Light of the Spirit Blog

“To see the essence in the unessential and to see the essence as unessential….(Dhammapada 11)”

These words of Buddha are frightening, for they express an actual experience on the part of the wanderer, not just some crack-brain ideas or concepts held only in the intellect. All of us consider that we know something when we have experienced it. So many firm-binding illusions have arisen from our own wrong-seeing. “I know it for myself” is often nothing more than the raving of the strait-jacketed ego. And things can get worse. Illusions of “truth” and “enlightenment” abound in the world of the “awakened” unawakened. And as Buddha points out, we cannot get to the perception of reality as long as these errors exist.

Wrong intent

It is not just our mistaken perceptions that prevent our escape from bondage. Rather, they give rise to another ingredient in the stew of our samsaric misery: wrong intention. Our whole purpose is wrong. Our goals are themselves delusive. We want “things” or power, or exalted positions–even in heaven-worlds. In other words, we want some more chains to wind around us rather than to slip out of the bonds and be free–free not only from such stuff, but free from even the capacity to desire them or be bound by them.

In the seventh chapter of the Bhagavad Gita Krishna lists four kinds of spiritual seekers:

“The world-weary, the seeker for knowledge, the seeker for happiness and the man of spiritual discrimination.”

The first he calls artas: one who is aware of a sense of loss or emptiness, who is aware of oppressions inner and outer, and who is suffering from it all. The second is jijnasus: one who desires to know, to gain knowledge. The third he calls artharthi: one who wishes to attain the summun bonum of life in the form of Highest Truth. The fourth is the pure jnani: one who is a man of wisdom, who seeks not to either gain something or be divested of something, who is not motivated by desire or aversion, but aims for the entrance into his essential nature. Who seeks for What IS for Itself alone.

Now if we look closely we will see that these four types embody the Four Aryan Truths enunciated by Buddha. The first is aware of suffering; the second knows that suffering has a cause and wants to know what to do about it; the third knows that the cessation of suffering is possible and is the paramartha–the highest aim and attainment–for all beings; and the fourth has known the way to end suffering and looks to that goal alone, knowing that knowledge (jnana) alone is the way to the goal.

“The man of discrimination [jnani] is the highest of these. He is continually united with me. He devotes himself to me always, and to no other. For I am very dear to that man, and he is dear to me.

“Certainly, all these are noble: but the man of discrimination I see as my very Self. For he alone loves me because I am myself: the last and only goal of his devoted heart. Through many a long life his discrimination ripens: he makes me his refuge, knows that Brahman is all. How rare are such great ones!” (Bhagavad Gita 7:18, 19).

Further Reading:

• The Four States of Understanding
• The Problem with Seeing Wrong

Q: Suppose everyone in this planet will not take birth again because they have attained liberation, does that mean the planet will be empty of human beings but only be occupied by flora and fauna? Is this condition possible?

Individual spirits (jivas) are coming into manifestation all the time in the most basic form and evolving upward in ever more complex forms throughout the cycles (kalpas) of creation until as human beings they attain liberation from earthly rebirth.

And then, since this world is only the first of the seven levels (lokas) that comprise relative existence (samsara), they have many more creations cycles to keep evolving until they eventually attain total union with God (Brahman).

So some are entering at one end and others are leaving at the other. It never stops. There has never been a beginning to this process and there never will be an end. It is as eternal as God, because it is all the manifestation of God.

More Questions and Answers:

• Gurus: Yes or No?
• Yogis Who Saw Jesus
• Reincarnation: Choosing Our Costumes in the Drama of Life

Q: For nearly my whole life I have heard and read that the religion of India is what turned it from one of the wealthiest countries in the world into one of the poorest in the world. What do you say to this?

A single word: Nonsense.

Vivekananda, upon his return to India from the prosperous West, said that after having been outside India every square inch of India’s soil was now a sacred place (tirtha) to him. He of course deplored India’s poverty, but he said: “The problem is not the religion of India, but the fact that it has not been followed.”

This is true, but there is a far more obvious reason for India’s economic plight at Vivekananda’s time and even past the midpoint of the twentieth century: ONE THOUSAND YEARS OF FOREIGN DOMINATION, AND OPPRESSION, including in the last three hundred years, deliberate sabotage of India’s economy.

I will not start on that subject because it is too horrible and infuriating. But it is a matter of history and many of my friends in India have told me of their own experiences in this matter.

Modern India

Why cannot people notice that after India gained Independence the economy began to rise–slowly, yes, but surely. And consider India now. It is emerging as one of the leaders in global economy! Why? Have the people of India abandoned Sanatana Dharma? Not at all. They practice it more openly and freely than ever before.

Therefore India is rapidly progressing beyond a “third world” status. I have myself seen amazing changes since my first pilgrimage to India at the end of 1962. Others I know marvel at the tremendous strides they see in India every time they visit again.

This is only to be expected, since: “In the beginning the Lord of beings created all men, to each his duty. ‘Do this,’ He said, ‘And you shall prosper. Duty well done fulfills desire like Kamadhenu the wish- fulfiller’” (Bhagavad Gita 3:10). Now that India is free both politically and spiritually, this is being demonstrated.

Further Reading:

• Seeing the One in All
• Following Christ: A Raja’s Example
• The Cave Where Jesus Stayed in India

This article explores the mystical insights of the beginning of the Gospel of Saint John

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made. In him was life; and the life was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not. That was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world.

He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not. He came unto his own, and his own received him not. But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name: Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God. And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.
(John 1:1-14)

• In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

Logos, here translated as Word, has more than one meaning:

1. a spoken word;
2. a full statement;
3. a discourse on a subject;
4. all the preceding, but in the mind, not verbalized;
5. will;
6. intention or purpose;
7. being an emanation of the mind, a symbol of the Only-Begotten of the Father, the Son of God, the Second Person of the Holy Trinity;
8. the Divine Word, the primal, creative Sound Vibration or Holy Spirit.

So when we read about “the Word” we must determine which–one or more–of the meanings are intended. That will determine the character of any explanation of the text. This opening passage from Saint John certainly implies that we are being told about the Son: Ishwara the Creator immanent in creation as its inner Guide, and the interaction between Him and the creation, including human beings.

Although the Godhead is absolutely One it is also Triune in an incomprehensible manner. This should not particularly bother us, for the ancient sages have assured us that nothing can be said absolutely about God, which means that to call God Unity is no more accurate than to call God Trinity. But we have to accommodate our limitations and work with what we have, confident that as we evolve the divine nature will become increasingly comprehensible to us.

Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are inherent in the transcendent Godhead, so Saint John is telling us that the Only-Begotten of the Father, the internal Word and Will, is absolutely eternal, and has not come into being, but has always been a “part” of God while at the same time God–the Whole.

• The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not any thing made that was made.

When the process of creation began in the depths of God’s Consciousness, the Word-Son was already fully there, He did not come into being or undergo any change. Every iota of relative existence was an emanation of Him brought about by His own self-determination (self-will). He is the sole Source of all things. He was in the bosom of the Father (John 1:18) and all spirits were in His bosom. There is no Will in the Godhead but the Logos-Word.

• In him was life; and the life was the light of men.

The Son is essentially Consciousness, the Consciousness in which all other consciousnesses or spirits are eternally rooted and existing. His Consciousness is our consciousness; though two they are one, and that is how it is that He experiences all things from the movements of every particle of every atom to every thought and experience of all sentient beings. This we have already discussed.

• And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehended it not.

Although an emanation of His Consciousness, insentient creation, manifest or unmanifest, is unconscious and therefore “darkness” that does not and cannot possess the ability to be aware of His existence. This statement also applies to those consciousnesses or spirits who have not yet evolved the capacity for such comprehension.

• That was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world.

The ability to be aware of that True Light and to be Lightened by It is the sole factor that determines whether or not we are human beings or merely humanimals. Those who dwell in human form without either possessing or exercising that faculty are not human in the fullest sense, no matter what other abilities they may have, including intellectual genius. That is why one holy woman I knew used to say regarding her spiritual teacher: “I was not a human being until he got hold of me.”

• He was in the world, and the world was made by him, and the world knew him not.

God the Son is the Inner Ruler of material creation which is an extension of His Consciousness or Being, yet it not only does not know Him, it cannot know him.

• He came unto his own, and his own received him not.

Both the material creation and the unevolved spirits within it are intimately linked with the Lord (Ishwara) who is continually acting upon them and evolving them according to their eternal nature. Yet they do not perceive Him and “receive” Him by uniting their consciousness with His–the creation does not have the capability and the unevolved have not yet developed the necessary faculties for it. It is unhappily true that some sentient beings do perceive the Presence of God in and around them but perversely refuse to acknowledge It and turn away in their wills from Him. But it is also happily true that in time they will turn toward Him, for it is their very nature to do so.

• But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name.

“When thou saidst, Seek ye my face; my heart said unto thee, Thy face, Lord, will I seek” (Psalms 27:8). Paniym, the Hebrew word translated “face,” means face, presence, sight (seeing), and person; so to seek the face of God is to seek God Himself. “Seek and ye shall find,” said Jesus (Matthew 7:7). Those who seek and find shall receive His Consciousness into their own consciousness, His Spirit into their spirit, and thereby “become the sons of God.” For they will have believed on His will and intention for them. It is an act of their heart–their essential being which is one with God.

• Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.

This “birth” from the confining womb of creation into Boundless Being as liberated Sons of God comes from God alone, for it is the revelation of God, of “Christ in you, the hope of glory” from eternity (Colossians 1:27). As one of Yogananda’s prayers said: “Spirit to Spirit goes.”

• And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.

Having made Himself “flesh” as creation, the Only-Begotten dwelt within and without us, and those who have been born into His Consciousness have perceived His Glory, having themselves become part of that Glory of the Only Begotten of the Father, and thereby also Full of Grace and Truth like Him.

Further reading:

• Yoga of the Sacraments
• The Gospel of Thomas for Yogis
• Esoteric Christian Beliefs

“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).

“Wrong” and “right”

Suffering is the lot of the wrong-doers and happiness is the lot of the right-doers. But what is “wrong” and what is “right”?

Here, too, a lot of moral slackers take up Buddhism and Hinduism with the idea that they will escape “Judeo-Christian morality.” And they do–being neither Buddhist nor Hindu in any viable sense. On the other hand, those who investigate either religion to any significant degree will encounter a moral code that extends far beyond the simplistic “good doggie, bad doggie” code of externalized Judaism or Christianity.

First of all, the concepts, of “sin,” “wrong,” “good,” “right,” and “virtue” are completely different from their seeming equivalents in Western religion. In Western religion a thing is good because God commands it, and bad because God forbids it. The inherent nature of the thing is irrelevant. Do what God wants and you will be good and rewarded accordingly; do what God “hates” and you will be evil and punished accordingly. It is all a matter of “law.”

The flaw in this should be obvious: everyone under the constraints of law seeks to get around it and yet be considered law-abiding. All kinds of stretches and concessions are sought–and obtained. (Just consider the Jesuitical contortions of Roman Catholic moral theology.) If one church will not make concessions, just go find one that will, or start your own.

A personal experience

I knew a man who did just that. He belonged to a fundamentalist church that said those who divorced and remarried would go to hell–and so would those they married. He preached it fervently, and once when rebuking a man for having married a divorced woman, was astounded when the man countered that the preacher’s own sister had married a divorcee! He investigated and found that to be so. So “God” led him to start his own church that held to all his original principles, except for the allowance of divorce and remarriage.

The real criterion

In the East the criterion is very different. If a thing spiritually harms the individual then it is wrong; if something spiritually benefits the individual then it is right. What else need be said? Naturally addicts and ignoramuses loudly insist that harmful things are not harmful and protest that beneficial things are burdensome and hurtful. But that does not matter to Eastern religion, because unlike Western religion there is no compulsion to coerce people into doing the good and avoiding the bad. If someone wants to harm himself, calling it good, that is his business. For such a person religion is irrelevant anyway–and he is irrelevant to religion.

Here again we see a profound difference between East and West. In the Western religions God as an almighty monarch is the center of attention, the adherents have no value or relevance except in relation to His ideas about them. In Eastern religions, the spiritual liberation of the individual is the center of concern, and the truth about his spiritual status is all-important (whether he or others accept or deny it).

Since liberation is the result of union with God, Eastern religions make Him truly the center of things, the center of life itself, in contrast to the basically political centrism of Western religions that insistently maintains an infinite gulf between God and us. In the West the question is: “Are you obeying and pleasing God?” and in the East it is: “Are you moving toward union with God?” As I say, it is politics versus states of being. One reduces us to nothing, the other makes spirit–both finite and Infinite–everything.

Here and beyond

Wherever we may be, we experience the effect of our deeds, whether we are physically incarnate in the material plane of existence or out of the body in an astral or causal world. Our presence in those worlds as well as our situation in them is determined solely by our own deeds. As a well-known Buddhist sutra affirms, we have nothing but our own actions and we never shall have anything but our own actions in the form of their results. As Saint Paul wrote to Saint Timothy: “Some men’s sins are open beforehand, going before to judgment; and some men they follow after” (I Timothy 5:24). They may be either actualized or potential, but they are there. They are there.

“He suffers.…He is glad”

It is the results that reveal the character of our actions, not the excuse-making or rationalization of ourselves or others. Consequently:

“The wrong-doer suffers both ways. He suffers and is tormented to see his own depraved behavior.…The doer of good is glad both ways. He is glad and rejoices to see his own good deeds.”

Anyone who wants can try to weasel out of it by claiming that God favors and purifies us by making us suffer to make us more “pleasing” to Him and curses those He detests by damning them through prosperity and ease, and therefore misery is proof of virtue. Such a view makes God a fool and a monster, but reveals that the view-holder is the fool, the monster–and is suffering accordingly.

Why does Buddha not explain to us about those bad, even horribly evil people, who live in high style and seem to have all they want, and those good people who have hardship and misfortune? The answer is twofold, external and internal.

Externally, the good fortune of the bad is the result of good deeds done in the past, and the misfortune of the good is the result of bad deeds done in the past. There is nothing more to it.

Internally, the truth is that no matter what advantages a person may have, how easy their outer life may be, the evil suffer constantly in their hearts and minds–that is why they are so addicted to alcohol, drugs, and frantic pleasure, especially sex.

Conversely, however unfortunate the external situation of the good may be, they experience peace and contentment and even rejoice in heart and mind. So there is no need to comment on them; Buddha is speaking of internal suffering and rejoicing–not prosperity, poverty, or other external conditions.

Further Reading:

• The Two Ways of Life and Death
• Maintaining Peace With Others
• Why to Become Free from Hatred

Our Father, Who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy Name. Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive them that trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For Thine is the kingdom, the power and the glory, for ever and ever. Amen.

This is not just a prayer, it is a powerful invocation and evocation of Consciousness, one of the most important formulas of power in the Christian tradition.

For many centuries it was the practice of fervent Christians to perpetually recite the Lord’s prayer, often using a string of beads to remind them to keep praying. In fact, our word “bead” comes from “bede” which means to pray or petition. So popular was this practice that an entire street in London consisted of shops selling those beads–hence its name of Paternoster Row, Paternoster being Latin for “Our Father.”

Also in those centuries it was common practice for many among the aristocracy and the wealthy to be accompanied at all times by a “bede-man” who stood by them and constantly prayed the Lord’s prayer silently, which was considered an invocation of the entire range of spiritual blessings needed by human beings. In some orders, such as the early Carmelites, a certain number of repetitions of the Lord’s prayer were done in place of the formal hours of the Divine Office. And pious laity often followed the same practice–especially those who had no books from which to read the prayers and psalms of the Office.

But it also has a meaning we should investigate.

• Our Father, Who art in heaven.

The “abode” of God is God: Infinite Consciousness symbolized by the boundless sky known in Indian mysticism as the Chidakasha or Conscious Space (Ether)–not some heaven modeled on the earth or any other kind of relative existence.

• Hallowed be Thy Name.

The very thought of God should be consecrated and consecratory in our minds. The holy names that invoke divine remembrance should be highly prized. The Greek word translated “name” is onoma, which means a name, an object named, and something that is being called upon–and in this instance implies the act of calling upon God. So we pray that any reaching out for God inwardly and outwardly will be made holy by divine response. For “hallow” is a translation of agiadzo, which means to make holy and also to purify. We are also asking that our invocation of God be purified and made effective–and the same be done to us.

• Thy kingdom come.

May the divine Consciousness descend into us and become our consciousness–may our finitude be transformed into Infinity and may we become gods within God.

• Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

Thus may we become perfect reflections of God here and now, being ourselves revelations of the Divine.

• Give us this day our daily bread.

May our life in the spirit be continually sustained by spiritual enlivenment received through direct, conscious and continual communion with God, “the heavenly bread, the life of the whole world.”

• And forgive us our trespasses as we forgive them that trespass against us.

Jesus is enunciating an inescapable law: “All things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them” (Matthew 7:12). “For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you” (Matthew 6:14). Even in the Beatitudes he set forth this principle, saying: “Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy” (Matthew 5:7).

Saint Paul wrote: “Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap” (Galatians 6:7). So although here we are praying about being forgiven for our transgressions, we are also assenting to the entire law of karma and the responsibility it entails. Further, we are promising to follow that law in the future in all things.

• And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil.

This does not mean that God would lead us into enticement to wrongdoing, but we are praying that we need not undergo difficulties or testings that will reveal our inner disposition to wrongdoing, but that they be revealed to us directly through the purification of our mind.

We pray that by our conforming to the karmic laws it will no longer be necessary for us to undergo the reaping of negative karmic seeds, but that the purification of our hearts will enable us to escape them through having learned the lessons they were meant to teach us–for karma is never reward and punishment but reaction meant for our instruction in the universal laws. We are aspiring to reach such a degree of wisdom that there will be no need for karmic reaction.

It is a matter of awakening into higher consciousness where karmic reaction will no longer be needed. As the Gita tells us: “Do not say: ‘God gave us this delusion.’ You dream you are the doer, you dream that action is done, you dream that action bears fruit. It is your ignorance, it is the world’s delusion that gives you these dreams” (Bhagavad Gita 5:14).

• For Thine is the kingdom, the power and the glory, for ever and ever. Amen.

This is a recognition of God’s eternal nature and a prayer for participation in that Eternal Being to such a degree that we will truly be gods within the greater Life of God. This transformation is the core of Jesus’ teachings, of “Christ in you, the hope of glory” (Colossians 1:27). This is no fanciful dream, but a reality, for we see in the great saints and masters that it is possible for men to become gods.

Further Reading:

• Religion for Awakening
• Robe of Light
• The Christ of India

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