Rishi Yajnavalkya in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad: 1.Swami Krishnananda.

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Thursday 25 , Jul 2024 06:55.
Article
Scriptures
Rishi Yajnavalkya in the Brihadaranyaka Upanishad: 1.
Swami Krishnananda.

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"Idam brahma, idam kshatram, ime lokah, ime devah, imani bhutani, idam sarvam yad ayam atma.":

"This Source of knowledge; this source of power; all these worlds; all these gods; all these beings – All this is just the Self."

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This proclamation is like a Brahma Astra that Sage Yajnavalkya is discharging against every kind of attachment one can conceive in this world. It is somewhat easy to accept that God is everywhere. It becomes easy because we always externalise the location of God, however much we may try to universalise Him. The idea of location in space does not leave us so easily. God is everywhere, this is what we generally believe. The everywhereness of God implies that there is space, and inasmuch as our mind is wedded completely to the concept of spatial expansion, we feel a little bit comforted when we are told that God is everywhere.

Now, here, a thunderbolt is discharged by Sage Yajnavalkya when he says the Self also is everywhere. Imani bhutani, idam sarvam yad ayam atma. All the fourteen worlds are the Self. Here we will not find it so easy to accept it, because we cannot spatialise the concept of Self. Our Self cannot be somewhere else, it must be within us only. But, what does one mean by saying "all the worlds, all the gods, all this is the Self". What is this that the Sage is telling us? What exactly is the Self? Can anyone tell us what is the Self? What meaning can we attach to this word? There is myself, yourself, this self, that self! The self is something which cannot be externalised, objectified or spatialised in any way. The Self is the utter subjectivity of universality. The universal concept is rather easy to accept because we may spatialise even the universal being. But the Self cannot be spatialised – I cannot be anywhere else than in myself.

But what does this declaration say? Imani bhutani, idam sarvam yad ayam atma. All the created beings, all the worlds, ima lokah – all – sarvam yad ayam atma. Can I place myself in the location of something which is the extended world outside? Is the world outside my self? How can I tear the internal location of my selfhood and place it in the sun, or anywhere else? This is an exercise which is like the Brahma Astra to the human concept of any value in this world. Can anyone believe that his self or her self is anywhere else other than in one's own self? Is it possible? Is the Self sitting in Brahma Loka, is it in Bhuvar Loka, Swarga Loka? Is it in Patala, is it in the sun, the moon and the stars? Can my self be conceived as being located there? But it is necessary to conceive such a possibility according to this great statement of Sage Yajnavalkya. 

This will rend the knot of attachment to personality, attachment to selfhood in an individualised form, and the result would be unthinkable. This exercise should not be attempted by anyone with even the least attachment to human individuality, personality, in whom the idea of 'I' or 'mine' has not gone. When an immature person attempts this kind of meditation and tries to wrench the self of oneself and place it on a tree outside, disastrous consequences may follow. If a purified mind tries this, liberation may follow.

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Continued

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