Vyasadeva left a total of 108 upanisads with selected passages from the four Vedas, as well as other Vedic literature that speak directly about self-realization. The list also includes the Bhagavad-Gita, also called the Gitopanisad.
As expected, the Upanisads are full of interesting passages, but most of it is not easy to understand, be due to the scarcity of good translations or lack of explanations of what the passages mean.
Here is an interesting passage from the Bṛhad-āraṇyaka Upanisad (2.45), where Yājñavalkya teaches his wife Maitreyī about self-realization.
The context is that Yājñavalkya had two wives: Maitreyī and Kātyāyanī. The second was just interested in regular household affairs, while Maitreyī was interested in spiritual knowledge. When later in life Yājñavalkya was preparing to accept the Vanaprastha order and go to the forest, he called Maitreyī and proposed to make a settlement, dividing the properties between her and Kātyāyanī. To this, Maitreyī answered:
There is an interesting verse in the Padma Purana, where the Lord tells Lord Shiva:
tvam ārādhya yathā śambho grahiṣyāmi varaṁ sadā dvāparādau yuge bhūtvā kalayā mānuṣādiṣu svāgamaiḥ kalpitais tvaṁ tu janān mad-vimukhān kuru maṁ ca gopaya yena syāt sṛṣṭir eṣottarottarā
“In the same manner, I shall worship you to ask a boon from you. You should descend to earth in your partial expansion and take birth as a human being in Kali-yuga. Concoct your own scripture and divert the people away from me. Hide me so that this creation will keep increasing.”
This is of course connected with Lord Shiva coming in Kali-yuga as Shankaracharya to preach impersonalism and thus bring the atheists back to the study of the Vedas. The interesting point in this passage however is the idea of increasing the population.
Srila Prabhupada mentioned that everything is inside his books. These are not just empty words, but the truth.
After compiling the four Vedas, Vyasadeva compiled the 108 Upanisads, making the spiritual knowledge contained in the Vedas more evident, culminating in the Vedanta Sutra, which brings forth the conclusions of the Upanisads. In the process, he also compiled the 18 Puranas, the Mahabharata, and other books.
Because the real meaning of the Vedanta Sutra is so difficult to understand, Srila Vyasadeva was instructed by his guru, Narada Muni to compile another book that would directly speak about the glories of devotional service and the pastimes of Krsna, making the real meaning of the Vedanta Sutra easily available.
By the time He received this instruction, Vyasadeva had already compiled the original Bhagavata Purana, as part of the 18 original Puranas, but having received this instruction he had the inspiration to rewrite the book as the Srimad Bhagavatam we have access to today. In this process, he received the help of two other great sages: His son, Sukadeva Goswami, and the son of Romaharshana, Suta Goswami, who added their realizations to the book, making it even sweeter than originally. The Srimad Bhagavatam was originally taught by Srila Vyasadeva to Sukadeva Goswami, who added His own realization while describing it to Maharaja Pariksit. This narration was later expanded by Srila Suta Goswami, resulting in the final text. This, in turn, was commented on by different Vaishnava acaryas, culminating with Srila Prabhupada, who compiled all this knowledge accumulated over thousands of years in his purports, adding his own realization in the process. This Srimad Bhagavatam we have access to is thus the fruit of the combined effort of all these powerful personalities.
Every soul in his pure state has three natural characteristics: eternity, knowledge, and bliss. These are three things we always hanker for when we are in this material world, but unfortunately, here they are in short supply. We want to be eternal, but we live for just a few years at a time. We want knowledge, but more often than not we become frustrated in our efforts. Similarly, everyone is looking for happiness, but it is constantly eluding us.
We look for happiness in different places, the desire is always there. Even self-destructive habits such as addiction come from a desire to find some kind of satisfaction, it’s just that a person looks for it in the wrong place.
People find small things that give them a little bit of happiness or at least some respite from the struggle of modern life. For some, it can be certain foods, for others certain experiences, such as traveling or meeting with friends. Others may find some satisfaction in alcohol or other things, while others may find pleasure in buying things. We have the idea that we do all these things for “ourselves”, but we may fail to consider who “ourselves” are.
Not all devotees are perfect. In any group or community, we can find devotees from different backgrounds and at different stages of spiritual development, all mixed. Some of them may be highly evolved people who show genuine saintly qualities, while others may not behave much better than the average Joe you may meet in the street. However, devotees are still the best of the bunch. Usually, the best people from each class are the ones who become devotees. On the other hand, we may often have the impression that living amongst devotees is not so great. Often we meet people who are not good-natured, and we may feel dislocated, not being able to find like-minded souls.
We may find it hard to reconcile these two ideas. On the one hand, devotees are supposed to be the best people, and on the other, we may often have trouble relating to devotees around us. How is it so?
Are devotees always good in a moral sense? If so, why often do devotees behave in dishonest ways?
In A Second Chance, Srila Prabhupada mentions that a true devotee will always be a good person, which means he will be kind, honest, soft-hearted, and so on. In fact, Srila Bhaktivinoda Thakura mentions that there are four classes of human beings, being the devotee the topmost.
Going from the lowest to the highest, the four classes are:
– The impious atheist – The pious atheist – The pious religionist – The devotee
What is interesting in this classification is that it doesn’t include such a thing as an “impious devotee”. According to this classification, one who is impious is by definition an atheist, because a devotee will always obey the laws of God. Only an atheist will ignore such laws, and therefore one who is immoral and impious must be an atheist. Sahajiyas sometimes claim to be devotees while breaking all rules of morality and civilized life, but they are also not considered devotees. Sometimes sahajiyas are counted amongst the neophyte devotees, a definition that certainly applies to the harmless cases, but the hard cases are often considered offenders who actually envy Krsna.
In other words, one may be materially pious and still be an atheist, but it is not actually possible to be a devotee and still be impious. These are actually two contradictory terms. Or one is a devotee, or he is impious. One can’t be both at the same time. Strictly speaking, only an atheist can be impious.
We can see that in the age of Kali, most people are actually in the “impious atheist” stage. This means that for most of us, a pious and moral life is not an extra, but an essential step in our spiritual life. One mistake we may commit is exactly to try to be a devotee without following a moral life. This led to scandals and ultimately fall.
However, when one is firmly situated in the platform of devotion, he may sometimes act in ways that may appear condemnable from a material point of view, just like in the case of Arjuna killing his relatives. This is something Prabhupada mentions in the chapter 16 of the same book:
“One may even become a brāhmaṇa, a very pious man, but that does not mean he has become a devotee. And sometimes a devotee appears to act against the rules of mundane piety. Arjuna, for example, was an exalted devotee of Lord Kṛṣṇa, but he killed his relatives. Ignorant people may say, “Arjuna is not a good man. Look, he killed his grandfather, his teacher, and his nephews, devastating the entire family.” But in the Bhagavad-gītā (4.3) Kṛṣṇa says to Arjuna, bhakto ’si me: “You are My very dear friend.” In the estimation of the material world Arjuna may not be a good man, but because he is a soul surrendered to the desire of the Supreme Lord, he must be accepted as a devotee. While it is true that Arjuna killed his own kinsmen, in the eyes of Kṛṣṇa he remained a dear friend and devotee. That is the difference between a devotee and a good man of this world: A good man of this world tries to always act piously, for he knows that if he acts badly he will suffer sinful reactions; but a devotee, although naturally a very good man, can act like a bad man on Kṛṣṇa’s order and still not fall down: he remains a pure devotee and is very dear to the Lord.”
This passage brings the idea of spiritual morality, which is higher than mundane morality. In this world, morality is based on the mode of goodness, including principles such as non-violence, honesty, and so on. These are essential principles for anyone practicing spiritual life. However, morality based on the mode of goodness is not absolute. Higher than it there is a spiritual morality, that is based on the desire to fulfill the order of Krsna. Generally speaking, to kill one’s relatives is immoral. However, if the order comes directly from Krsna, then it becomes the highest morality.
One example of this is that when Yudhishthira hesitated in fulfilling the instruction of Krsna of telling a lie that would help the Pandavas to win the battle, his chariot (who was previously floating above the ground, just like in the case of the demigods) touched the earth, showing that his piety diminished.
Ordinarily, to kill one’s relatives is bad both for the person who kills and for the one who is killed, due to the repercussions of the law of karma, but when Arjuna killed his relatives in the battle of Kuruksetra under the direct guidance of Krsna, the result was wonderful for both. The relatives attained liberation, and Arjuna became recognized as Krsna’s pure devotee. The test, in this case, is the result: acts of spiritual morality will always bring wonderful results, different from impious acts, which will always bring misery, suffering, and degradation.
In other words, a devotee is always a moral and pious person. Ordinarily, he acts on the platform of ordinary morality, but sometimes when there is a direct order from Krsna or His direct representative he may act at the higher level of spirtual morality, executing actions that will bring the supreme good for all involved. One who acts in an immoral way, on the other hand, is either an atheist or a very neophyte devotee who still can’t differentiate right and wrong.
Violence in a religious context, and especially in the context of the Bhagavad-Gita is a quite complex subject.
Materialists often see no problem in using violence to obtain whatever they want, be it richness, a kingdom, a woman, and so on. In the Bhagavad-Gita we see this exemplified in the figure of Duryodhana, who was ready to use all necessary means to achieve his goal of destroying the Pandavas and becoming king.
This type of violence is condemned in the Bhagavad-Gita by both Arjuna and Krsna.
Arjuna says, on Bg 1.37-38: “O Janārdana, although these men, their hearts overtaken by greed, see no fault in killing one’s family or quarreling with friends, why should we, who can see the crime in destroying a family, engage in these acts of sin?”
Krsna says, on Bg 16.9: “Following such conclusions, the demoniac, who are lost to themselves and who have no intelligence, engage in unbeneficial, horrible works meant to destroy the world.”
Two days ago I spoke a little about the atheistic Saṅkhya philosophy and the difference from the original Saṅkhya philosophy propounded by Lord Kapila many millions of years ago.
A concept that is very central to the atheistic Saṅkhya philosophy is the idea that everything that exists is a combination of pradhāna (the unmanifested mass of material elements) and purusha (the souls), excluding the idea of Isvara (the Supreme Lord). According to their theory, through the interactions of the three modes, pradhāna (or prakrti) is the ultimate cause of everything that exists, and purusha, the souls, get involved in the creation by falsely identifying with the different material manifestations.
The difficulty with this theory is that it is not supported in the Vedas. The Puranas include descriptions of how Lord Maha-Vishnu looks in the direction of the material energy, impregnating her with both Kala (the time energy), which puts her in motion, and the different souls who desire to take part in the material creation. Similarly, the Upanisads are full of passages describing the Lord as being the cause of the material creation.
The Śvetāśvatara Upaniṣad 6.16, for example, states: pradhāna-kṣetrajña-patir guṇeśaḥ, “The Supreme Lord as the Supersoul is the chief knower of the body and the master of pradhāna (the unmanifested material nature).”
On the other hand, there is no passage that says that the pradhāna or prakrti is the ultimate cause. Everywhere, prakrti is described as the apparent cause, just like a chisel being used by a carpenter.
Sometimes we may regret past decisions and missed opportunities. One may regret following a professional path instead of another, regret having entered a marriage that ended in frustration, regret missing the opportunity of moving to a different city or country, regret missing the opportunity of a certain investment, and so on.
The point is that most of what happens to us, including the result of many of our decisions is actually determined by our past karma. Our karma determines not only the place, time, and situation where we are going to take birth but also the particular disposition of planets and stars that are going to give us shelter, something that is studied in Vedic astrology. These different celestial bodies then pull us in different directions, influencing our thinking and actions. There is a combination of past desires and decisions that binds us to go through a certain combination of experiences and make certain decisions.
Sāṅkhya is the study of material elements. That’s what normally in the west is called metaphysics. In short, the Sāṅkhya system includes analytical knowledge that enables one to distinguish between matter and spirit.
The original Saṅkhya system was introduced during the reign of Svayambhuva Manu, at the beginning of the current day of Brahma by Lord Kapila, the son of Devahuti. This original system explains the material elements, as well as the workings of the universe, studies the causes of suffering for the jivas, and so on, leading ultimately to the process of devotional service to the Lord. This original philosophy of Saṅkhya is explained in the third canto of Srimad Bhagavatam.
Later, however, an impostor Kapila appeared, propounding another philosophy with the same name. This atheistic Saṅkhya studies the material elements (prakrti) and accepts the existence of the soul (purusa) without accepting the existence of Isvara, or God. According to this atheistic Saṅkhya philosophy, the entire material manifestation is simply based on a principle of cause and effect that has its ultimate cause on prakrti.
