The Inner Promise
A lecture by Sri Chinmoy
at the University of Essex, Colchester, UK
The inner promise is a seeker's inner progress. This progress inspires him, energises him and helps him to please God in God's own Way. The outer promise we make quite often, but the inner promise we make once or twice, not more, during our life's span. The outer promise we make, but the inner promise we keep, we try to live up to it. Finally, we try to manifest this inner promise on earth.
The outer promise we make to ignorance, to teeming ignorance, but the inner promise we make to God. Our outer promise is to torture the world either consciously or unconsciously, or try to destroy the world.
To change the face of the world and to fulfil the world with the divine Will, this is our inner promise that we have made to God.
Now, there are three significant steps to this inner promise.
God is to be seen.
God is to be felt.
God is to be realised.
To see God, we have to be far, far away from the snares of darkness and ignorance.
To feel God, we have to live in the domain and realm of aspiration, the mounting flame within us.
To realise God, we have to grow into divine and constant and supreme surrender.
After we have attained to God-realisation, there are two most significant steps, two more significant promises we have to make. These promises are God-revelation and God-manifestation.
God-revelation is the promise made by the God-realised souls on the strength of their unconditional concern for suffering humanity.
God-manifestation is the unconditional promise of the God-realised souls to love mankind unconditionally and to manifest the reality of Divinity here on earth.
In our day to day life, we see a child making promises to his mother: he won't tell a lie, he won't do anything wrong. But unfortunately, he does tell lies, he does make mistakes. But the mother has boundless patience. She feels that sooner or later her child will tell the truth and will do everything right. Then, as a young boy, a teenager, he does quite a few things wrong and he promises to his parents that he will not do them anymore. Unfortunately, he fails to keep his promise. But his parents have the capacity to forgive him. They feel that either today or tomorrow he will turn a new leaf. This is the inner confidence that they have in their son.
So in the spiritual life also, many seekers make an inner promise, an inner commitment. They say that they will enter into the spiritual life, they will give real importance to the life of purity, the life of aspiration, the life of realisation; but unfortunately they fail to fulfil their promise. Nevertheless, God's boundless Compassion never leaves them. God, with His adamantine Will and with His Vision of the ever-transcending Beyond, sees that these seekers will sooner or later enter into the right path and they will walk, march, run towards the Destined Goal.
Then there are some advanced seekers who have made considerable progress in their inner life, and who have made a promise to their own inner beings and to God that they will not give up their spiritual quest or journey unless and until they have realised God. God-realisation is their sole aim. As ill-luck would have it, after having some higher experiences, they do not want to march further. They feel that these experiences that they have already acquired are more than enough, at least for this life. So they do not want to go any further. God-realisation at that point they do not need or they do not want. So God-realisation remains a far cry for them.
But God knew that with utmost sincerity these seekers entered into the spiritual life and they have made considerable progress, only now they do not want to run towards their Destined Goal. They do not want to reach the farthest end of the Golden Shore.
God again with His boundless Compassion, observes the situation and tells the seekers, "Look, you will never be fulfilled. You will never see the face of satisfaction until you have seen the Golden Shore. You have not fulfilled your promise. But My Promise to you is unconditional. I shall wait for you. I shall take you, carry you to the destined shore of the Golden All at My choice Hour. If you do not want to run fast, faster, fastest, it is up to you; but you have to know that nobody on earth can remain unrealised, unfulfilled."
God says that this is the supreme decree. Each individual has to realise the highest Truth, but he who aspires will naturally reach the Goal sooner than the others who are still in the world of sleep.
As human beings, most of us are extremely clever. We are clever, but we are not wise. We try to deceive others, human beings. Not only that, we go to the length of deceiving our Inner Pilot, God. In spite of knowing that we can never, never deceive the Inner Pilot, we unconsciously, sometimes consciously, deliberately try to deceive the Inner Pilot, God. We tell God, "Oh God, if You give us some inner wealth (that is to say, peace, light and bliss), we shall offer half of our peace, light and bliss to mankind. We shall not grab them all. We shall not use them all for ourselves." It is just like saying to God, "If You give me a dollar, I will give half to mankind and only half I shall keep for myself."
Now, God observes our sincerity. He examines the face of sincerity, whether we are really sincere or not. And what happens? God gives us peace, light, bliss and divine qualities to some extent, but we feel that it was not according to our satisfaction. What do we do? Immediately we say, "Oh God, You have not given us the full amount, the full quantity. I wanted to have a dollar, but You have given me half a dollar. You are very clever. You have already kept half a dollar for Yourself, that is to say, for humanity. So I cannot give humanity the peace, light and bliss that I already have, because I feel that You have not given me the full amount."
How we try to deceive the divinity in humanity. Everybody here, here at this place, has something to offer: peace, light or bliss, sincerity, simplicity. There is nobody on earth who is not in a position to help the rest of mankind. This help, this service, if I can use the term service, can be offered by any individual here on earth.
If somebody feels that he is more sincere than somebody else, then let his sincerity be shared with other persons.
If somebody feels that he is pure, purer than somebody else, his neighbours or friends, then let him share his purity.
If somebody feels than he has aspiration, more aspiration than his friends or neighbours, then let him share it.
This is the promise that every moment we can make to God.
Then we come to realise that every time the soul enters into the field of creation and manifestation, the soul makes a most solemn promise to God, the Pilot Supreme, to try its utmost to reveal God here on earth. But unfortunately when the soul enters into the world, ignorance the sea tries to envelop the soul, and then our body, vital, mind and heart consciously or unconsciously get pleasure in identifying themselves with the ignorance-sea. But the soul is all-forgiving. It does not cast aside the body, vital, mind and heart. It has boundless patience.
If this body, vital, mind and heart identify themselves with the soul, and if they want to see the Truth with the soul's eye, if that is their promise, if that is their only promise, inner promise, then the date of God-realisation, God-revelation and God-manifestation on earth is not very far.
Each individual can make a solemn promise to himself, to herself, to humanity at large. This is a promise of dedicated self-service. And when he fulfils his inner promise, God fulfils His highest Promise of absolute Perfection in and through the aspirant.
Published in My Rose Petals, part 1
The Rig Veda
A lecture by Sri Chinmoy
at Barnard College, New York
The Rig Veda is the oldest of all the Vedas. Most students of the Vedas are of the opinion that the Rig Veda is the most inspiring, most soulful and most fruitful Veda. This Veda embodies the earliest monument of India’s aspiration and realisation. India’s poetry, India’s philosophy, India’s literature, India’s religion and India’s science all owe their very existence to the Rig Veda, which was their source.
When it is a matter of choice between quality and quantity, the wise long for quality and the ignorant cry for quantity. The highest quality and the greatest quantity almost never go together. But to our great joy, the Rig Veda surpasses most strikingly the other three Vedas both in quantity and in quality. The Yajur Veda, the Sama Veda and the Atharva Veda have borrowed a considerable amount of wealth from the Rig Veda.
In the Rig Veda, the gods are seen as personifications of nature-power. The seers invoke the cosmic gods with their heart’s prayers and their life’s dedication. These gods were supposed to have been thirty-three in number. Each god had his own origin; all of them did not come into being at the same time. It is said that at first they accepted human incarnation and were mortals, as we are now. But by drinking soma, nectar, immortal they became. In the subtle physical plane, they are retaining the quintessence of their physical forms and earthly appearances. Some are warriors, while others are priests. Indra is the champion leader of the warriors, and Agni is the champion leader of the priests.
Power they have. Power they are. Some have the power of Silence and Peace, while others have the power of Light and Delight. Ceaselessly they fought against the formidable forces of evil, and eventually they did win the victory.
The Rig Vedic gods are kind and compassionate. With their boundless kindness and compassion, they fulfil the desires of the matter-loving world and the aspirations of the spirit-invoking life. They live in different homes: Heaven, air and earth. Heaven is the home of Vishnu, Varuna, Surya, Mitra and a few others. The atmospheric region is for Indra, Rudra, the Maruts and others. Agni and Brihaspati are well known among those who are considered to be terrestrial gods.
In the Rig Veda we see the pure presence of devotion and the sure presence of knowledge. Devotion tells us how sweet and compassionate God is. Knowledge tells us how high and great God is. Devotion and knowledge find their complete satisfaction only in service. Service is concentration. Devotion is prayer. Knowledge is meditation. Only concentrated service, devoted prayer and illumined meditation can make us divinely great and supremely perfect.
According to the Vedas, action is a most essential part of life. Action is the conscious acceptance of our earthly existence. Action needs the body, which is its temple and fortress. Action needs life, which is its inspiration and aspiration. A man of action is an ideal hero in the battlefield of life. He lives with God’s human body, the earth, and works for God’s divine life, Heaven. Action is outer sacrifice and inner oneness. The Rig Veda offers us a supreme secret as to what kind of sacrifice we can make on the strength of our oneness. In action we see the universal presence of God. In action we embody the spirit and reveal the form. In the spirit is God the Absolute. In the form is God the Infinite. The Rig Veda speaks of God the Power:
"Twam Indra balad adhi sahaso jata ojasah...
O God, the existence rests on strength, valour and energy.
O Mighty One, You are Strength itself."
In order to manifest God considerably on earth, the seeker must live a long life.
"Aum bhadram karnebhih srinuyam deva...
O cosmic gods, may we hear with our ears what is good and auspicious.
May we see with our eyes what is good and auspicious..."
But merely living a long life lacking in divinity is nothing short of stark ignorance.
The seers of the Rig Veda regard God as the eternal Father, Mother and Friend. They also feel that God is their Beloved. God has many aspects, but a devoted seer prefers the aspect of God as Lord. He prays to his Lord for compassion and benediction. He has come to realise that if he has God’s Love and God the Love, then he needs nothing else from either earth or Heaven.
The Rig Vedic seers are the teachers of mankind. The Rig Vedic gods are the saviours of mankind. The teachers are teaching the world the message of Light and Truth. The saviours are healing the unaspiring, blind and deaf world, and championing the genuine seekers. The Rig Vedic seers are the builders of Hindu culture and Hindu civilisation. They represent the dawn of Hindu inspiration and the noon of Hindu aspiration. They offer to the world at large the ultimate meaning of religion. According to them, religion is the code of inner life. In each religion is the love-branch of the Truth-Tree. The Rig Vedic gods tell us to accept life with love, enjoy life with renunciation and fulfil life with surrender to the Will of the Absolute.
The Vedas tell us that we are cattle of the gods. Unfortunately, we are now compelled to feel that we are slaves of the machine. Let us aspire. Our aspiration will once more make us cattle of the gods. Later, our realisation will make us lambs of the gods. Finally, our manifestation will make us lions of the Absolute Supreme.
Aspiration we have.
Realisation we need.
Manifestation God and we together need.
With loving gratitude I offer this talk to my eldest brother, Hriday Ranjan Ghose, who is a great lover of the Rig Vedic lore, and an erudite exponent of the four Vedas.
Published in The Vedas: Immortality’s First Call