The Moksha Gita : Swami Sivananda // Commentary : Swami Krishnananda -Chapter 1 - 1.

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Monday, January 16, 2023. 07:00.

The Moksha Gita : Swami Sivananda

Commentary  : Swami Krishnananda-Chapter -1.1.

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Chapter 1: The Search for Truth -1.


1, 2. The disciple said: O Merciful Master! I bow to thee. I have fallen into the dreadful ocean of birth and death. I am afflicted with the three kinds of Taapas. Save me, O Lord. Teach me, how I should cross this ocean of Samsara.

The disciple approaches the Guru. This is the starting-point of Brahmavidya. The aspirant after equipping himself with the Sadhana-Chatushtaya, i.e., the ethical discipline necessary for the purification of the heart before entering into the field of Brahmavidya proper or the Science of the Ultimate Reality, goes to the Spiritual Teacher for higher Knowledge.

The Mundaka Upanishad says that, after finding everything on earth is worthless, the seeker after the eternally good, should approach a Preceptor who is well versed in scriptures and established in the Consciousness of Brahman. The subtleties of the Essence of Life enter into the heart of the aspirant only when he is purged of the impurities that cloud his understanding. The conduct of an aspirant after the Supreme Truth is an ideal one. It is not erudite learning that is demanded of the aspirant but a crystalline heart and a childlike feeling. The pride of scholarship has to be set aside before the glorious Teacher of Brahmavidya. Humbler than a blade of grass, filled with the fire of renunciation born of discriminative understanding, the seeker bows down to the Guru who glories in the majesty of Brahmic Splendour. Not as the present-day student of the school or the college, but as an earnest votary of Life's Grand Destination, roused up by the consciousness of suffering in pluralistic existence on earth, fully aware of the affliction of mortal living, cheated by chance, tormented by thought, defeated by the forces of nature, oppressed by the massive weight of worldly duty, shocked by the horror of death, dreaded by the consciousness of future lives where the tragedy of existence will be repeated, finding no way of escape from the prison of terrestrialness, the aspirant opens his eyes and looks up towards his Great Duty, the duty of Self-realization.

The necessity of a Guru is demanded by the fact that one's own conscience is not always to be trusted. Virochana acted according to the voice of his conscience and realised that "body is the Self". People who are filled with Mala, Vikshepa and Avarana, who are drowned in worldliness, cannot be guided by their conscience. A spiritual Preceptor is absolutely necessary. He alone can foresee the pitfalls of the aspirant and direct him in the right path. The Chandogya Upanishad says that only he who is guided by a Guru can have the Knowledge of Brahman. Others will be misled and lost in spiritual blindness; for the road to Moksha is hard to tread. It is a razor-path. The Grace of God and Guru, Ishwara-Kripa and Guru-Kripa will raise up the aspirant to the heights of Spiritual Attainment.

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