Light of the Spirit Blog

We believe in God, the undivided Unity, embracing all in oneness.

We believe in the Holy and all-glorious Trinity, Who pervades the whole universe, Who dwells also in the spirit of man.

We believe in Jesus Christ, the Lord of love and wisdom, first among his brethren, Who leads us to the glory of the Father, who is himself the way, the truth, and the life.

We believe in the law of good which rules the world and by which one day all His sons shall reach the feet of the Father, however far they stray.

We strive towards the ancient narrow path that leads to life eternal

So shall His blessing rest on us and peace forevermore. Amen.

This Creed is found in the fourth edition of the Liturgy of the Liberal Catholic Church. It is so exactly right and to the point that I feel you will benefit from a brief commentary on it.

We believe in God, the undivided Unity, embracing all in oneness.

The foundation of any meaningful spiritual teaching is the realization that all is One–very literally–and equally so: the One is all. God is absolutely undivided Unity, and those who know God are lifted into that Unity and liberated from the mirage of duality. God encompasses all modes of existence and is all modes of existence, for God is Existence Itself. “I am the birthless, the deathless, Lord of all that breathes. I seem to be born: it is only seeming, only my Maya. I am still master of my Prakriti, the power that makes me” (Bhagavad Gita 4:6). (Or, more literally: “Although I am birthless, the imperishable Self, although I am the Lord of all beings: controlling [governing] My own prakriti, I manifest through My Maya.”)

We believe in the Holy and all-glorious Trinity, Who pervades the whole universe, Who dwells also in the spirit of man.

In relation to creation–Maya or Prakriti–God has taken on a threefold mode: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. But the Son and the Holy Spirit are only temporary manifestations of the Father, lasting only as long as creation. This Trinity pervades the whole universe as its basis or “ground of being” and does the same within every individual spirit in manifestation. In the Gospel of John, Jesus many times indicates that he only does what he first sees the Father do, or is told by the Father to do (John 3:11; 5:19, 30; 6:38; 8:28; 11:42; 12:49, 50). In these words he speaks for all conscious beings: we are image-reflections of the triune Godhead, and live and do as It lives and does. That Life is within each one of us inseparably.

We believe in Jesus Christ, the Lord of love and wisdom, first among his brethren, Who leads us to the glory of the Father, Who is himself the way, the truth, and the life.

As a perfected being, love and wisdom were the dominant powers of Jesus. With love he healed and with wisdom he enlightened. As Adam the father of humanity (see Robe of Light) he was “first among his brethren” in both time and eternity, for he was the first in that creation cycle to ascend to divine status. Then he descended to lead us to the glory of the Father. He was the Way-Shower, the perfect exemplary of the Way, the Truth, and the Life, leading all who will follow his example to the glory of the Father. “Him that overcometh will I make a pillar in the temple of my God, and he shall go no more out” (Revelation 3:12). “To him that overcometh will I grant to sit with me in my throne, even as I also overcame, and am set down with my Father in his throne” (Revelation 3:21).

We believe in the law of good which rules the world and by which one day all His sons shall reach the feet of the Father, however far they stray.

Since all that exists is God, only good really exists–evil being only a distortion or misperception of the good, having no real existence of its own. Consequently, no matter how awful a mess things can appear to be, there is an essential condition of good that shall inevitably be brought forth. That is why Saint Paul could write: “We know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose” (Romans 8:28). And what is that purpose? That “one day all His sons shall reach the feet of the Father, however far they stray.” For the Father has an infinite number of “sons” who exist in and by Him, of whom He is the infinite Self. This is a great mystery, but all shall come to comprehend it fully, for they are eternally a part of it. No one is ever lost to God, much less “damned” by Him. All the prodigal sons eventually return to the bosom of their Father.

We strive towards the ancient narrow path that leads to life eternal.

The path of Christ is not just two thousand years old. Saint Augustine wrote in the fourth century: “The identical thing that we now call the Christian religion existed among the ancients and has not been lacking from the beginnings of the human race until the coming of Christ in the flesh, from which moment on the true religion, which already existed, began to be called ‘Christian.’” Earlier Saint Paul had written that the Christian Gospel was that which had already been taught throughout the whole world, “which was preached to every creature which is under heaven” (I Colossians 1:23). Authentic, original Christianity is not new, but eternal in essence, embracing the Ancient Wisdom that has existed from the beginning of the world. All master teachers of humanity are revivers of that Wisdom, reminders of what was at their time either lost or almost extinguished. That is why the Creed says that we seek “the ancient narrow path that leads to life eternal.”

So shall His blessing rest on us and peace forevermore. Amen.

The way of blessedness is found in seeking God, the source of everlasting peace. And even before we reach the heights of consciousness we will find peace in His blessing as He draws us upward into His perfection and freedom. For as the seers of India have declared, He is Satchidananda: Existence, Knowledge, and Bliss.

Related Articles:

• May a Christian Believe in Reincarnation?
• Esoteric Christian Beliefs
• The Gnosis of the Ten Commandments and the Beatitudes

After his initial exposition of the Self, already considered in previous essays, Krishna speaks of the four responses human beings have in relation to teaching about the Self:

“Someone perceives this [Self] as a wonder, another declares this as a wonder, still another hears of this as a wonder; but some, even having heard of It, yet comprehend nothing” (2:29).

Prabhavananda translates this: “There are some who have actually looked upon the Atman, and understood It, in all Its wonder. Others can only speak of It as wonderful beyond their understanding. Others know of Its wonder by hearsay. And there are others who are told about It and do not understand a word.”

The re-occurance of “four”

It is intriguing to see how the number four has significance in many ways in the scriptures of India. We usually think of seven as the mystic number (and it is), but four also comes into the picture many times, especially in considerations of the development of consciousness.

For example, there are four castes based on the level of the individual’s consciousness. (The present-day “caste system” is an unfortunate degeneration based on just about everything but the individual’s state of evolution.) The solar system is said to pass through four ages (yugas) in which the general consciousness of humanity ranges from only one-fourth to four-fourths of its potential. This numbering is the most important of all considerations, because it deals with the unfoldment of consciousness, consciousness itself being the nature of the Self.

Even in the life of Jesus we find this fourfold categorizing of spiritual consciousness. Toward the end of his public ministry, in response to his prayer God spoke in a great voice from the heavens. In the twelfth chapter of the Gospel of John we are told that those present reacted in four ways:

1. some knew it was the voice of God,
2. some thought it was the voice of an angel,
3. some did not hear it as words or a voice, but thought it was thunder, and
4. some did not hear a thing. If we analyze these responses will we find exactly the psychology of the four castes being expressed.

But let us return to Krishna. According to Krishna there are four states of awareness in relation to the Self:

1. direct knowledge,
2. deep faith and conviction–an intuition of the Self’s reality,
3. intellectual comprehension of the “theory” of the Self, and
4. complete non-comprehension.

Divine knowledge

“There are some who have actually looked upon the Atman, and understood It, in all Its wonder.”

In the ultimate sense, to know something is to be something. Although we are always our selves and incapable of being anything else, because we have fallen into the pit of delusion we are aware of and “know” just about everything but our selves. This is an awesomely horrible plight. But Krishna tells us that there are those who have actually regained their self-awareness, “seen” themselves in atmic vision and comprehended what they saw, coming to know the Self in the fullest sense.

Divine intuition

“Others can only speak of It as wonderful beyond their understanding.”

Since we are the Self, we obviously know all about it on the real level of our being. Evolution consists mainly of development/elaboration of our body vehicles, including the mind, but it also entails a refining of those vehicles, a transparency in which intuition comes more and more into play. It is this which is the real transcendence of the mind (intellect) and entry into true knowing. As a prelude to the direct knowing of the Self, the intuition of the Self arises and increases, leading the sadhaka onward to that knowing.

Divine understanding

“Others know of Its wonder by hearsay.”

Before intuition arises, the intellect is developed through evolution and becomes capable of grasping the concept of the Self–insofar as it can be intellectually grasped. No small degree of evolution is required before genuinely intelligent (buddhic) apprehension of the Self is possible. Therefore to simply have an intellectual comprehension of the incomprehension of the Self–to wonder at the truth of the Self–is itself a mark of significant spiritual development.

Uncomprehending ignorance

“And there are others who are told about It and do not understand a word.”

This is not a matter of intelligence only, but also a matter of evolution of consciousness. I have met highly intelligent people who just could not comprehend even the simplest of the principles set forth in the upanishads or the Gita. No matter how I tried to make them clear by restating them in different ways they remained incapable of even a glimmer of understanding.

For example, one very mentally active and intelligent man was thoroughly flummoxed by my statement that as long as we see life with the two eyes of duality we will wander in confusion and delusion, but as soon as we begin to see with the one eye of spiritual intuition we begin to understand our life and our selves. Again and again he asked me to explain, but he never got it in the least. He was very frustrated, at least realizing that I was making sense and the lack was on his part, but he never managed.

On another occasion one of the sadhus of our ashram was speaking to a Fundamentalist Protestant minister. The sadhu told him that we believed everyone could become exactly what Jesus was. Over and over he asked the sadhu to explain–not that he was rejecting the idea; he just could not grasp it. And he never did. It was a matter of evolution in both cases, for non-comprehension is even lower than a mistaken understanding.

Of course sometimes incomprehension is a matter of negativity. The Tibetan Buddhists say that stupidity is “daughter of hell.” Evolution of intelligence is a requisite, but it is certainly true that without purification of the intellect, however evolved, no understanding of higher spiritual realities is possible.

The four castes

Returning to the subject of caste, we can now realize in the light of Krishna’s exposition, that Shudras are those who are servants to materiality and ignorance, Vaishyas are those who have an intellectual understanding of the possibility of their betterment, Kshatriyas are those who, being close to apprehension of the Self, are able to intuit the truth of the Self while aware of their limitation, and Brahmins are those who see and know the Self. This is the sum of the entire matter.

Further Reading:

• Caste and Karma: for a further understanding of what determines our “caste.”
• The Brahmin: What Buddha says are the characteristics of a true “Brahmin.”
• You Know More Than You Think You Do

“They who devote themselves both to life in the world and to meditation, by life in the world overcome death, and by meditation achieve immortality” (Isha Upanishad 11).

Life is not just some maze to be somehow gotten through, or a Monopoly board with random advances and regressions–and there is certainly no Get Out of Jail Free. Rather, life demands the fullest exercise of the two faculties that mark human beings out from the rest of earthly life-forms: developed reason and intuition.

Intelligence of the highest order is necessary. This does not mean that the aspirant needs to be an intellectual, but he must be intelligent. Stupid people simply do not make it–mostly because stupid people never seek it. Nor can the seeker’s intelligence be kept on the shelf for only occasional use and amusement. At all times the yogi must be keenly aware of what is going on in his life sphere and ever seeking to understand and work out the mystery.

As already said, he needs highly developed intuition as well. Both these are only produced by meditation. This is because both intelligence and intuition (direct knowledge) are divine attributes. In the Bhagavad Gita Krishna declares himself to be intelligence (7:10; 10:34) and the knowledge of the mystic (9:12). In the Katha Upanishad (2:2:13) Brahman is said to be the “intelligence of the intelligent,” and in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad (2:1:13) the sage Gargya says: “The being who dwells in the heart as intelligence–him I meditate upon as Brahman.”

I am not speaking of cunning or cleverness or “savvy;” I am speaking of the intelligence which only arises in those who are of highly evolved consciousness.

The inner and outer at the same time

It is those who possess right intelligence and right intuition that can live both the inner and outer lives simultaneously–not first one and then the other in alternating cycles–in a spiritually productive (i.e., evolutionary) manner. By doing so they will accomplish two things: they will come to understand the real meaning and purpose of all they experience and do and thereby learn the lessons for which they came into relative existence; and they will come to experience (not just intellectually think) that the two are really one, manifestations of the One. Having seen the One in all, they have attained immortality even in this mortal life.

Dedication to Dharma

A final point. Notice that the upanishadic sage speaks of being devoted to the outer and inner lives. This means steadiness and regularity in practice as well as adamant adherence to the required disciplines such as yama and niyama. But most important it means wanting, even loving, to lead the outer and inner lives according to the precepts of dharma. There is no place here for grudging admittance of necessity, of stingy eking out of the barest minimum that is required, grumbling and resenting and wishing it need not be so. Such persons should not even try. They are not just losers, they are losses.

A practical example

Consider the perspective of a Christ. Crucifixion was the most horrible of deaths, yet according to Saint Paul: “Jesus… for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame” (Hebrews 12:2).

What a different perspective from the morbid and sentimental carryings-on over the passion of Jesus that some Christians engage in. Loving the world and the body that links them to the world, nothing seems to them more painful or tragic than its torture and death. But Jesus hastened to the mockery, the scourging, and the crucifixion for the joy that was set before him. No wonder he has been misunderstood and rejected through the ages by those who bear his name.

Further Reading:

• The Christ of India
• The Upanishads for Awakening
• The Aquarian Gospel for Yogis

“There are two ways, one of life and one of death; but a great difference between the two ways.”

So opens the Didache–The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles–perhaps the only authentic document we possess authored by the apostles of Jesus assembled in Jerusalem a few years after his death and resurrection. They were no doubt echoing words spoken to them by Jesus, and he was no doubt recalling the fifteenth and sixteenth verses of the Dhammapada which he would have either read or heard during the years he lived in the Buddhist monasteries of Northern India. In those verses Buddha set forth the two ways of life.

When Buddha first spoke to others the knowledge gained through his enlightenment, the first principle he gave was: “There is suffering.” This is the fundamental fact of relative existence. It is nonsense to accuse Buddha of being pessimistic or negative for saying this, for he continued with three other facts that give hope to anyone who ponders them: “Suffering has a cause. Suffering can be ended. There is a way to end suffering.” Everything else spoken by Buddha was the practical way to demonstrate the truth of these Four Aryan Truths by attaining Nirvana–the ending of all possibility of suffering.

Now in the Dhammapada Buddha is going to put it very succinctly:

“Here and beyond he suffers. The wrong-doer suffers both ways. He suffers and is tormented to see his own depraved behavior. Here and beyond he is glad. The doer of good is glad both ways. He is glad and rejoices to see his own good deeds” (Dhammapada 15, 16).

The “Big Catch”

Since duality is necessary for relative existence, there is no thing that does not have both advantages and drawbacks. Countless people in the West have hoped to escape the truth about their wrongdoing and its attendant guilt and retribution by seeking spiritual asylum in Oriental religions, notably Hinduism and Buddhism. “No hell here!” they exult, unaware that the popular scriptures of both Hinduism and Buddhism contain far more material on hell and threats of hell (often for incredibly petty offenses) than the Bible. “No talk about sin!” they shrill, perhaps not so unaware that both religions contain virtual libraries of material on those unescaped bugaboos. “No guilt!” they shout, not realizing that their desperation proves just the opposite.

It is definitely true that Hinduism and Buddhism have a far more accurate and optimistic definition and outlook regarding these things, but that is because they greatly emphasize the two things those refugees have most been seeking to escape: personal responsibility for wrongdoing and the inevitability of retribution for it. For those seeking a higher consciousness through the adoption of a higher (i.e., sin-free) life, hope and confidence are abundantly proffered:

“Though a man be soiled with the sins of a lifetime, let him but love me, rightly resolved, in utter devotion: I see no sinner, that man is holy. Holiness soon shall refashion his nature to peace eternal; O son of Kunti, of this be certain: the man that loves me, he shall not perish. (Bhagavad Gita 9:30, 31)

But there is no optimism for those who intend to stay in the hog-wallow mud of ignorance and evil:

“Men of demonic nature know neither what they ought to do, nor what they should refrain from doing. There is no truth in them, or purity, or right conduct. They maintain that the scriptures are a lie, and that the universe is not based upon a moral law, but godless, conceived in lust and created by copulation, without any other cause. Because they believe this in the darkness of their little minds, these degraded creatures do horrible deeds, attempting to destroy the world. They are enemies of mankind.

“Their lust can never be appeased. They are arrogant, and vain, and drunk with pride. They run blindly after what is evil. The ends they work for are unclean. They are sure that life has only one purpose: gratification of the senses. And so they are plagued by innumerable cares, from which death alone can release them. Anxiety binds them with a hundred chains, delivering them over to lust and wrath. They are ceaselessly busy, piling up dishonest gains to satisfy their cravings.

“‘I wanted this and today I got it. I want that: I shall get it tomorrow. All these riches are now mine: soon I shall have more. I have killed this enemy. I will kill all the rest. I am a ruler of men. I enjoy the things of this world. I am successful, strong and happy. Who is my equal? I am so wealthy and so nobly born. I will sacrifice to the gods. I will give alms. I will make merry.’ That is what they say to themselves, in the blindness of their ignorance.

“They are addicts of sensual pleasure, made restless by their many desires, and caught in the net of delusion. They fall into the filthy hell of their own evil minds. Conceited, haughty, foolishly proud, and intoxicated by their wealth, they offer sacrifice to God in name only, for outward show, without following the sacred rituals. These malignant creatures are full of egoism, vanity, lust, wrath, and consciousness of power. They loathe me, and deny my presence both in themselves and in others. They are enemies of all men and of myself; cruel, despicable and vile. I cast them back, again and again, into the wombs of degraded parents, subjecting them to the wheel of birth and death. And so they are constantly reborn, in degradation and delusion. They do not reach me, but sink down to the lowest possible condition of the soul” (Bhagavad Gita 16:7-20).

That is how Krishna put the matter before Buddha did; the sum of both are the same.

Further Reading:

• The Mind as the Source of Suffering and Happiness
• Craving
• The Big Picture

Responsiveness to yoga practice

You cannot lessen the effect of yoga, but you can certainly lessen or even prevent your responsiveness to it and the effect it will have on you. That is why it is so important that you read a book of necessary practical advice called How to be a Yogi: Practical Advice to Serious Yogis. There the Yoga Life is explained without which the practice of yoga will be of little significant effect. A few things that follow are from that book, but only a very few.

The bodies, physical, astral, and causal, are the vehicles through which the individual evolves during the span of life on earth, and must be taken into serious account by the yogi who will discover that they can exert a powerful, controlling effect on the mind. If wax and clay are cold they cannot be molded, nor will they take any impression. If molasses is cold it will hardly pour. It is all a matter of responsiveness. Only when warm are these substances malleable. In the same way, unless our inner and outer bodies are made responsive or reactive to the yogic process we will miss many of the beneficial effects. Hence we should do everything we can to increase our response levels, to ensure that our physical and psychic bodies are moving at the highest possible rate of vibration.

Diet and Yoga

A fundamental key to this is diet. For just as the physical substance of the food becomes assimilated into our physical body, the subtler energies become united to our inner levels, including our mind. The observant meditator will discover that the diet of the physical body is also the diet of the mind, that whatever is eaten physically will have an effect mentally. Here are some statements about the nature and effect of food that are found in the basic texts of India, the upanishads.

“From food has arisen strength [virya], austerity [tapasya], mantra, action, and the world itself” (Prashna Upanishad 6.4).

Ascetic discipline (tapasya) and prayer (mantra) are essential to religion, and here we see that the food we eat is their basis. And obviously the kind of food we eat will determine the quality of our discipline and prayer.

“By food, indeed, do all the breaths [pranas, life forces] become great” (Taittiriya Upanishad 1.5.4).

“Man, verily consists of the essence of food” (Taittiriya Upanishad 2.1.1).

So we are what we eat.

“From food, verily, are produced all creatures–whatsoever dwell on earth. By food alone, furthermore, do they live.…From food all creatures are born: by food, when born, they grow.…Verily, different from this, which consists of the essence of food, but within it, is another self, which consists of the vital breath [prana]. By this the former is filled. This too has the shape of a man. Like the human shape of the former is the human shape of the latter” (Taittiriya Upanishad 2.2.1).

The spiritual, astral body is drawn exclusively from food, so diet is crucial in spiritual development.

“Food when eaten becomes threefold. What is coarsest in it becomes faeces, what is medium becomes flesh and what is subtlest becomes mind. Water when drunk becomes threefold. What is coarsest in it becomes urine, what is medium becomes blood and what is subtlest becomes prana.…The mind, my dear, consists of food, [and] the prana of water…” (Chandogya Upanishad 6.5.1, 2, 4).

“That, my dear, which is the subtlest part of curds rises, when they are churned and becomes butter. In the same manner, my dear, that which is the subtlest part of the food that is eaten rises and becomes mind. The subtlest part of the water that is drunk rises and becomes prana. Thus, my dear, the mind consists of food, [and] the prana consists of water” (Chandogya Upanishad 6.6.1-3,5; the same is confirmed in 6.7.1-6).

“Now is described the discipline for inner purification by which self-knowledge is attained: When the food is pure, the mind becomes pure. When the mind is pure the memory [smriti–memory of our eternal spirit-Self] becomes firm. When the memory is firm all ties are loosened” (Chandogya Upanishad 7.26.2).

“On food rests everything—whatsoever breathes and whatsoever breathes not” (Brihadaranyaka Upanishad 1.5.1).

“In the body there are nerves [nadis] called hita, which are placed in the heart. Through these the essence of our food passes as it moves on. Therefore the subtle body receives finer food than the gross body” (Brihadaranyaka Upanishad 4.2.3).

Both meditation and diet refine the inner senses so we can produce and perceive the subtle changes that occur during meditation.

Negative effects of meat eating

Meat is both heavy and toxic–especially from the chemicals spread throughout the tissues from the fear and anger of the animal when it was slaughtered. So our minds will also be heavy and toxic from eating meat as well as poisoned by the vibrations of anger and fear. And then there is the karma of killing sentient beings. Moreover, the instinctual and behavioral patterns of the animals will become our instinctual and behavioral impulses. Fruits, vegetables, and grains have no such obstructions.

Consequently, our mental energies will be light and malleable, responsive to our spiritual disciplines. Few things are more self-defeating than the eating of meat. From the yogic standpoint, the adoption of a vegetarian diet is a great spiritual boon. By “vegetarian” I mean abstention from meat, fish, and eggs or anything that contains them to any degree, including animal fats.

Other factors in health, physical and spiritual

Our general health also contributes to our proficiency in meditation, so a responsible yogi is very aware of what is beneficial and detrimental to health and orders his life accordingly, especially in eliminating completely all alcohol, nicotine, and mind-altering drugs whether legal or illegal. Caffeine, too, is wisely avoided, and so is sugar.

All of the above-mentioned substances–meat, fish, eggs, animal derivatives, alcohol, nicotine, and mind-altering drugs–deaden and coarsen the mind and body–and consequently the consciousness. Thus they prevent the necessary effects and experiences of subtle Breath Meditation, reducing it to an exercise in relaxation and calmness rather than the means of liberation–for which it is solely intended.

10 ways to improve your yoga practice

The sum of all this is that we must do more than meditate. We must live out our spiritual aspirations by so ordering our lives that we will most quickly advance toward the Goal. This is done by observing Yama and Niyama, often called the Ten Commandments of Yoga. They are:

1. Ahimsa: non-violence, non-injury, harmlessness;
2. Satya: truthfulness, honesty;
3. Asteya: non-stealing, honesty, non-misappropriativeness;
4. Brahmacharya: sexual continence in thought, word and deed as well as control of all the senses;
5. Aparigraha: non-possessiveness, non-greed, non-selfishness, non-acquisitiveness;
6. Shaucha: purity, cleanliness;
7. Santosha: contentment, peacefulness;
8. Tapas: austerity, practical (i.e., result-producing) spiritual discipline;
9. Swadhyaya: introspective self-study, spiritual study;
10. Ishwarapranidhana: offering of one’s life to God, especially in the highest sense of uniting our consciousness with Infinite Consciousness through meditation.

Further Reading on ways to improve your yoga practice:

• The Foundations of Yoga (about Yama and Niyama)
• Spiritual Benefits of a Vegetarian Diet
• The Four Soul Killers

Just because something is the truth does not mean that we can easily grasp or accept it, however sincere we may be in our truth-seeking. How many years can go by without our fully grasping that someone we dearly love has left their body–they are so living to us. Sometimes we experience intense grief at their departure and absence, and at the same time really cannot feel that they are no longer with us.After all, we are in this earth plane because we are completely irrational–especially on the subconscious and emotional levels.

When my miracle-working grandmother died, I grieved and shed tears over the loss every single day for one year, and yet only on the anniversary day of her departure did I fully come to realize that she was gone! In my heart I could not believe that I would not find her in her house if I would just go there. So an intellectual understanding about birth and death does not help a great deal.

If the facts will not take root in our minds, then we at least need a better perspective on things. So Krishna is now explaining to Arjuna how he should consider these matters even if he cannot take in the truth that birth and death are mere appearances only. He continues:

“And moreover even if you think this to be eternally born or eternally dead, even then you should not mourn for this” (Bhagavad Gita 2:26).

Even if we consider birth and death to be real (which they are, as impressions in the mind), even then we should have no sorrow because:

“For the born, death is certain; for the dead there is certainly birth. Therefore, for this, inevitable in consequence, you should not mourn” (Bhagavad Gita 2:27).

The wisdom of Buddha

When we hurt, we want it to stop. That is the way with human beings, and when we lose something we want it back–no matter how obviously impossible that often is. So we demand miraculous intervention by God or His saints. When that happens we are happy, and the miracle gets written up in praise of God or the miracle-worker and everybody seems satisfied. But can they be, when the truth has simply been postponed or avoided? Truth is our very nature. How long will we violate it with more illusions?

How rare are those who never conceded to human demands for more fantasies to make them “happy”! Buddha was one such, and even after these thousands of years there are still many (including some who call themselves Buddhists) who consider that his utter realism was pessimism or indifference to people’s feelings. One incident that is not popular is his dealing with this subject of death and grief.

A story from the life of Buddha

A young woman whose infant had died came to Buddha and begged him to bring her child back to life. Buddha told her to go into a nearby town and bring him some rice from a family in which no one had ever died. She hastened into the town and spent the day going from house to house with her request. Everywhere she was told the same thing: death continually came to members of the family. In the evening she returned to Buddha and, bowing, thanked him for showing her the folly of her request. Having understood the universality of physical death, she saw that her grief and her request were based on ignorance–ignorance which was now dispelled.

In the West, the brilliant Stoic philosopher Epictetus counseled his students to study their lives and environment and determine what lay within the scope of their power to influence, produce, or eliminate. Having done this, they should put everything else out of their minds as things they should not even worry about. Birth and death are certainly major elements to cultivate indifference to.

A realistic perspective

Swami Kaivalyananda, a disciple of Yogiraj Shyama Charan Lahiri, once told Mukunda Lal Ghosh, later to be Paramhansa Yogananda, about miraculous healings done by his guru. But in conclusion he stated: “The numerous bodies which were spectacularly healed through Lahiri Mahasaya eventually had to feed the flames of cremation.” So in the end it was all the same: death had its way.

We only torment ourselves with the desire and attempt to postpone or cancel the inevitable. Years ago I heard about a hillbilly who spent the entire day in a theatre, watching the same film over and over. When asked why he did this, he answered that he did not like the way it came out and so was waiting for it to end differently. It was his incomprehension of the nature of motion pictures that gave him such a foolish hope. And so it is with us.

Earthly life

“Beings are such that their beginnings are unmanifest, their middles are manifest, and their ends are unmanifest again. What complaint [lamentation] can there be over this?” (Bhagavad Gita 2:28)

Like the hillbilly we either do not know the truth about this evanescent life of earthly incarnation or we refuse to face it. Our appearances on this earth are but a part of our life history. For aeons beyond number we never came into material manifestation at all. Then we began doing so, like actors entering a theater and moving over the stage in a brief play and then leaving to return home until the next performance. Not only are our “appearances” but a fraction of our relative existence, they are fundamentally unreal.

As Krishna implies, life on this earth is completely unnatural for us. It is natural to be out of the body, not in it. Yet we irrationally cling to it and to our memories of it, even trying to make each life duplicate the one before it, not even wanting the drama to develop, to evolve. And we insanely identify with the ever-changing temporary states, totally forgetting the unchanging eternal state that is the only thing real about us.

Many metaphysically-mind people begin heaping up even more folly through striving to remember their past lives and attributing full reality to them. Rare are those who utilize the memory of past lives to illuminate the problems of the present life so that they all can be let go of in order to pass on to higher life beyond any births.

All our “lives” are really deaths–descent into the worlds of change and decay, dreams caused by the fever of samsara, a disease whose cure we must vigorously seek and even more vigorously apply. Only when we come to know that we have never been born and have never died will we have peace and the cessation of sorrow.

Further reading:

• Do the Dead Die?
• Comprehending Death from the Aquarian Gospel for Yogis
• Seeing Death, Seeing Life from the Upanishads for Awakening