Shivaratri: Its Significance
To enlighten everyone that they are the atman (self) and not the body that is the material vesture of the atman is the purpose of the Mahashivaratri festival, says Bhagavan Baba in this Divine discourse.
The scriptures composed by the sages of Bharat [India] are testaments of genuine experience; they are to be interpreted and observed in practice, after reverential study by persons who have clarified their intellects through rigorous disciplines. They can confer eternal ananda [bliss] when they are thus utilized; but scholastic, philological, or grammatical inquiries that seek to comment and confuse can only lead to the neglect and loss of the precious content. They [the scriptures] are ready to teach the truth and lead the student toward the goal of ananda; they are eager to grant immortality and save man from the dreary round of birth and death.
Really speaking, children of Bharat are fortunate to have this invaluable heritage. The Vedas and Shastras (Hindu scriptures) speak of this fortune; the sages extol this land on this score; the Upanishads (Hindu scriptures) acclaim the people who have such gurus and guides; the achievements of generations of aspirants and seekers stand witness to this treasure and its worth. But, some blind cynics discard the treasure, and condemn it as something that draws men into futility. One can only pity them for their lack of vision. Bharat is the name of a way of life, not an extent of land between the seas and the Himalayas (mountains in northern India). It is another name for tolerance and mutual love, which have made it a garden of multi-colored religions, philosophies, creeds, and faiths.
It is the land where persons who have attained that realization have declared the identity between man and the goal. The individual is encased, while God is unbound; the individual believes himself bound, as having name and form, as the body and its appurtenances. The fire that is latent in the fuel can manifest only when it is lit by external fire. So too, the divinity of the intellect, the mind, and the inner instruments of cognition can manifest only when the atma is prompting and urging them. Otherwise, if they are prompted and urged by the senses, they will lead only to perdition and delusion.
Every directive given in the scripture on discipline is intended to help the sadhaka [spiritual aspirant] to realize this identity, and to derive the ananda which recognition of this unity confers. For example, take the exhortation in the Gita shloka [verse], which says, “Sarva dharmaan parityajya maam ekam sharanam vraja.” What is the dharma [right action] that has to be given up? Are all duties and responsibilities to be discarded? Or, does dharma here refer only to some of these?
Dharma is an omnibus expression, which means a lot of things, attitudes, behavior patterns, and mores. Very often it includes mere rules, which are known as vidhi and nishedha, the do’s and don’ts. If you are anxious to catch a bus, board a plane, or entrain for some place, you have to be at the stop, port, or station before a particular time and that is a vidhi. When two brothers divide among themselves the possessions left by their father, they share half and half; this is dharma, that is to say, the right and proper, moral, and approvable. Now, dharma of this nature is laid down and observed, so that we get peace and content, and sukha (happiness) may be promoted. It belongs to the relative world, while the absolute has no concern with these relative advantages or benefits. It is in the realm of ajnana [ignorance] that sukha is desired and dukha [suffering] is avoided.
Kama [desire] is the urge for karma [action]. It is regulated and modified by dharma so that sukha may be gained and dukha avoided. And, kama is the product or expression of ajnana [ignorance]. So, when the [Bhagavad] Gita directs that all dharma be given up, what is meant is that ajnana (which induces kama, the progenitor of karma that has to subserve dharma) is to be conquered, and overcome. Acquire jnana [true wisdom]; know the truth of thyself. Then, you will be free from lust and hate, because you will know that you are the ever full, the ever blissful.
Imagine a person searching for things in a room. His eye falls on all the articles he wants to secure, but he does not notice the person who searches. The seeker does not see himself. When you give up the search for objects, for things other than yourself, you see yourself and know yourself. When the drishta (seer) is seen, the drishya (seen) is negated; when the drishya (seen) is seen, the drishta (seer) is ignored.
Tideman [the previous speaker] said just now that in the very first meeting he had with me, I told him that I am God. In fact, every one is God, limiting himself into this particular name and form is which he is encased. If you believe yourself to be the label that is now affixed on you, and call your self by the name that others have given you, you can never know your reality and have unshakeable joy. This is the lesson that Vedanta teaches. Each one is “sathyam jnanam anantam Brahma”—truth, wisdom, unlimited, and the universal self. But, sunk in the morass of ajnana that multiplies endlessly the desires that haunt the mind, man forgets the core of his being. Every one must get convinced that he is the atman and not the body that is its [atman’s] material residence. To instruct you about this is the special purpose of the festival of Mahashivaratri.
People ask, why does Swami produce the lingam from within Himself on this day? But, let Me tell you, it is impossible for you to understand the attributes of the Divine and to measure Its potentialities, or, to gauge the significance of the manifestation of Divinity. It is agamya (unreachable) and agochara (not understandable, mysterious). Therefore, in order to bear witness to the fact that the Divinity is amidst you, it becomes necessary to express this attribute. Or else, the atmosphere of hatred, greed, cruelty, violence, and irreverence will overwhelm the good, the humble, and the pious.
The linga is just a symbol, a sign, and an illustration of the beginningless, endless, and limitless for it has no limbs, face, feet, front or back, and no beginning or end. Its shape is like the picture one imagines the nirakara (formless) to be. As a matter of fact, linga means—leeyate (that in which all forms and names merge) and gamyate (that toward which all names and forms are proceeding to attain fulfillment). It is the fittest symbol of the all-pervasive, the all-knowing, and the all‑powerful. Everything is subsumed in it and everything starts from it.
From the lingam arises jangam (universe); from the jangam arises sangam association, attachment, activity); and as a result of the sangam, one realizes the lingam (attributeless atma). Thus, the circle is completed. From the beginning less to the beginningless! This is the lesson that lingobdhavam [birth of the lingam] teaches. The lingasharira (the physical body) that is inhabited by the atma is but a vesture worn for this particular sojourn! Many a vesture has this soul worn, though its reality is eternal.
People have not imprinted in their hearts the lessons that the ancient Hindu scriptures and epics seek to teach. I have been, for example, asked often, why some persons who have associated themselves with Prasanthi Nilayam for years leave off, and do not appear again. The reply is evident for those who have studied the Ramayana [an epic] well. After ten or twelve years of `devotion,’ suddenly these people take a turn for the worse and stray away; as the Shastras (scriptures) say, ‘When the accumulated merit gets spent, they slip into the depths of mortality’. Sita is the daughter of earth, nature, or prakriti, seeking the eternal comradeship of Purusha (Universal Self). She weds the Purusha, the Lord come as Rama. When Rama agrees to go into exile and proceeds to the forest for a stay of fourteen long years, Sita too gives up all the luxuries she was accustomed to; she braves the perils of jungle life to be with Rama. She renounced desire from her heart for the sole goal of Rama.
She spent thirteen years with the Lord in perfect bliss as a consequence of the sacrifice she dared to make. Then, quite suddenly, desire sprouted in her mind, and carried her far away from the Lord. She saw a golden deer, and she coveted it. She who had renounced huge treasures of gold and diamond was attracted by a fantasy, and this led to the agonizing separation.
So too, for those long attached to me, there arises some desire—for lands, jobs, family life, fame, position, and possessions—and they move away! But Sita repented for her mistake, and her mind suffered extreme anguish at the separation. She called on her Lord to redeem her, calling out in contrition, Rama, Rama, Rama, Rama, with every breath. And, finally, Rama Himself moved toward her and restored Himself to the devotee. So, too, if you are agonizingly repentant and aware of the loss and anxious to rejoin, craving for the presence, this Sairam too will move toward you, and grant you grace.
Source: Sanathana Sarathi, March 1971
