Complete works of Swami Vivekananda
Volume 2
Jnana Yoga
CHAPTER VI
THE ABSOLUTE AND MANIFESTATION
Delivered in London, 1896
The one question that is most difficult to
grasp in understanding the Advaita philosophy,
and the one question that will be asked again
and again and that will always remain is:
How has the Infinite, the Absolute, become
the finite? I will now take up this question,
and, in order to illustrate it, I will use
a figure.
The Absolute And Manifestation.
Here is the Absolute (a), and this is the
universe (b). The Absolute has become the
universe. By this is not only meant the material
world, but the mental world, the spiritual
world — heavens and earths, and in fact,
everything that exists. Mind is the name of
a change, and body the name of another change,
and so on, and all these changes compose our
universe. This Absolute (a) has become the
universe (b) by coming through time, space,
and causation (c). This is the central idea
of Advaita. Time, space, and causation are
like the glass through which the Absolute
is seen, and when It is seen on the lower
side, It appears as the universe. Now we at
once gather from this that in the Absolute
there is neither time, space, nor causation.
The idea of time cannot be there, seeing that
there is no mind, no thought. The idea of
space cannot be there, seeing that there is
no external change. What you call motion and
causation cannot exist where there is only
One. We have to understand this, and impress
it on our minds, that what we call causation
begins after, if we may be permitted to say
so, the degeneration of the Absolute into
the phenomenal, and not before; that our will,
our desire and all these things always come
after that. I think Schopenhauer's philosophy
makes a mistake in its interpretation of Vedanta,
for it seeks to make the will everything.
Schopenhauer makes the will stand in the place
of the Absolute. But the absolute cannot be
presented as will, for will is something changeable
and phenomenal, and over the line, drawn above
time, space, and causation, there is no change,
no motion; it is only below the line that
external motion and internal motion, called
thought begin. There can be no will on the
other side, and will therefore, cannot be
the cause of this universe. Coming nearer,
we see in our own bodies that will is not
the cause of every movement. I move this chair;
my will is the cause of this movement, and
this will becomes manifested as muscular motion
at the other end. But the same power that
moves the chair is moving the heart, the lungs,
and so on, but not through will. Given that
the power is the same, it only becomes will
when it rises to the plane of consciousness,
and to call it will before it has risen to
this plane is a misnomer. This makes a good
deal of confusion in Schopenhauer's philosophy.
A stone falls and we ask, why? This question
is possible only on the supposition that nothing
happens without a cause. I request you to
make this very clear in your minds, for whenever
we ask why anything happens, we are taking
for granted that everything that happens must
have a why, that is to say, it must have been
preceded by something else which acted as
the cause. This precedence and succession
are what we call the law of causation. It
means that everything in the universe is by
turn a cause and an effect. It is the cause
of certain things which come after it, and
is itself the effect of something else which
has preceded it. This is called the law of
causation and is a necessary condition of
all our thinking. We believe that every particle
in the universe, whatever it be, is in relation
to every other particle. There has been much
discussion as to how this idea arose. In Europe,
there have been intuitive philosophers who
believed that it was constitutional in humanity,
others have believed it came from experience,
but the question has never been settled. We
shall see later on what the Vedanta has to
say about it. But first we have to understand
this that the very asking of the question
"why" presupposes that everything round us
has been preceded by certain things, and will
be succeeded by certain other things. The
other belief involved in this question is
that nothing in the universe is independent,
that everything is acted upon by something
outside itself. Interdependence is the law
of the whole universe. In asking what caused
the Absolute, what an error we are making!
To ask this question we have to suppose that
the Absolute also is bound by something, that
It is dependent on something; and in making
this supposition, we drag the Absolute down
to the level of the universe. For in the Absolute
there is neither time, space, nor causation;
It is all one. That which exists by itself
alone cannot have any cause. That which is
free cannot have any cause; else it would
not be free, but bound. That which has relativity
cannot be free. Thus we see the very question,
why the Infinite became the finite, is an
impossible one, for it is self-contradictory.
Coming from subtleties to the logic of our
common plane, to common sense, we can see
this from another side, when we seek to know
how the Absolute has become the relative.
Supposing we knew the answer, would the Absolute
remain the Absolute? It would have become
relative. What is meant by knowledge in our
common-sense idea? It is only something that
has become limited by our mind, that we know,
and when it is beyond our mind, it is not
knowledge. Now if the Absolute becomes limited
by the mind, It is no more Absolute; It has
become finite. Everything limited by the mind
becomes finite. Therefore to know the Absolute
is again a contradiction in terms. That is
why this question has never been answered,
because if it were answered, there would no
more be an Absolute. A God known is no more
God; He has become finite like one of us.
He cannot be known He is always the Unknowable
One.
But what Advaita says is that God is more
than knowable. This is a great fact to learn.
You must not go home with the idea that God
is unknowable in the sense in which agnostics
put it. For instance, here is a chair, it
is known to us. But what is beyond ether or
whether people exist there or not is possibly
unknowable. But God is neither known nor unknowable
in this sense. He is something still higher
than known; that is what is meant by God being
unknown and unknowable. The expression is
not used in the sense in which it may be said
that some questions are unknown and unknowable.
God is more than known. This chair is known,
but God is intensely more than that because
in and through Him we have to know this chair
itself. He is the Witness, the eternal Witness
of all knowledge. Whatever we know we have
to know in and through Him. He is the Essence
of our own Self. He is the Essence of this
ego, this I and we cannot know anything excepting
in and through that I. Therefore you have
to know everything in and through the Brahman.
To know the chair you have to know it in and
through God. Thus God is infinitely nearer
to us than the chair, but yet He is infinitely
higher. Neither known, nor unknown, but something
infinitely higher than either. He is your
Self. "Who would live a second, who would
breathe a second in this universe, if that
Blessed One were not filling it?" Because
in and through Him we breathe, in and through
Him we exist. Not the He is standing somewhere
and making my blood circulate. What is meant
is that He is the Essence of all this, tie
Soul of my soul. You cannot by any possibility
say you know Him; it would be degrading Him.
You cannot get out of yourself, so you cannot
know Him. Knowledge is objectification. For
instance, in memory you are objectifying many
things, projecting them out of yourself. All
memory, all the things which I have seen and
which I know are in my mind. The pictures,
the impressions of all these things, are in
my mind, and when I would try to think of
them, to know them, the first act of knowledge
would be to project them outside. This cannot
be done with God, because He is the Essence
of our souls, we cannot project Him outside
ourselves. Here is one of the profoundest
passages in Vedanta: "He that is the Essence
of your soul, He is the Truth, He is the Self,
thou art That, O Shvetaketu. " This is what
is meant by "Thou art God. " You cannot describe
Him by any other language. All attempts of
language, calling Him father, or brother,
or our dearest friend, are attempts to objectify
God, which cannot be done. He is the Eternal
Subject of everything. I am the subject of
this chair; I see the chair; so God is the
Eternal Subject of my soul. How can you objectify
Him, the Essence of your souls, the Reality
of everything? Thus, I would repeat to you
once more, God is neither knowable nor unknowable,
but something infinitely higher than either.
He is one with us, and that which is one with
us is neither knowable nor unknowable, as
our own self. You cannot know your own self;
you cannot move it out and make it an object
to look at, because you are that and cannot
separate yourself from it. Neither is it unknowable,
for what is better known than yourself? It
is really the centre of our knowledge. In
exactly the same sense, God is neither unknowable
nor known, but infinitely higher than both;
for He is our real Self.
First, we see then that the question, "What
caused the Absolute?" is a contradiction in
terms; and secondly, we find that the idea
of God in the Advaita is this Oneness; and,
therefore, we cannot objectify Him, for we
are always living and moving in Him, whether
we know it or not. Whatever we do is always
through Him. Now the question is: What are
time, space, and causation? Advaita means
non-duality; there are no two, but one. Yet
we see that here is a proposition that the
Absolute is manifesting Itself as many, through
the veil of time, space, and causation. Therefore
it seems that here are two, the Absolute and
Mâyâ (the sum total of time, space, and
causation). It seems apparently very convincing
that there are two. To this the Advaitist
replies that it cannot be called two. To have
two, we must have two absolute independent
existences which cannot be caused. In the
first place time, space, and causation cannot
be said to be independent existences. Time
is entirely a dependent existence; it changes
with every change of our mind. Sometimes in
dream one imagines that one has lived several
years, at other times several months were
passed as one second. So, time is entirely
dependent on our state of mind. Secondly,
the idea of time vanishes altogether, sometimes.
So with space. We cannot know what space is.
Yet it is there, indefinable, and cannot exist
separate from anything else. So with causation.
The one peculiar attribute we find in time,
space, and causation is that they cannot exist
separate from other things. Try to think of
space without colour, or limits, or any connection
with the things around — just abstract space.
You cannot; you have to think of it as the
space between two limits or between three
objects. It has to be connected with some
object to have any existence. So with time;
you cannot have any idea of abstract time,
but you have to take two events, one preceding
and the other succeeding, and join the two
events by the idea of succession. Time depends
on two events, just as space has to be related
to outside objects. And the idea of causation
is inseparable from time and space. This is
the peculiar thing about them that they have
no independent existence. They have not even
the existence which the chair or the wall
has. They are as shadows around everything
which you cannot catch. They have no real
existence; yet they are not non-existent,
seeing that through them all things are manifesting
as this universe. Thus we see, first, that
the combination of time, space, and causation
has neither existence nor non-existence. Secondly,
it sometimes vanishes. To give an illustration,
there is a wave on the ocean. The wave is
the same as the ocean certainly, and yet we
know it is a wave, and as such different from
the ocean. What makes this difference? The
name and the form, that is, the idea in the
mind and the form. Now, can we think of a
wave-form as something separate from the ocean?
Certainly not. It is always associated with
the ocean idea. If the wave subsides, the
form vanishes in a moment, and yet the form
was not a delusion. So long as the wave existed
the form was there, and you were bound to
see the form. This is Maya.
The whole of this universe, therefore, is,
as it were, a peculiar form; the Absolute
is that ocean while you and I, and suns and
stars, and everything else are various waves
of that ocean. And what makes the waves different?
Only the form, and that form is time, space,
and causation, all entirely dependent on the
wave. As soon as the wave goes, they vanish.
As soon as the individual gives up this Maya,
it vanishes for him and he becomes free. The
whole struggle is to get rid of this clinging
on to time, space, and causation, which are
always obstacles in our way. What is the theory
of evolution? What are the two factors? A
tremendous potential power which is trying
to express itself, and circumstances which
are holding it down, the environments not
allowing it to express itself. So, in order
to fight with these environments, the power
is taking new bodies again and again. An amoeba,
in the struggle, gets another body and conquers
some obstacles, then gets another body and
so on, until it becomes man. Now, if you carry
this idea to its logical conclusion, there
must come a time when that power that was
in the amoeba and which evolved as man, will
have conquered all the obstructions that nature
can bring before it and will thus escape from
all its environments. This idea expressed
in metaphysics will take this form; there
are two components in every action, the one
the subject, the other the object and the
one aim of life is to make the subject master
of the object. For instance, I feel unhappy
because a man scolds me. My struggle will
be to make myself strong enough to conquer
the environment, so that he may scold and
I shall not feel. That is how we are all trying
to conquer. What is meant by morality? Making
the subject strong by attuning it to the Absolute,
so that finite nature ceases to have control
over us. It is a logical conclusion of our
philosophy that there must come a time when
we shall have conquered all the environments,
because nature is finite.
Here is another thing to learn. How do you
know that nature is finite? You can only know
this through metaphysics. Nature is that Infinite
under limitations. Therefore it is finite.
So, there must come a time, when we shall
have conquered all environments. And how are
we to conquer them? We cannot possibly conquer
all the objective environments. We cannot.
The little fish wants to fly from its enemies
in the water. How does it do so? By evolving
wings and becoming a bird. The fish did not
change the water or the air; the change was
in itself. Change is always subjective. All
through evolution you find that the conquest
of nature comes by change in the subject.
Apply this to religion and morality, and you
will find that the conquest of evil comes
by the change in the subjective alone. That
is how the Advaita system gets its whole force,
on the subjective side of man. To talk of
evil and misery is nonsense, because they
do not exist outside. If I am immune against
all anger, I never feel angry. If I am proof
against all hatred, I never feel hatred.
This is, therefore, the process by which to
achieve that conquest — through the subjective,
by perfecting the subjective. I may make bold
to say that the only religion which agrees
with, and even goes a little further than
modern researches, both on physical and moral
lines is the Advaita, and that is why it appeals
to modern scientists so much. They find that
the old dualistic theories are not enough
for them, do not satisfy their necessities.
A man must have not only faith, but intellectual
faith too. Now, in this later part of the
nineteenth century, such an idea as that religion
coming from any other source than one's own
hereditary religion must be false, shows that
there is still weakness left, and such ideas
must be given up. I do not mean that such
is the case in this country alone, it is in
every country, and nowhere more than in my
own. This Advaita was never allowed to come
to the people. At first some monks got hold
of it and took it to the forests, and so it
came to be called the "Forest Philosophy".
By the mercy of the Lord, the Buddha came
and preached it to the masses, and the whole
nation became Buddhists. Long after that,
when atheists and agnostics had destroyed
the nation again, it was found out that Advaita
was the only way to save India from materialism.
Thus has Advaita twice saved India from materialism
Before the Buddha came, materialism had spread
to a fearful extent, and it was of a most
hideous kind, not like that of the present
day, but of a far worse nature. I am a materialist
in a certain sense, because I believe that
there is only One. That is what the materialist
wants you to believe; only he calls it matter
and I call it God. The materialists admit
that out of this matter all hope, and religion,
and everything have come. I say, all these
have come out of Brahman. But the materialism
that prevailed before Buddha was that crude
sort of materialism which taught, "Eat, drink,
and be merry; there is no God, soul or heaven;
religion is a concoction of wicked priests.
" It taught the morality that so long as you
live, you must try to live happily; eat, though
you have to borrow money for the food, and
never mind about repaying it. That was the
old materialism, and that kind of philosophy
spread so much that, even today it has got
the name of "popular philosophy". Buddha brought
the Vedanta to light, gave it to the people,
and saved India. A thousand years after his
death a similar state of things again prevailed.
The mobs, the masses, and various races, had
been converted to Buddhism; naturally the
teachings of the Buddha became in time degenerated,
because most of the people were very ignorant.
Buddhism taught no God, no Ruler of the universe,
so gradually the masses brought their gods,
and devils, and hobgoblins out again, and
a tremendous hotchpotch was made of Buddhism
in India. Again materialism came to the fore,
taking the form of licence with the higher
classes and superstition with the lower. Then
Shankaracharya arose and once more revivified
the Vedanta philosophy. He made it a rationalistic
philosophy. In the Upanishads the arguments
are often very obscure. By Buddha the moral
side of the philosophy was laid stress upon,
and by Shankaracharya, the intellectual side.
He worked out, rationalised, and placed before
men the wonderful coherent system of Advaita.
Materialism prevails in Europe today. You
may pray for the salvation of the modern sceptics,
but they do not yield, they want reason. The
salvation of Europe depends on a rationalistic
religion, and Advaita — the non-duality,
the Oneness, the idea of the Impersonal God
— is the only religion that can have any
hold on any intellectual people. It comes
whenever religion seems to disappear and irreligion
seems to prevail, and that is why it has taken
ground in Europe and America.
I would say one thing more in connection with
this philosophy. In the old Upanishads we
find sublime poetry; their authors were poets.
Plato says, inspiration comes to people through
poetry, and it seems as if these ancient Rishis,
seers of Truth, were raised above humanity
to show these truths through poetry. They
never preached, nor philosophised, nor wrote.
Music came out of their hearts. In Buddha
we had the great, universal heart and infinite
patience, making religion practical and bringing
it to everyone's door. In Shankaracharya we
saw tremendous intellectual power, throwing
the scorching light of reason upon everything.
We want today that bright sun of intellectuality
joined with the heart of Buddha, the wonderful
infinite heart of love and mercy. This union
will give us the highest philosophy. Science
and religion will meet and shake hands. Poetry
and philosophy will become friends. This will
be the religion of the future, and if we can
work it out, we may be sure that it will be
for all times and peoples. This is the one
way that will prove acceptable to modern science,
for it has almost come to it. When the scientific
teacher asserts that all things are the manifestation
of one force, does it not remind you of the
God of whom you hear in the Upanishads: "As
the one fire entering into the universe expresses
itself in various forms, even so that One
Soul is expressing Itself in every soul and
yet is infinitely more besides?" Do you not
see whither science is tending? The Hindu
nation proceeded through the study of the
mind, through metaphysics and logic. The European
nations start from external nature, and now
they too are coming to the same results. We
find that searching through the mind we at
last come to that Oneness, that Universal
One, the Internal Soul of everything, the
Essence and Reality of everything, the Ever-Free,
the Ever-blissful, the Ever-Existing. Through
material science we come to the same Oneness.
Science today is telling us that all things
are but the manifestation of one energy which
is the sum total of everything which exists,
and the trend of humanity is towards freedom
and not towards bondage. Why should men be
moral? Because through morality is the path
towards freedom, and immorality leads to bondage.
Another peculiarity of the Advaita system
is that from its very start it is non-destructive.
This is another glory, the boldness to preach,
"Do not disturb the faith of any, even of
those who through ignorance, have attached
themselves to lower forms of worship. " That
is what it says, do not disturb, but help
everyone to get higher and higher; include
all humanity. This philosophy preaches a God
who is a sum total. If you seek a universal
religion which can apply to everyone, that
religion must not be composed of only the
parts, but it must always be their sum total
and include all degrees of religious development.
This idea is not clearly found in any other
religious system. They are all parts equally
struggling to attain to the whole. The existence
of the part is only for this. So, from the
very first, Advaita had no antagonism with
the various sects existing in India. There
are dualists existing today, and their number
is by far the largest in India, because dualism
naturally appeals to less educated minds.
It is a very convenient, natural, common-sense
explanation of the universe. But with these
dualists, Advaita has no quarrel. The one
thinks that God is outside the universe, somewhere
in heaven, and the other, that He is his own
Soul, and that it will be a blasphemy to call
Him anything more distant. Any idea of separation
would be terrible. He is the nearest of the
near. There is no word in any language to
express this nearness except the word Oneness.
With any other idea the Advaitist is not satisfied
just as the dualist is shocked with the concept
of the Advaita, and thinks it blasphemous.
At the same time the Advaitist knows that
these other ideas must be, and so has no quarrel
with the dualist who is on the right road.
From his standpoint, the dualist will have
to see many. It is a constitutional necessity
of his standpoint. Let him have it. The Advaitist
knows that whatever may be his theories, he
is going to the same goal as he himself. There
he differs entirely from dualist who is forced
by his point of view to believe that all differing
views are wrong. The dualists all the world
over naturally believe in a Personal God who
is purely anthropomorphic, who like a great
potentate in this world is pleased with some
and displeased with others. He is arbitrarily
pleased with some people or races and showers
blessing upon them. Naturally the dualist
comes to the conclusion that God has favourites,
and he hopes to be one of them. You will find
that in almost every religion is the idea:
"We are the favourites of our God, and only
by believing as we do, can you be taken into
favour with Him. " Some dualists are so narrow
as to insist that only the few that have been
predestined to the favour of God can be saved;
the rest may try ever so hard, but they cannot
be accepted. I challenge you to show me one
dualistic religion which has not more or less
of this exclusiveness. And, therefore, in
the nature of things, dualistic religions
are bound to fight and quarrel with each other,
and this they have ever been doing. Again,
these dualists win the popular favour by appealing
to the vanity of the uneducated. They like
to feel that they enjoy exclusive privileges.
The dualist thinks you cannot be moral until
you have a God with a rod in His hand, ready
to punish you. The unthinking masses are generally
dualists, and they, poor fellows, have been
persecuted for thousands of years in every
country; and their idea of salvation is, therefore,
freedom from the fear of punishment. I was
asked by a clergyman in America, "What! you
have no Devil in your religion? How can that
be?" But we find that the best and the greatest
men that have been born in the world have
worked with that high impersonal idea. It
is the Man who said, "I and my Father are
One", whose power has descended unto millions.
For thousands of years it has worked for good.
And we know that the same Man, because he
was a nondualist, was merciful to others.
To the masses who could not conceive of anything
higher than a Personal God, he said, "Pray
to your Father in heaven. " To others who
could grasp a higher idea, he said, "I am
the vine, ye are the branches," but to his
disciples to whom he revealed himself more
fully, he proclaimed the highest truth, "I
and my Father are One. "
It was the great Buddha, who never cared for
the dualist gods, and who has been called
an atheist and materialist, who yet was ready
to give up his body for a poor goat. That
Man set in motion the highest moral ideas
any nation can have. Whenever there is a moral
code, it is ray of light from that Man. We
cannot force the great hearts of the world
into narrow limits, and keep them there, especially
at this time in the history of humanity when
there is a degree of intellectual development,
such as was never dreamed of even a hundred
years ago, when a wave of scientific knowledge
has arisen which nobody, even fifty years
ago, would have dreamed of. By trying to force
people into narrow limits you degrade them
into animals and unthinking masses. You kill
their moral life. What is now wanted is a
combination of the greatest heart with the
highest intellectuality, of infinite love
with infinite knowledge. The Vedantist gives
no other attributes to God except these three
— that He is Infinite Existence, Infinite
Knowledge, and Infinite Bliss, and he regards
these three as One. Existence without knowledge
and love cannot be; knowledge without love
and love without knowledge cannot be. What
we want is the harmony of Existence, Knowledge,
and Bliss Infinite. For that is our goal.
We want harmony, not one-sided development.
And it is possible to have the intellect of
a Shankara with the heart of a Buddha. I hope
we shall all struggle to attain to that blessed
combination.
