Secret Of Secrets
We are now at the halfway mark of the Bhagavad Gita. Arjuna started in total confusion and dilemma. His questions were varied and repetitive. It was as if he did not listen to what Krishna told him. As I said, questions arise from inner violence. They arise from the ego to prove one's correctness.
These questions gradually morph into doubts. Doubts are essential for any seeker. Doubt and faith are two sides of the same coin. Without doubt, we cannot develop faith. Blind faith will not help the seeker. It is just based upon social conditioning and will collapse under pressure. Real faith develops in the seeker when he sincerely questions spiritual truths. Raising sincere doubts before an enlightened master actually does a lot to integrate a person and strengthen his faith.
Krishna sees the change that is happening within Arjuna. He feels Arjuna's inner violence and conflict is clearing up and that his individual consciousness is opening. The master is ready to change gears now and take the dialogue to the next level that is needed to address this change in attitude.
In previous chapters Krishna explains to Arjuna how to act without attachment by renouncing the outcome of his actions to Existence. In the last chapter He provides Arjuna an understanding of the process of death and liberation. Now Krishna reveals to Arjuna the greatest of all secrets, the secret about Himself.
Q: Swamiji, you talked about the difference between questions and doubts and how Arjuna's questions change into doubts. Can you elaborate on this, please?
Secret of Secrets
When we are young, we question. Children continuously ask, 'Why is the sky so high or why is that cloud like a bird?' A child must be full of questions. That is the way intelligence flowers. Adults do not have answers to these questions most of the time, or if they do, they give foolish answers.
A child's questions are beyond logic. At least, we can attempt a rational, scientific answer if a child asks, 'Why is the sky blue?' However, if the child asks, 'Why is the sky so high?', what can we answer with our limited, logical mind? Since we cannot answer, we become upset and tell the child to keep quiet.
If we look at the question with the curiosity of a child, we go beyond our limited mind. This is how great scientists discover great truths. This is how Newton formulated the gravitational law. This is why Archimedes ran out of his bath naked.
A child questions in innocence. A child questions in curiosity. Often, it does not seek an answer. It expresses wonderment about what nature is. It is a blissful expression.
As the child grows up physically, he becomes conditioned by the people around him. He is constantly being told what to do and why and how. The conditioned child becomes a greedy and fearful adult.
A child has not created an identity around itself yet. Our identities are defined by our desires and the result of our desires. What we possess, what is 'mine' and what is 'ours', determines the opinion we have about ourselves. We are therefore poor or rich, powerful or inconsequential, and we behave appropriately to maintain that status.
As we grow up, we borrow and absorb the desires of others out of greed. We acquire and become fearful of losing what we have acquired. Our lives are driven by greed and fear. This mindset determines the identity of what we think we are and what we think we should be. We develop our egos and live in constant fear of losing that ego or identity.
This fear creates inner violence when our ego is threatened. Anything that threatens our status, our possessions, our desires and therefore, whatever threatens our identity, provokes inner violence. At the very least, this inner violence expresses itself as questions.
This is the basic difference between the questioning attitude of a child and the questioning attitude of an adult. The child comes from the position of curiosity and happiness. The adult reacts from his ego and inner violence.
Sit back and reflect upon what happens when someone questions our knowledge. Our knowledge is not a tangible possession. We think so highly of it and we are so dependent on it. When there is a challenge to it, we immediately become violent.
All knowledge is borrowed. What knowledge arises from the senses, through sensory inputs, seeing and hearing and so on, is from someone else. It is from somewhere else. It is borrowed. It is not ours to claim. So why should we become agitated when this borrowed knowledge is questioned?
But we assume responsibility for that knowledge because it has become another possession of ours. It forms part of our identity that we carefully build and nurture.
It takes wisdom and awareness to realize that this knowledge is like a castle built of cards. It requires inner awareness to know that it can crumble like a pack of cards that are stacked one on top of another. This wisdom is never borrowed. This wisdom comes from within. This wisdom arises through inner contemplation and meditation.
Once inner awareness blossoms, inner violence shrinks. We realize that there is no solid basis upon which our identity is built up. Life is ever-changing. Life is unpredictable, impermanent and uncontrollable. There is no identity that can be rigidly retained throughout one's life. As this awareness blooms, our questions turn to doubts.
Doubts are a reflection of our uncertainty about our identities. They reflect greater understanding of the reality of life. They arise not from inner violence but from growing awareness.
Sometimes disciples tell me how upset they are to have self-doubts about the spiritual path they have embarked upon. I tell them that it is a reflection of their growing faith. Faith and doubt are two sides of the same coin. We cannot have one without the other. We need to peel the layer of doubt to reveal the next layer of faith that in turn exposes another doubt. This process goes on until we discover that there is nothing at the core.
We reach where we belong: eternal bliss, nityānanda.
At the core, it is not faith born out of intellectual understanding or a greater emotional acceptance. Such faith, as I said, carries doubts with it. When our understanding becomes internalized and when it becomes a deeply experienced truth within us, then something deeper and stronger develops in our relationship with the master. We develop trust.
When both questions and doubts disappear, we are in a state of surrender. This is not a surrender arising from weakness. This is not a surrender that happens because we do not know which way to turn and where to go. Such surrender is foolish. That is the kind of surrender one has towards some authority or to religious and political power because one feels powerless and does not know what else to do. That is a surrender based on fear.
Surrender to the master is a surrender born out of courage. It arises out of deep conviction of knowing what to do and where to go. It is surrender with awareness.
Eternal And Easy