1. Oh enlightened one! The Vedas, being constituted of words, can only describe entities coming within the scope of the three gunas of Prakrti. How can they then really reveal Brahman, the Absolute Being, who is not included in the gunas of Prakrti, who cannot be defined or described as an object before us, and who is beyond the relation of cause and effect?
Sri Suka said:
2. The all-powerful Lord created faculties like intellect, mind, senses and prana in the Jiva in order that they may enjoy sense contacts in the world, may perform works, gain the felicities of heaven in the hereafter, and attain to liberation from samsara.
3. It is not proper to doubt the efficacy of the Veda. For, it is the ignorance-shattering science culminating in the knowledge of the Brahman, accepted as such by the most ancient of ancient wise men for times immemorial. A man accepting it with faith and sincerity and living a life of renunciation attains to the blessedness of abidance in the Supreme Spirit.
4. In order to make this clear, I shall narrate to you an episode relating to sage Narayana. It is a conversation that took place between Narada and Rishi Narayana.
5-6. Once in the course of his peregrinations all over the universe, Narada, the beloved of the Lord, went over to Badaryashrama to see Rishi Narayana who has been engaged during the whole kalpa in austerity constituted of dharma (righteousness), jnana (knowledge) and sama (practice of samadhi) for the material and spiritual good of men inhabiting Bharatavarsha.
7. Narada put this very question to sage Narayana who was sitting there surrounded by rishis living in the village of Kalapagrama.
8. The worshipful Narayana narrated to Narada what had taken place during a seminar on the Brahman at a sacrificial assembly held in Jana-loka by the ancients.
Rishi Narayana said:
9. Oh son of self-born Brahma! It was in Jana-loka, under the auspices of the mind-born sons of Brahma who are lifelong celibates, and amidst the residents of that region that this prolonged discussion on the Brahman, participated in by a large number of savants and self-controlled sages, took place.
10. You had gone to Swetadweepa at that time to pay obeisance to its lord Aniruddha when this assembly for discussion on the Brahman took place in Jana-loka. The question investigated then was the very question you have now raised.
11. Though all these sages were equal in learning, austerity, character, and even-sightedness towards friends, foes and neutrals, they made one among themselves, Sanandana the speaker while the others heard him with deep attention.
Sanandana said:
12-13. In order to awaken a sleeping emperor in the morning, the minstrels attached to his court come and proclaim his glorious deeds in praise of him. In the same way, in order to awaken the Lord at the end of the pralaya from the cosmic slumber into which He had entered when the previous kalpa had ended, withdrawing into Himself the whole universe and the powers connected with it, the Srutis (the Veda) recited a hymn recalling all His distinctive majesties.
The Srutis said:
14. Hail, Hail unto the Supreme Master unconquerable! Withdraw Thy Maya, constituted of the three gunas, from covering the knowledge of all Jiva, moving and unmoving, with the pall of ignorance. But in Thee, the controller of Maya, Maya is not the veil of ignorance as it is in the Jiva, but Thy inherent puissance and divine majesty. The Veda reveals Thee as sometimes manifesting Thy inherent power of Maya and at others as subsisting in Thyself, with all powers quiescent.
15. The whole universe of experience is ultimately Thyself alone. For, it is known to the Veda and the rishis that Thou alone remain when everything is dissolved to the subtlest state. Just as the appearance and disappearance of all effects like pots take place in their material substance clay, so do the appearance and dissolution of the universe take place in Thee, their material cause. But there is this difference that, unlike clay, Thy substance is not in the least affected by the creation of the universe out of, and its dissolution in, Thee. As everything that is conceived by thought and touched by the senses is only Thy manifestation and, therefore, Thyself the various deities and forms of worship described in the Veda really relate to Thee only, though indirectly. The steps we place on any object on the ground, though they appear to be placed on the object, are in the final sense placed on the earth only, as the earth supports all objects. So, too, do all the words and teachings of the Veda point towards Thee, though they may appear to deal with deities.
16. Oh Master of Prakrti! Knowing that all the divine manifestations and Incarnations are really Thyself, great sages have dived into the ocean of the world-sanctifying accounts of Thy sportive actions as such divine Incarnations and manifestations, and, through that, assuaged the heat of all their suffering. Oh Thou the Supreme One! It is then needless to say that those who overcome the limitations of space, time and mental modifications and intuit Thy Being will overcome all suffering, and be established in Thy state of Supreme Bliss.
17. Man can be said to be a man, truly alive, only if he adores Thee. Otherwise, he is merely a pair of bellows, a breathing machine. For, Thou art the Power that activates the insentient cosmic categories and enables them to take the shape of the universe, including man. In the human personality so formed, Thou, as the Purusa, permeates the five sheaths (kosas) – the Annamaya, Pranamaya, Manomaya, Vijnamaya and Anandamaya. Interpenetrating all these and taking their shape, Thou art described also as transcending them as their support – the One remaining as the ultimate substratum when all the distinctions of cause and effect are eliminated.
18. Among the followers of the path of the rishis, those who are most gross-minded called sarkarayanas meditate on Thee in the stomach region, that is, the centre in the navel called manipura, probably including muladhara. Others, more subtle-minded called arunis, meditate on Thee in the spiritual dimension in the heart region called dahara. From the heart, sushumna, the spiritual conduit leads to the head, the highest region where Thou art intuited in the sahasrara or the thousand-petalled lotus. There is no more birth and death for those attaining this.
19. Though Thou art already present in these diverse creations of Thine as their material cause, still it looks as if Thou hast entered into them again after the creation of the bodies, manifesting identification with their shape and character, just as the fire takes the shape and nature of the fuel it is burning. Therefore, men, who are endowed with a dispassionate mind and who have renounced all self-centred values, recognize Thee as the enduring Spirit in these transient bodies.
20. The Purusa abides in the bodies created by the karma of the Jiva, without the spiritual nature being effaced by anything within or without, in the midst of the cause and effect relationship. He is described as ‘part’ (amsa) of Thee, and Thou as the Whole endowed with infinite puissance and excellences. Arriving through discrimination at this spiritual origin and destiny of man, wise men adore Thee with deep faith and devotion, having accepted the Vedic teaching that Thou art the fulcrum for dedicating and depositing all one’s actions and that devotion to Thee can secure one’s release from samsara.
21. Oh Lord of all! In order to reveal this spiritual nature of man which is difficult to comprehend, Thou dost arise as divine Incarnations from time to time. There are some who enter into the vast nectarine ocean of Thy deeds and excellences, revealed through the sportive actions of these, Thy Incarnations, and exclude all other forms of spiritual striving. They leave their homes and all worldly attachments, and join that community of all-renouncing men who constitute the Paramahamsas ever sporting with delight at Thy lotus feet. They reject even liberation, and prefer premabhakti.
22. This human body, so well-suited for Thy service, is now readily available for one like a bosom friend or a dear relative to be used for devotional purposes. So also, Thou art eager to bless the devotee, being very benevolent to him. But alas! Ordinary man shows no interest in Thee because of his indulgence in sense objects of a degrading nature. By this neglect of devotional life, he becomes an annihilator of the soul. By the force of tendencies developed through a life of attachment to this body, he roams about in inferior bodies in this terrible maze of samsara.
23. Through remembrance, Thy antagonists attained to the same spiritual goal as the sages that had established complete control over their vital force, mind and senses, and meditated on Thee in the their heart. The Sruti-Devatas look upon Thee as equally present everywhere, and ever commune with Thy lotus feet. The gopikas of Brindavan that longed for the embrace of Thy arms, powerful and handsome like Adisesha, similarly communed with Thy lotus feet. Whatever is the nature of the passion that moves the devotee, if it makes him intensely think of Thee, Thy grace is ever on him!
24. Thou art the Primeval Being prior to whom or by whose side there none else existed. Lo! How can any one who came from Thee, and who is bound to dissolve into Thee, know Thee? From Thee, the creator Brahma arose, and from him the two types of divinities. And when Thou enter into Thy cosmic slumber drawing everything into Thyself, there is nothing left to be known as gross or subtle or as combination of both, no movement of time, no scripture. How can anyone, therefore, know the subtle truth about Thee unless instructed by Thee? So, to practise devotion to Thee, and win Thy grace is the easier way of salvation for man.
25. Different philosophers have different theories of Reality. The Vaiseshikas say that real entities arise from a previous state of non-existence. Naiyayikas have the theory that existent entities perish. The Samkhyas contend that the Spirit is many and, therefore, different in each body. The Mimamsa-ritualists find the truth in the fruits of ritualistic works. All these theories are guess-work based on misconception. So also, the materialist’s theory that man is a product of the three gunas of Prakrti and that every being is, therefore, a separate and perishable individual, is a theory based on the ignorance of Thy nature. For Thou, Pure Consciousness, in whom ignorance has no place, is the ultimate Truth.
26. This universe of the three gunas, a mental projection, and the individual self or the Jiva, are asat, something non-existent in themselves, but become sat, or derive existential value, because of Thee who art the substance behind them. The knower of the Self, therefore, recognizes all this as sat or existing, because everything is an expression of Thyself. A product of gold is not rejected as illusory because it exists in identification with its substance, gold. Having manifested the universe, Thou dost indwell it as its substance as gold abides in all its products.
27. Those who adore Thee as the soul and substance of everything overcome death. The others, who are averse to this truth, are bound by Thee to the life of samsara like animals, with the rope of Vedic ritualism, even though they are great scholars. Those who love Thee purify the worlds, not the others who put on a garb of spirituality without love of Thee at heart.
28. Though Thou, the self-luminous and self-conscious one, are without limbs and sense organs, Thou art the power that supports the sense faculties of all creatures. Dominated by Thy Maya, all the Devas and creators like Prajapatis offer tribute to Thee as subordinate kings do to their suzerains, and they in turn subsist on what men offer them as sacrificial offerings. Out of fear of Thee, all the Devas perform their appointed tasks.
29. Oh unfettered one! When Thou, the Transcendent Being, desire to sport with Thy Yogamaya and cast Thy glance at her, then the powers and tendencies of the Jiva that had become latent in Thee at the close of the cosmic cycle are roused up, and as a consequence, the Jiva, with bodies moving and unmoving, come into being. These differences noticed in the nature and the power of the Jiva are due to their own karma and not of Thy making. For, to Thee, who art the highest of all beings – who art the same towards all like akasa, beyond thought and words, and extremely subtle – there is no such difference as the favoured one and the disfavoured one.
30. Oh Eternal Being! If the embodied beings (the Jiva) are countless in number, and are also eternal and all-pervading, they cannot come under Thy control, as each would be its own absolute authority and could go in its own way. They can be under Thy control only if it is otherwise. If the Jiva are the manifestation of Thyself through an adjunct, then Thou, as their causal substance, will be permeating them in all their transformations through their adjuncts and would be their controller without losing Thy own original nature as the Supreme Being. But the all-pervading and ultimate seer that Thou art, Thou cannot be an object of knowledge like other knowable things. To say that the ultimate seer can be the seen will be an absurd doctrine.
31. A living being (Jiva) cannot be a product of Prakrti (matter) alone or of Purusa (consciousness) alone. For, both these are eternal, whereas living beings come and go. They are, therefore, the product of the mutual superimposition of both into a complex unit in which their separateness cannot be understood or experienced. They may be compared to bubbles in which air and water particles combine. When all those Jiva dissolve in Thee, the Existence-Knowledge-bliss, either in deep sleep or in liberation, then all their separateness disappears. The only difference is that in deep-sleep the mergence is still in combination with the adjuncts in a subtle form as of flower nectars of various kinds in honey, while in liberation it is absolute mergence as of river water in the ocean.
32. Knowing that it is due to the delusion caused by Thy Maya that the Jiva are subjected to birth after birth in the trans-migratory cycle (samsara), wise men adore Thee, the granter of release from samsara, with intense devotion. How can there be samsara for one who serves Thee? For, Thy wheel of Time with its rim of three parts, the past, the present and the future, on which the course of transmigration is mounted, causes fear only to those who do not take refuge in Thee.
33. Oh Birthless One! Even though a person has gained control over his senses and the pranas, if he has not surrendered himself at the feet of the guru, all his effort to discipline the extremely fickle mind, which is like an uncontrolled horse, will result only in the pain and trouble of striving, and he will be overwhelmed with deep sorrow because of failure. His condition will be like that of a party of merchants in the mid-ocean without a helmsman to direct the boat.
34. When Thou, the essence of all bliss, art available as his very self to man who has resigned himself to Thee, what further use will he have for such objects as relatives, sons, body, wife, wealth, house, lands, life and properties like chariots, etc? And what joy can a man derive, who, without knowing Thee, the bedrock of Reality, goes after the joy of sex-life and other pleasures of the world that are ephemeral and doomed to destruction by their very nature?
35. Though these devotees, who are free from the pride of narrow egotism, hold Thy lotus-feet in their heart, and have within themselves that all-sanctifying stream of devotion flowing from those feet of Thine, still they resort to pilgrimage to holy centres during their life-time, abandoning hearth and home. For even those who have but once seriously bestowed their mind on the ever-blessed Atman, which is Thyself, can never feel happy in the self-centred life of the home, which has a baneful effect on the spiritual essence in man. By their visit to such holy places, they sanctify them, and enhance their holiness.
36. It is contended that all this world has arisen out of sat, a really existent cause, and, therefore, it must also be real. This, however, is not acceptable to reason; first it is not universally applicable to all cases of cause and effect, as in the case of father and son. The son has a different identity from that of the father, and cannot be reduced into the latter’s form, as a pot can be reduced into mud. Next, sometimes an effect may be a mere appearance on a real cause, as the snake is in a rope in an illusory perception. In such types of instances, the rule that the effect is as real as the cause is not found to fit in. At the most, from the point of view of practical efficiency, it may have some relevance, even as a wrong idea blindly accepted on the ground of a transmitted tradition is found to work in practice, or as a false coin passes for a genuine one undetected. The permanence of the fruits of Vedic rituals based on Thy words, the Veda, is only wishful thinking of dull-witted persons who are not able to comprehend the Veda in its implications, suggestions and many-sidedness. Vedic rituals may bear fruits which may last long, but are not really eternal.
37. This universe did not exist before its creation and will not exist after the cosmic dissolution, too. So its existence in Thee, the Sat-Cit-Anand, during the interval, can only be in a phenomenal sense, without any substantiality. It is, therefore, compared to ornaments and pots which are the modifications of gold and mud respectively. Ignorant people mistake these temporary transformations of the mind to be permanent.
38. Prompted by Maya, Thy creative Power, the Jiva embraces the ignorance aspect of that Power and gets established in the feeling that it is a body-mind complex. Consequently it loses its blissful nature and becomes subject to birth and death in the trans-migratory cycle. But Thou, who art established in Thy spiritual glory, have shed ignorance, like a snake its slough, and shine in Thy unlimited majesty exhibiting the six-fold powers.
39. Oh Lord! If renunciates (yatis or sannyasins) do not root out the desire for enjoyment from their hearts, then Thou, though present in their hearts, dost not reveal Thy presence to those hypocrites, just as a jewel does not reveal itself to its wearer who has forgotten its presence on his neck. The ascetics who are after sense enjoyment have to suffer misery from two sources, death which is sure to visit them, and from Thee who does not reveal Thyself to them.
40. Oh Thou Lord of countless glories! In one who is illumined with Thy knowledge, the bond of self-centred life (egoity) is broken and, therefore, he is oblivious of (becomes free from) Thy laws regarding merit and demerit, enjoyment and suffering. The scriptural injunctions pertaining to man, who is body-centred, become meaningless for him. For, he is then established in the bliss of spiritual freedom which is Thyself, who hast entered into the hearts of men through the glorious devotional traditions transmitted in every age by great men through a succession of teachers and disciples.
41. Even leading Divinities like Brahma do not find the limits of Thee; for Thou art the unlimited, and the unlimited by its nature cannot be fully comprehended. For the same reason even Thou dost not know Thy limits. Within that infinite and incomprehensible being of Thine, countless brahmandas (universes), each with its seven expansive external coverings, whirl about together under the propulsion of Time like clusters of dust in the air. So the words of the Veda, unable to describe Thee positively, arrive at Thee only as the final residue left after negating all conceivable entities.
42. The great sages, born of the mind of Brahma, heard this exposition of the truth of the Brahman by Sanandana with great attention, and then saluted the Rishi, their hearts illumined by the knowledge of the Atman.
43. Thus was the quintessence of the Vedas, the Puranas and the Upanisads expounded by the ancient sage Sanandana and others, who move about from sphere to sphere in the universe.
44. Oh thou, inheritor of the bliss of Brahma! Thinking, with deep faith, over this message of renunciation for men, you may freely move about in the worlds.
Sri Suka Said:
45. Oh King! The sage Narada, who had perfect control over his mind and who observed strict celibacy in life, heard the teachings of Rishi Narayana with deep faith and receptivity and became filled with joy, thinking over them again and again.
46. Sri Narada said: ‘Salutations to Thee the Divine Incarnate, a manifestation of the Supreme Lord Krishna of holy fame who comes down as glorious Incarnations for the welfare of all creatures!’
47. Paying homage to Rishi Narayana, the first and foremost of sages, and to his worthy disciples, Narada went to the ashrama where my father Vyasa dwelt.
48. Received respectfully by Vyasa, Narada took a seat and narrated to him what he had heard from the mouth of Rishi Narayana, and I learned it from my father.
49. Thus have I answered, through the account of the above conversation, your question how the Brahman, beyond the gunas and words, can be grasped by the mind.
50. Meditate always on Hari who, as the creator, designed this universe for the benefit of the Jiva; who, as its material cause, remains unaffected as its substratum during its creation, sustenance and dissolution; who is the lord and director of dissolution; who is the lord and director of matter and Jiva; who, after creating the categories, enters into His creation along with the Jiva as the Indwelling Spirit and directs its evolution into various world systems and bodies of living beings; who governs the Jiva providing them with food and other conditions for higher evolution; who, through instruction as the guru, enables the Jiva to take refuge in Him and to abandon identification with the body even in the waking state as in the state of sleep; and who, being ever established in the Bliss-consciousness without the slightest trace of ignorance, is capable of giving complete freedom from fear to all beings.
