Atheists & Rationalists

It might be inferred, from what I’ve written in my previous posts, that men & women who endorse rationalism, atheism, & even Violence are, by that very reason, anathema to me.
Infact, it’s not so.

The rationalists, atheists, & even those who give a qualified acqueiscence to Violence, can be wonderful people, who deserve all our respect & admiration. I personally adore many of them.

My father is an atheist (for all practical purposes), and I myself was a staunch atheist-rational-egoist a few years back.

Certainly, today I think many of these people are mistaken in their views: but their philosophy has its own justification, its own powerful basis in reality. And a large number of them are people with enormous character & strength. They possess all those great virtues which we admire in a Man: aspiration to do something meaningful in life, tremendous endurance & tenacity, inexhaustible benevolence & deep respect for the sacrosanctity of the human personality, a strong sense of justice & an intransigent integrity, a passionate concern with ideas & indefatigable industriousness, independence of consciousness & a keen sensitivity to the finer things of life.

There are also many of them who lack generosity, tolerance (a quality which is an abomination to all mindless fanatics), ability to forgive & forget, and a self-induced callousness & cruelty. This, however, is not the rule, though it isn't the exception either.

So if I do indict rationalism, atheism, and Force & Violence - it's not necessary that I condemn & hate all rationalists, atheists, & the ones who give a QUALIFIED acquiescence to Force & Violence.

When it comes to atheists, I'd love to quote Victor Hugo, from "Les Miserables":

"There are, we know, mighty & illustrious atheists. These men, in fact, led round again towards truth by their very power, are not absolutely sure of being atheists, with them, the matter is nothing but a question of definitions, and at all events, if they do not believe in God, being great minds, they prove God. We hail, in them, philosophers, while, at the same time, inexorably disputing their philosophy."

Nothing could be truer, and no attitude of mind - healthier.

Take for instance the atheists who reject the existence of God by defining God as "Consciousness". While some modern philosophers might have made the gross error of calling God "Consciousness" - the fact is that this is not the definition of God at all, and never was. Not a single scripture has defined "God" as "Consciousness" - a relatively modern term, which evolved about the 17th century CE - with no strict correspondence in the ancient world. If one has to understand what God is, one has to go back to the source, the texts where this conception took its first complete shape, to those hoary sages & prophets & mystic-seers, almost non-existent for two millennia, who actually understood & apprehended God. They never do so. They can never extract any sentence from any primeval scripture which DEFINES "God" as "Consciousness" - and which defines Consciousness, or the procedure by which the definitions have been established. This is another example of the sheer ignorance & WILFUL REFUSAL of the so-called Rationalists, who pride themselves on focusing on "objective" reality, to search for the complete truth. Have they STUDIED the scriptures? Examined each & every statement & word in its depth? Been initiated into the mysteries of mystic knowledge? Pondered for years over the immortality of the soul? Known how & why the scriptures were written, and why only hieroglyphs & symbols were used, and not plain explanation of ideas? The real meaning of allegories & symbolic fantasies?

An appalling majority of them neither bother, nor think they ought to bother - and yet are ready to spit on, & malign, & misrepresent spiritual truths - condemn the scriptures & all mystic-seers - unload gallons of abuse on them & deny them a hearing - attribute the vilest & falsest of calumnies & conspiracies to them - or at best, dimiss them with repulsive pity, or a sarcastic laugh.

Truth & Reason?

Take for instance the absurd idea of the atheist-rationalist that "God is Unknowable". They reject God because they somehow think that according to the mystic, God is "Unknowable".

But then, how does the Vedantic seer say "Aham Brahmasmi" (Brihadaranyaka Upanishad, Yajur Veda) - "I am Brahman"? How on earth did he KNOW?

How does he say "Ayam Atma Brahma" (Mandukya Upanishad, Atharva Veda) - "This Self is Brahman"? (Self as in "Atma") How could he know without knowing Brahma (i.e. Brahman)?

Or take for instance the "Katha Upanishad". How does it make a statement like:- "When all desires that dwell within the human heart are cast away, then a mortal becomes immortal and (even) HERE HE ATTAINETH TO BRAHMAN."

Or, how does Yagyavalkya say:-

"Knowing that immortal Brahman, I am Immortal."

"They who know the life of life, the eye of the eye, the ear of the ear, and the mind of the mind, they have realized the ancient primordial Brahman."

The absurd, groundless hatred directed at India, and Indian ("Hindoo") culture becomes comprehensible only when one grasps that Indian civilization, philosophy & mysticism completely & totally demolishes the whole false structure of modern western Atheistic Rationalism, founded as it is on half-truths, distortions, misrepresentations, outright lies, and a laughable, pitiable ignorance. This hatred is to be found directed at the Orient in general - though it requires merely the effort to find a few good books, & now, a few websites, to see how passionately life-affirming, creative, inexhaustibly fertile, productive, & active - Oriental civilization (as also a large majority of Meso-American civilization) always was.

The rationalist, above all, seeks measurable, verbal, tangible & communicable CERTAINTY, not Absolute Truth. He doesn't like anything foggy or intangible. (Is it a concidence that the word "mystic" is so close to "misty"?) There's a great degree of weight in such a desire. Spirituality invariably descends into something as messy as black magic, astrology & prophecy, an obsession with karma & amulets & trinkets & talismans, and ALWAYS gets corrupted by aligning itself to politics & business. All this however, still does not negate the ultimate truth of scriptural wisdom. Nothing that is truly great is easy to achieve, the path is always very, very difficult - and if only a man or two can accomplish what Albert Einstein & Isaac Newton could (in the realm of intellect), only very few people can accomplish what Jesus or Lao Tzu did (in the field of spirituality). The difference lies in that in the realm of intellect, once an Albert Einstein or Werner Heisenberg has accomplished the original task, the rest of humanity has to merely understand the results, & repeat or apply, & at best, add to what they've given. I do not have to BECOME Einstein & repeat his struggle every step of the way, to understand what he did. I do not have to actually achieve his achievement. Not so in spirituality. Being a discipline of self-spiritual-development, each man has to BECOME Jesus or Sakyamuni, and do all that these men did, to achieve what they achieved. This is infinitely more difficult, and hence, while all of us may understand the Theory of Relativity, all of us can't see things clearly from Jesus' perspective. THIS is the crucial difference between mere intellectual striving, and spiritual self-development.

Certainty is not rejected by mysticism - but tangible, measurable certainty of the BASIS or starting-point of one's PURPOSE is. I really have no clue, in terms of realization with my whole being, if Brahman exists, though I CAN establish Its existence logically i.e. intellectually. And while I can percieve subtle changes in my whole being through the whole process of Yoga, it is only when I actually attain Moksha do I know that: Yes! Brahman IS, and THIS is Brahman. There is no greater certainty than this, in a Man's life. The point is that the rationalist thinks that only the Measurable & Finite exists, though, by his own terms, the Universe itself is Immeasurable (in time & space), and hence, Infinite. To the proposition that the non-measurable exists, for e.g., in emotions, or, in the phenomenon of consciousness itself, all he can do is vomit barrels of abuse on mystics as mind-haters, life-haters, man-haters. He avoids the infinite because of fear & underconfidence, or (in certain cases) the desire to mislead people & to propagate his own agenda, not because of rationality.

He does not seem to appreciate the idea that THAT which is the root & cause of, & the force behind & uniting ALL laws, all forces, all phenomenon, all forms, all levels of existence (both matter & consciousness), all of time & space - can neither be percieved by any one, or any combination, of sense-organs, or analyzed by the mind, and is not measurable, since it comprehends all measurement. It is apprehended, in its turn, by the whole being of Man, and not any specific separable part or element in him, or any limited combination of them. Hence, it cannot be tangible, or communicable (as an explanation of its specific, separative features or workings), or reduced to mathematical formulas.

This post has reached that point, where it would be undesirable to stretch it any longer, so I must halt. The thrust actually was, that the atheists & rationalists whom we come across in life (except certain specific ideological groups, or cults), are NOT people to be hated, or rejected, or disrespected. They are often excellent human beings, who truly seek the welfare of the world, and work hard for it. Their hatred against mysticism is often founded on a mistaken confusion of the obscene corruption of organized religion & certain mystery cults, for spiritualism itself, or the actual esoteric, mystic wisdom itself. But Innocent III is not St. Paul, and some pot-bellied, pig-tailed, saffron-robed, greedy, obese Brahmin spitting venom on Untouchables & lamenting that some member of a lower caste crossed his shadow, is not Veda Vyasa or Krishna. Jesus did NOT institute the Roman Catholic Church. The man who said "I and My Father are One" is not the man who established the Inquisition, and there is no deeper, ideological connection between their views. The hatred directed against the corruptions & falsehoods of organized, dogmatized religion is justified, and sacred - but the rejection of the baby with the bathwater is either innocently but seriously erroneous, or outright evil. In either case, it can have disastrous consequences, unless redeemed by an all-embracing Christian love (like that in the atheist Baba Amte) - by a passionate reverence for human life - by a fiery zeal to expand the human mind in its quest for ever-increasing comprehension of Nature's deepest laws & those of the totality of human life, i.e. for greater & greater Knowledge - & by a vast love for the liberation of the human mind, conscience & life unto ever-widening Wisdom & Truth.

Self-realization & self-expansion

My affirmation of ancient Hindu philosophy, Buddhism & Christianity is rooted in its grasp of the timeless truth that self-realization is self-expansion.

Growth is enlargement, and joy is contained in expansion.

This is not a growing big in physical dimensions, but an extension of limits, of pushing back horizons, of stretching the diameter of the circle of our consciousness, of breaking down walls & hacking away the obstructing brushes towards new landscapes.

This, in turn, is not conquest by subjugation - not establishing mastery over things.

Because mastery over things is nothing but making permanent our separativeness from them, of asserting our isolated existence over theirs.

It is establishment of the reign of fear - the fear of conflict & the fear of loss of control.

Therefore conquest is synonymous with despoilation, ravishment, plunder, loot, degradation. Conquest demands an adversary who poses a threat and a challenge of destruction. And an adversary is one whom we fear, however weak it might be, and however strong we might think we are, in our arrogant self-delusion.

Ancient spirituality, or mystical philosophy - or whatever you may chose to call it - sought to establish harmony not by recognizing (or holding as the primary focus) the conflict aspect of things - but the relatedness & harmony which exists between the all. It sought to solve the problem of fear not by being conscious of it every moment & fighting it, but by rooting it out of man's consciousness, & from the very face of existence. By being conscious of the fact that, in the ultimate, there is no cause for fear, and there is nothing to be feared. It sought to solve the problem of death not by affirming it completely, but by extinguishing death itself. And that was the great achievement of Jesus Christ: Jesus' triumph over death is the triumph of love over fear - of ultimate truth above superficial fact.

And thus, enlargement in a Sakyamuni or a Jesus did not take the form of establishing or setting up borders beyond borders, but by annihilating all borders.

Man is an Ocean, say the poets: the sages correct: Man is an endless ocean.

This idea of IMMENSITY was what attracted me first, and drew me in.

They who loved God were those who were aching to grow into the boundless: in them the principle of expansion knew that never through the use of his rational faculty, by intellectual analysis, by words & mathematics, by the use of his senses & limbs - can the INDIVIDUAL reach the ENDLESS with the totality of his being. Never can the senses & mind comprehend the All. For, by its very nature, the body & mind cannot deal with the totality as one - it can only deal with parts, fragments, and only in terms of bits & pieces of knowledge, however titanic & sophisticated. They knew that the principle of freedom, & rebellion against the unchosen tyranny of law, was rooted in a different realm altogether, and in that source was their final aim. That, in the ultimate, nature did not have be conquered to annul its tyranny, but had to be transcended.

Law rests on difference, and a philosophy of power rests on differentiation.

Recognition of difference rests on recognition of separativeness, of potential & actual conflict of interests. There is a difference between the I and the Non-I. The I is perishable, and seeks to continue. The Non-I is perishable, and seeks to continue, or isn't aware of the I, at all. Hence the difference, hence fear, hence the quest power, hence the struggle of conquest.

If my I is imperishable - if I am immortal - I destroy fear.

If the Non-I is fundamentally One with me - if I am infinite - I love.

And thus, the problem of difference found its true solution in realization of the fundamental non-existence of difference, in grasp of fundamental unity. That is, the philosophy of love.

The wisdom of old sought to solve problem of extension not by finalizing differences, but by finalizing identity. And that could only lead to love for the All.

In psychological terms, Christianity realized that Love is the force through which man grows into infinity, grows wide - large - in the highest sense of the term. It is the force through which he keeps growing into a wider, more expansive 'ME'. For Love happens only when the boundaries between the Me and the Non-Me dissolve; and active love is the force which dissolves the difference between Me & Non-Me.

True self-expansion is expansion in love & sympathy & relatedness - which is an ever-growing internal realization of love for all - an ever-growing sense of deathelessness & fearlessness.

Love is possible only when there is no Fear. The lesser we fear, the more we love. And fear rests on difference, on separativeness, on a false idea of self & life - on egoity, mortality & finiteness.

Love for the All is an expression of a man's infinity & immortality.

And that's why I do affirm that the highest truth of self-realization is to be found in the Vedas & Upanishads, in the Sutras, and in the New Testament.

A few verses from Sri Aurobindo

Mysticism, or Spirituality, is about transformation of consciousness.
About re-defining one's relationship with reality.
With a radical & fundamental re-definition of self & reality itself.
THIS has to be understood. Then one can easily percieve that there is no fundamental conflict between mysticism & rationality: there cannot be.
The conflict is only between a Jesus who HAS grasped this new truth, this new view - and the rest of humanity, which hasn't.
Man enlarges the very context of his being & existence, in mysticism; rather, he adds to the context: he discovers new contexts to his own being & existence: he sees himself from new perspectives.
He discovers unsuspected truths about himself, his very identity, his powers of apprehending truth.
It's not (primarily) about HOW to deal with reality - which is of crucial importance nevertheless - but WHAT is reality itself.
It's the discovery of a totally different face or aspect of reality.
And that's why, Sri Aurobindo wrote (I'm quoting out of Fritjof Capra's "The Tao of Physics"): "All things in fact begin to change their nature & appearance; one's whole experience of the world is radically different ... There is a new vast & deep way of experiencing, seeing, knowing, contacting things."
The whole objective is to EXPERIENCE REALITY IN A TOTALLY DIFFERENT WAY: & the importance of the objective lies in that in mysticism man seeks to experience ULTIMATE REALITY: it is his direct, total EXPERIENCE of reality in its very essence, its very root.
It is not UNDERSTANDING reality in the sense of being able to formulate, mathematize, & explain the processes of its working, to explicate its laws & so on: but KNOWING REALITY - TO EXPERIENCE WHAT IT ESSENTIALLY, FUNDAMENTALLY IS, in its TOTALITY, as ONE, COMPLETE WHOLE.
Not description or analysis, but plain & simple experience of the totality of reality by the totality of our being.

Here are a few lines from "Savitri", Aurobindo's magnum opus, which I've been trying to read for a while.
It's very heavy, very difficult to read at one stretch, and my own effort is broken & a little disjointed because I've to pay attention to other theoritical subjects which are of greater immediate, pressing importance.
But these lines are just fabulous:

Our souls can visit in great lonely hours
Still regions of imperishable Light.
All-seeing eagle-peaks of silent Power
And moon-flame oceans of swift fathomless Bliss
And calm immensities of spirit space.
... ... ....
In the unfolding process of the Self
Sometimes the inexpressible Mystery
Elects a human vessel of descent.
... ... ...
A breath comes down from the supernal air,
A Presence is born, a guiding Light awakes,
A stillness falls upon the instruments:
Fixed, motionless like a marble monument,
Stone-calm, the body is a pedestal
Supporting a figure of eternal Peace.
... ... ...
Or a revealing force sweeps blazing in;
Out of some vast superior continent
Knowledge breaks through trailing its radiant seas;
And Nature trembles with the power, the flame.

Or,

In moments when the inner lamps are lit
And life's cherished guests are left outside,
Our spirit sits alone & speaks to its gulfs.

Or, these poetic lines of unparalleled beauty glorifying the heroic in man:

His days were a long growth to the Supreme.
A skyward being nourishing its roots
On sustenance from occult spiritual founts
Climbed through white rays to meet an unseen Sun.
His soul lived as eternity's delegate,
His mind was like a fire assailing heaven,
His will a hunter in the trails of light.
An ocean impulse lifted every breath;
Each action left the footprints of a god,
Each moment was a beat of puissant wings.

There are a lot, lot more, but I'll put them up or just express my thoughts on them later.

SOME INDICATIONS OF THE TRUE NATURE OF GOD

"All this is Brahman immortal, naught else; Brahman is in front of us, Brahma behind us, and to the south of us and to the north of us and below us and above us; it stretches everywhere. All this is Brahman alone, all this magnificent universe."
(MUNDAKA UPANISHAD, Aurobindo's translation)

"She said to him, 'It is the Eternal. Of the Eternal is this victory in which ye shall grow to greatness.' Then alone he came to know that he was Brahman."
(KENA UPANISHAD, Aurodindo's translation)

"OM is this imperishable Word, OM is the Universe, and this is the exposition of OM.
The past, present & the future, all that was, all that is, all that will be, is OM.
Likewise all else that may exist beyond the bounds of Time, that too is OM."
(MANDUKYA UPANISHAD, Aurobindo's translation)

"All this universe is the Eternal Brahman, this Self is the Eternal, and the Self is four-fold".
(MANDUKYA UPANISHAD, Aurobindo's translation)

"In the beginning the Spirit was One and all this (universe) was the Spirit; there was nought else that saw..."
(AITERIYA UPANISHAD, Aurobindo's translation)

BEYOND THE CONFINES OF OUR NARROW EGOCENTRIC SELF - Written in May 2006

Driving down one of the busiest streets in Delhi, I noticed on the branches of trees that flanked the road, the arrival of spring.

Brilliant green shoots - trembling little droplets of green light - had begun to make their first bashful but joyous appearance on the boughs - glistening an almost blinding phosphorescent in the rays of an early spring Sun.

When I pointed out to my friend the sheer beauty & luminosity of the burgeoning life blossoming at the fringes of the bare branches, he merely nodded, and continued to drive, concentrating on the jangling traffic ahead.

It pained me to see that this magnificent offering of Nature - so powerful & yet so delicate, so joyous & yet so muted, so fervent & yet so reticent - had no taker, no grateful spectator - evoked no loving response from the millions of hearts that sped by everyday.

And that made me think: weren't those trees, in a sense, lonely? Weren't they, as it were, waiting for the touch of a beloved who had expired, never to return, never to pay the tribute of his love?

Waiting for a touch of comprehension? Of love?

Like a beautiful woman unnoticed & unseen by legions of blind men who pass by her without ever being aware of her existence, her beauty, of the longing in her heart?

And further, thought I, how is it that these men - empowered with science & technology - so energetic in their pursuit of some abstract notion they call "life" - how is it that they do not find it in their hearts, and in their souls, to even notice this glowing statement of the universe - this "Here I am" - beyond the narrow, stifling confines of their lives?

This indifference, & disparagement, is symptomatic of the blindness of Man & the self-interment of his essential Self in today's age. It is an indication of a certain spiritual disease that has infected human society the world over.

Indeed, as in our life, our consciousness has got restricted to closed, claustrophobic spaces: the constricted spaces of our cars, our pigeon-hole city apartments, & most of all, by our office cubicles...

These symbols of modern civilization in which our lives are moulded, have shaped & narrowed down our spiritual vision too.

The universe - the vast, limitless Being beyond - is no more than a vague, impersonal abstraction.

And what is worse, this sense of the unreality of the world begins just outside our doorstep.

A man's universe today is limited to his cubicle.

The breadth of his consciousness, his sense of Self, is no larger or wider.

Everything beyond is an abstraction to be analyzed & be made use of - a quarry to be mined - an object to be used & discarded.

What of that sublime spiritual vision in which every entity, every leaf of grass, every sunbeam of the universe vibrated with life, and had a deep meaning for Man's innermost soul - so profoundly articulated in our scriptures?

What about that sacred sense of life in which Man beheld in every apparently small & insignificant detail of a living, breathing Universe, a call of Love, a call of Union with the One & the All?

What about the that highest extension of consciousness in which every half-open bud, every speckle of foam on the crest of a frolicking wave of the sea - conveyed a message of Love from the Beyond - from the Unobtrusive, Silent Creator of countless worlds?

The loss of this holiest of all perspectives has robbed us of our capacity to see the Life & Breath beyond the cubicle of our narrow self as something vital - connected to us in a deep, ineffable way - fundamental to our being - personal.

Something to be seen, touched, loved, & nurtured.

The loss of our capacity to connect to the whole wide world beyond our stifling cubicles has rendered our lives lonely & desolate - and above all, has strangled the Lover in our souls.

The Lover who connects & heals - who lives in infinite sympathy & joyous relatedness with the whole of mankind - who sees in men not just distant obstacles & opportunities, but living reflections of himself.

The Lover who sees the soul in the heart of creation - the Person in every man - the Humanity of humanity.

For the capacity to reach out to Nature springs from the same source, the same element in us, which enables us to reach out to other human beings, to mankind, to the whole Universe - to the whole of Infinity; indeed, to God.

And it is from this element that comes our love for the Right, the Just, the Beautiful, & the Vast.

This element, this fountainhead of all Life in the world, is called the Self - Brahman - by our greatest sages-seers.

Our society today is essentially a society of constricted consciousness.

We can see the results of this constriction all around us.

We do not even think of another man's suffering until it affects an iota of our smug, indifferent, narcissistic contentment.

We live in a seemingly endless darkness of oblivion, of blind indifference, of tortured frustration, asphyxiating our own capacity to Love, & to Give.

We rave & rant about a "dog-eat-dog world", about life being a rat-race: & try as hard as possible to become so many dogs & rats.

Justice, Freedom, Joy & Harmony are made possible only through an extension of consciousness - in the reaching out of our hearts to the heart of the universe - in the embarking by our Soul on a journey to the Soul residing deep in the innermost niche of every particle of Creation.

Let us come out of the cubicle, the box, the throttling Definition that we mould ourselves in.

An infinity, an eternity of Joy & Love & Life is waiting for us - to be emancipated, to be known, to be realized - through ever-increasing Love & Sympathy - not only out there, in the limitless tracts of space beyond our petty-little egocentric selves - but here, deep in the cave within our own hearts.