Sathya Sai Baba Geetha Vahini - Chapter 24

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Sathya Sai BabaGeetha Vahini

Chapter XXIV

The awareness of one being only the witness of everything, is the secret of

self-realisation. Self-realisation is either the knowledge that "I am the truth

of Me" or "I have known Myself" or "All are one Atma," or "I have experienced

that the individual and the universal are not distinct". This is what every

person has to discover for himself; mere asceticism without this is sheer waste

of time and energy. Man is not a mere animal. He has in him the spark of the

divine and he should not allow it to be extinguished.

Why, even when the senses operate, they are prompted by the presence of Atma.

When the sun rises, birds take to wing, flowers bloom, the human community

starts its varied activities. The sun does not directly engage in any of these;

it is the prompter, that is all. The sun is not the cause; He is just the

activator, the witness, the onlooker. He is above and beyond all this. He is

not bound or based on man or beast or bird or flower.

Birds fly in the sky but they do not leave any trace behind of their path of

flight. So too, however many sensory impressions fly through the inner sky of

the heart, no impression should be left thereon. The heart is not affected by

their flying through.

But man sees only the superstructure, not the basis. In the garland, no one

observes the string that keeps the flowers together, the existence of the

string can be known only by investigation and inquiry. The basis is the string;

the flowers depend upon it and hang together on account of it, as a garland.

To understand this better, take another instance. Pots, pans, plates and pails

are all made of clay; but though there is clay in all these, clay is only clay.

It is not pot, pan, plate or pail. So too in the Atma, which is the basis, there

are no Gunas (or characteristics) like pot, pan, plate, or pail; but the Atma

exists in the Gunas as Gunaswarupa. It is the Atma which is mistaken for the

Gunas, because it is conceived as limited and as with name and form. The Atma

is the only reality that persists through all names and forms, like the clay

which is the only substance in all the pots and pans. By this kind of inquiry,

the conviction that the basis and the substance of everything is Atma or

Kshethrajna or Parabrahmam gets strengthened.

Then Krishna was asked by Arjuna, thus: "It is indeed very difficult to know

that basic Atma, that inner reality of all things. He is everywhere but is

nowhere visible! He is the inner core of all but cannot be contacted at all!

What is the cause of this mystery?"

Krishna replied: "Arjuna! You have not understood yet. The Atma is subtler than

the subtlest and so it is difficult to cognise it. You know the five elements,

do you not, earth, water, fire, wind and sky? Of these each subsequent element

is subtler than the previous one. Earth has five qualities: Sound, touch, form,

taste and smell; water has all these, except smell; fire has only three, sound,

touch and form, wind has only two qualities, sound and touch; and the last one,

sky has only sound. That is why each of these is subtler than the previous one

and also more widely spread. The sky is everywhere, penetrating in and through

all, because it has only one characteristic. How much more subtle must be the

Atma which has no qualities or characteristics! Imagine how much more immanent

and universal it must be! Those who are objectively minded cannot grasp this

phenomenon; only the subjective minded can have the solution."

"This faith can come only to those who can reason things out. It is a fatal

thrust on those who shout, in season and out of season, that God cannot be

immanent in everything because He is not to be perceived at all. They do not

believe that God is above and beyond the trivial qualities with which they seek

to measure Him. It is a pity, indeed. God is as near to you, as you are to Him;

if you keep afar, He too remains afar."

There are some fine examples of this truth in the Puranas. Hiranyakasipu sought

God in all things and came to the conclusion that He is nowhere. Prahlada, on

the other hand, believed that He can be found wherever He is sought and so He

appeared from out of the impenetrably hard iron pillar itself! Prahlada was

close to God and so God also was close to him.

The cow carries sacred sustaining milk in its own udder; but, unaware of this,

it runs after the water in which rice has been washed! So too man is unaware of

Madhava who is in him as his own Atma nor does he make an effort to discover

Him, who is his own reality. He runs after the much inferior joy obtainable

from the fleeting objects, with his defective and deceptive senses. What

colossal ignorance!

To revel in multiplicity is ignorance; to visualise the unity is the sign of

wisdom, Jnanam. Savam or "those who are dead to reality" alone see this as

"many". Only "Sivam" or the divine see the seeming many as "one". What is

called Jneyam, Atma, Kshetrajna, and Parabrahmam is that "one" only. This was

taught to Arjuna so that he might experience the bliss thereof.

Readers! As the rivers have the sea as their goal, Jivas have Brahmam as their

goal. Permanent joy can never be received by the "conscious" Jiva from

"material" objects. Moksha is the acquisition of permanent joy; it is also

called the attainment of Brahmam. Fixed exclusive devotion to Godhead can come

to those who have no attachment to the wild phantasmagoria of name and form,

which is called the "world". That alone can win Atma-jnana. The world is the

instrument for the attainment of renunciation; that is the reason why it is so

tempting and so treacherous. He is the real Vedanthin who sees the world as an

instrument, for escape from its coils.

Usually, the word "Oordhwa" is taken to mean "abovehigh", etc. But if you

consider the world to be a tree, then it has its roots in Brahmam; that is, the

roots are above and the branches are below! This was taught to Arjuna by Krishna

thus: "The tree of Samsara or life is a very peculiar one. It is quite distinct

from the trees of the world. The trees that you see in the world have their

branches above and roots below. The Asvattha tree of Samsara, however, has

roots above and branches below. It is a topsy-turvy tree."

Arjuna intercepted with a question. "How did it get the name, Aswattha? It means

a banyan tree, is it not? Why was the tree of life called so? Why was it not

called by some other name?" A strange name for a strange tree! "Listen.

Aswattha means Anithya, impermanent, transient; it also means the 'banyan

tree'. Its flowers and fruits are neither good for smelling nor for eating.

However, its leaves will be ceaselessly quivering in the wind. So it is also

called Chaladala, meaning 'quivering leaves.' Worldly objects too are ever

wavering, unsteady, ever changing positions. In order to make people understand

this truth and strive to overcome it, it is called Aswattha."

"This disquisition is to make men develop the higher vision and yearn for steady

faith in Brahmam. The objective world can be truly understood only by two types

of examination: the outer and the inner. There is a reasoning that binds and a

reasoning that liberates. He who sees the world as world sees wrong; he who

sees it as Paramatma sees right. The world is the effect; it has a cause; it

cannot be different from the cause. It is just a mutation of Brahmam, which

constitutes it. The millions of beings are the branches, twigs and leaves; the

seed is Brahmam, in which all the tree is subsumed and summarised. He who knows

this, knows the Vedas."

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