Paramahansa Nityananda and the Chidakasha Gita

October 4th, 2008 • By Atma Jyoti Ashram

Paramahansa Nityananda
One of the most valuable pieces of spiritual literature on the Atma Jyoti website is the Chidakasha Gita by Paramhansa Nityananda. Nityananda was one of the most remarkable spiritual figures of the early twentieth century in India. Nityananda was renowned for two outstanding traits: his utterly miraculous way of life and his great compassion on all suffering humanity, especially the poor and helpless. Even today, nearly fifty years after his leaving the body, hundreds are fed daily in his name. A brief life of Nityananda can be found here.

The Chidakasha Gita is a transcription of random teachings of Nityananda, given when he would walk unannounced into a house, sit down, and begin speaking. Though the devotees did the best they could, writing frantically in hope of keeping up with his words, the resulting records are often disjointed and sometimes make no sense since something is missing. This of course is a defect of the transcribers and not of Nityananda who was speaking spontaneously in spirit consciousness without interest in polished expression. Nevertheless, a devotee collected these fragments and had them printed under the title of Chidakasha Gita. [Chidakasha–from A Brief Sanskrit Glossary: “The Space (Ether) of Consciousness.” The infinite, all-pervading expanse of Consciousness from which all “things” proceed; the subtle space of Consciousnesss in the Sahasrara (Thousand-petalled Lotus). The true “heart” of all things.] They have been translated into several Indian languages as well as English.

Swami Nirmalananda has attempted to separate them under different subject headings to make it easier for students of spiritual life to examine these valuable teachings.

Our friend Kumuda (Sharon Janis) of Spiritual-Happiness.com has recorded the Chidakasha Gita according to topic and made it available for listening on her website. She has also made her recording available for purchase on CD or as a MP3 download, as well as other spiritual recordings. They are well worth listening to.

Below are some excerpts from the Chidakasha Gita on our site:

Bhakti

It is not bhakti to give a man some money or to give him a meal as charity. Bhakti is universal love. Seeing God in all beings, without the least idea of duality, is bhakti.
Bhakti in the beginning is selfish. Afterwards, there is no selfishness in it.
A vessel without water is of no use. Bhakti is water; intelligence (buddhi) is the vessel. He who has no subtle bhakti is no man.
Take ten men; their bhakti is not of an identical nature. When ten people are going on a journey, if one of them sits to take rest, the remaining nine will also do the same. Likewise, one man is inspired with bhakti; other people, by seeing or hearing him become also bhaktas.
Bhakti is the state of eternal bliss.
Bhakti (devotion) is nothing but love a man manifests towards an object. A man should believe that thing as great by which, because of his faith, he has been much benefited. This belief should not be relaxed. There is not a single thing without bhakti. All animals have bhakti. Just as water flows in different directions, so also is bhakti of different types. All animals have a right for bhakti. Bhakti is in all objects. Bhakti should be absolutely pure. Bhakti should be realized in the sky of consciousness. Bhakti should be internal and it should realize the subtle. Then a man becomes desireless and sorrowless. This state is eternal mukti. Let mukti be entered into by the path of sushumna.

God-vision

You must see that God Who is in the heart-space. Yes, you must see Him. You must see that Krishna who is eternal bliss (Nityananda). It is delusion to regard stone as God.
All tattwas have one root tattwa called Parabrahman. When this is realized, it is called jivanmukti. You must see the river at its source and not after it merges into the sea. You should see the mother root of a tree. All the trees have one mother root. So also, all have one and only one God. When you have realized all as one, homogeneous, this realization is mukti.
One who has become one with the Supreme has accomplished the object of his birth. One must concentrate his mind on the Supreme. One must become one with the Supreme. Wakefulness, dream state, and sleep state must melt in the Supreme and become one.

Mind (Manas–Buddhi)

The glass of a chimney lamp, when covered with carbon, is not transparent. Similarly, the carbon of the mind should be removed.
Just as camphor is consumed by the flames of fire, so also, the mind must be consumed by soul fire.
There are matches in a match-box. Fire is produced only when the match is rubbed against the side of the box. So also, the manas is the match; buddhi (intelligence) is the side of the box. We should rub the manas against buddhi and then we get the kingdom of atman which is the same as the liberation from the cycle of birth and death.
Buddhi is the king; manas is the minister; manas should be subordinated to buddhi.
Your mind should not flicker like the reflection of the sun in the shaking water.
The sea water is boundless; the tank water has a boundary. Our mind must be like the tank water. Mind is the cause of good and evil. A man may be good and bad according to his good or bad thoughts. God does not do good or evil to any man. The reason is, intelligence and knowledge are the divine faculties in man. A man protected by good thoughts cannot be harmed even by a cannon shot. Without yoga, liberation from karma is impossible.
Mind is the creator of ideas. When the gross ideas are suppressed and the man lives in the subtle, this state is called nirvikalpa samadhi or samadhi without ideas. Just as we teach a bird how to talk, keeping it in a cage with its feet bound, we must keep our mind in our buddhi. A man must learn for himself.