Ignorance versus Knowledge

All religious and spiritual paths are based on faith, without which we would not follow any belief system. But can faith be transformed into personal and profound knowledge? It is not too difficult to develop intellectual knowledge, but if we strip away the verbiage, what do we actually know of spirituality from our own personal experience?

We believe there is a God. To believe in God is a fundamental element of any spiritual faith or belief. We say that he is omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent, and that he is the Creator of everything. But how can such a being exist – beyond all description, beyond characteristics and attributes, beyond time and space? This is utterly beyond the mind’s capacity to grasp. So how can we truly say we believe in him?

There is no easy or obvious answer to this, except to say that there is a facet of our being – which we may call intuition – that senses the presence of a higher power. When we observe the workings of the world around us, such as the perfect geometry of flowers, or the spectacle of an endless night sky, our intuition enforces a sense of the presence of a Creator. It gives us confidence that we are not alone in the universe, and that there is a greater purpose than the works of man.

But who and what are we that we have this sense of intuition? Are we the physical body with a mind, which we may even believe to be a product of our equally physical brain? Spiritual paths refer to our true self as a soul, an immortal tiny spark of the eternal flame that is God himself. How on earth do we come to grips with this? It is beyond the intellect and the mind. And yet we believe!

There is something within us that knows this great mystery and aspires to its all encompassing love – something that has lain dormant for many ages. Now, through the Master’s grace, this ‘something’ in us has become activated and alive. As our soul begins to realize its separation from the Father, we feel its pain and longing to return home. We struggle to understand the meaning of all this, and we have no idea of how to answer this insistent call from within to return to our source.

But we need not fret. The Master, having brought us to this spiritual path, awakens us to our condition. He explains to us the inward path of discovery that leads to our own realization, and ultimately takes us into the presence of the Lord.

But first we need to recognize our present state. The mystics say that we have created our bondage to the creation by losing ourselves in the dense jungle of sense pleasures. This bondage is brought about by our constant creation of karma and the deep attachments we form for the physical world. The situation is very simple in principle, but impossibly complex if looked at in detail.

When we contemplate the prospect of spiritual liberation, the task seems downright impossible through our own efforts. Dominated by the mind, our senses, our actions and thoughts, we simply strengthen the binding ties that imprison our soul in the endless cycle of coming and going in this world. This is due to the currents of our attention constantly flowing downwards and outwards in pursuit of our worldly ambitions – leading to further complications and bondage.

The Master advises that our first priority should be to avoid exacerbating the problem. He teaches us some basic rules to follow so that we limit the addition of further karma and attachments. Of these the practice of simran is paramount. Engaging in simran during the course of the day will reduce our mind’s wandering into the world and redirect it inwards. Success in this practice will lead us to a situation where our consciousness is fully concentrated at the eye centre and we find ourselves at the feet of the Radiant Form of our Master within.

Next the Master puts us in touch with the Shabd, explaining the importance of bhajan and teaching us the practice of developing our own awareness of the sound of Shabd within ourselves. Through devotion to this practice our soul ascends, realizes its true identity, and separates from both mind and body, ultimately reaching the end of its journey in the court of the Lord himself.

However, it appears that many of us may not yet have developed our inner faculties to the extent where we can grasp the realities of God, the Master or our soul. As such we are ignorant of the inner path and find ourselves powerless to do anything spiritually significant. In fact, when it comes to our spiritual practice and our progress on the path, it is easy to become discouraged. Not having reached the Radiant Form of the Master at the eye centre, we may feel that we have not progressed at all.

Nevertheless, it is not true that we have made no progress. Spirituality does not work in accordance with the workings of the world and its processes. The results we expect from the world are far removed from the subtle outcomes of spiritual practice. This is because the consequences of spiritual practice happen beyond the grasp of our intellect, within the inner world.

Over time we must surely all have experienced distinct changes in our perspective and in our ability to deal with the constant changes of life. We may also sometimes notice that we are able to detach more easily from things that we no longer consider important to us; things that previously we would have fought tooth and nail to hang on to. These changes are not insignificant.

What is very interesting is that often we have no idea how these changes came about at all. One day we just realize that we see things differently, and that somehow changes have occurred within us that are not the direct or obvious product of our efforts. And this is a key element of our journey.

We do not understand and we do not know. This is precisely why we need a Master and a guide on this path. What we do know is that within us there is an overwhelming need, a yearning for something that lies completely beyond our understanding. Our situation is not unlike a seed, buried in the dark soil, waiting only for the water of love in order to germinate, grow and finally to burst forth into the light of the divine. We too can blossom and bloom into the spectacular fulfilment of our true spiritual potential.

We are in the process of spiritual advancement. We have been since the day our Master initiated us. This process is ongoing, and whether we realize it or not we are progressing under his tender care and merciful gaze. We are not alone. We were never alone. He is always with us and we have only to turn our attention inwards to be with him.