To attain the knowledge of righteousness (dharma), first, you must receive training under wise people, who are imbued with righteousness (dharma). Next, you must aspire to purify yourself (Atma shuddhi) and practice truth(sathya). Thirdly, you must realize the value of knowledge of the scriptures (Vedas), which is the voice of God. When these three steps are completed, you will clearly understand the truth and discriminate it from untruth. This enquiry into truth must be done in amity and cooperation. Everyone is entitled to attain spiritual wisdom. Everyone must be equally eager to discover the truth and benefit from it. All opinions must be tested on the touchstone of dharma, of universal goodness (sarvaloka-hitha). The principles that pass this test alone must be chosen and practiced, and shared with the world. Then will help humanity to progress. Then, everyone will develop joy and happiness in equal measure. All of you must use this method and perform noble and pure deeds consistently.
To get to correct understanding we need 'direct perception, inference and the spoken or written words of a self-realized authority' and now we have to find that in Swami and his words. We are trained how to live up to truth? If he is telling in such a way, how was that training, where was that training? Have we been aware that it was a training?
How do we purify ourselves and practice truth?
We do it with regular mediation, but what means that we should practice truth and not untruth?
And we have to realize the value of the scriptures, that is clear and the third level, the words of a self-realized authority, it is the easiest to grasp here and understood but that what is the most neglected really and Baba mentions here that it is Veda as the voice of God.
That is why Sanskrit words, they tell us where the authority is and that is 'Veda', that is the voice of God. Veda is seen, it is cognized wisdom, it is all based on insights and the big seers and therefore, it is the voice of God.
It is like Swami's words, they are the voice of God.
Next, you must aspire to purify yourself (Atma shuddhi) and practice truth(sathya). Thirdly, you must realize the value of knowledge of the scriptures (Vedas), which is the voice of God.
What is the first step the training, what is direct perception? We had that training during Darshan, it was called the sight of truth and what did we see, truth.
When we repeat a mantra it goes beyond the mind, we experience what we think it is and what it is not, it is a practiced value, it is purification of the mind. It has to be experienced. It is not what we think it is, it is what we are in the now.
It is not the image we have of it, it is the feeling of it now in that very moment in the present.
With the mantra repetition we purified the mind and go beyond the mind and that is about the Atma, but the Atma has to be cognized, it is not just pure consciousness, that is just a state of it, it is unlimited.
We have to live truth is direct experience of it, being it and not thinking it and it means getting to inference, right conclusion is about truth and we do it by contemplation, practice truth is the contemplation of the voice of God.
When these three steps are completed, you will clearly understand the truth and discriminate it from untruth.
There are three different levels of knowledge. We have sense-knowledge, the decision making and the scriptures, the words of a self-realized authority, the voice of God. It is our experience on the level of the senses. Sense-knowledge will never be the same as the voice of God. It is what we see and experience with our senses, when we meditate and repeat a mantra we transcend the senses, we go beyond the mind and that means also the senses, the senses are the mind. The voice of God is the Veda, the holy scriptures and they are seen by the Rishis (rishi is a seer) and it is not mind, but beyond the mind therefore, it is considered the voice of God.
In our study circle was in the text the 'tat tvam asi', the 'I am that'. There were lots of questions about it. We spoke about the 'I am' only and about the interview when Swami told us, every mantra is okay and he explained the mantra Soham with the breath and the meaning of it, the 'I am that' or 'I am God' or 'I am Shiva'.
And I told them how I felt and that I wondered how I could think 'I am God' at that time and that I looked at it from the body level and the small I and he explained that it opens the mind and today we know that he looked at it from the universal sight as God being everything and the difference between the 'I am' and the 'I am that' is that 'I am' is impersonal and 'that' is love and the is the relationship to God. We all sing for the divine and merge in that love and that is 'He' or 'God' or 'that' or also 'Shiva'.
And we had questions about something that was translated as sacrifice, but behind was the Sanskrit word and when we don't know how to understand it, the authority is the Sanskrit word and someone stood up and fetched a book in our library and looked at the word and we noticed it had not only one meaning, but many and that it was explained also as the bases of karma yoga, it was just translated as sacrifice. We also can google it and find all the different meanings, the word was 'tyaga'.
I would have translated it differently and when we looked at the definitions we got aware that it had more to do with giving up the fruits of our actions, the anxiety to enjoy the fruit of our action is overcome, we just do it, in that sense it has also to do with duty.
It is the renunciation of selfishness and desire,
in Tyāga('renunciation') one abandons the manifestations or objects of the universe through the cognition of Atman that is Sat and Cit and this is practiced by the wise as the giver of immediate salvation.
If it translated only as sacrifice we don't get really the right idea of it, here it is even mentioned as sat and cit, sat-chit-ananda, also three level as it is always about truth, if is it sat and chit ...
When there is a Sanskrit word mentioned by Swami it means we cannot just translate it, we have to think it over because the meaning is important and basic and if we translate it only with one word, we probably don't get to the right conclusion.
We have to understand the authority of the Sanskrit words and instead of being afraid of it, we see it as part of it and we just have to consider the text as very sacred really. We talked about the 'I am that', it is on three levels as well, 'thou art that' and 'I am that' and as conclusion 'all are that'.
In the inner view there was the man coming in our dream and it was the same 'I am that', the light of 'thou are that', was in us after he said 'engaged', we were 'that', the same 'I am that' and during singing in Prasanthi above the head of an other devotee was also the 'I am that' in the air and when I noticed that she was 'that' as well, it expanded to all devotees and 'all are that' and we reach that level where it is in all of us and it makes us understand what is meant with God is love.
It cannot be translated by the mind as God is everywhere without knowing that he is 'love only', love fills the universe that is God, everything else what we see with our eyes and hear with our ears is sense-perception and therefore, sense- knowledge.
If we listen to the mind and think God is everywhere projected on the outside world, we have not self-realization or God-realization, we just think that he is everywhere, but we have not the experience of it and that result in a mind state. God is love and in the world we have not oneness, but multiplicity, it is a mixed perception and to get to the state of truth, we have to do what he is telling us here, we have to discriminate and practice truth and we find it as 'love only' or just 'that'.
Baba was present afterwards during singing and felt like a bright light really, just light.
This enquiry into truth must be done in amity and cooperation.
That is the aim of the study circle, we enquire into truth and Swami's words with amity and cooperation.
Everyone is entitled to attain spiritual wisdom. Everyone must be equally eager to discover the truth and benefit from it. All opinions must be tested on the touchstone of dharma, of universal goodness (sarvaloka-hitha). The principles that pass this test alone must be chosen and practiced, and shared with the world.
That are the principles that pass the test and should be chosen and practiced.
We cannot claim to know God if we don't think it over and we don't listen to the voice of God and we don't know the principles. Swami is a hundred percent love only, it was beautiful last night because we talked about the 'I am that' and he felt like a hundred percent present really.
It is the first time we looked at it in the study circle that principle of the 'I am that'. It was a totally different feeling to share it with the others and that is really only possible in the study circle to talk on such a level with people and to get aware of it together and to share that divine truth is an amazing experience and when we look at it together with the eyes of the circle, we know that it is true, it is because we think it over together.
Then will help humanity to progress. Then, everyone will develop joy and happiness in equal measure.
All of you must use this method and perform noble and pure deeds consistently.
We have to use that method.
Okay and do we know now what method it is?
I read about a devotee in the Internet, she had been living permanently in the ashram and she has not realize the difference between the Atma and the mind, she didn't live truth and she got nuts, what she tells today has turned into the opposite and she projects everything that happened what she is not able to understand on the mind level and tries to get the answer on that level and that feels like she has lost her mind really, it can result only in a disaster if we explain that energy level with the mind.
That is also an example of all possibilities, I knew her and talked to her a few times and I was kind of shocked to read her state of mind today, but I am also sorry with her. She is today finding faults with everything she admired and loved before and that is not a good and it is a deplorable state of mind. It is absurd what she writes. It helps if we are able to discriminate between sense-knowledge (mind), being trained and understanding it right and inference, practicing truth and getting aware of the value of the scriptures, the voice of God, we have to see it on three levels really.
The first level sense-knowledge and being trained by someone, that is Darshan really, but if people didn't learn the lesson, they go back make it easy and project it in the mind telling God is everywhere, it is not experience and it is on the mind level, on a certain point truth will hit and it will show that we have not understood and practiced and we didn't do any Tapas.
God is love and only if we have that experience of 'all are that', with other words, love only on the insight or experience level we are entitled to tell that God is everywhere, because we have the experience of it.
We got to the conclusion that it is the meaning of 'tat tvam asi', the 'I am that', the method we have to practice, everything else is the mind only and sense-knowledge. Nobody who has not the experience of 'tat tvam asi' can tell that God is everywhere and we remember when Swami asked when someone said, God is everywhere, the answer was usually, 'how do you know?'
It is all about correct understanding.
God is love only, to get to the correct understanding we have to make the experience, it means first to discriminate between sense-knowledge, 'direct experience, inference and the words of a self-realized authority' or as Swami calls it here, the voice of God.
If we have those three levels and we know the difference between those three levels, we know the difference between truth and untruth.
That is good news and when we know the difference we have to share it with the world. We cannot keep it for ourselves, it is not meant for ourselves only and if we don't share it, we don't get to the right experience.
If we get that much of truth by Darshan, no matter how we got there, if we keep it for ourselves and only our own self-gratification and we don't share it with others, we are actually working against and not for the laws of nature and we have mother nature not with us, but against us. We have to see that it was a training by someone who knows Dharma, the direct experience of it and that we have to live truth, what means discrimination and by that we have to listen to the voice of God, that are the scriptures, Veda and the words of a self-realized authority. What matters is levels, three levels of knowledge we see in that method to get to highest wisdom.
That is how the understanding grows in thinking it over and in thinking it over we get the feeling for it, if we are trained by someone who knows Dharma it is direct perception, direct experience of the truth, that is what we experienced in Darshan and then we have to practice and it needs discrimination to practice truth, otherwise, we practice the sense-level again and go back to sense-knowledge and truth is Atma and different from the senses and the mind and it is present in love only. And the level of all possibilities means we can go for it and practice that method or we also cannot listen and we don't practice and we go back in the mind. That we can see of lots of people in the Internet, that are those accusing, blaming, finding faults instead of listening to the voice of God. We need the voice of God or the self-realized authority, we have to listen to his words and when we have those three levels we get to correct understanding.
That is the method Swami confirms it here, it is the method how to get to the right answer and to know the difference between truth and untruth.
That is good news for us, but also he tells us that we need to share it with the others, with the world, if we have that wisdom and we don't share, that is not good, the wisdom is divine and it is sacred.
After the study circle it felt sacred and we cannot go to a master teaching truth and go on living in illusion, the energy level doesn't match. If we don't want to live that highest wisdom, as soon as we go to him, we also have to practice, otherwise, only take advantage of that divine love shared by all devotees equally on a certain level it is against natural law.
And we have to understand that divine love is one with devotees, he is not alone God, but together with them and the love between him and his devotees is the sharing of the divine, we cannot separate Swami and his devotees without getting to wrong conclusions, because we separate what is inseparable and take advantage of that love thinking it is Swami's love.
That is not right, it is divine love and he is also the divine reflection of it, the love we share is the love of God and that is the love of God, Swami is teaching the love of God, he knows it how and he shows us how, he is the one who is the knower of Dharma and that is how he gives us direct perception, Darshan and afterwards we have to practice truth and we have to be careful to not go against truth and to live untruth, we have to discriminate.
He said first discrimination, second seeing it in our own life, (that is how we see it in our own life) and third going on no matter what obstacles are coming up (that is what we practice in just going on and on).
By thinking it over we get a feeling for it.
He is only the first part, the knower of Dharma giving us the right perception, Darshan, that is not all of it, afterwards the real work just begins as we have to practice truth and discriminate between truth and untruth. If we fall down in the mind and don't use enough discrimination, we don't value the gift we got in direct perception of truth, the Darshan.
We got the Darshan, sight of truth and now we have to practice and we have to listen to the voice of God, the scriptures and Veda, That is the method and people who had Darshan for such a long time like that permanent lady, she had been years and years in the ashram and I would have liked to be like her, I had to go back and work and now I prefer not to be in her situation actuall. She is nuts, she has lost her mind, she makes out of it an ugly thing really. But it is good for us to know how that can happen, she lived in that energy for years and she didn't listen, she took only advantage of it in one way or another.
The divine energy is not only Swami, it is God and God is between the devotee and Swami.
With the Hare Krishnas was a saying if God has to chose between God or the devotee, the devotee is higher, because the devotee loves God, while God is love and that is different, he is already there, but the devotees is the lover.
God and devotee are one, it is about God-realization.
In singing we merge, but we merge with something that is greater than we are. The whole is greater than the sum of its parts and we are just small entities and we can be part of the whole and get one with it, but if we misuse that love and take it for our own self and use it for our life only or we think it is his love, we make a personal matter what is universal love really.
Love is never only one person, it is always divine love and that is a sharing, there are also three, the lover, the beloved and the state of love.
What we feel in his presence is the state of love, it is the same love he has for us as we have for him, it is divine love that is where it merges. He knows who he is that is the difference, the love we share is divine and God and if we misuse it as it is a divine gift, it gets dangerous, because we don't misuse his love, but God's love and that is much bigger power and the result of the love of all his devotees.
When we go and sing, we become part of that oneness of the divine love, that is the sacrifice, we give up our ego for it and sing with the others. When we sit in the circle and think it over we give up the ego and listen to all and try to find that method he is talking about here and we sacrifice our own ego when we get aware that alone we don't know, but together we make the right experience.
That is the divine, it is greater than the sum of its parts and every time we make a step towards him, he comes towards us, but when we think that this divine love is in him only and we don't see the whole and we enjoy it on the level of the sense only and take it granted for our own self only and we don't share it with others, we go against natural law and we deceive not Swami, but our own self as it is divine and that is dangerous, that is how these people in the Internet have lost their minds and write nothing but nonsense all based on the mind and wrong conclusions in the mind and mind reasoning, they didn't get the difference Swami mentions here, the difference between 'direct perception' and Darshan and that we have to practice truth.
They think what they see with the eyes or with the mind is true and they argue and reason about it and they have lots of fantasy.
If we analyse it we find only two levels, the sense-knowledge and on the inference level as they get to a wrong conclusion and the voice of God they don't hear anymore. They don't know the difference between the mind and Atma.
One devotee said, that maybe she fell down because in the ashram she didn't have a study circle.
I guess that means we got the message, it is reflected in her words.
We understand how important it is to listen to Swami's words. If we lived for ten years of more in the ashram with that beauty and only love and we get to the conclusion that it is everything else but divine love, there is definitely something wrong.
It shows us what happens with the mind if we don't realize the difference between mind and Atma and if we don't listen to the voice of God and it is not only Swami, it is Veda we have to listen to as well.
To attain the knowledge of righteousness (dharma), first, you must receive training under wise people, who are imbued with righteousness (dharma). Next, you must aspire to purify yourself (Atma shuddhi) and practice truth(sathya).
Being with Swami was only the first step, afterwards we have to practice and purify ourselves, that is the second step and that is our Sadhana and meditation. What these people think is that being with Swami is the end of it, but it is only the beginning. We know if we meditate the mind gets purified.
Thirdly, you must realize the value of knowledge of the scriptures (Vedas), which is the voice of God. When these three steps are completed, you will clearly understand the truth and discriminate it from untruth.
The third is about the value of knowledge and that we do in listening to him and in the study circle or it could be also a study workshop, but we have to get aware of the value of knowledge, otherwise, we fall down in the mind again, that value of knowledge is a must, we have to realize it, it is part of it that we have the words of the self-realized authority.
That is why we have a Sanskrit word, we have to google it, if it is not clear, we have to get a feeling for it and the authority are the scriptures, the Vedas and no others scriptures really and that is why it is in Sanskrit.
We don't find tyaga in any other scripture than Veda.
This enquiry into truth must be done in amity and cooperation. Everyone is entitled to attain spiritual wisdom. Everyone must be equally eager to discover the truth and benefit from it.
Baba uses the Sanskrit words to keep us in touch with the source, the place where the divine is still alive.
All opinions must be tested on the touchstone of dharma, of universal goodness (sarvaloka-hitha).
What we have to do, what is the method?
Now we know. After thinking it over we got the feeling for it. We have been in his presence and got the experience of truth, we have to purify the mind and live truth, that is the second step and we have to get aware of the value of the scriptures, Veda, that is what we do now.
The principles that pass this test alone must be chosen and practiced, and shared with the world.
The principle in Sat-chit-ananda cannot be anywhere else but in Veda, the word tyaga we find in Veda. And only that we can share with others, only that and nothing else. Only that message can be true and Veda and divine message and not something perverted what has nothing to do with divine love.
It has to be the truth which was reflected in his Darshans. It is a gift, but also a challenge, we have to practice truth and not untruth, as it was mirrored in Darshan, the sight of truth. It is only the first part of our lesson and the test is when we have to put it into practice. We have to learn the lesson or it turns against our own nature, because it is all based on illusion if we see that love only in him and project it in the mind. It is divine love, it is pure love and it is shared between all and therefore, it is the sharing and power and love of all devotees with the one divine and it is highly sacred and as Swami tells us, ABC, always be careful.
If we live that love on a personal level, it is against natural law and if we tell it is everywhere, but we have not the right experience, it is just a different mind state. It is universal love and sacred and to get to the correct understanding we have to share with others.
Then will help humanity to progress. Then, everyone will develop joy and happiness in equal measure. All of you must use this method and perform noble and pure deeds consistently.
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