TRUTH SUBLIME

In the mysterious silence of the soul
The Void is full — of a calm repose — a joy of peace.
There thoughts are still and words are dumb,
It is neither yea nor nay,
Worlds like shadows flit and pass through it.
In it light and darkness lose distinction,
Sounds waft over it — like distant echoes of its own being,
A Truth sublime in which is blended strangely
Eternal motion and eternal rest.
— Swami Ramdas

 

How I understand it:

In this poem, Beloved Papa has described the Truth as the point where the so-called opposites meet, co-exist and losing distinction, reaching the state of equilibrium — Samatwam.

The Truth or Void is also as Beloved Papa elsewhere put it: “All-containing but still eluding the grasp of thought.” It is the point where there is calmness and peace even in the exuberance of joy, where yea and nay, light and darkness, motion and rest co-exist, but lose all distinction.

In this vast infinity of the Void, worlds come into existence, stay for a while and pass on. Their appearances and disappearances are like shadows because they are merely projections of the Infinite.

Pujya Swami Satchidanandaji said: “The world is actually not a creation of God, but a projection, which means God Himself has projected forth as the entire universe as a seed projects itself forth as a huge tree. Everyone is He and there is nothing but He.”

Sounds, though emanating from within the Void or Consciousness, seem distant like echoes, much like the projection of worlds.

The theme of this poem resonates in the following words of Pujya Swamiji culled from his book GOD GUIDES: “When I look at a person, I see him or her as pure Consciousness and the body is a tiny speck floating in the Consciousness. So, all the matter in the universe of innumerable forms is only many tiny spots floating in the pure Consciousness. When someone speaks, I know the sound comes from Consciousness only. Though the body walks etc., the power is of pure Consciousness only. But Consciousness is not affected by the so-called action. So, it can be said that such actions are taking place through the vehicles and the power for such actions is drawn from pure Consciousness only. So, there is no ego anywhere. But each form takes upon itself the responsibility for such action and therefore the sense of doership with all the consequences.”

To better understand the Void, Beloved Papa made it possible for me to dwell on It in the following manner:

THE GREAT VOID

To understand the “Un-understandable” with the help of our limited mind is like tongs trying to grasp the hands that hold them. However, it is only through the mind that we can try to make our way to the GREAT VOID! So, here’s an attempt in that direction.

To define or describe the GREAT VOID is very difficult. We may keep thinking of ways and means to do so however we find ourselves quite baffled and tongue-tied. It is probably due to this that Beloved Papa said: “In the Upanishads you will find the definition of God given negatively: ‘Not this, not this.’ Whatever you see, hear, touch, smell or talk is not He. But you can know Him by experience, by direct intuitional perception. Mind can think of relative things. What can it think of the Eternal? It is baffled. So, the Upanishads say Mouna or emptiness or nothingness is God. Silence is Brahman.”

This may have also been the reason why Beloved Papa did not use the word GREAT VOID multiple times in his talks and writing. After all, what can one write about the Un-writeable, what can one speak about the Unspeakable! Thus, “Mouna is Brahman’.

In one of his talks during the world tour, Beloved Papa said, “The manifest and the unmanifest as two aspects of One Truth which is both and yet beyond both.  It is unthinkable, incomprehensible and inexpressible.  We can express something about the dynamic and the static aspects, that is, the Reality with form and without form, but that which is beyond these is incomprehensible and inexpressible.  God is at once dynamic, static and transcendent.”

In the poem THE GREAT TRUTH, Beloved Papa called the mind, movement in darkness, and love, movement in light. In the poem TRUTH SUBLIME, he said: “The Void is full of a calm repose, a joy of peace. There thoughts are still and words are dumb; It is neither yea nor nay; worlds like shadows flit and pass through it. In it light and darkness lose distinction,” In GOD EXPERIENCE, Vol 2, he stated, “Where opposites meet, there opposites are transcended. That is called Samatwa; there you find God. There is perfect balance and peace here.” So, the GREAT VOID is a state of “perfect balance”,

This mystery is further dealt with by Beloved Papa through his explanations given in GOD EXPERIENCE, Vol.1, where he states: “God is a mystery. You cannot say what He is and what He is not… When opposites clash and disappear, what remains is silence. You can speak only about one of the opposites at a time — light or darkness. What can you say of that which is beyond light or darkness? You can conceive of light, conceive of darkness, but not of that which is beyond light and darkness. Even so, God can be realized, but cannot be expressed, cannot be defined. It will be futile to describe the Indescribable, to express the Inexpressible. He is the witness of His silence, He is also the witness of His talk. He is silence; He is talk; and He is beyond silence and talk. Silence cannot describe God. Talk cannot describe Him. There must be neither talk nor silence. He is the all-pervading, all-inclusive, all-transcendent Godhead. ‘When I talk, I am dumb. When I walk, I am still. When I work, I am at rest.’ The GITA brings us to that point where these opposites meet and lose distinction… God is at once active and inactive. To describe Him is difficult. One visualizes Him and tries to describe Him. It is all imagination, not reality. We form our own ideas about Him, but He is beyond all ideas. He is beyond all thought, all imagination. Imagination cannot soar up to Him. Mind cannot grasp Him. Words cannot describe Him. Still, we try to set Him forth in words. His glories are infinite. His powers are infinite. He who is beyond conception, beyond expression, has become everything. There is none but He. Therefore, the saint sees himself everywhere; sees God everywhere because God and he are not different. Ramdas cannot speak of Him except in this strain.”

Now that we understand that He is a mystery. How can we unravel this Mystery! How can we fathom the Unfathomable! The answer could be in Beloved Papa guidelines given to Pujya Mataji in her Sadhana days. He asked her to remember everything she did, from morning to night, in a chronological order, then he asked her to remember everything she spoke in a chronological order, thereafter recall everything she thought in a chronological order. By the time Pujya Mataji reached this juncture, she found that whenever she was trying to recall the sequence of thoughts, there would be gaps in the thought process. Slowly the gaps increased to the point where there were no thoughts for long intervals. Thus, during meditation, she could go into a state of Nirvikalpa Samadhi very easily.

My initial understanding was that Beloved Papa was aiding her meditation through these methods. However, now I think it could have been to make her get glimpses of the GREAT VOID during these gaps. This can be understood from the words of Vinobaji: “Cosmic Consciousness is hidden by the resolves or modifications of the mind and can be experienced in between two modifications. The mind is constantly covered or hidden by these modifications. These modifications are a result of different resolves and fantasies of the mind. But the time gap in between two such modifications is the one that needs to be harnessed and increased in length. During such intervals the Cosmic Consciousness reveals itself.”

Hence, the Truth — the GREAT VOID — can be experienced in the gaps of silence, talk, movement. It is the Substratum of the manifest and unmanifest aspects. Therefore, in It, the beginning and the end are the same. THE GREAT VOID is that in which all opposites meet and lose distinction.

Prem Sudha:

The Marathi translation of this poem, as enshrined in the collection called Prem Sudha, is given below:
सत्य
आत्म्याची शांतता अगाध-आणि आश्चर्यजनक आहे,
त्याचें हे शून्य संपूर्णतया भरले आहे,
गाढ विश्रांती आणि शांतीचा आनंद 
यांनी तें व्यापिलें आहे. 
विचार शांत होतात, आंही शब्दांना मौन पडतें,
त्या ठिकाणीं ‘आहे’ नाही —
त्या ठिकाणीं ‘नाही’ ही नाही,
छायेप्रमाणे शब्दमात्र त्यांतून निघून जाते. 
प्रकाश आणि उजेड भेदभाव मावळतो,
ध्वनी त्याच्यावरून तरलतर विहरत आहे —
दुरून येणाऱ्या स्वतःच्या प्रतिध्वनीप्रमाणे भासत आहे. 
अत्यंत उदात्त — अत्यंत श्रेष्ठ असें हें सत्य आहे,
आणि त्यांत अपूर्व प्रकारें मिसळ झाली आहे —
चिरंतन कर्म आणि चिरंतन स्थिति 
एकत्र विलसत आहेत!

The mp3 of the Bhajan is also attached herewith.






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