The Atma Jyoti Blog

Part 3 of Akshay Kumar Banerjea’s important essay from the Philosophy of Gorakhnath. This section deals with the practical yoga method, rather than the theoretical philosophical method covered in the last post.

A good many philosophers, having realized the inherent weakness of the method of logical reasoning and intellectual theorizing as a means to the perfect satisfaction of the innermost demand of the soul for the attainment of the Absolute Truth, have turned towards the method of spiritual self-discipline. One great Western philosopher has said that “Learned ignorance is the end of philosophy and the beginning of religion.” Religion here does not of course mean blind submission to any particular dogma or creed or performance of certain prescribed rites and ceremonies; but it means systematic discipline of the body, the senses, the mind, the intellect and the heart, under expert guidance, for the purification and refinement of the entire being of a man and the elevation of the empirical consciousness to higher and higher spiritual planes, so as ultimately to make it fit for being perfectly illumined by the light of the Absolute Truth. This is the path of Yoga.

The most illustrious philosopher of ancient Greece, who was proclaimed by the Oracle of Delphi as the wisest man of the age, gravely said that his wisdom perhaps lay in the fact that “I know that I know nothing.” This great Guru of many great philosophers frankly confessed that with all his philosophical reflections he could not reach the Ultimate Truth which his heart craved for.

The term Philosophy itself is very significant in this connection; it carries the sense of its own inherent limitation with it. It means love of wisdom, and not the perfect attainment of wisdom. It implies sincere and earnest pursuit of Truth, and not the direct realization of Truth. A Philosopher, so long as he relies solely upon logical reasoning and intellectual argumentation, may continually advance towards the Truth with all the earnestness of his heart, but will never reach it. In his very attempt to make the Absolute Truth an object of his logical conception and intellectual comprehension, the Absolute Truth eludes his grasp. He always searches and misses. His Eternal Beloved never unveils Himself to his logical intellect. He has to transcend his logical intellect in order to be united with the Transcendent Truth. His consciousness has to rise above the domain of Space, Time and Relativity in order to be in the closest embrace of the Infinite Eternal Absolute Truth. This is the path of True Religion. This is the path of Yoga.

After a good deal of deep thinking, the Upanishadic Rishi also came to the conclusion that Atma is not attainable by means of philosophical dissertation (pravachana) or intellectual acumen (medha) or extensive study (bahusruta); It is attainable only by him to whom It reveals itself (Yameva esha vrinute tena labhyah). A truth-seeker has however to make his consciousness fit for the self-revelation of Atma. It does not reveal itself to the consciousness of a person, howsoever intellectually gifted he may be, unless he is free from all vices and evil propensities, unless his mind is pure and steady and calm and tranquil, unless his entire consciousness is with intense longing directed towards the Divine Light.

So long as the sense of Ego predominates in the consciousness of a person, so long as he thinks that by dint of his own intellectual power he will unveil the true nature of Atma, the veil will remain in the form of his egoistic vanity. For the attainment of fitness for the self-revelation of Atma, the consciousness must be freed from the sense of Ego as well as all egoistic desires and attachments and inclinations of the mind. It is upon moral and spiritual self-preparation of the truth-seeker that fitness for Truth-realization depends. This means the systematic practice of Yoga. This is the conclusion at which the Upanishadic Rishi arrived.

It is to be noted that by the term Atma the Rishi meant the True Self of all existences the True Self of every individual as well as of the Universe -i.e., the Absolute Truth. The Upanishadic Rishi uses the term Brahma also in the same sense. Though the term Atma primarily means the True Self of an individual and the term Brahma means the Supreme, the Greatest, the Infinite and Eternal, i.e., the True Self of the Universe, the essential identity of the True Self of the Individual and the True Self of the Universe was revealed to the illumined consciousness of the Rishi hence Atma and Brahma are often used synonymously in the Upanishads, meaning the Absolute Truth. The Seers of the Upanishads have sometimes described all the Vedas and Vedangas, and as a matter of fact all intellectual knowledge, as Avidya (Ignorance) or Apara vidya (Lower knowledge). Para vidya (True knowledge) is that by which the Absolute Truth is directly realized (Yaya tad aksharam adhigamyate). This Para-vidya is Yoga-vidya the spiritual approach to the Absolute Truth.

Admission of shortcomings

The Vedanta-Darshan, which is the most widely accepted philosophical system of India, and in fact almost all the principal philosophical systems of India, frankly confessed that the method of logical argumentation was incapable of independently leading a truth-seeker to the final Truth (Tarka-apratisthanat). They all practically admitted that there could be no such logical argument as could not be refuted by counter-arguments. They therefore had to accept the spiritual experiences of enlightened seers (Agama or Aptavachana or Shrutis) as much more reliable evidence with regard to the nature of the Ultimate Truth. Many great sages spoke of the Ultimate Truth as beyond the range of thought and speech (Avang-manasa-gocharam), and they warned the truth-seekers against the application of logical categories for the ascertainment of the character of transcendental realities (Acintyah khalu ye bhava na tan tarkena yojayet). They advised the earnest seekers of Truth to have faith in the spiritual experiences of enlightened saints and to practically follow their instructions for the personal realization of the Same.

Philosophers, while expounding their particular views about the Ultimate Truth, often cite as evidence the spiritual experiences of universally adored saints and make them the bases of their logical argumentation. But, in doing so, they have necessarily to rely upon the verbal expressions given by the saints of their inner spiritual experiences, which are according to their own confessions beyond the scope of verbal expressions and logical argumentations. Naturally, the advocates of different systems of philosophy put different interpretations to these verbal expressions and try to strengthen their own views with their help.

The Vedantic System of Philosophy has been divided into a number of separate philosophical sub-systems, holding separate views with regard to the nature of the Ultimate Reality and strongly refuting each other’s conceptions and arguments, though they are all based upon the sayings of the Upanishads and the Bhagavad Gita, which all of them believe to be the verbal embodiments of the Truth of the supra-intellectual spiritual plane. Each of them tries to establish logically that its own interpretation of the sayings is the only correct one and that the interpretations given by other schools are wrong.

Similarly, the Buddhist philosophers became divided into different schools, though they all claimed to expound rationally the spiritual experiences of Lord Buddha, as expressed in his words. This has been the fate of all earnest attempts at the philosophical interpretations of the spiritual experiences of enlightened saints. Logical argumentations almost invariably lead to differences of views.

The path of Yoga does not require any such intellectual speculation. It does not necessitate the framing of hypotheses and theories and their testing by logical argumentations. A truth-seeker in this path is not involved in academic controversies with the advocates of divergent philosophical views. He is not interested in the logical establishment of any particular theory or dogma, and hence he does not feel impelled to refute the rival theories or dogmas upheld by other schools of thinkers. His aim is not to acquire an objective knowledge of the Absolute Truth and to form a logically valid intellectual conception of the supra-logical supra-intellectual Reality.

He aims at the direct spiritual experience of the Truth on a supra-logical supra-intellectual plane of consciousness. He advances in his path with an indomitable faith in the possibility of such experience. He does not create confusion in his mind by an attempt at an intellectual ascertainment of the nature of such experience, which is expected to be attained in the supra-intellectual plane, or of the possibility of any such transcendent experience.

It is as a matter of course impossible to demonstrate in any lower plane of existence and consciousness what is or is not possible in the higher and higher planes of existence and consciousness. What may be quite natural in a higher plane of existence and consciousness would appear unnatural or supernatural or logically untenable in a lower plane. A child cannot form any idea of the aesthetic and emotional experiences which are most natural to young men and women, though the objects stimulating such experiences may be present before the eyes of the child. A person, whose artistic faculty is not sufficiently developed, fails to appreciate and enjoy the beauty of a sweet song or a nice poem or a fine picture, though these may be the spontaneous expressions of the inner sentiments of a musician or a poet or a painter.

Similarly, the nature of the direct inner experiences of an enlightened Yogi cannot be an object of intellectual conception to any person, whose consciousness has not been sufficiently refined and has not ascended to the higher spiritual plane through the systematic practice of Yoga. Even an enlightened Yogi himself fails to give an accurate linguistic expression to his deeper spiritual experiences. He can guide a Truth-seeker in the path of advancement towards his truthful and blissful experiences, but he cannot give him a correct idea of his own experience of Truth by means of language or prove to him the possibility of such Truth-realization by means of logical reasoning. The Yogi’s method of search for the Absolute Truth is based on the idea that though the Absolute Truth may not be an object of intellectual comprehension and logical reasoning, It unveils Itself to the human consciousness, when this consciousness is adequately purified and refined and concentrated and thus becomes perfectly free from the impediments in the way of the self-revelation of the Truth to it.

A Yogi, therefore, instead of making futile attempts to form a perfect logical conception of the nature of the Absolute in the lower empirical planes of his consciousness, directs his attention and energy to the progressive purification, refinement and concentration of his empirical consciousness and its elevation to higher and higher spiritual planes, until the supreme transcendent plane is reached, in which the veil between the Ultimate Truth and the consciousness vanishes altogether and the consciousness is absolutely united with the Truth.

In the normal nature of a man, his empirical consciousness is related to and conditioned by his physical body, his senses and nervous system and brain, his mind and intellect and heart and his individual ego. All these together constitute the embodiment of his self-conscious soul. The soul appears to be imprisoned in this complex psycho-physical embodiment. A man’s perceptions and inferences, imaginations and reasonings, feelings and sentiments, desires and aspirations, thoughts and ideas, are all conditioned and determined by the characters and limitations of this embodiment. Hence they are all confined within the world of finitude and relativity.

A man, however, feels within his innermost consciousness, a persistent urge for transcending all limitations and bondages of this psycho-physical organism and attaining and enjoying the Absolute Truth, the Absolute Beauty, the Absolute Goodness, the Absolute Bliss of which, under his normal conditions, he cannot even form any positive conception. It is this inner urge of his soul which does not allow him to get permanent satisfaction from any achievement, however glorious, in this world of finite transient relative phenomena, and always prompts him to seek for more and more. Tatah kim, tatah kim–what after this, what after this? It is this inherent spiritual urge of his innermost consciousness which assures him (though not in an argumentative way) of the possibility of the apparently natural limitations of his psycho-physical embodiment being transcended by him by means of some appropriate form of self-discipline, and of the Absolute Truth-Beauty-Goodness-Bliss, which his soul craves for, being directly realized.

With the ultimate object of the attainment of this supreme spiritual experience, a Yogi devotes himself to the practice of such courses of self-discipline as may free his consciousness from the limitations which the psycho-physical embodiment imposes upon it. He holds before himself as the practical object of his pursuit an ideal state of his own consciousness, perfectly free from all impurities and distractions and doubts and perplexities, perfectly free from all desires and attachments and passions and propensities, perfectly free from all argumentative thought and preconceived notions, perfectly free from the sense of individual ego and the sense of distinction between the subject and the object, the internal and the external, the self and the not-self. It is in such a perfectly pure and refined, calm and tranquil, desireless and thoughtless, egoless and subject-object-less, transcendent state of the consciousness that the Absolute Truth-Beauty-Goodness-Bliss is expected to unconditionally reveal Itself, not as an object of the consciousness, but as the true Soul or Essence of the consciousness. The consciousness is in that state perfectly illumined by this Soul, and no difference exists between the consciousness and the Absolute Soul of all existences and experiences. In that transcendent experience no time or space exists, no relativity or causality exists, no distinction between Truth and Beauty and Goodness and Bliss exists. It is one absolute integrated experience, which cannot be described in terms of the analytical and synthetical categories of our normal intellectual understanding. The experience carries its certitude within itself, and it does not require any extraneous proof. Logical reasoning can neither deny its possibility, nor furnish any proof of its validity. But a Yogi, who is blessed with this experience, is free from all doubts. His yearning for the Absolute is perfectly satisfied. An earnest aspirant for Truth-realization advances in the path of Yoga under the guidance of such a Truth-realizer with, faith and perseverance.

In the Yoga-Shastras, this transcendent state of the consciousness is called Samadhi. The whole course of self-discipline in the path of Yoga is directed towards the attainment of this Samadhi, in which alone the direct and perfect experience of the Absolute Reality is possible. Samadhi is a thoroughly practicable ideal. Every step of progress in the direction of the realization of this ideal can be practically tested and verified. Hence Yoga is regarded as the most practical path to the realization of the ultimate Ideal of human life. As Bhisma says in the Mahabharata–Direct experience is the basis of Yoga (Pratyaksha-hetavo yogah). Samadhi is not a static condition of the consciousness. There are higher and higher stages of Samadhi, and in each higher stage there is a deeper realization of Truth.

Next: The Nature of Samadhi-Experience

Further Reading:

• Foundations of Yoga
• Where to Begin
• Vairagya (Dispassion): an essential ingredient in spiritual life.