Godown of Sugar

[warning : long post]

The Vedas say – “Through him everything shines. Everything exists because of his existence.”

He is the magician the real one, the magic is his work and it is the illusion. But for us because of our ignorance and also because his magic is so true, so strong and so perfect that we start to believe more in the magic than the magician. Because of our body, our innate affinity towards the magic is more inclined than to the magician. We easily get deviated by the creations of the creator and as the illusion grows, the creator cease to exist.

The eager mind asks why so? Why He will hide himself from his own creations?

Short answer – he is not at all hiding himself, his presence is everywhere, but yes we have failed to see him, or worst we have consciously wanted not to see him anymore. He comes to us in many forms but we don’t recognize him anymore.

And the long answer goes like this... It is for the same reason a magician values his magic more than himself. The magician wants the audience to appreciate his magic, his expertise in magic and to do that the magician must become invisible to raise his magic. The magician willingly wants his magic to be bigger than himself. God created this world not to please anybody but the “magic” is just a part of him. He is witness to everything; he is the cause of everything and yet interferes with nothing.

He is the sole witness to our existence. He is the observer of our three states – awake, dreaming and deep sleep.

Awake – when we are awake, our senses make us aware of this world and we accept it through these senses. In this state we realize that there are two worlds – the inside world, that is “I” and outside world, that is everything that is not “I”.

Dreaming – in this state the outside world is non-existent. In dream we dwell on the inside world. The inside world is not constrained by the limitations of outside world. Surprisingly, we don’t need regular senses to feel the inside world and that is reason that even blind people can dream.

Deep sleep – in deep sleep both the inner and outer world cease to exist. It is this state when we lose sense of time, space or for that matter any dimension.

God is beyond these states, he is the observer of the states and therefore irrespective of our knowledge of our existence (life and death), he exists. Hence, regardless how much we know him or don’t know him, he exists on his own accord.

He is aloof from his creations. He is detached from his creations. He is neutral. He is not affected by anything and yet everything is his effect only.

Shri Ramkrishna gave a great example to comprehend the paradox. He equates God with a lamp. The lamp gives light. In that light a person can read a good book or commit a crime. There is no virtue or sin that the lamp incurs by the goodness or evilness of actions carried in its light. It cannot choose to light up when someone reads a good book and similarly cannot choose to go off when someone is committing a crime. The lamp is isolated observer, indifferent and without prejudice. He is neutral and impartial because good, evil, darkness, and light are his only. These are there because he is and yet he is immune to all this. He is everything and yet he himself is unaffected that’s the nature of him.

The curious mind asks another question. If he is so invisible because of illusions, if he is so difficult to define then how simple mortals can realize him?

The answer is already known to us since our beginning. Whole mankind have been idol worshiper in one form or other. Some looked towards the sky and prayed “thinking/believing” his existence to be there. Some took some stones and believed his existence to be there. Some took plants, some took animals, and some took humans to be his existence and embodiment. He is there in the cross, he is there in the arc, he is there in the om and yet people who know anything of him, know that he is none of it, these are just symbols of him. All untrained minds need a symbol to get a basic hold of him. As mind progresses, it becomes less dependent on symbols to realize him.

Shri Ramkrishna explained beautifully, he said that it is irrelevant what form or formlessness to choose to symbolize him because he is there in both. The most important aspect is whether one can see Him in form or formlessness. If one doesn’t than both are useless; and if one sees Him than both are equally useful and effective.

The inquiring mind asks again, but how can one know which form to concentrate on?

It is always easy to seek him through a “form” because it is so natural to us. One just cannot opt to seek him in formless state. Even if it is formless, it still will have some form. Man will only be able to seek him through “form” till he is aware of his ‘I’ consciousness. As long as one has this ‘I’ awareness he will continue to seek him in “form” only irrespective of nature of form. Only when man has lost the ‘I’ awareness only then he can truly seek Him in attribute less and formless nature (nirguna, nirakara).

And because seeking him in true attribute less and formless nature is so difficult and almost impossible for most of us, he comes to us not only in form but in live form as human. To make us aware of his existence he came to us in the form of Ram, Krishna, Jesus, Muhammad, Mahavir, Buddha and Nanak. He visited earth and came to us in “flesh-and-blood” so that we all can see him, hear him, touch him, feel him and then follow him.

Vedas say that “no one can limit him” he is form and formless and then neither of it too. It doesn’t matter which form of worship it is, what matters is that the worship must be with ‘bhakti’(devotion) and that is the easiest and surest way to seek him.

The eager mind pops up another question, how much of him can we know?

Answer is, as much as one can, but certainly, no one can truly fathom him completely. Once an ant foraging for food found a heap of sugar, the sugar leaked out from a sack kept over a bench. The ant ate just one grain and then could not eat anymore. He picked up another grain and went towards its nest. While walking back home he thought next time I will take the whole heap. We know that how foolish this ant is. The ant will not be able to consume the heap in its whole life (or even multiple lives). This heap was just a small part of sugar that fell from the sack and that sack was outside the godown that had thousands of sugar sacks. The bottom line is this that in billion, trillion, zillion lives the ant will not be able to consume it. It may eat few sacks of sugar and still it will not have any effect on the amount of sugar the godown has. In a sense we are just like that ant trying to truly understand Him in this miniscule life of ours. Even if we have millions of lives, still He will remain unknown and unexplored.

Once a wise man said stop comprehending him, it’s beyond our comprehension, it’s a waste of time, we got this life to worship him, therefore if we can just get a grain of God from God’s godown our lives will be full. We all need just little bit of Him and he is merciful enough to give us that.

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And if one can understand the language then this is the one of the greatest songs to praise and understand HIM. Naaz Khiyaalvi wrote everything he could feel and Nusrat saab gave it the soul through his hypnotic voice. Enjoy it!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jo0EqAWHGdg&feature=related