Sri Ramakrishna on God

[Guest guest]

Sri Ramakrishna on God

You see many stars in the sky at night, but not when the sun rises. Can you

therefore say that there are no stars in the heavens during the day? O man,

because you cannot find God in the days of your ignorance, say not that there

is no God.

Many are the names of God and infinite the forms through which he may be

approached. In whatever name and form you worship Him through that you will

realise Him.

The Reality is one and the same; the difference is in name and form. There are

three or four ghat s on a lake. The Hindus, who drink water at one place, call

it jal . The Mussalmans at another place call it pani . And the English at a

third place call it ‘water’. All three denote one and the same thing, the

difference being in the name only. In the same way, some address the Reality as

‘Allah’, some as ‘God’, some as ‘Brahman’, some as ‘Kali’, and others by such

names as ‘Rama’, ‘Jesus’, ‘Durga’, ‘Hari’.

No one can say with finality that God is only ‘this’ and nothing else. He is

formless, and again He has forms. For the bhakta He assumes forms. But he is

formless for the Jnani. Do you know how it is? Brahman, Existence, Knowledge,

Bliss Absolute, is like a shoreless ocean. In the ocean visible blocks of ice

are formed here and there by intense cold.

Similarly, under the cooling influence, so to speak, of the bhakti of Its

worshippers, the Infinite transforms Itself into the finite and appears before

the worshipper as God with form. That is to say, God reveals Himself to His

Bhaktas as an embodied Person.

Again, as, on the rising of the sun, the ice in the ocean melts away, so on the

awakening of jnana , the embodied God melts back into the infinite and formless

Brahman. Then one does not feel any more that God is a Person, nor does one see

God’s forms. But mark this: form and formlessness belong to one and the same

Reality.

Once a man went into a wood and saw a beautiful creature on a tree. Later he

told a friend about it and said, ‘Brother, on a certain tree in the wood I saw

a red-coloured creature.’ The friend answered: ‘I have seen it too. Why do you

call it red? It is green.’ A third man said: ‘Oh, no, no! Why do you call it

red? It is green.’ A third man said: ‘Oh, no, no! Why do you call it green? It

is yellow.’ Then other persons began to describe the animal variously as violet,

blue, or black. Soon they were quarrelling about the colour.

At last they went to the tree and found a man sitting under it. In answer to

their questions he said: ‘I live under this tree and know the creature very

well. What each of you has said about it is true. Sometimes it is red,

sometimes green, sometimes, yellow, sometimes blue and so forth and so on. It

is a chameleon. Again sometimes I see that it has no colour whatsoever.”

In like manner, one who constantly thinks of God can know His forms and aspects.

God has attributes; then again He has none. Only the man who lives under the

tree knows that the chameleon can appear in various colours, and he knows,

further, that the animal at times has no colour at all. Others not knowing the

whole truth, quarrel among themselves and suffer.

Fire itself has no definite shape, but as glowing embers it assumes different

forms. Thus the formless fire is seen endowed with forms. Similarly, the

formless God sometimes invests Himself with definite forms.

The sun is many times bigger than the earth, but distance makes it appear like a

small disc. So the Lord is infinitely great, but being too far away from Him, we

are incapable of comprehending His real greatness

There is no distinction between impersonal God (Brahman) on the one hand and

Personal God (Shakti) on the other. It is one and the same Reality. When we

think of It as inactive, that is to say, not engaged in the acts of creation,

preservation, and destruction, then we call It Brahman. But when it engages in

these activities, then we call it Kali or Shakti.

God is like a hill of sugar. A small ant carries away from it a small grain of

sugar, and a bigger one takes from it a considerably larger grain. But in spite

of this the hill remains as large as before. So are the devotees of God. They

become ecstatic even with a little of a single Divine attribute. No one can

contain within him the realisation of all His glories and excellences.

As a piece of lead thrown into a basin of mercury soon dissolves in it, so the

individual soul melts away, losing its limitations, when it falls into the

ocean of Brahman.

The water and its bubble are one. The bubble has its birth in the water, floats

on it, and ultimately is resolved into it. So also the individual ego

(Jivatman) and the supreme Spirit (Paramatman) are one and the same. The

difference is in degree; the one is dependent, the other independent.

God is to man as magnet is to iron. Why does He not then attract man? As iron

deeply imbedded in mud is not moved by the attraction of the magnet, so the

soul deeply imbedded in Maya feels not the attraction of the Lord. But as when

the mud is washed away with water, the iron is free to move, so the soul when

be constant tears of prayer and repentance washes away the mud

Arun Reddy Nukala

+44 7946 595063

http://groups.msn.com/

ALL-NEW Messenger - all new features - even more fun!