Sai Baba Gita - Sense-Control, the Foundation for Self-Knowledge

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Sense-Control, the Foundation for Self-Knowledge

If you were to construct a house, even a simple and ordinary one, wouldn't you

take great care to lay a proper foundation? If that is true for a little house,

then how much more care must you take in laying down a solid foundation for the

great treasure house of self-knowledge. It is to provide such a foundation that

Krishna, in his teachings to Arjuna in the Gita, emphasized the need to control

the senses by developing a strong detachment from the objects of the world.

This is an essential requirement for building up a solid foundation. If the

foundation is not strong, the mansion of self-knowledge will not last long. It

will soon collapse.

Renunciation does not spring up suddenly to become the foundation of

self-knowledge. Such strong detachment does not just happen on the spur of the

moment. This quality must be steadily developed and practiced, together with

devotion and sense-control. If you want to light a lamp, you will need oil, a

container to hold it, and a wick. In the same way, in order to light the lamp

of wisdom, there is a need for detachment, devotion and control of the senses.

Detachment can be thought of as the container and devotion the oil.

Sense-control may be compared to the wick. If you bring these three elements

together, the Lord himself will come and light the lamp of self-knowledge

inside you. Before lighting this lamp in the heart of Arjuna, Krishna told him

that he first had to establish complete control over his senses.

Such strict control over the senses is not something which can be achieved by

most people. Even if they were to make an effort in this direction and achieve

some measure of sense-control, ordinary people would not continue with these

efforts because they would be convinced that by giving up sense enjoyments

their very life would come to an end. They consider sense enjoyments as the

only true source of happiness. This is what they experience day after day. But,

the unbounded joy of self-knowledge is something they have not experienced even

once. When you have a bird in your hand, would you let go of it and try to

catch the two birds which may or may not be hiding in the bush? Reasoning in

this way, they consider it madness to give up the sensory enjoyments which they

enjoy every day in order to gain the bliss of the atma through self-knowledge,

an experience which they have never known.

http://www.atmapress.com/saibabagita/saigita183.html

Sai Baba Gita, Compiled and edited by Al Drucker - Published by Atma Press -

http://www.atmapress.com - ISBN: 0963844903Online Edition:

http://www.atmapress.com/saibabagita/index.html

 

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