Kathopanishad : The Science of the Inner Life 1- 6 & 7. by Swami Krishnananda

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Monday, January 03, 2022. 7:00. PM.

1.INTRODUCTION : 6 & 7.

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6. THE PROCESS OF WITHDRAWAL :



The energy that is spent by the senses should be conserved through the stoppage of the activity of the senses. When the senses are prevented from their functions, there is a natural revolt of the senses, as a reaction to the attempt at their subdual. The reason for this revolt is that the energy that is withdrawn from the senses is, usually, not utilised well. No energy can rest in suspension, without being used; it shall find a way out. Hence the totality of sense-energy should be dissolved in the mind, so that there may not be any chance or possibility of its being expressed once again through the senses. But the mind also, being an organ which is an extrovert in nature, may project itself again through the senses, if the energy is allowed to stay in the mind without being utilised for a purpose. Generally, forced stoppage of sense-activity without proper discrimination results in nervousness, excitement, confusion and ultimately a kind of mental aberration. 



For this reason, the energy of the mind should be spent in the process of purifying it and transforming it into the purity of intelligence. The character of intelligence is not dynamic energy, but unruffled consciousness. Consciousness does not require itself to be spent out, because there is nothing subtler than consciousness. But, when the mental energy is transformed into the intellect, it remains in the individual in the form of a dynamic power. Power is always objective and tends to motion. Power cannot rest in itself and so forces itself out in some way or the other. The intellectual energy should therefore be reduced to universal consciousness or Mahat, where there is no danger of power getting itself externalised. The Mahat should further be reduced to the Santa-Atman or the Absolute Self which is free from even the possibility of objective consciousness. This is the ultimate Goal. The drift of the whole statement is that all ideas, names and forms, actions and their results, have to be resolved into their Source, by a knowledge of its absoluteness.


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7.THE PATH OF THE SEEKER :





The Sruti says, "Arise, Awake! Through obtaining men of wisdom, know it. A sharpened edge of a razor, hard to tread, a difficult path it is – thus sages declare." The individuals of the universe are all sleeping persons or dreamers in the night of ignorance. They are exhorted to wake up to the day of knowledge. The path of Sadhana is beset with great dangers. The Sadhaka has to experience sorrows and very unpleasant conditions in the process of the transformation of the individual into the Supreme Reality. Knowledge arises, in the beginning, not through mere self-effort, but through the company of the wise, the result of which is accelerated by the effects of past meritorious deeds. Self-effort takes the form of an intellectual undertaking, and the intellect being very strongly influenced by internal convictions and experiences of the individual concerned, the effort is many times not well directed. Every right effort should be preceded by right thinking, and no right thinking is possible as long as the individual is controlled by personal prejudices and desires. Hence the need for the company of the wise, which shall break open the fort of preconceived notions in the individual. 



Further, the path is a very difficult one to tread. The search for Truth is attended with many dangers. The Sadhaka is likely to be tempted, opposed, misled or held up on the way. The inner propensities take concrete forms and present themselves before the seeker because of his attempt at concentration of mind. Concentration is a death-blow given to mental desires, and hence the latter rise up with all might to put an end to the practice of concentration. Moreover, Sadhana is the method of the disintegration of the personality consisting of the five material sheaths. These sheaths include within themselves the substance of the entire universe. Therefore, when the aspirant turns his face against these sheaths, he is actually acting against the lower natural current of the whole external universe of manifestation. Here lies the danger of the practice. 



The objective powers of the universe rebel against the internal consciousness, and though this consciousness is more powerful than any objective power, it does not appear to be so because of its non-manifestation. The aspirant seems to be defeated, because his condition is one where the external tendencies are opposed and the internal Self is not known. Hence, he has no help until a higher state is reached, though he is unconsciously being led higher by the law of the Absolute. It is in this helpless condition of the absence of knowledge that the power of the result of previous discriminative practices raises the individual above the material entanglements. The object of knowledge is too subtle to be easily known, and the object of the senses is too gross to be easily avoided. 



This is the reason why there is every likelihood of the seeker's falling back into relative experience. But there is one great helping hand which pushes forward every Sadhaka, in spite of the several oppositions before him. Every bit of action that is done as a Sadhana for perfection produces such a power that it can never be destroyed by any material force of the universe. When a Sadhaka is opposed by an external power, the impression of the previous practice urges him forward, and this forward march is another act which adds another fresh stock of power to the already existing one. Every step taken forward adds more power to the previous stock, and the cumulative effect of Sadhana-Sakti becomes so great that it is able to overcome any external power. 



The subject is always more powerful than the object, because the subject is conscious and influences the object. The knower has a power over the known. The fact that the knower has the power to know the entirety of Nature shows that Nature is subservient to the knower. If the knower were less than the known, it would never have been possible for the knower to have complete knowledge of anything. Knowledge of everything means transcending everything in quality as well as in quantity. The path to perfection is, therefore, the way to the expansion of the localised being into limitless existence. Since every being is essentially consciousness, it is possible for everyone to become the greatest and the best, and exist as the Absolute, in the end.

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NEXT


8. THE LIBERATION OF THE INDIVIDUAL


To be continued .....


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