Nature of Brahman

(To M.): “Pure Ātman is unattached. Māyā, or avidyā, is in It. In māyā there are 3 Gunās :

1. Sattva
2. Rajas
3. Tamas

These 3 Gunās also exist in the Pure Ātman.

But Ātman Itself is unattached. If you throw a blue pill into the fire, you will see a blue flame. If you throw a red pill, you will see a red flame. But fire itself has no colour of its own.

If you put a blue pill in water, the water will turn blue. Again, if you put alum in that water, it will regain its natural colour.

A butcher was carrying a load of meat when he touched Sankara. Sankara exclaimed:

‘What! You have touched me!’

Jadabharata said the same thing to King Rahugana.

The Pure Ātman is unattached, and one cannot see It. If salt is mixed with water, one cannot see the salt with the eyes.

That which is the Pure Ātman is the Great Cause, the Cause of the cause. The gross, the subtle, the causal, and the Great Cause. The five elements are gross. Mind, buddhi, and ego are subtle.

Prakriti, the Primal Energy, is the cause of all these. Brahman, Pure Ātman, is the Cause of the cause.

This Pure Ātman alone is our real nature. What is jnāna? It is to know one’s own Self and keep the mind in It. It is to know the Pure Ātman.

How long should a man perform his duties? As long as he identifies himself with the body, in other words, as long as he thinks he is the body. That is what the Gitā says. To think of the body as the Ātman is ajnāna, ignorance.

(To the bearded Brahmo devotee from Shibpur) “Are you a Brahmo?”

(smiling): “I can recognize a worshipper of the Formless by looking at his face and eyes. Please dive a little deeper. One doesn’t get the gem by floating on the surface.

As for myself, I accept all-the formless God and God with form.”

to the devotees):“Ah! They are real devotees of God. They visit temples, sing hymns to God, and eat prasad. And the gentleman whom they have made their priest this year is learned in the Bhagavata.”

This is the lingasarira, or embodied soul. It consists of manas, buddhi, chitta, and Ahamkāra.

It is the Ātman bound by the eight fetters. And what is the chitta? It is the ‘I- consciousness’ that says, ‘Aha!’

According to the Gitā, one becomes afterwards what one thinks of at the time of death. King Bharata thought of his deer and became a deer in his next life. Therefore one must practise sādhanā in order to realize God. If a man thinks of God day and night, he will have the same thought in the hour of death.

Because of māyā. Through māyā one feels the Real to be the unreal and the unreal to be the Real. The Real means That which is eternal, the Supreme Brahman; and the unreal means that which is non- eternal, that is to say, the world.

What will one accomplish by mere reading? One needs spiritual practice- austerity. Call on God. What is the use of merely repeating the word ‘siddhi’? One must eat a little of it.

The hand bleeds when it touches a thorny plant. Suppose you bring such a plant and repeat, sitting near it: ‘There! The plant is burning.’ Will that burn the plant? This world is like the thorny plant. Light the fire of Knowledge and with it set the plant ablaze. Only then will it be burnt up.

“One must labour a little while at the stage of sādhanā . Then the path becomes easy. Steer the boat around the curves of the river and then let it go with the favourable wind.

(To the Mārwāri devotee) The rules for a sannyāsi are extremely hard. He cannot have the slightest contact with ‘woman and gold’. He must not accept money with his own hands, and he must not even allow it to be left near him.

Lakshminarayan Mārwāri, a Vedantist, used to come here very often. One day he saw a dirty sheet on my bed and said: ‘I shall invest ten thousand rupees in your name.

The interest will enable you to pay your expenses.’ The moment he uttered these words, I fell unconscious, as if struck by a stick. Regaining consciousness I said to him: ‘If you utter such words again, you had better not come here. It is impossible for me to touch money.

It is also impossible for me to keep it near me.’ He was a very clever fellow. He said: ‘Then you too have the idea of acceptance and rejection. In that case you haven’t attained Perfect Knowledge.’ ‘My dear sir, I said, ‘I haven’t yet gone that far.’

Lakshminarayan then wanted to leave the money with Hriday. I said to him: ‘That will not do. If you leave it with Hriday, then I shall instruct him to spend it as I wish. If he does not comply, I shall be angry. The very contact of money is bad. No, you can’t leave it with Hriday.’ Won’t an object kept near a mirror be reflected in it?"