The Esoteric Significance of the Kathopanishad - 6.5. Swami Krishnananda.

-

 


----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Wednesday,March 24, 2021. 09:25. AM.
Chapter 6: The Meaning of Not Coming Back - 5.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------



This wholeness that we feel in ourselves is the indivisibility of reality that pushes itself forward in every nook and corner of the world, in every cranny and creek, in every sand particle and atom. Every atom is a completeness by itself; it is not a fragment. A nucleus around which a few electrons revolve is a total atom. It is not a half atom, a one-fourth atom. Even if some of the limbs of our body are amputated, we will not feel that we are fifty-percent persons or one-fourth or seventy-five percent. If all the limbs are severed, we are still wholes. A person with no legs and no hands is not a half person; he is a whole person nevertheless. This is a proof that we do not seem to be bodies. We are not the body; otherwise, if the limbs are severed we would feel that some of our existence has gone, that we are only eighty-five percent. No one feels like that. This shows a person is not the body. Here is a great proof which is obvious and standing before us, staring in its reality.

There is a peculiar novelty in each person, each organic living body, which is a wholeness in itself, and it is not a physical, material, economic wholeness. Materially, physically, economically, we cannot be wholes. Nevertheless, we are wholes in a different sense. This mystical transcendent wholeness in us is the real I, the real we. Remember, it is proven hereby that we cannot identify ourselves with this body or anything connected with the body – the wealth, the land, the buildings, or even relations of every kind because they can be severed – but the sense of wholeness that we feel in ourselves cannot be severed from us. The feeling that we are one self-identical individual cannot get dismembered by any amount of affection of the physical body.

This wholeness of ours is a mystical, spiritual wholeness. What we are in ourselves is difficult to understand. If we are not the body, what else are we? There is no immediate answer to this question. A very vigilant and cautious approach is expected on our part to try to know what we really are. While we are little human beings compared to many others in the world, in comparison with the large universe in front of us, we still seem to be important persons. There is a status enjoyed by each individual. There is a self-respect which each one of us expects from others and enjoys even within one’s own self. Even if we are absolutely alone to ourselves, we have a sense of self-regard: I am. We do not feel that we are one-millionth of a human being because we are dissociated from other people. This mystery is the mystery of reality.

In communion, which is the yoga, it is this real wholeness in us that is to get united with the real wholeness of the world. Inasmuch as all things are made in almost a similar manner, the analysis that applies to our wholeness or our self-existent, self-complete, self-sufficient being will also apply to everyone else and everything else. In the same way as we do not seem to be physical bodies, nothing else in the world also can be called a physical body. What applies to us applies to everybody else also. By a little fragment of an analysis we have come to know that we do not appear to be the physical body. If that is the case, no one else is a physical body either. Then when we speak to a person, to whom are we speaking? When we befriend an individual, whom are we befriending? When we encounter a thing, what are we encountering? Not the physical body, not the physical structure which does not seem to be the essential nature of anything, including our own self.

To be continued ...


=========================================================================

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Esoteric Significance of the Kathopanishad : 2-3

-
Image
30/10/2018 The Esoteric Significance of the Kathopanishad : 2-3 Chapter 2: Nachiketas’ First Two Boons : 3. In a reverse process, we can dissolve everything into space. Earth can become water, water can become fire, fire can become air, and air can become space. So space, which is apparent emptiness before us, is capable of containing within itself the entire physical cosmos. Therefore, space is not non-material. It is nothing but material substance. For one reason, it is an object of perception. We can see space. Anything that is visualised or capable of being contacted by any sense organ is physical, and space is such. Hence, the final condition of the world seems to be only space-time. We are using two words, ‘space’ and ‘time’, for want of better expression. Actually, space and time are not two things. It is one peculiar, indescribable something which is, for want of better words, called a space-time complex. It is better to call it a compound because it is an indivisible
Read more
-
Image
Chapter-1. Section-1. Mantram-13. 1. In this mantram Nachiketas is asking Lord of Death, the second of his boons. 2. Naciketas is now asking Lord of Death, to give the secret knowledge regarding the karma that is to be done by a mortal in the world, 3. So that, as a result of its reactions he would come come to gain the Elysian pleasures of the Heavans. 4. Naciketas is requesting Lord of Death, to initiate him into the secret of the rituals by which the performer can reach immortality.  
Read more

The Secret of the Katha Upanishad : 4.3. Swami Krishnananda.

-
Image
======================================================================= Wednesday, February  01, 2023. 06:00 Discourse - 4.3. Post -22. ======================================================================== Our soul within may be compared to the Lord seated in a chariot. This body of ours, this individuality, this personality, may be regarded as a chariot in which is seated the soul- consciousness. The chariot is driven by a charioteer, a driver. The intellect in us is the charioteer. The reins are the operations of the mind. The horses which pull or drag this chariot are the senses—the eyes, ears, etc. The roads along which this chariot is driven by the charioteer with the help of the horses are the objects of the senses. All this is made possible by a joint activity of the Atman, the senses and the mind. This is a very concise and beautiful description, symbolic, dramatic, full of meaning and profundity. This chariot is to be driven right to the Abode of Vishnu—tad vishnoh paramam
Read more