Interview | How Vedanta is remedy for universal and permanent disease of humankind

“To be born is one thing, to be alive is another. To be born is just biologically here, to be alive is a totally different dimension — the dimension of spirituality. Unless a man is spiritual he is not alive yet.” These words of Osho, from Moving into the Unknown: The Discipline of Transcendence, come to mind while reading Dhruv S Kaji’s new book, Vedanta Vignettes (Motilal Banarasidass Publications, Rs 445).

The author, in the just released book, writes about the cesspool of mindless materialism which is constantly goading us to get on the “ever accelerating treadmill” of seeking more and more, and which “does not really get us anywhere”. He elaborates how Advaita Vedanta can play a crucial role in restoring balance in our lives by helping us gain “full and abiding knowledge” of our own truth — the truth of who we are. Vedanta, in that way, helps one go through the journey from being born to being alive.

Dhruv S Kaji, in an exclusive interview with Firstpost, talks about his new book Vedanta Vignettes, his spiritual journey as a student of Vedanta, and how Vedanta can help the humanity, currently crushed under the weight of individuality, come out of our self-centrism.

Excerpts:

You have been an ardent student of Vedanta. How did you get attracted towards Vedanta? Please tell us about your spiritual journey.

People turn to spirituality for a variety of reasons including family or cultural influences or because they are facing exceptional difficulties. At times, even a surfeit of success and pleasures promote a turn to spirituality, when ordinary success fails to provide lasting contentment. Some also turn to real spirituality when conventional religion does not bring fulfilment.

Another important reason, which also applies in my case, is an urge to find answers to the so-called ‘big’ questions of life. While there is no explanation for why this urge arises and becomes strong only in some people (unless one is willing to accept the karma theory as an explanation), it can become so powerful that it provokes great effort to address it by trying to find complete answers.

In my case, this urge arose and became powerful rather early in my life, in my late thirties, and ever since, for several decades, Vedanta remains the core pursuit in my life. While I do a number of other things, nothing comes close to Vedanta in terms of the joy and satisfaction it provides and the peace it brings even in challenging circumstances.

In the book’s Forward, Swami Tadatmananda Saraswati calls Vedanta an ocean that is not just vast but also salty — and thus hard to drink. What makes him say so? Is Vedanta too challenging, as the headline of one of the chapters says?

Vedanta is a bit peculiar and a mixed bag. The fundamental insight of Vedanta is that there is only one reality and everything we experience is just a temporary and insubstantial superimposition on that reality. This is remarkably simple to comprehend, but this also goes so much against our daily experiences and it is so counter-intuitive that it becomes remarkably difficult to accept. And it is even more difficult to make our emotions and habitual reactions fall in line with this revelation of Vedanta.

While there are challenges in obtaining the full benefits of Vedanta, there are some wonderful benefits which flow from even the initial part of Vedanta‘s journey which make life a little more simple and with fewer fears and anxieties. Also, while Vedanta does require effort and perseverance, don’t we make life-long effort in our careers, whether it is in making money or in managing a home? The question about difficulty in pursuing Vedanta comes about not because we are incapable of making effort and facing challenges but because we have yet not realised the value of Vedanta.

So, what is Vedanta, after all?

The most direct meaning of the word Vedanta is the small portions at the end (antah) of each of the four Vedas, probably the oldest scriptures of mankind. These same portions are also known by another name: the Upanishads.

But, in a broader sense, Vedanta refers to a view of life and reality based on the Upanishads but developed and expounded by later scriptures like the Brahma Sutras and the Bhagavad Gita and explained by a line of teachers, the most prominent being Adi Shankaracharya. It should be noted that, unlike conventional religion, Vedanta focuses less on the way of life because its real objective is to give us a correct view of life.

To look at it in another way, Vedanta is a remedy for the universal and permanent disease of humankind: the disease of lack of complete and permanent fulfilment. Here, Vedanta reveals a startling and unique solution which is not based on any physical change in our lives and circumstances but by proper knowledge of our own reality which, surprisingly, we are ignorant of.

Vedanta raises some of the basic questions such as: Who am I? This question has always rattled humanity across civilisations and cultures. Can you explain this?

This question does not find a ready answer partly because our civilisations tend to focus outwards rather than look inwards. This is because we falsely conclude that we already know our own selves and equally falsely conclude that the world contains sources of our fulfilment and therefore needs our single-minded attention, investigation and understanding. In our fascination with what we observe, we overlook the observer!

Another big difficulty in figuring out who or what I am is that the ‘I’ which we want to know is the same ‘I’ which wants to know. This is like our eyes wanting to see themselves! Vedanta helps us in this seemingly impossible task by operating like a mirror of carefully chosen words and techniques which makes self-knowledge possible.

Another oft-raised and most confusing question is: What is real? Is this world a reality or dream? And what is the cause of the world’s appearance?

Vedanta‘s definition of reality is something which is present in the past, present and future. By this definition, everything we know is unreal because all things were not present before they came into being and nothing lasts for infinity.

This makes the world unreal in Vedanta’s understanding. But Vedanta never denies our experiences of the world and nor does it deny the world’s utility. The world is not like our personal dream or a projection of our individual minds.

In fact, Vedanta goes at great length to explain what is absolutely unreal (a square circle), what is subjectively experienced (a personal dream), what is objectively experienced (the heat of fire which is experienced by everyone near the fire) and, finally, the only true reality (Vedanta calls this reality Brahman or Atma).

Asking questions about the cause of the world is like asking questions about the parents of the snake falsely seen in half-light, in the place of rope. The snake’s parents can never be found because the snake itself is not real.

And once, with enough light, the rope is clearly seen, then the snake disappears and the questions about its parents no longer remain. However, this understanding takes time and, in the interim, Vedanta holds out a mysterious power called Maya as the world’s cause.

One of the most debated and contentious questions is whether all religions teach the same thing. What’s your take?

You just have to look at different religions objectively to see that all religions certainly do not teach the same thing. Religions commonly promote some universal values such as truthfulness and compassion; they also encourage relating to a divine being or beings through prayer.

But, despite these commonalities, the differences between religions are very significant. We just have to look at the architecture of a mandir, masjid and a cathedral. Or look at the differences between a puja, mass and namaz.

Some religions may use wine in its rituals, another may encourage the sacrifice of an animal while a third may prohibit either of these practices.

Going beyond these cultural differences, some religions may require followers to bring others into their fold, using violence if necessary; other religions may have a much more tolerant ‘live and let live approach’.

The differences between religions become even more stark when we come to their spiritual insights. In many religions, the ultimate goal is to be in heaven, in the presence of the God of that religion. But in some other streams (such as Advaita Vedanta, Sufism, Taoism and the mystical aspects of Christianity) the ultimate goal is to recognise that there is only a single truth behind all existence and that you, the individual, and even God are not separate from this truth.

Such a view is abhorred by many mainstream religions and history is replete with mystics from Sufism and Christianity being persecuted and even killed for stating that both we individuals and our Gods arise from a common and singular truth.

So while it may sound very liberal to say that all religions teach the same thing, the fact is that religions vary a great deal in their practices, values and in their concept of the ultimate goal. We should accept these differences and even benefit from them instead of drawing a blanket of uniformity over all religions in a burst of misplaced universalism.

Very early in the book, you talk about the importance of a guru in learning Vedanta. Why is a guru so important?

Vedanta wants you to know yourself fully. As the task of obtaining this knowledge can only be done by you, there is obvious difficulty in the knower wanting to be the known. It would be like the phone wanting to dial its own number or a finger wanting to touch its own tip!

For achieving this seemingly impossible task Vedanta has teachings which are in the form of words. These words need to be employed precisely and using some time-tested techniques. For this, a teacher who is familiar with both the contents of Vedanta‘s scriptures and its special teaching methodology is vital. In addition to these qualifications, if the teacher also leads his own life in keeping with Vedanta‘s vision, then the very presence of such a true Guru has amazing and a very beneficial impact on the student.

For all these reasons, Vedanta is almost impossible to study fruitfully without a Guru’s guidance, at least for some time.

Unlike the commonly known two realities — real and unreal — in Vedanta there are four different realities. Please explain.

The concept of what is real is quite central to Vedanta‘s teachings and hence the need to have more detailed categorisation.

In our normal usage, a dream or a snake falsely seen in the place of a rope would be termed unreal. But Vedanta has a much stricter definition of unreal: something which cannot be experienced by anybody and examples here are a square circle or an elephant’s egg.

Then, things which are actually experienced are divided into two separate categories: the subjective and the objective. Subjective experiences are purely personal such as a dream or a personal error like mistakenly seeing a snake in place of a rope. Objective experiences are like seeing the rope which is available for common experience and use by everybody — our consensus reality.

Vedanta then goes further to say that none of these experiences, subjective or objective, actually capture true reality which is singular and without any attributes. The arguments and support for this startling statement are a bit involved and we can’t get into them here. But understanding of what is actually real has huge personal implications and benefits for us.

At a time when humanity is being crushed under the weight of individuality, how can Vedanta help us come out of our self-centrism?

Vedanta has always been relevant and never more so than today when self-centeredness and mindless consumerism hold sway. Vedanta‘s vision of only a singular reality being the basis of everything which appears and is experienced has a vast impact on our body-mind focus and drastically reduces the emphasis we lay on our egos and individualities. Vedanta has never been very popular with a large part of the population even in history. But if leaders, role-models and opinion-formers understand and accept Vedanta‘s insights, then their influence encourages society as a whole to become less competitive, more tolerant and more at peace with itself.

I personally believe that we all should be exposed to the wisdom of Vedanta even though relatively few may complete Vedanta‘s journey. Vedanta should be studied not only because we are religious or because we are Hindus but because we are humans and Vedanta offers a remarkably novel and effective solution to the fundamental human problem of lack of fulfilment and the resultant struggles, disappointments, enmity, guilt and regrets.

As you have written in the book, spirituality and moksha are two commonly used terms in the course of studying Vedanta. And they are subject to confusion and misunderstanding, so much so that you remind the readers of the story of five blind men and an elephant.

A lot of confusion and differing ideas surround these two commonly used terms. To put it briefly, moksha is gaining full and abiding knowledge of your own truth and spirituality is any activity or process which helps you to reach moksha.

Finally, what is the role of meditation in Vedanta?

In traditional Vedanta, meditation is for chitta ekagrata or one-pointedness of the mind because a mind capable of staying focused on the topic of study is vitally needed for understanding and holding on to Vedanta‘s subtle teachings. Meditation and its culmination, samadhi, are necessary means but not the end in Vedanta‘s journey. This is different from other traditions such as yoga, where meditation and samadhi are the final goal.

The book is available on Amazon and Flipkart.

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