DEIVATHIN KURAL # 94 (Vol #4) Dated 31 Oct 2010

DEIVATHIN KURAL # 94 (Vol #4) Dated 31 Oct 2010

(These e-mails are translations of talks given by Periyaval of Kanchi Kamakoti Peetam, over a period of some 60 years while he was the pontiff in the earlier part of the last century. These have been published by Vanadi Padippagam, Chennai, in seven volumes of a thousand pages each as Deivathin Kural. Today we are proceeding from the first para on page number 527 of Vol 4 of the Tamil original. The readers may note that here in 'man/he' includes 'woman/she' too mostly. These e-mails are all available at http://Advaitham.blogspot.com updated constantly)
22. All thoughts and feelings are originated, experienced, recognised, recorded, remembered, analysed and planned for the future in the mind! When they, those thoughts are not there, we feel that we are like a stone or a piece of wood and hence, we come to believe that when we refer to as I or me or we, it is this body or mind! But even without the body and mind, we are there. There is something else which is the life of us, the real we, which enables us to be and live, breathe and think; which when absent, the body is dead a cadaver! All thinking and feeling are no more in the cadaver for the cadaver! This something let us call it ‘the Uyir Tattva or Life Principle’, even after leaving the body, though not in this body, still continues to live!
23. (KTSV adds: This is the Halloween season. So, please do not let your mind run to such concepts such as ‘Living Dead {which most of us are anyhow} & World of Spirits or aavi ulagam’ and such things now! During Halloween the children wear all sorts of disguises. We will come back to this point about wearing of disguises and hiding our real selves a little later. Please concentrate on what is being said here by PeriyavaaL about Life Principle and the mind!) When we are dead, though the body is not the abode anymore, the Life Principle is not dead. So is the mind also not dead. To go through further experiences and do Karma, the Life Principle in that individual, called the Jeevan or Jeeva (a name given for the sake of convenience only) continues to assume yet another body and starts of straight away to do its Karma as before! There may or may not be a time gap between the ending of life in one body and the start of assuming another body. But what does continue is the life, separate identity as being separate and a whole list of, likes, dislikes, desires, wants, aspirations and knowledge! That is how we do see that we are all are born with an unbelievable stored data of such things (though some are more noticeably so)! For example, we come across a baby which takes up a Guitar or VeeNa and starts playing on it as though it has had years of training! This Life Principle starts working out the effects of its past Karma, as though continuing from where it left off, in a new body in a totally different environment altogether! The Life Principle having left one body takes up another and so does the mind, continue from where it left off and makes it function from yet another body. At the times when the mind is not functioning such as during sleep and swoon, Life Principle is there; but, when the Life Principle is not there the mind cannot function at all. At that time the body deteriorates, decomposes and disintegrates. From this we can infer that the mind and body are both dependent upon the Life Principle and have no existence apart from it. After the Life Principle having left one body and entered another body, the old mind can function in a new body, only after and not before! The Life Principle is the basis on which are dependent, the body and the mind! This idea should be clear from the foregoing analysis.
24. Awareness of the Life Principle Sans Mind. Devoid of the mind, its thoughts, resultant Karma of actions and their good and bad effects of further ties and connections; there is the happily pure awareness of being: that is the Adwaita Moksham or Sat – Chit – Aanandam or Being – Awareness – Bliss! The very word Jeevan being Life, how can this Life Principle be lifeless Jadam? Your question can be that, since when the mind was absent, silent or stand still, during sleep or when one is in a swoon; we were like a piece of wood or rock, inanimate, without any feelings or awareness; so, we can conclude that presence or absence of mind makes all the difference; is it not so? Yes! I agree with you that when the mind was absent or not functional, it made all the difference between being animate and inanimate! But the point to understand is that, it is the mind with Jeeva Sakti becomes animate and mind without the Jeeva Sakti becomes inanimate! It is the Jeeva Sakti or Life Principle that makes all the difference and not the mind. Mind is only a tool for recording, interpreting, remembering, recovering, retrieving, analysing, projecting, planning and processing the data so obtained! When disconnected to the Life Principle it is like any electronic equipment or instrument not connected to the battery or when the battery is down and out! So, for these reasons, it is the mind that is a Jadam! Life Principle remains ever live. That is why even during sleeping and swooning, the critical bodily functions such as blood circulation by the pumping of the heart and breathing; continue as before. In God’s Leela of Maya, we completely identify ourselves with the vicissitudes of the mind as our own ups and downs! That is the reason why, we are not able to understand as to what would be the condition of the Life Principle, when our mind is not there. Mind is like the tool or instrument through which we understand and interpret the world with all things in it as well as all the events that occur. So without the mind, or when the mind is not functional, we are not able to have / know / feel or understand any of the experiences! But just for a moment stop and think without the mind! If our eyes are closed or temporarily or permanently blind, is the world not seen or does all the light vanish? If our clock has stopped, it does not stop the time!
25. Point made is that, even after the mind is dead, awareness remains. That is the awareness of the Life Principle, which is forever. That is Chaitanyam, Gnaanam, Chit, Brhmam, Satyam, Shivam, Sundaram and so on and so on! It is wrong to say that it is aware. It is Awareness itself. It is not correct to say that it has Gnaanam. It is Gnaanam itself! To know is consciousness. But Life’s consciousness is Consciousness with a capital ‘C’!
26. So, even when our mind is not there, to be as the Being as the Life Principle, is the real existence. The hands, head, ears, nose, skin, legs are our tools. We are not the tools or parts of the body. We have a body. But, we are not the body. Similarly, we have a mind. But, we are not the mind! The one thing without which we cannot be is our life, the Life Principle! That is our real being. We could be without the mind, but we cannot be without life. So, we are life. Because if we were the mind, in sleep when the mind is defunct, we should cease to exist! But that is not so!
27. Thus there is the real self. It is in itself true happiness and absolute awareness, that is hidden from our own self, awareness and understanding by Maya! Maya has placed the screen of the mind between our real self and our comprehension. Then we think of ourselves as whatever is felt and experienced by the mind. Thus we tend to identify ourselves with the feelings, thoughts and opinions as of the mind! Every one of us is forever wishing to correctly find out our true being. We endeavour to know, to understand and become our true being! Towards this end we are persevering, doing meditation, prayers, tapasya, saadhana, studying the scriptures, listening to philosophers and saints, doing Atma Vichara and so on; pleading with God to remove that screen from our minds that is the cause of ignorance! The real tragedy is that it is the mind itself that is the screen and the cause of our ignorance! But, if we continue with our efforts and prayers with God to remove that screen, if we really melt with our prayers of urgency and sincerity, the screen will also melt and disappear! Like the poet says, “kaadalaagi kasindu kaNNeer malgi...... ...... naadan naamam namah sivaayave”, depending on the level of our sincerity, our success is also assured! Then our real form will shine forth. Instead of feeling that we are not able to understand or comprehend, because of our mind’s not being there, we will start understanding and comprehending, because of it’s not being there! This is when we will have real understanding. Like AruNagiri Naathar says, “tannan tani ninradu taan ariya innam oruvarku isaivippaduvo?” , we will establish ourselves in our true being! Then only we can be in the highest level of self awareness and be happy as happiness itself!
(To be continued.)
Sambhomahadeva.