The Divine And Demoniac Natures - Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 16
Reply With QuoteCan ‘Brahman’ be experienced, especially since it is being sought at all times via in-direct and temporal ways?
Orthodox hindu Vedas state:
As stated in the Taittiriya Upanisad (2.9): ". . . brahma puccham pratistha . . ."
1] There is God’s energy known as anna-maya, dependence upon food for existence.
This is a materialistic realization of the Supreme.
2] Then, in prana-maya {after realizing the Supreme Absolute Truth in food, one can realize the Absolute Truth in the living symptoms or life forms.]
3] Then, there is jnana-maya [realization extended beyond the living symptoms to the point of thinking, feeling and willing]
4] Then there is vijnana-maya (Brahman realization) [in which the living entity’s mind and life symptoms are distinguished from the living entity himself.]
5] the next and supreme stage is ananda-maya [realization of the all-blissful nature]
Thus there are five stages of Brahman realization, which are called brahma puccham.
The first three—anna-maya, prana-maya and jnana-maya—involve the fields of activities of the living entities.
Transcendental to all these fields of activities is the Supreme Lord, who is called ananda-maya.
The Vedanta-sutra also describes the Supreme by saying, ananda-mayo ’bhyasat: the Supreme Personality of Godhead is by nature full of joy.
To enjoy His transcendental bliss, He expands into vijnana-maya, prana-maya, jnana-maya and anna-maya.
In the field of activities the living entity is considered to be the enjoyer, and different from him is the ananda-maya.
That means that if the living entity decides to enjoy in dovetailing himself with the ananda-maya, then he becomes perfect.
This is the real picture of the Supreme Lord as the supreme knower of the field, the living entity as the subordinate knower, and the nature of the field of activities.
One has to search for this truth in the Vedanta-sutra, or Brahma-sutra.
It is mentioned here that the codes of the Brahma-sutra are very nicely arranged according to cause and effect, ie:
A] na viyad ashruteh (2.3.2) — the field of activities,
B] natma shruteh (2.3.18) — the living entity, and
C] parat tu tac-chruteh (2.3.40) — the Supreme Lord, the summum bonum of all various entities.
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
When, by simply quite sitting mantra-meditation one stops paying attention to thoughts and thus withdraws the senses inward toward its center point of origin ---No further stimulai distracts the mind's attention ---that is when the meditator preceives bliss. This Bliss is there from the beginning ---yet the meditator is fully conditioned to be distracted by life's stimulai.
It would seem that intimate moments in bed are comprised with activities that ask the performers to focus there attention to only a single minded goal ---it is an Irony that of all daily activities are not appreciated with the same level of 'delighting in the mercy' of all the facilities because the senses are so dulled by material living.
on the subject of "brahma puccham pratistha" I just found this on the web:
The taithreeya upanishad says about the stages of consciousness in a persons life.
The human and an animal differs in the conscious level, that is the human being has a higher conscious level and the animal has a lesser conscious level. But the human being who has a higher conscious level should not be satisfied with the higher conscious level, because the human being has still higher level of conscious level the BRAHMA BHUTA stage.
The upanishad says it is five kosas or the sheaths which covers the soul, which is called the brahma puccham. The stages are ANNA MAYA, PRANA MAYA,JANANA MAYA,VIJANA MAYA, ANANDA MAYA.Let us analyse the different stages one by one.
The lowest stage is the anna maya.Because the person in this stage is concerned only about the food aspect of life(anna maya).The best examples are the babies, who drink the mother's milk and sleep.
The next higher stage is called na pramaya. In this stage the person is concerned only about his survival (prana-life).The example is our survival in this material world.We go to office, factories, do work etc etc.If a person is concerned only about his survival and earning riches which will not give any tangible solution to the spiritual dimension of life.
The next higher stage of life is janana maya (seeking knowledge). At this the person is religious and believes in God and thinks that the God helps him in his walk of life and tries to gather information about God. But gathering information about God is not the solution unless or otherwise it is dovetailed with the self, Or in other words the relation ship about the living entity.
NOTES:
The three progressive stages of yogic enlightenment:
Brahman, Paramatma, Bhagavan
I) Brahman-Realization, ---the impersonal manifestation of God, nothingness, the field, the void; Brahman is also used as a general reference for God, et al.
II) Paramatma Realization, the presence of god as the nucleus of every inanimate spark and particle of matter and energy in the universe, and also god as present in every animate individual soul as the witnessing 'Supersoul'—hence the word, 'Param (super) atma' (soul)
[ Note: Conscience living beings are capable, by birth-right, of progressing through the following 5 stages of spiritual maturity:
A) anna-maya = recognize the manifest mercy of god as 'food'.
B) prana-maya = recognize god as 'living force in all life forms'.
C) Sankya-maya=recognize god as 'thinking, willing, and feeling'.
D) vigyana-maya= 'mind and ego seen different from the soul'.
E) ananda-maya= 'all-blissful nature' Via prema-bhakti-seva. (loving devotional service to Krishna
III) Bhagavan Realization, God as he is reveal in the Vedas of India—(krsnas tu bhagavan svayam . . . )
NOTES:
"Maya"= the Cosmic Material Energy' recognized as a field of temporary matter and energy in flux, whence, the soul appears, to lord it over as best as can be had. All the whilst identifying with the present body, which was afforded by the fruits of prior acti
NOTES:
living entities = individual souls aka conditioned souls
NOTES:
The 4 defects “flaws of conditioned soul = mistakes; illusioned; cheating; imperfect senses”
NOTES:
Karma & Reincarnation=Karma means, 'action'. All living creatures Eat/sleep/mate/defend---one must rise above the mundane order of life and death. We are all destined to take repeated births in various bodies until we are re-acquainted with The grace of Mukunda (a name for Krishna---the sole Bestower of Liberation from the material ocean of repeated births and deaths—since time immemorial). This is done by approaching the top experts in the world authorized to instruct novices in the science of Bhakti-yoga.
NOTES:
'Sanskrit' alphabet's arrangement=same as established by professional theatre school text books to teach 'International Phonetics' (I.P.A.) so as to teach "Dialects and Accent-Elimination". [note: Professor Higgins in the G.W. Shaw's play, 'My Fair Lady' introduces himself as a professor of Linguistics and a scholar of Sanskrit.]
NOTES:
"Indo-European" languages = Sanskrit's position in this family tree is indicated by the word 'Indo'. [Ed. Surmises that the word ‘Europa’ can equate to the following Sanskrit compound word: ‘Uru-purusa, Uru (vast) + purusa (person)
NOTES:
'Maha-Bharata' = 5000 year old Epic of ancient India describing the court intrigue and culture of Brahminical India during the end of the last [dwarpa yuga] epoch.
NOTES:
'Bhagavad-gita' = after reading the Tao te ching, and the Art of War, and Book of Five Rings, and the Japanese Code of Bushido, the Buddhist Sutras, after life times of monastic contemplation and services to humanity one might read a authorized translation of the 'Bhagavad-gita' as it is; see A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami's edition for this great spiritual 700 versed dialogue translated from the chapter in the Ancient Sanskrit Epic of Antiquity, the 'Maha-Bharata' in its original Devotional Tradition.
NOTES:
Authentic old-school Hinduism has two Schools of Thought,
the Theist—Vaishnava devotee of Krishna (bhagavata school) &
the Impersonalist---the seeker of release from the individual ego and attain refuge and thus merge in the primodial impersonal state of nirvana (sunyavada school). The individual indivisible vector point of the soul is 'active by nature', thus nirvana is not eternal.]
NOTES:
Vegetarianism is all about ‘AHIMSA—non-violence”. Not about our sentiments. Meatless living is all about warding-off bad (ugra-) karma for humans. It’s not about compassion for the animals welfare but about the welfare of children being indoctrinated into a life based on killing inorder to live up to a false standard of ‘living’.
NOTES:
The cow is sacred because = the cow is the quintessentially perfect species for agrarian society—the husband of the cow ‘the bull’ is the best beast of burden for farm life; the cow gives milk, cheese(s), yogurt, butter, curd, ghee, ice cream, whip cream, caramel sweets, medicinal urine, fuel, fertilizer. Oxen, leather.
NOTES:
Polytheism = This is a misnomer. The many Demigods of the Indian religion are actually India's Vedic Literature's claim to have a record of the family tree(s) of the superintendents of cosmic affairs since time immemorial, nay, since the first moment that the ‘present Brahma’(-anda) was exhaled from Maha-Vishnu's Breathing, etc, etc, etc . . .
NOTES:
Common words and concepts in the English lexicon derived from Sanskrit = mantra, yoga, guru, pundit, swami, kundalini, prana, Buddha, Brahma-Bull, sacred cow, bungalow, yoke, Lapsa- apsa, use of spices in cooking, ghee, Indiana, Europe, Juggernaut, ganja, oriental carpets, untouchables, the three Wise Men of Christ's birth, India considered the 'Crown Jewel' of the British Empire of old.
NOTES:
The cover of Jimmy Hendrix's Double Album 'Axis' (sic?) = contains himself and his band members' faces superimposed over that of the multi-faces of 'Visnu's Universal form'---this Universal form is from the Bhagavad-gita.
NOTES:
The very beginning of the child's film "The Muppit Movie" contains Kermit the frog ask, "Have you tried Hare Krishna?"
NOTES:
Charles Dickens’ 19th Century English novel “Oliver Twist” [about the orphan boy named Oliver] starts with the Schoolmaster of the orphan-asylum arriving at the home of the new foster parents, inorder to the retrieve Oliver whose tantrums had made trouble for himself and his newest adopting parents. Upon arriving at the home, the Schoolmaster unlocked the closet whence the boy was arrested by the parent. As he drags the boy back to the orphanage the Schoolmaster scolded the parents thus, “I told you not to feed the boy meat, I told you to feed him porridge”.
Originally Posted by Jack
Bookmarks