2l8 JNANA YOGA ness we are sure it is a good action. So with our thoughts we have to understand whether they make for disintegration, the many, or for oneness, for binding soul unto soul, and bringing one influence tp bear. If they do this we will take them up, and if not we will throw them off as criminal.
The whole idea of ethics is that it does not depend on anything unknowable, it does not teach anything unknown, but in the language of the Upanishad, "The God whom we worship as an unknown God, the same I preach unto thee." It is through that Self that you know anything else. I know the chair, but to know the chair I have first to know myself and then the chair. It is in and through the Self that the chair is known. It is in and through the Self that you are known to me, that the whole world is known to me, and therefore to say this Self is unknown is sheer nonsense. Take off the Self and the whole universe; vanishes. In and through Self all knowledge comes. Therefore it is the most known of all. It is yourself, that which you call 'T." You may wonder how this "I'* of me can be the "1" of you. You may wonder how this limited "I" can be that unlimited Infinite, and yet it is so. The limited is a mere fiction. It has been covered up, and a little of it is manifesting as the "I," but as yet it is only a part of the Infinite. The limitation never comes upon the unlimited; the limited is a fiction. The Self is known, therefore, to every one of us, man, woman or child, even to the animals. I Without knowing Him we can neither live nor move, nor have our being. Without knowing this Lord of all we cannot breathe a second, or live a second, for He PRACTICAL VEDANTA 2ig must be there to make us move, and think, and live. The most known of all, the God of the Vedanta, is not the outcome of imagination.
If this is not preaching a practical God, how would you teach a practical God? A God omnipresent, in every being, more real than these senses of ours. Where is there a more practical God than Him I see before me? For you are He, the Omnipresent God Almighty, the Soul of your souls, and if I say you are not I tell an untruth. I know it, whether at all times I realize it or not. He is the oneness, the unity of all, the reality of all life and all existence.
These ideas of the ethics of Vedanta have to be worked out in great detail, and therefore you must have a little patience. As I have told you, we want to take the subject in detail and work through it thoroughly, to see how the ideas grow from very low ideals, how the one great ideal of oneness has started out from all the surrounding ideas, and become shaped into that universal love, and we ought to study all these, in order to avoid dangers. But the world cannot wait for time to work up from the lowest steps. What is the use of our standing on higher steps if we cannot give the same truth to others coming afterwards. Therefore it is better to study it in all its workings; and first, it is absolutely necessary to clear the intellec- tual portion, although we know that intellectuality is almost nothing, it is the heart that is of most impor- tance. It is through the heart that the Lord is seen not through the intellect. The intellect is only the street cleaner, cleansing the path for us, a secondary worker, the watchman, the policeman; but the police- man is not a positive necessity for the workings of 220 J NANA YOGA 220 J NANA YOGA society. He is only to stop disturbances, to check wrong-doing, and that is all the work required of the intellect. When you read intellectual books, you think when you have mastered them: * "Bless the Lord that I am out of them once more," because the intellect is blind and has no motion of itself, it has neither hands nor feet. It is feeling that is the worker, that moves with speed infinitely superior to that of elec- tricity or any thing else. Do you feel, is the question. If you do, through that you will see the Lord. It is this feeling that you have to-day that will be intensi- fied, deified, raised to the highest platform, till it feels "everything, the oneness in everything, till it feels God in itself and in others. The intellect can never do that. "Different methods of speaking words, different methods of explaining the texts of books, these are for the enjoyment of the learned, not for the salvation of the soul."
Those of you who have read Thomas a Kempis will have found how in every page he insists on this: and almost every holy man in the world has insisted on it. Intellect is necessary, without it we fall into crude error, make all sorts of crude mistakes. Intellect checks this, but beyond that, do not try to build any- thing upon it. It is an inactive, secondary help; the real help is feeling, love. Do you feel for others? If you do you are growing in oneness. If you do not feel for others you may be the most intellectual giant ever born, but you will be nothing; you are but dry intellect, , and you will remain so. And if you feel, even if you cannot read any book, and do not know any language, you are in the right way. The Lord is yours.
Do you not know in the history of the world the PRACTICAL VEDANTA 221 power the prophets had, and where was it? In the intellect? Did any of them write a fine book on phil- osophy, on the most intricate ratiocinations of logic? Not one. They spoke only a handful of words. Feel like Christ and you will be a Christ; feel like Buddha and you will be a Buddha. It is feeling that is the life, the strength, the vitality without which no amount of intellectual activity can reach God. Intellect is like limbs without power of locomotion. It is only when feeling enters and gives them motion that they move and strike others. That has been the way all over the world, and you must remember it. This is one of the most practical things in Vedantic morality, for it is the teaching of the Vedanta that you are all prophets, and all must be prophets. The book is not the proof of your conduct, but you are the proof of the book. How do you know that a book preaches truth? Because you do it and feel it. That is what Vedanta says. What is the proofs of the Christs and Buddhas of the world? That you or I feel like them. That is how I and you understand that they were true. Our prophet soul Is the proof of their prophet soul. Your godhead is the proof of God Himself. If you are not a prophet there never has been anything true of God.
If you are not God there never was any God, and never will be. This, says the Vedanta, is the ideal to follow. Every one of us has to become a prophet, and you are that already. Only, know it. Never think there is anything impossible for the soul. It is the greatest heresy to say that. If there be sin this is the only sin, to say that you are weak, or that others are weak.
XIII PRACTICAL VEDANTA Part II I WILL read to you a very ancient story from the Chandogya Upanishad, how knowledge came to a boy. The form of the story is very crude, but we shall find that it contains a principle. A young boy said to his mother, "I am going to study the Vedas. Tell me the name of my father, and my caste." The mother was not a married woman, and in India the child of a woman who has not been married is con- sidered an outcast; he is not fit for anything, he is unable to be recognized, much less is he competent to study the Vedas. So the poor mother said: "My child, I do not know the name of your family. I was in service; I had to serve in many places; I do not know who your father is, but my name is Jabala." The child went to the college of sages, and there he was asked the same question. He asked to be taken as a student, and they in turn asked him: "Say child, what is the name of your father, and what is your caste?" The boy repeated what he had heard from his mother. "Sir, I asked my mother the question, and this was her answer." Most of the sages were disappointed at the answer, and did not know what to say, but one of PRACTICAL VEDANTA 223 them stood up and asked the boy to come to him, and said: "My boy you have not swerved from the truth; you have not swerved from the path of righteousness, and this is what is called a Brahmin, so you are a Brahmin, and I will teach you." So he kept the boy with him and educated him; and because he had told the truth, gave him a new name — Satyakama — ^the "truth desiring."
Now come some of the peculiar methods of ancient education. This teacher gave Satyakama four hun- dred lean, weak cows to take care of, and sent him to the forest. There he went and lived for some time. The teacher had told him to come back when there were one thousand in the herd. So after a few years, Satyakama heard a big bull in the herd telling him "We are a thousand now; take us back to your teacher. I will teach you a little of Brahman." "Say on, sir," said Satyakama. Then the bull said, "The east is a part of the Lord, so is the west, so is the south, so is the north. The four cardinal points are four parts of Brahman. You will be taught by the fire." Fire was the great symbol in those days, and every student had to procure fire and make offerings. So Satyakama came back, and after performing his oblation, and worshipping at the fire, he was sitting near it, when from the fire came a voice, "O Satyakama." "Speak Lord," said Satyakama. Perhaps you may remember a very similar story in the Old Testament, how Samuel heard a mysterious voice. "O Satyakama, I am come to teach you a little of Brahman. This earth is a por- tion of that Brahman. The sky and the heaven are a portion of Him. The ocean is a part of that Brahman."
224 J NANA YOGA 224 J NANA YOGA Then the fire said that a certain bird would teach him something. Satyakama continued on his journey, and when he had performed his evening sacrifice, there came a swan who said, "I will teach you something about Brahman. This fire which you worship, O Satyakama, is a part of that Brahman. The sun is a part, the moon is a part, the lightning is a part of that Brahman. A bird called Madgu will tell you another part." The next evening that bird came, and a similar voice was heard by Satyakama, "I will tell you some- thing about Brahman. Breath is a part of Brahman, sight is a part, hearing is a part, the mind is a part." Then the boy returned to his teacher, and the teacher saw him from a distance, and this is what he said, "Boy, thy face shines like a knower of Brahman." Then the boy asked the teacher to teach him more, and he said: "You have known some part of the truth already."
Now, apart from these allegories, what the bull taught, what fire taught, and what these others taught, we see the tendency of the thought and the direction in which it is going. The great idea of which we here see the germs, is, that all these voices are inside ourselves. As we read on we shall find how it is at last made clear that the voice is here in the heart, and the student understands that all this time he was hearing the truth, but his explanation was not cor- rect. He was interpreting the voice as from the; external world, while all the time the voice was inside him. The second idea that comes, is that of making the knowledge of the Brahman practical. It is always seeking the practical possibilities of religion, and we PRACTICAL VEDANTA 22$ find in reading these stories how it is becoming more and more practical every day. The idea is shown through everything with which the students were famihar. The fire with which they were worshipping was that Brahman. This earth is a part of Brahman, and so on.
The next story belongs to a disciple of this Satya- kama, who went to be taught by him and dwelt near him for some time. Now Satyakama went away somewhere, and the student became very down-hearted, so that when the teacher's wife came and asked the boy why he was not eating, the boy said: 'T am too unhappy to eat," and then a voice from the fire he was worshipping, saying: ''This life is Brahman. Brahman is the ether, and Brahman is space. Know Brahman.'' "I know, sir, that life is Brahman, but that He is space and that He is ether I do not know." What is meant by ether is infinite space. Then the fire taught him the duties of the householder. "This earth, this food, this fire and this sun, whom you wor- ship, are forms of Brahman. He who inhabits these is within you all. He who knows this and meditates on Him, all his sins vanish and he has long life and becomes happy. He who lives in the cardinal points, I am He. He who lives in the breath, and in the ether, in the heavens, and in the lightning, I am He." Here too we see the same idea of practical religion. That which they were worshipping as the fire, the sun, the moon, and so forth, the voice with which they are familiar, takes up the subject, and explains it, and gives it a higher meaning, and that is the real practi- cal side of Vedanta. It does not destroy the world, 226 J NANA YOGA but it explains it; it does not destroy the person, but explains it; it does not destroy the individuality, but explains it, by showing the real individuality. It does not show that this world is vain, and does not exist, but it says understand what this world is, so that it may not hurt you. The voice did not say to Satyakama that the fire which he was worshipping was all wrong, or the sun, or the moon, or the light- ning, or anything else, but it showed him that the same spirit which is inside the sun, the moon, the lightning, the lire, and the earth, is in him, so that everything became transformed, as it were, to the eyes of Satya- kama. The fire which was merely a material fire before in which to make oblations, assumes a new aspect, and becomes the Lord really. The earth has become transformed, life has become transformed, the sun, the moon, the stars, the lightning, everything becomes transformed, deified. Their real nature is known. For we must know that the theme of the Vedanta is to see the Lord in everything, to see things in their real nature, not as they appear to be.
Then another lesson is taught which is very peculiar. **He who shines through the eyes is Brahman. He is the beautiful one, He is the shining one. He shines in all these worlds." A certain peculiar light, the commentator says, which comes to the pure man is the light in the eyes meant here, and it is said that when a man is pure, such a light will shine in his eyes, and that light belongs really to the soul within which is everywhere. It is the same light which is shining in the planets, in the stars, and suns.
The other thing that I will read to you is about PRACTICAL VEDANTA 227 some peculiar doctrines of these ancient Upanishads, about birth and death and so on. Perhaps it will interest you. Svetaketu went to the king of the Panchdlas, and there the king asked him, "Do you know where people go when they die? Do you know whether they come back or not? Do you know why this earth does not become full, and why it does not become empty?" The boy replied that he did not know Then he went to his father and asked him the same questions. The father said, "I do not know," and they both returned to the king. The king said this knowledge was never among the priests, it was only among the kings, and that is why the king rules the world. But this man served the king for some time, and at last the king said he would teach him. *'0 Gautama, the fire that you worship outside is a very low state of things. This earth itself is that great symbol of fire. The air is its fuel. The night is its smoke. Its flame is the cardinal points. The lower part is inhabited by darkness. In this fire the gods pour the oblation, the rain out of which comes food. You need not make oblation to that little fire; the whole world is that fire, and this oblation, this worship, is continually going on. The gods, and the angels, everybody is worshipping. Man, O Gautama, is the greatest symbol of fire, the body of man. We get the idea becoming practical once more, the Brahman coming down. And the one idea that runs through all these symbolical stories is that invented symbolism may be good, and helpful, but better symbols exist already than any you can invent. If you want to invent an image to worship God, a better image still 228 J NANA YOGA exists, the living man. If you want to build a temple to worship God, that may be good, but a better one, a much higher one, exists, the human body.
We must remember that the Vedas have two parts, the ceremonial and the knowledge portions. By that time ceremonials had become so intricate and multi- plied that it was almost hopeless to disentangle them and in the Upanishads the ceremonials are almost done away with, but gently, by explaining them. We see that in old times they had these oblations and sacrifices, but here the philosophers come, and they, instead of snatching their symbols from the hands of the ignorant, instead of taking the negative position which we, unfortunately, find general in modern reforms, gave them something to take their place. Here is the symbol of fire, very good. But here is another symbol, the earth. What a grand, great sym- bol! Here is this little temple, but the whole universe is a temple; a man can worship anywhere. There are the peculiar figures that men draw on the earth, and build altars, but here is the greatest of altars, the living conscious human body, and worship here is far greater than the worship of any dead symbols.
We now come to a peculiar doctrine. I do not understand much of it myself. If you can make something out of it I will read it to you. When a man who has meditated, and purified himself, and got knowledge, dies, then he first goes to light, from light to day, from day to the light half of the moon, from that to the six months when the sun goes to the north, from the months to the year, from the year to the sun, from the sun to the moon, from the moon to PRACTICAL VEDANTA 229 the lightning, and when he comes to the sphere of lightning he meets a person who is not a man, and that person helps him to meet Brahman, to meet God. This is the path of the gods. When sages and know- ing persons die they go that way and they do not return. What is meant by this month and year and all these things, no one understands clearly. Each one makes his own meaning, and a good many say it is all nonsense. What is meant by going to the world of the moon, and of the sun, and this person who comes to help the Soul after it has reached the spheres of light, no one knows. There has been a peculiar idea among the Hindus that the moon is a state of life, and we will see how life has come from the moon, it has rained from the moon upon this earth. Those that have not attained to knowledge, but have done good work in this life, when they die, first go through smoke, then to night, then to the dark fifteen days, then the six months when the sun goes to the south, from that they go to the region of the forefathers, then to ether, then to the region of the moon, and there they become the food of the gods, and are born as gods. There they live as long as their good works will permit. And when the efifect of the good work has been finished they come back. They first become ether, and then air, and then smoke, then mist, then cloud, and then get hold of raindrops, and fall upon the earth, get into food, are eaten up by human beings, and then become their children. Those whose works have been very good take birth in very good families, and those whose works have been bad take very bad births. The animals are always dying, and are con- 230 J NANA YOGA tinually coming in this earth. That is why this earth is not full, and not empty.
Several ideas we can get also from this, and later on, perhaps, we shall be able to understand it better, and we can speculate a little upon what they mean. The last part, how those who have been in heaven are returning, is clearer perhaps than the first part, but the whole idea seems to be this, that there is no permanent heaven without realizing God. Now some people who have not realized God, but have done good work in this world, with the view of enjoying the results thereof, when they die go through this and that place, until they reach heaven, and there they are born in the same way as we are here, as children of the gods, and they live there as long as their good works will permit. Out of this comes one basic idea of the Vedanta, that everything which has name and form is transient. This earth is transient, because it has name and form, and so the heavens must be tran- sient, because there also the name and form remain. A heaven which was eternal would be contradictory in terms, just as the earth cannot be eternal; because everything that has name and form must begin in time, exist in time, and finish in time. These are settled doctrines with the Vedanta, and the heavens are given up.
We have seen in the Samhita how the other idea was that heaven was eternal, much the same as the idea which is prevalent in Europe among Mohamme- dans and Christians. The Mohammedans concretize it a little more. They say it is a place where there are gardens, beneath which rivers run. In the desert PRACTICAL VEDANTA 23 1 of Arabia water is something which is very desirable, so the Mohammedan always conceives his heaven as full of water. I was born in a country where there are six months of rain every year. I would think of heaven, I suppose, as a dry place, and so would the English people. These heavens in the Samhita por- tion are eternal; the departed have beautiful bodies and live with their forefathers, and are happy ever afterwards. There they meet with their fathers, and children, and relatives, and lead very much the same life as here, only much happier. All the difficulties and obstructions to happiness in this life will vanish, and all its good parts and enjoyments will be left. But however comfortable mankind may consider this, there is something which is truth and something which is comfort. There are cases where truth is not comfortable until we reach the climax. Human nature is very conservative. It goes on doing something, and once having done that something it finds it hard to get out of it. The mind will not allow new thoughts to come, because they give pain.
So here, in the Upanishads, we see a tremendous departure made. It is declared that these heavens, where men used to go and live with the ancestors cannot be permanent, seeing that everything which has nam.e and form must die. If there arc heavens with forms, these heavens must vanish in course of time; it may be millions of years, but there must come a time when they will have to go. Another idea by this time has appeared, that these souls must come back to this earth, that these heavens are places where they enjoy the results of their good works, and after 232 JNANA YOGA these effects are finished they come back into this earth life again. One idea is clear from this, that mankind had a perception of the philosophy of causa- tion even at that early time. Later on we shall see how our philosophers bring that out in the language of philosophy and logic, but here it is almost in the language of children. One thing you may remark in reading these books, that it is all internal perception. If you ask me if this can be practical, my answer is it has been practical first, and philosophical next. You can see that these things have been perceived and realized first, and then written. This world spoke to the early thinkers, birds spoke to them, animals spoke to them, the sun, the moon spoke to them, and bit by bit they realized things and got into the heart of nature, not by cogitation, not by the force of logic, not by picking the brains of others and making a big book, as is the fashion in modern times, not as I do, by taking up one of their writings and makmg a lecture; but by patient investigation and discovery. Its essential method was practice, and so it will be always. Religion will be always a most practical science. There never was or will be any theological religion. It is practice first, and knowledge after-