Esoterics of Worship and Psychic Exploration.
Author: Satguru Bodhinatha Veylanswami
Description: Gurudeva was able to see the three worlds connecting in the temple. Puja and worship enables the beings in the inner worlds to send their blessings, help and support. Offerings and chanting provide energy the Deities can return in blessing us. Bhashya on Gurudeva's original writings on the Sixth Dimension. Overcome identification with personality; identify with awareness which has never changed.
Transcription:
Good Morning.
For our Master Course Lesson of the day, today I believe is the last lesson in "Merging With Siva," Lesson 20, "The Esoterics of Worship." So, it's a very important area, esoterics of worship, something Gurudeva was very talented at. So what does esoterics of worship mean? Well it means what's going on in the inner worlds, what's going on in a subtle way in the temple when we worship. In other words, we know what's going on in an obvious way. This morning we did a homa, we did certain chants; that was our external worship. But what went on inwardly. How did the fire hook us up with the internal worlds? When we do a puja again we know what's external, we do our puja, we do our abhishekam and we can see all of that, but what hooks us up with the inner worlds and how blessings are received are what's being referred to as the esoterics of worship. And as I mentioned, Gurudeva, certainly an expert in it, meaning he could see what was going on in ways that perhaps no one else, or at least very few people, have in recent years, have been able to see and document and describe.
So, of course, the story we all know is the founding of the temple here was based upon a vision of Lord Murugan. Gurudeva was wondering where to put the murthi. The bronze murthi had arrived and this structure wasn't here at the time and in fact, what's behind me used to be the front door of the building as most of you know. And so murthi arrived and Gurudeva was wondering where to put it, where to create a temple on the property. And so that night he had a dream of Lord Murugan and Lord Murugan indicated this particular spot in that dream's last vision and so that's why the Nataraja is there and also why this building has no front door. God took over the front door. So we go around the side like dutiful servants and go in the servant's entrance. God stands at the front door.
So esoterics, the way Gurudeva liked to explain it is the three worlds: The physical world where physical beings reside, the second world or Antarloka where the devas, (called angels in other religions), reside and then the third world where God and the Gods themselves and great beings, great gurus reside in the third or Sivaloka. And so Gurudeva was able to see these three worlds connecting in the temple in a very dynamic way and did many writings about them. And I think the one that, one of the ones that I remember clearly, cause it was so useful I thought, was the inner worlds are always hooked up to the temple but it's the ceremony which creates an even tighter relationship and enables the beings in the Antarloka and the Sivaloka to really send their blessings and help and support to those who are attending the puja in the temple. And I think the writing says, you know: "It's when the bell is being rung loudly and the flame is held high" in other words, the major high point of the puja when the most blessings come and the Deity is able to really bless in a dynamic way all those who are present.
But one of the ideas here in today's lesson, I'll read the paragraph.
"When you worship the God in the temple through puja and ceremony, you are bringing that Divinity out of the microcosm and into this macrocosm. You supply the energy through your worship and your devotion, through your thought forms and even your physical aura. The pujari purifies and magnetizes the stone image for this to take place. The Gods and the devas are also magnetizing the stone image with their energy and finally the moment is ready and they can come out of the microcosm into this macrocosm and bless the people. You observe that they stayed only for an instant, but to them it was a longer time. The time sense in the inner worlds is different."
So Gurudeva's talking about energy; you supply the energy. So energy is an important part of worship. And so that as Gurudeva points out the pujari's energy himself, as well as what's offered; that's why we offer flowers and cut fruit or cooked food because it's providing energy, energy that the Deity can use in blessing us. It's helping the Deity in the Sivaloka be able to contact us by providing energy or an intermediate substance and that enables blessings to more effectively reach and penetrate us.
So this morning, for example, before we end, we offer the fruit and the flowers into the homa. More energy! Just like we would in the puja, food and flowers, it's given right before the final blessing. So we're giving energy through the food and flowers and giving energy through chanting Aum Namah Sivaya and through making offerings. And then, after we've given energy, we ask for the blessings to come back. Very interesting phenomena. And it works. So, it's the balancing factor that, which is just because they're there and they're blessing us, we don't want to get that involved in the process. So, that relates to what's coming up.
So the realm of the deities in our Shum language structure is called the sixth dimension. So this is a writing on the sixth dimension.
"The superconscious plane of the sixth dimension is situated at the third eye or ajna chakra."
So, Gurudeva means that where you see it from, not that it's actually just sitting there. It's not physically sitting there but rather that's the faculty, the chakra, or the ability to look is there. So from this point we can see the sixth dimension.
"The great saints and sages venerated by men have lived fully and consciously in this rarified mind strata. The beautiful actinic body of light, that pure inner body exists in the sixth dimension. There are people who once lived in physical bodies and who now live totally in the sixth dimension. It is possible to live without a physical body in this dimension and to still be fully conscious. One lives in his inner body. Temple Deities are sixth dimensional beings. When we visit temples and praise or pray to saints, devas or deities of great spiritual power who watch over a certain segment of third and forth dimensional consciousness, they actually do hear and see our supplications. Some of these beings lived on Earth as a person meditating, striving, everything. They achieved a certain realization, mastered a certain area so completely that they earned the right, so to speak, to reign over that inner office after physical death. This is a theory in psychology upon which so called oriental mythology is based. These sixth dimensional beings are contacted in meditation."
Now here comes the balancing factor.
"Before Self Realization has been attained, the sixth dimension can be a fascinating pitfall for an endless involvement for this life (meaning a sidetrack). For that reason, in earlier years, I taught devotees to avoid contacting that dimension and to concentrate fully on their realization. Otherwise they would become interested and involved in the same way one can get involved in the astral plane of the third dimension and never get far beyond it other than intellectually. Therefore, I taught disciples to establish themselves firmly in the fourth dimension, touch occasionally into the fifth and then move directly to the very pure seventh. Only after someone was very well stabilized in the non-dual experience of Self Realization and the life style of sadhana, then and only then were they allowed to investigate the world of the devas. For them any experience is viewed as merely another aspect of themselves and not as something else, a being greater than themselves."
That's the idea that even though Gurudeva writes about it, deities and devas and so forth, he's not asking us to develop that faculty. Cause it's a side path. Even though it's a fascinating side path it's a side path from Self Realization or from experiencing our Oneness with God. It's a fascinating trip into the inner worlds but it's still a twoness. It's still: "I am here and I am seeing this being." There's a dualism there so we're trying to get beyond dualism. So the seventh dimension is just the top of the head so Gurudeva in Shum, that's why we go from the power of the spine, simshumbisi which is the forth dimension, into kaif or pure awareness aware of itself which is the seventh dimension. So we skip everything in the middle in our meditation and that's why. Because we're not trying to see deities in their personal form or experience you know, a dualism that's looking into the sixth dimension or the Sivaloka.
So it's a very interesting point and I'm trying to figure out how to weave it in to the material. Just realized this morning it would be a visceral statement because this idea of spirituality, and for lots of people who are experiencing spirituality in North America, does get into this realm of inner plane beings in some way. And so we want to explain what it is and explain why Gurudeva suggests we avoid it and just go straight into the pure awareness aware of itself and then try and realize that the deeper aspects of our Oneness with God and not perpetuate the separation. So, again a fascinating area, right?
Oh, let's know all about our past lives. That'll solve all our present problems, right? Not really! You know, we don't remember our, most people don't remember their past lives for a good reason. You know, we're burdened enough by the mistakes of one life. [laughs] Remember all the mistakes we made in this life and dealing with that is hard enough. For some people it's overwhelming, you know. Imagine if we could remember ten past lives and all the mistakes we made in those lives. Aaugh! We'd have trouble getting out of bed in the morning. So we forget for a reason. And also it gives us just more identification with the personality. Now, not only do we have the personality in this life to overcome, but and break away the identity from; we have the personalities we were in past lives to get rid of also.
So, again you know, it's a fascinating area but it doesn't really cause spiritual progress. It just, it actually, it's a sidetrack, getting into past lives. And then concepts of who we were previously. So, what we're trying to do of course, is even to drop off the concept of who we are in this life and instead of identifying with our personality, you know, to identify with awareness that which has never changed and which is the same when we were one year old as it is now. You know that part of us, awareness. So identifying with the personality is definitely something that is worth discussing as well.
Well, thank you very much. Have a wonderful phase.
[End of transcript.]