This is quite a tricky question. It could potentially lead to unending debates. Most Buddhists believe that Buddha did say that the soul does not exist.
And many a so-called ‘rationalist’ rally behind Buddhism because it rejects the concept of soul!
BeforeI get into the question answer session, let me make a quick announcement.
The fourth part of my audio book “The Ultimate book on Yoga” is now available. It is titled “Part 4 of The Ultimate Book on Yoga: How do Yoga postures work?”.
It is a one-hour long audio available in most stores and some libraries. You may not find it in amazon/audible though, since they don’t support parts.
If you have ever wondered how Yoga postures help in improvement of health, this is the book for you.
This book investigates into the reasons how Yoga postures enhance health. That would not only satisfy your curiosity but also helps you in performing these postures in the right way to reap the full potential of Yoga. So, please have a look, I mean lend an ear 😉. You will surely find some interesting things about this aspect of Yoga which you probably were never aware of.
As usual, use the link https://books2read.com/UltimateYoga to find this book in your favorite store. This link would take you to the first part of the series. Some stores may list the current part explicitly as a book in the series titled “The Ultimate book on Yoga”, some may show it as other related books. In some stores you may have to explicitly search for it using the title in the search box. I am sure that you will find this book very interesting and useful.
Now let us get back to our regular question answer session.
Today’s question is “Is Samadhi some form of brain malfunction?”
That is a tough question which can potentially shake the roots of many Yoga enthusiasts 😉 People who are determined to rubbish spiritual experiences and all types of spiritual practices keep quoting all sorts of ‘evidences’.
They argue that the experience that one goes through in advanced stages of meditation are nothing short of some weird happenings in the brain.
We often use the word spirituality to mean some uncommon or mystic set of notions or practices. Even people who do not believe in the concept of spirit or soul use the term to mean such things. Many people talk about ‘spiritual experiences’. Most modern Gurus take subjective experience as the proof of existence of spirituality that is beyond science.
This is the question I am often asked. Many people get attracted to Yoga or meditation believing that they can attain psychic powers through these practices. Many a Gurus became well known either because of their psychic claims, or through their autobiographies in which they give a long list of mystics they have met in their lives who displayed psychic powers.
Before I discuss further, let me clarify that what I intend to discuss is about Advaita and Dwaita which are often wrongly translated as Monism and Dualism respectively.
BeforeI take up today’s question, I have a small update.
The third part of my audio book series namely “The Ultimate Book on Yoga” is just out and is available in almost all stores and in some libraries.
It is titled “Part 3 of The Ultimate Book on Yoga: How to minimize stress?”. It is a one hour forty-five minutes long audio in which I discuss simple but effective and long-lasting Yogic techniques to minimize stress.
It is almost completely explained in an anecdote driven style that should make listening interesting and convincing. As usual, the link to look for is https://books2read.com/UltimateYoga. You can choose your favorite store and search for the book using the title if it is not explicitly listed. I hope that you will find this part interesting and useful.
Now back to our regular Q n A session.
Today's question is "Does Patanjali really teach meditation?"
Patanjali may be a puzzle to many people who dabble around in Yoga.
The person who asked me this question is under the impression that Patanjali who is often credited to be the father of Yoga does not really teach how to meditate!
The person who asked this question apparently watched a video in which a well-known spiritual Guru made a claim that he has ways to stop time!
The context was a discussion between a reputed astrophysicist and this spiritual Guru. The astrophysicist kept wondering about various theories about time and how conclusions arrived at by these theories are beyond comprehension.
After the overwhelming response to my audiobook “Part 1 of the Ultimate book on Yoga : Let us know Yoga better”, I have now released a sequel to that book titled “Part 2 of the Ultimate book on Yoga : Brain science behind Yoga”.
I have been discussing lot of things for the past some years. Most of my talks were around Yoga, Meditation, Indian philosophy and so on.
I have always encouraged people to ask questions before accepting anything. Many of my readers have asked me questions both through by blog as well as through other channels.
After having defined what God is, and why idol worship is not something forbidden, Badarayana goes on to give some finer suggestions on God realization.
Idol worship has been in vogue since time immemorial in all races and communities. Hindus are no exceptions. But Abrahamic religions forbid idol worship at least as a principle. There is an interesting story regarding this.
Since our entire discussion revolves around God or Brahma, probably we should first define what this God is. Many people who claim to be believers have tough time defining God.
They may describe God as some person in the heaven, or some deity in a temple, and so on. But they probably cannot ‘define’ God.
All of us love our mother. So, there is nothing wrong if one declares that his or her mother is beautiful even if she is horrible looking 😉 May be to some extent it is acceptable if we say that “my mother is the most beautiful!”. But the problem starts when we say that “your mother is ugly as compared to mine”.
If you ever were a mother – well, no gender bias, it could as well apply to a father - you probably would better appreciate whatever I am going to discuss now. As a child grows, it goes through stages of gradual building up of its vocabulary. Most of what it says initially is gibberish and makes no sense at all. But does a mother ever complain? On the contrary she takes that with pride – her kid is at least attempting to say something. She finds meaning in those unintelligible words!
Have you ever seen a rotten corpse? Just the thought of it may be repulsing to you.
The nauseating stench, decomposed flesh, wriggling maggots, the hungry vultures tearing apart the rotten stuff… Can you picturize that? Horrible isn’t it?
I am sorry to use such harsh words. But they are not my words, nor they are addressed to you. That is how the Brahma supporters admonish their Jain opponents.
Let us continue our debate between the Brahma supporters and the Jain philosophers that we started in the previous episode.
The Jain philosophers have a totally non violent approach even when they debate. They use their AnEkaantha Vaada to accept even the opponent’s view as one of the possible views. They don’t disagree with anyone. That is nice. But the Brahma supporters have problem even with that approach. This is how they refute the Jain views.
How do you like it when someone says that to you? Is it meant to be a compliment or criticism? Many a times, even very nice ideas fall apart when it comes to practical application.
Jainism, one of the very ancient Indian schools of philosophy, has many such puzzling things. With all high respect for the great masters of this school, I often see many contradictions in their way of thinking, however much they were well intended.
Many of us often make the mistake of jumping to conclude identity, based on similarity between two things. If two things are similar, that does not mean that they are identical. A cow has 4 legs and so also a dog. That does not make cow and dog same!
The Vijnyaana Vadi Buddhists see the similarity between the dream world and our wakeful world and jump to the conclusion that since dream world is nonexistent, our wakeful world also does not exist! The brahma supporters reject this reasoning. Let us see how.
There was another sect of Buddhists who denied the existence of the material world. They said that “all that exists is only the minds. What we think as something existing outside is actually inside our mind!”
The Buddhists have a fantastic theory of existence which neither needs the concept of soul nor the God. They say that there is no one who experiences anything. But still they say that you need to toil all your life to free yourself from all the suffering! That is the focal point of Buddhism.
The Brahma supporters ridicule this theory of Buddhists not only as illogical but something that contradicts our day-to-day experience. This is how they pull down the Buddhist theory –
In the previous episode we noted that the Buddhists rejected the concept
of soul as well as God. These two were central to the philosophy of the
Brahma supporters. Definitely there is a serious difference. Before we
sort out the differences, let us first listen to what the Buddhists have
to say.
I am happy to announce the release of my 23rd book namely “Krishna's 4 paths to ultimate happiness”. Though not exactly a book on Yoga in the conventional sense, the subtitle of this book reads as “Complete Yogic science of the Bhagavad Geetha”.
Like the Bhagavad Geetha, specifically in this book, I use the word Yoga in a wide connotation – to mean a path to ultimate realization or happiness. This path also includes conventional Yoga as a form of meditative practice, in addition to other paths such as Jnyaana Yoga, Karma Yoga and Bhakti Yoga.
As we discussed in the previous episodes, the supporters of Brahma or God somehow managed to silence their opponents in the Vedic camp. Prominent among these opponents were the Samkhya and the Vaisheshika.
These opponents, though they accepted the authority of the Vedas, were not willing to accept the concept of God. Not at least as a source of the created world. They had their own reasons which the Brahma supporters vehemently refuted.
Continuing our discussion on the debates on Brahma or God, in this episode let us see how the Brahma supporters face the criticisms by the Vaisheshikas or the ancient Indian atomic theorists.
Did you know that there existed atomic theorists in India more than 2000 years before Dalton and others developed our modern atomic theory?
You may not find their theories as elaborate as the atomic theories of today. But the fact is that they did come up with such a theory thousands of years ago! And without any sophisticated gadgets that we have today. They did not even have an ordinary microscope for that matter. Isn’t that amazing?
We human beings get bored sometimes. And we end up doing all kinds of silly things. But does God also get bored sometimes? Does he also do silly things?
In the previous episode we saw how the ancient Samkhya philosophers put forward their claims. In one stroke they make the idea of Brahma or God totally irrelevant.
Apparently, they can explain ‘everything’ without taking recourse to any mystical entity called God! How does the Brahma supporters take on this onslaught of the opponent?
