The Real & The Unreal

Swami: Oh! When did you arrive? You were not visible anywhere outside. Are you well?

Bhakta: It’s two days since I came. I see here a number of people everywhere outside. I hear the incess­ant confusion of voices. Coming from my place to avoid that confusion, I find here, too, crowds are everywhere. Therefore, I entered inside. There it is fine, blissful, and quiet. That is why I was in the Hall inside. It is as quiet inside as it is restless outside.

Swami: What is special in this? It is natural. Where there is jaggery, there the ants gather…and between out­side and inside, this is the distinction! That is the chara­cteristic. That is how it is.

Bhakta: Swami! I do not understand what You say. If You tell me in detail, I shall listen and be happy.

Swami: You yourself said, didn’t you, that there is an outside and an inside. Well, those are what we call ‘bahyaprapancham’ and ‘antaraprapancham’—the ex­ternal world and the internal world. Now, which is the internal? Give me your idea.

Bhakta: You want it to come from my mouth it­self? It would be so good if You speak.

Swami: Well, making the questioner himself give out the answers is the Sanathana [ancient] method of teaching. If those who question, themselves give the answers, they would clearly understand the subject. The lecturing style is different. In olden days, all the rishis [saints] enabled their disciples to understand Vedanta only by this method. So, come on! Speak! Let us see.

Bhakta: Do you want me to speak of the objects I have seen with the eye?

Swami: Not only the eye. Tell me all that you have experienced and known through all the senses of cogni­tion, the eye, the ear, etc.

Bhakta: Earth, sky, water, sun, moon, wind, fire, stars, dusk, mountains, hills, trees, rivers, women, men, children, old persons, animals, birds, coldness, heat, the happy, the miserable, fishes, insects, disease… like these I have seen many.

Swami: Enough, enough, that is enough! This is the “prapancha [world]” Did you see it only today? Did it exist yesterday? Will it exist tomorrow?

Bhakta: Why do you ask me so, Swami? It has existed like this for ages, isn’t it? Who knows for how long it will exist, or since how long it has existed?

Swami: ‘Since how long it has existed!’ you said, isn’t it? That is what we speak of as anadi, beginning-less. This external world is beginning-less… When there is ‘external’, there must be ‘internal’ also, is it not? Well, have you ever seen a cinema?

Bhakta: Ever seen! Why, Swami, the cinema, too, is a part of the prapancham, isn’t it? I have seen many.

Swami: What did you see? Tell me.

Bhakta: I have seen many wonderful ‘pictures’; I have heard numerous experiences of joy and sorrow.

Swami: ‘I have seen’, you say. The screen is one, the ‘picture’ is another. Did you see both?

Bhakta: Yes.

Swami: Did you see the screen and the ‘picture’ both at the same time?

Bhakta: How is that possible, Swami? When the pictures are seen, the screen is not visible; when the screen is visible the pictures are not seen.

Swami: Right! The screen, the pictures, do they exist always?

Bhakta: No. The screen is permanent; the pictures come and go.

Swami: As you say, the screen is permanent, and the pictures come and go. For this ‘permanent’ and ‘imperma­nent’ we use the words, sthiram and asthiram, nithyam and anithyam, ksharam and aksharam. I ask you: Does the picture fall on the screen or the screen fall on the picture? Which is the basis for what?

Bhakta: The pictures fall on the screen; so for the picture the screen is the basis.

Swami: So, too, the external world, which is like the picture, has no permanence; it changes. The internal world is fixed; it does not change. The external has the internal as its basis, its substratum.

Bhakta: But. Swami! I heard you say ksharam­-aksharam, nithyam-anithyam.

Swami: Yes, my boy! You were speaking now of pictures, do these have names and forms?

Bhakta: Haven’t they? Its only because they have names and forms that the story is understood. Then only do we recollect Ramayana and Bharatham. There is no formless name and nameless form.

Swami: Good! That is well said! Where there is a form there must be a name; where there is a name, there must be a form Both these are connected with each other. When we say, “avinabhava sambandha”–it is to this rela­tionship that we refer. Have you understood now the meaning of ‘prapancham’?

Bhakta: I have grasped that it is identified with name and form, but, Swami, I would like to hear You describe how it originated.

Swami: You should not fall into the tangle now. If we engage ourselves in describing that, it would be like getting into a mango garden and without eating the fruit we have plucked, calculating the number of trees in the garden, the number of twigs on each branch, the number of fruits on each twig, and what the total price of all the mangoes would be if the price of one mango is so much. Instead of senselessly wasting precious time in the collec­tion of this information, we should, like the person who eats the fruit, find out what is of primary importance, and understanding that thing first, attain contentment and joy. Leave that alone. What did you say is the nature of this prapancham? This prapancham has another name too, do you know?

Bhakta: I said that the prapancham is identified with name and form. I have heard that it is known by another name, jagat.

Swami: This nama-roopa prapancham, this jagat is like indrajala or magician’s art, real only as long as you see it. So, too, the world is real only so long as you experi­ence it with your indriyas or senses. That is to say, anything not experienced in the wakeful stage ‘is taken as non­existent.’ Under such circumstances, we say ‘sat [truth]’ for existence and ‘asat [untruth]’ for non-existence. Therefore, what do you say of this world? Is it ‘sat’ or ‘asat’?

Bhakta: It exists in experience in the wakeful stage, and so it is ‘sat’; it does not exist in the deep sleep stage, and so it is ‘asat’.

Swami: Oh! sat, asat, did you say? When these two words are added, we get sadasat [lasting], isn’t It? This is what is spoken of by us as maya, do you know?

Bhakta: Is that maya [illusion] similar to magic?

Swami: Is it not? ‘Indrajalam idam sarvam’—all this is the magician’s work. That is what the rishis have been saying since ages.

Bhakta: Then there must be a performer of all this indrajala, isn’t it?

Swami: Certainly, there is. That magician is God. He is endowed with countless auspicious attributes. The Maharishis have formed a name on the basis of each attri­bute and a form on the basis of each name and attained realization meditating on those forms, making the Attributeless Attributeful and the Formless Formful. Is it not their experience that is being proclaimed through a thou­sand tongues? In the Sastras, Vedas, and the Upanishadshave they not declared how they have realized God in their dhyana samadhi [meditation], each in his own way, according to his attitude and devotion and worship; how each has been blessed with the vision of the Lord and the actual con­summation of union with Him?

Bhakta: Yes. Swami! I have understood that. But you said that name and form are based on attributes. Kindly explain this to me.

Swami: Certainly. We must now pay attention to such important topics only because the others are beyond your powers of imagination. Listen carefully. Since the Lord pleases all, He is known as Rama. So, also, He is Premaswarupa, the embodiment of love. He is Bhakta­vatsala, full of affection to His devotees; He is Krupa­sagara, Ocean of Mercy. In each such name and form, He has vouchsafed Sakshatkara to bhaktas and blessed them with sayujya [merger with the Divine]. The Formless God assumes all forms in order to bless bhaktas.

Bhakta: I am happy. I am indeed so happy, Swami! Through Your grace, I understand quite clearly. Just one doubt: The Formless Paramatma, you said, has countless names. Are all names and forms equal? Is there any difference?

Swami: What a question! All names and forms are certainly equal. Whatever name and form are worshipped, the Lord is of that unique real Swarupa only. It is pos­sible to realize Him through that name and form. But the bhaktashould pay attention to one matter. In whichever form the Lord is worshipped, the favor prayed for the purpose must be one.

Bhakta: What type of purpose, Swami?

Swami: Mumukshutwam [desire for liberation]. The Lord alone should be loved, nothing else. Love That. Meditate on That. That should be concretized. Finally, resolve that you be merged in That. That type of acute desire alone one should have.

Source: Sandeha Nivarini