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Science of
Meditation and Integral Yoga
Chandan
Sukumar Sengupta
Teachings of Veda and Epics are from age old traditions.
After the Epic Age we have passed on a span of thousands of years. Are such age
old teachings becoming irrelevant day by day? Is the discussion on such
teachings becoming useless in present day context?
If
we start searching proper answer to these questions then we have to rely on the
fact of the exact relationship with which the time and philosophy move on.
Actually
Philosophy and Religion never take the support of the confluence of time. Time
can even repeat itself through predetermined actions. Philosophy never intends
to influence the normal cycle of the confluence of time. Therefore, both of
these aspects of our daily life are independent of each other and reflect
themselves independently.
What
happened in Epic Age and the way Lord Rama handled the situation during that
time had a deeper impact in the society during that time. It has exhibited the
value system with which a State and a family can define their role in society.
Those values are still relevant. Advent of any change in the material world has
no power of influencing the fundamental value system with which a community
leader should work.
There
are millions of books and narratives with some noble initiative available for
explaining and elaborating the propositions of teachings of Gita. Gita is
relevant for both learners and teachers. It has something to say even to a
layman having less knowledge about the mysteries hidden amidst the
conversations displayed in the holy book of Gita.
The term Gita directly links our
thinking with the conversation that took place in between Arjuna, a Warrior from
the side of Pandavas, and his friendly guide Krishna. It was going on amidst a
critical situation in which Arjuna lost his power of finalising something
justifiable to have a sanction of war and killings. Involvement in a series of
killing of such a type in which his beloved ones were standing at a threshold
of death made the warrior discontented. Krishna took the role of his charioteer
to normalise the situation and to let Arjuna understand his own status in a
better way. The agitation, as described in the holy book of Mahabharata, was
against the stand of his own family members having intention of grabbing all
the resources by taking advantage of some conspired game-fares. The game-fare
of such type with in infliction of opportunistic ideals was moved on
differently and both the segments of a single family took a stand against each
other.
Lord Krishna defined his stand
by putting himself in the side of Pandavas with a sheer commitment of not to
use his weapon at any instances. It was his stand that made him free from
direct indulgence of the warfare and made it possible to guard Pandavas through
delivering timely relevant instruction. In this way he has secured his position
similar to that of the brain in our body. Conversation of Krishna and Arjuna amidst
the battle field was also an act of holy instructions duly issued for Arjuna to
signify his timely need. It had linked senses with duties, established
correlation between rights and duties, issued bands of things to be done and
things not to be done, entangled a spirit with its higher source, conferred the
juxtaposition of creation and the creator and finally re-established need of
knowing the self.
Madbhagvad-Gita,
as the complete term coined for the holy book, had also defined the role of
divine power in infusing values within the intellect and senses of a fellow
devotee. It has also established a perfect correlation between knowledge and
devotion. None of the paired combination alone can succeed in bringing
fame.
Through
all the eighteen chapters of the holy book, Godly propositions were
incorporated by saints and philosophers who have created it for commons. It has
a perpetual compilation of various combinations of practical aspects of Yoga
and Meditation. It has also narrated the true nature of Knowledge that often
receive a confluence more confluous than that of a stream. Attainment of such
knowledge is a subject of individual apprehension and resides solely on the
purity of mind.
Our
discussion up to this point has made a point clear about the nature and
proposition of knowledge confluence remaining evident amongst us since
centuries with a clear impetus of facilitating its follower for gaining an
ascent through divinity and perfectness. There exist narratives in different
forms and in different languages meant primarily to make people aware of the
eternal philosophical aspects related to teachings of Gita.
Another effort of making Gita simple, easy to
understand, more confluous to attend aspirations of people, more perpetuated to
incorporate aspirations of millions and more conferred to actualise role of
senses. Efforts may be of varying kinds to satisfy aspirations of people in
different ways out. It may have some more relevant narratives that can
efficiently link up the need of fundamental values reflected by Gita at
different instances.
Effort
is also made to curtail unwanted explanations for maintaining the flow of the
vibration of thought process intact. Discussion on any philosophical aspects
should not go in a hurry and also it should not be too slow. It should have
adequate stress of combined segments of knowledge and information to keep
things enlightened and actualised.
It
will be even more perfectly balanced to contingent human efforts of ascent
towards the state of the unification of conscious mind with that of masterly
guide. Effort is also made to encompass the segregation of individual
differences from the common philosophical knowledge to make it more people
friendly and more relevant, as well as time tested one.
Gita,
in its actual sense, stands for some sort of compilation that people can sing.
It can be discussed with some beautiful rhythmic tunes. Collective recitation
of Gita brings out a collective wave in the form of auditory vibrations for the
purpose of cleansing the immediate surrounding. It also conferred essence of
collective and community level worship for making the entire effort possible
and for keeping the converged senses of cooperation and brotherhood alive.
To
a compilation of prayers and songs meant for the supreme lord the World Poet
coined a term “Gitanjali” for it. To link up the practical aspects of life and
mission of an individual with the specified spiritual destiny, Saint Vinoba
coined the term “Katha Gita (Gita through a series of stories)” and incorporated
all the teachings and narratives of Gita in absolutely friendly way. Examples
are in plenty. It had not diffused the glory of the original compilation of
Gita, also had not conferred replacing the original poetic compilation with
millions of narratives. Waves of vibrations that the chanting of Gita creates
is based on the assimilation of collective vibrations of saintly senses that
makes a way out through the surrounding of the place of worship and gives birth
to an essence of keeping the collective vibrations of cooperation, brotherhood,
divine omnipresence and interlinkages of senses alive.
We,
in the same manner, can successfully create hundreds and thousands of such
narratives duly inflicted with fundamental human values to make the spark of
Gita a confluous one, a vibrant one and a strategic one. It has enormous power
of accommodations for incorporating all sorts of socially and culturally
relevant directives within the scope of its teaching related to individual
refinement impregnated with spiritual ascent. It also makes the relationship of
creator and the creation a vibrant one. We can specify any of the particular
effort as an initiative inflicted with divine power meant for accomplishing
certain works. All such Gita, duly compiled by saintly people, are not with us.
In due course of time we have lost many of such beautiful, relevant and time
tested compilations due to various reasons. Our mind kept on imbibing presence
of such powers tradition by tradition through many of our rituals. Those graceful
efforts played a significant role in keeping waves of community worship alive.
Gita
was interpreted differently by different saints since olden times. Still we
have a lot to explore from it in the true sense. The teachings and discourses
duly incorporated by Saint Veda Vyasa reflect the teachings of Upanishads put
together. Saint Vyasa wanted to incorporate all the fundamental value system
and yoga based life in a compact compilation to provide people an ease of
access to the divine knowledge.
If
we correlate different scriptures and Epics side by side then the value system
duly reflected through all the propositions of saints will reflect each other’s
presence in common. We can better understand this aspect by taking an example
of idol making. We use clay for shaping it differently to reflect our
imagination and art, similarly the case is there with Philosophy of Yoga. We
can correlate Yoga with all aspects of our life. In that sense we can even say
that, “All Life is Yoga.”
This
extended philosophy and belief cannot cripple our mind and intellect. We can
even, for an example, consider the life of a beggar as a manifestation on the
basis of Yoga. The beggar prepares the mind for begging something from any
individual. In failing to get anything the fellow beggar prefers to move on
further to gain a living. Ultimately the fellow beggar surrenders
himself/herself at the disposal of the almighty. Time cannot permit us to move
as per our own wishes and willingness, but philosophy can do so. We can even
adhere to certain principles and propositions to express our wishes and
willingness to move through such doctrines.
People
maintain faith on certain principles and rituals in which they feel themselves
properly secured. Such security feelings will give birth to a communion having
identical wishes and willingness. They even come across certain rituals to
accomplish the jointly with an affinity of exhibiting a community feelings.
There exist thousands of nobles in a society.
One cannot claim that all such individuals are absolutely perfect and wise by
all means. Some of the notable limitations of all the individuals can be
ascertained with varying evidences which may remain prevalent during their
activities in a society.
Eight different components of the material
element of the Nature are as follows:[1]
1. The Earth or worldly material things of various types.
2. Water: it is the greatest percentage of the
physical body and also works as a basis of all kinds of biochemical reactions.
3. Fire: A kind of thermodynamic regulation which
transforms the inter-conversion of energy and also the shift of energy from one
trophic level to the other.
4. Air: IT ensures a basis of gaseous exchange during
different metabolic activities. It also ensures it presence within the material
basis of the life forms.
5. Space: It is the basis with which an individual
registers its place in the habitat. It even quantifies the horizon of activity
within the scope of a habitat.
6. Mind: A seat of the horizon of consciousness and
confluence of impulses with the help of five different sense organs.
7. Ego: A state of the mental consciousness with
which an individual registers its presence in the surrounding. It also makes
the manifestation other components of mind and body manifested.
8. Intellect: A higher state of higher form of analytical
brain power with which an individual implies adequate balance in between mind
and body and ensures desirable presence in the surrounding. It also acts as a
guiding force with which the fellow individual remains functional.
Interior energy also registers its presence in
the states of creation and ensures proper coordination between different
material elements. Embodiment of soul in the coordinated material elements is
ensured by another element which remains off the interactive Nature elements
and ensures the creations through implying adequate inductions. Such a supreme
inductor of creation is nothing but the Divine (Purush) Element. This element
is beyond the scope of the exhibits of three different qualities. The Divine creates
and also dissolution of Nature elements become recognizable in through the
induction of that Divine only. During such disintegration all the nature
elements are shifted again to their respective positions from where they had
registered their participation during creation. That Divine is also different
sensible sparks such as sight, taste, smell, touch and sound. It is also the intellect of an intelligent
individual. We may become confused to see the presence of some qualities of the
Divine in the intellect element. It should be considered as the reflection of
the supreme creator and often become recognizable because of the omnipresence
of intellect near the Divine.
All the Elements of Nature manifest
differently on the basis of their three different qualities (Guna – Traya),
such as Truth or goodness (Satwa), Rajas (the quality of activity, chaos,
impulsivity and passion) and Tamas (the quality of darkness, illness, dullness
etc.).[2]
Character of an individual is determined on the basis of interplay of all these
three qualities.[3]
But the Purush Element (the Divine Power) remains off the quality parameters
and people having some sort of illusion (Maya) start comparing similarities
between Intellect and the Divine. The Divine manifest through Nature elements
but remain off the cycle of creation and destruction because of its inductive
approaches.
There exists a person who may not be capable
of recognizing the real character and role of the Divine. These four different
types of people are:
1. People who are ignorant of knowledge.
2. Even after knowing the real role of the divine,
people who lazily follow their lower nature, mind and senses.
3. People with deluded intellect.
4. People having a nature and conducts like that
of a demon.
There also exist different types of people
having adequate affinity towards the Divine. People having affinity towards
knowledge, adequately devoted to their respective masters, distressed ones and
seekers of worldly possessions can have adequate affinity towards gaining
consciousness for feeling the omnipresence of the Divine. A worshipper with
adequate knowledge will be the individual having highest pursuit with affinity
towards gaining the Divine enlightenment. Intellect of such person remains
embedded in the Divine and with such graceful pursuits the individual starts
reflecting the Divine. Worshipper having material desires remains engaged in
the acts of material gains and start moving through the path of Divine
enlightenment by performing sacrifices and practices of Meditation.
A devotee remains engaged in the prolonged
state of worship by keeping faith on any celestial god. Such individual also
attains success through a fruitful arrangements made by the Divine only.
Devotees reach ultimately to the Divine and other worshippers gain the
desirables through the Divine arrangements only. Such Divine power knows the
all creations, but none of the creators with limited knowledge rarely become
capable of recognizing the true state and functioning of that Divine in the
process of Creation and Destructions.
The Treasure of Knowledge
The supreme indestructible and inducer element
of the creator power is called Brahman (the Divine or the Purush Element). The
supreme Divine power becomes helpful when one assimilates its reflection on the
intellect with its proper exhibits and its role in the creation and
destruction. We can correlate the ways of functioning of the Divine by
observing any luminous object like that of the sun. Some of the hidden
mysteries responsible for the luminous nature of the sun have become known to
us, and there exists several mysteries still unexplored because of our
limitations in terms of senses and intellect.
Mystery behind the inter-conversion of matter and energy is the main
process responsible for liberating such a tremendous amount of radiation in the
form of electromagnetic waves that radiating out from the celestial bodies like
that of the Sun. Before such radiation the energy remained trapped inside the
atomic nuclei were in the form of Nuclear Energy. We also came to know about
presence of such king of tremendous amount of energy within all types of atoms
of different elements. This phenomenon indicates the presence of creation
elements and destruction elements inside the atomic nuclei. It is also
confirmed that such nuclei remain inactive during all kinds of chemical
reactions. Such a tremendous concentration of creation element ensures its
presence during the process of creation but remains off the system of bindings.
It registers its presence in the form of powerful particles.
All the above phenomena indicate the way
supreme power becomes functional whenever time comes. The Divine energy ensures
its presence in all sorts of creation. Even stars were created in olden times under
the influence of such Divine power. It can be ascribed as the supreme power
with which balance of matter and energy is ensures. It is also true that matter
alone or energy alone cannot make the creation possible. Both of these supreme
creation elements interact in a coordinated fashion to make creations possible.
We rarely recognize the presence of energy element in the creation because of
their non-sensible characters. We can feel the presence of such electromagnetic
waves through the activities of reflections accomplished by other earthly
visible elements or through any other celestial elements. The sun itself
registers in the universe as a successful combination of matter and energy
through which the presence of matter is guarded by the intense power of
outwardly directed radiations.
This discussion encompasses the scientific
basis of the Vedic, Sankhya and Yoga Philosophy. Living things always rest on
Divine in same way the blowing wind rests in the atmosphere.[4]
Only ignorant ones behave differently by violating prescribed rules of the
nature and intend knowingly or unknowingly to put oneself in trouble. People
can worship that Divine differently through varying degree and nature of
contributions. Aham (or the ego centre) is everything perceivable in the
surrounding in varying forms of relatives, friends, parents, masters and other
living forms. Supreme goal for all the life form is, therefore, to have an
exploration of working out the instances during which one start recognizing the
Divine omnipresence.
Worshippers of other forms or god or other
forms of power or faiths worship the supreme Divine because of the universal
existence of such power at various instances in our surrounding. Similarities
of the characters of the Nature elements itself indicate the presence of a
uniform supreme inducer of creation element at all instances in the form of the
Divine. [5]
People should offer all acts and conducts with
absolute sincerity to the Divine for enriching one’s knowledge base.
Worship described in Bhagvadgita is for all
irrespective of their individual differences. By doing so it has registered the
fact regarding the universality of the worship methods and the processes of
spiritual ascent duly narrated at different portions of the holy book Gita. It
is, therefore, exclusively not meant for any specific group of worshippers. [6]
The Divine knowledge passes on from one
generation to the other through the process of orientation and extensive
training. During such training a devotee generally maintains the stability of
mind, body and intellect for ensuring proper and timely maintained confluence
of knowledge from the master to the follower. The degree of involvement of
master and followers in the synthesis of knowledge will ensure the degree and
instances of success. Divine knowledge also enables an individual to redefine
the role duly prescribed for him or her in the society. It also ensures the
onset of a repeated refinement process which aims ultimately towards the
instance during which renunciation of the soul is duly accomplished.
Different functional exhibits of knowledge
duly enlisted by saints are as follows : a state of humbleness; freedom from
hypocrisy; non-violence; forgiveness; simplicity; service offered to the
master; maintaining cleanliness of body, mind and intellect; steadfastness;
self-control; dispassion toward the objects of the senses; establishing a hold
and control on egoism; recognising the evils of birth, disease, old age, and
death; non-attachment to sensible objects; absence of clinging to relatives,
children, home, and other worldly objects; even-mindedness amidst desirable and
undesirable events in life; spontaneous and exclusive devotion towards the
Divine; inclination of mind towards a state of calmness and stability through
ensuring detachments from socially inclined gatherings of subjects other than
the scope of study and experimentations; strong adherence towards the Divine,
related subjects and spiritual knowledge; a long lasting aspiration of the thought processes related to the
truth.[7]
Contrasting bases of above mentioned knowledge
will be considered as acts of an ignorant mind and intellect. At the final
stage of our understanding regarding the alignment three different horizons
through which the Divine ensure manifestation will be discussed in particulars.
Three different portions of the Divine
consciousness that remained active in the Natural world have the following
orientations:
1.
Adhyatm
or the Divine of an individual (the inner world consciousness of an individual)
: it registers its omnipresence beside the Nature elements and gets reflected
during certain instances through intellect.
2.
Jeevatm
or the Divine getting manifested through rest of the other individuals
including plants and animals.
3.
Paramatm
or existence of the Divine beyond the scope of all the living forms and duly
ensures the wider dimensions of creations and destructions at the levels of the
celestial supremacy like Universe, Galaxy, Nebula etc.
Modern science has created an instance
due to which we can easily go through evidences related to the vast expansion
of the Universe. We can even claim that we all were earlier not aware of the
presence of such a vast expansion over the ether which appears blue during day
time and dark during night. Both the contrasting colours are not the actual
character of the limitless sky. We also confirm that the presence of all the
celestial bodies can be recognized even during day time with the help of
specially enabled devices. Such kind of limitless expansion of the Universe and
information related to the varying nature and orientations of all such bodies
were depicted during olden times by Vedic saints. They have also pointed out
about our limitations with which we may not be capable enough in ensuring our
access to all those knowledge.
We can correlate the Vishwaroopa (or
the vision of the Universal expansion of creations) through explanations
registered in the chapter 11 of Bhagvadgita. Names of different characters were
pointed out symbolically to narrate the true nature of the Knowledge confluence
from one generation to the other. Saints always played a vital role in
preserving, cultivating and transferring the holy knowledge from generation to
generations. Lord Krishna recognized himself as Kapil amongst all sages. This
recognition has confirmed the alignment of the Philosophical alignment of Gita
towards Sankhya Philosophy. Other schools of thought process will register
their presence in the light of Sankhya narratives. The converging nature of the
synthesis of Divine Knowledge is also confirmed by different instances of
discussions depicted in Bhagvadgita.
.
[1] This classification of the materials has another back reference
from the Sankhya Philosophy proposed by Sage Kapil.
n Sankhya Karika and Sankhya Tatwa Mimansa ( Resolution of Nature
Elements).
[2] Refer Samkhya Karika by Ishwarkrishna.
[3] James G. Lochtefeld, Guna, in The Illustrated Encyclopedia of
Hinduism: A-M, Vol. 1, Rosen Publishing, ISBN 9780823931798, page 265
T Bernard (1999), Hindu
Philosophy, Motilal Banarsidass, ISBN 978-81-208-1373-1, pages 74–76
[4] Bhagvadgita, Chapter 9, Verse 6-12.
[5] Bhagvadgita, Chapter 9, Verse 23,24.
[6] Bhagvadgita, Chapter 9, Verse 29,30-32.
[7] Source: Bhagvadgita, Chapter 13, Virses 8 to 12
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