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by
Sri Bimal Mohanty
VOL
No. 119
December : 2010
CHAPTER 119
UPANISHADSARA- MUNDAKA- The expanse of Brahman and the origin of the creation
Based on lectures by Sri Bimal Mohanty
Brahman is to be known. But is Brahman knowable within the limited boundaries of our cognizing faculties?
That is what the next sloka of Mundaka implies when it says:
Yat tat adresyam agrAhyam agotram avarnam achakhsyushrotram tat apAnipAdam
Nityam bibhum sarvagatam susukhsam tat avyayam tat bhutayonim paripasyanti dhirAh.
By higher knowledge we connect to Brahman, who is not a visible object – adreshyam because He is not gross. What is drsya or becomes visible to us? That which can be comprehended by our physical eyes. Physical eyes can comprehend what is in itself gross and physical. Since Brahman is not physical and gross, it can only be comprehended by our intutive perception which is beyond our physical sense organs. One wishing to understand Brahman the essential requisite is to transcend the limitations of any physical limitation. He is agrAhyam – you can not say I have got him now. You can only get something which lies within your reach of your physical organs like hands, ears etc. One can not discover His origin as he is agotram. Brahman has no gotra or source of origin, He has no features –avarnam. He has no defined limbs like eyes, ears, hands feet etc to describe. Being eternal knowledge He is nityam the ever existent. If He were not nityam, the absolute truth would be subject to change and conditional. He is sarvagatam- all pervading as the truth knowledge is applicable to one and all. He is very subtle susukshsm.
The purport of all these adjectives is to drive home the point that knowledge of Brahman comes to yogi not in his physical or mental dimensions but when he transcends them to reach his psychic dimension which is achieved through yoga alone. Brahman does not get exhausted as one thing after another keeps on flowing out of Him – avyayam bhutayonim That is how men of steady wisdom see Him – Paripasyanti dhirAh. That is cognizance at supramental level.
One may read the scriptures and still may not see what is to be seen, may not grasp what is to be grasped by the mind, may not be able to connect with what one has to get connected to. There are no distinguishable features of Brahman to catch hold of and which can be cognized by the eyes, ears or our limbs (or who himself has no physical features). But by the higher knowledge and with patience Brahman the immutable (nityam), all encompassing (bibhum) all pervading (sarvagatam) , extremely subtle (susuksham) and imperishable (avyayam) and origin of all manifestations (bhutayonim) can be truly seen.
The above sloka is one of the most difficult to understand as it attempts to describe the subtle intricacies of Brahman. Meditative tapasvis spend years in contemplation to understand Brahman. To know what is He really like? These thoughts are also echoed in another Upanishad – The Mandukya ( as similar sounding name like Mundaka but different from it) which we may take up later some time, where it is said:
Na antah prajnam na vahisprajnam na ubhayatah prajnam na prajnAnaghanam na prajnAm na aprajnAm
Adrstam avyavahAryam agrAhyam alakshanam achintyam avyapadesyam ekAntam apratyayasAra
He is neither comprehensible within the inner subjective world, nor in the objective outer world and not even when both are transcended. (The subjective world is that which is comprehended by physical reasoning, like all the physical happenings around us. But the objective world is comprehended only through esoteric reasoning which have no visible existence as for example universal emotions of love and compassion, altruism etc.).
He is neither limited to wisdom nor to ignorance not even when knowledge and ignorance both are understood. He is unseen, unrelated to any thing, without any distinguishing features. He is beyond the mental grasp, without a name, He is one and only without a second.
What all these imply?
When we say “Brahman is this”, we automatically put a defining boundary around Brahman. When we say “Brahman is not this” we also assume a limitation of Brahman. In both cases we are putting limitations on Brahman .All definitions are in effect expressions of limitations and Brahman is beyond any boundary of limitation, beyond expression. Nothing is excluded from Brahman. He encompasses everything. That is how men of wisdom visualize Him. Dhirah paripasyanti.
Brahman can not be described by defined adjectives or measured by any measuring tool. These adjectives that we give to Brahman are indeed forced limitations, as if to say “this is it” period. In other words we are saying that Brahman is what my mind has conceived and there is nothing more to it. I have measured Brahman by using my organs of perception, my mind as the measuring tools. What I have measured is the parimAna or the measure of Brahman.
But we know fully well that my organs have their limitations. The eyes can see only so much. The ears can hear only so far. Mind can think only within its zone of cognizance. So what about the existence beyond the limitations of the tools? What lies there?
Brahman exists every where. He also exists beyond the boundaries of cognizance. With a limited tool you cannot measure up the limitless immeasurable, the aparimeya until the tool itself becomes without limits, to be able to reach all the way. The measurer with its measuring tool and the object of measure must first become compatible in order to be able get the total picture. Limitlessness is the character of Brahman hence measurer also has to be limitless like Brahman. That is the concept to be understood when it is said brahmeiva Brahmavit. Brahman only knows Brahman. The knower of Brahman becomes one with Brahman to know Brahman.
The entire concept of Mundaka Upanishad, on this topic of para and apara vidya is to lead and reveal The Brahman. Because that happens to be the knowledge of all knowledges, the only knowledge and everything else is ignorance. The question asked by Saunaka to Angirasa, kasmin nu bhagavo vijnAte sarvamidam vijnAtam bhavati iti? -what is that when known, all these become known? - is the beginning of the quest to arrive at paravidya. ( Note here the use of the word vijnate denoting vijnAna and not jnAna or vidya).
In slokas after slokas, Angiras expounds the ultimate source which has to be known. Not studied as vidya, not exercised merely intellectually as jnAna, but made totally conscious of, the state of vijnAna. That knowledge is Brahman and Brahman only.
When Brahman is known, the rest of things keep falling at the right places like a solved jigsaw puzzle.
We begin to understand the entire phenomenal canvas around us as nothing but Brahman and created out of Brahman.
YathA urnanAbhih srjate grnhate ca
TathA prithivyAm osadhayah sambhavanti
YathA satah purusAt kesalomAni
TathA aksharAt sambhavati iha viswam
As the spider”s thread comes out of the spider and then the spider withdraws them unto itself, as the vegetation on the earth come out from its within and as the hair and the body hair come out from a living man so does the entire creation pours out of Brahman the inexhaustible. There is no end to this process.
This sloka gives answer to the question “How the universe was created? Scientists speculate many theories and all theories after creating some interest amongst a group of people over a period, gets rejected by another group. One such theory is the great big bang theory. Some time back we had discussed here how this theory does not hold water and fails to explain many questions.
People wonder, is there a beginning to this universe? Is there a point in time and space which can be fixed as the origin of the universe? The upanishadic logic also makes this question absurd and irrelevant. If Brahman himself is this manifested universe, then asking if there is a beginning of this universe is tantamount to asking if there is a beginning of Brahman. This is again absurd because Brahman by definition is anadi, without a beginning.
Further, when we are searching for the starting point of the creation or the universe, which state of the universe we should take as our universe? The universe that we have around us, can we say that this is the real state of universe that we are talking of? We can not say so, because from moment to moment, from a fraction of a second to another fraction of a second, the universe is changing its shape and form. The heavenly bodies that we see at this very moment, at the wink of the eye have vanished or changed. Some of them that we see are not even existing. Only their light which started when they were existing is reaching us now. So the “creation” of the universe is a ceaseless continuous process- never stopping and never constant as the hair grows on head and the vegetation grows out of the earth as saidin the earlier sloka. There was never a zero state as far as the creation of this universe is concerned. A state of “non-existence” is not logical.
This means that the creation was always there. It had only a different form, different arrangement and shape. Before our solar system came into being, something else in another shape was existing in its place. That was one state of creation. When our solar system, our galaxy or any other galaxy will cease to exist, the creation will be another state in another form. There is no beginning and there is no end to this ever dynamic manifestation of Brahman.
At the start of the vedic concept of Brahma day, when the visible creation unfolds out of Brahman, this creation is in one form. At the end of Brahma day, when the Brahma night begins, when the phenomenal creation collapses into the Brahman, it is again the creation in another form in the cycle of events. Which point in this is the ‘beginning’? Which is the end? All these are ever-existing Brahman in His ever dynamic aspect.
Then there is a lot of talk about some kind of a big bang which supposed to have triggered the creation of this universe. Which is this big bang? What is this explosion? We all know that in this universe explosions are taking place every moment of time. Some heavenly system is blowing up right now, some new systems, galaxies, stars are forming and some collapsing. There are bangs everywhere and every moment. Srusti, Sthiti and Pralay, coming into being, existing for a fleeting moment and passing on to another state is the non-stop game being played around. So which bang is big and which bang is small? Do we know? Do we know which portion of the universe we are talking about? Do we know the boundaries of the universe? Do we know what is the total content of this limitless universe? Do we know in which part of the universe, what is happening at this very moment?
The point is not whether there was a certain explosion at a certain point of time or not and some effects produced by it. But a particular explosion as the beginning of the creation is the point the sanatan philosophy discards. The vedic concept here is one of anantakoti Brahmanda, a countless systems and objects within this limitless space. Barring that much, we know no more. Our limited mind and intellect are incapable of comprehending the picture or knowledge of the universe in its totality. In the absence of all these knowledge to talk of a specific event as the trigger point for creation can only be termed very amusing.
