Yoga and Gayatri Mantra Yoga is the basis of our culture and wisdom indeed; it has two branches, Hatha Yoga and Raja Yoga. Hatha Yoga is for health of the body and Raja Yoga is for purification of mind and meditation. Gayatri Mantra is a part of Raja Yoga. It is the gist of the Vedas which is the oldest scripture in the world and very basis of the entire wisdom. Gayatri mantra is essence of the Vedas, and essence of the Gayatri mantra is Om. The Gayatri mantra reveals the wisdom that is given in the Upanishads as well. This mantra is the royal road (the easier and open way of meditation to all) to see God in three aspects. “Om bhurbhuvah svah, tat saviturvarenyam bhargodevasya dhi mahi, dhio yo nah prachodayat”. We find the mantra in three parts here, one of its parts is “Om bhurbhuvah svah”, second part is “tat saviturvarenyam bhargodevsya dhi mahi”, and the last part is “dhio yo nah prachodayat”. Let us now comprehend what each part conveys- Om denotes God, when we say Om, it must be understood that we are calling up God. Om is also known as “shabda Brahm”, the emblem of God. Brahm or God is One, He is the Supreme Spirit, cosmic and omnipresent, the Om. God cannot be seen or heard but word (shabda) can be seen, heard and written also. Now where is that God (Om)? God is present in bhu, bhuvah and svah. Bhu is this earth where we are living; bhuvah means the space beyond the earth or the universe, the solar system, planets and milky-ways etc, wherever anything of the creation exists, is called the bhuvah. And what is svah? Svah is beyond that even, where exists nothing at all, but God alone, in His purest form. Thus God is present in this world where we live and there, where we dont live and there also where nothing of the creation exists but only God, thus the Vedas convey the vastness or omnipresence of Om. We imagine Om (God) is all pervading, present in every thing, if we look beyond the earth, then whatever other planets and astral worlds exist, God is present there also, so the sages say that we should see God in every living being and thing, because He has created all and His presence reflects in His entire creation. But the Rishis who can see things even higher above, they call this earth a very small place, the sun alone is one million times bigger than the earth, there are many other planets and worlds in the creation and God is present there also. Those Rishis say that why to limit our sight to that (bhuvah) only, beyond that too where exists nothing at all (the svah), not even the sky, God is present there also. When we speak of Gayatri mantra, the first part of it, “Om bhurbhuvah svah” reveals omnipresence of the God almighty. The Gayatri mantra is Yoga, for first of all we seek the shelter of God in this, and see God in such immensity that He is called the Infinite; there is no end of Him. This earth, though it is vast, but we say that it is limited and there are countless other things in the universe, but there would be some number to those also, but what is the extent of God? God is called neti (Na = no, iti = end), having no end or the endless. Therefore, Rishis of higher vision behold higher above and go on seeing, whereas people, who have their outlook limited to this earth and see God here only they return to this world of human beings after this life, because their affiliation is limited to this world only. But those who are capable of seeing much higher, their soul can go there also; it can go to other higher worlds too, because their perception and sadhna that is practice and endeavor to spiritual enlightenment under the guidance of Guru*, is of higher magnitude. But Rishis of the highest order have their vision even beyond the universe also, the svah. When soul reaches to the highest place, where there is nothing except God, then where will they born? They attain liberation. The Yoga Darshan calls that place “Kaivalya Path” kaivalya means only the Spirit. Nothing but the Spirit dwells there. So the first part of Gayatri mantra is of great importance, it speaks of Triloki, the triune of the three worlds, the earth, the space and beyond the space, the divine world, and God pervades all everywhere. (*Guru- (Gu = darkness, ru = light, Gu also means gunatita that is beyond three modes of nature and ru means rupatita that is beyond any form). So the one who guides from darkness to the light and is in oneness with the Absolute (Yogi). Therefore only a Yogi is known as the complete Guru, who teaches the means for fitness of the body, mind, intelligence and self-realization. God shows Himself to none, only the Guru leads a disciple to God-realization. Hence, greater importance is attributed to the Guru than God, so the Guru is worshiped first of all.) In second part of the mantra, “tat saviturvarenyam bhargo devasya dhi mahi”, tat means that, savita means the Creator of the three worlds, bhargo means light, the magnificent brilliance, devasya means divine. That divine light is Varenyam, worth bearing in mind, we choose that Supreme radiance, there is nothing greater than that to choose, such is the light of the Creator. What we do to it? Dhi mahi, dhi means intelligence, mahi means to bear; we bear that supreme effulgence in our intelligence, and meditate on it. Here comes in Yoga, for meditation is the part of Yoga. We meditate on the purest divine light of the Creator of the three worlds. Now comes the practical aspect of the mantra, it is called sadhna, the practice to realize God, here we imagine God as the Absolute, the greatest of all, the all pervading light, meditate on that light knowing it the manifestation of God and get absorbed in it, this will eventually result into Samadhi. What will be the benefit of samadhi? Our intelligence would purify and attain enlightenment. It is natural for us to think about what is before us and our intelligence attains knowledge of what we perceive. When we think of materialism, our intelligence becomes materialistic, when we think about some noble subject, it becomes noble, but when we contemplate nothing except that divine light, our intelligence becomes like that, attains purity and divine qualities. The last part of Gayatri mantra is “dhio yo nah prachodyat”. Here we pray to God. Dhio means intelligence, yo means which, nah means ours, prachodyat is to inspire or enhance, so this part consists of a prayer, we pray, O God, inspire our intelligence to Thy Divine Light. Thus, when a disciple goes to a Rishi (Guru), the Rishi teaches him Gayatri mantra, the disciple recites and memorizes it first, secondly Rishi explains its meaning which the disciple grasps, and third aspect of it is the sadhna, the practice to realize it. When a disciple is told about sadhna, he is made to sit in meditation and taught to perceive that divine light in mind, which gradually takes him to the state of samadhi and his intelligence becomes divine indeed. These are the three sections of Gayatri mantra; depicting omnipresence and the form of God. Significance of Light - What is significance of the Light? Light is of utmost importance in the Vedic culture. In our (Vedic) culture, we worship light “tamsoma jyotirgamaya” - rise from darkness to Light. The light or jyoti has three forms. The first form of light is the physical one, second form is divine that is light of mind and third form is spiritual one, the Soul. All the three are beneficial to us and these are the very basis our life; our survival is not possible without these. First, the physical forms of light are fire and sunlight etc. The life depends on these. Therefore, our Rishis revered these, they used to live in the sun and fire always used to be with them, it used to be called Aahit Agni. Sadhus (sages) and the common people always used to keep fire available in their houses, by burning wood or dried cow-dung etc, because there was no matchsticks and it was very difficult to light it up with a device called arni. They used to worship sun and fire as these are life sustaining, we get strength from these. If there is no fire, we cannot cook our food and life is impossible without the sun. Second form of light is divine; it is mind. The mind has also been called a light, which is deep within us. The Vedas say, “Jyotishamapijyoti tanmayemanah shivasankalpamastu”, which means, my mind which is the light of lights, it must become pure with good thoughts. Mind is higher than the senses, so it has been called the divine light. If some one is sitting in the sun but there is darkness in the mind, what can one achieve then? We have to make our mind like a steadily glowing lamp. The Gita in this context says that mind of a Yogi is steady and constant like flame of a lamp burning without a flicker, being undisturbed by any wind (external influence). Such should be the mind of a devotee. The Rishis meditate on this divine light as well. We dont have to worship sun and fire only but this divine light as well. What will be the benefit of it? When a lamp is lit up, we notice that all the moths that come to it get burnt up, similarly when mind is enlightened; all the ominous thoughts vanish. Such is the significance of second form of light. We must make use of sunlight by doing Yoga-asanas and Pranayama in it, the mind must remain luminous always, dispelling darkness. If darkness prevails then thieves in the form of bad thoughts would get in, which will lead to bad deeds and to degradation. Therefore, mind must be kept illuminated always. Gayatri mantra tells the third form of light which Rishis behold and meditate in Samadhi, “tat saviturvarenyam bhargo”, the greatest light of the Creator, beyond everything else; that is the real eternal Light, the spiritual one, the Gayatri mantra mentions this as the light of God that exists within the body, in the form of soul. Soul is a fraction of the Absolute or Supreme Soul (Parmatma). Here we see that we are heading for more and more subtle forms of light. We can see the physical light- sunlight, fire etc and feel its warmth as well, whereas divine light of mind illuminates within with great difficulty, it is not visible to common eye and it gets extinguished as well, it is more subtle than the physical light. But the light of God, it is difficult to imagine even. This light of God is called Atma jyoti, the light of soul. It is extremely difficult to realize it; it is even more subtle than the divine light of mind, we meditate upon and strive to realize it. Thus are the three forms of light, having great importance in our lives. We must understand and make the best use of these. Four Kinds of Intelligence Intelligence is next thing the Gayatri mantra mentions. Our intelligence must develop to perceive that Supreme light, but intelligence is also of four types. One is Pashvik buddhi, the beastly intelligence, second is the manavi buddhi, the human intelligence, third is Daivi buddhi, the divine intelligence and fourth is Aarsh or Ishvariya buddhi’, the Godly intelligence. We recite Gayatri mantra; it tells how our intelligence should be? In last part of the mantra dhio yo na prachodyat, we pray to God to set our intelligence right, inspire it to righteousness, because our intelligence is often wicked or perverted by nature, it has to be set right indeed. One must introspect the kind of intelligence one has, whether it is pashvik (beastly), like that of animals. What the animals do? They do violence, for example, lion, dog, fox, cat etc, they kill and eat. People, whose brains work up to this only, what is to be killed and what is to be eaten, such intelligence is called beastly. If we remain up to this alone, then there is absolutely no use of studying the Gayatri mantra. It tells us to shun such thoughts. Therefore, we pray God to enlighten our intelligence with the purest divine light, pious thoughts and deeds; this prayer has to be brought into practice. Second is manavi buddhi, the human intelligence, it is like that of ours. It is full of avarice; there is violence and anger in the first one and greed in the second. We are human beings; we always think of money, wealth and long for something or the other, this way our intelligence is always filled with materialism. We shall remain tangled in this mundane world only; if we do not rise above this, in no way we can benefit then, Gayatri mantra will be of no help. Third type of intelligence is the divine intelligence. We pray to God, but the prayers alone are of no use, if we put up no efforts, we should strive to realize it indeed. Gayatri is a the mantra of learning, the Guru teaches this mantra to disciples and shows the way to practice and realize it. So, we have to determine the kind of intelligence we should attain and what we must do? We have to detach from materialism and look beyond the world in order to ascend from human intelligence to divine. It is attained by becoming introvert, having total control over the senses, the mind then delightfully settles in the soul and remains absorbed in the infinite Light. Thus one realizes the soul and attains divine wisdom and intelligence. The divine intelligence attains knowledge of the entire universe- whatever exists in the creation; it is called science or truth, the knowledge of nature. He, who enhances his intelligence to this level, then secrets of universe unfold to him by itself, even those secrets which scientists discover by many experiments. A person of divine intelligence can instantly know any secret behind any thing intuitively. We wish to have such divine intelligence (to know the all the secrets). We should be able to read the inner-self of a person, what one is thinking and we would come to know about the future as well, such should be our intelligence. It is said that Rishis used to be trikal darshi, the viewers of past, present and future as well. Yogic scriptures explain, “Aparigrahastherya janmakathanta sambodha”- with stability in practice of austerity (Aparigraha, non- accumulation), one knows about ones past lives. The intelligence should not always think of materialistic things of the world, rather it should rise above it, by being detached from the world and firmness in divine wisdom is Aparigraha or austerity. Thus, one can know about the past, has knowledge about the present and acquires knowledge of future as well. Such a person is called trikal darshi, we pray to God to grant us such divine intelligence. Gayatri mantra teaches us a great lesson here, our intelligence must ascend to the height of divine enlightenment, this is what “dhio yo na prachodyat” means. We have got intelligence, but it is trapped in violence, it has become beastly or planning something or other of the worldly things all the time. If it remains entangled only in materialism and gratification of the senses, then how will it be divine? This can be attained if we rise above from petty things of the world and do the sadhna. In this process one is not obsessed or attached even to ones body. This body has also been called a trap or accumulation (parigraha). We have got this trap by our sanskaras, which are the imprints of our thoughts and deeds of previous lives on the mind, for the mind along with soul goes to the next life, thus our thoughts and deeds determine our prospective life- family, place of birth and the personality of a person. This way the soul along with the senses (mind, intelligence and ego) mind get a new body and this cycle goes on and on. This body is an instrument to liberate the soul, but if we put up no effort to liberate it, then this body is nothing but a trap indeed. Liberation is possible when one has no attachment to body even; such is the final stage of austerity. We have got this body and other things associated with it and woven a trap for ourselves thus, if we dont come out of this, our intelligence would never become divine? We wish to be trikal darshi, but we even forget what happened yesterday. why is it so? It is because of Parigraha, the attachment. We are always worried about worldly things; thus forget the things of yesterday, poor intelligence is helpless. The divine intelligence is no doubt higher but limited to the knowledge of Nature only. If one gets knowledge of the past, present and future, but this knowledge is only of nature. The complete wisdom includes knowledge of nature and its Creator as well. The higher stage of divine intelligence is called the Aarsh or Ishvariya buddhi, it is the intelligence of Rishis. What is this Aarsh buddhi? There are two types of knowledge in the world. The Vedas say, “Ritam satyam cha”, one is Satya and the other is Rita. All the knowledge of universe- fire has heat, computer is made to work, space-shuttle is sent to other planets etc, the entire knowledge of Nature is called satya, the truth or science. The higher knowledge beyond science, which tells us about God is called Rita. Knowledge of Nature is science or Truth (vijnana) and knowledge of God is wisdom (Rita or jnana). But, how to attain that wisdom and know God? A person, who rises above the Nature by constant devotion and sadhna, he reaches to the final state of samadhi and attains the highest place where there is only God in the Absolute form. God is present everywhere, His power reflects in every form on the earth and beyond in different worlds of His creation. But the place where He is not in any particular shape but in His Absolute form, having wisdom of that form is Rita, one attains arsh-intelligence. But who will attain that? Rishis reach that stage and experience Ritambhara tat prajna, prajna means intuitive intelligence, dhio and prajna are the same thing. When one reaches that stage by renunciation and wisdom, then evolves the Ritambhra prajna, the intelligence full of wisdom (Rita). As ponds fill with rainwater, similarly this intelligence is inundated with divine light of God at all times. The intelligence is the same, whether we fill it with beastly thoughts, develop it to human intelligence and fill it with greed and materialism or with more sadhana, elevate it to the divine intelligence and realize soul. But when great Rishis reach the ultimate state of samadhi, then everything else is ousted; only the thing that remains in the intelligence is Rita, the light of the Supreme Soul. Thus a person attains wisdom of the Absolute and liberation or the moksha. The nature of our intelligence is such that whatever we see, it forms an image of the same in it and we understand that thing. It is a natural phenomenon. Thus when one sees God in its Absolute or cosmic form and contemplates on Him, then one attains His wisdom. Thus, the intelligence that emerges in such higher state of samadhi is called the Ritambhra prajna. According to the scriptures of Yoga, a person in such a state seeks only the Rita, the purest wisdom of the Supreme Soul. We have to strive for realization of God that is the Rita as well as knowledge of nature that is science or truth, all below that is untruth (asatya). Thus, Gayatri mantra clarifies three things; first, God is omnipresent, He exists on the earth, the universe and beyond- that is svah (Om bhu bhuvah svah). Second part (“tat saviturvarenyam bhargodevasya dhi mahi”) reveals God in the form of divine Light, which we bear in the intelligence, whichever way we contemplate Him, we must have that perception firm in our intelligence, keep contemplating it in mind and go on forgetting the world gradually. It will result in enlightenment (samadhi). The higher we go the more enlightenment we shall attain. Finally our intelligence becomes Ritambhra Prajna. Thus, one attains oneness with the Supreme Soul, attains liberation. But, who helps intelligence in this process? The body, senses and mind help the intelligence to attain that goal, provided we train these to this goal. If our food for body is not pure, how come our intelligence will be pure then? Those who kill and eat animals that is beastly intelligence, if it remains the same, they will become animals after this life, And those who are trapped in greed and materialism, they would be back to this world only. But if elevated to divine intelligence then we will transcend this world to higher ones; the heaven etc. And those who obtain Aarsh-buddhi or Ritambhra prajna with their sadhna, will reach the divine world, set free from the cycle of life and death, attain liberation . All this is the work of intelligence alone. Thus, all the options are open before us; we have to make a choice of our destination, and put up sincere and constant efforts with reverence and patience to attain it. The Guru tells us all about Gayatri mantra, to recite it, understand its meaning and realize it with regular practice. But what the most people do? They say that they recite Gayatri mantra for so many times, or chant mantra for so many times by rosary of beads . It is right, the words can be memorized this way, but it is of no use if the science or full precept behind the mantra is not understood and realized. This is the wisdom of Rishis; as said before, the Vedic knowledge is the greatest treasure of wisdom, the real stem indeed of all the offshoots, its essence is the Gayatri mantra and essence of the Gayatri mantra is Om or God. We have to practice it, doing sadhna and realizing God this way is Yoga. It is Raja Yoga and the other branch of Yoga is Hatha Yoga. One, who practices both, is a Yogi (he who is in union with the Absolute), one who practices only one of these is an incomplete Yogi, but one who practices none of these is nothing (ayogi). Yoga is the universal wisdom for physical and spiritual enlightenment of all mankind. Therefore, let us broaden our vision and strive for salvation of the self. Om This is a lecture delivered by Satguru dev Sri Chaman Lal Kapur ji, at Yoga Sadhan Ashram, Chicago, USA, in 1989. It is translated and edited to share with the curious devotees. (Please share, let the Vedic wisdom reach to everyone in the world. Krinavanto vishvamaryam- Make the world Arya (righteous).
Posted on: Sat, 02 Nov 2013 10:28:31 +0000
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