"Who am I? Swami" – on paths to salvation

(Continued from previous post)

As the name with which he is well known suggests, Ramana’s emphasis had always been the path of enquiry, namely “who am I?”. But in general he suggests four paths.

1. Path of enquiry

2. Path of devotion

3. Path of Yoga

4. Path of Hatayoga

In all these paths Ramana says that the underlying principle is the same – stopping the mind and its activities. But Ramana hastens to add that stoppage of the mind does not mean complete stoppage. The awareness has to continue even after stoppage of other mental activities. Otherwise, he points out, a person in deep sleep, a person who is in coma, or a person who is unconscious in general, would all have attained salvation! In none of these cases the awareness persists though the mental activities have stopped. 

This is yet another point I have discussed in my book “How and why of Yoga and Meditation”, where I have equated “awareness” to the activity of the “attention system” in the brain. This system should not be shutdown but should be in a highly active (while most of the cortical activities have stopped) state to attain self realization.

Let me briefly discuss the four paths suggested by Ramana.

1.Path of enquiry

This is Ramana’s pet path. Ramana says that when someone constantly indulges in the enquiry – “Who am I?” all other thoughts in his mind gradually stop and he will reach a stage of samädhi. This is when the ultimate self realization is attained and according to Ramana, that is the direct path to salvation.

2.Path of devotion

In this path, Ramana says that one focuses his mind on an external object such as God, Guru and so on, and expresses devotion to that object. Though Ramana disapproves the existence of separate God or Guru (Ramana believes in just the soul and nothing else), he says that in the initial stages such devotion helps one to stop mental activities since the mind is repeatedly focused on God or Guru. But gradually this focus turns inward and finally leads to self realization where he realizes that “He” himself is both the God and Guru.

This is yet another point where there is amazing similarity between Ramana’s views and what I have discussed about devotional singing in my book “How and why of Yoga and Meditation”.

3. Path of Yoga

By Yoga, Ramana means the Yoga system laid down by Patanjali and not what we know today as Yoga. Ramana fully agrees with Patanjali’s definition of Yoga as “Yoga is about restraining the activities of the mind”. And the process naturally leads to samädhi and ultimate self realization.

4. Path of Hatayoga

Today, most people take the words Yoga and Hatayoga as if they are synonymous. But not Ramana. All through his conversations Ramana directly or indirectly makes light comments about Hatayoga, though he repeatedly says that he does not wish to criticize any path. The first post in this series namely “Who am I? Swami – on Hatayoga” says it all.

Another strange recent development is - equating Yoga postures or asanas to Yoga, though originally Patanjali talks about none of the asanas propagated by modern Yoga teachers. On several occasions when people ask Ramana about his opinion about asana, Ramana intentionally or unintentionally evades direct answer. Sometimes he uses the word asana to mean meditative postures such as the lotus posture and says that they are useful during meditation or while doing Pränäyäma. Sometimes he uses the word asana to mean just the seat (in Sanskrit language that is what it means) on which a person sits during meditation, and says that whether it has to be on a deer skin, layer of kusha grass etc. (these are the seats some Yoga teachers recommend), is immaterial. He talks lightly about strange explanation given by these teachers for the use of a particular type of seat.

Ramana’s final word about Hatayoga is that - those who cannot follow the first 3 paths probably get benefited by Hatayoga, though he repeatedly says that it is a roundabout path which has to ultimately lead to the first three paths!

Though I have tried to show that there is not much of support for asanas (as they are known today) in ancient texts, I have discussed some proven health benefits of these asanas in my book. I have also discussed the possible reasons for the same.

More in the next post.