"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

Monday, August 28, 2017

The Proof of Truth

Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

The Proof of Truth

Can there be proof of truth? Maharaj sometimes puts this question, as if to himself. Can truth be grasped intellectually? Apart from keen intellect, says Maharaj, the seeker must have faith to enable him to grasp the basic essentials of truth. And the faith should be of the kind that can accept the Guru's word as God's own truth. Faith is the first step, and no further progress is possible unless the first step is taken first.

There are simple-minded people, who, though not gifted with keen intellect, have abundant faith. Maharaj gives them a mantra and asks them to chant it and meditate till their psyche is purified enough to receive knowledge.

With the intellectuals, Maharaj has to deal differently. The intellectual understands what the vaiour religions propogate, the ethical and moral codes they prescribe, and also the metaphysical concepts they adumbrate; but he remains unenlightened. What he actually seeks is truth, the constant factor that is not subject to any change. And, what is more, he wants proof, but is not able to say what kind of proof would satisfy him. Proof as such would itself be something subject to space and time, and the intellectual is intelligent enough to know that. Truth, in order to be truth, must be timeless and spaceless. Maharaj says that any intelligent person must admit that I AM, the sense of conscious presence, of being, is the only truth every sentient being knows of, and that is the only proof one can have. And yet, mere existence cannot be equated with truth for the simple reason that existence itself is not timeless and spaceless like Reality.

Maharaj, in his talks, throws abundant light on this stalemate. A blind man may say: Prove to me that there are colors, only then will I believe all your lovely description of the rainbow. Whenever such questions are put to Maharaj, he counters them  by saying: Prove to me that there is something like Bombay or London or New York! Everywhere, says he, it is the same earth, air, water, fire and sky. In other words, one cannot seek truth as an object not can truth be described. It can only be suggested or indicated, but not expressed in words, because truth cannot be conceived. Anything conceived will be an object and truth is not an object. As Maharaj puts it: You cannot shop for truth, as something which is authoritatively certified and stamped as 'Truth'. Any attempt to find the proof of truth would involve a division of the mind into subject and object, and then the answer could not be the truth, because there is nothing objective about truth, which essentially is pure subjectivity.

The whole process, says Maharaj, is like a dog chasing its own tail. In seeking a solution to this riddle one must analyze the problem itself. Who is it that wants the proof of Truth or Reality? Do we clearly understand what we are? All existence is objective. We all 'exist' as objects only, as mere appearances in the consciousness that cognizes us. Is there really any proof that we (who seek proof of Reality) ourselves exist, other than as objects of cognition in someone else's mind?

When we seek the proof of truth, what we are trying to do is equivalent to a shadow seeking proof of substance! Maharaj, therefore, urges us to see the false as false, and then there will be no more looking for truth. Have you understood what I mean? he asks. Do you not intuitively feel what the position is? That which is sought is the seeker himself! Can an eye see itself? Please understand, he says: Timeless, spaceless, not cognizable sensorially is what we are; temporal, finite and sensorially cognizable, is what we appear to be as separate objects. Consider what you were before you acquired the physical form. Did you need any proof about anything then? The question of proof arises only in relative existence, and any proof provided within the parameters of relative existence can only be an untruth!

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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