Talks mar 7

 https://selfdefinition.org/ramana/Talks-with-Sri-Ramana-Maharshi--complete.pdf

180

D.: What is Guru’s Grace? How does it work? 

M.: Guru is the Self. 

D.: How does it lead to realisation? 

M.: Isvaro gururatmeti ... (God is the same as Guru and Self ...).

 A person begins with dissatisfaction. Not content with the world he seeks satisfaction of desires by prayers to God; his mind is purified; he longs to know God more than to satisfy his carnal desires. Then God’s Grace begins to manifest. 

God takes the form of a Guru and appears to the devotee;

 teaches him the Truth; 

purifies the mind by his teachings and contact;

 the mind gains strength, 

is able to turn inward; 

with meditation it is purified yet further,

 and eventually remains still without the least ripple. 

That stillness is the Self. 

The Guru is both exterior and interior. 

From the exterior he gives a push to the mind to turn inward. 

From the interior he pulls the mind towards the Self and helps the mind to achieve quietness. 

That is Grace. 

Hence there is no difference between God, Guru and Self.

...

D.: Is the Supreme Being with or without attributes? 

M.: Know first if you are with or without attributes. 

.........

D.: What is samadhi?

 M.: One’s own true nature. 

.......

D.: Why then is effort necessary to attain it? 

M.: Whose is the effort?

 D.: Maharshi knows that I am ignorant. 

M.: Do you know that you are ignorant? Knowledge of ignorance is no ignorance.

All scriptures are only for the purpose of investigating if there are two consciousnesses. Everyone’s experience proves the existence of only one consciousness. Can that one divide itself into two? Is any division felt in the Self? 

Awaking from sleep one finds oneself the same in the wakeful as well as in the sleep states. That is the experience of each one. The difference lies in seeking, in the outlook. Because you imagine that you are the seer separate from the experience, this difference arises. Experience shows that your being is the same all through.

.

D.: From where did ignorance come? 

M.: There is no such thing as ignorance. It never arises. Everyone is Knowledge itself. Only Knowledge does not shine easily. 

The dispelling of ignorance is Wisdom which always exists 

- e.g. the necklace remaining round the neck though supposed to have been lost; or each of the ten fools failing to count himself and counting only the others. To whom is knowledge or ignorance?

......

D.: Can we not proceed from external to internal? 

M.: Is there any difference like that? Do you feel the difference - external and internal - in your sleep? This difference is only with reference to the body and arises with body-consciousness (‘I thought’). The so-called waking state is itself an illusion. 

Turn your vision inward and then the whole world will be full of Supreme Spirit. 

The world is said to be illusion. Illusion is really Truth. Even the material sciences trace the origin of the universe to some one primordial matter - subtle, exceedingly subtle. God is the same both to those who say the world is real and to their opponents. Their outlook is different. You need not entangle yourself in such disputations. The goal is one and the same for all. Look to it.

.......

182

Talk 200. 

Mr. Cohen desired an explanation of the term “blazing light” used by Paul Brunton in the last chapter of A Search in Secret India. 

Maharshi: Since the experience is through the mind only it appears first as a blaze of light. 

The mental predispositions are not yet destroyed. 

The mind is however functioning in its infinite capacity in this experience. 

As for nirvikalpa samadhi i.e. samadhi, of non-differentiation (undifferentiated, supreme, beatific repose), it consists of pure consciousness, 

which is capable of illumining knowledge or ignorance; it is also beyond light or darkness. 

That it is not darkness is certain; can it be however said to be not light? 

At present objects are perceived only in light. Is it wrong to say that realisation of one’s Self requires a light? 

Here light would mean the consciousness which reveals as the Self only.

The yogis are said to see photisms of colours and lights preliminary to Self-Realisation by the practice of yoga. 

Once before Goddess Parvati practised austerities for realising the Supreme. She saw some kinds of light. 

She rejected them because they emanated from the Self, leaving the Self as it was ever before. 

She determined that they were not supreme. 

She continued Her austerities and experienced a limitless light. 

She determined that this also was only a phenomenon and not the Supreme Reality.

 Still she continued Her austerities until she gained transcendental peace. 

She realised that it was Supreme, that the Self was the sole Reality. 

The Taittiriya Upanishad says, “Seek Brahman through penance”. 

Later on, “Penance is Brahman”. 

Another Upanishad says, “That itself is penance which is again made up of wisdom alone”.

 “There the sun shines not, nor the moon, nor the stars, nor fire; all these shine forth by Its light”.

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