Overcome The Great impediments to Spiritual
Progress
Divine Life
Society Publication: Discourse 3 - The Secret of the Katha Upanishad by Sri Swami
Krishnananda
“Overcome Avidya (ignorance), Kama (desire) and Karma (action) by Yajna ( sacrifice), Dana (charity) and Tapas (discipline)”
The Great impediments to spiritual progress
The great impediments to
spiritual progress are known as avidya,
kama and karma—ignorance, desire and action. These three aspects of the
obstacle are really a single obstacle presenting itself in three different
ways. An ignorance of the true and ultimate nature of things is called avidya. We call it ignorance, or
nescience, or the absence of knowledge, or darkness, etc. This ignorance, avidya, breeds a desire for the external
objects of sense—kama. An ignorance
of the character of reality, which is avidya,
at once presupposes an affirmation of personality, ahamkara—and a desire to contact other personalities. Avidya causes ahamkara simultaneously. They are almost inseparable, like the heat
and the light of fire. The moment there is this self-affirmation born of
ignorance, there is a necessary consequence of it following, viz. a longing to
make good what has been lost, by way of contact with things. That is called kama. To fulfil kama or desire there is karma
or action. So the whole of one’s life is a threefold effort of avidya, kama and karma—
ignorance, desire and action. This is the tripura
or the threefold fortress of the demoniacal powers, which Lord Siva is supposed
to have broken through with a single arrow. These are the three citadels made
of gold, silver and iron, as they say in the Puranas. These are the three knots
or granthis—Brahma-granthi, Vishnu-granthi and Rudra-granthi —which the hatha-yogins
and the kundalini-yogins and the tantrikas speak of—avidya, kama, karma.
It is a single power appearing as three independent impediments to the
expression of knowledge.
Overcoming the threefold bondage
The three fasts of Nachiketas
may be compared to the soul’s endeavor to break through these three fortresses,
a withdrawal gradually effected from the outer to the inner, overcoming the
force of karma, overcoming the power
of kama and finally overcoming avidya. Three forms of tapas or austerity have to be undergone
with three aids and with the help of three sadhanas
or spiritual practices. You overcome birth and death with these three
processes. You gain mastery over those conditions which limit you to the body
in all its three layers of expression and to the three planes—the physical, the
astral and the celestial. These are the essential bondage of the soul inwardly
as well as outwardly limiting its expression and confining it to samsara or earthly existence and
suffering. The overcoming of this threefold bondage is the implication of the
term ‘trinachiketa’ mentioned in the
Upanishad.
The instruments that have to
be made use of in this effort are the mind, the intellect and the spirit (manas-buddhi-atma), all combined in a
single-pointed effort—tribhiretya sandhim.
You have also to perform three actions, to which a reference has been made in
the eighteenth chapter of the Bhagavadgita: trikarma—yajna, dana, tapas. Yajna is the sacrifice which one performs for attaining union with
Reality. It includes all forms of self-abnegation and dedication. The Lord
himself is compared to yajna—Yajno vai vishnuh, and in the masterly Purusha-Sukta of the Vedas the whole creation is compared to
a yajna of the Supreme Being. Yajna is, therefore, the supreme effort
of the soul to unite itself with God. Dana
is the charitable disposition of the soul towards others. Charity does not mean
only parting with a few rupees or dollars. Charity is an attitude of the mind.
It may be expressed in the form of physical action, or it may not be so expressed.
It includes charitable feelings, a charitable attitude, conduct and behavior
towards others. The capacity to appreciate the situation of others is charity.
When you are in a position to enter into the feelings and the actual conditions
and circumstances of other souls and other persons and feel as they feel and
think as they think and act as they act, not with a sweating effort but with a
spontaneous expression of your nature, that would be the essence of a
charitable nature—dana. Tapas is personal discipline, bodily,
verbal as well as mental. One who puts forth this threefold spiritual endeavor
overcomes birth and death—Tarati
janma-mrityu.
Excerpts from:
Overcome The Great impediments to Spiritual Progress - The Secret of the Katha Upanishad by Sri Swami
Krishnananda
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