Jnanis And The Path They Teach, Part Four
Author: Satguru Bodhinatha Veylanswami
Description: Śiva has a form but He is also formless. In deep meditation, Śivajñāna, we can, within the temple of our own heart, see God Śiva’s Holy Form. Śiva is the God of Love. The practice of yoga is the highest pinnacle within our most ancient faith. Meditation must be undertaken by a member of a religion that gives a hope of a future life and does not threaten failure with eternal suffering. Meditation, if it is to lead to jñāna, must begin with a belief that there is no intrinsic evil and encompass the truth of karma. There is no intrinsic evil, however, men act in evil ways because they're not in touch with their soul nature. The Śaiva Samayam is the greatest religion in the world. The Śaiva Samayam is the oldest religion in the world. The worship of God Śiva will bring you knowledge of your divine, inner Self. We follow the arduous path of charyā, kriyā and yoga resulting in jñāna. Then the Quiet comes.
Transcription:
Today we are continuing "Merging with Siva" Chapter 46 entitled: "Jnanis And The Path They Teach" a talk given in 1984.
Lesson 321
"The Nature Of God Śiva
"Śiva has a form but He is also formless. But He does have a form, and He exists in the realm of highest consciousness called the Śivaloka. Śiva has a mind, a superconscious mind that permeates like a plasma all the forms that He creates, all the forms that He preserves and all the forms that He absorbs back into Himself. Śiva is very close to each and every one of us. Śiva’s mind permeates all of us. But when we want to see Śiva’s form and receive His darshan, we go to the Śiva temple, and when the holy priest invokes God Śiva, God Śiva hovers in His body of golden light over the Śivaliṅga. In deep meditation, Śivajñāna, we can, within the temple of our own heart, see God Śiva’s Holy Form.
"God Śiva creates. God Śiva preserves all His creations and, when the creation is no longer needed, absorbs it back into Himself, to create again. Śaivites all over the world love God Śiva. God Śiva loves His devotees. For each step the devotee takes toward Śiva, Śiva takes nine steps toward the devotee. Such are the final conclusions of Śaiva Siddhānta. There is no reason to ever become confused about the many Deities in our wonderful Hindu faith. Is Lord Gaṇeśa our Supreme God? No. Is Lord Murugan our Supreme God? No. They are Gods, two of the many Gods that God Śiva has created.
"But God Śiva is Supreme God, timeless, formless, spaceless, permeating all form, and yet having a form. He is the fullness of everything that fills people from within out. In Śaivism we become stronger, we become fearless, through our worship of Śiva. Members of the Śaiva Samayam, the Śaivite religion, do not fear death, for they know about rebirth. Members of the Śaiva Samayam do not fear an eternal hell; there is no eternal hell. Members of the Śaiva Samayam do not fear their ministers, their priests, swāmīs or gurus. Members of the Śaiva Samayam do not fear God. The lack of fear, therefore, makes you strong. Our saints tell us in the sacred hymns of the Tirumurai that the worship of Śiva makes you strong. The worship of God Śiva brings you intelligence. The worship of God Śiva will bring you knowledge of your divine, inner Self. Remember this as you go forth in life: we do not use weapons in our religion. We follow the path of nonviolence, noninjury to other beings. Our only weapon is our mind, our intelligence.
"Unfortunately, in some, though not all, of the Judaic/Christian sects, the fear of God is prevalent. The distinction between good and bad, heaven and hell, is predominant, causing fears, apprehension and deep mental conflict. Hence, this psychological set-up is not conducive to the practice of yoga, for it arbitrates against the very idea of oneness of man and God which the yogī seeks. Those who have been so indoctrinated often try to meditate, but necessarily do not succeed in its deepest attainments, because of subconscious barriers placed there by a dualistic philosophy."
Lesson 322
"When the Quiet Comes
(That's a great title, "When the Quiet Comes".)
"In order to really meditate to the depth of contemplation, and not merely to quiet mind and emotion and feel a little serenity, you have to be a member of a religion that gives the hope of nondual union with God, that teaches that God is within man, only to be realized. Meditation, if it is to lead to jñāna, must begin with a belief that there is no intrinsic evil and encompass the truth of karma, that we are responsible for our own actions. Such meditation must be undertaken by a member of a religion that gives a hope of a future life and does not threaten failure with eternal suffering, should failure be the result. Such meditation is possible, in fact required, of those who follow the Hindu Dharma. Hence, the practice of yoga is the highest pinnacle within our most ancient faith."
Maybe a comment on "no intrinsic evil" is good. Gurudeva also says in "Dancing with Śiva": "Men act in evil ways because they have lost contact with their soul nature." So just because we say there's no intrinsic evil doesn't mean we're saying that men don't act in evil ways. But men act in evil ways because they're not in touch with their soul nature. So no intrinsic evil is saying that intrinsically in every person there's a soul. But just in some people that soul is really covered up. It hasn't manifested at all. So the whole purpose of life, the whole purpose of society is to help the individual move up in consciousness and start expressing some of the soul nature. So no intrinsic evil verses accepting that people act in evil ways. Not a contradiction.
"If you go through the entire holy scriptures of Śaivism, you will not find our saints singing hymns to Adonai-Yahweh, Buddha or Jesus. Our saints told us to worship God Śiva, the Supreme God, to worship Gaṇeśa first before worshiping Śiva, to worship Lord Murugan. In the old days, there were millions of Śiva temples, from the Himalayan peaks of Nepal, through North and South India, Sri Lanka and what is now Malaysia and Indonesia. Everyone was of one mind, worshiping Śiva together, singing His praises with a one voice. As a result, India was spiritually unified. It was then the wealthiest country in the world. The worship of Śiva will give you wealth. The worship of Śiva will give you health. The worship of Śiva will give you knowledge. The worship of Śiva will fill your heart with love and compassion.
"The Śaiva Samayam is the greatest religion in the world. The Śaiva Samayam is the oldest religion in the world. The Śaiva Samayam has yoga. It has great temples, great pandits, ṛishis and scriptures. All the saints who sang the songs of Śiva told us how to worship Śiva and how we should live our Śaivite lives. We must all follow those instructions. In singing those songs to Śiva, Śiva will give you everything that you ask for. He will give you everything that you ask for, because Śiva is the God of Love.
"Our saints have sung that Śiva is within us, and we are within Śiva. Knowing that, fear and worry and doubt are forever gone from our mind.
When the mind has resolved all of its differences through worship, penance, dhāraṇā, dhyāna, then the inner which is stillness itself is known. Then the inner is stronger than the outer. It is then easy to see every other person going through what has to be gone through during his or her particular stage on the path. Opposites are there, but no opposites are seen. This is why it is easy for the wise—made wise through spiritual unfoldment—to say, “There is no injustice in the world. There is no evil, no sin.”
"We only see opposites when our vision is limited, when we have not experienced totally. There is a point of view which resolves all contradictions and answers all questions. Yet to be experienced is yet to be understood. Once experienced and understood, the Quiet comes. The karmas are quiet. This is the arduous path of charyā, kriyā and yoga resulting in jñāna. This is the path of not only endeavoring to unfold the higher nature but, at the same time and toward the same end, dealing positively and consciously with the remnants of the lower nature. Following this spiritual path, we find ourselves effortlessly replacing charity for greed and dealing with, rather than merely suppressing, the instinctive feelings of jealousy, hatred, desire and anger."
Then I have as a comment.
In the Mata Description of Kadavul Temple on our website:
"MATA – THE HINDU DENOMINATION"
So when we were working on this concept of describing a Hindu Temple we were setting a model that other temples could follow in terms of talking about the denomination, the philosophy, the priesthood, the scriptures on which the ceremonies are based, the only temple I've seen who copied it is the Scott Road Murugan Temple in Malaysia. They have the same idea, of course they follow the Meykandar philosophy but they like the idea of giving a precise description of the temple. Said another way, it's confusing to Hindus to into different temples, experience different things, hear different statements and there's no reference to what the temple represents. In my Pub. Desk on this I compared it to Indian restaurants. Indian restaurant, it just doesn't say an Indian restaurant, it just doesn't say a Hindu temple, it says: South Indian cuisine, North Indian cuisine, veg, veg, non-veg, non-veg and it even gets more specific, gets into regional cuisines, you know, Chettinad cuisine. So encouraging Hindu temples at least to describe themselves as well as restaurants do. That's the idea.
"Kadavul Hindu Temple follows the Saivite tradition, the oldest of the four main denominations of Hinduism. In the Tamil language of South India, our religion is known as Saiva Samayam, or simply Saivam. We worship the one Supreme Being as God Śiva, and Lords Ganesha and Murugan, whom God Siva created to assist Him in the care of His great creation. In Saivism, Shakti is God Śiva’s manifest power and is not separate from Him. This is depicted most clearly in the image of God Siva as Ardhanarishvara, whose left side is female and right side is male. In Kadavul there is no separate Deity representing Shakti, for in our tradition the Supreme Being is neither male nor female, but encompasses both."
And my way of paraphrasing the main concept is:
"Kadavul is a temple to the Supreme Being who this denomination of HIndus calls Śiva."
So that's a nice way to explain it to someone who's not familiar with Hindu temples. If you just say "Oh that this is a temple to God Śiva" then God Śiva then becomes one of many gods, possibly. So, but if you say it's a temple to the Supreme Being, who, this denomination of Hindus calls Śiva, then puts it in the right perspective.
Thank you very much. Have a wonderful day.
[End of transcript.]