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Karma as the Source of Diversity

The Vedas recognize divine karma (the action of God) as the source of all creation, preservation and destruction. However, since God performs them without desires, unlike human beings he is not bound by them. From the first chapter of the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad (1.6.1) we learn that karma is one of the triple causes of diversity, the other two being name and form. The diversity in names arises from speech, and the diversity in forms comes from the eye, whereas the (mind and) body is the sources for the diversity in actions. For all actions, the body is the source, the controller, or the lord. Within the body, the mind, the speech, breath, the organs of action, and the organs of perception are considered the main deities who receive their share of food from the body and perform their actions. However, we cannot fully rely upon them to fight the impurities and the evil that can infest our body, since they are all vulnerable to evil and demonic actions, thoughts, desires, temptations, a...
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Maitri Upanishad


The laying of the formerly-described sacrificial fires is indeed the sacrifice of Brahman. Therefore let the sacrificer, after he has laid those fires, meditate on the Self. Thus only does the sacrificer become complete and faultless. But who is to be meditated on? He who is called Prana (breath).

What is the use of the enjoyment of pleasures in this offensive, pithless body - a mere mass of bones, skin, sinews, marrow, flesh, seed, blood, mucus, tears, phlegm, ordure, water, bile, and slime! What is the use of the enjoyment of pleasures in this body which is assailed by lust, hatred, greed, delusion, fear, anguish, jealousy, separation from what is loved, union with what is not loved, hunger, thirst, old age, death, illness, grief, and other evils!

He who, without stopping the out-breathing, proceeds upwards, and who, modified (by impressions), and yet not modified, drives away the darkness (of error), he is the Self. He who in perfect rest, rising from this body (both from the sthula and stikshma), and reaching the highest light', comes forth in his own form, he is the Self this is the immortal, the fearless, this is Brahman.

Now then this is the science of Brahman, and the science of all Upanishads, I shall tell it to thee

We hear (in the sacred records) that there were once the Valakhilyas, who had left off all evil, who were vigorous and passionless. They said to the Pragapati Kratu: "O Saint, this body is without intelligence, like a cart. To what supernatural being belongs this great power by which such a body has been made intelligent? Or who is the driver?

He who in the Sruti is called "Standing above," like passionless ascetics, amidst the objects of the world, he, indeed, the pure, clean, undeveloped, tranquil, breathless, bodiless, endless, imperishable, firm, everlasting, unborn, independent one, stands in his own greatness, and by him has this body been made intelligent, and he is also the driver of it.

Sound, touch, and other things are like nothings; if the elemental Self is attached to them, it will not remember the Highest Place.


Comments

  1. Ganesh YegneshwaranMarch 13, 2022 at 5:06 PM

    Wonder whether Samadhi is possible without Sambhog for majority of us. Tvam Tatva Masi

    ReplyDelete

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