Cosmic Evolution - The Vedantic Perspective - Part 1 - The magician and the magic
Word of Caution:
This write up below is definitely not an exhaustive description of what our scriptures talk about Creation. It is my very limited understanding of the vast literature available in public domain.
The objective is to get a broad idea of the principles involved so that when we take up the study of our scriptures and Sanskrit Slokas, we will have a better comprehension of what they say.
Reader is strongly advised to strictly learn these under the guidance of a Guru if one wants a deep dive in this subject.
The Magician
In our previous newsletter on the subject, as part of the Scientific perspective, we were trying to understand in vain, who the “Magician” is, who generates creation without needing to be created. In other words we were looking for the “causeless cause” for and before the Big Bang. We also understood that
We need to be looking outside the system of cause-and-effect as within that cause & effect systems, a “causeless cause” is inconceivable. This means that we need to look beyond science.
We should also be looking at that “something” (causeless cause) which has both existence and consciousness.
We noticed that modern science is yet to provide an answer to these intricate questions.
Our Rishis, Saints and Seers, in line with the inquiring environment at that time, controlling their sense and action organs and in a detached manner observed closely nature, its manifestations, people, their actions and the results of their actions; analysed the data in their super computer called “brain using their operating system (OS) “mind alias manas” and contemplated extensively through deep meditations (akin to operations/iterations in computer language). Their processes were inward looking and the focus was only on that “causeless cause” that we just discussed. They lived their lives as per their findings to validate theirs and passed on their findings to their disciples who lived with them in their Ashrams.
These Gurus called that “causeless cause” as “Brahman” or “Atman”. They recognised “Brahman” as the one and only one pure, omnipresent, eternal Ultimate Reality that has both “existence and consciousness” i.e., the “Brahman” is the only eternal truth “sat” with “cit” and in “ananda” - an absolute, eternal and infinite Self-existence, Self-awareness in a state of Self-delight.
Our Rishis said that in the beginning nothing exists except this singularity called Brahman. The scientific statement that we saw reinforces this as a single infinitely dense infinitely hot and bright spot. Such an ultimate reality, the only pure, omnipresent, indestructible eternal blissful reality is beyond descriptions for human beings, being limited by their sense and action organs. That is the reason the Vedas describe this Ultimate Reality through the process of negation viz. not this, not this (“neti, neti”) ….discounting everything that is within the grasp of living beings (sentient and insentient); the essence that remains is that Ultimate Reality.
Mundaka Upanishad defines this Ultimate Reality as
यत्तदद्रेश्यमग्राह्यमगोत्रमवर्णंमचक्षुःश्रोत्रं तदपाणिपादम् |
नित्यं विभुं सर्वगतं सुसूक्ष्मं तदव्ययं यद्भूतयोनिं परिपश्यन्ति धीराः || 1.1.6 ||
That which is invisible, inconceivable, without lineage, without any classifications (Varṇa), without eyes and ears, without hands and feet, and that which is eternal, all-pervasive, omnipresent, extremely subtle and undecaying” – that is what the wise behold as the source of all beings.
Hence the first principle, That One, the Ultimate Reality, the Brahman - tad ekam - cannot be characterized. It is without qualities or attributes, even negative ones. To apply to it any description is to limit the limitless. Brahman is the Consciousness that knows itself (“svayam prakaasham”) in all that exists; Brahman is the Ananda, the secret Bliss of existence which is the ether of our being and without which none could breathe or live.
Yet after attempting to describe such a state presumed to be prior to creation, the Vedas has the humility to admit that all this is a surmise, for it is not possible to be sure of things which lie so far beyond human knowledge.
“ When the mind is transcended, these values, valid in the relative planes, can have no more meaning in the realm of the universal oneness “
“In communicating to the seekers the unsurpassing beauty and indefinable perfections of the Absolute, the Upanishads stammer, the Brahmasutras exhaust themselves and the Bhagvad Gita hesitates with an excusable shyness”
Swami Chinmayananda.
It is to be experienced in dynamic silence of one’s own deepest meditations.
The Magic
Although indeterminable because of its absoluteness and infinity, this Supreme and Eternal Infinite Ultimate Reality determines itself and reveals itself to our consciousness in the universe. This revelation is the magic.
What is revealed ? - The real and fundamental truths of its being which are beyond the universe and in it and are the very foundation of its existence.
To whom is it revealed? - These truths present themselves to our conceptual cognition.
How is it revealed? - Presented as the fundamental aspects in which we see and experience the omnipresent Reality. Depending upon one’s progress in spirituality and the level that one has reached, this is presented/revealed as Nirguna Brahman, Saguna Brahman, Individual soul in a body or as a body that has life -(“Aham Brahmasmi, Aham Jeevosmi, Aham Dehasmi”).
This is the magic that The Magician performs.
With this basic understanding, we will try and and get a broad overview of some of the principles and the processes involved in the Cosmic Evolution as per our scriptures, in the newsletters that will follow.
God Bless