Re: Srila Bhakti Siddhant Saraswati Prabhupada

Initiation Into Spiritual Life 


BY SRILA BHAKTISIDDHANTA SARASVATI THAKURA

THE ceremony of diksha or  initiation is that by which the spiritual Preceptor  admits one to the status of a neophyte on the path of  spiritual endeavour. The ceremony tends to confer  spiritual enlightenment by abrogating sinfulness. Its  actual effect depends on the degree of willing  co-operation on the part of the disciple and is,  therefore, not the same in all cases. It does not  preclude the possibility of reversion on the novice to  the non-spiritual state, if he slackens in his effort or  misbehaves. Initiation puts a person on the true track  and also imparts an initial impulse to go ahead. It cannot, however, keep one going for good unless one  chooses to put forth his own voluntary effort. The  nature of the initial impulse also varies in accordance  with the condition of the recipient. But although the  mercy of the good preceptor enables us to have a glimpse  of the Absolute and of the path of His attainment, the  seed that is thus sown requires very careful tending  under the direction of the preceptor, if it is to  germinate and grow into the fruit-and-shade-giving tree.  Unless our soul of his own accord chooses to serve  Krishna after obtaining a working idea of his real  nature, he cannot long retain the Spiritual Vision. The  soul is never compelled by Krishna to serve Him. But initiation is never altogether futile. It changes  the outlook of the disciple on life. If he sins after  initiation, he may fall into greater depths of  degradation than the uninitiated. But although even  after initiation temporary set-backs may occur, they do  not ordinarily prevent the final deliverance. The  faintest glimmering of the real knowledge of the  Absolute has sufficient power to change radically and  for good the whole of our mental and physical  constitution and this glimmering is incapable of being  totally extinguished except in extraordinarily  unfortunate cases.

It is undoubtedly practicable for the initiated, if only  he is willing, to follow the directions of the preceptor  that lead by slow degrees to the Absolute. The good  preceptor is verily the savior of fallen souls. It is,  however, very rarely that a person with modern culture  feels inclined to submit to the guidance of another  specially in spiritual matters. But the very person  submits readily enough to the direction of a physician  for being cured of his bodily ailments. Because these  latter cannot be ignored without consequences that are  patent to everybody. The evil that results from our  neglect of the ailments of the soul is of a nature that  paralyses and deludes our understanding and prevents the  recognitions of itself. Its gravity is not recognized as  it does not apparently stand in the way of our worldly  activities with the same directness as the other. The  average cultured man is, therefore, at liberty to ask  questions without realizing any pressing necessity of  submitting to the treatment of spiritual maladies at the  hands of a really competent physician.

The questions that are frequently asked are as these:  �Why should it be at all necessary to submit to any  particular person or to subscribe to any particular  ceremony for the purpose of realizing the Absolute Who  by His nature in unconditioned? Why should Krishna  require our formal declaration of submission to Himself?  Would it not be more generous and logical to permit us  to live a life of freedom in accordance with the  principles of our perverted nature which is also His  creation. Admitting that it is our duty to serve  Krishna, why should we have to be introduced to Him by a  third party? Why is it impossible for one to serve Sri  Krishna directly?� It would no doubt be highly  convenient and helpful to be instructed by a good  preceptor who is well-versed in the Scriptures in  understanding the same. But one should never submit to  another to an extent that may furnish a rascal with an  opportunity of really doing harm. The bad preceptor is a  familiar character. It is inexplicable how those gurus  who live in open sin contrive nevertheless to retain the  unquestioning allegiance of the cultured portion of  their disciples.

Such being the case, can we blame any person who  hesitates to submit unconditionally to a preceptor,  whether he is good or bad? It is of course necessary to  be quite sure of the bonafide of a person before we  accept him even tentatively as our spiritual guide. A  preceptor should be a person who appears likely to  possess those qualities that will enablemhim it improve  our spiritual condition.

Those and similar thoughts are likely to occur to most  persons who havereceived an English education, when they  are asked to accept the help of any particular person as  his spiritual preceptor. The literature, science and art  of the West, body forth themprinciple of the liberty of  the individual and denounce the mentality that leads one  to surrender tohowever superior a person his right of  choosing his own course. They inculcate the necessity  and high value of having faith in oneself. But the good preceptor claims our sincere and complete  allegiance. The good disciple makes a complete surrender  of himself at the feet of the preceptor. But the  submission of the disciple is neither irrational or  blind. It is complete on condition that the preceptor  himself continues to be altogether good. The disciple  retains the right of renouncing his allegiance to the  preceptor the moment he is satisfied that the preceptor  is a fallible creature like himself. Nor does a good  preceptor accept any one as his disciple unless the  latter is prepared to submit to him freely. A good  preceptor is in duty bound to renounce a disciple who is  not sincerely willing to follow his instructions fully.  If a preceptor accepts as his disciple one who refuses  to be wholly guided by him, or if a disciple submits to  a preceptor who is not wholly good, such preceptor and  such disciple are, both of them, doomed to fall from  their spiritual state.

No one is a good preceptor who has not realised the  Absolute. One who has realised the Absolute is saved  from the necessity of walking on the worldly path. The  good preceptor who lives the spiritual life is,  therefore, bound to be wholly good. He should be wholly  free from any desire for anything of this world whether  good or bad. The categories of good and bad do not exist  in the Absolute. In the Absolute everything is good. We  can have no idea in our present state of this absolute  goodness. Submission to the Absolute is not real unless  it is also itself absolute. It is on the plane of the  Absolute that the disciple is required to submit  completely to the good preceptor. On the material plane  there can be no such thing as complete submission. The  pretence of complete submission to the bad preceptor is  responsible for the corruptions that are found in the  relationship of the ordinary worldly guru and his  equally worldly-minded disciples.

All honest thinkers will realise the logical propriety  of the position set forth above. But most persons will  be disposed to believe that a good preceptor in the  above sense may not be found in this world. This is  really so. Both the good preceptor and his disciple  belong to the spiritual realm. But spiritual  discipleship is nevertheless capable of being realised  by persons who belong to this world. Otherwise there  wold be no religion at all in the world. But because the  spiritual life happens to be realizable in this world it  does not follow that it is the worldly existence which  is capable of being improved into the spiritual. As a  matter of fact the one is perfectly incompatible with  the other. They are categorically different from one  another. The good preceptor although he appears to  belong to this world is not really of this world. No one  who belongs to this world can deliver us from  worldliness. The good preceptor is a denizen of the  spiritual world who has been enabled by the will of God  to appear in this world in order to enable us to realise  the spiritual existence.

The much vaunted individual liberty is a figment of the  diseased imagination. We are bound willingly or  unwillingly to submit to the laws of God in the material  as well as in the spiritual world. The hankering for  freedom in defiance of His laws is the cause of all our  miseries. The total abjuration of all hankering for such  freedom is the condition of admission to the spiritual  realm. In this world we desire this freedom but are  compelled against our will to submit to the inexorable  laws of physical nature. This is the unnatural state.  Such unwilling for forced submission does not admit us  into the spiritual realm. In this world the moral  principle, indeed claims our willing submission. But  even morality also is a curtailment of freedom  necessitated by the peculiar circumstances of this  world. The soul who does not belong to this world is in  a state of open or court rebellion against submission to  an alien domination. It is by his very constitution  capable of submitting willingly only to the Absolute. The good preceptor asks the struggling soul to submit  not to the laws of this world which will only rivet its  chains but to the higher law of the spiritual realm. The  pretence of submission to the laws of the spiritual  realm without the intention of really carrying them out  into practice is often mistaken for genuine submission  by reason of the absence of fullness of conviction. In  this world the fully convinced state is non-existent. We  are, therefore, compelled in all cases to act on  make-believes viz. the so-called working hypotheses. The  good preceptor tells us to change this method of  activity which we have learnt from our experience of  this world. He invites us first of all to be really and  fully informed of the nature and laws of the other world  which happens to be eternally and categorically  different from this phenomenal world. If we do not  sincerely submit to be instructed in the alphabets of  the life eternal but go on perversely asserting however  unconsciously our present processes and so-called  convictions against the instructions of the preceptor in  the period of novitiate we are bound to remain where we  are. This also will amount to the practical rejection of  all advice because the two worlds have nothing in common  though at the same time we naturally fail to understand  this believing all the time in accordance with our  accustomed methods that we are at any rate partially  following the preceptor. But as a matter of fact when we  reserve the right of choice we really follow ourselves,  because evenwhen we seem to agree to follow the  preceptor it is because he appears to be in agreement  withourselves. But as the two worlds have absolutely  nothing in common we are only under a delusion when we  suppose that we really understand the method or the  object of the preceptor or in other words reserve the  right of assertion of the apparent self. Faith in the  scriptures can alone help us in this otherwise  unpracticable endeavour. We believe in the preceptor  with the help of the shastras when we understand  neither. As soon as we are fully convinced of the  necessity of submitting unambiguously to the good  preceptor it is then and only then that he is enabled to  show us the way into the spiritual world in accordance  with the method laid down in the shastras of that  purpose which he can apply properly and without  perpetrating a fatal blunder in as much as he himself  happens to belong to the realm of the spirit. The crux of the matter lies not in the external nature  of the ceremony of initiation as it appears to us  because that is bound to be unintelligible to us being  an affair of the other world, but in the conviction of  the necessity and the successful choice of a really good  preceptor. We can attain to the conviction of the  necessity of the help of a good preceptor by the  exercise of our unbiased reason in the light of our  ordinary experience. When once this conviction has been  truly formed Sri Krishna Himself helps us in finding the  really good preceptor in two ways. In the first place he  instructs us as regards the character and functions of a  good preceptor through the revealed Shastras. In the  second place He Himself sends to us the good preceptor  himself at the moment when we are at all likely to  benefit by his instructions. The good preceptor also  comes to us when we reject him. In such cases also it is  certainly Krishna Who sends him to us for no reason  what-so-ever. Krishna has revealed from eternity the  tidings of the spiritual realm in the form of  transcendental sounds that have been handed down in the  records of the spiritual Scriptures all over the world.  The spiritual Scriptures help all those who are prepared  to exercise this reason for the purpose of finding not  the relative but the Absolute Truth to find out the  proper instructor in accordance with their directions.  The only good preceptor is he who can make us really  understand the spiritual scriptures and they enable us  realise the necessity and the nature of submission to  the processes laid down in them. But there is still  every chance of foul play.

A very clever man or a magician may pass himself off as  a person who can properly explain the Scriptures by  means of his greater knowledge or deceptive arts. It is  very important, therefore, that we should be on our  guard against such tricks. The Scholar as well as the  magician pretend to explain the Scriptures only in terms  of the object or happenings of this world. But the  Scriptures themselves declare that they do not tell us  at all of the thing of this world. Those who are liable  to be deluded by the arts of pervert yogis who persuade  themselves into believing that the spiritual is  identical with the perversion, distortion or defiance of  the laws of physical nature. The laws of physical nature  are not unreal. They govern the relation of all relative  existences(.) In our present state it is therefore,  always possible for another who possesses the power or  the knowledge to demonstrate the merely tentative  character of what we choose to regard as our deepest  convictions by exposing their insufficiency or  inapplicability. But such surprises as they belong to  the realm of the phenomenal, have nothing to do with the  Absolute. Those who have an unspiritual partiality for  scholarship or for magic fall into the clutches of the  pseudo-religionists. The serious plight of these victims  of their own perversity will be realised from the fact  that no one can be delivered from the state of ignorance  by the method of compulsion. It is not possible to save  the man who refuses on principle to listen to the voice  of reason. The empiric pedants are no exception to this  rule.

The plain meaning of the Shastras should, therefore, be  our only guide in the search of the good preceptor when  we actually feel the need of his guidance. The  Scriptures have defined the good preceptor as one who  himself leads the spiritual life. It is not any worldly  qualifications that make the good preceptor. It is by  unreserved submission to such a preceptor that we can be  helped to reenter into the realm that is our real home  but which unfortunately is veritable terra incognita to  almost all of us at present and also impossible of  access to one body and mind alike which is the result of  the disease of abuse of our faculty of free reason and  the consequent accumulation of a killing load of worldly  experiences which we have learnt to regard as the very  stuff of our existence.

Nitya-lila Om Visnupadea 108 Srila Prabhupada Bhakti  Siddhanta Sarasvati Thakura.


His Divine Grace Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura  has written:

THAKUR BHAKTIVINODE

"We avail of the opportunity offered by the Anniversary  Celebrations of the advent of Thakur Bhaktivinode to  reflect on the right method of obtaining those benefits  that have been made accessible to humanity by the grace  of this great devotee of Krishna. Thakur Bhaktivinode  has been specifically kind to those unfortunate persons  who are engrossed in mental speculation of all kinds.  This is the prevalent malady of the present Age. The  other Acaryas who appeared before Thakur Bhaktivinode  did not address their discourses so directly to the  empiric thinkers. They had been more merciful to those  who are naturally disposed to listen to discourses on  the Absolute without being dissuaded by the specious  arguments of avowed opponents of Godhead. Srila Thakur Bhaktivinode has taken the trouble of  meeting the perverse arguments of mental speculationists  by the superior transcendental logic of the Absolute  Truth. It is thuspossible for the average modern readers  to profit by the perusal of his writings. That day is  not far distant when the priceless volumes penned by  Thakur Bhaktivinode will be reverently translated, by  the recipients of his grace, into all the languages of  the world.

The writings of Thakur Bhaktivinode provide the golden  bridge by which the mental speculationist can safely  cross the raging waters of fruitless empiric  controversies that trouble the peace of those who choose  to trust in their guidance for finding the Truth. As  soon as the sympathetic reader is in a position to  appreciate the sterling quality of Thakur Bhaktivinode's  philosophy the entire vista of the revealed literatures  of the world will automatically open out to his  reclaimed vision.

There have, however, already arisen serious  misunderstandings regarding the proper interpretation of  the life and teachings of Srila Thakur Bhaktivinode.  Those who suppose they understand the meaning of his  message without securing the guiding grace of the Acarya  are disposed to unduly favour the methods of empiric  study of his writings. There are persons who have got by  heart almost everything that he wrote without being able  to catch the least particle of his meaning. Such study  cannot benefit those who are not prepared to act up to  the instructions lucidly conveyed by his words. There is  no honest chance of missing the warnings of Thakur  Bhaktivinode. Those, therefore, who are misled by the  perusal of his writings are led astray by their own  obstinate perversity in sticking to the empiric course  which they prefer to cherish against his explicit  warnings. Let these unfortunate persons look more  carefully into their own hearts for the cause of their  misfortunes.

The personal service of the pure devotee is essential  for understanding the spiritual meaning of the words of  Thakur Bhaktivinode. The Editor of this Journal,  originally started by Thakur Bhaktivinode, has been  trying to draw the attention of all followers of Thakur  Bhaktivinode to this all-important point of his  teachings. It is not necessary to try to place ourselves  on a footing of equality with Thakur Bhaktivinode. We  are not likely to benefit by any mechanical imitation of  any practices of Thakur Bhaktivinode on the opportunist  principle that they may be convenient for us to adopt.  The Guru is not an erring mortal whose activities can be  understood by the fallible reason of unreclaimed  humanity. There is an eternally impassable line of  demarcation between the Saviour and the saved. Those who  are really saved can alone know this.Thakur Bhaktivinode  belongs to the category of the spiritual world-teachers  who eternally occupy the superior position.

The present Editor has all along felt it his paramount  duty to try to clear up the meaning of the life and  teachings of Thakur Bhaktivinode by the method of  submissive listening to the Transcendental Sound from  the lips of the pure devotee. The Guru who realises the  transcendental meaning of all sounds, is in a position  to serve the Absolute by the direction of the Absolute  conveyed through every sound. The Transcendental Sound  is Godhead, the mundane sound is non-Godhead. All sound  has got these opposite aptitudes. All sound reveals its  Divine face to the devotee and only presents its  deluding aspect to the empiric pedant. The devotee talks  apparently the same language as the deluded empiric  pedant who had got by heart the vocabulary of the  Scriptures. But notwithstanding apparent identity of  performance, the one has no access to the reality while  the other is absolutely free from all delusion. Those who repeat the teachings of Thakur Bhaktivinode  from memory do not necessarily understand the meaning of  the words they mechanically repeat. Those who can pass  an empiric examination regarding the contents of his  writings are not necessarily also self-realised souls.  They may not at all know the real meaning of the words  they have learnt by the method of empiric study.Take for  example the Name "Krishna". Every reader of Thakur  Bhaktivinode's works must be aware that the Name  manifests Himself on the lips of His serving devotees  although He is inaccessible to our mundane senses. It is  one thing to pass the examination by reproducing this  true conclusion from the writings of Thakur Bhaktivinode  and quite another matter to realise the Nature of the  Holy Name of Krishna by the process conveyed by the  words.

Thakur Bhaktivinode did not want us to go to the clever  mechanical reciter of the mundane sound for obtaining  access to the Transcendental Name of Krishna. Such a  person may be fully equipped with all the written  arguments in explanation of the nature of the Divine  Name. But if we listen to all these arguments from the  dead source the words will only increase our delusion.  The very same words coming from the lips of the devotee  will have the diametrically opposite effect. Our empiric  judgment can never grasp the difference between the two  performances. The devotee is always right. The  non-devotee in the shape of the empiric pedant is always  and necessarily wrong. In the one case there is always  present the Substantive Truth and nothing but the  Substantive Truth. In the other case there is present  the apparent or misleading hypothesis and nothing but  un-truth. The wording may have the same external  appearance in both cases. The identical verses of the  Scriptures may be recited by the devotee and the  non-devotee, may be apparently misquoted by the  non-devotee but the corresponding valuesof the two  processes remain always categorically different. The  devotee is right even when he apparently misquotes, the  non-devotee is wrong even when he quotes correctly the  very words, chapter and verse of the Scriptures. It is not empiric wisdom that is the object of quest of  the devotee. Those who read the scriptures for gathering  empiric wisdom will be pursuing the wild goose chase.  There are not a few dupes of their empiric Scriptural  erudition. These dupes have their admiring under-dupes.  But the mutual admiration society of dupes does not  escape, by the mere weight of their number, the  misfortunes due to the deliberate pursuit of the wrong  course in accordance with the suggestions of our lower  selves.

What are the Scriptures? They are nothing but the record  by the pure devotees of the Divine Message appearing on  the lips of the pure devotees. The Message conveyed by  the devotees is the same in all ages. The words of the  devotees are ever identical with the Scriptures. Any  meaning of the Scriptures that belittles the function of  the devotee who is the original communicant of the  Divine Message contradicts its own claim to be heard.  Those who think that the Sanskrit language in its  lexicographical sense is the language of the Divinity  are as deluded as those who hold that the Divine Message  is communicable through any other spoken dialects. All  languages simultaneously express and hide the Absolute.  The mundane face of all languages hides the Truth. The  Transcendental face of all sound expresses nothing but  the Absolute. The pure devotee is the speaker of the  Transcendental language. The Transcendental Sound makes  His appearance on the lips of His pure devotee. This is  the direct, unambiguous appearance of Divinity. On the  lips of non-devotees the Absolute always appears in His  deluding aspect. To the pure devotee the Absolute  reveals Himself under all circumstances. To the  conditioned soul, if he is disposed to listen in a truly  submissive spirit, the language of the pure devotee can  alone impart the knowledge of the Absolute. The  conditioned soul mistakes the deluding for the real  aspect when he chooses to lend his ear to the  non-devotee. This is the reason why the conditioned soul  is warned to avoid all association with non-devotees. Thakur Bhaktivinode is acknowledged by all his sincere  followers as possessing the above powers of the pure  devotee of Godhead. His words have to be received from  the lips of a pure devotee. If his words are listened  from the lips of a non-devotee they will certainly  deceive. If his works are studied in the light of one's  own worldly experience their meaning will refuse to  disclose itself to such readers. His works belong to the  class of the eternal revealed literature of the world  and must be approached for their right understanding  through their exposition by the pure devotee. If no help  from the pure devotee is sought the works of Thakur  Bhaktivinode will be grossly misunderstood by their  readers. The attentive reader of those works will find  that he is always directed to throw himself upon the  mercy of the pure devotee if he is not to remain  unwarrantably self-satisfied by the deluding results of  his wrong method of study.

The writings of Thakur Bhaktivinode are valuable because  they demolish all empiric objections against accepting  the only method of approaching the Absolute in the right  way. They cannot and were never intended to give access  to the Absolute without help from the pure devotee of  Krishna. They direct the sincere enquirer of the Truth,  as all the revealed scriptures do, to the pure devotee  of Krishna to learn about Him by submitting to listen  with an open mind to the Transcendental Sound appearing  on His lips. Before we open any of the books penned by  Thakur Bhaktivinode we should do well to reflect a  little on the attitude, with which as the indispensable  pre-requisite, to approach its study. It is by  neglecting to remember this fundamental principle that  the empiric pedants find themselves so hopelessly  puzzled in their vain endeavour to reconcile the  statements of the different texts of the Scriptures. The  same difficulty is already in process of overtaking many  of the so-called followers of Thakur Bhaktivinode and  for the same reason.

The person to whom the Acarya is pleased to transmit  hispower is alone in a position to convey the Divine  Message. This constitutes the underlying principle of  the line of succession of the spiritual teachers. The  Acarya thus authorised has no other duty than that of  delivering intact the message received from all his  predecessors. There is no difference between the  pronouncements of one Acarya and another. All of them  are perfect mediums for the appearance of the Divinity  in the Form of the Transcendental Name Who is identical  with His Form, Quality, Activity and Paraphernalia. The Divinity is Absolute Knowledge. Absolute Knowledge  has the character of indivisible Unity. One particle of  the Absolute Knowledge is capable of revealing all the  potency of the Divinity. Those who want to understand  the contents of the volumes penned by the piece-meal  acquisitive method applicable to deluding knowledge  available to the mind on the mundane plane, are bound to  be self-deceived. Those who are sincere seekers of the  Truth are alone eligible to find Him, in and through the  proper method of His quest.

In order to be put on the track of the Absolute,  listening to the words of the pure devotee is absolutely  necessary. The spoken word of the Absolute is the  Absolute. It is only the Absolute Who can give Himself  away to the constituents of His power. The Absolute  appears to the listening ear of the conditioned soul in  the form of the Name on the lips of the sadhu. This is  the key to the whole position. The words of Thakur  Bhaktivinode direct the empiric pedant to discard his  wrong method and inclination on the threshold of the  real quest of the Absolute. If the pedant still chooses  to carry his errors into the Realm of the Absolute Truth  he only marches by a deceptive bye-path into the regions  of darker ignorance by his arrogant study of the  scriptures. The method offered by Thakur Bhaktivinode is  identical with the object of the quest. The method is  not really grasped except by the grace of the pure  devotee. The arguments, indeed, are these. But they can  only corroborate, but can never be a substitute for, the  word from the living source of the Truth who is no other  than the pure devotee of Krishna, the concrete Personal  Absolute. Thakur Bhaktivinode's greatest gift to the world  consists in this; that he has brought about the  appearance of those puredevotees who are, at present,  carrying on the movement of unalloyed devotion to the  Feet of Shree Krishna by their own wholetime spiritual  service of the Divinity. The purity of the soul is only  analogously describable by the resources of the mundane  language. The highest ideal of empiric morality is no  better than the grossest wickedness to the  Transcendental perfect purity of the bonafide devotee of  the Absolute. The word 'morality' itself is a  mischievous misnomer when it is applied to any quality  of the conditioned soul. The hypocritical contentment  with a negative attitude is part and parcel of the  principle of undiluted immorality.

Those who pretend to recognise the Divine Mission of  Thakur Bhaktivinode without aspiring to the  unconditional service of those pure souls who really  follow the teachings of the Thakur by the method  enjoined by the scriptures and explained by Thakur  Bhaktivinode in a way that is so eminently suited to the  requirements of the sophisticated mentality of the  present Age, only deceive themselves andtheir willing  victims by their hypocritical professions and  performances. These persons must not be confounded with  the bonafide members of the flock.

Thakur Bhaktivinode has predicted the consummation of  religious unity of the world by the appearance of the  only universal church which bears the eternal  designation of the Brahma Sampradaya. He has given  mankind the blessed assurance that all Theistic churches  will shortly merge in the one eternal spiritual  community by the grace of the Supreme Lord Shree Krishna  Chaitanya. The spiritual community is not circumscribed  by the conditions of time and space, race and  nationality. Mankind had been looking forward to this  far-off Divine Event through the Long Ages. Thakur  Bhaktivinode has made the conception available in its  practicable spiritual form to the open minded empiricist  who is prepared to undergo the process of enlightenment.  The key stone of the Arch has been laid which will  afford the needed shelter to all awakened animation  under its ample encircling arms. Those who would  thoughtlessly allow their hollow pride of race,  pseudo-knowledge or pseudo-virtue to stand in the way of  this long hoped for consummation, would have to thank  only themselves for not being incorporated in the  spiritual society of all pure souls. These plain words need not be misrepresented, by  arrogant persons who are full of the vanity of empiric  ignorance, as the pronouncements of aggressive  sectarianism. The aggressive pronouncement of the  concrete Truth is the crying necessity of the moment for  silencing the aggressive propaganda of specific untruths  that is being carried on all over the world by the  preachers of empiric contrivances for the amelioration  of the hard lot of conditioned souls. The empiric  propaganda clothes itself in the language of negative  abstraction for deluding those who are engrossed in the  selfish pursuit of worldly enjoyment.

But there is a positive and concrete function of the  pure soul which should not be perversely confounded with  any utilitarian form of worldly activity. Mankind stands  in need of that positive spiritual function of which the  hypocritical impersonalists are in absolute ignorance.  The positive function of the soul harmonises the claims  of extreme selfishness with those of extreme  self-abnegation in the society of pure souls even in  this mundane world. In its concrete realisable form the  function is perfectly inaccessible to the empiric  understanding. Its imperfect and misleading conception  alone is available by the study of the Scriptures to the  conditioned soul that is not helped by the causeless  grace of the pure devotees of Godhead." Srila Bhaktisiddhanta Sarasvati Thakura, The Harmonist, December 1931, vol. XXIX No.6





please forgive me posting nama bhajan I realise you already have it.

lowerthanarat

Comment on this Post