Science Precedes Practice
Many a seeker on the spiritual
path is often unintelligently enthusiastic with a misapprehension of the nature
of spiritual life and the way to the attainment of the goal. Sincere seekers
often imagine that yoga is a practice, and they want nothing but practice, with
an added notion that it will bring about an immediate experience of a
supernormal reality. There is no such thing as a sudden jumping into the
practice of yoga, yet they imagine that it is doing something immediately and
that it will be followed up by a sudden outburst of supernal light.
I had occasion to hear from a
sincere sadhaka that what he requires is
immediate practice and immediate experience. This is not to be unless the mind
is cleared of all its cobwebs of entanglement with phenomenal experience. The
mind will not concentrate, whatever be the effort we put forth, because the
mind we are contemplating is one facet of a large structure of universal
psyche. Most people fail in their attempt at concentration of the mind because
they think this so-called mind of theirs has no connection with other things in
the world.
The Bhagavadgita is also
called a Brahma Vidya in addition to its being called a Yoga Shastra. It is a
science of the Eternal, and it is a scripture on the practice of yoga. Science
precedes practice. There is a scientific system of the methodology of working
laid out in one's own mind and, as the science of economics tells us, there are
stages of the fulfilment of the program. To build a house we have a program of making a
plan, maybe a master plan. The location, the structure, the nature of the
material, the persons who will be entrusted with building, the idea of the work
of construction, and the final structure will depend upon the purpose for which
it is raised.
Theory and practice are not
bifurcated as the North Pole and the South Pole. Idea expressed is action. As
water condenses into ice, thought manifests itself as activity. In the same way
as water and ice are not different—it is water itself that has become ice, and
they are not two different things—likewise, it is the idea that has become
practice. Science becomes technology. We cannot have merely a technological
organisation without the scientific concept and knowledge preceding this
practice.
The ultimate realisation of
the aim is the concretisation of the theoretical foundation already laid in
one's consciousness. When consciousness becomes one with its content and the
content does not remain something outside as a perceptional category, that
state of conscious experience is called spiritual Realisation or
God-realisation.
This principle is also
emphasised in the Bhagavadgita. It is a Brahma Vidya, or the science of the
Absolute, and by science what we mean here is the ideological structural basis
for its expression as spiritual practice, which is called yoga. Thus, yoga is
an external manifestation of the internal foundation of Brahma Vidya. So it is
necessary that we should know where we stand. There is not to be that mistake
of underestimation or overestimation of oneself. Neither are we nothing, nor
are we everything. This is a great difficulty for seekers because nothing can
be harder than the assessment of oneself by oneself. We cannot exactly know
where we stand in this world, what our relationship is with the atmosphere in
which we are living. That is why the need for a Guru arises—a teacher, a guide,
a master who has trodden the path and knows the various steps to be taken and
the stages to be passed through.
Continue to read:
If you would like to purchase the print edition, visit:
http://www.dlshq.org/cgi-bin/store/commerce.cgi
http://www.dlshq.org/cgi-bin/store/commerce.cgi
If you would
like to contribute to the dissemination of spiritual knowledge please contact
the General Secretary at:
