Cosmic Consciousness: The Man-God Whom We AwaitMcIvor-Tyndall, Alexander J. (Alexander James)
Religion
Cosmic Consciousness: The Man-God Whom We Await
McIvor-Tyndall, Alexander J. (Alexander James)
Theosophy
When the disciple has once grasped the fact that he _is_ a soul, and
_possesses_ a mind and a physical covering, he has entered on the way of
Illumination, and must inevitably reach the goal; then shall he find
"perfect fruition of the longing" after the perfect Self, and its
completement in union with the love that he craves. "Have you, in lonely
darkness longed for companionship and consolation? You shall have angels
and archangels for your friends and all the immortal hosts of the Dawn."
Such are the Yoga sutras, or aphorisms, as enunciated by Patanjali.
If the aspiring one were to give up a whole lifetime to their practice,
gaining at last the consciousness of immortal life and love, what a small
price to pay.
_Raja Yoga_ with its methods and exercises, is the path of knowledge,
through application; concentration; meditation.
The practice of Raja Yoga will lead the student to the path of Gnani Yoga;
and to the realization that Bhakti Yoga, the way of love and service will
be included, not as an arduous task; not as a study, or as a means to an
end, but because of the love of it.
_Gnani Yoga_ comes as complementary to practice of the sutras because
knowledge applied for the purpose of spiritual attainment brings _wisdom_.
_Gnani Yoga_, then, is the path of wisdom. The follower of Gnani Yoga seeks
the occult or hidden wisdom, and always has before him the idea of whether
this or that be of the Self, the _atman_, or of the self, the personal,
gradually eliminating from his desires all that does not answer the test of
its reality in spiritual consciousness; he welcomes experiences of all
kinds, as so many lessons from which he extracts the fine grain of truth,
and throws aside the husks; he accepts nothing blindly or in faith, but
"proves all things holding fast to that which is good"; not that he lacks
faith, but because the very nature of his inquiry is to discover the
interior nature and its relation to God.
There are many in the world of to-day who feel the urge toward the path of
Gnani Yoga, because of the conviction that is forcing itself upon every
truly enlightened mind, that civilization with all its wonderful
achievements, does not promise happiness, or solve the question of the
soul's urge. In short, the educated, and the well conditioned, if he be a
thinker, and not submerged in _maya_, lost in the personal self, inevitably
finds himself searching for the _real_ in all this labyrinth of mind
creations and sea of emotions, and then as a rule, he seeks the path of
Gnani Yoga, because his intellect must be satisfied, even though his heart
calls. The mystic, the teacher, and the philosopher are following the path
of Gnani; so is the true occultist, but many who deal in so-called
occultism are employing _knowledge_ only, entirely missing the higher
quality--_wisdom_.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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