The Mundakoupanishad : Post-53. - Swami Krishnananda

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Tuesday 05, mar 2024. 06:30.

Chapter 3: Section 2.

Mantram- 6.

POST-53.

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Mantram-6.

"Vedanta-vijnana-suniscit-arthah

sannyasa-yogad yatayah suddha-sattvah, 

te brahma-lokesu paranta-kale 

paramrtah pari-mucyanti sarve." (3.2.6):

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Those seekers, knowers, whose internal nature has been purified by a life of intense quest and renunciation, and those who are well established in the Atman and who have been illumined by the knowledge of the Vedanta Shastra, whose mind has been fixed forever in one given direction, who have attained a conviction which is forever certain and no shaking of that conviction is ever possible, such great souls reach Brahmaloka.

There are two kinds of mukti mentioned here. The previous verse describes sadyomukti. What we are reading just now describes kramamukti. Sadhyomukti is immediate liberation, just here. Wherever we depart, whichever be the place where we die or cast off the body, at that very spot we merge into Brahman. If a drop in the ocean is to unite itself with the ocean, it need not have to travel some hundreds of kilometres to reach the ocean; it is just there. It dives into the very bosom of its own source, the ocean. In a similar manner, the soul need not have to travel in some direction—to go to the Sun, the Moon, stars, etc. It dissolves here itself because that which it has to reach is at the very spot where it is. That is called sadyomukti, immediate liberation, which is very rarely obtained. It is attained with great difficulty by those most blessed ones who have no desires at all of any kind.

Otherwise, the lesser ones reach Brahmaloka gradually through the Devayana Marga, through the rays of the Sun, through the Sun, and then through lightning, and through a Mahapurusha who comes and takes the soul by the hand to Brahmaloka. It is said that this soul will remain in Brahmaloka for as long as this universe lasts, which means to say, for such length of time as Brahma himself rules the cosmos. At the end of the universe—the pralaya, or the ultimate dissolution of the cosmos—the universe is dissolved, and together with it, Brahma is also dissolved. And when Brahma and the universe are dissolved in ultimate pralaya, the souls abiding there will also dissolve, and will attain Absolute Brahman. Until that time, they will be in the region of the Creator for as long as the Universe lasts. This is called kramamukti, the graduated system of attainment of liberation in the case of those who have sattvic desires, who have done great sattvic upasanas and have worshipped God with devotion, but sattvic karma is still persisting, and therefore they will not immediately merge with Brahman. They will reach up through the graduated scale prepared by prakriti through the sattva guna, and having reached Brahamaloka at the end of time, they merge with Brahman. Either way it is good; there is no harm. Let us go through Brahamaloka if we cannot have immediate liberation: te brahma-lokesu parantakale paramatah parimucyanti sarve.

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Next

Mantram-7.

"Gatah kalah pancadasa pratidevatha devas ca sarve prati- devatasu, 

karmani vijnanamayas ca atma pare'vyaye sarve eki- bhavanti." (3.2.7): 

Continued

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