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JNÂNA YOGA

PART II

[Illustration: SWÂMI VIVEKÂNANDA]

VEDÂNTA PHILOSOPHY

JNÂNA YOGA

PART II

_SEVEN LECTURES_

BY

SWÂMI VIVEKÂNANDA

PUBLISHED BY

THE VEDÂNTA SOCIETY 135 West 80th Street NEW YORK

COPYRIGHT, 1907 BY SWÂMI ABHEDÂNANDA

NEW YORK THE BAKER & TAYLOR CO., 33 EAST 17TH ST.

EDITOR’S PREFACE

The lectures given in this volume were originally delivered by Swâmi Vivekânanda in New York in the beginning of 1896, and were received with the greatest enthusiasm. Their purely philosophical character, however, made it doubtful as to whether they would appeal to the general public, and for that reason they were not brought out in book form at once. The great success of the London lectures on Jnâna Yoga, which were published several years ago and which have already gone through two editions, now encourages the belief that this series will meet with an equally favorable reception. The conception of Jnâna according to Vedânta is a bold and daring one, and reaches the highest possible ideal, for it teaches the absolute unity of all existence. As will be easily understood by the students of the former volume, Jnâna Yoga is purely monistic on the highest spiritual plane. Speaking about this phase of Vedânta, Prof. Max Müller writes: “None of our philosophers, not excepting Heraclitus, Plato, Kant, or Hegel has ventured to erect such a spire, never frightened by storms or lightnings. Stone follows on stone in regular succession after once the first step has been made, after once it has been clearly seen that in the beginning there can have been but One, as there will be but One in the end, whether we call It Âtman or Brahman.” This may be a difficult thought for many to grasp at the outset, but it is worth careful study, and once understood will be a never-failing light to guide the enquiring soul to the crowning truth of all philosophy.

CONTENTS.

JNÂNA YOGA--PART II.

INTRODUCTION 9

I.

THE SÂNKHYA COSMOLOGY 21

II.

PRAKRITI AND PURUSHA 44

III.

SÂNKHYA AND ADVAITA 69

IV.

THE FREE SOUL 94

V.

ONE EXISTENCE APPEARING AS MANY 121

VI.

UNITY OF THE SELF 141

VII.

THE HIGHEST IDEAL OF JNÂNA YOGA 157

INTRODUCTION

This universe of ours, the universe of the senses, the rational, the intellectual, is bounded on both sides by the illimitable, the unknowable, the ever unknown. Herein is the search, herein are the inquiries, here are the facts, from this comes the light which is known to the world as religion. Essentially, however, religion belongs to the supersensuous and not to the sense plane. It is beyond all reasoning and is not on the plane of intellect. It is a vision, an inspiration, a plunge into the unknown and unknowable, making the unknowable more than known, for it can never be “known.” This search has been in the human mind, as I believe, from the very beginning of humanity. There cannot have been human reasoning and intellect in any period of the world’s history without this struggle, this search beyond. In our little universe, this human mind, we see a thought arise. Whence it arises we do not know, and when it disappears, where it goes we know not either. The macrocosm and the microcosm are, as it were, in the same groove, passing through the same stages, vibrating in the same key.

In these lectures I shall try to bring before you the Hindu theory that religions do not come from without, but from within. It is my belief that religious thought is in man’s very constitution, so much so that it is impossible for him to give up religion until he can give up his mind and body, until he can give up thought and life. As long as a man thinks, this struggle must go on, and so long man must have some form of religion. Thus we see various forms of religion in the world. It is a bewildering study, but it is not, as many of us think, a vain speculation. Amidst this chaos there is harmony, throughout these discordant sounds there is a note of concord, and he who is prepared to listen to it will catch the tone.

The great question of all questions at the present time is this: Taking for granted that the known and the knowable are bounded on both sides by the unknowable and the infinitely unknown, why struggle for that infinite unknown? Why shall we not be content with the known? Why shall we not rest satisfied with eating, drinking, and doing a little good to society? This idea is in the air. From the most learned professor to the prattling baby, we are told to do good to the world, that is all of religion, and that it is useless to trouble ourselves about questions of the beyond. So much is this the case that it has become a truism. But fortunately we _must_ question the beyond. This present, this expressed, is only one part of that unexpressed. The sense universe is, as it were, only one portion, one bit of that infinite spiritual universe projected into the plane of sense consciousness. How can this little bit of projection be explained, be understood, without knowing that which is beyond? It is said of Socrates that one day while lecturing at Athens, he met a Brahmin who had travelled into Greece, and Socrates told the Brahmin that the greatest study for mankind is man. The Brahmin sharply retorted: “How can you know man until you know God?” This God, this eternally unknowable, or absolute, or infinite, or without name,--you may call Him by what name you like,--is the rational, the only explanation, the _raison d’être_ of that which is known and knowable, this present life. Take anything before you, the most material thing; take one of the most material sciences, as chemistry or physics, astronomy or biology, study it, push the study forward and forward, and the gross forms will begin to melt and become finer and finer, until they come to a point where you are bound to make a tremendous leap from these material things into the immaterial. The gross melts into the fine, physics into metaphysics, in every department of knowledge.

Thus man finds himself driven to a study of the beyond. Life will be a desert, human life will be vain if we cannot know the beyond. It is very well to say: Be contented with the things of the present; the cows and the dogs are, and all animals, and that is what makes them animals. So if man rests content with the present and gives up all search into the beyond, mankind will have to go back to the animal plane again. It is religion, the inquiry into the beyond, that makes the difference between man and an animal. Well has it been said that man is the only animal that naturally looks upwards; every other animal naturally looks prone. That looking upward and going upward and seeking perfection are what is called salvation, and the sooner a man begins to go higher, the sooner he raises himself towards this idea of truth as salvation. It does not consist in the amount of money in your pocket, or the dress you wear, or the house you live in, but in the wealth of spiritual thought in your brain. That is what makes for human progress, that is the source of all material and intellectual progress, the motive power behind, the enthusiasm that pushes mankind forward.

Religion does not live in bread, does not dwell in a house. Again and again you hear this objection advanced, “What good can religion do? Can it take away the poverty of the poor”? Supposing it cannot, would that prove the untruth of religion? Suppose a baby stands up among you when you are trying to demonstrate an astronomical theorem, and says: “Does it bring gingerbread?” “No, it does not,” you answer. “Then,” says the baby, “it is useless.” Babies judge the whole universe from their own standpoint, that of producing gingerbread, and so are the babies of the world. We must not judge of higher things from a low standpoint. Everything must be judged by its own standard and the infinite must be judged by an infinite standard. Religion permeates the whole of man’s life, not only the present, but the past, present, and future. It is therefore the eternal relation between the eternal soul and the eternal God. Is it logical to measure its value by its action upon five minutes of human life? Certainly not. These are all negative arguments.

Now comes the question, can religion really accomplish anything? It can. It brings to man eternal life. It has made man what he is and will make of this human animal a god. That is what religion can do. Take religion from human society and what will remain? Nothing but a forest of brutes. Sense-happiness is not the goal of humanity; wisdom (Jnânam) is the goal of all life. We find that man enjoys his intellect more than an animal enjoys its senses, and we see that man enjoys his spiritual nature even more than his rational nature. So the highest wisdom must be this spiritual knowledge. With this knowledge will come bliss. All these things of this world are but the shadows, the manifestations in the third or fourth degree of the real Knowledge and Bliss.

One question more: What is the goal? Nowadays it is asserted that man is infinitely progressing, forward and forward, and there is no goal of perfection to attain to. Ever approaching, never attaining, whatever that may mean and however wonderful it may be, it is absurd on the face of it. Is there any motion in a straight line? A straight line infinitely projected becomes a circle, it returns to the starting point. You must end where you begin, and as you began in God, you must go back to God. What remains? Detail work. Through eternity you have to do the detail work.

Yet another question. Are we to discover new truths of religion as we go on? Yea and nay. In the first place we cannot know anything more of religion, it has all been known. In all the religions of the world you will find it claimed that there is a unity within us. Being one with divinity, there cannot be any further progress in that sense. Knowledge means finding this unity. I see you as men and women, and this is variety. It becomes scientific knowledge when I group you together and call you human beings. Take the science of chemistry, for instance. Chemists are seeking to resolve all known substances into their original elements and if possible to find the one element from which all these were derived. The time may come when they will find one element that is the source of all other elements. Reaching that, they can go no farther; the science of chemistry will have become perfect. So it is with the science of religion. If we can discover this perfect unity, there cannot be any farther progress.

The next question is can such a unity be found? In India the attempt has been made from the earliest times to reach a science of religion and philosophy, for the Hindus do not separate these as is customary in Western countries. We regard religion and philosophy as but two aspects of one thing which must equally be grounded in reason and scientific truth. In the lectures that are to follow I shall try to explain to you first the system of the _Sânkhya_ philosophy, one of the most ancient in India, or in fact in the world. Its great exponent Kapila is the father of all Hindu psychology and the ancient system that he taught is still the foundation of all accepted systems of philosophy in India to-day,--which are known as the _Dârsanas_. They all adopt his psychology, however widely they differ in other respects.

Next I shall endeavor to show you how Vedânta, as the logical outcome of the _Sânkhya_, pushes its conclusions yet farther. While its cosmology agrees with that taught by Kapila, the Vedânta is not satisfied to end in dualism, but continues its search for the final unity which is alike the goal of science and religion. To make clear the manner in which the task is accomplished will be the effort of the later lectures in this course.

I

THE SÂNKHYA COSMOLOGY

Here are two words, the microcosm and the macrocosm, the internal and the external. We get truths from both of these by means of experience; there is internal experience and external experience. The truths gathered from internal experience are psychology, metaphysics and religion; from external experience the physical sciences. Now a perfect truth should be in harmony with experience in both these worlds. The microcosm must bear testimony to the macrocosm, and the macrocosm to the microcosm; physical truth must have its counterpart in the internal world, and the internal world must have its verification in the outside. Yet as a rule we find that many of these truths are constantly conflicting. At one period of the world’s history the “internals” became supreme, and they began to fight the “externals;” at the present time the “externals,” the physicists, have become supreme, and they have put down many claims of the psychologists and metaphysicians. So far as my little knowledge goes, I find that the really essential parts of psychology are in perfect accordance with the essential parts of modern physical knowledge.

It is not given to every individual to be great in every respect; it is not given to the same race, or nation, to be equally strong in the research of all the fields of knowledge. The modern European nations are very strong in their researches into external physical knowledge, but the ancient Europeans were weak in their researches into the internal part of man. On the other hand, the Orientals have not been very strong in their researches in the external physical world, but have excelled in their researches into the internal, and therefore we find that some of the Oriental theories are not in accordance with Occidental physics, neither is Occidental psychology in harmony with Oriental teachings on this subject. The Oriental physicists have been criticised by Occidental scientists. At the same time each rests on truth, and, as we stated before, real truth in any field of knowledge will not contradict itself, the truths internal are in harmony with the truths external.

We know the present theories of the Cosmos according to the modern astronomers and physicists, and at the same time we know how wofully they hurt the old school of theologians, and how every new scientific discovery that is made is as a bomb thrown into their house, and how they have attempted in every age to put down all these researches. In the first place, let us go over the psychological and scientific ideas of the Orientals as to cosmology and all that pertains to it, and you will find how wonderfully it is in accordance with all the latest discoveries of modern science, and when there is anything lacking you will find that it is on the side of modern science. We all use the word Nature, and the old Hindu philosophers called it by two different names, _Prakriti_, which is almost the same as the English word “nature,” and by the more scientific name, _Avyaktam_ (“undifferentiated”), from which everything proceeds, out of which come atoms and molecules, matter and force, and mind and intellect. It is startling to find that the philosophers and metaphysicians of India ages ago stated that mind is but matter in a finer form, for what are our present materialists striving to do but to show that mind is as much a product of nature as the body? And so is thought; and we shall find by and by that the intellect also comes from the same nature which is called _avyaktam_, the undifferentiated.

The ancient teachers define _avyaktam_ as the “equilibrium of the three forces,” one of which is called _Sattva_, the second _Rajas_ and the third _Tamas_. _Tamas_, the lowest force, is that of attraction, a little higher is _Rajas_, that of repulsion, and the highest is the control of these two, _Sattva_, so that when the two forces, attraction and repulsion, are held in perfect control, or balance, by the _Sattva_, there is no creation, no movement; but as soon as this equilibrium is lost, the balance is disturbed and one of these forces gets stronger than the other. Then change and motion begin and all this evolution goes on. This state of things is going on cyclically, periodically; that is to say, there is a period of disturbance of the balance, when all these forces begin to combine and recombine, and this universe is projected; and there is also a period when everything has a tendency to revert to the primal state of equilibrium, and the time comes when a total absence of all manifestation is reached. Again, after a period, the whole thing is disturbed, projected outward, again it slowly comes out in the form of waves; for all motion in this universe is in the form of waves, successive rise and fall.

Some of these old philosophers taught that the whole universe quiets down for a period; others maintained that this quieting down applies only to systems. That is to say, that while our system here, this solar system, will quiet down and go back into that undifferentiated state, there are millions of other systems going the other way. I should rather follow the second opinion, that this quieting down is not simultaneous over the whole universe, but that in different parts different things are going on. But the principle remains the same, that all that we see, that Nature herself is progressing in successive rises and falls. The one stage, going back to the balance, to the perfect equilibrium, is called the end of a cycle. The whole _Kalpa_, the evolution and the involution, has been compared by theistic writers in India to the inbreathing and outbreathing of God; God, as it were, breathes out the universe, and it returns into Him again. When it quiets down, what becomes of the universe? It still exists, only in finer form, as it is called in Sanskrit, in the “causal state” (_Kârana Sarira_). Causation, time and space are still there, only they are potential. This return to an undifferentiated condition constitutes involution. Involution and evolution are eternally going on, so that when we speak of a beginning, we refer only to the beginning of a cycle.

The most extraneous part of the universe is what in modern times we call gross matter. The ancient Hindus called it the _Bhutas_, the external elements. There is one element which according to them is eternal; every other element is produced out of this one, and this eternal element is called _Âkâsa_. It is somewhat similar to the modern idea of ether, though not exactly the same. This is the primal element out of which everything proceeds, and along with this element there was something called _Prâna_: we shall see what it is as we go on. This _prâna_ and this _âkâsa_ eternally exist, and they combine and recombine and form all manifestation. Then at the end of the cycle everything subsides and goes back to the unmanifested form of _âkâsa_ and _prâna_. There is in the Rig Veda, the oldest scriptures in existence, a beautiful passage describing creation, and it is most poetical--“When there was neither ought nor nought, when darkness was rolling over darkness, what existed?” and the answer is given, “It (the Eternal One) then existed without motion.” _Prâna_ and _âkâsa_ were latent in that Eternal One, but there was no phenomenal manifestation. This state is called _Avyaktam_, which literally means “without vibration,” or unmanifested. At the beginning of a new cycle of evolution, this _avyaktam_ begins to vibrate and blow after blow is given by _prâna_ to the _âkâsa_. This causes condensation and gradually, through the forces of attraction and repulsion, atoms are formed. These in turn condense into molecules and finally into the different elements of Nature.

We generally find these things very curiously translated; people do not go to the ancient philosophers or to their commentators for their translation and have not learning enough to understand for themselves. They translate the elements as “air,” “fire,” and so on. If they would go to the commentators they would find that they do not mean anything of the sort. The _âkâsa_, made to vibrate by the repeated blows of _prâna_, produces _vâyu_ or the vibratory state of the _âkâsa_, which in turn produces gaseous matter. The vibrations growing more and more rapid generate heat, which in Sanskrit is called _tejas_. Gradually it is cooled off and the gaseous substance becomes solid, _prithivi_. We had first _âkâsa_, then came heat, then it became liquified, and when still more condensed appeared as solid matter. It goes back to the unmanifested condition in exactly the reverse way. The solids will be converted into liquid and the liquid into a mass of heat, that will slowly go back into the gaseous state, disintegration of atoms will begin, finally equilibrium of all forces will be reached, vibration will stop and the cycle of evolution which in Sanskrit is called _Kalpa_ is at an end. We know from modern astronomy that this earth and sun of ours are undergoing the same transitions, this solid earth will melt down and become liquid once more, and will eventually go back to the gaseous state.

_Prâna_ cannot work alone without the help of _âkâsa_. All that we know is that motion or vibration and every movement that we see is a modification of this _prâna_, and everything that we know in the form of matter, either as form or as resistance, is a modification of this _âkâsa_. This _prâna_ cannot exist alone, or act without a medium, but in every state of it, whether as pure _prâna_, or when it changes into other forces of nature, say gravitation or centrifugal attraction, it can never be separate from _âkâsa_. You have never seen force without matter or matter without force; what we call force and matter being simply the gross manifestations of these same things, which, when superfine, we call _prâna_ and _âkâsa_. _Prâna_ you can call in English the life, or vital energy, but you must not restrict it to the life of man, nor should you identify it with the spirit, _Âtman_. Creation is without beginning and without end; it cannot have either, it is an eternal on-going.

The next question that comes is rather a fine one. Some European philosophers have asserted that this world exists because “I” exist, and if “I” do not exist, the world will not exist. Sometimes it is expressed in this way; they say, if all the people in the world were to die, and there were no more human beings, and no animals with powers of perception and intelligence, all manifestations would disappear. It seems paradoxical, but gradually we shall see clearly that this can be proved. But these European philosophers do not know the psychology of it, although they know the principle; modern philosophy has got only a glimpse of it.

First we will take another proposition of these old psychologists which is rather startling, that the grossest elements are the _bhutas_, but that all gross things are the results of fine ones. Everything that is gross is composed of a combination of minute things, so the _bhutas_ must be composed of certain fine particles, called in Sanskrit the _tanmâtras_. I smell a flower; to smell that, something must come in contact with my nose; the flower is there and I do not see it move towards me; but without something coming in contact with my nose I cannot smell the flower. That which comes from the flower and into contact with my nose are the _tanmâtras_, fine molecules of that flower, so fine that no diminution can be perceived in the flower. So with heat, light, sight, and everything. These _tanmâtras_ can again be subdivided into atoms. Different philosophers have different theories, and we know these are only theories, so we leave them out of discussion. Sufficient for us that everything gross is composed of things that are very, very minute. We first get the gross elements, which we feel externally, and composing them are the fine elements, which our organs touch, which come in contact with the nerves of the nose, eyes and ears. That ethereal wave which touches my eyes, I cannot see, yet I know it must come in contact with my optic nerve before I can see the light. So with hearing, we can never see the particles that come in contact with our ears, but we know that they must be there. What is the cause of these _tanmâtras_? A very startling and curious answer is given by our psychologists,--self-consciousness. That is the cause of these fine materials, and the cause of the organs. What are these organs? Here is first the eye, but the eye does not see. If the eyes did see, when a man is dead, and his eyes are still perfect, they would still be able to see. There is some change somewhere; something has gone out of the man, and that something, which really sees, of which the eye is the instrument, is called the organ. So this nose is an instrument, and there is an organ corresponding to it. Modern physiology can tell you what that is, a nerve centre in the brain. The eyes, ears, etc., are simply the external instruments. It may be said that the organs, _Indriyas_, as they are called in Sanskrit, are the real seats of perception.