{"id":1375,"date":"2013-07-13T01:34:24","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:34:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=1375"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:34:24","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:34:24","slug":"32-works-devotion-and-knowledge-vol-13-essays-on-the-gita-volume-13","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/01-works-of-sri-aurobindo\/01-sabcl\/13-essays-on-the-gita-volume-13\/32-works-devotion-and-knowledge-vol-13-essays-on-the-gita-volume-13","title":{"rendered":"-32_Works, Devotion and Knowledge .htm"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
\n
\n

\n
\nSIX<\/font><\/span> <\/font><\/p>\n

\n
\nWorks, Devotion
\nand Knowledge<\/font><\/span> <\/font> <\/b> <\/p>\n

 \n<\/p>\n

\nT<\/font><\/span><\/b>HIS<\/font> then is the integral truth, the highest and widest
\nknowledge. The Divine is supracosmic, the eternal Parabrahman who supports with
\nhis timeless and spaceless existence all this cosmic manifestation of his own
\nbeing and nature in Space and Time. He is the supreme spirit who ensouls the
\nforms and movements of the universe, Paramatman. He is the supernal Person of
\nwhom all self and nature, all being and becoming in this or any universe are
\nthe self-conception and the self-energising, Purushottama. He is the ineffable
\nLord of all existence who by his spiritual control of his own manifested Power
\nin Nature unrolls the cycles of the world and the natural evolution of
\ncreatures in the cycles, Parameshwara. From him the Jiva, individual spirit,
\nsoul in Nature, existent by his being, conscious by the light of his
\nconsciousness, empowered to knowledge, to will and to action by his will and
\npower, enjoying existence by his divine enjoyment of the cosmos, has come here
\ninto the cosmic rounds.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>The inner soul in man is here a partial
\nself-manifestation of the Divine, self-limited for the works of his Nature in
\nthe universe, prakrtir<\/i> īiva<\/i>–bhūgtā<\/i>. In his spiritual essence the individual is one
\nwith the Divine. In the works of the divine Prakriti he is one with him, yet
\nthere is an operative difference and many deep relations with God in Nature and
\nwith God above cosmic Nature. In the works of the lower appearance of Prakriti
\nhe seems by an ignorance and egoistic separation to be quite other than the One
\nand to think, will, act, enjoy in this separative consciousness for the
\negoistic pleasure and purpose of his personal existence in the universe and its
\nsurface relations with other embodied minds and lives. But in fact all his
\nbeing, all his thinking, all his willing and action and enjoyment are only a
\nreflection \u2013 egoistic and perverted so long as he is in the ignorance \u2013 of the Divine’s
\nbeing, the Divine’s thought, will, action and enjoyment of Nature. To get <\/p>\n

\nPage 308<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/div>\n

\n\u00a0<\/span>back to this truth of himself is his direct means
\nof salvation, his largest and nearest door of escape from subjection to the
\nIgnorance. Since he is a spirit, a soul with a nature of mind and reason, of
\nwill and dynamic action, of emotion and sensation and life’s seeking for the
\ndelight of existence, it is by turning all these powers Godwards that the
\nreturn to the highest truth of himself can be made entirely possible. He must
\nknow with the knowledge of the supreme Self and Brahman; he must turn his love
\nand adoration to the supreme Person; he must subject his will and works to the
\nsupreme Lord of cosmos. Then he passes from the lower to the divine Nature: he
\ncasts from him the thought and will and works of the Ignorance and thinks,
\nwills and works in his divine dentity as soul of that Soul, power and light of
\nthat Spirit; he enjoys all the inner infinite of the Divine and no longer only
\nthese outward touches, masks and appearances. Thus divinely living, thus
\ndirecting his whole self and soul, and nature Godwards, he is taken\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

To
\nknow Vasudeva as all and live in that knowledge is the secret. He knows him as
\nthe Self, immutable, continent of all as well as immanent in all things. He
\ndraws back from the confused and perturbed whirl of the lower nature to dwell
\nin the still and inalienable calm and light of the self-existent spirit. There
\nhe realises a constant unity with this self of the Divine that is present in
\nall existences and supports all cosmic movement and action and phenomenon. He
\nlooks upward from this eternal unchanging spiritual hypostasis of the mutable
\nuniverse to the greater Eternal, the supracosmic, the Real. He knows him as the
\ndivine Inhabitant in all things that are, the Lord in the heart of man, the
\nsecret Ishwara, and removes the veil between his natural being and this inner
\nspiritual Master of his being. He makes his will, thought and works one in knowledge
\nwith the Ishwara’s, attuned by an ever-present realisation to the sense of the
\nindwelling Divinity, sees and adores him in all and changes the whole human
\naction to the highest meaning of the divine nature. He knows him as the source
\nand the substance of all that is around him in the universe. All things that
\nare he sees as at once in their appearance the veils and in their secret trend
\nthe means and signs of
\n <\/span><\/p>\n

\nPage 309<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/div>\n

self-manifestation
\nof that one unthinkable Reality and everywhere discovers that oneness, Brahman,
\nPurusha, Atman, Vasudeva, the Being that has become all these creatures.
\nTherefore too his whole inner existence comes into tune and harmony with the
\nInfinite now self-revealed in all that lives or is within and around him and
\nhis whole outer existence turns into an exact instrumentation of the cosmic
\npurpose. He looks up through the Self to the Parabrahman who there and here is
\nthe one and only existence. He looks up through the divine Inhabitant in all to
\nthat supernal Person who in his supreme status is beyond all habitation. He
\nlooks up through the Lord manifested in the universe to the Supreme who exceeds
\nand rules all his manifestation. Thus he arises through a limitless unfolding
\nof knowledge and upward vision and aspiration to that to which he has turned
\nwith an all-compelling integrality, sarvabhāvena<\/i>.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>This integral turning of the soul Godwards
\nbases royally the Gita’s synthesis of knowledge and works and devotion. To know
\nGod thus integrally is to know him as One in the self and in all manifestation
\nand beyond all manifestation, \u2013 and all this unitedly and at once. And yet even
\nso to know him is not enough unless it is accompanied by an intense uplifting
\nof the heart and soul Godwards, unless it kindles a one-pointed and at the same
\ntime all-embracing love, adoration, aspiration. Indeed the knowledge which is
\nnot companioned by an aspiration and vivified by an uplifting is no true
\nknowledge, for it can be only an intellectual seeing and a barren cognitive
\nendeavour. The vision of God brings infallibly the adoration and passionate
\nseeking of the Divine, \u2013 a passion for the Divine in his self-existent being,
\nbut also for the Divine in ourselves and for the Divine in all that is. To know
\nwith the intellect is simply to understand and may be an effective
\nstarting-point, \u2013 or, too, it may not be, and it will not be if there is no
\nsincerity in the knowledge, no urge towards inner realisation in the will, no power
\nupon the soul, no call in the spirit: for that would mean that the brain has externally
\nunderstood, but inwardly the soul has seen nothing. True knowledge is to know
\nwith the inner being, and when the inner being is touched by the light, then it
\narises to embrace that which is seen, it yearns to possess, it struggles to
\nshape that in itself and itself to it, it\u00a0\u00a0
\n<\/span>
\n <\/p>\n

\nPage 310<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/div>\n

labours to
\nbecome one with the glory of its vision. Knowledge in this sense is an
\nawakening to identity and, since the inner being realises itself by
\nconsciousness and delight, by love, by possession and oneness with whatever of
\nitself it has seen, knowledge awakened must bring an overmastering impulse
\ntowards this true and only perfect realisation. Here that which is known is not
\nan externalised object, but the divine Purusha, self and lord of all that we
\nare. An all-seizing delight in him and a deep and moved love and adoration of
\nhim must be the inevitable result and is the very soul of this knowledge. And
\nthis adoration is no isolated seeking of the heart, but an offering of the
\nwhole existence. Therefore it must take also the form of a sacrifice; there is
\na giving of all our works to the Ishwara, there is a surrender of all our
\nactive inward and outward nature to the Godhead of our adoration in its every
\nsubjective and in its every objective movement. All our subjective workings
\nmove in him and they seek him, the Lord and Self, as the source and goal of
\ntheir power and endeavour. All our objective workings move out towards him in
\nthe world and make him their object, initiate a service of God in the world of
\nwhich the controlling power is the Divinity within us in whom we are one self
\nwith the universe and its creatures. For both world and self, Nature and the
\nsoul in her are enlightened by the consciousness of the One, are inner and
\nouter bodies of the transcendent Purushottama. So comes a synthesis of mind and
\nheart and will in the one self and spirit and with it the synthesis of
\nknowledge, love and works in this integral union, this embracing God-realisation,
\nthis divine Yoga.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>But to arrive at this movement at all is
\ndifficult for the ego-bound nature. And to arrive at its victorious and
\nharmonious integrality is not easy even when we have set our feet on the way
\nfinally and for ever. Mortal mind is bewildered by its ignorant reliance upon
\nveils and appearances; it sees only the outward human body, human mind, human
\nway of living and catches no liberating glimpse of the Divinity who is lodged
\nin the creature. It ignores the divinity within itself and cannot see it in
\nother men, and even though the Divine manifest himself in humanity as Avatar
\nand Vibhuti, it is still blind and ignores or despises the veiled Godhead, avajānanti<\/i> mām<\/i> mūdhā<\/i>
\nmānusīm<\/i> tanum<\/i> āśritam<\/i> <\/span><\/p>\n

\nPage 311<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/div>\n

 And if it
\nignores him in the living creature, still less can it see him in the objective
\nworld on which it looks out from its prison of separative ego through the
\nbarred windows of the finite mind. It does not see God in the universe; it
\nknows nothing of the supreme Divinity who is master of these planes full of
\nvarious existences and dwells within them; it is blind to the vision by which
\nall in the world grows divine and the soul itself awakens to its own inherent
\ndivinity and becomes of the Godhead, godlike. What it does see readily, and to
\nthat it attaches itself with passion, is only the life of the ego hunting after
\nfinite things for their own sake and for the satisfaction of the earthly hunger
\nof the intellect, body, senses. Those who have given themselves up too entirely
\nto this outward drive of the mentality, fall into the hands of the lower
\nnature, cling to it and make it their foundation. They become a prey to the nature
\nof the Rakshasa in man who sacrifices everything to a violent and inordinate
\nsatisfaction of his separate vital ego and makes that the dark godhead of his
\nwill and thought and action and enjoyment. Or they are hurried onward in a fruitless
\ncycle by the arrogant self-will, self-sufficient thought, self-regarding act,
\nself-satisfied and yet ever unsatisfied intellectualised appetite of enjoyment
\nof the Asuric nature. But to live persistently in this separative
\nego-consciousness and make that the centre of all our activities is to miss
\naltogether the true self-awareness. The charm it throws upon the misled instruments
\nof the spirit is an enchantment that chains life to a profitless circling. All
\nits hope, action, knowledge are vain things when judged by the divine and
\neternal standard, for it shuts out the great hope, excludes the liberating
\naction, banishes the illuminating knowledge. It is a false knowledge that sees
\nthe phenomenon but misses the truth of the phenomenon, a blind hope that chases
\nafter the transient but misses the eternal, a sterile action whose every profit
\nis annulled by loss and amounts to a perennial labour of Sisyphus. \u00b9<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span>The great-souled who open themselves
\nto the light and largeness of the diviner nature of which man is capable, are alone
\non the path narrow in the beginning, inexpressibly wide in the end that leads
\nto liberation and perfection. The growth of the god in man is man’s proper
\nbusiness; the steadfast turning of this lower <\/p>\n

\u00b9<\/span>Gita, IX. 11-12.<\/span> <\/p>\n

\nPage 312<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/div>\n

Asuric and
\nRakshasic into the divine nature is the carefully hidden meaning of human life.
\nAs this growth increases, the veil falls and the soul comes to see the greater significance
\nof action and the real truth of existence. The eye opens to the Godhead in man,
\nto the Godhead in the world; it sees inwardly and comes to know outwardly the
\ninfinite Spirit, the Imperishable from whom all existences originate and who exists
\nin all and by him and in him all exist always. Therefore when this vision, this
\nknowledge seizes on the soul, its whole life-aspiration becomes a surpassing
\nlove and fathomless adoration of the Divine and Infinite. The mind attaches
\nitself singly to the eternal, the spiritual, the living, the universal, the
\nReal; it values nothing but for its sake, it delights only in the all-blissful
\nPurusha. All the word and all the thought become one hymning of the universal
\ngreatness, Light, Beauty, Power and Truth that has revealed itself in its glory
\nto the human spirit and a worship of the one supreme Soul and infinite Person. All
\nthe long stress of the inner self to break outward becomes a form now of
\nspiritual endeavour and aspiration to possess the Divine in the soul and
\nrealise the Divine in the nature. All life becomes a constant Yoga and unification
\nof that Divine and this human spirit. This is the manner of the integral
\ndevotion; it creates a single uplifting of our whole being and nature through
\nsacrifice by the dedicated heart to the eternal Purushottama.\u00b9<\/span><\/p>\n

Those
\nwho lay a predominant stress on knowledge, arrive to the same point by an
\nalways increasing, engrossing, enforcing power of the vision of the Divine on
\nthe soul and the nature. Theirs is the sacrifice of knowledge and by an ineffable
\necstasy of knowledge they come to the adoration of the\u00a0 <\/span>Purushottama, j\u00f1āna<\/i>–yaj\u00f1ena<\/i> yajanto<\/i> mām<\/i> upāsate<\/i>.
\nThis is comprehension filled with Bhakti, because it is integral in its
\ninstruments, integral in its objective. It is not a pursuit of the Supreme
\nmerely as an abstract unity or an indeterminable Absolute. It is a heart-felt
\nseeking and seizing of the Supreme and the Universal, a pursuit of the Infinite
\nin his infinity and of the Infinite in all that is finite, a vision and
\nembracing of the One in his oneness and of the One in all his several
\nprinciples, his innumerable visages, forces, <\/p>\n

\u00b9<\/span>IX. 13-14<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPage 313.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/div>\n

forms,
\nhere, there, everywhere, timelessly and in time, multiply, multitudinously, in
\nendless aspects of his Godhead, in beings without number, all his million universal
\nfaces fronting us in the world and its creatures, ekatvena prthaktvena bahudhā viśvatomukham<\/i>. This knowledge
\nbecomes easily an adoration, a large devotion, a vast self-giving, an integral
\nself-offering because it is the knowledge of a Spirit, the contact of a Being,
\nthe embrace of a supreme and universal Soul which claims all that we are even
\nas it lavishes on us when we approach it all the treasures of its endless
\ndelight of existence.\u00b9<\/span><\/p>\n

The
\nway of works too turns into an adoration and a devotion of self-giving because
\nit is an entire sacrifice of all our will and its activities to the one
\nPurushottama. The outward Vedic rite is a powerful symbol, effective for a
\nslighter though still a heavenward purpose; but the real sacrifice is that
\ninner oblation in which the Divine All becomes himself the ritual action, the
\nsacrifice and every single circumstance of the sacrifice. All the working and
\nforms of that inner rite are the self-ordinance and self-expression of his
\npower in us mounting by our aspiration towards the source of its energies. The Divine
\nInhabitant becomes himself the flame and the offering, because the flame is the
\nGodward will and that will is God himself within us. And the offering too is
\nform and force of the constituent Godhead in our nature and being; all that has
\nbeen received from him is given up to the service and the worship of its own
\nReality, its own supreme Truth and Origin. The Divine Thinker becomes himself
\nthe sacred mantra; it is the Light of his being that expresses itself in the
\nthought directed Godward and is effective in the revealing word of splendour
\nthat enshrines the thought’s secret and in the rhythm that repeats for man the
\nrhythms of the Eternal. The illumining Godhead is himself the Veda and that
\nwhich is made known by the Veda. He is both the knowledge and the object of the
\nknowledge. The Rik, the Yajur, the Sama, the word of illumination which lights
\nup the mind with the rays of knowledge, the word of power for the right
\nordaining of action, the word of calm and harmonious attainment for the bringing
\nof the divine desire of the spirit, are themselves the Brahman, the <\/p>\n

\u00b9<\/span>Footnote:IX. 15.<\/span> <\/p>\n

\nPage 314.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/div>\n

\n Godhead.
\nThe mantra of the divine Consciousness brings its light of revelation, the
\nmantra of the divine Power its will of effectuation, the mantra of the divine
\nAnanda its equal fulfilment of the spiritual delight of existence. All word and
\nthought are an outflowering of the great OM, \u2013 OM,
\nthe Word, the Eternal. Manifest in the forms of sensible objects, manifest in
\nthat conscious play of creative self-conception of which forms and objects are
\nthe figures, manifest behind in the self-gathered superconscient power of the
\nInfinite, OM is the sovereign source, seed, womb of thing and idea, form and
\nname, \u2013 it is itself, integrally, the supreme Intangible, the original Unity,
\nthe timeless Mystery self-existent above all manifestation in supernal being.\u00b9<\/span> This sacrifice is therefore at
\nonce works and adoration and knowledge.\u00b2<\/span><\/p>\n

To
\nthe soul that thus knows, adores, offers up all its workings in a great
\nself-surrender of its being to the Eternal, God is all and all is the Godhead.
\nIt knows God as the Father of this world who nourishes and cherishes and
\nwatches over his children. It knows God as the divine Mother who holds us in
\nher bosom, lavishes upon us the sweetness of her love and fills the universe
\nwith her forms of beauty. It knows him as the first Creator from whom has
\noriginated all that originates and creates in space and time and relation. It
\nknows him as the Master and ordainer of all universal and of every individual
\ndispensation. The world and fate and uncertain eventuality cannot terrify, the
\naspect of suffering and evil cannot bewilder the man who has surrendered
\nhimself to the Eternal. God to the soul that sees is the path and God is the
\ngoal of his journey, a path in which there is no self-losing and a goal to
\nwhich his wisely guided steps are surely arriving at every moment. He knows the
\nGodhead as the master of his and all being, the upholder of his nature, the husband
\nof the nature-soul, its lover and cherisher, the inner witness of all his
\nthoughts and actions. God is his house and country, the refuge of his seekings
\nand desires, the wise and close and benignant<\/p>\n

\n <\/p>\n

\u00b9<\/span>AUM, \u2013 A the spirit of the gross and external,
\nVirat, U the spirit of the subtle and internal, Taijasa, M the spirit of the
\nsecret superconscient omnipotence, Prajna, <\/span>OM<\/span> the Absolute, Turiya. \u2013 Mandukya Upanishad.<\/i><\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n

\u00b2<\/span>IX. 16-17.<\/span> <\/p>\n

\nPage 315<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/div>\n

 friend of
\nall beings. All birth and status and destruction of apparent existences is to
\nhis vision and experience the One who brings forward, maintains and withdraws
\nhis temporal self-manifestation in its system of perpetual recurrences. He
\nalone is the imperishable seed and origin of all that seem to be born and
\nperish and their eternal resting-place in their non-manifestation. It is he
\nthat burns in the heat of the sun and the flame; it is he who is the plenty of
\nthe rain and its withholding; he is all this physical Nature and her workings.
\nDeath is his mask and immortality is his self-revelation. All that we call
\nexistent is he and all that we look upon as non-existent still is there secret
\nin the Infinite and is part of the mysterious being of the Ineffable.\u00b9<\/span><\/p>\n

Nothing
\nbut the highest knowledge and adoration, no other way than an entire
\nself-giving and surrender to this Highest who is all, will bring us to the
\nHighest. Other religion, other worship, other knowledge, other seeking has
\nalways its fruits, but these are transient and limited to the enjoyment of
\ndivine symbols and appearances. There are always open for our following
\naccording to the balance of our mentality an outer and an inmost knowledge, an
\nouter and an inmost seeking. Outward religion is the worship of an outward
\ndeity and the pursuit of an external beatitude: its devotees purify their
\nconduct from sin and attain to an active ethical righteousness in order to
\nsatisfy the fixed law, the Shastra, the external dispensation; they perform the
\nceremonial symbol of the outer communion. But their object is to secure after
\nthe mortal pleasure and pain of earthly life the bliss of heavenly worlds, a
\ngreater happiness than earth can give but still a personal and mundane
\nenjoyment though in a larger world than the field of this limited and suffering
\nterrestrial nature. And to that to which they aspire, they attain by faith and
\nright endeavour; for material existence and earthly activities are not the
\nwhole scope of our personal becoming or the whole formula of the cosmos. Other
\nworlds there are of a larger felicity, svargalokam<\/i>
\nviśālam<\/i>. Thus the Vedic
\nritualist of old learned the exoteric sense of the triple Veda, purified
\nhimself from sin, drank the wine of communion with the gods and sought by
\nsacrifice and good deeds the rewards of heaven. This firm<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u00b9<\/span> IX. 17-19<\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n

\nPage 316.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/div>\n

 \u00a0<\/span>belief in a Beyond and this seeking of a
\ndiviner world secures to the soul in its passing the strength to attain to the
\njoys of heaven on which its faith and seeking were centred: but the return to
\nmortal existence imposes itself because the true aim of that existence has not
\nbeen found and realised. Here and not elsewhere the highest Godhead has to be
\nfound, the soul’s divine nature developed out of the imperfect physical human
\nnature and through unity with God and man and universe the whole large truth of
\nbeing discovered and lived and made visibly wonderful. That completes the long
\ncycle of our becoming and admits us to a supreme result; that is the opportunity
\ngiven to the soul by the human birth and, until that is accomplished, it cannot
\ncease. The God-lover advances constantly towards this ultimate necessity of our
\nbirth in cosmos through a concentrated love and adoration by which he makes the
\nsupreme and universal Divine the whole object of his living <\/span>\u2013 <\/span>not either egoistic
\nterrestrial satisfaction or the celestial worlds <\/span>\u2013 <\/span>and the whole object of his thought and his seeing. To see
\nnothing but the Divine, to be at every moment in union with him, to love him in
\nall creatures and have the delight of him in all things is the whole condition
\nof his spiritual existence. His God-vision does not divorce him from life, nor
\ndoes he miss anything of the fullness of life; for God himself becomes the
\nspontaneous bringer to him of every good and of all his inner and outer getting
\nand having, yogaksemam<\/i> vahamyaham<\/i>. The joy of heaven and the
\njoy of earth are only a small shadow of his possessions; for as he grows into
\nthe Divine, the Divine too flows out upon him with all the light, power and joy
\nof an infinite existence.\u00b9<\/span><\/p>\n

Ordinary
\nreligion is a sacrifice to partial godheads other than the integral Divinity.
\nThe Gita takes its direct examples from the old Vedic religion on its exoteric
\nside as it had then developed; it describes this outward worship as a sacrifice
\nto other godheads, anya<\/i>–devatah<\/i>, to the gods, or to the
\ndivinised Ancestors, or to elemental powers and spirits, devān<\/i>, pitrn<\/i>,
\nbhūtāni<\/i>. Men consecrate
\ntheir life and works ordinarily to partial powers or aspects of the divine
\nExistence as they see or conceive them \u2013 mostly powers and aspects that ensoul
\nto them
\n <\/p>\n

\u00b9<\/span>IX. 20-22.<\/span> <\/p>\n

\nPage 317<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/div>\n

things
\nprominent in Nature and man or else reflect to them their own humanity in a
\ndivine exceeding symbol. If they do this with faith, then their faith is
\njustified; for the Divine accepts whatever symbol, form or conception of
\nhimself is present to the mind of the worshipper, yām<\/i> yām<\/i> tanum<\/i> śraddhayā<\/i> arcati<\/i>, as
\nit is said elsewhere, and meets him according to the faith that is in him. All
\nsincere religious belief and practice is really a seeking after the one supreme
\nand universal Godhead; for he always is the sole master of man’s sacrifice and askesis
\nand infinite enjoyer of his effort and aspiration. However small or low the
\nform of the worship, however limited the idea of the godhead, however
\nrestricted the giving, the faith, the effort to get behind the veil of one’s
\nown ego-worship and limitation by material Nature, it yet forms a thread of
\nconnection between the soul of man and the All-soul and there is a response.
\nStill the response, the fruit of the adoration and offering is according to the
\nknowledge, the faith and the work and cannot exceed their limitations, and
\ntherefore from the point of view of the greater God-knowledge, which alone
\ngives the entire truth of being and becoming, this inferior offering is not
\ngiven according to the true and highest law of the sacrifice. It is not founded
\non a knowledge of the supreme Godhead in his integral existence and the true
\nprinciples of his self-manifestation, but attaches itself to external and
\npartial appearances, \u2013 na<\/i> mām<\/i> abhijānanti<\/i> tattvena<\/i>.
\nTherefore its sacrifice too is limited in its object, largely egoistic in its
\nmotive, partial and mistaken in its action and its giving, yajanti<\/i> avidhipūrvakam<\/i>.
\nAn entire seeing of the Divine is the condition of an entire conscious self-surrender;
\nthe rest attains to things that are incomplete and partial, and has to fall
\nback from them and return to enlarge itself in a greater seeking and wider
\nGod-experience. But to follow after the supreme and universal Godhead alone and
\nutterly is to attain to all knowledge and result which other ways acquire,
\nwhile yet one is not limited by any aspect, though one finds the truth of him
\nin all aspects. This movement embraces all forms of divine being on its way to
\nthe supreme Purushottama.\u00b9<\/span><\/p>\n

This
\n\u00a0<\/span>absolute self-giving, this one-minded
\nsurrender is the \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 <\/span><\/p>\n

\u00b9<\/span> IX<\/span> \u00a0<\/span>23-25<\/span>. <\/p>\n

\nPage 318.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/div>\n

 devotion
\nwhich the Gita makes the crown of its synthesis. All action and effort are by
\nthis devotion turned into an offering to the supreme and universal Godhead.
\n\u201cWhatever thou doest, whatever thou enjoyest, whatever thou sacrificest,
\nwhatever thou givest, whatever energy of tapasya, of the soul’s will or effort
\nthou puttest forth, make it an offering unto Me.\u201d Here the least, the slightest
\ncircumstance of life, the most insignificant gift out of oneself or what one
\nhas, the smallest action assumes a divine significance and it becomes an acceptable
\noffering to the Godhead who makes it a means for his possession of the soul and
\nlife of the God-lover. The distinctions made by desire and ego then disappear.
\nAs there is no straining after the good result of one’s action, no shunning of
\nunhappy result, but all action and result are given up to the Supreme to whom
\nall work and fruit in the world belong for ever, there is no farther bondage.
\nFor by an absolute self-giving all egoistic desire disappears from the heart
\nand there is a perfect union between the Divine and the individual soul through
\nan inner renunciation of its separate living. All will, all action, all result
\nbecome that of the Godhead, work divinely through the purified and illumined
\nnature and no longer belong to the limited personal ego. The finite nature thus
\nsurrendered becomes a free channel of the Infinite; the soul in its spiritual
\nbeing, uplifted out of the ignorance and the limitation, returns to its oneness
\nwith the Eternal. The Divine Eternal is the inhabitant in all existences; he is
\nequal in all and the equal friend, father, mother, creator, lover, supporter of
\nall creatures. He is the enemy of none and he is the partial lover of none;
\nnone has he cast out, none has he eternally condemned, none has he favoured by
\nany despotism of arbitrary caprice: all at last equally come to him through
\ntheir circlings in the ignorance. But it is only this perfect adoration that
\ncan make this indwelling of God in man and man in God a conscious thing and an
\nengrossing and perfect union. Love of the Highest and a total self-surrender
\nare the straight and swift way to this divine oneness.\u00b9<\/span><\/p>\n

The
\nequal Divine Presence in all of us makes no other preliminary condition, if
\nonce this integral self-giving has been made <\/p>\n

\u00b9<\/span> IX. 26-29.<\/span> <\/span><\/p>\n

\nPage 319<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/div>\n

in faith
\nand in sincerity and with a fundamental completeness. All have access to this
\ngate, all can enter into this temple: our mundane distinctions disappear in the
\nmansion of the All-lover. There the virtuous man is not preferred, nor the sinner
\nshut out from the Presence; together by this road the Brahmin pure of life and
\nexact in observance of the law and the outcaste born from a womb of sin and
\nsorrow and rejected of men can travel and find an equal and open access to the supreme
\nliberation and the highest dwelling in the Eternal. Man and woman find their
\nequal right before God; for the divine Spirit is no respecter of persons or of
\nsocial distinctions and restrictions: all can go straight to him without
\nintermediary or shackling condition. \u201cIf\u201d says the divine Teacher \u201ceven a man
\nof very evil conduct turns to me with a sole and entire love, he must be
\nregarded as a saint, for the settled will of endeavour in him is a right and
\ncomplete will. Swiftly he becomes a soul of righteousness and obtains eternal
\npeace.\u201d In other words a will of entire self-giving opens wide all the gates of
\nthe spirit and brings in response an entire descent and self-giving of the
\nGodhead to the human being, and that at once reshapes and assimilates
\neverything in us to the law of the divine existence by a rapid transformation
\nof the lower into the spiritual nature. The will of self-giving forces away by
\nits power the veil between God and man; it annuls every error and annihilates
\nevery obstacle. Those who aspire in their human strength by effort of knowledge
\nor effort of virtue or effort of laborious self-discipline, grow with much
\nanxious difficulty towards the Eternal; but when the soul gives up its ego and
\nits works to the Divine, God himself comes to us and takes up our burden. To
\nthe ignorant he brings the light of the divine knowledge, to the feeble the
\npower of the divine will, to the sinner the liberation of the divine purity, to
\nthe suffering the infinite spiritual joy and Ananda. Their weakness and the
\nstumblings of their human strength make no difference. \u201cThis is my word of
\npromise,\u201d cries the voice of the Godhead to Arjuna, \u201cthat he who loves me shall
\nnot perish.\u201d Previous effort and preparation, the purity and the holiness of
\nthe Brahmin, the enlightened strength of the king-sage great in works and knowledge
\nhave their value, because they make it easier for the imperfect human creature
\nto arrive at <\/span><\/p>\n

\nPage 320.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/div>\n

 this wide
\nvision and self-surrender; but even without this preparation all who take
\nrefuge in the divine Lover of man, the Vaishya once preoccupied with the
\nnarrowness of wealth-getting and the labour of production, the Shudra hampered
\nby a thousand hard restrictions, woman shut in and stunted in her growth by the
\nnarrow circle society has drawn around her self-expansion, those too, pāpa<\/i>–yonayah<\/i>, on whom their past Karma has imposed even the very
\nworst of births, the outcaste, the Pariah, the Chandala, find at once the gates
\nof God opening before them. In the spiritual life all the external distinctions
\nof which men make so much because they appeal with an oppressive force to the
\noutward mind, cease before the equality of the divine Light and the wide
\nomnipotence of an impartial Power.<\/p>\n

The
\nearthly world preoccupied with the dualities and bound to the immediate
\ntransient relations of the hour and the moment is for man, so long as he dwells
\nhere attached to these things and while he accepts the law they impose on him
\nfor the law of his life, a world of struggle, suffering and sorrow. The way to
\nliberation is to turn from the outward to the inward, from the appearance
\ncreated by the material life which lays its burden on the mind and imprisons it
\nin the grooves of the life and the body to the divine Reality which waits to
\nmanifest itself through the freedom of the spirit. Love of the world, the mask,
\nmust change into the love of God, the Truth. Once this secret and inner Godhead
\nis known and is embraced, the whole being and the whole life will undergo a
\nsovereign uplifting and a marvellous transmutation. In place of the ignorance
\nof the lower Nature absorbed in its outward works and appearances the eye will
\nopen to the vision of God everywhere, to the unity and universality of the
\nspirit. The world’s sorrow and pain will disappear in the bliss of the
\nAll-blissful; our weakness and error and sin will be changed into the
\nall-embracing and all-transforming strength, truth and purity of the Eternal.
\nTo make the mind one with the divine consciousness, to make the whole of our
\nemotional nature one love of God everywhere, to make all our works one
\nsacrifice to the Lord of the worlds and all our worship and aspiration one
\nadoration of him and self-surrender, to direct the whole self <\/p>\n

IX. 30-32.<\/span> <\/p>\n

\nPage 321<\/span><\/p>\n

\n
\n<\/div>\n

\n\u00a0<\/span>Godwards in an entire union is the way to rise
\nout of a mundane into a divine existence. This is the Gita’s teaching of divine
\nlove and devotion, in which knowledge, works and the heart’s longing become one
\nin a supreme unification, a merging of all their divergences, an intertwining
\nof all their threads, a high fusion, a wide identifying movement.\u00b9<\/span>  <\/p>\n

\u00b9<\/span>IX. 33-34.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPage 322.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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