Loving Isvara

In reality, there are no persons. So how is there a personal God? The universal reflection of pure consciousness is to Maya as individual reflections of awareness are to ignorance. This is what the sages say. But as long as you are acting like a person, love the God you’re with.

Dayananda on Ananda

Ātman-bliss confusion

Brahma-ātman is presented in the śāstra as ānanda. This one experiential word ‘ānanda’ is frequently a cause for confusion. The Taittirīyopaniṣad presents Brahman as satyam jñānam anantaṁ. These three words are equivalent to sat-cit and ānanda.

The meaning of the word ānanda is ananta, limitlessness. The word, ‘satya’ which is generally an attribute to a thing existent in time, is in apposition with the word ananta. Because of the qualifying word ananta, satya is released from the three-fold limitations of space, time and object-status.

At the same time, being the cause of everything, satya is the truth of everything that is dependent upon it. And satya is also jñāna, which as a word can mean knower or knowledge or even known. But with the word ananta, the limited meaning of jñāna is removed and jñāna, the invariable consciousness presence in all these three, becomes its meaning.

The invariable content of the knower-known-knowledge is consciousness, which is satya. This satyam-jñānam-anantam, the consciousness, ātman, is predicated to Brahman which is the cause of the entire jagat. Later in the Taittirīyopaniṣad and elsewhere in the upaniṣads, the word ānanda is used in the place of ananta, which is the svarūpa of ātman. 

Here, the word ‘ānanda’ can be translated as bliss if ānanda is experiential. But when it is a word unfolding the svarūpa of ātman, its translation can never be bliss. A special bliss experience is not going to announce, ‘I am ātman bliss,’ so that it can be recognised as unlike any other bliss experienced before.

Even if there is an experience of bliss, as modern Vedanta promises, the experience is only as good as we interpret it. And the interpretation is again only as good as our knowledge. Self-knowledge requires a means of knowledge for which we have no refuge except the śruti. If the śruti is presented as theory, the seeker’s initial confusion gets confounded.

Then what is the necessity for using the experiential word ānanda? The word serves two purposes: Firstly, it shows that the knowledge of ātman is desirable because ātman Is ānanda svarūpa. Secondly, it shows that the source of all forms of ānanda is nothing but the limitlessness of ātman.

If ānanda is translated as bliss instead of limitlessness or fullness, the seeker is led to believe that there is a special bliss hitherto not experienced. In fact, the śāstra says that any form of ānanda, whether it is born of sensory experience, viṣayānanda, or in the wake of some discovery, vidyānanda or by disciplines of yoga, yogānanda, is nothing but svarūpānanda. 

The word ānanda, therefore, is meant to draw the attention of the seeker to oneself as the source of all ānanda. It means the seeker is limitlessness, fullness, which is experienced as happiness whenever the mind meets with the required disposition. The recognition of this fact removes the error of seeing myself as unhappy, ignorant and mortal. So the meaning of the words sat, cit and ānanda is important in helping the seeker recognise the self as free from all attributes .

~Dayananda

The Canticles of Satcitananda

1. the canticles of satcitananda

The principle of existence is that impersonal being and supreme presence, sat.

The ground of pure consciousness is that absolute awareness and foundational intelligence, cit.

Not experiential bliss, as the superimposition of attention is not the substrate of awareness, but nondual and limitless, holistic bliss infinity, ananda.

2. people are dreamed of

"My dear People, My dear Bagginses and Boffins, and my dear Tooks and Brandybucks, and Grubbs, and Chubbs, and Burrowses, and Hornblowers, and Bolgers, Bracegirdles, Goodbodies, Brockhouses and Proudfoots."

The body-mind is made from material of maya. Satcitananda gives it life like a red hot iron ball in the great inferno of this universal furnace. Experience is consumed. Memories are made. People are dreamed of. Prepositions are stranded.

In light, of light, from light, to light, for effortless nondoing and intuitive nonknowing, tattvamasi.

Joy of Metaphors from Atmabodha 2-4

THE JOY OF METAPHORS

Just as fire is the direct cause for cooking, Knowledge is the direct means of Liberation.

Knowledge destroys ignorance like light destroys darkness.

The Self reveals Itself by Itself – like the sun when the clouds pass away.

~from Atmabodha 2-4

Nikhilananda on Known and Unknown

 "Brahman is different from the known, that is to say, from the tangible world of name and form, because It is the Eye of the eye, and so on. All tangible objects can be known somehow, by someone, and to some extent. Brahman is quite different from such objects.

Lest the disciple should misunderstand the statement of the teacher and conclude that Brahman is altogether unknown, the preceptor says that It is above the unknown. The word unknown means the unmanifested avidyā, which is the seed of the gross universe.

By describing Brahman as both distinct from the known and above the unknown, the text indicates that Brahman is Atman, or the inmost Self of the knower; for none other than one’s own Atman can be distinct from both the known and the unknown.”

~Nikhilananda on Kena 1.4

Nikhilananda on Brahman and Atman

 “Atman is the deathless, birthless, eternal, and real Substance in every individual. It is the unchanging Reality behind the changing body, sense-organs, mind, and ego. It is Spirit, which is Pure Consciousness and is unaffected by time, space, and causality;

Therefore It is limitless and One without a second. As the unchanging Reality in the individual is called Atman, so the unchanging Reality in the universe is called Brahman. Brahman, too, is beyond time, space, and causality and is all-pervading Spirit.

Vedanta states that Brahman and Atman are one and the same. The knowledge of this identity or non-difference is called Self-Knowledge."

~Nikhilananda (from commentary on Atmabodha) 

Nikhilananda on the Rediscovery of Knowledge

“According to Vedanta the truth about man is that he is Brahman, or Infinite Spirit. The cause of his bondage and suffering is ignorance of his real nature. Knowledge destroys this ignorance and Self-Realization immediately follows.

Spiritual disciplines purify the heart, train the aspirant in concentration, and thus create the necessary condition for the revelation of Knowledge, which always exists. Since the Self is by nature eternal and immortal, It cannot be the result of an antecedent cause.

Knowledge, Liberation, Self, and Consciousness all denote the same spiritual experience. Knowledge is the cause of Liberation only in a figurative sense. The attainment of Knowledge really means the rediscovery of Knowledge, which is never non-existent.”

~Nikhilananda (from commentary on Atmabodha) 

Absolutely Waiting for Godot

i.

What most think of as consciousness is really reflection of consciousness and such thinking is utterly superstitious and not nor ever can be proven by the church of scientific materialism. Consciousness is not a product of the body-mind as some ignorantly assume. But is the ground.

So here’s the rub. One could reasonably identify with the body-mind if all-knowing consciousness had been produced by it. But surprise, surprise, it wasn’t. And that’s disturbing to the general metaparadigm. I shouldn't take it personally.

If consciousness is actually the substrate to the superimposition of the body-mind, as the proverbial rope is to snake, as foundational awareness is to conceptual attention, then this congregation begins to question who am I. Waiting for absolution.

ii.

As atheism is the last refuge of a theist, nihilism is the final philosophy requiring personal deconstruction. Neti nihilism too. All views must pass. Awareness is unborn. Pure consciousness is the principle of existence. Satcitananda is nondual. I am Brahman.

iii.

Living like an individual in the indivisible is the only way to make a decent living in America these days. They say the lifeless moon is a spitting image of the sun but maya is more hydrologic. So much depends upon Satcitananda.

v 

Beyond the fire of the mind is the light of consciousness. Beyond the movie is the silver screen. Beyond the light of consciousness is the black whole of awareness.

Views on Cause and Effect

"The view that effects are different from their causes (asatkaryavada) is worse than the view that the effect is essentially identical with its cause (satkaryavada);

within the latter, the view that the cause transforms itself into its effect (parinamavada) is worse than the view that it manifests its appearance as effect without itself changing in so doing (vivartavada);

still, all views that take causation seriously are inferior to nonorigination (ajativada), since causal relations, as any relations, involve differences and are thus tinged with ignorance."

~Karl Potter

Nirguna Godhead and Saguna Idols

From the point of view of ignorance and illusion, avidya and maya,

the absolute godhead nirguna brahman is

endowed with attributes within this world of dreams

where its people call this manifestation of the absolute respectfully:

Isvara, Saguna Brahman, God, The Universe, and Ten Thousand Other Namarupa.

*

Basic Satcitananda

From the point of view of ignorance and illusion, avidya and maya, the absolute godhead nirguna brahman is endowed with attributes within this world of dreams where its people call this manifestation of the absolute respectfully: Isvara, Saguna Brahman, God, The Universe, and Ten Thousand Other Namarupa.

The absolute godhead is before the big bang of spacetime beyond the boundaries of humankind and world war mind as existence equals consciousness equals bliss your basic satcitananda and its experiential power of three.

Existence is the first principle. Consciousness is the ground of all knowing. Bliss is the essence of holistic infinity.

*

Sunnet

The sun illumines the solar system

but I illumine the sun.

I deconstruct the matrix

while avoiding the bends of belief.

I pledge myself to the principle of existence

and its effortless nondoing.

I stand on the ground of pure consciousness 

and intuitive nonknowing.

I breathe the essence of nonduality.

Breathe the essence of nonduality.