Lessons on the Upanishads

by Swami Krishnananda

This is the grandeur of the Upanishadic philosophy. All this is beautiful to hear, but it is so beautiful that you may not be able to put it into practice. Something going beyond you, totally, may not be easily applicable to your daily life. There are obstacles. Many impediments are there in your life, even in attempting to go ahead along this path. What are the obstacles? This also is indicated in a little analogy in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad itself.

The gods, the demons and the human beings went to Prajapati, the Creator.It appears all of them said, "Great Master, please teach us."

Prajapati called the gods and said, "I am teaching you. Listen to what I am saying. Da." Only one letter was spoken – da.

Then Prajapati asked the gods, "Do you understand what I am saying?"

"Yes, yes; we understand," they replied.

Then Prajapati called the demons. "I am giving you one instruction. Listen to me. Da. Do you understand?"

"Yes, we understand," they replied.

Then Prajapati called the human beings. "I am giving you an instruction. Da. Do you understand?"

"Yes, we understand," they replied.

"What did you understand?" Prajapati asked.

The gods said, "We understand from this 'da' that you are telling us to practise damyata." In Sanskrit damyata means 'restrain yourself'.

Prajapati said, "Oh, very good, you have understood what I mean. Da means damyata. Restrain yourself; do not be indulgent."

Then Prajapati asked the demons, "What is it that you have understood?"

"Yes, sir, we understand. By 'da' you meant dayadhvam: be compassionate."

This is because the demons are very cruel in nature. The gods are supposed to be indulgent and so Prajapati said, "Restrain yourself." The demons are cruel and so he said, "Be compassionate."

And to the human beings Prajapati asked, "Da – what do you understand by this?"

"Yes, we understand. You told us data: give in charity," they replied.

This is because human beings are usually greedy. They will not give anything; they only take. All human beings are business people. They are very miserly in giving, but very clever in taking. So he told the human beings "be charitable". Thus, three categories of beings understood the word 'da' in three different ways, according to their own view of things. Because the angels knew that they were indulging in joys, Prajapati made the point of self-restraint – damyata – to them. The demons, of course, knew they were very cruel, so dayadhvam: be merciful and compassionate. For the human beings, of course: be charitable.

Now, these three instructions have a great application to us. Though you may consider that we are human beings and that demons are somewhere and gods are somewhere else, all the three characteristics can be found in our own selves. The godly character is inside us. The demoniacal character also is inside us, and the human nature also is inside us. Sometimes you can behave like a god. You can behave like a gentleman – a grand majestic person, very attractive and composed, with a very good nature, highly considerate, and really divine. You can be like that if you want. Otherwise, you can go on doing work for accumulating wealth only, working hard for more and more of things, and will not part with a cent. This is commercial business mentality gone to the extreme. Or you can be a very violent person; you hate everything, you dislike all things; nobody is your friend; you are the dictator of things; you a tyrant and you want to swallow everything. This is demoniacal. Don't you feel like this sometimes? Sometimes you feel composed like a god, sometimes you feel irritated like a demon, and sometimes you feel miserly.

These three points are to be taken into consideration in our personal life. When a godly nature manifests itself, it need not necessarily mean an indulgent nature. Here, in this particular context of the teaching of Prajapati to the three categories of beings as we have it in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad, the gods are considered as rarefied, higher-bodied individuals in the heavens, who are supposed to be enjoying life on account of the meritorious deeds that they did earlier in their lower species of life. If you do some very good deeds and your life is short here, so that within the span of this little life you cannot enjoy the rewards of your good deeds, you will be transported to an ethereal, rarefied realm of satisfaction and enjoyment which will follow as a natural effect of all the good deeds that you did in this world. This is one kind of divine existence – celestial life. But godly behaviour need not mean only this kind of thing.

Godly behaviour is, in fact, to bring oneself to see things as the Divine Being would see, as God Himself would see the world outside. Sattva, rajas and tamas are three characteristics of prakriti, with which you are all very familiar through your study of the Bhagavadgita and the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali. You feel happy and you are delighted in enjoyment when there is sattva in your personality; you are greedy when there is rajas, and violent when there is tamas. Of course, there is no need of mentioning that you should not be tamasic in nature. It is also not good to be rajasic. It is always good to be sattvic. Now, sattva does not mean absence of action. Rajas is considered to be an impulsion to work, movement, action, etc.; tamas is lethargic activity; and sattva may be considered, therefore, as total freedom from work. But sattva is intense activity of a different kind. There can be a kind of activity which may look like no activity.

Yogarudhasya tasyaiva shamah karanam uchyate is a passage in the sixth Session of the Bhagavadgita.Aruruksor muner yogam karma karanam uchyate, yogarudhasya tasyaiva shamah karanam uchyate (Gita 6.3): "For the beginner in yoga, action is the means; for the established one in yoga, cessation of action is the means." This may be interpreted to mean that when you are established in yoga, you do nothing. Bhagavan Sri Krishna does not say that, because the whole Gita is a song of action based on some principles of consciousness. So, how can He say that establishment in yoga is cessation of action? There must be some other meaning behind this word 'shamah'. It is a peace that passeth all understanding, as people generally say. It is not a dead silence that is called peace. It is an intense activity of consciousness that creates a sense of satisfaction in us. When you have peace, it does not mean that everything is dead and still and nothing is moving. That does not mean peace. It is an intense feeling of satisfaction due to absence of turbulence of any kind. It is activity of a different kind altogether. Very intense activity may sometimes, under certain circumstances, look like no activity. A heightened voltage of electricity passing through a copper wire may look like it is doing nothing. Only if you touch the wire will you know whether there is electricity or not. The wire is there, but you cannot see anything happening. The very rapid movement of an electric fan may give the impression that it is not moving at all. You do not see the blades of the fan. Put a finger into it: you will know whether it is working or not. So, a very heightened form of activity may look like no activity. A very heightened form of light may look like no light. This happened when Sri Krishna, in the court of the Kauravas, manifested His Cosmic Form and blazed forth like thousands of suns, which looked like darkness to mortal eyes. Those present closed their eyes. They could not see anything. If thousands of suns rise in the sky, will you see them? You will close your eyes; then, what you see will be pitch darkness. Even if you gaze at the sun for a few minutes and then look away, you will see black spots. You will not see light. So, sattva, in the sense of yoga, in the context of our practice of it, should be considered as a divine nature manifesting itself from within us. And a sattvic person, a divine person, a godly person, is not necessarily an inactive person, but he may be inactive from the point of view of ordinary perception.

Somebody went to Ramana Maharshi, it appears, and said: "Sir, why don't you do some good work for people instead of sitting quietly?" He replied, "How do you know that I am not doing any good work?" One thought from Masters of this kind will vibrate through the whole universe, and it will work such miracles that millions of people, sitting around tables or working hard with hands and feet, cannot achieve. The greatest Masters of the world are supposed to be unknown to human history. The greatest people of the world known to you in history are second-rate and third-rate heroes. The first-rate heroes come silently and go silently. They not only do not speak, their existence itself is not known. They are like Nara-Narayana in Badrikashrama. If you go, you cannot see them there. Your mortal eyes are not fit enough to visualise the presence of these great masters. They are centres of intense vibration, and their one thought is sufficient; it is enough to last for the duration of the world. All this I am telling you, by way of a story, to show that intense sattva is activity of a divine character; it is something like God working.

Do you believe God works? But, He does not work as we do. He does not require instruments, materials, office, attendants, limbs, hands and feet, organs. He wants nothing. His very Being vibrates as action. That is divine action, and to that end Bhagavan Sri Krishna is trying to take our minds when He says that yoga is yoga of action. We are always afraid of action, because we always understand action in the sense of doing something which takes away some energy from us or depletes some property that belongs to us and we lose something rather than gain something. In all work we seem to be losing something. Therefore, we are afraid of work; we close our offices on holidays. A holy day does not mean a closing day. It is difficult to become a Godman. It is not easy. You may go on thinking about it, but you cannot become a Godman quickly, because of the sense organs being so turbulent. Indriyani parany ahur indriyebhyah param manah (Gita 3.42): "The senses are so powerful that they drag your mind in the direction of relative activity and even relative thinking, and will not permit you to think in this form of heightened thought, which is God-thought."

The greatest yoga is to think, as far as possible, as God Himself perhaps would think. The infinite God does not think anything but Himself. God loves only Himself, and He will love you also, provided you stand inseparate from Him. Therefore, atmasakahatkara is also atmasamarpana. The greatest renunciation brings the greatest realisation, and the greatest renunciation is the renunciation of your own existence itself. Then the greatest fulfilment follows.