"The very first step in understanding what this is all about is giving up the concept of an active, volitional 'I' as a separate entity and accepting the passive role of perceiving and functioning as a process." - Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

Friday, November 8, 2013

This Knowledge Is Eternal

Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
December 9, 1980.

M: Here you will get to know what is, not what you expect to hear. Duality arises when consciousness arises. I am present and I know that I am present - that is duality. I am and I am not conscious of being present - that is unicity. There is only ONE, but when this conscious presence is there, then there is a sense of duality.

Q: Is a realized person aware of everything?

M: Actually no one is realized, there is only pure knowledge. It is only for reasons of communication that we say a person is realized. The knowledge has realized that it is knowledge; that is all that has happened. I am not the body, I am not the words; when knowledge recognizes this it is called Self-Realization.

Q: The knowledge Maharaj is giving is for jnanis. What happens to the very simple man who is not able to comprehend this?

M: Bhajans and meditation. By meditation the knowledge which is immature will gradually grow into maturity.

Q: A thousand years ago people were primitive. They could not have understood this. It is only for developed minds.

M: Whether primitive or civilized, people can understand this. Even in those days there must have been some to whom this knowledge did appear and they instinctively understood.  This knowledge is not new; it has always been in existence. People came to know instinctively. 

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सर्वभूताधिवासं यद्भूतेषु च वसत्यपि।
सर्वानुग्राहकत्वेन तद्स्म्यहं वासुदेवः॥

That in whom reside all beings and who resides in all beings,
who is the giver of grace to all, the Supreme Soul of the universe, the limitless being:
I AM THAT. -- Amritabindu Upanishad