Lesson 340 – Dancing with Śiva

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Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

How Do Hindus Understand Moksha?

ŚLOKA 30
The destiny of all souls is moksha, liberation from rebirth on the physical plane. Our soul then continues evolving in the Antarloka and Śivaloka, and finally merges with Śiva like water returning to the sea. Aum Namaḥ Śivāya.

BHĀSHYA
Moksha comes when earthly kar­­ma has been resolved, dhar­ma well per­formed and God fully realized. Each soul must have performed well through many lives the varṇa dharmas, or four castes, and lived through life’s varied experiences in ­order to not be pulled back to physical birth by a deed left un­done. All souls are destined to achieve moksha, but not necessarily in this life. Hindus know this and do not delude themselves that this life is the last. While seeking and attaining profound re­aliz­ations, they know there is much to be done in fulfilling life’s other goals (purush­ār­thas): dharma, righteousness; artha, wealth; and kāma, pleasure. Old souls re­nounce worldly ambitions and take up sannyāsa in quest of Par­aśiva, even at a young age. Toward life’s end, all Hin­dus strive for Self Re­al­iz­ation, the gateway to liberation. After moksha, subtle kar­mas are made in in­ner realms and swiftly resolved, like writing on water. At the end of each soul’s evolution comes viś­vagrāsa, total ab­sorp­tion in Śiva. The Vedas say, “If here one is able to re­­alize Him before the death of the body, he will be lib­er­at­­­ed from the bondage of the world.” Aum Namaḥ Śivāya.

Lesson 340 – Living with Śiva 

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Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

Neglecting The First Duty

What happens to a child who receives such contradictory training? He doesn’t know whom or what to believe. He pulls away from the Christian religion he learned at school. He pulls away from the Śaivite religion he learned at home. He grows up without a religion. He does not have the good Catholic fathers to turn to; nor can he turn to his parents’ religion when in need of spiritual advice, for Śaivism has been discredited in his mind. He is thus denied a religion in this life. As one Catholic Father confided, “The Hindu children in our school may never become Catholics, but they also will never be good Hindus.” The child who once attended home pūjā with joy and respected the visiting swāmī no longer shows him praṇāmas, resists pūjā time, challenges parental decisions and slowly takes over the home, relegating the parents to second-class citizenship within it. All in the home are consigned to dance around the contrary feelings of such children in order to avoid their threats of unchaperoned dating, leaving home, even suicide. As a result, these spiritual orphans are growing up without a religion and turning to drugs, turning to crime, turning to existentialism and Western rationalism, even terrorism, for some semblance of security, turning to divorce and even suicide in increasing numbers when life becomes difficult to face. Their lack of religious life is creating a very serious karma, taking them into the consciousness of the seven lower worlds. This karma is the responsibility of our Śaivite community, of each and every one of us. We will all reap the bad karma generated by our neglect.

Those who have been educated in Christian schools have little respect for the swāmīs, pandits and gurus of Śaivism. They don’t respect the sanctity of our temples. They may go into a temple to fulfill the social customs, but in their hearts they don’t believe that the Gods live in the temple, because they have been told in school that the stone Deities are just stones, that pūjās are just primitive rituals. You love your children and you should not sacrifice their minds for an education, for a little money. That money will be ill-gotten, for you played the Christians for fools in order to get it. Do the Christians believe our beliefs? No. Do the Jews? No. Do the Muslims? No. They do not believe a single one of our central beliefs, which are karma, reincarnation, the existence of God everywhere, the absence of an eternal hell and the assurance that every soul, without exception, will attain liberation.

All religions are not the same. They are not equal. They have different spiritual goals and, therefore, different attainments reached by their followers. We must not forget this, especially these days when it is fashionable to ignore the differences and to claim that all religions are one. We must not be taken in by those who make such claims. The religions of the world are all great, but they are not all the same. Their beliefs are different, and since beliefs create attitudes, they hold different attitudes toward life and death, and toward the soul and God, too. Our collective beliefs create our collective attitudes and thus perpetuate the culture.

Yes, we have but one duty to perform: to pass our religion on to the next generation, the next, the next and the next. How is this done? Through Śaivite education, building more schools. We must educate our youth well. The alternative is to allow Śaivism to be conquered by atheism, to be conquered by Christianity, to be conquered by Islam, to be conquered by existentialism and Western rationalism, materialism and secular humanism, and to be conquered by the liberal neo-Indian postulations which seek to cut the roots of tradition. Our only hope lies in educating the children, the young minds which are open and eager to learn, but which are being enticed away from their heritage. Hold them close, protect them, love them dearly and give them the treasures of Śaivism. That is the greatest gift you can offer them. Everything else will perish. Everything else will decay.

You can remember this next time a Christian missionary comes to your door. Welcome him with “Namaste.” Tell him or her, “We are Hindus. We have a catechism of our own. We have a creed and an affirmation of faith in our religion, too. We have our scriptures, our Holy Bible of the Śaivite Hindu Religion. We have religious leaders and institutions, and a tradition that is vastly more ancient than any other. We have our holy temples and our great Gods. We are proud to be Śaivites. We are proud to worship God Śiva and the Gods. We have all this and more. Thank you very much.” And then close the door!

NANDINATHA SŪTRA 340: QUALIFICATION TO PERFORM TEMPLE PŪJĀ
All my Śaiva monastics who qualify may perform the parārtha pūjā in their temples. Should they not renew their vows or be dismissed, they are prohibited to perform or teach this pūjā thenceforth. Aum Namaḥ Śivāya.

Lesson 340 – Merging with Śiva 

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Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

Distractions And Sidepaths

In the ākāśa, he would be able to go into all sorts of psychic phenomena. We don’t want that. We don’t want to utilize the ākāśa in that way, because then we cause the growth of gross matter in the subconscious mind, which is capable of imprinting into the ākāśa things that we want to happen. Then we could go in the ākāśa and see them. We will see those forms change shape from what we have, from our own subconscious, imprinted in the subconscious. Then, through the power of the light, it takes form in the ākāśa, and we can have a little world of our own going around on the inside, and that is called psychism or occultism. We don’t want that. Nor do we want to tune in with anybody else who is also in the ākāśa, because that leads us away from the purity of yoga.

Now, for instance, if I were in the ākāśa and two other adepts were in the ākāśa, then we could tune in with one another, and I might even see their faces in the ākāśa. We would guard against this, because that would be allowing the superconscious mind to take form. When the superconscious mind takes form, then that means the consciousness is lowered and we are being led away from our goal, and the next thing we knew we would come through the subconscious back to the conscious mind. We want to avoid this. We don’t want to come through the subconscious to the conscious mind. From samādhi, we want to come directly from the superconscious into the conscious. So, we avoid all form and colors that we might see in the ākāśa.

When the sannyāsin arrives at that state, the next lesson will occur. He will be in a pure state of consciousness, pure bliss. It will appear to him as spaceless. He will be having a feeling of timelessness, a feeling of formlessness, but it is not the Self. It is taken as the Self, but it is not the Self, for it still has consciousness. In summary, we have discovered how to come out of darkness into light in the practice of samādhi, and how to go through two different stages of light into a realm of pure consciousness which we call the ākāśa.

As we have previously studied, there are seven different states in the superconscious mind, seven different states and usages. The very first is the light. And the pure consciousness state that we just discussed is the seventh state. All the others we want to avoid. It is not that it wouldn’t be possible to get into them and develop them, but we want to definitely avoid them, because they are, shall we say, deterrents to the purities in the Self. So, we shall avoid them by going from basic inner light to a more intense light and popping out into a pure state of consciousness. The sannyāsin will still have an overall consciousness of the physical body. As a matter of fact, when he is looking down at the physical body, it might just appear like a shadow to him. It is not advisable for him to look down at the physical body in consciousness, for that will lead him down into the sixth or fifth plane of consciousness, and we don’t want to be there in the superconscious. Then other things will intervene, and he won’t achieve the samādhi. He will have to come out and start over again. So, these investigations we want to avoid, because they are not necessary, ever, though they are not impossible. When he is in his pure state of consciousness, then he has to look for the continuation of the kuṇḍalinī force or, shall we say, the continuation of the nerve currents that house the kuṇḍalinī force. In conscious-mind terms, that will look like a tube or a nerve current which would be issued right from the top of the head.

In this state of pure consciousness, like in outer space, he tries to find just one nerve current right at the top of the head. When he finds this nerve current at the top of the head, he is taught to concentrate on it from where it begins at the top of the head right up to the end of it, and soon he finds the end of it. The experience of experiences. Of course if he has a mishmash in his subconscious mind, he won’t be able to hold this pure state of consciousness. The subconscious mind in its power and intensity of this contemplation will begin picking up, and he will be coming right back into outer consciousness. But if his subconscious is fairly clean and under control, then he will be able to hold it, and he will hold it quite naturally. It will be a natural state to him after Self Realization.

So, then the next thing to do is to find this nerve current. In conscious-mind terms, it may be about one-half inch in diameter. In superconscious-mind terms, it may be eleven feet in diameter, because the superconscious mind can magnify or it can diminish. It has that power almost at will. He must try to find the center of this nerve current, and then he comes into the core of this ākāśa, the very atomic structure that makes it up.

Lesson 339 – Dancing with Śiva

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Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

Why Are We Not Omniscient Like Śiva?

ŚLOKA 29
The three bonds of āṇava, karma and māyā veil our sight. This is Śiva’s purposeful limiting of awareness which allows us to evolve. In the superconscious depths of our soul, we share God Śiva’s all-knowingness. Aum.

BHĀSHYA
Just as children are kept from knowing all about adult life until they have matured into understanding, so too is the soul’s knowledge limited. We learn what we need to know, and we understand what we have experienced. Only this narrowing of our awareness, coupled with a sense of individualized ego, allows us to look upon the world and our part in it from a practical, human point of view. Pāśa is the soul’s triple bondage: māyā, karma and āṇava. Without the world of māyā, the soul could not evolve through experience. Karma is the law of cause and effect, action and reaction governing māyā. Āṇava is the individuating veil of duality, source of ignorance and finitude. Māyā is the classroom, karma the teacher, and āṇava the student’s ignorance. The three bonds, or malas, are given by Lord Śiva to help and protect us as we unfold. Yet, God Śiva’s all-knowingness may be experienced for brief periods by the meditator who turns within to his own essence. The Tirumantiram explains, “When the soul attains Self-knowledge, then it becomes one with Śiva. The malas perish, birth’s cycle ends and the lustrous light of wisdom dawns.” Aum Namaḥ Śivāya.

Lesson 339 – Living with Śiva

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Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

Contradictory Teachings

We know from modern psychology how important early impressions are. The first impressions that go into the minds of young people mold and influence their entire life. While a child is learning history in a Catholic school, learning geometry, learning mathematics, he is also being taught the teachings of the Catholic Church. The teachings of the Catholic Church are not the Śaiva Dharma. They are drastically different, in some ways even opposite, from the Śaiva Dharma. What has happened? In order to gain an education for their children so they can grow up and earn money, so they can compete with their peers in the West, the parents have sacrificed the soul of the child and prepared him for a poor birth in his next life.

It happens in this way. The child goes to school each day and listens to the teachings of the Catholics about God and Jesus and Mary. He learns from the Catholic Catechism that the soul goes to heaven or to hell after one birth on this Earth, that those who do not accept Jesus as their savior suffer eternally in hell, where the physical body burns forever without being consumed, that one must not worship idols, that other religions are not God’s true path.

Then the child returns home, and his parents try to undo these impressions by telling him that there is no eternal hell and no original sin, that non-Christians do not suffer in hell, that Śiva is a God of love, that karma does exist and souls do incarnate many, many times upon the Earth. This young mind, not having matured into reason as yet, simply becomes confused. At school he hears that his parents just don’t understand, and he should therefore not listen to them about religious matters. At home his parents tell him that in certain matters he should not listen to the nuns, should not believe the good fathers, that Śaivism is his religion, and is a wonderful religion, that it is all right to wear holy ash. Imagine a child who goes to school and is taught all day, six or eight hours a day, that he should believe the Catholic beliefs. He is taught that there is no reincarnation, that there is no karma, that Hinduism is a pagan religion, that the Catholic religion is the only true religion in the world, that his parents are wrong, that his forefathers were wrong, that the ṛishis and satgurus are also wrong. And then, for an hour or so at night, if he is lucky, the parents teach that the Catholic Church is wrong, that he should go there only for the secular education, that he should disregard all the other instruction, not listen to the holy fathers and nuns but ignore them when they talk about their religion.

A true story was related to me by Pundit K.N. Navaratnam, Jyotisha Shastri, a close devotee of my satguru. “As a young boy growing up in Jaffna, I received my primary school education in a Christian school. The teacher impressed upon me in religious classes that the Hindu Gods were all evil devils. We were told when passing the Hindu temples to spit and swear at these evil images. Many times I followed my teacher’s instructions and indeed did these inappropriate deeds—until one day I spat at an image of Lord Gaṇeśa and immediately fell to the ground and suffered a serious head wound. My cousin was studying in a Catholic convent with many other students who were born as Hindus. Every morning they were taken to the church for prayers. On the way the students passed a Hindu temple where they were told to spit and swear in the direction of the temple. This was a cruel and dishonest attempt at conversion to a different faith.”

NANDINATHA SŪTRA 339: THE PROBLEMS OF TODAY END TODAY
All Śiva’s monastics treasure harmony as their way of life. They stop work, attend to and resolve before sleep any inharmonious conditions that may arise, knowing that creativity lies dormant while conflict prevails. Aum.

Lesson 339 – Merging with Śiva

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Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

Finding the Light’s Center

After his first nirvikalpa samādhi, the renunciate’s concentration and his practice of concentration should be easier. His first step in practicing samādhi would be to concentrate upon one physical object, that is if he cannot see his inner light. And if his mind is confused, he won’t be able to see the inner light, like before he went into his first samādhi. Only after he has gone into samādhi many, many, many times, where his whole body becomes filled with light, will he then see his inner light all the time, twenty-four hours a day. But at first he won’t. He will have his first breakthrough, but he won’t see the light all the time.

If he doesn’t see the inner light, he must concentrate, get his mind quiet, write down his confessions and understand the different experiences he has gone through, in the very same way he has been taught in his beginning study. Then, finally, when his inner light—which he will soon begin to find right at the top of the head—comes into prominence, he must turn his concentration onto that. And, with enough mind power, he should be able to hold that inner light, a very bright white light looking just like a star, right at the top of the head. This will give him figures and conscious-mind forms, about three inches in diameter, and then he would concentrate the light into a three-inch diameter. He may not always know where the center is, especially if he has been involved in his Śaiva seva. If that is so, he should press the top of his head with his finger, and that will indicate to him where the center of that light should be. This will immediately center his awareness in the center of the light. Then he tries to part it, tries to open it up like a camera lens, and comes into brilliant, very brilliant, light. It will just be scintillating, much brighter than a star. It will be like a carbon-arc light. This is very brilliant and very powerful. The renunciate is then schooled in how to hold that to a three-inch diameter, because the tendency will be for that light to fill up his whole head. He will feel very blissful. We don’t want that to happen. We don’t want the emotions or the lower mind to get out of control simply because he found a bright light in his head.

He has seen other seekers, as they were just awakening in the inner light, get so carried away about the inner light that it throws them into an emotional state and they can get fanatical about it. It doesn’t give them any inner wisdom or anything like that. So, remembering this, the wise sannyāsin will not allow himself to get emotional about the inner light, because seeing this light indicates that he is only beginning to come into his superconscious. The light, really, is the friction of the superconscious mind against the conscious and subconscious mind. In my way of looking at it, it is an electrical friction. The odic forces and the actinic forces merging causes light and sound.

So, when he sees this brilliant light right in his head—more brilliant than he has ever seen, intensified brilliance—he tries to find the center of it. When he finds the center of it, again trying to open up that light like a camera lens, he will then come into a state of consciousness called Satchidānanda, a state of pure consciousness, a state of pure bliss, savikalpa samādhi. Here he won’t be in a brilliant light anymore. Above him it will look like he is looking way up in the sky, into outer space, and the color of it will be a whitish blue. That will be the ākāśa he will be in.

Lesson 338 – Dancing with Śiva 

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Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

How Is Our Soul Identical with Śiva?

ŚLOKA 28
The essence of our soul, which was never created, is immanent love and transcendent reality and is identical and eternally one with God Śiva. At the core of our being, we already are That—perfect at this very moment. Aum.

BHĀSHYA
At the core of the subtle soul body is Parāśakti, or Sat­chid­ānanda, im­manent love; and at the core of that is Paraśiva, transcendent reality. At this depth of our being there exists no separate identity or difference—all are One. Thus, deep with­in our soul we are identical with God now and forever. These two divine perfections are not as­­pects of the evolving soul, but the nucleus of the soul which does not change or evolve. From an absolute perspective, our soul is already in nondual union with God, but to be realized to be known. We are That. We do not become That. Deep within this physical body, with its turbulent emotions and getting-educated mind, is pure perfection identical to Śiva’s own perfections of Parāśakti and Paraśiva. In this sacred mystery we find the paradoxes of oneness and twoness, of being and becoming, of created and uncreated existence subtly delineated. Yea, in the depth of our being, we are as He is. The Vedas explain, “The one control­ler, the inner Self of all things, who makes His one form manifold, to the wise who perceive Him as abiding in the soul, to them is eternal bliss—to no others.” Aum Namaḥ Śivāya.

Lesson 338 – Living with Śiva

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Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

The First 24 Years

There are no more mahārājas to defend the Śaiva Dharma for the people, and therefore the people themselves have taken up the scepter. Together they have to work to preserve and publish scriptures. Together they have to found Śaivite schools and universities in which the knowledge of their forefathers will be safeguarded and disseminated. It is not enough to be born into a Śaivite home. Education and training are now more essential than ever before if Śaiva souls being born today are to grow up into the fullness of the Śaiva Samayam.

In our efforts to preserve Śaivism, we have but one paramount duty to perform, and that is to pass Śaivism on to the next generation. How do we do this? By capturing and holding the minds of our youth for their first twenty-four years, holding them close, as was done in the traditional gurukula, exposing them to a broad yet specific knowledge and immersing them in the most wonderful impressions of our great religion. Children during the brahmacharya āśrama, we could say, are on the kuṭumba mārga, the stage of being trained by their parents, of being educated, of developing into useful members of society. After age twenty-four, they can be freely released with the confidence that they will contend well in a demanding world, that they will always have their faith to guide and strengthen them when karmas become intense or alien influences encroach.

We of the older generation are already set in our ways. Our patterns were established years ago when early impressions impregnated and influenced our minds. We can still learn, we can study, but our formative years are largely past. It is now the children who must be thought of, for they will be here when we pass away. We can devise ways to let them benefit from our experience, good and bad. To do this, we must hold them firmly for twenty-four years as they go through two natural twelve-year cycles of life, impressing on them the intricacies of the Śaiva Samayam before they are exposed to any alien faith or belief. Having done that, our duty is complete, and we can rest assured that Śaivism will be perpetuated by our children, by our children’s children and on into the future of the world, on into the new age of space.

However, it must be said, and said boldly, that not all Śaivites are performing this important duty. Rather than becoming the first gurus, as mother and father, as is traditional, they send the youth off to school, away from home, without chaperoning, and make the world his guru. From there he falls naturally into āṇava mārga, the path of being his own person, looking out for “number one.”

If we fail and let a single generation slip by, the entire religion will be threatened. It only takes one generation to let our religion begin a fall into disuse. I gave this message on Śaivite education to over 300,000 devotees during a 1981 tour of Sri Lanka and India. It was an important message at the time, well received, and today is no less relevant. I pointed out in no uncertain terms that for many decades Hindus have been sending their children to Catholic schools. They do this because the Catholics run very fine educational institutions and programs throughout India and Sri Lanka and elsewhere, and each family naturally wants its children to have the best education. The children do get a good discipline and education, but it is a Catholic education, an education ultimately designed to bring young boys and girls into the Catholic religion, designed to persuade them of the Christian view of life, of the Christian view of God and salvation, and of all the Christian beliefs.

Hindu parents should not send their children to Christian missionary schools, nor to schools founded in the name of any other religion who seek to influence them, even in subtle ways, such as through symbols and peer missionaries who chide and taunt Hindu children about their culture, their beliefs, their dress or their symbols. These schools have a detrimental effect on the subconscious minds of the children, steadily turning them away from Hindu beliefs. When they slowly absorb the attitudes of another faith, slowly their belief structure is altered, and gradually their actions at home reflect this change.

NANDINATHA SŪTRA 338: THEIR LIKES ARE THEIR DISLIKES
All Śiva’s monastics firmly uphold the spirit of nonownership, never adopting the householder attitudes of claiming their own space, timing, tools, friends, ambitions, likes and dislikes. Yea, they are unattached. Aum.

Lesson 338 – Merging with Śiva

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Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

Bringing Others Into Realization

The lesson I want to point out is that once the soul has realized the Self, it is now on the road to realizing it again, and realizing it again and again. It is just as simple as that, and the warning that I would give is: do not become fascinated in the aftermath of any experience of the Self—so that the inner mind is always reaching for the highest samādhi, not being intrigued with the superconscious that is after samādhi. When one is intrigued with the superconsciousness after samādhi, this builds up the forces, not only of the mind but all the psychic forces, and brings the maṭhavāsi into a realm of occultism. This is something to guard against, because when he is intrigued with the aftermath, with the possibilities and the ramifications of the mind, this will eventually lead him around and around in circles, because the mind can offer nothing other than ramifications. In the beginning teachings, all devotees learn that the mind created itself, created itself and created itself. Well, even the superconscious mind does this.

What must be really sought after, in order for one as a Self-Realized person to fulfill his destiny of bringing others into Self Realization, is a pure samādhi which will keep the pure teachings of advaita yoga alive on the Earth through the sannyāsins. Everything on Earth comes through people. Everything of advanced knowledge has come through people. Self Realization is the pure teachings of yoga attained on the Earth through people who talk, breathe, live just like the Self-Realized soul does.

If he goes into nirvikalpa samādhi and becomes ramified in the psychic powers that come after samādhi, after his first samādhi, his second samādhi, his third samādhi, he will become more intense and will realize new possibilities within himself. If he remains on those planes of the phenomena of the occultism of the mind, then he gains new and fascinating powers of the mechanism of the mind, but he loses the power to bring others along the path into samādhi. If the renunciate maintains a clean samādhi and comes back into the mind, he realizes he has had some extrasensory perceptions, and he does not use them. He does not use them at all unless, of course, he uses them quite naturally, just as naturally as he would enjoy a meal, but he does not dwell on supernatural powers as anything special. He is at every point in time just who he is.

What the renunciate is taught to dwell on would be the next time and the next time he would be going into samādhi. Then he awakens a strong current within himself that can bring others into samādhi. By dropping off unessential powers, he gains one great power. That is the one great power that those who have realized the Self want, the power to bring others into Self Realization. You can only do that by having first attained a pure Self Realization yourself and going into samādhi again and again and again. Remember, the sannyāsin’s destiny is this: having realized the Self, bring others into the pure realization of the Self, and teach other sannyāsins to go into samādhi and come out with a well-balanced mind, without deviating one way or another on the psychic planes.

Lesson 337 – Dancing with Śiva

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Recording: Gurudeva’s cloned voice

How is our soul different from Śiva?

ŚLOKA 27
Our soul body was created in the image and likeness of the Primal Soul, God Śiva, but it differs from the Primal Soul in that it is immature. While Śiva is unevolutionary perfection, we are in the process of evolving. Aum.

BHĀSHYA
To understand the mysteries of the soul, we distinguish be­tween the soul body and its essence. As a soul body, we are indi­vidual and unique, different from all others, a self-effulgent being of light which evolves and matures through an evolutionary pro­cess. This soul body is of the nature of God Śiva, but is different from Śiva in that it is less resplendent than the Primal Soul and still evolving, while God is unevolutionary perfection. We may liken the soul body to an acorn, which contains the mighty oak tree but is a small seed yet to develop. The soul body ma­tures through experience, evolving through many lives in­­­to the splendor of God Śiva, ultimately realizing Śiva totally in nirvikalpa samādhi. Even after Self Realization is at­tained, the soul body continues to evolve in this and other worlds un­til it merges with the Primal Soul, as a drop of water merges with its source, the ocean. Yea, this is the destiny of all souls without exception. The Vedas say, “As oil in sesame seeds, as butter in cream, as wa­ter in river beds, as fire in friction sticks, so is the ātman grasped in one’s own self when one searches for Him with truthfulness and austerity.” Aum Namaḥ Śivāya.