Kathopanishad : ( 04/03/2013. )

30/05/2018 Chapter 1: The World is an Arena of Sacrifice-8. The little gesture of sacrifice that we communicate in respect of others is a tendency towards movement in the direction the higher world. Our world is this body only, and when we do a little sacrifice we have transcended this bodily world and extended it to the realm of other people’s existence. We cannot have any sense of affection for other people unless we have overcome the sense of satisfaction with only this bodily world. If this body were all and I am totally satisfied with living in this body only, there would be no point in my talking to another person. I would totally mind my own business. The gesture of good will, in whatever form it may be expressed, is a tendency to the recognition of an existence of a world transcending the physical world of body. Here is a philosophical note attached to the story that I am trying to narrate. Vajasravasa performed this yajna, and offered everything that he possess

18/05/2018 Chapter 1: The World is an Arena of Sacrifice-7. Sacrifice is parting with something which one possesses. It may be the offering of ghee when we actually utter the mantras and conclude with saying svaha. We offer to the sacred fire some charu or holy ghee or some such thing. Some article which we possess, which belongs to us, is offered as a gesture of parting with our own little joy for the sake of a larger joy, maybe in heaven. The yajna, or the sacrifice, which Vajasravasa the sage performed was called vishwajit, a sacrifice which is not known to people these days and not undertaken by anyone nowadays. A world-conquering sacrifice was vishwajit, as we have Indrajit; one who has conquered Indra is called Indrajit, one who conquers the universe is vishwajit. Vajasravasa the sage performed a yajna called vishwajit for the conquering of the blessedness of heavenly satisfaction. He gave away all his possessions because it is laid down that the more is the charity

07/05/2018 Chapter 1: The World is an Arena of Sacrifice-6. Now we are coming to a very interesting feature of human existence itself, which I was trying to identify with sacrifice. If life cannot be equated wholly with activity and we can be alive even without being active, and therefore, life may be something different from what we call action or performance, then yajna or sacrifice need not necessarily be the ritualistic performances with which we are usually familiar in orthodox circles. The concern of man, and of all living beings, is primarily the instinct of living. It is the instinct to exist, to live, a word which you cannot define adequately. You do not know what it is to live. You may say to live is to do something. On a careful study of this situation you will realise that to live need not necessarily mean to do something. There may be something in you which cannot be equated with activity of any kind. You, the so-called I or you, evidently, obviously, indescriba