Vedanta
Vedanta is a science of in-depth inquiry into the human being.
Introduction
Over unbroken centuries down to our own day, the sages of Vedanta, the rishis, have probed the nature of the human being in minute detail, reaching conclusions unparalleled in history, and placing at everyone's disposal the vast legacy of the tireless work and example of these sages, saints and scientists.
Vedanta developed as an oral tradition in India for many centuries before it was written down. Its teachings were preserved in the commentaries and texts of Indian sages and philosophers such as Shankara, Ramanuja and Madhva. In this field nothing rests on imagination or on any kind of belief, faith or authority. Every step of its disciplines can be verified, every experiment repeated at any time. This legacy is deeply practical, because it allows each of us to discover our intrinsic potential, work on our own improvement and overcome every kind of limitation, becoming better, happier, broader, more harmonious, more peaceful and more successful human beings.
The Sanskrit word Vedanta combines two others: Veda, the eternal source of knowledge, and anta, "the final part" or "the essence". The name was given because Vedanta centres on the teachings of the Upanishads, the last texts of the Vedas, which present a philosophical and spiritual vision of the world. So Vedanta means the essence of the Vedas, their deepest content. Here "knowledge" does not mean the limited knowledge we gain from merely reading books. It means understanding the Self in depth: knowledge of oneself, of our real nature and capacities, grounded in serious, deep and sustained inquiry.
We may say that Vedanta provides a rational basis for understanding God, that Sri Ramakrishna revived the practical methods for realising the divinity of man, and that Vivekananda combined these elements attractively, giving people a practical path suited to their individual differences. Knowledge may be secular or spiritual, but for Vedanta all knowledge is sacred. We may begin with secular knowledge and continue the search towards the spiritual. Vedanta, then, is the search for deep knowledge of the Self.
We want the truth of things, not mere opinions or beliefs. If we hold a belief, is it true? Anyone can believe, but is the belief true? That is what science does: any belief that can be put to the test contributes to science and then becomes a true belief. If our belief rests on truth, can we demonstrate it? The answers to these questions are simply wonderful, and they are tremendously relevant to our search for the highest truth.
The more knowledge we gain, the more wealth we can create and share. Apart from efficient work inspired by knowledge, there is no other way to reach fullness of life. Self-knowledge is the supreme value, the greatest and most splendid achievement of life.
In practice, we can highlight the following principles:
- Know yourself. Practise self-analysis, reflection and meditation to understand more deeply who we are beyond our personal identity. Knowing oneself, one can experience one's connection with the universe and with the divine.
- Selfless service. Help others without expecting reward or recognition. Selfless service is seen as a form of worship of the divinity present in all beings: we are all one.
- Renunciation. The word may frighten some people, but what is at stake is setting aside worldly preoccupations to focus on the spiritual quest. It may include letting go of desires and material attachments to concentrate on spiritual growth. Whenever we have a higher goal, we put the essential before what is merely secondary.
- Cultivating spiritual qualities such as love, compassion, truthfulness, peace and non-violence. These qualities are seen as essential both for spiritual illumination and for personal growth, and are cultivated through meditation, reflection and spiritual practice under the guidance of the guru.
The spiritual life is truly a great adventure. It is demanding, but if we work at it patiently we will find the effort infinitely rewarding.
Some key concepts and terms
Brahman (the spiritual ground of the universe)
Vedanta observed that everything manifested in the world, and the world itself, is constantly changing, and concluded that whatever changes has a beginning in time and an end. Everything changes and everything will pass; in this world we are all passing through. But is there anything that does not change, that has neither beginning nor end, that is eternal and permanent? Vedanta answers with an emphatic yes: at the core of every being, in the deepest and most hidden Self of every creature, lies the same single, undivided Reality, whose nature is pure consciousness, eternal and unconditioned, beyond all space, time and causation. It is this supreme consciousness that manifests itself as the world, as creatures, as body, mind, the elements and nature itself. This is Vedanta's concept of divinity, the meaning of the word God. The Sanskrit term for this transcendent, impersonal reality is Brahman, the divine ground of being.
Brahman is only a word; we could just as well call God "x" or "y". But the word Brahman carries a powerful meaning: it comes from the Sanskrit brihat, something expansive, great, infinite, something that embraces this whole universe within and without. Brahman stands for the ultimate reality of the universe. Happily, in India this reality is not extra-cosmic. There is no God set against the universe; the universe came from God and is not different from God. That is the teaching of the Upanishads. Close your eyes and you see Brahman; open them and you see the same Brahman in the names and forms around you. From Brahman the universe came, in Brahman it rests, and into Brahman it returns.
The supreme oneness of all things
In the Upanishads we receive this knowledge as the highest truth. Nothing further can exist once you reach oneness. The Indian sages discovered this universal oneness by investigating the depth of the human being and finding the infinite, imperishable, non-dual dimension of what we experience as our self. Seen through the senses, it is finite; looked into more deeply, it reveals its infinite dimension, just as above the waterline we see only the tip of a rock, but searching below we realise its immense size.
This supreme oneness, between the universe and Brahman, between the human soul and the Soul of all souls, is condensed in the "great sayings" of the Upanishads, the mahavakyas: in the Chandogya (6.8.7), Tat tvam asi, "Thou art That"; in the Mandukya (2), Ayam Atma Brahma, "This Self is Brahman"; in the Brihadaranyaka (1.4.10), Aham Brahmasmi, "I am Brahman"; and in the Aitareya (3.1.3), Prajnanam Brahma, "Consciousness is Brahman". Another great saying, in the Mundaka (2.2.11), declares Brahmaivedam amritam, "All this manifested universe is the immortal Brahman." Brahman is of the nature of sat (existence), chit (consciousness) and ananda (bliss). All the joys we obtain through the senses are only drops of this infinite bliss of Brahman, Vedanta boldly proclaims.
The greatest temple of God is the human heart
Pure, perfect, free from limitation, our essential being is one with the Supreme Spirit. The greatest temple of God is the human heart, and the goal of life is to manifest this inherent divinity. Consciously or unconsciously, every human being moves towards expressing it, for it is our true nature. Brahman is infinite existence, consciousness and bliss, says Vedanta. This reality is transcendent and impersonal. Yet Vedanta also holds that God can be personal, taking human form in different ages. Most importantly, God dwells in our hearts as the divine Self, the Atman, never born and never dying, untouched by our failings or by the changes of our bodies and minds.
The eternal moral order
The Vedas also declare that God is the creator and upholder of rita, the eternal moral order. The whole universe is governed by rita; all the laws that keep order in this universe and in the subtler worlds are included in it, and no one in the universe can escape this moral law. Hinduism therefore regards infinite consciousness as the very foundation of ethics and morality.
The ability to form happy relationships with others is a spiritual capacity; it does not come from the intellect. A person of great learning may be quite petty; great erudition and pettiness can go together. But when your spiritual awareness awakens, even a little, you begin to feel your oneness with everything around you. Here we witness the birth of true values in human life, a great lesson we must learn. A healthy society should give a place of honour to those who have advanced in the spiritual life and realised this truth, for they can truly bring about the essential changes we all need.
This kind of knowledge must reach every person in every part of the world, and that is what is happening in our modern age. Books on the subject are appearing in profusion all over the world, and one day they will make an impact on the human mind, especially when we face problems that ordinary knowledge cut off from wisdom cannot solve. We need a deeper, scientific and practical philosophy to help us find lasting solutions. As the agnostic Bertrand Russell said: "Unless men increase in wisdom as much as in knowledge, increase of knowledge will be increase of sorrow."
Maya
Vedanta declares that our real nature is divine: pure, perfect, eternally free. We do not have to become Brahman; we are Brahman. Our true Self, the Atman, is one with Brahman. But if our real nature is divine, why are we so unaware of it? The answer lies in the concept of maya, or ignorance. Maya is the veil that covers our real nature and the real nature of the world around us. Maya is fundamentally inscrutable: we do not know why it exists or when it began. What we do know is that, like any ignorance, maya vanishes with the dawn of knowledge, the knowledge of our divine nature.
Brahman is the very truth of our existence: in Brahman we live and move and have our being. "All this is indeed Brahman," declare the Upanishads, the scriptures on which the philosophy of Vedanta rests. The changing world around us can be compared to the images moving on a cinema screen: without the unchanging screen behind them there can be no film. In the same way, behind this changing world, it is the unchanging Brahman, the substratum of existence, that gives the world its reality. For us, however, this reality is conditioned, like a distorting mirror, by time, space and causation, the law of cause and effect. Our vision of reality is further clouded by a mistaken identification: we identify ourselves with body, mind and ego instead of with the Atman, the divine Self.
This original misperception creates more ignorance and pain, in a chain reaction: identifying with body and mind, we fear disease, old age and death; identifying with the ego, we suffer anger, hatred and a hundred other torments. Yet none of this touches our real nature, the Atman. Maya can be compared to clouds covering the sun: the sun remains in the sky, but thick cloud keeps us from seeing it. When the clouds disperse, we realise the sun was there all along. Our clouds, maya appearing as selfishness, hatred, greed, lust, anger and ambition, are blown away when we meditate on our true nature, when we engage in unselfish action, and when we consistently act and think in ways that manifest our real nature: through truthfulness, purity, contentment, self-control and patience. This purification of the mind drives away the clouds of maya and lets our divine nature shine.
Shankara, the great sage-philosopher of eighth-century India, used the example of the rope and the snake to illustrate maya. Walking along a dark street, a man sees a snake; his heart pounds, his pulse races. On closer inspection, the "snake" turns out to be a coiled piece of rope. Once the illusion is dispelled, the snake is gone for ever. In the same way, walking down the dark street of ignorance, we see ourselves as mortal creatures and, around us, a universe of name and form, conditioned by time, space and causation. We become aware of our limitations, bondage and suffering. On closer inspection, both the mortal creature and the universe turn out to be nothing other than Brahman.
The goal of life
Arise, awake, and learn by approaching the great ones; for the path is sharp as a razor's edge, difficult to cross and hard to tread — so say the wise.
~ Katha Upanishad 1.3.14 ~
All that is needed is to realise the truth. It is not a dogma to be believed; let us remember the difference. Dogmas are made to be believed without question; truths are to be understood and verified. Truth is what already exists. The Upanishads give us verified and verifiable truths about the human being and the universe.
The sages affirm that the goal of human life is to realise and manifest our divinity: the infinite life, knowledge and love that are innate in us, already within. This is our one inevitable destiny. The goal of life is human excellence, that is, becoming better with every breath. Vedanta gives people the means, encouragement and impetus to turn towards their innate greatness, their inner divinity, the grandeur of their own deep being. Vedanta helps us gain deep wisdom, attain knowledge and discern between the right path and the wrong one. It produces a character oriented to the noblest moral and spiritual values, free of hostility and hatred, full of understanding, love and compassion.
Each soul is potentially divine. The goal is to manifest this Divinity within by controlling nature, external and internal. Do this either by work, or worship, or psychic control, or philosophy — by one, or more, or all of these — and be free.
~ Swami Vivekananda ~
Instruments and conditions for success
We have only two essential instruments for the journey of life: the mind and the body, the body-mind complex. And there are two conditions. First, the observance of ethical values, because ultimately we are all bound to one another. Our conduct in the world should cause no discord, resentment or discomfort to others; moral excellence is the foundation of Vedanta. Next comes physical fitness: we need to be healthy, strong and free from illness and discomfort, and to have the wisdom to overcome the body's natural limitations. With these conditions met, we will have the vigour and the right frame of mind for an adventure of this kind.
A single starting point
So where do we begin? Vedanta respects each person's constitution and understands that practice can begin from only one point: where the person is now, whatever their background and whatever their resources. Vedanta says: start where you are. Learn to love what you are doing, and soon you will be doing what you love. Go forward and stop not till the goal is reached.
Harmony of religions
Finally, Vedanta holds that all religions teach the same basic truths about God, the world and our relationship with our fellow beings. Thousands of years ago the Rig Veda declared:
Truth is one; the wise call it by many names.
~ Rig Veda ~
The world's religions offer a diversity of approaches to God, each of them true and valid; each offers the world a unique and irreplaceable path to God-realisation. The contradictory messages we find among religions owe more to doctrines and dogmas than to the reality of spiritual experience. Though the outward observances of the world's religions differ, their inner aspects are remarkably alike.
Avatar
If the multiplicity of the universe arose from the One, rests in the One and finally returns to it, the One can take any form; there is no limit to its modes of expression. Brahman, as the source of all power, has this capacity. Vedanta calls God She, He or That; there is no gender bias. If God can manifest as the universe, could God not take the form of a Divine Personality such as Shiva, Vishnu or the Goddess? Or even incarnate in human form, as Rama, Krishna, Buddha, Jesus or Ramakrishna?
The same Brahman is understood by some, according to their beliefs, culture and capacity, as Shiva; by others as the Divine Mother, the Holy Spirit and so on. It incarnates in human form as the avataras: Rama, Krishna, Buddha, Jesus, Shankaracharya and Ramakrishna. Shiva, Vishnu, the Goddess and the Holy Spirit are not human beings but idealised beings, represented in human or often superhuman form. Many mystics have realised them through spiritual practice and expressed their experiences in beautiful poems and songs. Still, they are not human beings. God descending as a human being, the avatara, is another important orientation that emerged after the period of the Upanishads, on the path of bhakti, or devotion.
From the devotional perspective, the Supreme God can become incarnate as a human being. This concept of the avatar, the divine incarnation in human form, arose in the period of the Mahabharata; it does not exist in the Vedas or the Upanishads, but in the Mahabharata and later literature it becomes a very important teaching: God incarnating in this world, living as a human being among human beings, and giving spiritual strength and inspiration to all. History has shown that spirituality centred on an avatar is more dynamic and transformative for humanity than one centred on the various ideal deities. We may describe an avatar as a maker of history as well as a divinity. This is a significant development in the history of religion; the concept of the avatar also raises the status of humanity to the highest level, far above the gods and other celestial beings, as the Upanishads had already done by discovering the truth of the human being as the infinite, immortal Atman.
The first and most authoritative statement on the avatar is Sri Krishna's declaration in the fourth chapter of the Bhagavad Gita, part of the great Hindu epic, the Mahabharata (4.7–8):
Whenever there is a decline of dharma and a rise of adharma, I incarnate myself.
~ Sri Krishna ~
The next verse further illustrates the concept of the avatar in Vedanta:
For the protection of the good, for the destruction of the wicked, and for the establishment of dharma, I am born from age to age.
~ Sri Krishna ~
According to this concept, the avatar is not only a Divine Personality but also a maker of history. Philosophy interprets history; the avatar creates it.
This concept of the avatara, which Sri Krishna describes in the fourth chapter of the Gita, is central both to Vedanta and to Christianity. In this modern age a similar adjustment became necessary, and a great person, Sri Ramakrishna, was born. The teaching is with us in books, but we are unable to understand or follow it. Someone must come and give us a new vision. Who will do it? Not a scholar, not a priest, not a professor; what do they know? It needs a tremendous spiritual personality, who comes quietly, quietly, and sets in motion a new current of spirituality. That spirituality slowly envelops people, little by little, and slowly changes the world.
How society changes
How does the avatara change the balance of forces in society? Let us see what Swami Vivekananda said about the importance of the avatar, who comes to set things right when they go wrong in society. During his four years in America and Europe he never spoke about Sri Ramakrishna, only about Vedanta. When people learned that he had a teacher called Ramakrishna, a wonderful personality, they pressed him to speak about his Master. So in New York and London he gave a lecture entitled "My Master". It is a wonderful lecture in beautiful English and a beautiful portrait of a great teacher. Here is how it begins (Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda, vol. IV):
"Whenever virtue subsides and vice prevails, I come down to help mankind," declares Krishna, in the Bhagavad-Gitâ. Whenever this world of ours, on account of growth, on account of added circumstances, requires a new adjustment, a wave of power comes; and as a man is acting on two planes, the spiritual and the material, waves of adjustment come on both planes. On the one side, of the adjustment on the material plane, Europe has mainly been the basis during modern times; and of the adjustment on the other, the spiritual plane, Asia has been the basis throughout the history of the world. Today, man requires one more adjustment on the spiritual plane; today when material ideas are at the height of their glory and power, today when man is likely to forget his divine nature, through his growing dependence on matter, and is likely to be reduced to a mere money-making machine, an adjustment is necessary; the voice has spoken, and the power is coming to drive away the clouds of gathering materialism. The power has been set in motion which, at no distant date, will bring unto mankind once more the memory of its real nature; and again the place from which this power will start will be Asia.
This world of ours is on the plan of the division of labour. It is vain to say that one man shall possess everything. Yet how childish we are! The baby in its ignorance thinks that its doll is the only possession that is to be coveted in this whole universe. So a nation which is great in the possession of material power thinks that that is all that is to be coveted, that that is all that is meant by progress, that that is all that is meant by civilisation, and if there are other nations which do not care for possession and do not possess that power, they are not fit to live, their whole existence is useless! On the other hand, another nation may think that mere material civilisation is utterly useless. From the Orient came the voice which once told the world that if a man possesses everything that is under the sun and does not possess spirituality, what avails it? This is the oriental type; the other is the occidental type.
Each of these types has its grandeur, each has its glory. The present adjustment will be the harmonising, the mingling of these two ideals. To the Oriental, the world of spirit is as real as to the Occidental is the world of senses. In the spiritual, the Oriental finds everything he wants or hopes for; in it he finds all that makes life real to him. To the Occidental he is a dreamer; to the Oriental the Occidental is a dreamer playing with ephemeral toys, and he laughs to think that grown-up men and women should make so much of a handful of matter which they will have to leave sooner or later. Each calls the other a dreamer. But the oriental ideal is as necessary for the progress of the human race as is the occidental, and I think it is more necessary. Machines never made mankind happy and never will make. He who is trying to make us believe this will claim that happiness is in the machine; but it is always in the mind. That man alone who is the lord of his mind can become happy, and none else. And what, after all, is this power of machinery? Why should a man who can send a current of electricity through a wire be called a very great man and a very intelligent man? Does not nature do a million times more than that every moment? Why not then fall down and worship nature? What avails it if you have power over the whole of the world, if you have mastered every atom in the universe? That will not make you happy unless you have the power of happiness in yourself, until you have conquered yourself. Man is born to conquer nature, it is true, but the Occidental means by "nature" only physical or external nature. It is true that external nature is majestic, with its mountains, and oceans, and rivers, and with its infinite powers and varieties. Yet there is a more majestic internal nature of man, higher than the sun, moon, and stars, higher than this earth of ours, higher than the physical universe, transcending these little lives of ours; and it affords another field of study.
~ Swami Vivekananda, "My Master" ~
There is a vast literature on Vedanta
In English, the Advaita Ashrama bookshop in India offers the Ramakrishna Order's publications. In Portuguese, Editora Vedanta works to translate major Vedanta titles, which are still few in our language.