Miscellaneous - Religion   

Man reaps what he sows

CHENNAI SEPT.10 . The scriptural texts adopt different means to explain the nature of the Supreme Being, who is infinite, as any description can only provide a glimpse into the Absolute Reality. The method of negation in the Upanishads is a case in point. At the level of human beings the same technique can be used to understand that the Self (Atman) is the Reality. The Taittiriya Upanishad, for instance, analyses the human personality as comprising five levels— the physical body, vital, mind, intellect and the blissful sheath— to show that the Self is beyond these five sheaths.

Just as in the instruction of worldly knowledge it is possible to explain what is unknown by pointing out something, which is familiar, and proceed step by step from there, so also in the case of spiritual knowledge a seeker has to start from the known and progress to the unknown. The quest will take one further on the spiritual path until it becomes apparent that what one is seeking outside is within.

The first lesson a spiritual aspirant has to learn is not to make others the scapegoat for one's lot in life. This is a very natural human tendency and one has to make effort consciously while facing the vicissitudes of life to overcome the inclination to shift the blame on other factors without accepting the fact that one is only reaping the fruit of one's Karma (actions). Further, when a person does not get his due in life he erroneously thinks that someone is responsible for impeding his progress. Though in life situations one could correlate such instances it was important to remember that every individual got his deserts according to his Karma in the end, said Sri K.Srinivasan in his discourse.

There is an incident related in the life of Sage Yajnavalkya who was the teacher of King Janaka to underscore the fact that Karma is not a theory to be established by debate and that concepts related to spiritual truth have to be understood at a one-to-one level of preceptor-disciple and also only when the aspirant's mind is ready to grasp it. When the king had declared to gift cows to one who could remove his doubts Yajnavalkya sent his disciples and asked them to bring all the cows to his hermitage. When questioned about his action he offered to answer all the queries posed to him. It was when the discussion steered around Karma that the sages Artabhaga and Yajnavalkya explained that Karma was responsible for man's joys and sorrows and also rebirths.

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