REGAINING
THE LOST KINGDOM:
Purity and Meditation in the Hindu Spiritual Tradition
by Pravrajika Vrajaprana
There
is in Indian lore the tale of the king of Smritinagar who, as a result
of a riding accident, lost his memory and forgot that he was the ruler
of a glorious kingdom. He lived as a miserable and impoverished hunter
until the day he "impersonated" a king and approached his own
kingdom. Then his memory returned and he realized that he really was
the king.
Hinduism says that we suffer from a spiritual amnesia that has made
us forget we are heirs to the glorious divine kingdom that exists within
our own hearts. In order to regain this lost kingdom, Hinduism has
developed four major yogas which can be seen as spiritual thoroughfares
to the divine.
In this paper I examine the means by which Hinduism proposes to
regain the kingdom: first, by examining the kingdom itself; second, by
examining the crucial role that purity and meditation play in seeking
the kingdom, and finally, by examining the four major yogas as the
practical methods of regaining the kingdom.
Hinduism affirms that the kingdom of God is within us; Hinduism
further asserts that it is within our power to regain the kingdom that
we seem to have lost. The kingdom's "loss" was due to maya—ignorance
of our true, divine nature. To regain the kingdom we need to escape
maya's clutches and for this, the practice of purity and meditation is
essential.
Hinduism defines purity as the state of being identified with our
true nature, the Atman, which is pure, perfect, and eternal. The Atman
is one with Brahman—the infinite transcendent Reality, the divine
ground of being. The more we identify with our real nature, the purer we
are. The more we identify ourselves with the urges of the body and the
moods of the mind, the less pure we are. Our bondage to flesh and senses
along with the mind's attachment to and identification with them,
constitutes impurity. Developing purity is one of Hinduism's central
objectives and every major yoga puts great emphasis on its attainment.
Each yoga has various sadhanas—spiritual disciplines—for
attaining purity of heart.
There are four major yogas, each one based on the spiritual seeker's
temperament. The goal of each yoga is to join the limited individual
with the limitless divine. The four yogas are: 1) raja yoga, the path of
meditation; 2) bhakti yoga, the path of love; 3) karma yoga, the path of
selfless action; and 3) jnana yoga, the path of knowledge. These yogas
are not airtight compartments, however: every yoga complements and
strengthens the other yogas.
Raja yoga is the royal path of meditation. In the Hindu tradition,
meditation is not a passive act or a relaxation technique: meditation is
an intense and concentrated search for the divine Reality within. Raja
yoga's aim is to control the vrittis, the thought-waves of the
mind, so that the Atman, the divine Self, can shine forth in its own
splendor. By subduing the vrittis which continually arise and disturb
meditation, the mind can be concentrated into one steady, calm vritti
directed toward the divine Reality; this is what meditation actually is.
Raja yoga's purificatory disciplines are known as yama and niyama:
Yama consists of nonviolence, truthfulness, nonstealing, chastity or
celibacy, and the nonreceiving of gifts. Niyama consists of cleanliness,
contentment, austerity, study, and devotion to God. These disciplines
are observed so that the spiritual seeker can be freed from the desires
and lower impulses that pull him or her away from God.
Bhakti yoga, the path of love, harnesses our most powerful desires—to
love and to be loved—and directs them into a path for God-realization.
Bhakti yoga presupposes a dualistic relationship with a personal God,
but as our love for God grows we become increasingly aware that the God
we are worshiping is really our own Self. In bhakti yoga the devotee
meditates, prays, and worships his or her Ishta—Chosen Ideal—which
can either be an avatar, incarnation of God, or a god or goddess—aspects
of the infinite Brahman seen through a human lens. The goal of bhakti
yoga is to attain union with God; the sadhanas for achieving this are
japa—repetition of a mantra—along with prayer, devotional singing,
chanting of hymns, making pilgrimages, and keeping holy company.
Karma yoga, the path of dedicated, selfless action, transforms work
into a sadhana. Karma—which means both action and the effects of
action—is normally a spiritual bondage because it is deeply rooted to
desire. Karma yoga turns action into a means of spiritual realization by
detaching desire from the work we perform. Karma yoga is done in one of
two ways: either by working for work's sake alone in an attitude of
complete detachment or by dedicating one's actions and their fruits to
God. Either way the mind is purified by removing desire for the results
of our actions. Once purity of heart is achieved, the karma yogi's mind
is naturally pulled toward the divine—either to the impersonal Reality
or to a personal form of God.
Jnana yoga, the path of knowledge, is for spiritual seekers whose
discriminating intellects are more powerful than their emotions. Jnana
yoga asserts that ignorance of our divine nature is the only obstacle to
spiritual realization, and knowledge alone can remove this obstacle.
"Knowledge" does not refer to an intellectual
understanding, but to the direct experience of the Atman. As bhakti yoga
uses love, jnana yoga uses the intellect to slash a path through maya to
freedom and perfection. Jnana yoga has four preliminary requisites: The
first is discrimination between the everlasting and the transitory; the
second is detachment or dispassion; the third is a collection of six
virtues: tranquillity, self-control, mental poise, forbearance, faith,
and concentration. The final requirement is longing for liberation—freedom
from the bondage of ignorance which engenders egotism and identification
with the body. Once these four preliminary requirements are established,
the fundamental disciplines of jnana yoga can be practiced. These
disciplines are the classic triad of hearing the truth, reflecting on
the truth, and having unbroken meditation on the truth of Brahman.
Unbroken meditation, practiced for a long period of time, brings samadhi,
union with Brahman.
Each of the four yogas has samadhi—union with the divine—as its
objective. This experience is the goal of human life, the highest
attainment. Attaining that divine kingdom within our own hearts, we will
realize that the kingdom had been waiting for us the whole time. Once we
realize that kingdom is in our possession, we—like the king who now
knows his true identity—will live in perfect bliss, freedom and joy.
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