{"id":1387,"date":"2013-07-13T01:34:28","date_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:34:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/?p=1387"},"modified":"2013-07-13T01:34:28","modified_gmt":"2013-07-13T01:34:28","slug":"47-towards-the-supreme-secret-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\/47-towards-the-supreme-secret-vol-13-essays-on-the-gita-volume-13","title":{"rendered":"-47_Towards the Supreme Secret.htm"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n
\n
\n

\n\t\t
\n\t\tTWENTY-ONE<\/font><\/span><\/b> <\/font><\/p>\n

\n\t\tTowards
\nthe Supreme Secret*<\/font><\/span><\/b>  <\/font> <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

                
\nT<\/font>HE<\/font> Teacher has completed all
\nelse that he needed to say, he has worked out all the central principles and
\nthe supporting suggestions and implications of his message and elucidated the
\nprincipal doubts and questions that might rise around it, and now all that
\nrests for him to do is to put into decisive phrase and penetrating formula the
\none last word, the heart itself of the message, the very core of his gospel.
\nAnd we find that this decisive, last and crowning word is not merely the
\nessence of what has been already said on the matter, not merely a concentrated
\ndescription of the needed self-discipline, the Sadhana<\/span>,
\nand of that greater spiritual consciousness which is to be the result of all
\nits effort and askesis<\/span>; it sweeps out, as it were,
\nyet farther, breaks down every limit and rule, canon and formula and opens into
\na wide and illimitable spiritual truth with an infinite potentiality of
\nsignificance. And that is a sign of the profundity, the wide reach, the greatness
\nof spirit of the Gita’s teaching. An ordinary religious teaching or
\nphilosophical doctrine is well enough satisfied to seize on certain great and
\nvital aspects of truth and turn them into utilisable dogma and instruction,
\nmethod and practice for the guidance of man in his inner life and the law and
\nform of his action; it does not go farther, it does not open doors out of the
\ncircle of its own system, does not lead us out into some widest freedom and unimprisoned<\/span> largeness. This limitation is useful and indeed
\nfor a time indispensable. Man bounded by his mind and will has need of a law
\nand rule, a fixed system, a definite practice selective of his thought and
\naction; he asks for the single unmistakable hewn path hedged, fixed and secure
\nto the tread, for the limited horizons, for the enclosed resting-places. It is
\nonly the strongand<\/span> few who can move through freedom
\nto freedom. And yet in the end the<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

*Gita, XVIII. 49-56.<\/span><\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 508<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

free soul ought to have an issue
\nout of the forms and systems in which the mind finds its account and takes its
\nlimited pleasure. To exceed our ladder of ascent, not to stop short even on the
\ntopmost stair but move untrammelled and at large in the wideness of the spirit
\nis a release important for our perfection; the spirit’s absolute liberty is our
\nperfect status. And this is how the Gita leads us: it lays down a firm and sure
\nbut very large way of ascent, a great Dharma, and then it takes us out beyond
\nall that is laid down, beyond all dharmas<\/span>, into
\ninfinitely open spaces, divulges to us the hope, lets us into the secret of an
\nabsolute perfection founded in an absolute spiritual liberty, and that secret, guhyatamam<\/span>, is the substance of what it calls its supreme
\nword, that the hidden thing, the inmost knowledge. And first the Gita restates the body of its message. It summarises<\/span> the whole outline and essence in the short space
\nof fifteen verses, lines of a brief and concentrated expression and
\nsignificance that miss nothing of the kernel of the matter, couched in phrases
\nof the most lucid precision and clearness. And they must therefore be scanned
\nwith care, must be read deeply in the light of all that has gone before,
\nbecause here it is evidently intended to extract what the Gita itself considers
\nto be the central sense of its own teaching. The statement sets out from the
\noriginal starting-point of the thought in the book, the enigma of human action,
\nthe apparently insuperable difficulty of living in the highest self and spirit
\nwhile yet we continue to do the works of the world. The easiest way is to give
\nup the problem as insoluble, life and action as an illusion or an inferior
\nmovement of existence to be abandoned as soon as we can rise out of the snare
\nof the world into the truth of spiritual being. That is the ascetic solution, if
\nit can be called a solution; at any rate it is a decisive and effective way out
\nof the enigma, a way to which ancient Indian thought of the highest and most
\nmeditative kind, as soon as it commenced to turn at a sharp incline from its
\nfirst large and free synthesis, had moved with an always increasing
\npreponderance. The Gita like the Tantra<\/span> and on
\ncertain sides the later religions attempts to preserve the ancient balance: it maintains
\nthe substance and foundation of the original synthesis, but the form has been
\nchanged and renovated in the light of a developing spiritual ex- <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 509<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

perience<\/span>.
\nThis teaching does not evade the difficult problem of reconciling the full
\nactive life of man with the inner life in the highest self and spirit; it
\nadvances what it holds to be the real solution. It does not at all deny the efficacy
\nof the ascetic renunciation of life for its own purpose, but it sees that that
\ncuts instead of loosening the knot of the riddle and therefore it accounts it
\nan inferior method and holds its own for the better way. The two paths both
\nlead us out of the lower ignorant normal nature of man to the pure spiritual
\nconsciousness and so far both must be held to be valid and even one in essence:
\nbut where one stops short and turns back, the other advances with a firm
\nsubtlety and high courage, opens a gate on unexplored vistas, completes man in
\nGod and unites and reconciles in the spirit soul and Nature.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>And therefore in the first five of these
\nverses the Gita so phrases its statement that it shall be applicable to both
\nthe way of the inner and the way of the outer renunciation and yet in such a
\nmanner that one has only to assign to some of their common expressions a deeper
\nand more inward meaning in order to get the sense and thought of the method favoured<\/span> by the Gita. The difficulty of human action is
\nthat the soul and nature of man seem fatally subjected to many kinds of
\nbondage, the prison of the ignorance, the meshes of the ego, the chain of the
\npassions, the hammering insistence of the life of the moment, an obscure and
\nlimited circle without an issue. The soul shut up in this circle of action has
\nno freedom, no leisure or light of self-knowledge to make the discovery of its
\nself and the true value of life and meaning of existence. It has indeed such
\nhints of its being as it can get from its active personality and dynamic
\nnature, but the standards of perfection it can erect there are much too
\ntemporal, restricted and relative to be a satisfactory key to its own riddle.
\nHow, while absorbed and continually forced outward by the engrossing call of
\nits active nature, is it to get back to its real self and spiritual existence?
\nThe ascetic renunciation and the way of the Gita are both agreed that it must
\nfirst of all renounce this absorption, must cast from it the external
\nsolicitation of outward things and separate silent self from active nature; it
\nmust identify itself with the immobile Spirit and live in the silence. It must
\narrive at an inner inactivity, naiskarmya<\/i><\/span>. It is therefore this saving inner<\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 510<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

passivity that the Gita puts here
\nas the first object of its Yoga, the first necessary perfection in it or Siddhi<\/span>. \u201cAn understanding without attachment in all things,
\na soul self-conquered and empty of desire, man attains by renunciation a supreme
\nperfection of naiskarmya<\/i><\/span>.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>This ideal of renunciation, of a
\nself-conquered stillness, spiritual passivity and freedom from desire is common
\nto all the ancient wisdom. The Gita gives us its psychological foundation with
\nan unsurpassed completeness and clearness. It rests on the common experience of
\nall seekers of self-knowledge that there are two different natures and as it
\nwere two selves in us. There is the lower self of the obscure mental, vital and
\nphysical nature subject to ignorance and inertia in the very stuff of its
\nconsciousness and especially in its basis of material substance, kinetic and
\nvital indeed by the power of life but without inherent self-possession and
\nself-knowledge in its action, attaining in the mind to some knowledge and
\nharmony, but only with difficult effort and by a constant struggle with its own
\ndisabilities. And there is the higher nature and self of our spiritual being,
\nself-possessed and self-luminous but in our ordinary mentality inaccessible to
\nour experience. At times we get glimpses of this greater thing within us, but
\nwe are not consciously within it, we do not live in its light and calm and
\nillimitable splendour<\/span>. The first of these two very
\ndifferent things is the Gita’s nature of the three gunas<\/span>.
\nIts seeing of itself is centred<\/span> in the ego idea, its
\nprinciple of action is desire born of ego, and the knot of ego is attachment to
\nthe objects of the mind and sense and the life’s desire. The inevitable
\nconstant result of all these things is bondage, settled subjection to a lower
\ncontrol, absence of self-mastery, absence of self-knowledge. The other greater
\npower and presence is discovered to be nature and being of the pure spirit
\nunconditioned by ego, that which is called in Indian philosophy self and
\nimpersonal Brahman. Its principle is an infinite and an impersonal existence one
\nand the same in all: and, since this impersonal existence is without ego,
\nwithout conditioning quality, without desire, need or stimulus, it is immobile
\nand immutable; eternally the same, it regards and supports but does not share
\nor initiate the action of the universe. The soul when it throws itself out into
\nactive Nature is the Gita’s Kshara<\/span>, <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 511<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

its mobile or mutable Purusha<\/span>; the same soul gathered back into pure silent self
\nand essential spirit is the Gita’s Akshara<\/span>, immobile
\nor immutable Purusha<\/span>.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>Then evidently the straight and simplest way
\nto get out of the close bondage of the active nature and back to spiritual freedom
\nis to cast away entirely all that belongs to the dynamics of the ignorance and
\nto convert the soul into a pure spiritual existence. That is what is called
\nbecoming Brahman, brahma-bhūya<\/i><\/span>.
\nIt is to put off the lower mental, vital, physical existence and to put on the
\npure spiritual being. This can best be done by the intelligence and will, buddhi<\/span>, our present topmost principle. It has to turn away
\nfrom the things of the lower existence and first and foremost from its
\neffective knot of desire, from our attachment to the objects pursued by the
\nmind and the senses. One must become an understanding unattached in all things,
\nasakta-buddhih sarvatra<\/span><\/i>.
\nThen all desire passes away from the soul in its silence; it is free from all
\nlongings, vigata-sprhah<\/i><\/span>.
\nThat brings with it or it makes possible the subjection of our lower and the
\npossession of our higher self, a possession dependent on complete self-mastery,
\nsecured by a radical victory and conquest over our mobile nature, jitātmā<\/i><\/span>.
\nAnd all this amounts to an absolute inner renunciation of the desire of things,
\nsannyāsa<\/i><\/span>.
\nRenunciation is the way to this perfection and the man who has thus inwardly
\nrenounced all is described by the Gita as the true Sannyasin<\/span>.
\nBut because the word usually signifies as well an outward renunciation or
\nsometimes even that alone, the Teacher uses another word, tyāga<\/i><\/span>, to distinguish the
\ninward from the outward withdrawal and says that Tyaga<\/span>
\nis better than Sannyasa<\/span>. The ascetic way goes much
\nfarther in its recoil from the dynamic Nature. It is enamoured<\/span>
\nof renunciation for its own sake and insists on an outward giving up of life
\nand action, a complete quietism of soul and nature. That, the Gita replies, is not
\npossible entirely so long as we live in the body. As far as it is possible, it
\nmay be done, but such a rigorous diminution of works is not indispensable: it
\nis not even really or at least ordinarily advisable. The one thing needed is a
\ncomplete inner quietism and that is all the Gita’s sense of naiskarmya<\/i><\/span>.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>If we ask why this reservation, why this
\nindulgence to the <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 512<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

dynamic principle when our object
\nis to become the pure self and the pure self is described as inactive, akartā<\/span>, the answer is that that inactivity and divorce
\nof self from Nature are not the whole truth of our spiritual release. Self and
\nNature are in the end one thing; a total and perfect spirituality makes us one with
\nall the Divine in self and in nature. In fact this becoming Brahman, this
\nassumption into the self of eternal silence, brahma-bhūya<\/i><\/span>, is not all our
\nobjective, but only the necessary immense base for a still greater and more marvellous<\/span> divine becoming, mad-bhāva<\/span><\/i>. And to get to that
\ngreatest spiritual perfection we have indeed to be immobile in the self, silent
\nin all our members, but also to act in the power, Shakti, Prakriti<\/span>,
\nthe true and high force of the Spirit. And if we ask how a simultaneity of what
\nseem to be two opposites is possible, the answer is that that is the very
\nnature of a complete spiritual being; always it has this double poise of the
\nInfinite. The impersonal self is silent; we too must be inwardly silent,
\nimpersonal, withdrawn into the spirit. The impersonal self looks on all action
\nas done not by it but by Prakriti<\/span>; it regards with a
\npure equality all the working of her qualities, modes and forces: the soul impersonalised<\/span> in the self must similarly regard all our actions
\nas done not by itself but by the qualities of Prakriti<\/span>;
\nit must be equal in all things, sarvatra<\/span>. And at the
\nsame time in order that we may not stop here, in order that we may eventually
\ngo forward and find a spiritual rule and direction in our works and not only a
\nlaw of inner immobility and silence, we are asked to impose on the intelligence
\nand will the attitude of sacrifice, all our action inwardly changed and turned
\ninto an offering to the Lord of Nature, to the Being of whom she is the self-power,
\nsvā<\/i><\/span> prakrtih<\/span><\/i>, the
\nsupreme Spirit. Even we have eventually to renounce all into his hands, to
\nabandon all personal initiation of action, sarvārambhāh<\/i><\/span>, to keep
\nour natural selves only as an instrument of his works and his purpose. These
\nthings have been already explained fully and the Gita does not here insist, but
\nuses simply without farther qualification the common terms, sannyāsa<\/i><\/span> and naiskarmya<\/i><\/span>. <\/p>\n

A completest<\/span> inner quietism once admitted as our necessary
\nmeans towards living in the pure impersonal self, the question how practically
\nit brings about that result is the next issue that <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 513<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

arises. \u201cHow, having attained
\nthis perfection, one thus attains to the Brahman, hear from me, O son of Kunti<\/span>,\u2014that which is the supreme concentrated direction of
\nthe knowledge.\u201d The knowledge meant here is the Yoga of the Sankhyas<\/span>,\u2014the
\nYoga of pure knowledge accepted by the Gita, j\u00f1āna-yogena<\/i><\/span> sānkhyānām<\/span><\/i>,
\nso far as it is one with its own Yoga which includes also the way of works of
\nthe Yogins<\/span>, karma-yogena<\/span> yoginām<\/i><\/span>. But
\nall mention of works is kept back for the moment. For by Brahman here is meant
\nat first the silent, the impersonal, the immutable. The Brahman indeed is both
\nfor the Upanishads and the Gita all that is and lives and moves; it is not
\nsolely an impersonal Infinite or an unthinkable and incommunicable Absolute, acintyam<\/i><\/span> avyavahāryam<\/i><\/span>.
\nAll this is Brahman, says the Upanishad; all this is Vasudeva<\/span>,
\nsays the Gita,\u2014the supreme Brahman is all that moves or is stable and his hands
\nand feet and eyes and heads and faces are on every side of us. But still there
\nare two aspects of this All,\u2014his immutable eternal self that supports existence
\nand his self of active power that moves abroad in the world movement. It is
\nonly when we lose our limited ego personality in the impersonality of the self
\nthat we arrive at the calm and free oneness by which we can possess a true
\nunity with the universal power of the Divine in his world movement. Impersonality
\nis a denial of limitation and division, and the cult of impersonality is a
\nnatural condition of true being, an indispensable preliminary of true knowledge
\nand therefore a first requisite of true action. It is very clear that we cannot
\nbecome one self with all or one with the universal Spirit and his vast
\nself-knowledge, his complex will and his widespread world-purpose by insisting
\non our limited personality of ego; for that divides us from others and it makes
\nus bound and self-centred<\/span> in our view and in our will
\nto action. Imprisoned in personality we can only get at a limited union by
\nsympathy or by some relative accommodation of ourselves to the view-point and
\nfeeling and will of others. To be one with all and with the Divine and his will
\nin the cosmos we must become at first impersonal and free from our ego and its
\nclaims and from the ego’s way of seeing ourselves and the world and others. And
\nwe cannot do this if there is not something in our being other than the
\npersonality, <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 514<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

other than the ego, an impersonal
\nself one with all existences. To lose ego and be this impersonal self, to
\nbecome this impersonal Brahman in our consciousness is therefore the first
\nmovement of this Yoga.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>How then is this to be done? First, says the
\nGita, through a union of our purified intelligence with the pure spiritual substance
\nin us by the yoga of the buddhi<\/span>, buddhyā<\/i><\/span> viśuddhayā<\/i><\/span> yuktah<\/i><\/span>. This
\nspiritual turning of the buddhi<\/span> from the outward and
\ndownward to the inward and upward look is the essence of the Yoga of knowledge.
\nThe purified understanding has to control the whole being, \\=atm<\/span>\\=ana<\/span>\\.m niyamya<\/span>;
\nit must draw us away from attachment to the outward-going desires of the lower
\nnature by a firm and a steady will, dhrtyā<\/i><\/span>, which in its concentration faces entirely towards
\nthe impersonality of the pure spirit. The senses must abandon their objects,
\nthe mind must cast away the liking and disliking which these objects excite in
\nit,\u2014for the impersonal self has no desires and repulsions; these are vital
\nreactions of our personality to the touches of things and the corresponding
\nresponse of the mind and senses to the touches is their support and their
\nbasis. An entire control has to be acquired over the mind, speech and body,
\nover even the vital and physical reactions, hunger and cold and heat and
\nphysical pleasure and pain; the whole of our being must become indifferent,
\nunaffected by these things, equal to all outward touches and to their inward
\nreactions and responses. This is the most direct and powerful method, the
\nstraight and sharp way of Yoga. There has to be a complete cessation of desire
\nand attachment, vairāgya<\/i><\/span>;
\na strong resort to impersonal solitude, a constant union with the inmost self
\nby meditation is demanded of the seeker. And yet the object of this austere
\ndiscipline is not to be self-centred<\/span> in some supreme egoistic
\nseclusion and tranquillity<\/span> of the sage and thinker
\naverse to the trouble of participation in the world-action; the object is to
\nget rid of all ego. One must put away utterly first the rajasic<\/span>
\nkind of egoism, egoistic strength and violence, arrogance, desire, wrath, the
\nsense and instinct of possession, the urge of the passions, the strong lusts of
\nlife. But afterwards must be discarded egoism of all kinds, even of the most sattwic<\/span> type; for the aim is to make soul and mind and <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 515<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

life free in the end from all
\nimprisoning I-ness and my-ness, nirmama<\/span>. The
\nextinction of ego and its demands of all sorts is the method put before us. For
\nthe pure impersonal self which, unshaken, supports the universe has no egoism
\nand makes no demand on thing or person; it is calm and luminously impassive and
\nsilently regards all things and persons with an equal and impartial eye of
\nself-knowledge and world-knowledge. Then clearly it is by living inwardly in a
\nsimilar or identical impersonality that the soul within, released from the
\nsiege of things, can best become capable of oneness with this immutable Brahman
\nwhich regards and knows but is not affected by the forms and mutations of the
\nuniverse.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>This first pursuit of impersonality as
\nenjoined by the Gita brings with it evidently a certain completest<\/span>
\ninner quietism and is identical in its inmost parts and principles of practice
\nwith the method of Sannyasa<\/span>. And yet there is a point
\nat which its tendency of withdrawal from the claims of dynamic Nature and the
\nexternal world is checked and a limit imposed to prevent the inner quietism
\nfrom deepening into refusal of action and a physical withdrawal. The
\nrenunciation of their objects by the senses, visayāms<\/i><\/span> tyaktvā<\/span><\/i>, is to be of the nature of Tyaga<\/span>; it must be a giving up of all sensuous attachment, rasa<\/span>, not a refusal of the intrinsic necessary activity of
\nthe senses. One must move among surrounding things and act on the objects of the
\nsense-field with a pure, true and intense, a simple and absolute operation of
\nthe senses for their utility to the spirit in divine action, kevalair<\/i><\/span> indriyaiścaran<\/span><\/i>,
\nand not at all for the fulfilment of desire. There is to be vairāgya<\/i><\/span>, not in the common
\nsignificance of disgust of life or distaste for the world action, but
\nrenunciation of rāga<\/i><\/span>,
\nas also of its opposite, dvesa<\/i><\/span>.
\nThere must be a withdrawal from all mental and vital liking as from all mental
\nand vital disliking whatsoever. And this is asked not for extinction, but in
\norder that there may be a perfect enabling equality in which the spirit can
\ngive an unhampered and unlimited assent to the integral and comprehensive
\ndivine vision of things and to the integral divine action in Nature. A
\ncontinual resort to meditation, dhyāna-yoga-paro<\/i><\/span> nityam<\/span><\/i>, is the firm means by which the soul of man can realise<\/span> its self of Power and its self of silence. And yet
\n <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 516<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

there must be no abandonment of
\nthe active life for a life of pure meditation; action must always be done as a sacrifice
\nto the supreme Spirit. This movement of recoil in the path of Sannyasa<\/span> prepares an absorbed disappearance of the individual
\nin the Eternal, and renunciation of action and life in the world is an
\nindispensable step in the process. But in the Gita’s path of Tyaga<\/span> it is a preparation rather for the turning of our
\nwhole life and existence and of all action into an integral oneness with the
\nserene and immeasurable being, consciousness and will of the Divine, and it
\npreludes and makes possible a vast and total passing upward of the soul out of
\nthe lower ego to the inexpressible perfection of the supreme spiritual nature, parā<\/i><\/span> prakrti<\/span><\/i>.<\/p>\n

This decisive
\ndeparture of the Gita’s thought is indicated in the next two verses, of which
\nthe first runs with a significant sequence, \u201cWhen one has become the Brahman,
\nwhen one neither grieves nor desires, when one is equal to all beings, then one
\ngets the supreme love and devotion to Me.\u201d But in the narrow path of knowledge bhakti<\/span>, devotion to the personal Godhead, can be only an
\ninferior and preliminary movement; the end, the climax is the disappearance of
\npersonality in a featureless oneness with the impersonal Brahman in which there
\ncan be no place for bhakti<\/span>: for there is none to be
\nadored and none to adore; all else is lost in the silent immobile identity of
\nthe Jiva<\/span> with the Atman. Here there is given to us something
\nyet higher than the Impersonal,\u2014here there is the supreme Self who is the
\nsupreme Ishwara<\/span>, here there is the supreme Soul and
\nits supreme nature, here there is the Purushottama<\/span>
\nwho is beyond the personal and impersonal and reconciles them on his eternal
\nheights. The ego personality still disappears in the silence of the Impersonal,
\nbut at the same time there remains even with this silence at the back the action
\nof a supreme Self, one greater than the Impersonal. There is no longer the
\nlower blind and limping action of the ego and the three gunas<\/span>,
\nbut instead the vast self-determining movement of an infinite spiritual Force,
\na free immeasurable Shakti. All Nature becomes the power of the one Divine and
\nall action his action through the individual as channel and instrument. In
\nplace of the ego there comes forward conscious and manifest the true spiritual
\nindividual in the freedom of his real nature, in <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 517<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

the power of his supernal status,
\nin the majesty and splendour<\/span> of his eternal kinship
\nto the Divine, an imperishable portion of the supreme Godhead, an indestructible
\npower of the supreme Prakriti<\/span>, mamaivāmśah<\/i><\/span> sanātanah<\/span>, parā<\/span> prakrtir<\/span> jīva-bhūtā<\/span><\/i>. The soul of man then feels
\nitself to be one in a supreme spiritual impersonality with the Purushottama<\/span> and in its universalised<\/span>
\npersonality a manifest power of the Godhead. Its knowledge is a light of his
\nknowledge; its will is a force of his will; its unity with all in the universe
\nis a play of his eternal oneness. It is in this double realisation<\/span>,
\nit is in this union of two sides of an ineffable Truth of existence by either
\nand both of which man can approach and enter into his own infinite being, that
\nthe liberated man has to live and act and feel and determine or rather have
\ndetermined for him by a greatest power of his supreme self his relations with
\nall and the inner and outer workings of his spirit. And in that unifying realisation<\/span> adoration, love and devotion are not only still
\npossible, but are a large, an inevitable and a crowning portion of the highest
\nexperience. The One who eternally becomes the Many, the Many who in their
\napparent division are still eternally one, the Highest who displays in us this
\nsecret and mystery of existence, not dispersed by his multiplicity, not limited
\nby his oneness,\u2014this is the integral knowledge, this is the reconciling
\nexperience which makes one capable of liberated action, muktasya<\/span>
\nkarma.<\/p>\n

This knowledge
\ncomes, says the Gita, by a highest bhakti<\/span>. It is
\nattained when the mind exceeds itself by a supramental and high spiritual
\nseeing of things and when the heart too rises in unison beyond our more
\nignorant mental forms of love and devotion to a love that is calm and deep and
\nluminous with widest knowledge, to a supreme delight in God and an illimitable adoration,
\nthe unperturbed ecstasy, the spiritual Ananda<\/span>. When
\nthe soul has lost its separative<\/span> personality, when it
\nhas become the Brahman, it is then that it can live in the true Person and can
\nattain to the supreme revealing bhakti<\/span> for the Purushottama<\/span> and can come to know him utterly by the power
\nof its profound bhakti<\/span>, its heart’s knowledge, bhaktyā<\/i><\/span> mām<\/span> abhijānāti<\/span><\/i>. That is the integral knowledge,
\nwhen the heart’s fathomless vision completes the mind’s absolute experience,\u2014samagram<\/i><\/span> mām<\/span> j\u00f1ātvā.<\/span><\/span><\/i> <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 518<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

\u201cHe comes to know Me,\u201d says the
\nGita, \u201cwho and how much I am and in all the reality and principles of my being,
\nyāvān<\/i><\/span> yaścāsmi<\/span>
\ntattvatah<\/span><\/i>.\u201d This integral knowledge is the
\nknowledge of the Divine present in the individual; it is the entire experience
\nof the Lord secret in the heart of man, revealed now as the supreme Self of his
\nexistence, the Sun of all his illumined consciousness, the Master and Power of
\nall his works, the divine Fountain of all his soul’s love and delight, the
\nLover and Beloved of his worship and adoration. It is the knowledge too of the
\nDivine extended in the universe, of the Eternal from whom all proceeds and in
\nwhom all lives and has its being, of the Self and Spirit of the cosmos, of Vasudeva<\/span> who has become all this that is, of the Lord of
\ncosmic existence who reigns over the works of Nature. It is the knowledge of
\nthe divine Purusha<\/span> luminous in his transcendent
\neternity, the form of whose being escapes from the thought of the mind but not
\nfrom its silence; it is the entire living experience of him as absolute Self, supreme
\nBrahman, supreme Soul, supreme Godhead: for that seemingly incommunicable
\nAbsolute is at the same time and even in that highest status the originating
\nSpirit of the cosmic action and Lord of all these existences. The soul of the liberated
\nman thus enters by a reconciling knowledge, penetrates by a perfect simultaneous
\ndelight of the transcendent Divine, of the Divine in the individual and of the
\nDivine in the universe into the Purushottama<\/span>, mām<\/i><\/span> viśate<\/span> tadanantaram<\/span><\/i>. He becomes one with him in his
\nself-knowledge and self-experience, one with him in his being and consciousness
\nand will and world-knowledge and world-impulse, one with him in the universe
\nand in his unity with all creatures in the universe and one with him beyond
\nworld and individual in the transcendence of the eternal Infinite, śāśvatam<\/i><\/span> padam<\/span> avyayam<\/span><\/i>. This is the culmination of the supreme bhakti<\/span> that is at the core of the supreme knowledge.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>And it then becomes evident how action
\ncontinual and unceasing and of all kinds without diminution or abandonment of any
\npart of the activities of life can be not only quite consistent with a supreme
\nspiritual experience, but as forceful a means of reaching this highest
\nspiritual condition as bhakti<\/span> or knowledge. Nothing
\ncan be more positive than the Gita’s statement in this <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 519<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n
\n

<\/span><\/div>\n

matter. \u201cAnd by doing also all
\nactions always lodged in Me he attains by my grace the eternal and imperishable
\nstatus.\u201d This liberating action is of the character of works done in a profound
\nunion of the will and all the dynamic parts of our nature with the Divine in ourself<\/span> and the cosmos. It is done first as a sacrifice
\nwith the idea still of our self as the doer. It is done next without that idea
\nand with a perception of the Prakriti<\/span> as the sole
\ndoer. It is done last with the knowledge of that Prakriti<\/span>
\nas the supreme power of the Divine and a renunciation, a surrender of all our
\nactions to him with the individual as a channel only and an instrument. Our
\nworks then proceed straight from the Self and Divine within us, are a part of
\nthe indivisible universal action, are initiated and performed not by us but by
\na vast transcendent Shakti. All that we do is done for the sake of the Lord
\nseated in the heart of all, for the Godhead in the individual and for the
\nfulfilment of his will in us, for the sake of the Divine in the world, for the
\ngood of all beings, for the fulfilment of the world action and the world
\npurpose, or in one word for the sake of the Purushottama<\/span>
\nand done really by him through his universal Shakti. These divine works, whatever
\ntheir form or outward character, cannot bind, but are rather a potent means for
\nrising out of this lower Prakriti<\/span> of the three gunas<\/span> to the perfection of the supreme, divine and
\nspiritual nature. Disengaged from these mixed and limited dharmas<\/span>
\nwe escape into the immortal Dharma which comes upon us when we make ourselves
\none in all our consciousness and action with the Purushottama<\/span>.
\nThat oneness here brings with it the power to rise there into the immortality beyond
\nTime. There we shall exist in his eternal transcendence. <\/p>\n

Thus these eight
\nverses carefully read in the light of the knowledge already given by the
\nTeacher are a brief, but still a comprehensive indication of the whole
\nessential idea, the entire central method, all the kernel of the complete Yoga
\nof the Gita. <\/p>\n

\nPage \u2013 520<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

TWENTY-ONE  Towards the Supreme Secret*                     THE Teacher has completed all else that he needed to say, he has worked out all the central…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1387","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-13-essays-on-the-gita-volume-13","wpcat-31-id"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1387","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1387"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1387\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1387"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1387"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/worksofthemotherandsriaurobindo.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1387"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}