by Sri Bimal Mohanty
VOL No. 31
September. 2003

ATTEMPTS TO DESCRIBE BRAMHAN - Part 5

"Based on the lectures by Sri Bimal Mohanty"

Bramhan has many aspects of His divine characteristics all combined in one. He is verily the one who is all in one. When different characteristics of His come to play He is perceived as a different entity. This is similar to what we all are in this worldly life. When I perform my duties with my son, I am a father. When I perform different duties with my wife I am a husband. With a friend I am a friend and with a patient I am a doctor, in the temple I am a priest. But it is me only in all these characters. That is the first aspect.

The next aspect in this context is that, Bramhan is both tranquil bliss, and intense action at the same time. Bramhan is bliss because there is no anti-power to Bramhan that can create strife or any kind of discord.

Hence He is always in perpetual bliss. Bramhan is also not a dead concept. Therefore he has to be active. Only dead are inactive. To think Bramhan as a dead entity is an absurd concept. So Bramhan is simultaneously both bliss and action. The nearest example given to understand this, is that of the ocean. The ocean is calm and tranquil at its lowest depths. The ocean also has the waves on its surface continuously in motion. Both the waves, and the still water at the bottom, are part of the same ocean. Likewise Bramhan is also both. Our seers describe this concept as viruddha dharmaasaya. – supporter of all seemingly opposite characteristics. Bramhan is harmony but harmony in action.

When it comes to action, we perceive him as Ishwara. It is the Ishwara aspect of Bramhan which is responsible for the creation. The three constant factors of the creation are "coming into being", "existing" and "dissolving"- sristi, sthiti and pralaya. This is what is implied in the word janmadi that is referred in the Bramhasutra that we discussed a little earlier. Janmadi i.e. beginning with janma or sristi and extending to sthiti and then pralaya. The esoteric meaning behind this continuous play we shall deal with a little later. But let us know that creation means these three activities, continuously played out all around us.

When Bramhan is perceived in creation mode, we name Him as Bramhaa, (as distinct from Bramhan), in sustaining mode He is Vishnu and in the dissolution mode He is Mahesha.

We all know that for any activity to be undertaken, the prerequisite ingredient is energy or Shakti. Without energy no action can take place. Every action around us requires the essential input of energy or Shakti. It is the energy that eventually transforms itself into action, the basis of all matter. Thus it was not difficult to conceive that Bramhaa, Vishnu and Mahesha for accomplishing the activities of sriti, sthiti and pralay must be endowed or empowered with shakti or energy as integral to them.

So Saraswati, the creative shakti became integral to Bramhaa, Lakshmi the shakti that provides resources for sustenance became integral to Vishnu and Parvati (also known by other names) became integral to Mahesha.

The common mind understands that whatever is produced is produced from the female womb. Nothing is born out of a male. Janani or that from which something is born, is essentially feminine. Therefore it was also logical that Saraswati, Lakshmi and Parvati are best explained as feminine concepts. So Saraswati, Lakshmi and Parvati are easily visualised as consorts of Bramhaa, Vishnu and Mahesh joined with them eternally.