The All-Pervading Person
Sun, 08/31/2008 - 18:13 — admin
TEACHER: For an ordinary person, it would be an impossible task, but it's an easy matter for the Supreme Being. To explain this, let me draw on the analogy of the sun and sunshine used previously by Sri Ramanuja and Sri Krishna Chaitanya. The sun generates innumerable rays of sunshine, and this sunshine pervades the entire solar system. Although the influence of the sun is spread everywhere in the form of sunshine, the sunglobe itself can always be perceived to be in some particular place in the vast universal sky. The sun is thus simultaneously all-pervading and yet localized. The same situation is true of the Absolute Truth. The Absolute Truth is both personal and impersonal. In His personal form, He is locally situated, but in His impersonal form, He is all-pervasive.
In a sense, even an ordinary person can be present in more than one place. A king, for example, can be present in all parts of his kingdom although he personally remains within his castle. He accomplishes this through the agency of his energy, i.e., his army, his representatives, etc. The citizens are thus able to feel the king's presence throughout the entire kingdom even while the king remains in his palace. The fact that the Supreme Soul is able to simultaneously be present everywhere, yet personally remain in a particular place is confirmed in Bhagavad-gita.1
The idea that if God is everywhere, He cannot be situated in a particular place is a materialistic concept. It arises through the study of material nature and a subsequent attempt to understand the Absolute Truth on the basis of observed material laws. For example, if you tear a piece of paper into tiny bits and scatter it all over the room (thus spreading it everywhere), it loses its original form and is no longer situated in a particular place. Mayavadi philosophers think that the same law, which applies to pieces of paper and other material things, also applies to the Absolute Truth. This is not the case, however. The Supreme Absolute Truth is supra-mundane. He is outside the boundaries of material laws.
An impersonalist yogi can be very dangerous because he may try to take the position of the Supreme Lord, believing himself to be the Supreme dominator and enjoyer of all that he surveys. This is the darkest region of ignorance. He may try to act on the illusion that he is God and that the world is his playground. He may become, in other words, a “super-hedonist.” One such “I am God”ist, Richard Alpert (Ram Dass), formerly a professor at Harvard University, declares that no one exists except oneself, and that after merging with the impersonal Brahman, one returns to the world and is the world and is everyone.The All-Pervading Person
If you come back into form from having merged with God ... you fill the forms [bodies] though there is no one home, it is just more lila, the dance of God.1
The late Swami Muktananda, a well-known “I am God”ist who had thousands of followers, wrote:
Assuming physical bodies, He appears as separate entities.2
According to the “I am God”ist, the apparent existence of others is just a hallucination. And since you are God, you are the creator of the laws of the universe (or as Ram Dass puts it, “You are the laws of the universe!”).3 And since you are the laws of the universe—since you are God—then there is no higher person or law to which you must subject yourself. Your will, your desire, is God's desire—God's will—so there is no need whatsoever to check or control your desires or actions. As another “I am God”ist, Werner Erhard puts it:
What you're doing is what God wants you to do. Be happy.4
So according to the “I am God”ist, since you and I—each of us—is God, whatever you and I and others are doing is what God wants us to do. You can be engaging in the most illicit or the most heinous activities, but since you are God, you are doing the will of God. Your will is God's will. In other words, he believes his will is God's will because he wrongly believes he is God.
Science of Identity Foundation – Siddhaswarupananda
1Ram Dass, Grist for the Mill (Santa Cruz, CA: Unity Press, 1976), p. 166.
2Swami Muktananda, Siddha Meditation, p. 59.
3Ram Dass, Remember, Be Here Now (Albuquerque, NM: Lama Foundation, 1971), p. 86.
4Quoted in Adelaide Bry, est (Erhard Seminars Training): 60 Hours That Transform Your Life (New York: Harper and Row, 1976), p. 66.
TEACHER: For an ordinary person, it would be an impossible task, but it's an easy matter for the Supreme Being. To explain this, let me draw on the analogy of the sun and sunshine used previously by Sri Ramanuja and Sri Krishna Chaitanya. The sun generates innumerable rays of sunshine, and this sunshine pervades the entire solar system. Although the influence of the sun is spread everywhere in the form of sunshine, the sunglobe itself can always be perceived to be in some particular place in the vast universal sky. The sun is thus simultaneously all-pervading and yet localized. The same situation is true of the Absolute Truth. The Absolute Truth is both personal and impersonal. In His personal form, He is locally situated, but in His impersonal form, He is all-pervasive.
In a sense, even an ordinary person can be present in more than one place. A king, for example, can be present in all parts of his kingdom although he personally remains within his castle. He accomplishes this through the agency of his energy, i.e., his army, his representatives, etc. The citizens are thus able to feel the king's presence throughout the entire kingdom even while the king remains in his palace. The fact that the Supreme Soul is able to simultaneously be present everywhere, yet personally remain in a particular place is confirmed in Bhagavad-gita.1
The idea that if God is everywhere, He cannot be situated in a particular place is a materialistic concept. It arises through the study of material nature and a subsequent attempt to understand the Absolute Truth on the basis of observed material laws. For example, if you tear a piece of paper into tiny bits and scatter it all over the room (thus spreading it everywhere), it loses its original form and is no longer situated in a particular place. Mayavadi philosophers think that the same law, which applies to pieces of paper and other material things, also applies to the Absolute Truth. This is not the case, however. The Supreme Absolute Truth is supra-mundane. He is outside the boundaries of material laws.