The Spiritual Import of the Mahabharata and the Bhagavad gita : Ch-9. Part-15.

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9: The Unity of the Lover and the Beloved :


Part-15.


The four stages mentioned here—arto jijnasur artharthi jnani—explain subtly the various stages of bhakti, gaunabhakti, vaidhibhakti, culminating in parabhakti.

Ritualistic devotion is called vaidhibhakti.

The well known devotions of the world, where devotees cry to God in prayers of various types, as inculcated in the various religions, is gaunabhakti; but parabhakti is the inability to exist without God.




In the Bhakti Shastras, various rasas are mentioned—various tastes, as they are called.

The subjects treated of in the Alankara Shastras are rhetoric.

We pass through various stages of emotion in devotion to God, right from the social level, the physical level, the vital, the mental, the intellectual and the spiritual levels.

We find that we are shaken up gradually as we proceed onwards, stage by stage, to the Being of God.

It is as if the river is straining towards the ocean—it is sensing the very presence of the flood that is dashing in front of it at the delta.

The river has not yet touched the ocean, but it can sense it.


Swami Krishnananda

To be continued  ....

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