Yoga may be governed for a long time by one Scripture or by several successively, -- if it is in the line of the great Hindu tradition, by the Gita, for example, the Upanishads, the Veda. Or it may be a good part of his development to include in its material a richly varied experience of the truths of many Scriptures and make the future opulent with all that is best in the past. But in the end he must take his station, or better still, if he can, always and from the beginning he must live in his own soul beyond the written Truth, -- sabdabrahmativartate -- beyond all that he has heard and all that he has yet to hear, -- srotaryasya srutasya ca. For he is not the Sadhaka of a book or of many books; he is a Sadhaka of the Infinite.
  8:Another kind of Shastra is not Scripture, but a statement of the science and methods, the effective principles and way of working of the path of Yoga which the Sadhaka elects to follow. Each path has its Shastra, either written or traditional, passing from mouth to mouth through a long line of Teachers. In India a great authority, a high reverence even is ordinarily attached to the written or traditional teaching. All the lines of the Yoga are supposed to be fixed and the Teacher who has received the Shastra by tradition and realised it in practice guides the disciple along the immemorial tracks. One often even hears the objection urged against a new practice, a new Yogic teaching, the adoption of a new formula, "It is not according to the Shastra." But neither in fact nor in the actual practice of the Yogins is there really any such entire rigidity of an iron door shut against new truth, fresh revelation, widened experience. The written or traditional teaching expresses the knowledge and experiences of many centuries systematised, organised, made attainable to the beginner. Its importance and utility are therefore immense. But a great freedom of variation and development is always practicable. Even so highly scientific a system as Rajayoga can be practised on other lines than the organised method of Patanjali. Each of the three paths, trimarga 51, breaks into many bypaths which meet again at the goal. The general knowledge on which the Yoga depends is fixed, but the order, the succession, the devices, the forms must be allowed to vary, for the needs and particular impulsions of the individual nature have to be satisfied even while the general truths remain firm and constant.
  --
  18:As the supreme Shastra of the integral Yoga is the eternal Veda secret in the heart of every man, so its supreme Guide and Teacher is the inner Guide, the World-Teacher, jagad-guru, secret within us. It is he who destroys our darkness by the resplendent light of his knowledge; that light becomes within us the increasing glory of his own self-revelation. He discloses progressively in us his own nature of freedom, bliss, love, power, immortal being. He sets above us his divine example as our ideal and transforms the lower existence into a reflection of that which it contemplates. By the inpouring of his own influence and presence into us he enables the individual being to attain to identity with the universal and transcendent.
  19:What is his method and his system? He has no method and every method. His system is a natural organisation of the highest processes and movements of which the nature is capable. Applying themselves even to the pettiest details and to the actions the most insignificant in their appearance with as much care and thoroughness as to the greatest, they in the end lift all into the Light and transform all. For in his Yoga there is nothing too small to be used and nothing too great to be attempted. As the servant and disciple of the Master has no business with pride or egoism because all is done for him from above, so also he has no right to despond because of his personal deficiencies or the stumblings of his nature. For the Force that works in him is impersonal -- or superpersonal-and infinite.

1.01 - The Human Aspiration, #The Life Divine, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  0:She follows to the goal of those that are passing on beyond, she is the first in the eternal succession of the dawns that are coming, - Usha widens bringing out that which lives, awakening someone who was dead. . . . What is her scope when she harmonises with the dawns that shone out before and those that now must shine? She desires the ancient mornings and fulfils their light; projecting forwards her illumination she enters into communion with the rest that are to come. Kutsa Angirasa - Rig Veda.1
  0:Threefold are those supreme births of this divine force that is in the world, they are true, they are desirable; he moves there wide-overt within the Infinite and shines pure, luminous and fulfilling. . . . That which is immortal in mortals and possessed of the truth, is a god and established inwardly as an energy working out in our divine powers. . . . Become high-uplifted, O Strength, pierce all veils, manifest in us the things of the Godhead. Vamadeva - Rig Veda.2
  1:THE EARLIEST preoccupation of man in his awakened thoughts and, as it seems, his inevitable and ultimate preoccupation, - for it survives the longest periods of scepticism and returns after every banishment, - is also the highest which his thought can envisage. It manifests itself in the divination of Godhead, the impulse towards perfection, the search after pure Truth and unmixed Bliss, the sense of a secret immortality. The ancient dawns of human knowledge have left us their witness to this constant aspiration; today we see a humanity satiated but not satisfied by victorious analysis of the externalities of Nature preparing to return to its primeval longings. The earliest formula of Wisdom promises to be its last, - God, Light, Freedom, Immortality.
  --
  4:We speak of the evolution of Life in Matter, the evolution of Mind in Matter; but evolution is a word which merely states the phenomenon without explaining it. For there seems to be no reason why Life should evolve out of material elements or Mind out of living form, unless we accept the Vedantic solution that Life is already involved in Matter and Mind in Life because in essence Matter is a form of veiled Life, Life a form of veiled Consciousness. And then there seems to be little objection to a farther step in the series and the admission that mental consciousness may itself be only a form and a veil of higher states which are beyond Mind. In that case, the unconquerable impulse of man towards God, Light, Bliss, Freedom, Immortality presents itself in its right place in the chain as simply the imperative impulse by which Nature is seeking to evolve beyond Mind, and appears to be as natural, true and just as the impulse towards Life which she has planted in certain forms of Matter or the impulse towards Mind which she has planted in certain forms of Life. As there, so here, the impulse exists more or less obscurely in her different vessels with an ever-ascending series in the power of its will-to-be; as there, so here, it is gradually evolving and bound fully to evolve the necessary organs and faculties. As the impulse towards Mind ranges from the more sensitive reactions of Life in the metal and the plant up to its full organisation in man, so in man himself there is the same ascending series, the preparation, if nothing more, of a higher and divine life. The animal is a living laboratory in which Nature has, it is said, worked out man. Man himself may well be a thinking and living laboratory in whom and with whose conscious co-operation she wills to work out the superman, the god. Or shall we not say, rather, to manifest God? For if evolution is the progressive manifestation by Nature of that which slept or worked in her, involved, it is also the overt realisation of that which she secretly is. We cannot, then, bid her pause at a given stage of her evolution, nor have we the right to condemn with the religionist as perverse and presumptuous or with the rationalist as a disease or hallucination any intention she may evince or effort she may make to go beyond. If it be true that Spirit is involved in Matter and apparent Nature is secret God, then the manifestation of the divine in himself and the realisation of God within and without are the highest and most legitimate aim possible to man upon earth.
  5:Thus the eternal paradox and eternal truth of a divine life in an animal body, an immortal aspiration or reality inhabiting a mortal tenement, a single and universal consciousness representing itself in limited minds and divided egos, a transcendent, indefinable, timeless and spaceless Being who alone renders time and space and cosmos possible, and in all these the higher truth realisable by the lower term, justify themselves to the deliberate reason as well as to the persistent instinct or intuition of mankind. Attempts are sometimes made to have done finally with questionings which have so often been declared insoluble by logical thought and to persuade men to limit their mental activities to the practical and immediate problems of their material existence in the universe; but such evasions are never permanent in their effect. Mankind returns from them with a more vehement impulse of inquiry or a more violent hunger for an immediate solution. By that hunger mysticism profits and new religions arise to replace the old that have been destroyed or stripped of significance by a scepticism which itself could not satisfy because, although its business was inquiry, it was unwilling sufficiently to inquire. The attempt to deny or stifle a truth because it is yet obscure in its outward workings and too often represented by obscurantist superstition or a crude faith, is itself a kind of obscurantism. The will to escape from a cosmic necessity because it is arduous, difficult to justify by immediate tangible results, slow in regulating its operations, must turn out eventually to have been no acceptance of the truth of Nature but a revolt against the secret, mightier will of the great Mother It is better and more rational to accept what she will not allow us as a race to reject and lift it from the sphere of blind instinct, obscure intuition and random aspiration into the light of reason and an instructed and consciously self-guiding will. And if there is any higher light of illumined intuition or self-revealing truth which is now in man either obstructed and inoperative or works with intermittent glancings as if from behind a veil or with occasional displays as of the northern lights in our material skies, then there also we need not fear to aspire. For it is likely that such is the next higher state of consciousness of which Mind is only a form and veil, and through the splendours of that light may lie the path of our progressive self-enlargement into whatever highest state is humanity's ultimate resting-place.

1.01 - The Ideal of the Karmayogin, #Essays In Philosophy And Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  Hinduism we find the basis of the future world-religion. This sanatana dharma has many scriptures, Veda, Vedanta, Gita,
  Upanishad, Darshana, Purana, Tantra, nor could it reject the
  --
  Aryan character, the Aryan life. Recover the Vedanta, the Gita, the Yoga. Recover them not only in intellect or sentiment but in your lives. Live them and you will be great and strong, mighty, invincible and fearless. Neither life nor death will have any terrors for you. Difficulty and impossibility will vanish from your vocabularies. For it is in the spirit that strength is eternal and you must win back the kingdom of yourselves, the inner Swaraj, before you can win back your outer empire. There the Mother dwells and She waits for worship that She may give strength. Believe in Her, serve Her, lose your wills in Hers, your egoism in the greater ego of the country, your separate selfishness in the service of humanity. Recover the source of all strength in yourselves and all else will be added to you, social soundness, intellectual preeminence, political freedom, the mastery of human thought, the hegemony of the world."

1.01 - The Unexpected, #Twelve Years With Sri Aurobindo, #Nirodbaran, #Integral Yoga
  When we other doctors came up, we saw Dr. Manilal examining Sri Aurobindo's injured leg. The Mother was sitting by Sri Aurobindo's side, fanning him gently. I could not believe what I saw: on the one hand Sri Aurobindo lying helplessly, on the other, a deep divine sorrow on the Mother's face. But I soon regained my composure and helped the doctor in the examination. My medical eye could not help taking in at a glance Sri Aurobindo's entire body and appreciating the robust manly frame. His right knee was flexed, his face bore a perplexed smile as if he did not know what was wrong with him; the chest was bare, well-developed and the finely pressed snow-white dhoti drawn up contrasted with the shining golden thighs, round and marble-smooth, reminiscent of Yeats's line, "World-famous golden-thighed Pythagoras". A sudden fugitive vision of the Golden Purusha of the Vedas!
  Each gentle movement of the leg by the doctor made Sri Aurobindo let out a short "Ah!" which prompted the Mother to ask, "Is it hurting you?" Throughout the investigation he uttered very few words, only to answer the doctor's questions. Finally the doctor pronounced that there was a fracture of the thigh bone. Sri Aurobindo simply heard the verdict and made no comment.

1.02.2.1 - Brahman - Oneness of God and the World, #Isha Upanishad, #unset, #Zen
  workings of Prakriti. Maya, signifying originally in the Veda comprehensive and creative
  knowledge, Wisdom that is from of old; afterwards taken in its second and derivative

1.02.2.2 - Self-Realisation, #Isha Upanishad, #unset, #Zen
  Truth or causal Idea (called in Veda Satyam, Ritam, Brihat, the
  True, the Right, the Vast), Atman becomes the ideal being or

1.02.3.1 - The Lord, #Isha Upanishad, #unset, #Zen
  The Vedantic idea of God, "He", Deva or Ishwara, must not be
  confused with the ordinary notions attached to the conception of
  --
  greater, more vast and all-overpowering. Vedanta admits the
  human manifestation of Brahman in man and to man, but does
  --
  of the One is as old as the Rig Veda.
  in Time and Space working out their relations through causality.

1.02.4.1 - The Worlds - Surya, #Isha Upanishad, #unset, #Zen
  The enjoyment of beatitude in a heaven beyond is also not the supreme consummation. But Vedantic thought did not envisage rebirth as an immediate entry after death into a new body; the mental being in man is not so rigidly bound to the vital and physical, - on the contrary, the latter are ordinarily dissolved together after death, and there must therefore be, before the soul is attracted back towards terrestrial existence, an interval in which it assimilates its terrestrial experiences in order to be able to constitute a new vital and physical being upon earth. During this interval it must dwell in states or worlds beyond and these may be favourable or unfavourable to its future development. They are favourable in proportion as the light of the Supreme Truth of which Surya is a symbol enters into them, but states of intermediate ignorance or darkness are harmful to the soul in its progress. Those enter into them, as has been affirmed in the third verse, who do hurt to themselves by shutting themselves to the light or distorting the natural course of their development. The Vedantic heavens are states of light and the soul's expansion; darkness, self-obscuration and self-distortion are the nature of the Hells which it has to shun.
  In relation to the soul's individual development, therefore, the life in worlds beyond, like the life upon earth, is a means and not an object in itself. After liberation the soul may possess these worlds as it possesses the material birth, accepting in them a means towards the divine manifestation in which they form a condition of its fullness, each being one of the parts in a series of organised states of conscious being which is linked with and supports all the rest.

1.02.4.2 - Action and the Divine Will, #Isha Upanishad, #unset, #Zen
  This Will is Agni. Agni is in the Rig Veda, from which
  the closing verse of the Upanishad is taken, the flame of the
  --
  is said in the Veda that Vayu or Matarishwan, the Life-principle,
  is he who brings down Agni from Surya in the high and far-off

1.024 - Affiliation With Larger Wholes, #The Study and Practice of Yoga, #Swami Krishnananda, #Yoga
  For the purpose of controlling the mind, we have to adjust ourself to the concept of a higher reality. That is what is meant by ekatattva abhyasah, by which there is pratisedha or checking of the modifications of the mind. The introduction of the concept of a higher reality into the mind can be done either by logical analysis or by reliance upon scriptural statements. Great texts like the Upanishads, the Vedas and such other mystical texts, proclaim the existence of a Universal Reality which can be reached through various grades of ascent into more and more comprehensive levels. The happiness of the human being is not supposed to be complete happiness.
  In the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad and the Taittareya Upanishad we have, for instance, an enumeration of the gradations of happiness, which is a wonderful incentive for the mind to concentrate on higher values. In the Taittariya Upanishad we are told that human happiness is the lowest kind of happiness, and not the highest happiness, as we imagine. We think that perhaps we are superior to animals, plants and stones, etc., and biologists of the modern world are likely to tell us that we are Homo sapiens, far advanced in the process of evolution, perhaps having reached the topmost level of evolution. It is not true. The Upanishad says that we are in a very low condition.

10.26 - A True Professor, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 04, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   A teacher has to be a yogi does not mean that he is to be a paragon of moral qualities, following, for example, the ten commandments scrupulously. Not to tell a lie, not to lose temper, to be patient, impartial, to be honest and unselfish, all these more or less social qualities have their values but something else is needed for the true teacher, something of another category and quality. I said social qualities, I might say also mental qualities. The consciousness of the teacher has to be other than mental, something deeper, more abiding, more constant, less relative, something absolute. Do we then prescribe the supreme Brahma-consciousness for the teacher? Not quite. We mean the consciousness of a soul, the living light that is within every aspiring human being. It is a glad luminousness in the heart that can exist with or without the brilliant riches of a cultivated brain. And one need not go so far as the Vedantic Sachchidananda consciousness.
   That is the first and primary necessity. When the teacher approaches the pupil, he must know how to do it in and through that inner intimate consciousness. It means a fundamental attitude, a mode of being of the whole nature rather than a scientific procedure: all the manuals of education will not be able to procure you this treasure. It is an acquisition that develops or manifests spontaneously through an earnest desire, that is to say, aspiration for it. It is this that establishes a strange contact with the pupil, radiates or infuses the knowledge, even the learning that the teacher possesses, infallibly and naturally into the mind and brain of the pupil.

1.02.9 - Conclusion and Summary, #Isha Upanishad, #unset, #Zen
  and anti-pragmatic Vedanta begin to appear. The Isha belongs
  to the earlier or Vedic group. It is already face to face with
  --
  of the most interesting passages of Vedantic literature. It is the
  sole Upanishad which offered almost insuperable difficulties to
  --
  renunciation of world-existence. The general trend of Vedantic thought would accept
  the renunciation of desire and egoism as the essential but would hold that renunciation of
  --
  Mahas, Veda, Drishti, replaces the fragmentary mental activity.
  True Buddhi (Vijnana) emerges from the dissipated action of the

1.02 - IN THE COMPANY OF DEVOTEES, #The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna, #Sri Ramakrishna, #Hinduism
  Pundit Samadhyayi was present. The Brahmo devotees introduced him to Sri Ramakrishna as a scholar well versed in the Vedas and the other scriptures. The Master said, "Yes, I can see inside him through his eyes, as one can see the objects in a room through the glass door."
  Trailokya sang. Suddenly the Master stood up and went into samdhi, repeating the Mother's name. Coming down a little to the plane of sense consciousness, he danced and sang:

1.02 - Isha Analysis, #Isha Upanishad, #unset, #Zen
  THE UPANISHADS, being vehicles of illumination and not of instruction, composed for seekers who had already a general familiarity with the ideas of the Vedic and Vedantic seers and even some personal experience of the truths on which they were founded, dispense in their style with expressed transitions of thought and the development of implied or subordinate notions.
  Every verse in the Isha Upanishad reposes on a number of ideas implicit in the text but nowhere set forth explicitly; the reasoning also that supports its conclusions is suggested by the words, not expressly conveyed to the intelligence. The reader, or rather the hearer, was supposed to proceed from light to light, confirming his intuitions and verifying by his experience, not submitting the ideas to the judgment of the logical reason.

1.02 - Karmayoga, #Essays In Philosophy And Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
   Vedanta and Yoga to life. To many who take their knowledge of Hinduism secondh and this may seem a doubtful definition. It is ordinarily supposed by "practical" minds that Vedanta as a guide to life and Yoga as a method of spiritual communion are dangerous things which lead men away from action to abstraction. We leave aside those who regard all such beliefs as mysticism, self-delusion or imposture; but even those who reverence and believe in the high things of Hinduism have the impression that one must remove oneself from a full human activity in order to live the spiritual life. Yet the spiritual life finds its most potent expression in the man who lives the ordinary life of men in the strength of the Yoga and under the law of the Vedanta. It is by such a union of the inner life and the outer that mankind will eventually be lifted up and become mighty and divine. It is a delusion to suppose that Vedanta contains no inspiration to life, no rule of conduct, and is purely metaphysical and quietistic. On the contrary, the highest morality of which humanity is capable finds its one perfect basis and justification in the teachings of the Upanishads and the Gita. The characteristic doctrines of the Gita are nothing if they are not a law of life, a dharma, and even the most transcendental aspirations of the
   Vedanta presuppose a preparation in life, for it is only through life that one can reach to immortality. The opposite opinion is due to certain tendencies which have bulked large in the history and temperament of our race. The ultimate goal of our religion is emancipation from the bondage of material Nature and freedom from individual rebirth, and certain souls, among the highest we have known, have been drawn by the attraction of the final hush and purity to dissociate themselves from life and bodily action in order more swiftly and easily to reach the goal. Standing like
  --
  Moreover the word Vedanta is usually identified with the strict Monism and the peculiar theory of Maya established by the lofty and ascetic intellect of Shankara. But it is the Upanishads themselves and not Shankara's writings, the text and not the commentary, that are the authoritative Scripture of the
   Vedantin. Shankara's, great and temporarily satisfying as it was, is still only one synthesis and interpretation of the Upanishads.
  There have been others in the past which have powerfully influenced the national mind and there is no reason why there should not be a yet more perfect synthesis in the future. It is such a synthesis, embracing all life and action in its scope, that the teachings of Sri Ramakrishna and Vivekananda have been preparing. What is dimly beginning now is a repetition on a wider stage of what happened once before in India, more rapidly but to smaller issues, when the Buddha lived and taught his philosophy and ethics to the Aryan nations. Then as now a mighty spirit, it matters not whether Avatar or Vibhuti, the full expression of God in man or a great outpouring of the divine energy, came down among men and brought into their daily life and practice the force and impulse of utter spirituality. And this time it is the full light and not a noble part, unlike Buddhism which, expressing Vedantic morality, yet ignored a fundamental reality of Vedanta and was therefore expelled from its prime seat and cradle. The material result was then what it will be now, a great political, moral and social revolution which made India
  Karmayoga
  --
   the Guru of the nations and carried the light she had to give all over the civilised world, moulding ideas and creating forms which are still extant and a living force. Already the Vedanta and the Yoga have exceeded their Asiatic limit and are beginning to influence the life and practice of America and Europe; and they have long been filtering into Western thought by a hundred indirect channels. But these are small rivers and underground streams. The world waits for the rising of India to receive the divine flood in its fullness.
  Yoga is communion with God for knowledge, for love or for work. The Yogin puts himself into direct relation with that which is omniscient and omnipotent within man and without him. He is in tune with the infinite, he becomes a channel for the strength of God to pour itself out upon the world whether through calm benevolence or active beneficence. When a man rises by putting from him the slough of self and lives for others and in the joys and sorrows of others; - when he works perfectly and with love and zeal, but casts away the anxiety for results and is neither eager for victory nor afraid of defeat; - when he devotes all his works to God and lays every thought, word and deed as an offering on the divine altar; - when he gets rid of fear and hatred, repulsion and disgust and attachment, and works like the forces of Nature, unhasting, unresting, inevitably, perfectly; - when he rises above the thought that he is the body or the heart or the mind or the sum of these and finds his own and true self; - when he becomes aware of his immortality and the unreality of death; - when he experiences the advent of knowledge and feels himself passive and the divine force working unresisted through his mind, his speech, his senses and all his organs; - when having thus abandoned whatever he is, does or has to the Lord of all, the Lover and Helper of mankind, he dwells permanently in

1.02 - MAPS OF MEANING - THREE LEVELS OF ANALYSIS, #Maps of Meaning, #Jordan Peterson, #Psychology
  The central myth of Indra, which is, furthermore, the most important myth in the Rig Veda, narrates his
  victorious battle against Vrtra, the gigantic dragon who held back the waters in the hollow of the
  --
  fashioner of the gods, Tvastr, whose role is not clear in the Rig Veda, had built himself a house and
  created Vrtra as a sort of roof, but also as walls, for his habitation. Inside this dwelling, encircled by
  --
  gesture of Soma (Rig Veda II, 12, 1) or of Indra when the latter smote the Serpent in his lair (Rig Veda,
  VI, 17, 9), when his thunderbolt cut off his head (Rig Veda I, 52, 10).287
  Order explored territory is constructed out of chaos and exists, simultaneously, in opposition to that

1.02 - Prana, #Liber ABA, #Aleister Crowley, #Philosophy
  This opens to us the door to almost unlimited power. Suppose, for instance, a man understood the Prana perfectly, and could control it, what power on earth would not be his? He would be able to move the sun and stars out of their places, to control everything in the universe, from the atoms to the biggest suns, because he would control the Prana. This is the end and aim of Pranayama. When the Yogi becomes perfect, there will be nothing in nature not under his control. If he orders the gods or the souls of the departed to come, they will come at his bidding. All the forces of nature will obey him as slaves. When the ignorant see these powers of the Yogi, they call them the miracles. One peculiarity of the Hindu mind is that it always inquires for the last possible generalisation, leaving the details to be worked out afterwards. The question is raised in the Vedas, "What is that, knowing which, we shall know everything?" Thus, all books, and all philosophies that have been written, have been only to prove that by knowing which everything is known. If a man wants to know this universe bit by bit he must know every individual grain of sand, which means infinite time; he cannot know all of them. Then how can knowledge be? How is it possible for a man to be all-knowing through particulars? The Yogis say that behind this particular manifestation there is a generalisation. Behind all particular ideas stands a generalised, an abstract principle; grasp it, and you have grasped everything. Just as this whole universe has been generalised in the Vedas into that One Absolute Existence, and he who has grasped that Existence has grasped the whole universe, so all forces have been generalised into this Prana, and he who has grasped the Prana has grasped all the forces of the universe, mental or physical. He who has controlled the Prana has controlled his own mind, and all the minds that exist. He who has controlled the Prana has controlled his body, and all the bodies that exist, because the Prana is the generalised manifestation of force.
  How to control the Prana is the one idea of Pranayama. All the trainings and exercises in this regard are for that one end. Each man must begin where he stands, must learn how to control the things that are nearest to him. This body is very near to us, nearer than anything in the external universe, and this mind is the nearest of all. The Prana which is working this mind and body is the nearest to us of all the Prana in this universe. This little wave of the Prana which represents our own energies, mental and physical, is the nearest to us of all the waves of the infinite ocean of Prana. If we can succeed in controlling that little wave, then alone we can hope to control the whole of Prana. The Yogi who has done this gains perfection; no longer is he under any power. He becomes almost almighty, almost all-knowing. We see sects in every country who have attempted this control of Prana. In this country there are Mind-healers, Faith-healers, Spiritualists, Christian Scientists, Hypnotists, etc., and if we examine these different bodies, we shall find at the back of each this control of the Prana, whether they know it or not. If you boil all their theories down, the residuum will be that. It is the one and the same force they are manipulating, only unknowingly. They have stumbled on the discovery of a force and are using it unconsciously without knowing its nature, but it is the same as the Yogi uses, and which comes from Prana.

1.02 - Prayer of Parashara to Vishnu, #Vishnu Purana, #Vyasa, #Hinduism
  That chief principle (Pradhāna), which is the indiscrete cause, is called by the sages also Prakriti (nature): it is subtile, uniform, and comprehends what is and what is not (or both causes and effects); is durable, self-sustained, illimitable, undecaying, and stable; devoid of sound or touch, and possessing neither colour nor form; endowed with the three qualities (in equilibrium); the mother of the world; without beginning; and that into which all that is produced is resolved[14]. By that principle all things were invested in the period subsequent to the last dissolution of the universe, and prior to creation[15]. For Brahmans learned in the Vedas, and teaching truly their doctrines, explain such passages as the following as intending the production of the chief principle (Pradhāna). "There was neither day nor night, nor sky nor earth, nor darkness nor light, nor any other thing, save only One, unapprehensible by intellect, or That which is Brahma and Pumān (spirit) and Pradhāna (matter)[16]." The two forms which are other than the essence of unmodified ViáčŁáč‡u, are Pradhāna (matter) and PuruáčŁa (spirit); and his other form, by which those two are connected or separated, is called Kāla (time)[17]. When discrete substance is aggregated in crude nature, as in a foregone dissolution, that dissolution is termed elemental (Prākrita). The deity as Time is without beginning, and his end is not known; and from him the revolutions of creation, continuance, and dissolution unintermittingly succeed: for when, in the latter season, the equilibrium of the qualities (Pradhāna) exists, and spirit (Pumān) is detached from matter, then the form of ViáčŁáč‡u which is Time abides[18]. Then the supreme Brahma, the supreme soul, the substance of the world, the lord of all creatures, the universal soul, the supreme ruler, Hari, of his own will having entered into matter and spirit, agitated the mutable and immutable principles, the season of creation being arrived, in the same manner as fragrance affects the mind from its proximity merely, and not from any immediate operation upon mind itself: so the Supreme influenced the elements of creation[19]. PuruáčŁottama is both the agitator and the thing to be agitated; being present in the essence of matter, both when it is contracted and expanded[20]. ViáčŁáč‡u, supreme over the supreme, is of the nature of discrete forms in the atomic productions, Brahmā and the rest (gods, men, &c.)
  Then from that equilibrium of the qualities (Pradhāna), presided over by soul[21], proceeds the unequal developement of those qualities (constituting the principle Mahat or Intellect) at the time of creation[22]. The Chief principle then invests that Great principle, Intellect, and it becomes threefold, as affected by the quality of goodness, foulness, or darkness, and invested by the Chief principle (matter) as seed is by its skin. From the Great principle (Mahat) Intellect, threefold Egotism, (Aha
  --
  [11]: The commentator argues that Vāsudeva must be the Brahma, or supreme being, of the Vedas, because the same circumstances are predicated of both, as eternity, omnipresence, omnipotence, &c.; but he does not adduce any scriptural text with the name Vāsudeva.
  [12]: Time is not usually enumerated in the Purāáč‡as as an element of the first cause, but the Padma P. and the Bhāgavata p. 10 agree with the ViáčŁáč‡u in including it. It appears to have been regarded at an earlier date as an independent cause: the commentator on the MokáčŁa Dherma cites a passage from the Vedas, which he understands to allude to the different theories of the cause of creation. Time, inherent nature, consequence of acts, self-will, elementary atoms, matter, and spirit, asserted severally by the Astrologers, the Buddhists, the Mimānsakas, the Jains, the Logicians, the Sā
  khyas, and the Vedāntis. ΚρáœčÎœÎżÏ‚ was also one of the first generated agents in creation, according to the Orphic theogony.
  --
  [15]: The expression of the text is rather obscure; 'All was pervaded (or comprehended) by that chief principle before (recreation), after the (last) destruction.' The ellipses are filled up by the commentator. This, he adds, is to be regarded as the state of things at a Mahā Pralaya, or total dissolution; leaving, therefore, crude matter, nature, or chaos, as a coexistent element with the Supreme. This, which is conformable to the philosophical doctrine, is not however that of the Purāáč‡as in general, nor p. 12 that of our text, which states (b. VI. c. 4), that at a Prākrita, or elementary dissolution, Pradhāna itself merges into the deity. Neither is it apparently the doctrine of the Vedas, although their language is somewhat equivocal.
  [16]: The metre here is one common to the Vedas, Táč›áčŁtubh, but in other respects the language is not characteristic of those compositions. The purport of the passage is rendered somewhat doubtful by its close, and by the explanation of the commentator. The former is, 'One Pradhānika Brahma Spirit: THAT, was. The commentator explains Pradhānika, Pradhāna eva, the same word as Pradhāna; but it is a derivative word, which may be used attributively, implying 'having, or conjoined with, Pradhāna.' The commentator, however, interprets it as the substantive; for he adds, 'There was Pradhāna and Brahma and Spirit; this triad was at the period of dissolution.' He evidently, however, understands their conjoint existence as one only; for he continues, 'So, according to the Vedas, then there was neither the existent (invisible cause, or matter) nor the non-existent (visible effect, or creation),' meaning that there was only One Being, in whom matter and its modifications were all comprehended.
  [17]: Or it might be rendered, 'Those two other forms (which proceed) from his supreme nature;' that is, from the nature of ViáčŁáč‡u, when he is Nirupādhi, or without adventitious attributes: ### 'other' (###); the commentator states they are other or separate from ViáčŁáč‡u only through Māyā, illusion,' but here implying false notion;' the elements of creation being in essence one with ViáčŁáč‡u, though in existence detached and different.
  --
  [34]: 'The world that is termed spirit;' explained by the commentator, 'which indeed bears the appellation spirit;' conformably to the text of the Vedas, 'this universe is indeed spirit.' This is rather Vedānta than Sā
  khya, and appears to deny the existence of matter: and so it does as an independent existence; for the origin and end of infinite substance is the Deity or universal spirit: but it does not therefore imply the non-existence of the world as real substance.

1.02 - The Development of Sri Aurobindos Thought, #Preparing for the Miraculous, #George Van Vrekhem, #Integral Yoga
  in South India he took up his study of the Vedas and dis-
  covered the secret of their esoteric contents. He now lived

1.02 - The Divine Teacher, #Essays On The Gita, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  HE PECULIARITY of the Gita among the great religious books of the world is that it does not stand apart as a work by itself, the fruit of the spiritual life of a creative personality like Christ, Mahomed or Buddha or of an epoch of pure spiritual searching like the Veda and Upanishads, but is given as an episode in an epic history of nations and their wars and men and their deeds and arises out of a critical moment in the soul of one of its leading personages face to face with the crowning action of his life, a work terrible, violent and sanguinary, at the point when he must either recoil from it altogether or carry it through to its inexorable completion. It matters little whether or no, as modern criticism supposes, the Gita is a later composition inserted into the mass of the Mahabharata by its author in order to invest its teaching with the authority and popularity of the great national epic. There seem to me to be strong grounds against this supposition for which, besides, the evidence, extrinsic or internal, is in the last degree scanty and insufficient. But even if it be sound, there remains the fact that the author has not only taken pains to interweave his work inextricably into the vast web of the larger poem, but is careful again and again to remind us of the situation from which the teaching has arisen; he returns to it prominently, not only at the end, but in the middle of his profoundest philosophical disquisitions. We must accept the insistence of the author and give its full importance to this recurrent preoccupation of the Teacher and the disciple.
  The teaching of the Gita must therefore be regarded not merely in the light of a general spiritual philosophy or ethical doctrine, but as bearing upon a practical crisis in the application of ethics and spirituality to human life. For what that crisis stands, what is the significance of the battle of Kurukshetra and its effect on
  --
  India has from ancient times held strongly a belief in the reality of the Avatara, the descent into form, the revelation of the Godhead in humanity. In the West this belief has never really stamped itself upon the mind because it has been presented through exoteric Christianity as a theological dogma without any roots in the reason and general consciousness and attitude towards life. But in India it has grown up and persisted as a logical outcome of the Vedantic view of life and taken firm root in the consciousness of the race. All existence is a manifestation of God because He is the only existence and nothing can be except as either a real figuring or else a figment of that one reality. Therefore every conscious being is in part or in some way a descent of the Infinite into the apparent finiteness of
  14
  --
  The Vaishnava form of Vedantism which has laid most stress upon this conception expresses the relation of God in man to man in God by the double figure of Nara-Narayana, associated historically with the origin of a religious school very similar in its doctrines to the teaching of the Gita. Nara is the human soul which, eternal companion of the Divine, finds itself only when it awakens to that companionship and begins, as the Gita would say, to live in God. Narayana is the divine Soul always present in our humanity, the secret guide, friend and helper of the human being, the "Lord who abides within the heart of creatures" of the Gita; when within us the veil of that secret sanctuary is withdrawn and man speaks face to face with God, hears the divine voice, receives the divine light, acts in the divine power, then becomes possible the supreme uplifting of the embodied human conscious-being into the unborn and eternal. He becomes capable of that dwelling in God and giving up of his whole consciousness into the Divine which the Gita upholds as the best or highest secret of things, uttamam rahasyam. When
   para bhava.

1.02 - The Doctrine of the Mystics, #Hymns to the Mystic Fire, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
    1 This excerpt is reproduced from the 1946 edition of Hymns to the Mystic Fire. The complete essay which appeared in the Arya is published in The Secret of the Veda with Selected Hymns, Part Three. - Ed.
  The Vedic deities are names, powers, personalities of the universal Godhead and they represent each some essential puissance of the Divine Being. They manifest the cosmos and are manifest in it. Children of Light, Sons of the Infinite, they recognise in the soul of man their brother and ally and desire to help and increase him by themselves increasing in him so as to possess his world with their light, strength and beauty. The Gods call man to a divine companionship and alliance; they attract and uplift him to their luminous fraternity, invite his aid and offer theirs against the Sons of Darkness and Division. Man in return calls the Gods to his sacrifice, offers to them his swiftnesses and his strengths, his clarities and his sweetnesses, - milk and butter of the shining Cow, distilled juices of the Plant of Joy, the Horse of the Sacrifice, the cake and the wine, the grain for the GodMind's radiant coursers. He receives them into his being and their gifts into his life, increases them by the hymns and the wine and forms perfectly - as a smith forges iron, says the Veda - their great and luminous godheads.
  All this Vedic imagery is easy to understand when once we have the key, but it must not be mistaken for mere imagery. The Gods are not simply poetical personifications of abstract ideas or of psychological and physical functions of Nature. To the Vedic seers they are living realities; the vicissitudes of the human soul represent a cosmic struggle not merely of principles and tendencies but of the cosmic Powers which support and embody them. These are the Gods and the Demons. On the world-stage and in the individual soul the same real drama with the same personages is enacted.
  --
  Such are some of the principal images of the Veda and a very brief and insufficient outline of the teaching of the Forefa thers. So understood the Rig Veda ceases to be an obscure, confused and barbarous hymnal; it becomes the high-aspiring Song of Humanity; its chants are episodes of the lyrical epic of the soul in its immortal ascension.
  This at least; what more there may be in the Veda of ancient science, lost knowledge, old psycho-physical tradition remains yet to be discovered.

1.02 - The Eternal Law, #Sri Aurobindo or the Adventure of Consciousness, #Satprem, #Integral Yoga
  All quotations from the Upanishads, the Veda, and the Bhagavad Gita in this book are taken from Sri Aurobindo's translations.
  15
  --
  heirs to the Veda, which saw God everywhere in this "marvelous universe" and the last Upanishads, a Secret was lost; it was lost not only in India but in Mesopotamia, in Egypt, in Greece, and in Central America. It is this Secret that Sri Aurobindo was to rediscover,
  perhaps because his being combined the finest Western tradition and the profound spiritual yearning of the East. East and West, he said,

1.02 - THE NATURE OF THE GROUND, #The Perennial Philosophy, #Aldous Huxley, #Philosophy
  Like St. Augustine, Eckhart was to some extent the victim of his own literary talents. Le style cest Ihomme. No doubt. But the converse is also partly true. Lhomme cest le style. Because we have a gift for writing in a certain way, we find ourselves, in some sort, becoming our way of writing. We mould ourselves in the likeness of our particular brand of eloquence. Eckhart was one of the inventors of German prose, and he was tempted by his new-found mastery of forceful expression to commit himself to extreme positionsto be doctrinally the image of his powerful and over-emphatic sentences. A statement like the foregoing would lead one to believe that he despised what the Vedantists call the lower knowledge of Brahman, not as the Absolute Ground of all things, but as the personal God. In reality he, like the Vedantists, accepts the lower knowledge as genuine knowledge and regards devotion to the personal God as the best preparation for the unitive knowledge of the Godhead. Another point to remember is that the attri buteless Godhead of Vedanta, of Mahayana Buddhism, of Christian and Sufi mysticism is the Ground of all the qualities possessed by the personal God and the Incarnation. God is not good, I am good, says Eckhart in his violent and excessive way. What he really meant was, I am just humanly good; God is supereminently good; the Godhead is, and his isness (istigkeit, in Eckharts German) contains goodness, love, wisdom and all the rest in their essence and principle. In consequence, the Godhead is never, for the exponent of the Perennial Philosophy, the mere Absolute of academic metaphysics, but something more purely perfect, more reverently to be adored than even the personal God or his human incarnationa Being towards whom it is possible to feel the most intense devotion and in relation to whom it is necessary (if one is to come to that unitive knowledge which is mans final end) to practise a discipline more arduous and unremitting than any imposed by ecclesiastical authority.
  There is a distinction and differentiation, according to our reason, between God and the Godhead, between action and rest. The fruitful nature of the Persons ever worketh in a living differentiation. But the simple Being of God, according to the nature thereof, is an eternal Rest of God and of all created things.

1.02 - The Philosophy of Ishvara, #Bhakti-Yoga, #Swami Vivekananda, #Hinduism
  In explaining the next Sutra, Ramanuja says, "If you say it is not so, because there are direct texts in the Vedas in evidence to the contrary, these texts refer to the glory of the liberated in the spheres of the subordinate deities." This also is an easy solution of the difficulty. Although the system of Ramanuja admits the unity of the total, within that totality of existence there are, according to him, eternal differences. Therefore, for all practical purposes, this system also being dualistic, it was easy for Ramanuja to keep the distinction between the personal soul and the Personal God very clear.
  We shall now try to understand what the great representative of the Advaita School has to say on the point. We shall see how the Advaita system maintains all the hopes and aspirations of the dualist intact, and at the same time propounds its own solution of the problem in consonance with the high destiny of divine humanity. Those who aspire to retain their individual mind even after liberation and to remain distinct will have ample opportunity of realising their aspirations and enjoying the blessing of the qualified Brahman. These are they who have been spoken of in the Bhgavata Purna thus: "O king, such are the, glorious qualities of the Lord that the sages whose only pleasure is in the Self, and from whom all fetters have fallen off, even they love the Omnipresent with the love that is for love's sake." These are they who are spoken of by the Snkhyas as getting merged in nature in this cycle, so that, after attaining perfection, they may come out in the next as lords of world-systems. But none of these ever becomes equal to God (Ishvara). Those who attain to that state where there is neither creation, nor created, nor creator, where there is neither knower, nor knowable, nor knowledge, where there is neither I, nor thou, nor he, where there is neither subject, nor object, nor relation, "there, who is seen by whom?" such persons have gone beyond everything to "where words cannot go nor mind", gone to that which the Shrutis declare as "Not this, not this"; but for those who cannot, or will not reach this state, there will inevitably remain the triune vision of the one undifferentiated Brahman as nature, soul, and the interpenetrating sustainer of both Ishvara. So, when Prahlda forgot himself, he found neither the universe nor its cause; all was to him one Infinite, undifferentiated by name and form; but as soon as he remembered that he was Prahlada, there was the universe before him and with it the Lord of the universe "the Repository of an infinite number of blessed qualities". So it was with the blessed Gopis. So long as they had lost sense of their own personal identity and individuality, they were all Krishnas, and when they began again to think of Him as the One to be worshipped, then they were Gopis again, and immediately Bhakti, then, can be directed towards Brahman, only in His personal aspect.

1.02 - The Two Negations 1 - The Materialist Denial, #The Life Divine, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  17:Not only in the one final conception, but in the great line of its general results Knowledge, by whatever path it is followed, tends to become one. Nothing can be more remarkable and suggestive than the extent to which modern Science confirms in the domain of Matter the conceptions and even the very formulae of language which were arrived at, by a very different method, in the Vedanta, - the original Vedanta, not of the schools of metaphysical philosophy, but of the Upanishads. And these, on the other hand, often reveal their full significance, their richer contents only when they are viewed in the new light shed by the discoveries of modern Science, - for instance, that Vedantic expression which describes things in the Cosmos as one seed arranged by the universal Energy in multitudinous forms.6 Significant, especially, is the drive of Science towards a Monism which is consistent with multiplicity, towards the Vedic idea of the one essence with its many becomings. Even if the dualistic appearance of Matter and Force be insisted on, it does not really stand in the way of this Monism. For it will be evident that essential Matter is a thing non-existent to the senses and only, like the Pradhana of the Sankhyas, a conceptual form of substance; and in fact the point is increasingly reached where only an arbitrary distinction in thought divides form of substance from form of energy.
  18:Matter expresses itself eventually as a formulation of some unknown Force. Life, too, that yet unfathomed mystery, begins to reveal itself as an obscure energy of sensibility imprisoned in its material formulation; and when the dividing ignorance is cured which gives us the sense of a gulf between Life and Matter, it is difficult to suppose that Mind, Life and Matter will be found to be anything else than one Energy triply formulated, the triple world of the Vedic seers. Nor will the conception then be able to endure of a brute material Force as the mother of Mind. The Energy that creates the world can be nothing else than a Will, and Will is only consciousness applying itself to a work and a result.

1.02 - Where I Lived, and What I Lived For, #Walden, and On The Duty Of Civil Disobedience, #Henry David Thoreau, #Philosophy
  Every morning was a cheerful invitation to make my life of equal simplicity, and I may say innocence, with Nature herself. I have been as sincere a worshipper of Aurora as the Greeks. I got up early and bathed in the pond; that was a religious exercise, and one of the best things which I did. They say that characters were engraven on the bathing tub of king Tching-thang to this effect: Renew thyself completely each day; do it again, and again, and forever again. I can understand that. Morning brings back the heroic ages. I was as much affected by the faint hum of a mosquito making its invisible and unimaginable tour through my apartment at earliest dawn, when I was sitting with door and windows open, as I could be by any trumpet that ever sang of fame. It was Homers requiem; itself an Iliad and Odyssey in the air, singing its own wrath and wanderings. There was something cosmical about it; a standing advertisement, till forbidden, of the everlasting vigor and fertility of the world. The morning, which is the most memorable season of the day, is the awakening hour. Then there is least somnolence in us; and for an hour, at least, some part of us awakes which slumbers all the rest of the day and night. Little is to be expected of that day, if it can be called a day, to which we are not awakened by our Genius, but by the mechanical nudgings of some servitor, are not awakened by our own newly-acquired force and aspirations from within, accompanied by the undulations of celestial music, instead of factory bells, and a fragrance filling the airto a higher life than we fell asleep from; and thus the darkness bear its fruit, and prove itself to be good, no less than the light. That man who does not believe that each day contains an earlier, more sacred, and auroral hour than he has yet profaned, has despaired of life, and is pursuing a descending and darkening way. After a partial cessation of his sensuous life, the soul of man, or its organs rather, are reinvigorated each day, and his Genius tries again what noble life it can make. All memorable events, I should say, transpire in morning time and in a morning atmosphere. The Vedas say, All intelligences awake with the morning. Poetry and art, and the fairest and most memorable of the actions of men, date from such an hour. All poets and heroes, like Memnon, are the children of Aurora, and emit their music at sunrise. To him whose elastic and vigorous thought keeps pace with the sun, the day is a perpetual morning. It matters not what the clocks say or the attitudes and labors of men. Morning is when I am awake and there is a dawn in me. Moral reform is the effort to throw off sleep.
  Why is it that men give so poor an account of their day if they have not been slumbering? They are not such poor calculators. If they had not been overcome with drowsiness, they would have performed something.

10.36 - Cling to Truth, #Collected Works of Nolini Kanta Gupta - Vol 04, #Nolini Kanta Gupta, #Integral Yoga
   For two things have happenedtwo mighty happenings in earth's history, in the course of nature's evolution here: two unseen events that have new-oriented the destiny of earth and mankind. First of all human consciousness in its essential achievement has risen to a new level of consciousness, although not in the mass, nor generally even in individuals, but there has come a common acquiescence in the being to a higher status of livingproletarianism at its best means nothing else. Human nature has shed something of its mediaeval crudeness and obscurantism, separatism and selfishness; human mind has been more sharpened and polished and widened so as to receive easily the message of the cosmic rays. There has dawned in the atmosphere the perception or sense, of a higher, purer, more luminous and enlightened status of existence. That is, one may say, Nature's gift, the outcome of the millennial, the aeonic working of an aspiration inherent in matter towards light and order. That is the first event. The second one is more occult but more mighty and even devastating. It is the descent, the manifestation, the intervention of a new force here below. They who have seen it know and there is no question. The Veda has declared long ago: The Unseeing have not the Knowledge, those who have eyes possess the Knowledge.
   Today, more than ever, only a little of this pure consciousness will bring you victory, not merely safety from a great perdition. Against the vast, what appears as the all-swallowing gloom of the external space, the inner space is now luminous, doubly luminous and powerful.

1.03 - PERSONALITY, SANCTITY, DIVINE INCARNATION, #The Perennial Philosophy, #Aldous Huxley, #Philosophy
  In other words there must be imitation of Christ before there can be identification with the Father; and there must be essential identity or likeness between the human spirit and the God who is Spirit in order that the idea of imitating the earthly behaviour of the incarnate Godhead should ever cross anybodys mind. Christian theologians speak of the possibility of deification, but deny that there is identity of substance between spiritual Reality and the human spirit. In Vedanta and Mahayana Buddhism, as also among the Sufis, spirit and Spirit are held to be the same substance; Atman is Brahman; That art thou.
  When not enlightened, Buddhas are no other than ordinary beings; when there is enlightenment, ordinary beings at once turn into Buddhas.

1.03 - Reading, #Walden, and On The Duty Of Civil Disobedience, #Henry David Thoreau, #Philosophy
  Those who have not learned to read the ancient classics in the language in which they were written must have a very imperfect knowledge of the history of the human race; for it is remarkable that no transcript of them has ever been made into any modern tongue, unless our civilization itself may be regarded as such a transcript. Homer has never yet been printed in English, nor schylus, nor Virgil evenworks as refined, as solidly done, and as beautiful almost as the morning itself; for later writers, say what we will of their genius, have rarely, if ever, equalled the elaborate beauty and finish and the lifelong and heroic literary labors of the ancients. They only talk of forgetting them who never knew them. It will be soon enough to forget them when we have the learning and the genius which will enable us to attend to and appreciate them. That age will be rich indeed when those relics which we call Classics, and the still older and more than classic but even less known Scriptures of the nations, shall have still further accumulated, when the Vaticans shall be filled with Vedas and
  Zendavestas and Bibles, with Homers and Dantes and Shakespeares, and all the centuries to come shall have successively deposited their trophies in the forum of the world. By such a pile we may hope to scale heaven at last.

1.03 - The End of the Intellect, #Sri Aurobindo or the Adventure of Consciousness, #Satprem, #Integral Yoga
  the lost meaning of the Veda.23
  The day came, however, when Sri Aurobindo had had enough of these intellectual exercises. He probably realized that one can go on amassing knowledge indefinitely, reading and learning languages,

1.03 - The Human Disciple, #Essays On The Gita, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
   actual language of the epic does not justify and, if pressed, would turn the straightforward philosophical language of the Gita into a constant, laborious and somewhat puerile mystification. The language of the Veda and part at least of the Puranas is plainly symbolic, full of figures and concrete representations of things that lie behind the veil, but the Gita is written in plain terms and professes to solve the great ethical and spiritual difficulties which the life of man raises, and it will not do to go behind this plain language and thought and wrest them to the service of our fancy. But there is this much of truth in the view, that the setting of the doctrine though not symbolical, is certainly typical, as indeed the setting of such a discourse as the Gita must necessarily be if it is to have any relation at all with that which it frames. Arjuna, as we have seen, is the representative man of a great world-struggle and divinely-guided movement of men and nations; in the Gita he typifies the human soul of action brought face to face through that action in its highest and most violent crisis with the problem of human life and its apparent incompatibility with the spiritual state or even with a purely ethical ideal of perfection.
  Arjuna is the fighter in the chariot with the divine Krishna as his charioteer. In the Veda also we have this image of the human soul and the divine riding in one chariot through a great battle to the goal of a high-aspiring effort. But there it is a pure figure and symbol. The Divine is there Indra, the Master of the
  World of Light and Immortality, the power of divine knowledge which descends to the aid of the human seeker battling with the sons of falsehood, darkness, limitation, mortality; the battle is with spiritual enemies who bar the way to the higher world of our being; and the goal is that plane of vast being resplendent with the light of the supreme Truth and uplifted to the conscious immortality of the perfected soul, of which Indra is the master.

1.03 - The Two Negations 2 - The Refusal of the Ascetic, #The Life Divine, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
  19:We seek indeed a larger and completer affirmation. We perceive that in the Indian ascetic ideal the great Vedantic formula, "One without a second", has not been read sufficiently in the light of that other formula equally imperative, "All this is the Brahman". The passionate aspiration of man upward to the Divine has not been sufficiently related to the descending movement of the Divine leaning downward to embrace eternally Its manifestation. Its meaning in Matter has not been so well understood as Its truth in the Spirit. The Reality which the Sannyasin seeks has been grasped in its full height, but not, as by the ancient Vedantins, in its full extent and comprehensiveness. But in our completer affirmation we must not minimise the part of the pure spiritual impulse. As we have seen how greatly Materialism has served the ends of the Divine, so we must acknowledge the still greater service rendered by Asceticism to Life. We shall preserve the truths of material Science and its real utilities in the final harmony, even if many or even if all of its existing forms have to be broken or left aside. An even greater scruple of right preservation must guide us in our dealing with the legacy, however actually diminished or depreciated, of the Aryan past.

1.03 - VISIT TO VIDYASAGAR, #The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna, #Sri Ramakrishna, #Hinduism
  "What Brahman is cannot he described. All things in the world - the Vedas, the Puranas, the Tantras, the six systems of philosophy - have been defiled, like food that has been touched by the tongue, for they have been read or uttered by the tongue. Only one thing has not been defiled in this way, and that is Brahman. No one has ever been able to say what Brahman is."
  VIDYASAGAR (to his friends): "Oh! That is a remarkable statement. I have learnt something new today."
  MASTER: "A man had two sons. The father sent them to a preceptor to learn the Knowledge of Brahman. After a few years they returned from their preceptor's house and bowed low before their father. Wanting to measure the depth of their knowledge of Brahman, he first questioned the older of the two boys. 'My child,' he said, 'You have studied all the scriptures. Now tell me, what is the nature of Brahman?' The boy began to explain Brahman by reciting various texts from the Vedas. The father did not say anything. Then he asked the younger son the same question. But the boy remained silent and stood with eyes cast down. No word escaped his lips. The father was pleased and said to him: 'My child, you have understood a little of Brahman. What It is cannot be expressed in words.'
  Parable of ant and sugar hill
  --
  "As for what has been said in the Vedas and the Puranas, do you know what it is like?
  Suppose a man has seen the ocean, and somebody asks him, 'Well, what is the ocean like?' The first man opens his mouth as wide as he can and says: 'What a sight! What tremendous waves and sounds!' The description of Brahman in the sacred books is like that. It is said in the Vedas that Brahman is of the nature of Bliss - It is Satchidananda.
  "Suka and other sages stood on the shore of this Ocean of Brahman and saw and touched the water. According to one school of thought they never plunged into it.
  --
  Only through affirmation, never negation, can you know Him; Neither through Veda nor through Tantra nor the six darsanas.
  It is in love's elixir only that He delights, O mind; He dwells in the body's inmost depths, in Everlasting Joy.
  --
  "Ramprasad asks the mind only to guess the nature of God. He wishes it to understand that what is called Brahman in the Vedas is addressed by Him as the Mother. He who is attri buteless also has attri butes. He who is Brahman is also akti. When thought of as inactive, He is called Brahman, and when thought of as the Creator, Preserver, and Destroyer, He is called the Primordial Energy, Kli.
  "Brahman and akti are identical, like fire and its power to bum. When we talk of fire we automatically mean also its power to burn. Again, the fire's power to burn implies the fire itself. If you accept the one you must accept the other.
  --
  "What is needed is absorption in God - loving Him intensely. The 'Nectar Lake' is the Lake of Immortality. A man sinking in It does not die, but becomes immortal. Some people believe that by thinking of God too much the mind becomes deranged; but that is not true. God is the Lake of Nectar, the Ocean of Immortality. He is called the 'Immortal' in the Vedas. Sinking in It, one does not die, but verily transcends death.
  Of little use are worship, oblations, or sacrifice.

WORDNET



--- Overview of noun veda

The noun veda has 1 sense (no senses from tagged texts)
                    
1. Vedic literature, Veda ::: ((from the Sanskrit word for `knowledge') any of the most ancient sacred writings of Hinduism written in early Sanskrit; traditionally believed to comprise the Samhitas, the Brahmanas, the Aranyakas, and the Upanishads)


--- Synonyms/Hypernyms (Ordered by Estimated Frequency) of noun veda

1 sense of veda                            

Sense 1
Vedic literature, Veda
   => sacred text, sacred writing, religious writing, religious text
     => writing, written material, piece of writing
       => written communication, written language, black and white
         => communication
           => abstraction, abstract entity
             => entity


--- Hyponyms of noun veda

1 sense of veda                            

Sense 1
Vedic literature, Veda
   HAS INSTANCE=> Samhita
   HAS INSTANCE=> Brahmana
   HAS INSTANCE=> Aranyaka
   HAS INSTANCE=> Vedanga


--- Synonyms/Hypernyms (Ordered by Estimated Frequency) of noun veda

1 sense of veda                            

Sense 1
Vedic literature, Veda
   => sacred text, sacred writing, religious writing, religious text




--- Coordinate Terms (sisters) of noun veda

1 sense of veda                            

Sense 1
Vedic literature, Veda
  -> sacred text, sacred writing, religious writing, religious text
   => scripture, sacred scripture
   HAS INSTANCE=> Adi Granth, Granth, Granth Sahib
   HAS INSTANCE=> Avesta, Zend-Avesta
   HAS INSTANCE=> Bhagavad-Gita, Bhagavadgita, Gita
   HAS INSTANCE=> Mahabharata, Mahabharatam, Mahabharatum
   => Bible, Christian Bible, Book, Good Book, Holy Scripture, Holy Writ, Scripture, Word of God, Word
   => Paralipomenon
   HAS INSTANCE=> Torah, Pentateuch, Laws
   HAS INSTANCE=> Torah
   HAS INSTANCE=> Tanakh, Tanach, Hebrew Scripture
   HAS INSTANCE=> Prophets, Nebiim
   HAS INSTANCE=> Hagiographa, Ketubim, Writings
   => Testament
   => Gospel, Gospels, evangel
   => Synoptic Gospels, Synoptics
   HAS INSTANCE=> Book of Mormon
   => prayer
   => service book
   => Apocrypha
   => sapiential book, wisdom book, wisdom literature
   => Pseudepigrapha
   HAS INSTANCE=> Koran, Quran, al-Qur'an, Book
   => Talmudic literature
   HAS INSTANCE=> Gemara
   HAS INSTANCE=> Mishna, Mishnah
   => Vedic literature, Veda
   HAS INSTANCE=> Upanishad
   => mantra
   => psalm
   HAS INSTANCE=> Psalm




--- Grep of noun veda
atharva-veda
ayurveda
rig-veda
sama-veda
veda
vedalia
vedanga
vedanta
yajur-veda



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https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/928542.Ayurveda_and_the_Mind
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/928543.Yoga_and_Ayurveda
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/928567.Ayurveda
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9463812.Secrets_of_the_Vedas
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/976582.The_Secret_Teachings_of_the_Vedas
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/1084267.Luis_Sep_lveda
https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/1140531.Chrissie_Loveday
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https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/14437689.Marian_Sepulveda
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https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/9875066.Gaspar_Ortega_Sep_lveda
Goodreads author - Luis_Sep_lveda
Goodreads author - Vedat_T_rkali
Goodreads author - Swami_Nirvedananda
Goodreads author - A_C_Bhaktivedanta_Swami_Prabhup_da
Goodreads author - Sonya_Loveday
Goodreads author - Sri_Srimad_Bhaktivedanta_Narayana_Gosvami_Maharaja
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/Adukkha-m-asukha_vedana
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/Advaita_Vedanta
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/Aparapariya-vedaniya-kamma
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/Atharvaveda
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/Category:Ayurveda
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/Category:Rig_Veda
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/Cattle_in_religion#Atharva_Veda
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/Cattle_in_religion#Rig_Veda
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/File:Rigveda_MS2097.jpg
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/Hindu_deities#Devas_in_the_Vedas
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/Rig_Veda
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/Rigveda
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/Samaveda
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/Soma#In_the_Rigveda
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/Vedan
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/Vedana
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/Vedanta
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/Vedas
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/World_egg#Sanskrit_scriptures_and_Vedanta
https://religion.wikia.org/wiki/Yajurveda
Kheper - I_Ching_and_Vedas -- 19
Kheper - AdvaitaVedanta -- 36
Kheper - atman -- 24
Kheper - Vedanta index -- 30
Kheper - koshas -- 42
http://malankazlev.com/kheper/topics/Vedanta/maya.html -- 0
Kheper - Ramana_on_creation -- 23
Kheper - Shankara -- 31
Kheper - Vedanta -- 48
auromere - links-between-vedas-upanishads-tantra-and-puranas
auromere - reconciling-samkhya-vedanta-and-tantra
auromere - sapta-chatushthaya
auromere - vedas-books
Integral World - Tantra and Veda: The Untold Story, Roar Bjonnes
Integral World - Ken Wilber Videos: Descartes: Reviving the West's Greatest Vedantist
selforum - rig veda samhita
selforum - forum for vedanta and science
selforum - rig veda unveiled
selforum - vedantic doctrines of
selforum - psychology in rig veda yajur veda
selforum - christian vedantist
selforum - inner meaning of vedas
selforum - vivekananda modifies classical vedanta
selforum - existentialism and vedanta
selforum - secret of veda
selforum - vedas as spiritual allegory
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selforum - vedic to vedantic and later to
selforum - series of vedantically possible worlds
selforum - new veda of divine life
selforum - platos myth of cave reflecting vedantic
selforum - sri aurobindo learned veda without help
selforum - sri aurobindos acquaintance with veda
selforum - cow in veda is pre eminently symbolical
selforum - ancient philosophy begins with vedas
selforum - bliss of vedawise whose soul blight of
selforum - evolution and veda
selforum - sri aurobindos integral vedanta and
selforum - neo vedantic knowledge project of sri
selforum - 13 problems of sankhya vedanta proposed
selforum - roots of dharma can be traced to veda
dedroidify.blogspot - nasadiya-rig-veda-book-10-hymn-129
https://circumsolatious.blogspot.com/2018/01/lost-secrets-of-rig-veda-revealed-in.html
https://circumsolatious.blogspot.com/2018/04/i-believe-veda-to-be-foundation-of.html
https://circumsolatious.blogspot.com/2018/04/lost-secrets-of-rig-veda-recovered-full.html
wiki.auroville - Agni_Veda_Research
wiki.auroville - Ritam_"The_Word_in_the_Rig-Veda_and_in_Sri_AurobindoM-bM-^@M-^Ys_epic_poem_Savitri"
wiki.auroville - The_Secret_of_the_Veda
wiki.auroville - Vedas
Dharmapedia - A._C._Bhaktivedanta_Swami_Prabhupada
Dharmapedia - Advaita_Vedanta
Dharmapedia - Atharvaveda
Dharmapedia - Ayurveda
Dharmapedia - Category:Ayurveda
Dharmapedia - Category:Rigveda
Dharmapedia - Category:Vedanta
Dharmapedia - Category:Vedas
Dharmapedia - Chronology_of_the_Rig_Veda
Dharmapedia - File:AUM_symbol,_the_primary_(highest)_name_of_the_God_as_per_the_Vedas.svg
Dharmapedia - Flora_and_Fauna_of_the_Rig_Veda
Dharmapedia - Geography_of_the_Rig_Veda
Dharmapedia - Neo-Vedanta
Dharmapedia - Rig_Veda
Dharmapedia - Rigveda
Dharmapedia - Rigveda_and_Avesta
Dharmapedia - Samaveda
Dharmapedia - Swami_Veda_Bharati
Dharmapedia - The_Astronomical_Code_of_the_Rigveda
Dharmapedia - The_Rigveda:_A_Historical_Analysis
Dharmapedia - The_Rig_Veda_and_the_History_of_India
Dharmapedia - Veda
Dharmapedia - Vedanga
Dharmapedia - Vedanta
Dharmapedia - Vedas
Dharmapedia - Yajurveda
Psychology Wiki - Advaita_Vedanta
Psychology Wiki - Ayurveda
Psychology Wiki - Category:Vedanta
Psychology Wiki - File:Rigveda_MS2097.jpg
Psychology Wiki - Hinduism#CITEREFBhaktivedanta1997
Psychology Wiki - Rig_Veda
Psychology Wiki - Sri_Aurobindo#Discovering_the_Hidden_meaning_of_the_Vedas
Psychology Wiki - Veda
Psychology Wiki - Vedanta
Psychology Wiki - Vedanta#Achintya_Bhed.C4.81bheda
Psychology Wiki - Vedanta#Advaita_Vedanta
Psychology Wiki - Vedanta#Dvaita
Psychology Wiki - Vedanta#Dvait.C4.81dvaita
Psychology Wiki - Vedanta#External_links
Psychology Wiki - Vedanta#Formalization
Psychology Wiki - Vedanta#History
Psychology Wiki - Vedanta#In_Modern_Times
Psychology Wiki - Vedanta#List_of_teachers
Psychology Wiki - Vedanta#Purnadvaita_or_Integral_Advaita
Psychology Wiki - Vedanta#References
Psychology Wiki - Vedanta#See_also
Psychology Wiki - Vedanta#Shuddhadvaita
Psychology Wiki - Vedanta#Source_texts
Psychology Wiki - Vedanta#Sub-schools_of_Vedanta
Psychology Wiki - Vedanta#Vishishtadvaita
Psychology Wiki - Vedas
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https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/A._C._Bhaktivedanta_Swami_Prabhupada
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https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Atharva_Veda
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https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Sama_Veda
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https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Vedas
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Yajurveda
Gravedale High (1990 - 1990) - Max Schneider is the only human boy at Gravedale High, which is otherwise populated entirely by teenage versions of classic hollywood monsters such as vampires, werewolves, and frankensteinian creatures. The comedy came from the fact that, as far as the monsters were concerned, they were all perfec...
House Party 3(1994) - Hip Hop duo Kid & Play return in the second follow-up to their 1990 screen debut House Party. Kid (Christopher "Kid" Reid) is taking the plunge and marrying his girlfriend Veda (Angela Means), while his friend Play (Christopher Martin) is dipping his toes into the music business, managing a roughnec...
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330,003 Crossdressers From Beyond the Rig Veda
A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada
Adam Loveday
Advaita Vedanta
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ngel Seplveda
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