LIFE-DIVINE MYSTERY

The divine mystery is puzzling. The Supreme Divine is infinite, limitless, and fathomless. It is beyond the comprehension of a finite, limited, and measured one. Is it possible for a creature to know about the creator? Can a limited and finite mechanism having a beginning and an end comprehend the limitless, infinite, fathomless, and incomprehensible? More accurately, the mortal cannot comprehend the immortal, nor can the finite being contain the infinite. The divine mystery remains a puzzle and continues to remain so.

The scientist who in the past proclaimed that there was nothing beyond this world now proclaims: "The more I know of phenomena, the more I am puzzled. Intellect is finite and cold. Behind these changing phenomena is the unchanging noumenon. Behind the dynamic, rotating electrons, there is the static, motionless something, or something beyond the intellect and the world".

 1. Outline.

The processes of nature and of life are mysteries. Everything moves, and nothing is fixed. Change is the unchanging law of nature and also of the entire life process. However, the enigma is the direction of the change. Is the direction of the movement toward divine consciousness or away from that? If it is so, there are push and pull factors in the universe: one is pulling towards divinity, and the other is pushing towards undivinity. The former by the spiritual energy, and the latter by the sensual forces deeply engrained in our sense perceptions.

mātrā-sparśhās tu kaunteya śhītoṣhṇa-sukha-duḥkha-dāḥ

āgamāpāyino ’nityās tans-titikṣhasva bhārata

Sri Krishna explains to Arjuna, “O son of Kunti, the contact between the senses and the sense objects gives rise to fleeting perceptions of happiness and distress. These are non-permanent, and come and go like the winter and summer seasons. O descendent of Bharat, one must learn to tolerate them without being disturbed.”  

Swami Krishnananda beautifully elucidiates this aspect. "Every day is a conflict before us, an opposition, a confrontation, and a question that demands an answer. Our struggles throughout the days and nights of our lives are our attempts to answer the question of life, which is the great enigma or mystery.

Sri Krishna in the Bhagavad Gita explains to Arjuna

nāsato vidyate bhāvo nābhāvo vidyate sataḥ

ubhayorapi dṛiṣhṭo ’nta stvanayos tattva-darśhibhiḥ

Of the transient there is no endurance, and of the eternal there is no cessation. This has verily been observed and concluded by the seers of the Truth, after studying the nature of both.

mayā tatam idaṁ sarvaṁ jagad avyakta-mūrtinā

mat-sthāni sarva-bhūtāni na chāhaṁ teṣhvavasthitaḥ

This entire cosmic manifestation is pervaded by Me in My unmanifest form. All living beings dwell in Me, but I do not dwell in them.

Arjuna also affirm and accept the divine mystery in the Bhagavad Gita

paraṁ brahma paraṁ dhāma pavitraṁ paramaṁ bhavān

puruṣhaṁ śhāśhvataṁ divyam ādi-devam ajaṁ vibhum

āhus tvām ṛiṣhayaḥ sarve devarṣhir nāradas tathā

asito devalo vyāsaḥ svayaṁ chaiva bravīṣhi me

“Arjuna said: You are the Supreme Brahmān, the ultimate, the supreme abode and purifier, the Absolute Truth and the eternal Divine Person. You are the primal God, transcendental and original, and You are the unborn and all-pervading beauty. All the great sages like Nārada, Asita, Devala, and Vyāsa proclaim this of You, and now You Yourself are declaring it to me. O Kṛiṣhṇa, I totally accept as truth all that You have told me. Neither the gods nor demons, O Lord, know Thy personality.”

2. Mysteries

The mysteries of nature are the creation, the creator, life, birth, death, rebirth, the conflict between good and evil, and so on. The mysteries are not so easy to comprehend with our limited minds and senses. The finite creature does not know how he comes to the earth and also has no answer about when to leave the earth. Life was unmanifest before and after and remains manifest in between, i.e., during the life process.

avyaktādīni bhūtāni vyakta-madhyāni bhārata

avyakta-nidhanānyeva tatra kā paridevanā

Sri Krishna says, “O scion of Bharat, all created beings are unmanifest before birth, manifest in life, and again unmanifest on death. So why grieve?”

The human being is composed of three bodies, as per the Indian philosophical tradition. The bodies emanating from Brahmān by avidya, "ignorance" or "nescience" viz., gross body, subtle body and causal body.

"The bodies and koshas can have no existence independent of Atman."

Gross Body (Sthula sarira)

That which is seen by the physical eyes, that which is composed of flesh, bones, fat, skin, nerves, hair, blood, etc., is the physical body. It has six changes, viz., birth, existence, growth, modification, decay, and death. This body grows in youth and decays in old age. It develops when good, nourishing food is given and decays if the food is withdrawn or if there is some disease. Because it disintegrates and decays, it is called sarira. As the body is burned after death, it is called deha.

The Subtle Body (Sukshma sarira)

It is composed of seventeen Tattvas, viz., five Jnana Indriyas, five Karma Indriyas, five Pranas, mind, and intellect. The subtle body develops through intense Abhimana, or egoism, and strong Raga-Dvesha and decays when egoism and Raga-Dvesha are destroyed or decreased. The subtle body is burned by the three kinds of Tapas, viz., adhyatmic, adhibhautic, and adhidaivic.

Causal Body (Karana sarira)

Ajnana or Avidya alone constitutes the Karana Sarira. The causal body develops through the idea, I am Jiva and decays when this idea is annihilated or decreased, when "I" is identified with Brahmān. "The subtle and causal bodies are thickened in worldly-minded persons and are thinned out in earnest aspirants."

At the time of death, the soul discards its gross body and departs with the subtle and causal bodies. God again gives the soul another gross body according to its subtle and causal bodies and sends the soul into a suitable mother’s womb for the purpose. After the soul gives up one gross body, there is a transitional phase before it receives a new gross body.

vāsānsi jīrṇāni yathā vihāya

navāni gṛihṇāti naro ’parāṇi

tathā śharīrāṇi vihāya jīrṇānya

nyāni sanyāti navāni dehī

Sri Krishna highlights, “As a person sheds worn-out garments and wears new ones, likewise, at the time of death, the soul casts off its worn-out body and enters a new one.”

dehino ’smin yathā dehe kaumāraṁ yauvanaṁ jarā

tathā dehāntara-prāptir dhīras tatra na muhyati

Sri Krishna says to Arjuna, just as the embodied soul continuously passes from childhood to youth to old age, similarly, at the time of death, the soul passes into another body. The wise are not deluded by this. By this, He establishes the principle of transmigration of the soul from lifetime to lifetime. He explains that in one lifetime itself, we change bodies from childhood to youth to maturity and then to old age

3. Remarks

Life poses a problem that the human being has not succeeded in solving with all his intellectual endowments. The deeper vision of life, which one may call philosophical, mystical, spiritual, or religious, has revealed the basic or foundational features of creation as a movement towards and a movement away from a center. This seems to be the secret to life and an answer to all its questions of life. There is a center somewhere, toward which everything seems to be gravitating and which, at the same time, seems to be repelling everything. This simultaneous feeling of the pull and the repulsion is the conflict. This is at the root of all problems.

Sri Aurobindo highlights the cardinal fact of the spiritual evolution of the human being from a mental into a supramental being. He says behind the appearance "there is the Reality of a Being and Consciousness, a Self of all things, one and eternal... This One Being and Consciousness are involved in this matter. Evolution is the method by which it liberates itself. "Divinity is always hidden behind the material universe, and the entire process is evolutionary." Consciousness appears in what seems to be the inconscient, and once having appeared, it is self-impelled to grow higher and higher and at the same time to enlarge and develop towards a greater and greater perfection. Life is the first step in this release of consciousness; mind is the second, but the evolution does not finish with mind; it awaits a release into something greater, a consciousness that is spiritual and supramental. The next step of the evolution must be toward the development of Supermind and Spirit as the dominant powers in the conscious being."

The mystery behind life-divine is beyond the knowledge or comprehension of the ordinary mortals.

Even Sri Krishna, while explaining to Arjuna in the Bhagavad Gita, says so.

na me viduḥ sura-gaṇāḥ prabhavaṁ na maharṣhayaḥ

aham ādir hi devānāṁ maharṣhīṇāṁ cha sarvaśhaḥ

yo māmajam anādiṁ cha vetti loka-maheśhvaram

asammūḍhaḥ sa martyeṣhu sarva-pāpaiḥ pramuchyate

Neither celestial gods nor the great sages know of My origin. I am the source from which the gods and great seers come. Those who know Me as unborn and beginningless, and as the Supreme Lord of the universe, they among mortals are free from illusion and released from all evils.

-Asutosh Satpathy