Asato Ma Sat Gamaya, Tamaso Ma Jyotri Gamaya, Mrityurma Amritum Gamaya.
Om Shanti Shanti Shanti Om lead us from the unreal to the real, lead us from darkness unto light, lead us from death to immortality. Om Peace Peace Peace This morning the subject is a hymn to the Devi. This is about the Devi Suktum. A magnificent hymn found in the Vedas, in the Rig Veda. It's incredibly ancient, 5000 years or more and at this point some of you will go there you go everything is 5000 years or more. But it is very ancient. In fact couple of days ago I was listening to a discussion in which one of the participants was Jessica Fraser. She is a professor of Indian philosophy at Oxford University and she was saying that these can be roughly dated by the latest modern, most conservative kind of scholarship to be about 1700 BCE which means that's about 3700 years before our time which is like 1200 years before the Buddha. So more than a thousand years before the Buddha. So 3700 years, 5000 years give or take to a 10 or 12 centuries. So incredibly ancient and this is the oldest, the earliest existing record of a religious, spiritual, philosophical text and the first teaching by a woman, by a Rishi who was a woman all those centuries ago, a voice coming down to us, recorded perfectly, transmitted exactly in the language in which she spoke. We have heard it chanted many times because this is the time when we worship the Divine Mother in the form of Durga, you can see and one of the common practices during this time which is called Navaratri in Hinduism is to chant the Durga Saptashati, the Chandi and the Chandi is always chanted with the Devi Sukta, with this hymn. So the hymn to the Divine Mother and part of that is this particular hymn to the Devi. Who was she? We know that her father was a Rishi, a sage, the ones who saw the Vedic mantras, the Rishis. Rishaya Mantra Darshtara, the Rishis are the ones who saw the mantras, literally saw these truths. That's where the whole idea of philosophy comes from in India. If you see the word for philosophy in Sanskrit it is Darshan, literally to see, see the ultimate truth. And we were always told when we studied philosophy that you know philosophy, I still remember the voice of my philosophy teacher as a young novice monk, there was this old gentleman who was a disciple of Swami Abhedananda, our Swami Abhedananda, this professor Nirodhwaran Chakravarti, retired professor of philosophy, who would start his class to teach these would-be monks about Western philosophy. He would start by saying, please remember that philosophy in the Western sense is different from Darshan in the Indian sense. It was customary to make this distinction. So philosophy is love of wisdom, it's about thinking philosophically about philosophical issues, whereas Darshan is seeing the ultimate truth. But this distinction is not valid actually. I, I read a few years ago this French philosopher, Luc Ferry. So the French have a completely different way, unique way, independent way of thinking about it. So he's written this book on Western philosophy and if you read that book you will see there is absolutely no reference to any English-speaking author. So there is no philosophy worth the name in England, Australia, USA, Canada, none of the English-speaking world have anything worthwhile to say about philosophy. It's all French, German and the ancient Greeks. Anyhow, the point he makes is philosophy is not the right word. The right word is theory and theory, he says, theory is derived from theos and oran which means to see the ultimate truth. It has exactly the same meaning as Darshan. Anyway, so the earliest record of these philosophical teachings is this, this hymn from the Rig Veda which is the oldest existing religious spiritual text of humanity today and there also it is from a woman. Remember today and she speaks about her realization. Her name was Vak, her father's name was the Rishi Ambrin. So her full name would be Vak Ambrini. So this lady, this Rishi who lived 3000, 4000, 5000 years ago, her voice is coming down to us. We have heard this again and again in India, you hear it every year, this chanting. I never really reflected on the meaning until this time, this occasion. I thought it was incredible. We'll see that today, what I'm going to talk about. Whatever we have in religion, spirituality, philosophy, not only in Vedanta, not only in the whole of Hinduism, in all the world's traditions, all the important ideas, the important developments, the central teachings are all there. Thousands of years before the other Rishis, before the Buddha and before Shankara, before the Upanishads, historically speaking, before all that we do, our Drig Drishya Viveka and Aparoksha Anubhuti, the seer and the seen and the five levels of the human personality, pure consciousness, existence, bliss, Brahman, Atman, all of that, before all of that, before God and religion and Avatar, before all of that, all of these ideas are already there. What that lady said nearly 5000 years ago, I feel we have not gone one inch beyond that in this 5000 years of history. That's a tremendous claim to be making but we'll explore that today. This incredible hymn. So it's in the Rig Veda. What I'll do is, I'll request our IT team, we, let's hear it first before we go into it. Let's hear it in two versions. One version will be the precise, correct Vedic chanting, the way it is technically, correctly chanted, so that we will hear first and then there is the more familiar version, more familiar to us in Bengal for example, which everybody in Bengali families, you know, you wake up on Mahalaya and it's playing the Biren Bhadra performance. There's a beautiful chorus rendition, chorus singing of the same sutra, of the same Sukta. So first, the correct Vedic chanting, Devi Sukta, please. Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Sukta, Devi Kondi, Sribas, Rangas- And now, the other version which we hear from childhood onwards I would hear early in the morning on Mahalaya, when the Devi Paksha starts. So parents, my mother would put on the radio. So it's a memory etched into every Bengali child probably. It's a very beautiful chorus. Let's hear that. Really magnificent and even the poetry of it, which we shall see. So what does she say here which is so significant, so amazing? First she says, she opens in a very high tone. You see here, she is speaking of her own realization. See she is enlightened, she realizes identity with Brahman. So she is speaking now not only as this person who has become enlightened, but from the perspective of Brahman, from the perspective of the ultimate reality. Now in Vedanta we will ask this question, which perspective is she speaking from? From the absolute perspective of existence, consciousness, bliss, Brahman, nirguna Brahman? Or is it from the perspective of God, Saguna Brahman? Both. So you will see how easily she moves between the absolute Brahman and the personal God. She is moving back and forth and the enlightened person. So amazing. So she opens, the theme is, Aham Rudre Vir Vasubhis Charam Yahaam I am all the Vedic Gods. She says to her community, the Vedic people. So the religion at that time was, they had these extensive fire rituals, which were called Yagas or Yajnas. And the offerings were made to Gods and these Gods were Gods with small g. So they were forces, they were beings which controlled the entire universe. So a variety of these beings and the purpose was to get their blessings so that you would get what you want. The worshippers would get what they want in this life or the next. Children, empires, cattle, abundant crops and rainfall and heaven in the next life and so on. So the various Vedic Gods, she says, the Rudras who are 11 in number, the Vasus who are 8, the Adityas who are supposed to be 12 in number, the Vishwadevas which are 13 in number. The primary Gods of the Vedic pantheon, Mitra, Varuna, Agni, the fire God, Indra, the twin, Ashwin twins, Somadeva, Twashta, Pusha, all of these, what about them? Ultimately they are one reality. I and look at the confidence of this lady, throughout every verse begins with Aham, I. I am that which you worship as the Adityas, as the Rudras, as Indra, as Varuna, as Agni. I am that one reality shining in and through all of them. All the powers that you see manifested in nature which you deify and worship as Gods in the Vedic pantheon, they are not many. They are all one reality and I am that reality. She is speaking as the personal God. See, this is thousands of years before the great monotheistic traditions arose in the Middle East. At least 2 to 3 thousand years before the beginning of Judaism. 500 years after which comes Christianity, 800 years after which comes Islam. Long before that, the development that God is one, one reality. Here is Vak, the Rishika, Vak Ambrini, she is saying, I am that one reality which appears as all the divinities that humanity worships. But there is a little twist here. That one reality is female. I am that. Yes, God exists and God is a woman. Which is in direct counterpoint to the idea that in the Middle East when the Abrahamic traditions arose, it's a male God which comes up there. And of course, God is neither male nor female, it's beyond gender. But when you express it in this way, she takes this route that God, the divinity which is expressed is the mother of the universe. The deity is female. If you conceive of a deity as a personal God, conceive of it as mother. Aham dadami dravinam havishmate supraabhye yajamana yasunvate. Think of the great religious activity of the ancient Vedic people where across at least the Gangetic plains there would be these ashrams, there would be these great fire sacrifice altars and flames rising up and smoked into the sky and the sonorous chanting of the Vedic priests and the devotion of the masses all around. This was religion. And she says all that you offer into all the deities, expecting whatever, anything that you want, all that you offer comes to me. Through all the deities that you offer it comes to God, to the one God. And everything that you get from these rituals, whatever you get, worldly, otherworldly, all that comes from me also. This is the great secret that I teach unto you, that every religious activity that you do flows to one reality. Though you may worship it in many forms, behind all existing powers is one divinity. That has to be recognized. This is the teaching she gives to the Vedic people, that beyond all the Vedic divinities is one supreme power and that is I, that is God or the Divine Mother, the Mother Goddess. There's a beautiful saying, akashat patitam toyam sagaram pratigachchati, all the rain that falls from the sky, in rivers and rivulets, in lakes, whatever, ultimately flows to the same ocean. Similarly, in whichever form you give your offerings, it all flows to the divinity, to the Mother Goddess, who I am. I am the one who gives all to humanity. So what about the powers of nature, the different powers? They get their power from me. In the Kena Upanishad, the Vedic gods are shown as different powers of nature and then they find that one power appears before them, an extraordinary being, before whom none of their powers work against this being. They don't realize that this is the ultimate reality of the universe, Brahman, but they don't realize what it is and they are puzzled. And then Brahman disappears. The king of the gods, Indra is standing there puzzled. What was this extraordinary being before whom all the divine powers of the gods do not work? You know, the fire cannot burn, the wind cannot blow and so on. He is wondering this and then the divine mother appears before him, Uma Haimavati, the daughter of the Himalayas, exactly Durga, she appears before him and says that was Brahman. We will come to that later. So anything that you want in this world, worldly, you want money, pleasure, family, prosperity, success, you want heaven after death, you want enlightenment and God realization and moksha, nirvana, all of that comes from me. This has to be known. This is the great secret of religion. Again, two to three millennia before the rise of the monotheistic religions, she says this. Then, aham rashtri sangamani vasu naam chikitushi pradhama yajnanam, the sheer language. See even this is Vedic Sanskrit and you can notice here, those who study Sanskrit, they notice here a kind of vigor, a freshness, simplicity, power and freshness which later on becomes more ornamental, more subtle, more sophisticated maybe. But here it is just sheer, it's natural freshness. I think it was, it was Sorrow who reading the Gita and the Upanishads says that when you read these pages, you come into contact with the dawn of civilization, the first light of civilization, you see the freshness of the human mind. She says, what does she say here? I am the mother of all nations, aham rashtri. By the way, for Vedic scholars who might be wondering where do I get these interpretations from? So two sources, one is Sayana who is the great commentator on the Vedas, that is of course one source. The other one is not so well known, it's more modern which is Dr. Mahanama Vrata Brahmachari. He was a great Vaishnava teacher in Bangladesh and in Bengal also, very well known. But there is an interesting connection between him and America. Many people all around the world have heard of Thomas Merton, probably the most famous Christian monk of the 20th century, Thomas Merton. Now Mahanama Vrata Brahmachari was doing, he came to the United States, he did a PhD in theology in Vaishnava studies in the University of Chicago. So this young Indian scholar, he met this young American man and that man was very interested in Eastern religions which he maintained throughout his life. But this Mahanama Vrata Brahmachari encouraged this young American man to investigate Catholicism which led him to ultimately become the famous Catholic monk Thomas Merton. So that story is very interesting. So he has written a book, Chandi Chinta, which means Reflections on the Chandi. So there is a chapter on the Devi Sukta which I am using for interpretations. And Vagambhrini, the Rishi, she says, I am the mother of nations. I am the source of civilization. What does that mean? Let me tell you an interesting thing I read last year, or year before last. You know this book Sapiens, you will know Harari, a very interesting take on history. I have always been interested in history. A lot of people find it boring but I assure you if you read this book you will not find it boring and you will get an interest in history. Now there is one section in which he talks about the well-known orthodox in history that how did religion originate? So first of all you need for religion, you need a settled life. So that means agriculture has to be there. Agriculture means people settle down. You cannot be a hunter-gatherer, you cannot be a forager if you are cultivating fields. So you settle down. You build a village. And then part of that organization leads to organized religion. Some kind of religious activity starts. So before that also there were religious beliefs, some kind of proto-religious beliefs. But what we today recognize as the roots of religion, that started with settling down villages and agriculture. Then in the middle of the village somebody builds a temple or something. Yuval Noah Harari says no. Religion did not arise from the beginning of civilization. Civilization began from religion. How? He says that recently in southeastern Turkey there is a site which they excavated and they found these huge stone pillars, several meters high. Some of them were 7 tons and one partially finished stone pillar was 50 tons. Huge stone pillars with inscriptions and engravings, meanings of which we don't understand today. Now such pillars have been found also. Most famous of them is the Stonehenge in England. But the ones found in Turkey and the Stonehenge, there is a difference in age. Stonehenge is about 2500 BC. The ones found in Turkey are 12,000 years ago, about 9,000 BC to 10,000 BC. So now 12,000 years before our time. Clearly before the beginning of agriculture, as far as we know. Before the beginning of agriculture, before the beginning of village life, certainly before the beginning of cities and nations and all of that. More than 12,000 years ago you find these huge stones, clearly some kind of religious significance, nothing else, religious significance. Now he says, this is very strange. How did hunter-gatherers, foragers, little groups of little tribes, even small tribes. If you are a forager, hunter-gatherer, you cannot maintain too many people like that. So you have to have very small in number. To build these things, construct them, erect them, maintain them would have taken thousands and thousands of people at the very least. How did they do it? Then they found the next clue. The first evidence of the taming of wheat, cultivated wheat, not just wild wheat, but cultivated wheat was found near that site. And the stunning conclusion that historians came to was, it's not that these were constructed when there was agriculture and villages and all that. Agriculture and villages were started in order to construct these things. These things were the purpose of agriculture and village life, in order to have religion. So the motivation for settling down, when you need thousands of people to construct this, you need to feed them, then agriculture starts. Then you need to settle down around it and maintain it and start villages. What an amazing insight. Till now historians thought and we had been taught also, agriculture starts, civilization starts and then religion also develops. No, religion develops and therefore civilization comes. She says, I am the mother of civilization. It is in my worship that you have built up the civilizations of humanity. What an amazing thing. You come down to today. I was just thinking, here, right here. Somebody was saying here, New York is definitely the greatest city of the world. I saw inscribed on the Columbus, the footpath there. John Lennon, it's written in chalk. Somebody asked John Lennon, why do you live in New York? He used to live right here in the Dakota. Why do you live in New York? He says, why do I live in New York? If I lived in ancient times, I would have lived in Rome. New York is verily the Rome of our times. So New York is basically the symbol of modern 21st century, 20th century, 21st century civilization. Here, right here, you have the Statue of Liberty. We don't think about it in those terms. We think about it as secular. But just forget the secular religious divide. Think about it, what is the spirit, the ideology, the idea behind the Statue of Liberty? Just look at the statue itself. There is the flame, the light. And on the other hand, the books. I know it's a tablet, but it's books. Let's call it books. Today, tablet means something else. So it's books. And I think there are chains, broken chains under her feet. You go beyond the bondage. You go beyond bondage by knowledge and the light of liberty and freedom. Freedom is attained. Bondage is overcome through knowledge. And the whole thing is represented by the mother figure, the female figure. This is exactly what she is talking about, three, four thousand years ago. How do you know? Isn't it a stretch? Not really. Who recognized this? Swami Vivekananda, who is a true child of the Rishi Vagambhrini. Four thousand years later, a representative, one of the best representatives of that tradition comes to these shores. And he says, Hail Columbia, Mother of Liberty. He immediately recognized the spirit. There is a book, The Gift Unopened by Eleanor Stark, I think. So there the author writes that Vivekananda's teachings and Vedanta is the gift to America, which is still unopened, which brings to America the idea of her own greatness, not just the secular greatness, not just the economic greatness or the military or political greatness, the spiritual greatness. The Statue of Liberty is a spiritual figure, actually, and we need to discover that. So she says, Aham Rashtri, I am the spirit of nations, I am the mother of nations, I am the source of civilization. Chikki Tushi, I am spiritual knowledge embodied. Chikki Tushi Prathama Yajnanaam, to those who want it, I reveal spiritual knowledge, the teachings of spirituality, highest teachings of religion. Going ahead. Then next, even more amazing. Mayaso annamati yo vipasyati yath pranitiya im srinotyuktam. All beings who eat, consume food and live on food, you see, you all who see and you hear, all life, it is sustained by me, in and through me. What is amazing about this? In the Keno Upanishad, which if you look at it historically, I will just mention here, traditionally, if you ask a traditional Vedic scholar, they will completely reject all this historical analysis. They will say, Vedas are timeless. It is not that she came earlier and the Upanishads came later. They are all timeless and revealed together. But let us do historical analysis. If you do historical analysis, then she came earlier and the Upanishads came later. Centuries later, you find in one of the most important, extraordinary Upanishads, Keno Upanishad. It starts with,” Keneshitam patati preshitam manaha kena prănaha prathamaha praiti yuktaha. Keneshităm văchamimăm vadanti chakshuhu shrotram ka u devo yunakti” What does it mean? Impaled by what do these words come out? What illumines these thoughts in the mind? From where do these thoughts arise? By what does one speak? By what, what bright being enables me to see and hear and smell and taste and touch and breathe? All the activities of cognition, sense organs, the activities of thinking, the activities of the motor organs, eating, walking, talking, all of that. What is the one light which illumines all of that? And then the Upanishad itself answers in paradoxical language.
Shrotrasya shrotram manaso mano yad văcho ha văcham sa u prănasya prănashchakshushashchakshuhu, You ask what is that which shines in and through all our cognitions, our perceptions, all our activities? It is that one light which is the ear of the ear, the eye of the eye, the mind of the mind. You ask how do I speak? Don't tell me. The speech of the speech, you are right. The speech of the speech, the breath of the breath. And knowing this, the one, the seeker, the spiritual seeker who knows this goes beyond death, transcends death, transcends suffering. What exactly is the spiritual quest at its core? How do you do it and what is the result? Everything has been said here. To put it simply without paradoxical language, you can say what the Upanishad is talking about, the Rishi of the Upanishad, Kena Upanishad is saying this one consciousness, one awareness. When you see, are you not aware? When you hear, are you not aware? When you smell, taste, touch, speak, think, are you not aware? You are. Seeing, hearing, smelling, touching, thinking, speaking, these are all different activities. But is the awareness behind all of them, is the awareness in itself different? No. It is one reality which shines in and through all of these activities and gives us that first person experience. So, you will say now you will speak about the hard problem of consciousness. No, the first person experience is made possible by this one non-object, pure subject, awareness. The light of this awareness, what the Buddhists call the clear light of the void, shining in and through. So, she says, I am that light. She is not only the cosmic power behind all the gods which controls the universe, which is the recipient of all worship, the source of civilization. But in each of us, in our lives, whatever is going on in our lives, it is all possible because of that one light which is the Divine Mother, which is our real, the core of ourselves. That shining, all else shines. By its light all is lit up. tam eva bhantam anubhati sarvam tasya bhasa sarvam idam vibhati kathopa nishad What is that light? It is the Divine Mother. She says, I am that light. What is that light? It is you. It is our real nature. I am that light which shines through every activity of life. It is only because of her. Without that light, all darkness. Imagine, if I cannot hear, I will still be aware, but I will be aware that I can't hear anything. I am deaf. If I can't see, I will still be aware. It will just be a dark world, but I am aware that I can't see anything. But look at the reverse. Suppose eyes are functioning, brain centers are functioning, ears are functioning, but awareness is not there. Then? Will it be that I can hear, I can see, but I am not aware. That's all. You are laughing. Impossible. Correct. So ridiculous. The world will go dark for us without awareness. Awareness is that which makes the entirety of life possible. The experience of life is possible because of awareness. She says that is one awareness and it is an immortal light. It is I. I am that. It also means I am that. That means she is speaking as God, as the mother goddess. But you are that. Your real nature is that. So you and she are one reality. What is the reality of God or the reality of the mother goddess and your reality? One and the same. This is the meaning of tat tvam asi, that thou art. When we say aham brahmasmi in Vedanta, I am Brahman, we don't mean anything more than that. We mean that pure awareness, pure consciousness. That light which shines through all our activities, thoughts, feelings, experiences of life. There is more to it, but we will get to that. Then she sounds a note of warning: amantavom?nta upak?iyanti Those who do not know this secret, those who do not reflect upon it and assimilate it, they wither away. They go from death to death. Kenopanishad also warns this: cedaved?datha satyamasti na cedih?ved?nmahat? vina??i? If you know this secret, if you realize this, you have attained reality, you become immortal, go beyond death. If you do not know this, you go from death to death. Great is the loss in human life. If one dies, goes away from this life without realizing this identity, your identity with the divine mother, your identity with pure consciousness. She says here, amantavoma, who has not realized me, who has not reflected upon me, who is not centered in me, that one withers away. Withers away means he is continuously whirled in the cycle of birth and death. Then she goes on, again beautiful, simple, powerful Sanskrit.
ahameva svayamida? vad?mi ju??a? devebhiruta m?nu?ebhi? I myself reveal spiritual knowledge, religion to humans and gods. I myself, aham swayam eva idam vadami yushtam, I reveal the highest truths, the beautiful, the sacred. The idea of revelation, at the source of religion lies revelation. Whether you say it is the Vedas or what was revealed to the Jewish prophets or to Prophet Muhammad, the whole claim is that the source of religion is this revelation. She says I am that which reveals religion to humanity. I speak by myself. What does that mean? Here Mahanama Bratavaramachari points out something interesting. The enlightened one, after long struggle, spiritual practice, you realize I am Brahman, whatever your spiritual realization and then you speak. So your spiritual practice, your journey, your realization, then you speak. That's one. The rishis, to them was revealed the secrets of the Vedas, they also speak. That's two. But here it is God speaking, not by my spiritual practice, she says here. I am not speaking out of I worked hard and then I got something and I am giving it to you. No. Not it was revealed to me, I am transmitting it to you, like the rishis or the prophets, not even that. I am the source. I am that which is giving the spiritual knowledge to all of humanity from cycle to cycle, in every cycle of creation and destruction, existence of the universe. The cycle of creation, existence and destruction of the universe, srishti, sthiti, pralaya, in every cycle I am the one who reveals. Aham idam swayam eva vadami yushtam. To the gods and the humans. We are reminded of the beautiful Vedic mantra, which is, Swami Vivekananda loved this. When you ask what is religion, he would love to quote this. Shrinvantu vishwe amritasya putra, aaye dhamani divyani tastu. He says that some rishi, somewhere, we do not know whom, said that listen all ye children of immortal bliss. Not only human beings, he says the gods in the heavens also, you also listen, small g gods. Gods in the heavens, you also listen because what I am going to say you do not know. Vedaham purusham mahantam, I have realized that infinite being. Adityavarnam tamasah parastah. What is the nature of that infinite being? Of the nature of endless consciousness, endless light of awareness. Not this empirical consciousness which we are talking about here, that which lights this up. The endless consciousness, the limitless consciousness I am. Adityavarnam tamasah parastah, forever beyond the darkness of death and suffering. Tameva viditva atimrityu meti, knowing that one goes beyond death. Nanya phantha vidyate ayanaya, there is no other path. No secular path will take you to that. In Silicon Valley they are trying very hard how to attain immortality in the body. Won't work. I did an interview couple of months back in Hollywood. So there is this history channel. They have a program called the unexplained. So I was interviewed and they wanted to know if you can sort of preserve the body, how do yogis live long, and can you upload your consciousness into the cloud and somehow continue with this physical existence. So they are doing a program on that and the host is William Shatner. Captain Kirk, Star Trek. And he is in the news now. At the age of 90 he is going to go to space. Yes, yes. So I told the interviewer that why don't you ask William Shatner. He is practically immortal himself. He is 90 years. He has been acting since 1951. So he is practically immortal himself. The only way to attain immortality is to realize the immortal which is the existence, consciousness, bliss, the absolute. And she says I am that which reveals this truth. She is speaking here as the personal God, the God of religion. Swayamidam Vadami. To human beings and to Gods. Exactly the language of the rishis. And that rishi who spoke this which Swami Vivekananda quoted, she must have been centuries if not millennia before that rishi. Then again another very important beautiful truth: yam kamaye tam tamugram krnomi tam brahmanam tamrsim tam sumedham Whoever worships me with devotion, whatever they want, I give them that. This one I make Brahma, the creator of the universe. That one I make a rishi and the other one I make the greatest intellectual that there ever was. Tam brahmaanam tam rishim tam sumedham. It all comes from her. It is her gift to give. Now Brahma is supposed to be the greatest being of this universe who is manifested at the beginning of creation and who makes the rest of the universe. So that is supposed to be the highest possible position for a jiva, sentient being to attain. But another meaning of I make that one a Brahma means I make that one an enlightened one. And this is not a stretch interpretation because if you look at the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad, the first one to become enlightened was Brahma. Brahma realized aham brahmasmi. Not I am this Brahma but I am Brahman, the ultimate reality. So if you want to become enlightened, that's what she is saying. If you want to become enlightened, you want to be free of the cycle of birth and death, you want God realization, moksha, nirvana, worship me. By my grace alone it is possible. Tam brahmaanam tam rishim tam sumedham. Those who want to be a great sage, those who want to become Einstein or something like that, it is by the grace of the Divine Mother that this tremendous insights into religion and spirituality come. I remember Swami Brahmananda was there in Kashi in Benares and the Holy Mother, Maa Sharda Devi was also there. So she asked somebody to go and ask Rakhal Swami Brahmananda, why do you need to worship the Divine Mother? You have the Upanishads, Vedanta, Rig Drishya Viveka, Panchadarshi, Aparoksha, Anubhuti and all of that. You have the direct teaching. So you just practice that. Indiscriminate, I am not the body, I am not the mind. And then you realize that I am Brahman, you realize your true identity. But it is not that easy. You might say we know Swami, we have been coming to the Vedanta Society for decades now, it is not that easy. Yes, so grace is necessary. That is what all spiritual seekers throughout the ages have realized. We call it grace, Kripa. So the grace comes from the Divine Mother. So Swami Brahmananda asked him and he said, Brahma Gyane Chabi Kaathi Maayar Haate. The keys to the enlightenment, the keys to Brahma Gyana, the knowledge of Brahman is in the hands of the Divine Mother. Out of emotion speaking, out of devotion to Maa Sharada. Because Sri Ramakrishna was his Guru, so Maa Sharada is the wife of the Guru, so reverence to her. That is why he is saying the keys to Brahma Gyana are in her hands. Four, five thousand years before that, Vagamarini, she has said, Yam Kama Tam Tamugram Krnomi, I raise that one, the one who worships with any particular desire, I raise that one to the heights of excellence, to the everest of excellence. Whether you want to be an enlightened one, whether you want to be a Rishi, whether you want to be the greatest intellectual who ever lived, it comes from my blessings. It is true. I have seen it. Yes, even with the slightest bit of effort, but by the grace of the Divine Mother, immediately, something that we do not deserve at all, is entirely possible. That also you can get by yourself, by the grace of God again, but with enormous amount of effort and careful practice for maybe lifetimes. It can take time. Sri Ramakrishna said in Benares, which is the land of Vishwanatha, Shiva and Annapurna, the Divine Mother. So Annapurna is the one who gives food. So the language Sri Ramakrishna used is that no one goes hungry in the land of Annapurna. You will be fed, but some are fed in the morning, some in the afternoon, some in the late afternoon, some have to wait till evening. What is morning, afternoon, late afternoon, evening? It doesn't seem much. You have to wait. A little hungry you may be. This is the life, the day of the universe. At the beginning of creation, in the middle of creation where we are, and towards the dusk and darkness which comes at the end of the universe. One may have to wait many many lifetimes. I am reminded of this silly little joke I had read in Reader's Digest many many years ago. So this man, he prays to God and God appears before him. What do you want? This man is very clever. He says, I don't want much. Lord, you are infinite. You have everything. Like one penny of yours is equal to a billion dollars for us. All I want from you is one penny from your treasure house. Which is equal to billion dollars for me. That's all I want. That's easy for you, isn't it Lord? The Lord says, you are right. One penny is equal to your billion dollars. I will give it to you. Wait for one second. So how many lifetimes that will be. There was one devotee of the Holy Mother, very devoted person. He got initiation from the Holy Mother, Ma Sharda Devi. Long after she had passed on, he suffered a lot in his life. Many family problems, health problems, family problems, terrible stuff. But all throughout he maintained his peace of mind, devotion, with a serene heart he saw through all of that. He used to say that when I got initiation, Mother looked at me carefully and she said, she warned me. She said, Baba, my child, I see that you have a little suffering in your life. And she did this. This is the way the Bengali women speak. When they say little, they mean this. And he said, this is what is little suffering. If she had said, if you have a lot of suffering in your life, what would have happened? This little suffering, I am devastated by this. Then she goes on to say, again every verse starts with Aham. I, completely confident, established in our divinity. Aham rudraya dhanuratanomi brahma dviseh sarve hantavau. All the obstacles that come on the path of enlightenment, I remove them. I am proactive. I put the arrows on the bow of the mighty Rudra who destroys all the enemies of the spiritual seekers. That means every obstacle that comes in spiritual life, I am on your side. Never fear. Everything will be overcome and you will attain to God realization. I am the one. Look at the poetry. I fix the arrows on the bow of Rudra, the mighty Rudra, who takes aim at all the obstacles and the enemies of those who seek Brahman. So I do that. Then another interesting part, Aham janaya samadam krnomyaham dyavaprthivi a vivesa. It's like a war cry. I make war for the benefit of humanity, for the benefit of my children. I make war. I pervade the earth and the sky and I make war. This is interesting. Let's face it squarely. Throughout history, tribes have fought against other tribes. Cities and nation states have fought against other cities and nation states. And everyone has claimed God is on my side. And not only that, even further and even worse, I am fighting for the sake of God. I saw at Harvard University, there is a beautiful memorial church. So if you go in there, you see on one wall the names of all the alumni of Harvard who were killed in the First World War, Second World War. It's all written there. Ex-students. One whole wall is full of those names. You will see, interesting, some of them, I noticed carefully, they are German names. So they were German students who studied at Harvard, went back and fought on the German side against Americans. So it's written name so and so, within bracket, enemy. But still student, our student. But enemy! Now notice, the amazing confluence. It's so interesting. Church, university, war, religion, education, warfare. All coming together in such an amazing way. It's a fact. We cannot turn our eyes from it. That God has been invoked in the worst of human enterprises. A war. That's a wrong use of religion. That's an abuse of religion. But that spark is there. Still, it's also a fact that there is this spirit which comes forward to protect humanity in its worst times. When the forces of evil are strong and powerful. In the United States, here you say, the last good war was the Second World War, they say. And we don't have Bill here today. So we actually have a Second World War veteran, someone who fought in the last good war. What is this last good war? Where clearly the forces arrayed against you are detrimental to civilization. Detrimental to the universal order. And so she says, I make war for the protection of people. Janaya samadham krnomi. I engage in war for the protection of people. I pervade the earth and the skies. Latest concept of air-land battle, I think. Then, highest advaita, mamayo nirapsvantah samudre. She says, my womb is the vast ocean of sacchidananda. From which emerges the universe, in which plays the universe and disappears the universe back again. Ashtavakra sings, aham mayy anantam aham bodho vishwa vichy svabhavata, udetu vastamayatu name vriddhi na bhakshati. I am this infinite ocean of existence consciousness. In this ocean small waves come up. They are nothing but these entire universes which come up. Let the waves arise, let the waves subside. The ocean does not increase or decrease thereby. Similarly, she is saying, I am that infinite ocean of existence consciousness. The universe emerges like waves in me. So when the wave is coming up, isn't the wave still a part of the ocean? Certainly. Isn't the wave still in the water? Of course, it's nothing other than water. And when it disappears, where does it disappear to? Water again. So the commentator, Mahanama Vrata Brahmachari, he writes very touchingly, what does this mean? This means we are forever on the lap of the mother. It's not that we have come from the mother, now we are distant from the mother. One day, God knows where we are going. No, we have come from the mother. We are forever on the lap of the mother. And at death we go back to the mother in the individual sense and in the sense of the entire cosmos. The cosmos lies in the lap of the mother. That is the meaning of this. In me, the infinite consciousness, the universe floats. Then the conclusion. Soaring, what poetry? It's really moving: Ahameva vata iva pravamyarabhamana bhuvanani visva At the beginning of the universe, she says: arabhamana bhuvanani visva ,when the worlds were created, I blew through that like a breeze. Blew through that like a breeze. Much later, in the Taitiri Upanishad it is said, Tatsrishtva Tadevanu Pravisat, having created that, I entered into it. What does that mean? It's like, imagine the waves coming up and the water says, having created the waves, I enter into it. Which means, the waves are nothing but me. The universe is nothing but me. I sustain all the universe by giving it existence. Sat, existence. By giving it light, awareness, chit and giving it meaning, ananda. All existence, life and death is sat. All knowledge, awareness, experience is chit. All meaning and love and seeking and purpose is ananda. And how she is expressing it, she says, as a breeze I blew through the universe at its beginning. Investing it with existence and light and meaning. And then she says, even more stunning, the conclusion is stunning. This entire universe comes from me, exists in my lap and disappears into me. I have invested it with existence, light and meaning. It is nothing to me. She says, I transcend it completely. She says: paro diva parayena. Beyond this is the transcendent sky of existence, consciousness, bliss which is my real form. And I pervade this universe also. Swami Vivekananda said, we Hindus worship a transcendent, imminent God. Satchidananda Brahman which is entirely beyond this universe, beyond time, space and causation, beyond maya is the reality. In Vedanta Sahasrara, the first thing we learn, vastu satchidananda madhvayam brahma. The reality is existence, consciousness, bliss, non-dual Brahman. Ajnanadi sakala jarasa muha avastu. From ignorance downwards, from maya downwards, everything else is an appearance. She is saying this here. And yet she says, whatever else you see in the universe, that also is I. I transcend it all and yet I am in and through all of it. Just yesterday I was seeing, a very nice article has come out. Einstein believed in Spinoza's God. But what is this Spinoza's God? And the description is something pretty close to this. What Spinoza was struggling to say, see God cannot be entirely transcendent. He was struggling in the orthodox Jewish interpretation at that time. So God is beyond all of this. And it has to be. If God is not beyond all of this, then God is limited and imperfect and terrible. So God has to be perfect. Perfect means you have to save God from this mess. So God is beyond this. Yes, this is a mess. Born, birth, messy. Life is messy. Death is even worse. There is so much evil and suffering in this world. If this is God, it is not a particularly good God. It is a miserable God. So God has to be transcendent. But then that creates terrible problems. What is the problem? The problem is that then you have two realities, God and this world. A perfect God somewhere, we have no idea where, when, how because it is beyond all where, beyond all when, beyond all how. Time, space, causation, beyond all that. Desha, kala, vastu, pariccheta, sunya in Sanskrit. Beyond the limitation of space, time and causation and object. And then you have this imperfect universe. This is the reality which we are experiencing right now. You have two. What is the problem? The problem is that God you are talking about becomes strictly limited. It becomes too small. Why? Because there is something that God is not. The moment you say that you admit the existence of a second reality apart from God, to that extent God becomes less. This is the problem with all the dualistic, theistic religions of the world. That God is something else. Immediately you are saying God is not God. That God is not worth worshipping. It's a limited entity. Worse, the moment you divorce God from this universe, then God exists only as a matter of speculation and belief. You have no more doors to the divinity anymore. By looking at this universe, all theologians for thousand years, Christian theologians, Islamic theologians, the dualistic Hindu theologians, they have been desperately trying to prove God. Look at this universe by design, by the first cause argument, this and that. Modern science laughs at all of that. Every one of your arguments can be refuted or at least diffused by modern science. This amazing diversity of life, there must be an intelligence behind it. Darwinian evolution tells you, modern neo-Darwinians will tell you, we can demonstrate through computer models and all, how just by the force of evolution, survival of the fittest, random mutation, genetic mutation, you can have this tremendous diversity of life. You don't need some kind of intelligence to explain all this. Just the existence of the universe, there must be a first cause. Yes, the first cause can be explained by or at least hinted at by quantum mechanics, as so called emergence of quantum, before the big bang, particles emerging, matter, antimatter disappearing, some of it emerges and does not disappear back again and emerges into a full-fledged universe. I am quoting Mishio Kaku here, the God equation. You can explain it. No God in the process at all. You cannot really seriously argue from just this material universe to God, not today in 21st century. It doesn't work. Those old proofs, they are very interesting proofs of the existence of God, but they are not convincing. They are rather underwhelming, not overwhelming. You cannot argue from this. Then what happens? That God of belief, the God of speculation, the theistic, dualistic, other God becomes very weak. Alan Watts says, when you have a pot, clay pot, then you are told that there is a cause of this clay pot. It's called clay. There is something called clay which is the cause of this clay pot. Something called God which is the cause of this universe. Now if you look for the clay other than the clay pot, other than the pot if you are looking for clay, other than this universe if you are looking for a cause outside, other than the pot if you are looking for the clay, Alan Watts calls it the crack pot idea. He says, you go one step forward and say that which is the cause of this universe, that which is the reality of this universe is right here and now. It is imminent in this universe, but because it's also transcendent, it can be perfect, it can be eternal, it can be beyond all good and evil cause and effect and yet be the substance or the reality of this universe, the ground of this universe. Mystics in all the world religions came to this understanding. It's only in Advaita Vedanta and arguably in some forms of Mahayana Buddhism that a whole framework developed. It became mainstream. Non-dualism became mainstream. So non-dualism, at the core of the idea of non-dualism that there is only one reality without a second, even when everything else is appearing, even then there is only one non-dual reality. At the core of that idea is the transcendent, imminent God. Long before the dialectics of Advaita Siddhi and Khandana Khandaka, the extraordinary difficult text of Advaita Vedanta, long before them, long before Shankaracharya, who wrote the commentaries on the Upanishads, Gaudapada who proved non-causality, Ajatavada, the theory of the non-origination of the universe. Long before them, the Brahma Sutras, long before that, the Upanishads who declared these truths, millennia before that, is the voice of this lady who is saying the ultimate reality is transcendent and imminent. How do you know? I am that reality. She has no qualms about saying it. But as you are also, I know it, you do not know it. That's the difference. Paro diva paro ena, I am in the transcendent world. Oh so you are completely different from this world. And she says, prthivyeitavati mahina sam vabhuva, and in and through this entire world of the heaven and the earth, I pervade all of that and remain established in my own glory. That is the reality of Vagambhrini, that Rishi whom we salute today, who appears in the form of the Divine Mother Durga, who is the light in all of us, who has given us the highest knowledge, who is at the foundation of religion, the foundation of civilization, the entire human project, the foundation of this universe, and the ultimate highest teaching of how you can realize that truth and go beyond suffering, go beyond death. Realize the destiny of human life. So salutations to her on this occasion when we are beginning the worship of the Divine Mother. Can we have that chorus once again? It is good to end with that beautiful chorus. Now we know the background. Let's listen to it once again. Om aham rdrevirvvasuviscaramyahamadityeirta visvadeveih Aham, Aham, Mitravarunobha, Vibharmaham, Indragni, Aham Asinobhaya, Aham, Aham, Somamaham, Vibharmyaham, Tvastaramuta pusharam, Bhagam, Aham, Dadhmi dravinam, Havismate, Suprabhya, Yajamanaya, Sunvate, Aham, Rashtri, Chandamani, Vasuna, Jititushi Prathama, Yajina namatam, Ma deva vyadhuh, Purutra, Purita, Prabhurya, Vesayanti, May so, annamatti, Yo Vipasyati, Yah Praniti, Ya Im, Shronoti, Yukam, Amantavomanta, Upaksiyanti, Shrudhi, Srutam Sraddhivam, Te Vadami, Ahameva, svayamidam Vadami, Justam, Devebhirta, Manusebhih, Yam Kamaye, tam Tamugram, Krnomi, Tam Brahmanam Tamrsim tam sumedham Aham, Rudraye, Dhanuratanoomi Brahmadvise sarave hanta va u Aham, janaye, samadam Krnomyaham, Dyavaprthivi Avivesaa Aham, Suve Pitaramasya Murdhana mama Yoni Rapsvantah samudre Tato Vitishthe Bhuvananu Visvotamum dyam varsmanopa sprsami Ahameva vata iva Pravamya Rabhamana Bhuvanani Visva Paro diva para Ena prthivyai , Tavati Mahina Sambabhuva On this occasion, I pray to the Divine Mother Durga, to Sri Ramakrishna, to Ma Sharda Devi, to Swami Vivekananda for their blessings, this auspicious Devi Paksha. May our lives be blessed. May we attain to the highest goal of human life, which is enlightenment and freedom in this very life itself. Om Shanti Shanti Shantihi, Hari Om Tat Sat Sri Ramakrishnarpamastu
