Jnâna Yoga, Part II: Seven LecturesVivekananda, Swami
Religion
Jnâna Yoga, Part II: Seven Lectures
Vivekananda, Swami
Vedanta; Yoga, Jñana
_Brahman_, this _Âtman_, this Self, is the King of all beings. These
ideas are very helpful to men; they are for meditation. For instance,
meditate on the earth, think of the earth, at the same time knowing
that we have in us that which is in the earth, that both are the same.
Identify the body with the earth, and identify the soul with the Soul
behind. Identify the air with the soul that is in the air and that is
in you and so on. All these are one, manifested in different forms. To
realize this unity is the end and aim of all meditation, and this is
what _Yajnavalkya_ was trying to explain to _Maitreyi_.
VII
THE HIGHEST IDEAL OF JNÂNA YOGA
As this is the last of these classes it is better that I give a brief
_resumé_ of all that I have been trying to tell you. In the Vedas and
Upanishads we find records of some of the very earliest religious ideas
of the Hindus, ideas that long antedated the time of Kapila, ancient as
this great sage is. He did not propound the _Sânkhya_ philosophy as a
new theory of his own. His task was to throw the light of his genius on
the vast mass of religious theories that were existing in his time and
bring out a rational and coherent system. He succeeded in giving India
a psychology that is accepted to the present day by all the diverse
and seemingly opposing philosophical systems to be found among the
Hindus. His masterly analysis and his comprehensive statement of the
processes of the human mind have not yet been surpassed by any later
philosopher and he undoubtedly laid the foundation for the Advaita
philosophy, which accepted his conclusions as far as they went and then
pushed them a step farther, thus reaching a final unity beyond the
duality that was the last word of the _Sânkhyas_.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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