The Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda/Volume 3/Bhakti-Yoga/The Method and the Means
CHAPTER X
THE METHOD AND THE MEANS
In regard to the method and the means of Bhakti-Yoga we read in the
commentary of Bhagavan Ramanuja on the Vedanta-Sutras: "The attaining of
That comes through discrimination, controlling the passions, practice,
sacrificial work, purity, strength, and suppression of excessive joy."
Viveka or discrimination is, according to Ramanuja, discriminating, among
other things, the pure food from the impure. According to him, food becomes
impure from three causes: (1) by the nature of the food itself, as in the
case of garlic etc.; (2) owing to its coming from wicked and accursed
persons; and (3) from physical impurities, such as dirt, or hair, etc. The
Shrutis say, When the food is pure, the Sattva element gets purified, and
the memory becomes unwavering", and Ramanuja quotes this from the Chhândogya
Upanishad.
The question of food has always been one of the most vital with the Bhaktas.
Apart from the extravagance into which some of the Bhakti sects have run,
there is a great truth underlying this question of food. We must remember
that, according to the Sankhya philosophy, the Sattva, Rajas, and Tamas,
which in the state of homogeneous equilibrium form the Prakriti, and in the
heterogeneous disturbed condition form the universe — are both the substance
and the quality of Prakriti. As such they are the materials out of which
every human form has been manufactured, and the predominance of the Sattva
material is what is absolutely necessary for spiritual development. The
materials which we receive through our food into our body-structure go a
great way to determine our mental constitution; therefore the food we eat
has to be particularly taken care of. However, in this matter, as in others,
the fanaticism into which the disciples invariably fall is not to be laid at
the door of the masters.
And this discrimination of food is, after all, of secondary importance. The
very same passage quoted above is explained by Shankara in his Bhâshya on
the Upanishads in a different way by giving an entirely different meaning to
the word Âhâra, translated generally as food. According to him, "That which
is gathered in is Ahara. The knowledge of the sensations, such as sound
etc., is gathered in for the enjoyment of the enjoyer (self); the
purification of the knowledge which gathers in the perception of the senses
is the purifying of the food (Ahara). The word 'purification-of-food' means
the acquiring of the knowledge of sensations untouched by the defects of
attachment, aversion, and delusion; such is the meaning. Therefore such
knowledge or Ahara being purified, the Sattva material of the possessor it
— the internal organ — will become purified, and the Sattva being purified,
an unbroken memory of the Infinite One, who has been known in His real
nature from scriptures, will result."
These two explanations are apparently conflicting, yet both are true and
necessary. The manipulating and controlling of what may be called the finer
body, viz the mood, are no doubt higher functions than the controlling of
the grosser body of flesh. But the control of the grosser is absolutely
necessary to enable one to arrive at the control of the finer. The beginner,
therefore, must pay particular attention to all such dietetic rules as have
come down from the line of his accredited teachers; but the extravagant,
meaningless fanaticism, which has driven religion entirely to the kitchen,
as may be noticed in the case of many of our sects, without any hope of the
noble truth of that religion ever coming out to the sunlight of
spirituality, is a peculiar sort of pure and simple materialism. It is
neither Jnâna, nor Bhakti, nor Karma; it is a special kind of lunacy, and
those who pin their souls to it are more likely to go to lunatic asylums
than to Brahmaloka. So it stands to reason that discrimination in the choice
of food is necessary for the attainment of this higher state of mental
composition which cannot be easily obtained otherwise.
Controlling the passions is the next thing to be attended to. To restrain
the Indriyas (organs) from going towards the objects of the senses, to
control them and bring them under the guidance of the will, is the very
central virtue in religious culture. Then comes the practice of
self-restraint and self-denial. All the immense possibilities of divine
realisation in the soul cannot get actualised without struggle and without
such practice on the part of the aspiring devotee. "The mind must always
think of the Lord." It is very hard at first to compel the mind to think of
the Lord always, but with every new effort the power to do so grows stronger
in us. "By practice, O son of Kunti, and by non-attachment is it attained",
says Shri Krishna in the Gita. And then as to sacrificial work, it is
understood that the five great sacrificed [1] (Panchamahâyajna) have to be performed as usual.
Purity is absolutely the basic work, the bed-rock upon which the whole
Bhakti-building rests. Cleansing the external body and discriminating the
food are both easy, but without internal cleanliness and purity, these
external observances are of no value whatsoever. In the list of qualities
conducive to purity, as given by Ramanuja, there are enumerated, Satya,
truthfulness; Ârjava, sincerity; Dayâ, doing good to others without any gain
to one's self; Ahimsâ, not injuring others by thought, word, or deed;
Anabhidhyâ, not coveting others' goods, not thinking vain thoughts, and not
brooding over injuries received from another. In this list, the one idea
that deserves special notice is Ahimsa, non-injury to others. This duty of
non-injury is, so to speak, obligatory on us in relation to all beings. As
with some, it does not simply mean the non-injuring of human beings and
mercilessness towards the lower animals; nor, as with some others, does it
mean the protecting of cats and dogs and feeding of ants with sugar — with
liberty to injure brother-man in every horrible way! It is remarkable that
almost every good idea in this world can be carried to a disgusting extreme.
A good practice carried to an extreme and worked in accordance with the
letter of the law becomes a positive evil. The stinking monks of certain
religious sects, who do not bathe lest the vermin on their bodies should be
killed, never think of the discomfort and disease they bring to their fellow
human beings. They do not, however, belong to the religion of the Vedas!
The test of Ahimsa is absence of jealousy. Any man may do a good deed or
make a good gift on the spur of the moment or under the pressure of some
superstition or priestcraft; but the real lover of mankind is he who is
jealous of none. The so-called great men of the world may all be seen to
become jealous of each other for a small name, for a little fame, and for a
few bits of gold. So long as this jealousy exists in a heart, it is far away
from the perfection of Ahimsa. The cow does not eat meat, nor does the
sheep. Are they great Yogis, great non-injurers (Ahimsakas)? Any fool may
abstain from eating this or that; surely that gives him no more distinction
than to herbivorous animals. The man who will mercilessly cheat widows and
orphans and do the vilest deeds for money is worse than any brute even if he
lives entirely on grass. The man whose heart never cherishes even the
thought of injury to any one, who rejoices at the prosperity of even his
greatest enemy, that man is the Bhakta, he is the Yogi, he is the Guru of
all, even though he lives every day of his life on the flesh of swine.
Therefore we must always remember that external practices have value only as
helps to develop internal purity. It is better to have internal purity alone
when minute attention to external observances is not practicable. But woe
unto the man and woe unto the nation that forgets the real, internal,
spiritual essentials of religion and mechanically clutches with death-like
grasp at all external forms and never lets them go. The forms have value
only so far as they are expressions of the life within. If they have ceased
to express life, crush them out without mercy.
The next means to the attainment of Bhakti-Yoga is strength (Anavasâda).
"This Atman is not to be attained by the weak", says the Shruti. Both
physical weakness and mental weakness are meant here. "The strong, the
hardy" are the only fit students. What can puny, little, decrepit things do?
They will break to pieces whenever the mysterious forces of the body and
mind are even slightly awakened by the practice of any of the Yogas. It is
"the young, the healthy, the strong" that can score success. Physical
strength, therefore, is absolutely necessary. It is the strong body alone
that can bear the shock of reaction resulting from the attempt to control
the organs. He who wants to become a Bhakta must be strong, must be healthy.
When the miserably weak attempt any of the Yogas, they are likely to get
some incurable malady, or they weaken their minds. Voluntarily weakening the
body is really no prescription for spiritual enlightenment.
The mentally weak also cannot succeed in attaining the Atman. The person who
aspires to be a Bhakta must be cheerful. In the Western world the idea of a
religious man is that he never smiles, that a dark cloud must always hang
over his face, which, again, must be long drawn with the jaws almost
collapsed. People with emaciated bodies and long faces are fit subjects for
the physician, they are not Yogis. It is the cheerful mind that is
persevering. It is the strong mind that hews its way through a thousand
difficulties. And this, the hardest task of all, the cutting of our way out
of the net of Maya, is the work reserved only for giant wills.
Yet at the same time excessive mirth should be avoided (Anuddharsha).
Excessive mirth makes us unfit for serious thought. It also fritters away
the energies of the mind in vain. The stronger the will, the less the
yielding to the sway of the emotions. Excessive hilarity is quite as
objectionable as too much of sad seriousness, and all religious realisation
is possible only when the mind is in a steady, peaceful condition of
harmonious equilibrium.
It is thus that one may begin to learn how to love the Lord.
- Notes
- ↑ To gods, sages, manes, guests, and all creatures.