Thoughts on Spirituality

 

B Sena

 

          The Deathless dwells in the heart of death,

          When Man bursts his mortal bounds,

          The Boundless stands revealed.

                                                                   Tagore

 

All forms, all things, all objects, all phenomena are so many manifestations, varied as they may be, of the spirit indwelling in the heart of them.  “Lifeforce,” say Bergson, “is ever expressing itself through matter.  The sensory phenomena are the visible formations of the life-force, yet they are not the life-force itself.  The life-force though immanent in all forms transcends them all.”  It is through the gross and the material that we come to know of the life-force as ti works in and upon nature, shaping with kaleidoscopic rapidity the warp and wood of life as we see it in and around us.  The enchanting colors and the bewitching smell fo the roses, the freshness of the dew-fed verdure in the garden are visible signs and symbls of the spirit of spring.

 

The vast universe with so many solar systems, inter-planetary relationships, earths and heavens, mountains and rivers, is an interplay of spirit in matter, regardless of how gross or subtle the matter may be.  The spirit cannot but attract matter and manipulate it as it thinks best, according to certain laws.  Matter is to the spirit just as clay to a potter who makes out pots, deep or shallow, flat or round, small or big, according to his needs.

 

There is a subtle relationship between spirit and matter.  If fact, matter itself is nothing but congealed energy.  The spirit, on the other hand, is active energy, a life-force.  By the law of affinity like attracts like.  The higher energy of the spirit or the energizing principle cannot but act upon the hidden and dormant energy in matter, activting it into what we call life-physical life, no matter at what level.

 

Everyone, man, beast, bird, insect, even herbs and shrubs, have in them a seed-bearing fruit each of tis own kind which blossoms forth in due time.  Thus goes on the wheel of life, up and down by the force of its own momentum lodged in the innermost depths of each being and brought into fruition by the Oversoul or the Spirit of God as it activates and quickens the dormant life impulse in the center of each.

 

 So is the case with man, but with a difference.  Man occupies the top rung in the ladder of life.  It given to him to be able to know his Self and to know his God.  Both reside in the human body.  But while He lives in us, we do not live in Him.  The tragedy of life is that the individual self-consciousness sunders the individual from the cosmic consciousness—all-pervading and all-permeating- the source of all life on all the planes of existence, the eternal and the deathless principle, that outlives all forms, colors and designs.

 

It is only on the deathbed that something of the Reality dawns as life is forcibly drawn out of the tabernacle of the flesh.  “When Man bursts the mortal bounds the Boundless stands revealed.”  But does this fleeting glimpse benefit us in any way? No.  The spirit clothed in astral matter passes out of the physical to the great deep from where it came.

 

Is there then no way of God-realization? There is a way, say the sages.  Besides the involuntary bursting of the bounds, there is a voluntary bursting of the bounds, there is a voluntary way of disrobing the Boundless by a practical process of self-analysis whereby one can, while in the body, rise above body consciousness, transcending the bodily adjuncts.  Those who are initiated into the mysteries of the beyond have to pass through experiences similar to that of death, but with a difference: for then one rises into higher consciousness instead of sinking into unconsciousness; and then the vision is of the Light of Life and not darkness as when clothed in raiments of astral and mental material.  This bursting of the bounds is absolutely necessary for God-realization; and we can do it, and have a vision of the glory of the Boundless in full awareness, with the help and guidance of a Word-personified Saint.

 

 

 

O MASTER

 

    Unless my eyes gleam with Your light, blind me.

     If Your words are not on my tongue, make me dumb.

    Let me be still if not moving with you.

   Keep me kind and caring, even toward those who wish

me brought low, or keep me alone.

    Centered in You, this world can cause me no pain.

    Strengthen that center, I beg you, for it often wavers.

                                                                                                         

Tracy Leddy.