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Swami Nirmalananda Giri (Abbot George Burke)

Those Who See God: Alive in Divine Consciousness

alive

Part 4 of Making Attraction and Aversion Work For Us, Not Against Us, a commentary on the 7th Ode of Solomon, written in Apostolic times.

  • The Seers shall go before him, and they shall be seen before him. And they shall praise the Lord for his love, because he is near and seeth.

Those who see God are ever before his Face, and wherever they go they bring with them that sacred Presence. Fortunately I have known quite a few holy people like this. If I wanted to be with God I went to spend time with them. They have been of various spiritual traditions, for God knows nothing of our artificial boundaries and foolish attempts to have an exclusive franchise on his love.

When one man I knew would speak to a group there would an all-pervading sense of heavenly joy and sweetness. What he said was wise, but the inner experience was beyond all words. I was only a teenager then and had not yet read Yogananda’s definition that God is joy, but I certainly experienced it. Another blessed soul was a frail little lady who literally blazed with white fire which I could feel from a distance. She lived in constant spiritual vision.

It is true: God is “glorified in his saints” (II Thessalonians 1:10). He is their song and they are his. So before we see God he sends his holy ones to give us a “foretaste of glory divine” as Fanny Crosby put it. Such exalted souls dwell in God’s love “because he is near and seeth” them as surely as they see him.

  • And hatred shall be taken from the earth, and along with jealousy it shall be drowned. For ignorance hath been destroyed upon it, because the knowledge of the Lord hath arrived upon it.

All the evil passions that are as demons tormenting humanity on this earth which they have turned into a hell spring from one cause: ignorance. This is why the great teachers of India, especially Shankara, insist that spiritual wisdom (jnana) alone brings liberation from the bonds of ignorance. When the knowledge of God (Brahmajnana) enlightens the consciousness then hell becomes heaven without our needing to go anywhere.

Amitabha BuddhaThere was a spiritual adept in China who was a devotee of Amitabha Buddha, the Buddha of Infinite Light. Once as she was walking along softly reciting the invocation of Amitabha a spiritual wiseacre said to her contemptuously: “Tell me grandmother, do you think Amitabha Buddha is listening to you in his paradise?” To his surprise she shook her head, continuing her invocations. “Then if Amitabha is not in his paradise, where is he?” insisted the smart-aleck. She pointed to her heart and kept on walking and reciting.

The idea of peace on earth in a social and political sense is as silly as expecting mental institutions to cease having mentally ill people living there. This earth is where the spiritually crazy are put. Someone once asked Yogananda if he believed in hell. The Master smiled and asked: “Where do you think you are?” But peace and joy can prevail in the heart of God’s devotee wherever he may be. It is an individual matter, but none the less glorious for that.

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Five Quick Questions for Abbot George

Q: How do I exhaust all my vasanas totally in this life before death, so that I will no longer transmigrate/reincarnate totally? Even if you do not exhaust all your vasanas in this life, if you have been constant in your sadhana you can be … Continue reading

The Road to Happiness

road to happiness

More from our series “Wisdom of Sri Gajanana Maharaj of Nashik”

Every human being is ceaselessly trying to acquire happiness

Every human being is ceaselessly trying to acquire happiness or to increase his share in it and to avoid pain, or at least to lessen it as much as possible. But the experience is just the contrary. He is ever feeling the lack of something and is always plunged in misery. Things which are pleasant in the beginning end in sorrow, and misery is always on the increase and gets the upper hand.

As man does not really understand wherein lies his happiness, he passes his days in the vain hope of securing happiness some time or other. Death catches him in its grip while his search for happiness is still going on. People do not profit by the example of their companions and fellow-beings, and so continue the same search and follow the same path. They, however, do not stop to think wherein lies real and lasting happiness.

A man, if he thinks deeply about this, will come to know that all things in this world which appear pleasant are perishable and false like a mirage. They either cause pain or increase the pain which is already there. No one, however, acquires this insight. On the contrary, everyone is entangled more and more in this snare of misery and finds it difficult to see a way out of the maze.

It is therefore necessary that some royal road should be pointed out so that people going by that path might root out this unending sorrow and pain and reach the destination where there is everlasting peace and happiness. I am putting before the world my experiences in order that people might find an easy, short and sure way of reaching this goal of everlasting happiness.

When you get experience for yourself, you will be sure that you are on the right path.

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The Journey to God Through the Practice of Yoga

Journey to God-practice of yoga

Part 3 of Making Attraction and Aversion Work For Us, Not Against Us, a commentary on the 7th Ode of Solomon, written in Apostolic times (to be available as a paperback and ebook later this year).

  • For he it is Who is incorruptible, the perfection of the worlds and their Father.

This is an exposition of the nature of Ishwara. If we unite ourselves with him through yoga sadhana we shall become like him.

  • He has allowed him to appear to them that are his own, in order that they may recognize him that made them, and not suppose that they came of themselves.

One of the greatest flaws of any religion or spiritual philosophy is the presumption that spiritual truths can be figured out intellectually or by applying logic. Anyone with a modicum of self-observation is aware of both the limitations and the unreliability of the mind. This is why all authentic spiritual traditions tell us that the only viable working with the mind is that which enables us to go beyond the mind!

Maharshi PatanjaliIn the Divine Unity, the Supreme Spirit fosters the evolution of all the individual spirits which draw their being from It. Patanjali tells us in the Yoga Sutras that God himself is the Guru of all. (“Being unconditioned by time he is guru even of the ancients” 1:26.) Mostly he teaches through providing the experiences that their own higher minds determine, but he does at times teach them through intuitions that arise from the depths of their own beings where God is to be found.

The ancient tradition of India tell us that the primeval sages, the rishis, turning within in profound meditation, discovered Brahman as the essence of all Being, just as the ode says in this verse. Brahman is also our Source, the power which has enabled our manifestation within relativity and which empowers us to ascend to the Absolute.

  • For knowledge he hath appointed as its way; he hath widened it and extended it and brought it to complete perfection.

This is why we must persevere in the practice of japa and meditation, simple as they may seem. On the mechanical level they are simple (even childishly simple) but on the level of their effects they are as complex as relative existence itself. That is why the practice of yoga can deliver us from the nets and snares of relativity.

You will find that your experience of yoga practice will be infinitely varied. On occasion, of course, your meditation and japa may seem to be the same day after day, but that is because your inner and outer bodies are adjusting to the plateau of evolution your practice has brought you to. The effects are being assimilated and permatized during such periods. But after a while you will perceive yourself moving on in the depths of meditation to new areas of development.

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Making Attraction and Aversion Work For Us, Not Against Us, Part 1

attraction and aversion graphic

A continuation of our series of postings on the early Christian writings, the mystical Odes of Solomon, written in Apostolic times (to be available as a paperback and ebook later this year).

As the impulse of anger against evil, so is the impulse of joy over what is loved, and brings in of its fruits without restraint.
My joy is the Lord and my impulse is toward him, this path of mine is beautiful.
For I have a helper–the Lord; he has generously shown himself to me in his simplicity, because his kindness has diminished his dreadfulness.
He became like me in order that I might receive him; in form he was considered like me so that I might put him on.
And I trembled not when I saw him, because he was gracious to me.
Like my nature he became that I might learn him, and like my form that I might not turn back from him.
The Father of knowledge, is the Word of knowledge.
He Who created wisdom, is wiser than his works.
And he Who created me when yet I was not, knew what I should do when I came into being.
Wherefore he pitied me in his abundant grace, and granted me to ask from him and to receive from his sacrifice.
For he it is Who is incorruptible, the perfection of the worlds and their Father.
He has allowed him to appear to them that are his own, in order that they may recognize him that made them, and not suppose that they came of themselves.
or knowledge he hath appointed as its way; he hath widened it and extended it and brought it to complete perfection.
And has set over it the traces of his light, and I walked therein from the beginning even to the end.
For by him it was wrought, and he rested in the Son.
And for its salvation he will take hold of everything; and the Most High shall be known in his Saints.
To announce to those that have songs of the coming of the Lord, that they may go forth to meet him and may sing to him, with joy and with the harp of many tones.
The Seers shall go before him, and they shall be seen before him.
And they shall praise the Lord for his love, because he is near and seeth.
And hatred shall be taken from the earth, and along with jealousy it shall be drowned.
For ignorance hath been destroyed upon it, because the knowledge of the Lord hath arrived upon it.
Let the singers sing the grace of the Lord Most High, and let them bring their songs.
And their heart shall be like the day, and like the excellent beauty of the Lord their pleasant song.
And let there be nothing without life, nor without knowledge nor dumb.
For (the Lord) hath given a mouth to his creation, to open the voice of the mouth towards him, and to praise him.
Confess ye his power, and show forth his grace. Alleluia.
Ode of Solomon 7

There was an old vaudeville routine where someone would be telling news to another. At one point, the hearer would say: “That’s good,” and the narrator would say: “No, that’s bad,” and continue on to explain. Later the hearer would comment “That’s bad,” and the narrator would contradict and say, “No, that’s good.” And so it would go on: “That’s good,” “No, that’s bad,” That’s bad,” “No, that’s good,” until the end which was always “bad.”

In junior high school I heard a joke version that began: “Fortunately, a man was flying in an airplane; unfortunately, the engine quit; fortunately, he had a parachute; unfortunately, the parachute did not open;” and it, too, went on to end most unfortunately.

This is really the way of most religion. No matter how positive the initial statements may be, fear and condemnation get injected somewhere along the line, ultimately resulting in a conviction of incapacity and unworthiness.

Schizophrenic religion

A few years ago on the internet I found a website that expounded the innate perfection of all sentient beings, affirming that liberation was the natural goal of all humanity. Then it went on to fulminate and fume against anyone who dared to disbelieve their One and Only True Master, describing the eternal darkness and suffering that would be the lot of unbelievers. That was awful, but worse was to come: the horrendous fate of disciples who dared to read anything but the Master’s writings or to even walk into a building owned by another spiritual organization. There was a lot of talk about how the Master mystically implanted some kind of enlightenment device (I am not joking or satirizing) in the astral bodies of all disciples, and how these devices would become deformed if the disciple committed the crimes just mentioned, or even began to question the Master’s words. As a result they, too, would wander eternally in darkness and pain, but it would be much worse than that of the unbelievers.

Bad Dog cartoonI have found this malignant schizophrenia in virtually every spiritual group I have met or made the mistake of joining. Things are all smiles and sunshine at the first, eventually developing into clouds, rain, thunder, lightning, and terror. Bad You! Bad You! Another version of: Bad Dog! Bad Dog!

In Pilgrim’s Regress, C. S. Lewis satirizes this by having someone tell a tenant how much–oh, how much–the landlord loves his tenants. So much so, that the landlord had prepared a pit of fire for any tenant that insulted his love by breaking the rules. So, the messenger concluded, we must all love the landlord very much and trust in his love so he will not torture us in the fire pit–something he very much did not want to do. Is it any wonder that so many “true believers” are crazy in a part of their mind?

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