Swami teaches... Purusha, Prakriti, Body and Creation

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Swami teaches... (12 January 2005)

 

Purusha, Prakriti, Body and Creation

 

 

Purusha stands for a large number of different persons. Prakriti stands for

a wide variety of manifestations of the world. You have been taught that just

as the manifestations of the material world are very many, so also the

manifestations of the Purusha or the soul are manifold. But, if we really

enquire into this from the point of view of the meaning which we are aiming at,

then Purusha can be only one. The Purusha or the soul is simply the

manifestation of the divine. On the other hand, the manifestation of matter, of

the material things, is this world. This Prakriti or the world is something

which is filled with all the five elements. All these are destructible. They

are not permanent. But what is clear, what is clean, what is indestructible and

what is effulgent and shining, is only one and that is the soul or Purusha.

Srutis have described this soul as something which has no attributes, as

something which is superior, as something which is eternal and permanent, as

something which does not change at all.

 

"How does creation go on?" For getting a dream, the cause is your sleep. So

also for creation what is called Maya is the cause. For Maya there is no

beginning and there is no end. Thus this creation or the world you see around

you is something which is related to Maya. Maya always loves the soul, loves

the Purusha. It wants to be with Him, wants to reach God. So also the creation

wants to reach God all the time. In some Puranas, it is said that Purusha has

attached himself to the world. In the material world, although many shapes come

about and although we may make a distinction between men and women with many

different names, while this distinction can be made in Prakriti, so far as

Purusha is concerned there can be no such distinction.

Here, in this world, in the drama of our life on the stage of this world, we

are putting on the part of many appearances. In the aspects of either these five

elements or the five Kosas or the five Thathwas, all these people are equal and

there is no difference. Therefore, when you talk of manhood, what you have to

regard as man, as Purusha, is the strength, the energy of Purusha that is

contained in him. Thus it is by the coexistence and by the combination of these

two, the soul, or the Purusha, and the Prakriti or the world of matter, that

creation is going on.

 

For example, there is a light from the lamp. By the breeze, you will find

that light moves a little, hither and thither. If there is a lot of breeze then

the light itself will be extinguished. There are so many changes in the lamp.

But there is no change at all in the light that is coming from this lamp. To

any one who may come here, the lamp is handing on its brightness. In the same

manner, God, who has no attributes, is handing his pure effulgence to everyone,

irrespective of who he is. Because this aspect of God, which has no attributes,

goes and enters some other abode like the body, or divinity gets joined to

something else, there the differences appear. But the original divine thing is

one and the same and does not change at all.

 

For such creation there will have to be some one who is responsible. We have

seen the mud in the tank. We are also seeing the water in the river. Water alone

from the river will not enable you to make a pot or a pan. The mud alone from

the tank will not enable you to make a pot or a pan. It is the combination of

water and mud that will enable you to create either a pot or a pan. Simply by

the combination of water and mud, the pot or the pan is not going to be ready.

There has to be a potter who will prepare the pots and pans. Such a potter is

God. The energy or the power is the water.

The mud which was got from the tank or the mound or which went into the

making of the pot is all the same. But it has taken the shape in one case of

the pot, in another case of the mound and in another case of the pit. For the

depression, for the mound and for the pot, the root cause is mud.

In course of time, this pot is going to break. In course of time, the mound

in front of the potter's house will become smaller and smaller. But the mud

remains all the time as mud.

By some desires and by some actions of our parents and also by the Sankalpa

or the wish of God, the human body comes into existence. This life, Jiva, can

be compared to the mud in the mound which goes on diminishing time after time.

Dehatma (the body) is going to be destroyed (as the pot). All human bodies in

time are going to be destroyed. Pictorially the mud or the basic constituent of

the human body is the Paramatma that is going to go to its original place from

which it has emanated. Like the pots and pans which have come from mud, and in

course of time after usage they break and go back as mud, so also we have to

accept that the contents of all these human bodies which have come from the

primary spirit, after they have been used and destroyed, will again return to

the source.

What existed before we were born? If it did exist, there is no question of

its being born. Suppose we take the view that it did not exist at all. If it

did not exist, where is the question of something which did not exist and does

not exist being born? How are we to find this out? How do we get the knowledge

of what is this 'I'? Those texts which tell us and teach us answers to these

questions are called Upanishads and Sastras.

It is not possible to understand yourself, without seeking it from

experienced people and without seeking it from Upanishads and without

practising what these texts teach. Of course, in this world, we are seeing the

five organs, the five Kosas, the five elements and even the Atma or the soul,

we are able to realise and see. But those that have to tell you what the paths

are which you have to adopt in order that you may realise fully the meaning of

these things, are our Sastras that are time-honoured, old and ancient. (Reet's

extracts-compilation from: The Divine Discourse Bhagawan Sathya Sai Baba,

"Purusha and Prakriti." Summer Course in Spirituality and Indian Culture, May

1972, Brindavan).

 

PS:

The compilations "Swami teaches..." are pictorially my experiences, how I

understand different episodes from His Teaching. They are far not simple

reproductions from His texts but as real living imaginations of Swami's texts

through me, how I ackowledge His wisdom. Such is my path to acquire Swami's

Teaching as an inner set for me. It is possible, that I am not correctly

understand some of His explanations, but I try to do the best on the way to

enlightenment as a seeker. (Therefore the reproduction "Swami teaches...

without indication the original Swami's source with the note "Reet's

extracts-compilation" is not welcome. All notes concern to my interpretation

His Teaching are welcome).

Certainly, anyone has his/her own methods. As many followers are, so many

different approaches. Mine is only as an example of millions others approaches.

Maybe it is inspired someone closer to Swami's Teaching who is on the path of

seeking eternal truth.

 

Namaste - Reet