The Song of the Infinite
A lecture by Sri Chinmoy
at Mount Holyoke College, South Hadley, Massetcutis.
The Vedas are the most ancient scriptures in the library of consciously evolving humanity. For our own conscious evolution we may be inspired to read the Vedas by Max Müller’s encouragement: “I maintain that for everybody who cares for himself, for his ancestors, for his history, for his intellectual development, a study of Vedic literature is indispensable.”
The Vedas embody intuitive visions, divine experiences and life-illumining Realities. From the ignorance-sea we have to enter into the Knowledge-Sea. The Rig Veda inspires us, saying, “The vessels of Truth carry men of good deeds across the ocean of ignorance.”
Present-day human life is nothing but an endless despondency. To come out of the trap of despondency is almost impossible. But the Yajur Veda offers us a solution: “He who sees all existences in the Self and the Self in all existences, falls not into the trap of blighting and weakening despondency.”
The Vedas are universal; hence, the West can claim them as well as the East. The great American philosopher Thoreau said something most significant about the Vedas: “What extracts from the Vedas I have read fall on me like the light of a higher and purer luminary which describes a loftier course through purer stratum, free from particulars, simple, universal. The Vedas contain a sensible account of God.” Undoubtedly they do.
The firm belief of Sir William Jones is challenging and at the same time illumining: “I can venture to affirm, without meaning to pluck a leaf from the never-fading laurels of our immortal Newton, that the whole of his theology, and part of his philosophy, may be found in the Vedas.”
The Vedic commandment for the human physical is shaucham. Shaucham means purity — purity in the body and purity of the body. Without the body’s purity nothing divine in us can expand; nothing divine in us can be permanent.
The Vedic commandment for the human vital is ahimsa. Ahimsa means non-violence — non-violence in the vital and non-violence of the vital. It is from non-violence that man gets his greatest opportunity to feel that he does not belong to a small family, but to the largest family of all: the universe. India’s philosophy of non-violence was first put into practice by the compassionate Lord Buddha and his followers. Gandhi’s non-violence was a most precious gift to the life-loving humanity of the present.
The Vedic commandment for the human mind is satyam. Satyam means truth or truthfulness. Truthfulness in the mind and truthfulness of the mind alone can lead us to a higher life, a life of illumining Divinity and fulfilling Immortality.
The Vedic commandment for the human heart is ishwarapranidhan. Ishwarapranidhan means the heart’s loving devotion to the Lord Supreme. When we have pure and spontaneous devotion for the Supreme Lord we feel our inseparable oneness with Him, with the Eternity of His Spirit, with the Infinity of His Body and with the Immortality of His Life.
In the Vedas the concept of sacrifice looms very large. We sacrifice to God what we have: ignorance. God sacrifices to us what He is: Perfection. God’s sacrifice is always unconditional. Our sacrifice at times is conditional and at times is unconditional. In conditional sacrifice we fight and win the battle. In unconditional sacrifice we do not have to fight at all, for the Victory is already won. Victory is our birthright; it is forever ours.
Sacrifice is self-offering. Self-offering is self-fulfilment. Self-fulfilment is Love-manifestation and Truth-perfection. Through our outer sacrifice we become a divine part of Mother Earth. Through our inner sacrifice we become an immortal part of Father Heaven. We make the outer sacrifice when we come out of the domain of binding desires and enter into the domain of liberating aspiration. We make the inner sacrifice when we try to manifest God in the world of ignorance after having achieved God-realisation. The outer sacrifice demands the strength of a hero. The inner sacrifice demands the power of an army. With our outer sacrifice we see the Truth. With our inner sacrifice we become the Truth.
Published in The Vedas: Immortality's First Call
William Blake
A talk by Sri Chinmoy
in Room 550 of the United Nations, New York
William Blake, English poet. Imagination he had; vision he had. Needless to say, he had these two supernal qualities in abundant measure. To him, imagination was reality's all-illumining beauty and vision was beauty's all-fulfilling reality. To him, imagination was a true man and vision was a true and perfection-inspiring man.
Insane he was — so thought some of his contemporaries, even some of his own friends. But he was not insane. Unfortunately, his reality-worlds most people were not and are not wont to see. Most people have no access to these worlds. An inner cry is needed, a true love of the unknown is needed and a brave heart is needed to go beyond the fact-world, beyond the reality-world already seen and already acquired.
Blake's immortal poem The Tyger is humanity's invaluable treasure.
"Tyger, Tyger, burning bright
In the forests of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?"
Here we see that ignorance-energy, which threatens to devour the entire world, finally discovers its transformation-salvation in the realisation of the absolute One. This absolute One embodies both ignorance-energy and knowledge-energy and, at the same time, far transcends them both.
The soul's soulful originality was Blake's gift to mankind. Blake the art-painting-lover and the thought-progress-lover was the puissant and incessant flow of originality-creativity.
Blake's friend and disciple, Samuel Palmer, realised him and made it easy for the world to realise him. Blake was a man without a mask: his aim single, his path straightforward, his words few. So he was free, noble and happy. Something more: Blake was humanity's challenge to go beyond the achievements of the earthbound life and divinity's challenge to grow and glow in the ever-transcending Beyond's reality-existence.
Blake's life-boat sailed between the soul-essence-purity and the body-substance-impurity. Indeed, this experience each human life encounters. Then there comes a time when the unlit and undivine part in us cheerfully and devotedly surrenders to the lit and divine part in us. Here surrender means conscious awareness, inseparable oneness. In the realisation of its inseparable oneness with the divine, the undivine in us receives illumination, satisfaction and perfection.
In his lifetime Blake was obscure; recognition was a stranger to him. Now, a century after his departure from the world-scene, the world has discovered and recognised in him a world-lover who had the message of transformation — the transformation of hell-torture into Heaven-rapture and the transformation of the body's ignorance-sea into the soul's wisdom-sky.
Today is Blake's birthday. On November 28, over two hundred years ago, Blake was born; but his soul is still aspiring, still illumining the world and still trying to manifest the divinity that it embodies for earth-awakening, earth-illumination and earth-fulfilment. The poet has the vision of tomorrow, the artist has the vision of tomorrow; the scientist, the singer and the musician all have the vision of tomorrow. All the human beings who are awakened and who are more than ready to contribute something of their own, their very own, in the world at large are really blessed souls and the invaluable, immortal treasures of Mother Earth.
Published in Reality-Dream
Twenty-Two Prayers
given by Sri Chinmoy in Singapore
My Lord tells me
That every eager effort
Of my heart
He deeply values.
An intense God-love
Means a desire-conquered life.
Alas,
The fleeting moments of my life
Are empty of God’s Light.
God’s Flute
Awakens my heart.
God’s Gong
Awakens my mind.
God’s Drum
Awakens my life..
I have millions of flowers
In my heart-garden,
But I love the silence-flower
Infinitely more than any other flower.
Detachment — not out of shock,
But out of wisdom-light —
Permanently lasts.
A God-unwillingness-mind
Is, indeed,
A real God-failure-life.
What I sleeplessly need
Is a Heaven-ascending heart.
My Lord,
Every day my love increases for You.
How is it that Your Love for me
Does not increase even once a year?
“My child,
I really do not know
How to answer your question.”
My Lord,
Please, please free me
With Your Compassion-Eye.
My Lord,
Please, please, please bind me
With Your Affection-Heart.
When I arrive
At my Lord’s Palace,
He immediately embraces me
Most fondly and most proudly.
When my Lord arrives
At my cottage,
I immediately place myself
At His Feet
And devour the dust of His Feet.
My heart’s gladness
And my life’s sadness
Both hear my Lord’s choice Voice.
Impossibility-accomplishments:
This is what my Lord
Every day expects from me.
Each time I prayerfully cry
Or soulfully smile,
My Lord invites me
To enter into
His Heaven-Heart-Garden.
The divine Grace
Comes down from Above
Not when I want it,
But only when I desperately need it.
Not God’s Eye,
But God’s Heart takes the timing
In all our Heavenward races.
A gratitude-God-lover
And a devoted God-seeker
Are God’s most favourite children.
God has a very big Desire:
His Desire is to see me happy
Twenty-four hours a day.
What is my mission?
My mission is the outer manifestation
Of my Lord’s inner Vision.
Heaven is nowhere else
Save and except
In my Lord’s Compassion-flooded Eye.
Published in My Christmas-New Year-Vacation Aspiration-Prayers, part 22