Shree Jagannath: Lord of the Universe

Lord Jagannath is the Lord of the Universe. He is Param Brahman, the Supreme Godhead, from which all Gods and Goddesses emanate. He is both the God unmanifest as well as the God manifest. He is both Nirgun Brahman (God without attributes. God as avang-manasa-gochara, beyond the reach of senses or mind) of Shankara and Sagun Brahman (God with attributes, the personified Brahman, such as Rama or Krishna) of Ramanuja. This multitudinous character of Jagannath reminds me of this great Vedic wisdom:

ॐ पूर्णमदः पूर्णमिदं पूर्णात्पुर्णमुदच्यते

पूर्णस्य पूर्णमादाय पूर्णमेवावशिष्यते ॥

ॐ शान्तिः शान्तिः शान्तिः ॥

It literally means: “That is full. This is full. The full is taken out of the full. Take out the full from the full, the full remains. Om, peace, peace, peace.”

Lord Jagannath is both the ‘full’ and the parts that are also ‘full’, which are taken out of the ‘full’. Let us meditate on this. By creating the universe and all the elements in it, the Lord does not limit Him or lose His ‘full’ness. This brings another element. As the whole world is Lord's creation out of Himself, the whole world and its elements partake His consciousness. Applying this logic further, we are all divine as we are created by the Supreme Lord.

Then the question arises - if we are all parts of God, then why there is so much violence? Why there is so much chaos in the world? Why cannot we see and consider another individual as we consider ourselves? The answer is Avidya- Ignorance. We consider our separate selves as the sole reality. We cannot see all – ourselves and other selves – as creations of God. We cannot see the other integrated reality, the Lord, who is our Creator. Because of our ignorance, we think our separate selves as the sole reality. As dust particles cover a mirror and hides our view of ourselves, a thick miasma of ignorance veils us from our integrated and truer reality. Shankara took this aspect of ignorance and our indulgence in it seriously and declared the world is Maya, illusion. Shankara has a sound argument here. So far we consider ourselves absolute truth and ignore the divine truth, we are in illusion. But once we recognize that we are truth, but relative or empirical truth, the ignorance and illusion vanish, we become truly liberated.

Tulsidas believed that the Lord Jagannath is Lord Rama. At the first sight of Lord Jagannath, Tulsidas fell into a dilemma. How could Jagannath be not beautiful as Rama? How could this Lord be incomplete – no feet, no complete hands, no ears? Grief-stricken, he returned from the temple, thinking – no, Lord Jagannath cannot be Lord Rama. He had a vision. It was so powerful and compelling, he rushed to the temple and saw in place of Lord Jagannath was standing Lord Rama. He wrote in Ramcharitmanas:

बिनु पद चलइ सुनइ बिनु काना।

कर बिनु कर्म करइ बिधि नाना ।।…

He goes everywhere without legs.

He hears everything without ears.

He does everything without hands…

While Tulsidas’s vision of Lord Jagannath as Lord Rama can be characterized as his experience of the Lord as Sagun Brahman, his poem, quoted above, alludes to his experience of the Lord as Nirgun Brahman. Lord Jagannath is Lord Rama, but He is not confined to the image of Lord Rama as He is Nirgun Brahman. To a devotee like Tulsidas, He is amenable as a personified God, Lord Rama, but for a Jnana Yogi like Shankara, He is Nirgun Brahman - beyond the reach of human senses and conception, including the conception of a particular God.

Lord Jagannath is not confined to a particular people or a particular place. He is not the God of a particular state or a country. He is above the narrow confines of religion, nationality, creed, color, language, economic status or any man made divisions. Muslim Salabega was his devotee, as also poor Dasia Bauri. Guru Nanak went to Puri to see the Lord. Contemporary research suggests that Jesus Christ had visited Puri to receive light from the Lord.

Lord Jagannath is the only Lord who comes out of the temple every year so that all His devotees receive His grace. It has a deeper significance. Before the Supreme God all are equal. There is no discrimination on the basis of man-made divisions.

More the Jagannath culture spreads more the good for the world. The more this culture spreads, the more the people across the world come to know the Lord’s universal significance. I pray that the Rath Yatra in Tampa is a step in this direction.

Jai Jagannath !

(This article is part of the Tampa Rath Yatra Journal, July 2018.)

Dying the 'Religion' Way?

Last month more than 100 people died in a stampede in the Indian state of Madhya Pradesh. The dead when alive were devotees. They went to the Ratangarh temple on the occasion of the Durga Puja, one of the important Hindu festivals. The dead mostly included women, children and old men. 30 children died. Seven years ago stampede had taken place in the same place, but no lessons were drawn.

It does not need any hard evidence to point out that most of the people who died were poor. For thousands of devotees, there were only one sub-inspector and nine constables to maintain law and order. The top officials of the district were busy in elections, or were simply careless. Had the Chief Minister of the state, forget Chief Minister, had a senior bureaucrat of the state been visiting the temple, the law and order could have been better maintained, perhaps the stampede could have been avoided. Perhaps religious festivals should be graced by the so called elite people so that lives of the poor people could be saved!! 

I am particularly sad for the children who died. Perhaps they could have preferred to play in their house yards than visiting temples where most of them could little understand what is going on. These children died, and with them a portion of future India is lost. The tradition of visiting temples on religious occasions might be a good thing as it might bring solace to mind and heart, but if stampede and death would be the consequence then I would prefer to worship my God in my house than visiting to a temple and get killed. I remember reading news that one family who went to a religious place to celebrate the birthday of their only son lost all lives in a road accident on return. Perhaps we need better roads, better law and order, and better discipline before visiting temples and offering prayers. 

The excessive reliance on tradition may not be always helpful. There needs to be a distinction between superstition and tradition. As I interpret theology, God does not demand that one must go to temple to reach Him. There is God in human being and when the human being realizes God in him and identifies him with Him, then there is realization of God and liberation, for that it is not necessary to go to temple. Swami Vivekananda, one of the great religious and social reformers of India, argued that it is better to play football than to read Gita. He was at remorse at the poverty of India, the malnutrition affecting her children. He argued, with which I agree, that without a healthy body and mind, an individual can not be true follower of God. An emaciated body will devote most time thinking about food than God. And a corrupt mind can never lead us to God even if we sit and stand 24/7 before the statue of God in the most famous temple. 

Marx is right when he argued religion is the opium of the masses. It teaches subservience and fatalism. I know that this is a negative aspect of religion. In its positive aspect, religion has many utilities both for peace of mind and for spiritual progress. Let me talk about this negative dimension. Fatalism induces in the recalcitrant a sense of apathy towards affairs of life as he believes that the God will do everything for him. This enabled the colonial powers to easily dominate the God-believing people as fatalism induces in them the belief that it is what God wants. I read somewhere that when Abdali attacked India, he had an easy run in some places in killing people as many of them under the spell of the Bhakti movement did not counter the attack. If that is religion, then I would better disavow it. 

A religion devoid of courage, vigor, devoid of life and dynamism, devoid of progress and adaptation, is no religion as such but a dying creed. At least that is not Hinduism. Perhaps decay has gripped the religion. Particularly in the context of Hindu religion, there are no stalwarts in the image of Shankara or Ramanuja or Swami Vivekananda or Sri Aurobindo who can guide the practitioners of the religion. Now-a-days in India we have a lot of talk about religion, but not for internal illumination but external embellishment. It is no surprise that the so called God-men and God-women are morally corrupt. External preaching without internal purity has almost created a miasma over the true tenets of the religion. The old ritual persists but the spirit has seemed to evaporate.

I am not at all amused with the death of the innocent on the bridge over the Sindh river last month. Though the religion occasion coincided with my birthday, I felt helpless as on such an occasion I heard people dying. Goddess Durga, whose temple the pilgrims thronged must have not desired such a scene. Though it would be both futile and irrational to study the mind of the Goddess, but if we apply the human reasoning it would be appropriate to say that the Goddess, whom we worship as mother, must not rejoice at the death of her children.

The basic tenet of Hindu religion is perhaps best captured by the 15th century Gujarati philosopher, Narsinh Mehta, who sang, ‘the devotee is he who understands and cares for other’s pain’ (Vaishnava Jana to tene kahiye jo pir parai jaane re). If service is one pillar, then sacrifice is certainly the other. But service and sacrifice demand courage and preparedness. A person who is filled with vices can neither perform service nor sacrifice. And the vices can be individual as well as collective. When a religion is gripped by the vices with majority of the practitioners believing that religion is just a ritual, and nothing more, then there is no end to perdition not after this life but in this life.

Some people believe that if a person dies on an auspicious religion occasion, then he directly goes to heaven. Perhaps this belief persists in other religions. I strongly disapprove such a belief. Such a belief justifies all kinds of death on these occasions, including the stampede that took place in Madhya Pradesh last month. I would rather let the people stay at home and pray from there rather than letting them to become victims of a poorly organized festival, irresponsible administration, and deadly rumors.

(Where) Meeting is Parting must be

While watching TV on a Saturday morning, a sudden idea crept into my mind. It is (Where) Meeting is Parting Must Be. This is how human life is. Where there is meeting, there must be parting. Meeting point in human life has its parting point as well. In Hegelian language if Meeting is thesis, then Parting is the inevitable anti-thesis. And the process goes on. Simple examples. Sometimes, while watching a favourite TV programme, we long this programme to continue further so that we can enjoy it but that does not happen. The programme ends in its stipulated time. Another example. When we go to meet somebody, a time comes when we have to say bye. These are some of the simplest examples; I will now proceed to complex examples. Human life is in continuous movement. It cannot remain static. Human being is born, grows up, and dies, whether naturally or unnaturally. It cannot stop this process of nature. Hence, whatever one does in life, I am talking from the point of view of action, it must pass away. Action, the term itself denotes movement. We must do something ‘to do action,’ whether physical, vital or mental. When I am thinking about somebody or something, or when I am writing this column, or when I am tilling the field – all these are actions. And all these actions cannot be permanent. Perhaps here, my argument is similar to that of Buddhist argument of momentariness (Kshanavada). Life is in flux, in continuous flux, and there is nothing permanent, nothing eternal, nothing enduring. If the whole life is in flux, if the life mechanism is in movement, then naturally all things in life, all activities, all meetings, are part of this process of momentariness. They cannot be permanent or eternal. Hence, when I meet a friend on the way to university, I must leave him after moments howsoever engrossing the interaction might be as he must have something to do, as I have to. And the process continues. Usually when a government is formed in a state by a political party, it must be in office for some years, then some other dispensation takes its place. Even in traditional kingdoms ruled by monarchs, the rulers had to cease from the thrones after their death, or old age, or by overthrow. In fact I wanted here to emphasize some aspects of life linked to this central argument of momentariness. My point here is that howsoever precious a thing, a possession, a friendship, or a relationship we value, it must pass away, if not today, then tomorrow, if not tomorrow then day after, if not this year, then after few years. This is the eternal law and no other law can change it, even the supreme science or technology cannot change it. Once we agree or rather once we appreciate this dictum, then there often appears (or will appear) a sense of urgency in our life. We will no longer take a view as the herd takes, rather our approach to life will be that of a spiritual scientist, as that of a Mahatma Gandhi or a Buddha. Gautama realized this at the age of 20, and left his beautiful wife Yshodhara and son Rahul, the position of prince and all wealth a kingdom endowed on him. Later he became Buddha (enlightened). How many of us can really do this? A person who loves his family- wife, children, parents and other relatives- thinks as if things will endure eternally. But that does not really happen. Man behaves as if everything is permanent, but that is not the case. Even so called ‘permanent job’ is not permanent job actually, as one has to retire at the age of superannuation. My point is: Is it possible to take a broader approach to life, an approach by positioning ourselves on the sky, or on a mountain top, and see below towards the life? Is it possible to rise above narrow thinking, and think about the universal, the real, which is really mind boggling as mind often fails to grasp its breadth, than being lost in simple equation of mine and thine, I and you; the life we live is more stuffed with self-attachment, than with real love and sacrifice. Adi Shankara calls this world Maya or illusion and he is right from one point of view. So far we do not comprehend this complex nature of working of things in our life and in the world, we will be submerged in a narrow pond, than in the all flowing, crystal clear river of life. It is like the heaven-sage Narad, who once being curious and fascinated to find and know the human life, turned to an actual man, but later found himself so much submerged in the narrow pond of life that he forgot his sainthood and had to be killed by Vishnu from this bondage. Life is bondage in that sense. It can also be a source of liberation. Once we understand it, it will be easier to free from this bondage. Till we do not understand, we will be in illusion as Shankara says. I did not mean we should denunciate life, and turn into a corner of a cave and lose ourselves in blank meditation. It rather means a life full of activity, full of meaning and responsibility, free from bondage, free from narrowness, and free from submergence in this ‘narrow Naradic pond.’ Once we understand every meeting, means every meeting, howsoever short or long, must end in parting, our look will be changed towards life. A new realization will dawn as we will see everything, our daily activity, daily life, our relations within family and without family, internal as well as external, in a new sense. It will also bring to us that eternal understanding and flow of energy that instead of losing ourselves in trivialities of life, we will find ourselves myriad noble things to do in our life. And in a close analysis we will find that meeting and parting are in fact two faces of the same coin that is life.

Dualism Persists

In the context of human society and human relations, an idea cropped up in my mind when I was watching TV in a friend’s house while staying for few days. It is the concept of duality, or dual lives, or dual personalities (it is different from the psychological concept of split personality). This dualism is deliberate, selfish, and constructed by human being to live in this world. This I came to conclusion while watching religious channels like Samsakara and Astha in TV. The preachers say beautiful, soothing things to the ear. They say some great things, and which are actually needed by the tormented human society, afflicted by the issues of deception, trickery, greed and the vices which humans love to domesticate and love to nurture in own beings. The speakers picked up a theme from Hindu mythology such as Ramayana and Mahabharata and contextualize them to cater to the needs of the present society. A good thing indeed. They preach non-violence, selflessness, social service. They also talk about how to have peace in mind, how to have devotion to God, to have meditating mind and so on. They narrated the stories of Hanuman’s devotion to Rama, and love and surrender of Radha to Krishna and so on. These are really good, and not only that, I am reasonably sure, if a person follows these words sincerely, then there will be great improvement in him and surroundings, no doubt.

But when I think about the practical implications of such an exercise, I find myself dismayed. The analogy narrated by Swami Vivekananda often comes to my mind in this context. He differentiated between a pundit and a yogi. A pundit reads so many things, he is a good narrator, good orator, quotes from scriptures like Vedas and Upanishads with full authority, but while coming to practice he is a nut. While he teaches others to control over their anger, he is an angry man, for example. While he teaches others to conquer desire, he in fact is a slave of this vice, for example. Swami Vivekananda says it is better to be a yogi, than to be a pundit. Yogi is not a scholar, is not well versed in scriptures. But whatever, however few, noble things he knows or learns, he practices. He learns anger is not good, and now he is a man of peace. Now he knows desire has to be conquered, and he conquers it. Hence, while yogis are a rare species, pundits are numerous. While a yogi like Ramakrishna Paramahansa is a rare sight, we find hundreds and thousands of pundits (even I doubt whether all of them have mastery over scriptures) flock our streets, TV sets, and wear the clothes of yellow, and portray themselves as yogis. Some of these pundits do not forget to give them a facial in a beauty salon before public appearance. If preaching for them is a profession, then they are job holders, doing their job, as we do in our work places. But to be a yogi, to be a preacher of noble virtues, one has to be in ‘job’ 24 hours and throughout the life. Putting in the language of Sri Aurobindo, 'all life is yoga.' It is not like preaching for the record, and in the next moment you become a person of all ordinary desires and vices. Ramakrishna was illiterate, and could not write his name correctly, but we all know how great he was, how saintly he was.

But the dualism concept goes much deeper and much farther. This is not confined to the preachers, but spread to the people, including the organizers, who come to listen to the preachers. While these pundits and so called pundits may number hundreds and may be thousands, the people who flock to listen to them number hundreds of thousands. Let me talk about organizers. They are usually rich people. I understand that. Without money power, it is difficult to organize huge events like these ones. Arranging the venue, providing all the facilities like carpets, chairs, etc. to carry on the activities or arranging media and recording system and air conditioning or fans, and to look after the pundit and his group, all need money. The organizers provide money, and also raise money from the listeners and followers. I have no problem, no objection with that. I am concerned with how far these organizers follow the teachings of the pundits. We all come across stories how these people become rich by following foul means, by following short cuts (by avoiding routes of hard work and efforts, while I am saying this obviously I am not referring to all organizers, there are always exceptions). There is also a familiar story how a businessman was putting sugar particles into ant holes, so that the vice he earns by adding sand to sugar in his grocery shop can be compensated by putting few sugar particles into ant holes, for the vice of adding sand to sugar, or stones to rice, can be compensated /balanced by offering alms to beggars or putting sugar in ant holes and so on.

My central question is: are the organizers or the people who contribute to these events are motivated by this spirit of ‘balance’ and ‘compensation?’ If that is the spirit, if that is the underlying motivation, then the whole price in organizing such events is zero, as it is seen, viewed from a commercial, business point of view. It is like killing an animal, and to balance the sin, you nurture another animal. In fact, the concept of fear in religion that if you commit sin you will be punished in after life, and if you commit virtue you will be suitably rewarded in after life is so strong, so motivating, that I see in most of these events, most of these organizations, there is a sense to capitalize on this fear factor. They are motivated by this end game of ‘balance’ and ‘compensation.’

Then what is the end result? It is like coming back to square one. The pundit says you remain calm, think ill of none. You listen to it carefully, and also you know that it is a great thing to practice in life, but the moment the pundit jumps to the second sentence, you forget it, you think about humdrum daily life. It is like Guru Nanak finding a person performing Namaz on the street, while actually thinking about his lost flock of sheep while performing the prayer. Hence, this is the dualism, which must be avoided, curbed and nullified. The only positive thing I can see in these activities is just diversion of time in some harmless things. From that point of view, it may be a fine thing. But, I do not think that is the sole purpose of organizing these events, where millions of people spend time and huge sums of money.

At the end this dualism persists. Leo Tolstoy says, the ‘kingdom of God lies within you.’ Unless the human being realizes the God ‘within,’ all the ‘outside’ practices such as listening to pundits, or going to temples, mosques, gurudwaras, churches and synagogues will be vain. It is the ‘within’ or the inner self of human being that is reflected in his ‘outside’. Unless that realization comes in thought and practice, this dualism will continue with all its vigour, prompting a great soul like Adi Shankara calling the activities of the world as Maya or illusion, because that is not the truth as we see, that only pushes us to live in a world of dualism, in which the outer self, the show, the veneer predominates over the subtle, the inner and the soul.

Birth Anniversary of Sri Ramakrishna

This year we are celebrating the birth anniversary of Sri Ramakrishna. It is the 175th birth anniversary. Though it is the 175th, I feel Ramakrishna and his messages are still alive and much relevant in today’s turbulent world. Last year when I visited Belur Math, and also the Dakshineswar temple, both situated at the opposite banks of river Ganga (locally called Hugli), I could still feel the marvels created by the great souls like Ramakrishna, and his disciple Swami Vivekananda. Hundreds of thousands of people throng to these places every day, and seek noble teachings preached by them, and ennoble their lives.

Ramakrishna did not know how to write. He was in the conventional sense an illiterate. He could not write his name correctly. The museum in the premises of Belur Math show how he was born in a modest family, a family of priests (if I remember correctly), and he did not have enough means to realize the dream of being educated and being a babu. I read somewhere when as a child he was walking in the field, he saw a group of birds flying in the sky and he had a divine realization. There are many such interesting stories one can come across in the life of this child, later one of the greatest apostles of truth, honesty and innocence.

After Ramakrishna’s death, when his wife Sarada Devi, in order to follow Hindu tradition, decided to wipe out the red vermillion on head, and taking out bungles, Ramakrishna suddenly appeared alive and said to her that I am not dead, I am alive; the Lord that is Rama, the Lord that is Krishna, in this body is Ramakrishna. Hence, no need to appear like a widow. The great soul, the image of simplicity, even his saintly frame, as I see in photographs and paintings, his discourse with his disciples, his gestures in the air showing three fingers, are something which are markers of the great mysticism which Ramakrishna embodied. And this mysticism is not something pure chimera or fantasy, but something that changed and moulded lives of millions, including the atheist Narendra, later became Swami Vivekananda. There is a story that whenever Ramakrishna touched coins, he felt pain and his fingers became crooked. His yet to be disciple Narendra doubted this, and put a coin under his bed, and the Saint pained and his fingers became crooked. These are some of the stories, which invoke curiosity towards further delving deep into the lives of these great men. The western philosopher Romain Rolland has written a beautiful book on Ramakrishna. Ramakrishna himself has told thousands of stories, with full of meanings, full of lessons for his followers, and even non-followers to learn and mould their lives.

The great saint was no preacher of fundamentalism or exclusivism. There is a beautiful story how this great saint practiced all religions. He practiced Christianity and Jesus came to him. He practiced Islam and realized God, and then he could realize and preached that God can be realized in every religion. It is not the religion but the individual’s faith in practicing the religion that is more important. He used o say – to realize God, one needs to have a child like simplicity. He, in this context, used to give the example of a baby cat or a baby monkey. In the case of baby monkey the mother cat bites and lifts the baby gently to shift it from one place to other. The baby is not afraid, and is fully dependent on her mother. Similarly, the seeker must have complete faith and surrender that whatever the mother, the God, will do, will do for the good. The baby monkey clutches the mother’s body so tightly that it goes with mother from branch to branch without falling on the ground. Similarly, the seeker must have that much unshakable faith and that persistence in God that she will go wherever He takes her. Ramakrishna used to say if you have absolute faith, even an iota of absolute faith; you can jump the Himalayas or swim across the seas. It may appear churlish to the cynic, but it is the fact which Ramakrishna realized, and also realized by his disciples and followers.

Here I remember the concept which Plato gave, that we know everything innately, but gradually we come to know that we know things. Ramakrishna was the messenger of God, who had realized God directly; hence for him the formal education, formal initiation was matter of no importance. It is said that while his guru Totapuri took 40 years to realize God, Ramakrishna realized it only in three days. He was the person beyond the images of the world, beyond the human calculation; he was in fact Jivan Mukta, to quote Shankara’s terminology. He was in this world, but beyond this world. When I visited the temple he was the main priest in later part of 19th century, and when I saw his room, he was staying; it was the experience that made me realize that we have the world where such people came and went, but they left an indelible print, a rich heritage for future generation to follow and cultivate. Perhaps, on his birth anniversary, it will be the greatest tribute to Ramakrishna, to believe in honesty, truth and virtues, and then try to implement those values in our lives.

Some Reflections on Perfection

What is perfection, what are its elements, is there something called perfection, which are perfect, and can the transient things and beings be perfect? And lastly, can human being be perfect? If we analyze Plato’s Idea then we come to know that the idea is perfect, which lives in idea, which is not visible to us, but which exists, and all other things and beings are imperfect imitation of idea. There are many examples to illustrate this theory. One famous is, not this horse or that horse is the ideal horse, not perfect horse, but the idea of horse is the perfect, which must be the subject of equine science. The same argument goes further. It is an abstract thought, perhaps not amenable to empirical analysis. Then the argument goes, not everything is subject to empirical analysis, even the idea of perfection as well. The idea lives in the sphere of ideas, but It is, and It exists. Then comes the idea of agnosticism, which says that we cannot say whether there is something called perfect or something called God or not, we do not know is the answer.

Veda’s theory, or also in a different way propounded by Spinoza and Hegel is that every determination is a negation, and the Vedic equivalent is ‘Neti Neti,’ not this, not this. When we talk about something, or when we elaborate something, then we leave so many other things as well. As the Jainas say in their theory of Anekantavada, that the Truth, the Perfect is many sided reality, and we human beings with our limited knowledge and perception see only one aspect, and take it as the whole. But that is not the truth. It is like in Shankara’s language to perceive in rope the snake in dark, but that is not the reality. But, then can we see something perfect, something called perfection? But, then, perhaps we will need not limited knowledge, but a knowledge, a perception which has 360 degree vision of the things and beings, or the kind of humility what Socrates says, ‘I know that I do not know.’

The ontological proof of God says that God is perfect, and it is self-evident, a priori like three angles of a triangle equals to 180 degree, and for which we do not need proof. The existence of God is a self-evident axiom, which does not need any proof. The idea of God emanates in our mind shows itself there must be something or somebody, which is called God, which is perfect, the best, the beautiful, the knowledgeable, the wise, and so on.

Coming back to this idea of perfection, which various theories about God attempt to prove that God is perfect, the question emerges can human beings attain perfection? We have seen spurt of genius around us and in history, that there are great scientists, philosophers, who have unraveled many mysteries of the universe. But how far they have attained perfection? Is it possible for human beings to attain perfection, or is it something called chimera, or something too idealistic and abstract, which is an impossible chase for the ordinary, brittle human beings, who take birth, grow old and then die, like any other animal?

I read somewhere the famous philosopher Jiddu Krishnamurti wrote that mediation is where there is no meditator, implying that meditation is something so deep, and so immense and enthralling, that individual doing meditation loses the sense of self-identity or loses himself in universal identity. A person having this realization can vouch it, otherwise like A. J. Ayer call it non-sense, as it is not verifiable to logical analysis and empirical observation. But, when we study the lives of great people, we come to know that there are many things which are beyond empirical, or what Kant says transcendental, which are beyond the reach of both realist and empiricist paradigms.

I believe in the saying that all life is a movement towards higher goal. I read, ‘no human will can conquer against Divine’s will, let us put ourselves exclusively on the side of the Divine and the victory is ultimately certain.’ If we study it from its face value, it may appear as a call to sheer dogmatism and orthodoxy. But a deeper analysis completely changes its meaning. When it says Divine will, it is not the will of the narrow thinking of an individual, but an elevated thinking of an individual who identifies his will with the universal will. It moves the human animal to rise towards perfection, for that one needs a constant aspiration. This is not pure mysticism, or something pure tantric, or something old and outdated. This is amenable to practice. A person who has done meditation for 10 or 15 minutes with a composed mind and realized its power can obviously find the real sense of this argument and its kernel.