The temporal illusory hologram we call Life in this universe is an insentient program. Only the God-within, ATMAN-Self is sentient.
The human being is comparable to a sort of data-collecting vehicle (my term) and is microcosmic meaning that each of us is the duplicate of the much larger macrocosmic form known as the Cosmic Being. Within that Being is a sort of ‘Mother Board’ (PRAKRITI) that generates the temporal illusory hologram. Prakriti’s GUNAS run every creature in the universe from gods to demons as well as us humans.
All the worlds in this universe are within us, just as the entire hologram is contained in all of its parts.
What is here is there, what is not here is nowhere.
-VISHVASARA Tantra
Our individual holograms are emitted from these microcosmic versions of the universe via our data-collecting vehicles. Our mind accesses the memory that stores data and program instructions. The mind is discerning and similar to the central processing unit that carries out program instructions to the central nervous system that sends signals to and from the brain as the input and the output device.
India’s traditional metaphysical system, SAMKHYA, defines the mind as both as sensory organ and a motor organ. The mind presides over the sensory organs and the motor organs. Its special characteristic is discernment. VASANA is the ‘tendency or innate disposition’ that creates memory.
The mind is programmed or rather influenced by the ego, which is termed AHAMKARA is Sanskrit. Once the mind has sorted the incoming data, the ego (AHAMKARA) moves in to “appropriate” whatever has been discerned. Traditional SAMKHYA explains the nature of the ego by a set of phrases I find amusing:
“I alone preside over what has been discerned by the mind.”
“I am entitled to this.”
“All these objects are for my use.”
“There is no one else entitled to it.”
“I alone exist.”
In SAMKHYA the intellect is distinct from the mind. The intellect is termed the Buddhi Principle (not the person Buddha). According to SAMKHYA this Buddhi intellect principle goes into action when it ascertains what should be done as a reaction to the data the mind has discerned after the ego has made its appropriation.
The Buddhi Principle is also insentient. However its close proximity to and relationship with Spirit (PURUSHA) gives the Buddhi the ‘appearance’ of being sentient.
This Buddhi Principle seems to be the only function within the data-collecting vehicle capable of providing us with anything close to Free Will. The Buddhi’s ascertainment of what is to be done, what duty (dharma is the term used) is to be performed, is considered to be an act of Will. Thus it is the Buddhi that is programmed with the capacity to recognize the mechanics of our state of ‘bondage’ in the illusion and through recognition we therefore have the opportunity to liberate our consciousness.
***
The software programs that run this temporal illusory hologram are eternal. Even when the universe is in a state of ‘dissolution’ these programs exist as subliminal impressions, latent and waiting for the re-emergence of the world in the next four cycles of time.
Thus the temporal illusory hologram is made up of insentient programs, which are eternal. They appear to move our consciousness through the four cycles of time. In the microcosm of our bodies there are numerous circuits, centers of consciousness that control the software that runs the body.
Some of these programs are ‘on automatic’ – like breathing or blood flow. While others allow us the opportunity to control our thoughts and bodily functions. These circuits are stations of power and intelligence that can be seen in the chakra system of the subtle body with the inner-eye (the eye of the mind or heart) as light - incessantly moving, spinning, revolving, spewing colors of pulsating light.
In the Krita Yuga, the Golden Age, we are well aware of our part in this creation. We understand how these circuit stations of power operate because, back in our state of Oneness, we as the Self-ATMAN created them. Their function is to manifest whatever we want into the hologram. Thus in that initial cycle of time we do not, for example, need to labor to grow our food.
But as the Krita Age flows on into the Treta Yuga, we begin moving into the process of Forgetting who we are. Our bodies become ever more dense, as our consciousness sinks down into the appearance of solidity.
Only by analogy with its own form can the mind depict what lies beyond itself. The outward world is but an appearance, a reflected image – the only thing real is the mirror.
-Alain Danielou; The Gods of India
As it would be most natural for us to imagine things in our own form, we begin to anthropomorphize these spherical lights - the forms of consciousness that in reality are only these circuit stations (the chakras) - into beings and finally into devas, gods, or DEVATA.
“The Vedic gods represent the different centers of activity in the brain and the spinal chord. … the Vedic Rishis (Seers) were well acquainted with the normal working of the nervous system in the body – its physiology lies hidden in the mysteries of the Vedas.”
-Dr. V.G. Rele; ‘The Vedic Gods’ (Apavarga in Samkhya)
These gods are in actuality the spherical circuitries of consciousness we ourselves designed and placed in the subtle body’s system of chakras to regulate exchanges of energies via a master plan. For example Varuna is the god for taste and the tongue; the gods Agni and Savitri are important sources of light; Indra is the god of PRANA (life-energies) and the INDRIYA are the senses – and so on.
The word chakra is Sanskrit for wheel. These centers turn and spin. The chakras are also often seen and described as the Lotus. These centers or chakras correspond to the entire spectrum of all frequency waveforms in the universe and their correlative hierarchal worlds, that is each a reflection of the specific degrees of that spectrum.
***
By the end of the Treta Yuga delusion sets in generating great confusion. We forget who and what these ‘gods’ are. The memory that they are symbols encoded to represent the powers and functions of the subtle and physical bodies, along with the ability to create whatever we want, rapidly becomes distorted and lost.
We humans made these gods “real” and began to feel that we were subservient to them. We felt that we needed to worship them and sacrifice to them to have our desires fulfilled, something we once did for ourselves.
The more we accepted these ‘deities’ as entities external to us, the more the Phantasmal Hierarchies grew. The more we worshipped external gods, by making sacrifices and offerings to these entities – who we created and are within us – the more energy we transferred to their temporal illusory holograms, their Loka worlds. Thus the gods grew in power and in number until in the Dvapara Yuga, they began to dominate us.
Bhagavad Gita 7. 24: “… god worshippers go to the gods.”
When you worship the gods, you get recycled through the myriad worlds back into human bodies lifetime after lifetime. No matter how lovely or long your visit is in a particular heaven or even as an angel, eventually your ‘merit’ runs out - and you return to incarnate here in flesh & blood to face once again the polarities of pleasure and pain.
Liberation (MOKSHA) from the perpetual cycles of rebirth is attained only through a return to the original state of Oneness with Self-ATMAN, the God-within.
In the Dvapara Yuga, we could still ‘see’ these illusions we had generated. Thus there are countless stories – what we now in our complete confusion call mythology – concerning the interaction of humans with gods and out-of-this-world beings.
When the Kali Yuga moved in on us and literally ‘cooked’ our consciousness - due to the fact that the way we experience time changes in each Yuga - most of us lost our ability to ‘see’ the myriad worlds.
They are very much still with us.
SAMKHYA KARIKA of ISVARA KRSNA
With the Tattva Kaumudi of Sri Vacaspati Misra
Translated by Swami Virupakshananda
Sri Ramakrishna Math Printing Press, Madras India
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