October 2011 - Advaita Ashrama

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these divisions are merely from the human standpoint.
Consciousness belongs to God and it is
singular, there are not many types of consciousness,
nor are there divisions in it. As Sri Ramakrishna
would say, a stick floating on water does
not divide the water. Nature has many forms,
but consciousness is everywhere. In the powerful
words of the Aitareya Upanishad: ‘All these
are impelled by Consciousness; all these have
Consciousness as the giver of their reality; the
universe has Consciousness as its eye and Consciousness
as its end. Consciousness is Brahman.’
The Taittiriya Upanishad speaks of the one
and the many thus: ‘He [God] wished, “Let me
be many, let me be born.” He undertook a deliberation.
Having deliberated, he created all this
that exists. That (Brahman), having created (that),
entered into that very thing. And having entered
there, It became the formed and the formless, the
defined and the undefined, the sustaining and
the non-sustaining, the sentient and the insentient,
the true and the untrue. Truth became all
this that there is. They call that (Brahman) Truth.’
How God creates is declared by Sri Ramakrishna
through one of his experiences: ‘One day He
[God] showed me the maya of Mahamaya. A
small light inside a room began to grow, and at last
it en veloped the whole universe.’ This experience
coincides with what the Katha Upanishad says:
‘He who—being one, the controller, and the inner
Self of all—makes a single form multifarious.’
Though we run after and experience the
many, in our perceptions and also deep down
we have that faint knowledge of the one running
through the many, for that is our nature.
Yet, often times we forget this nature of ours,
and for some fortunate ones it comes back in full
force. Once near Vrindavan a hungry and tired
Swami Turiyananda kept brooding over the fact
that everyone was engaged in some form of work
and was producing something, while he lived
618
Prabuddha Bharata
like a vagabond. Distressed, he fell asleep under
a tree. ‘There he had a vision: He saw himself
outside of his body, and he was looking at himself
while he slept. He saw his body expanding
and expanding, until there was no end to it. The
body became so large that it covered the entire
world. Then he addressed himself: “Oh, you are
not a vagabond. You are one with the universe.
You are the all-pervading Atman.” So thinking,
he jumped up and felt very happy. His despondency
was at an end.’
There is another deeper dimension to the
identity of we in the one and the many and this
is made clear in another similar experience of
Swami Shivananda at Ootacamund: ‘The other
day as I sat here silently watching the [Nilgiris]
blue mountain ranges I experienced something.
I saw a luminous figure coming out of this body,
and it grew and grew, till at last it enveloped the
whole world. [Heaving a deep sigh he then remarked]:
The Master is my Paramatman, the
supreme Self. It is He who pervades the whole
universe. “A quarter of His is this whole universe;
His other three immortal quarters are in
the bright region” (Purusha Sukta).’
Sri Ramakrishna, as the Atman or Paramatman,
is thus the real one and the many. And this
was very forcefully brought out at Kashipur during
his terminal illness. Sri Ramakrishna could
not speak because of pain. One day he placed his
hand on his heart and whispered to Narendra,
the future Swami Vivekananda: ‘“I see that all
things—everything that exists—have come from
this.” He asks Narendra by a sign, “What did you
understand?” Narendra: “All created objects have
come from you.” The Master’s face beams with
joy. He says to Rakhal, “Did you hear what he
said?”’ Did we hear properly what Swamiji said? It
is Sri Ramakrishna who is the one and the many.
He says that God, ‘appears manifold through
maya; but in reality He alone exists.’ P
PB October 2011