Some Clarifications on Taraka Brahma

[Published in Prajina Bharati April 1984]

Respected Mr. Editor,

It is very nice that certain points of Ananda Katha have provoked interesting discussions. Ac. Hari Shankarji’s letter on Nagina da’s clarification has stirred thoughts in my humble psychic world and I wish to share them with others.

I can not say how far my words will satisfy the curiosity of inquisitive souls but I would like to pen for critical appreciation the answer I find within me.

Since I am taking the liberty to express my views on a matter related to Nagina da’s writings, I offer my sincerest apology to him.

Naginada has reproduced Baba’s words in Ananda Katha. He did not feel it necessary to question Baba on the points that are agitating some devotees.

I think that he did not do it because:

• he did not find any reason to disbelieve Baba, and
• those matters did not appear incongruous to him.

The bone of contention is: Does Taraka Brahma have a previous life? How can Shri Ram Chandra Upadhyaya be Baba in this life?

Taraka Brahma has no previous life as he is unborn or self-born. What about Shri Ram Chandra Upadhyaya episode then? Is it untenable?*

To me, it is not. In order to understand this riddle, a short philosophical discussion will help:

This means it is a particular position and state of consciousness, which we call Taraka Brahma just as we call Nirguna and Saguna due to their distinctive state of consciousness.

We cannot say then that this entity has a separate existence* from the supreme and that it holds a particular position independent of the supreme.

It has become supreme. As such, it is Supreme in its new status.

Take for example water of well, pond, and ocean. After due purification when they are mixed together, no trace of the distinctive characteristics of well, pond or ocean could be found.

What we find is just water*. All distinctions have vanished since the factors creating distinctions exist no more now.

Similarly, a sadhaka in the elevated state of his mind passes through various experiences, and merges in the highest being when he has exhausted all his samskaras.

In that supreme state of psychic dilation, we can call him by a particular name.

But the fact is that he has already cast off the robe of unit entity.

He can give up physical body whenever he desires. The bondage of mortal life ceases for him in that most exalted state.

It is true Taraka Brahma has no need for sadhana* for His salvation.

He is not in bondage so there is no question of salvation for him. He is perfect within Himself.

He is the Supreme Lord, the goal of all creatures and objects. But then the moot point is:

When He takes a samkalpa to assume human form*, how does it materialise?

Since he has no previous life, how did he get a physical medium for expression?

There can be no abrupt appearance of a physical structure for Taraka Brahma. Everything has to follow the law of creating and evolution. Else, what is the need at all of being born from the womb of a woman?

He can just materialize a fully-grown up body, a well-developed human personality, to serve as his medium and start his work all at once instead of associating himself with a family, with mother father, brother, sisters etc. But it doesn’t happen like that as this will be the negation of the laws of prakrti.

It will be unnatural.

What does he do then? He wants to take a human form and assign a role for himself.

At that moment, he chooses a medium whose all samskaras have been exhausted and therefore free from the qualification of unit entity. Obviously this medium can be any unit who has reached that supreme state since all are same at that pinnacled state of consciousness.

And it is in this background, that a particular body may be said to possess a particular name at a given time of its existence in the evolutionary flow of cosmological order.

The mind of an entity requires a physical frame that is capable of maintaining parallelism with its psychic wave. And so Taraka Brahma chooses a body inhabited by a liberated soul.

The mention of Shri Ram Chandra Upadhyaya* in this regard is simply to denote that it was the medium accepted by Taraka Brahma.

It was Ram Chandra Upadhyaya who got salvation and not the Taraka Brahma.

Taraka Brahma utilized the highly evolved physical organism of Shri Upadhyaya for his physical expression.

Thus, no communication gap appears to exist in relation to Shri Upadhyaya and his subsequent lives.

Somewhere Baba has said. “Body is not the guru. The entity operating within the body is Guru… but the form has special significance since He is expressing through it."

Therefore use of the term ‘Baba’ by Nagina in describing the previous lives is merely to state the narrative.

The body is the medium of expression of Taraka Brahma. But since, in the evolutionary flow of the cosmos it is related to Shri Upadhyaya Baba has been used in both the senses according to the context.

Taraka Brahma is an Infinite, formless. Abstract entity.

How can he have a physical body, which is bound by the imperfection of limitations?

It is therefore absurd to debate on the point that Taraka Brahma created a different and special body which doesn’t have to pass through saincara and pratisaincara.

Such a proposition will be totally illogical and philosophically unsound. This is why the theory of avatarvada is not supported by Ananda Marga philosophy.

Taraka Brahma is an entity and not a body. He chooses a body for his expression which he deems best. The form is not He, resident of the form is He.

In his discourse on Tantra and Indo-Aryan civilization (see the book Abhimata) Baba has said: “the question as to who between Shiva Krsna is superior does not arise. All Brahma-knowing entities are same. They are all Brahma.”

By using the expression Brahma – knowing entities” implication is that Brahma alone knows Brahma and one realizing Brahma becomes Brahma himself. He is verily Brahma is that stance of his existence.

While recording Baba’s words in the article, ”Unresolved Mystery” in Bodhikalpa (January 75), Amitananda Avadhuta writes: “I have gone to Jamalpur hill for doing sadhana. I am sitting when someone tells in my ears, come with me. I will show you a better place for sadhana, follow me. I see no one but I follow the voice whose presence I feel so clearly and asks me to do sadhana. After a while, it tells me, Are you mad? Don’t, he is Maya. Are you P.R. Sarkar? See who your are! And a reel of my past life, my earlier lives, flashes clearly before my eyes and I realize who I am” (Here “I” is used for Baba).

Once in a demonstration on an avadhuta at Jamalpur, Baba asked him to see who Baba was 7000 years ago. The avadhuta saw Shiva. When asked to see 3500 years ago, he saw Krsna*.

Taraka Brahma has no previous lives*, but the fact that he was Shiva and Krsna is previous lives is intended to suggest that Lord comes in every age on a particular mission.

The same Lord is known as Shiva, Krsna and today Anandamurti. He is the same whenever and wherever He appears.

In the book Vicitra Abhijinata, Baba has called certain experiences as samskaraja i.e. born out of one’s innate samskaras, which results from the psychological peculiarities of the person.

In such strong experiences, one experiences the reflection has own self in a particular circumstance or at a particular time.

It is thus natural that in Baba’s case it would be Shiva and Krsna as the reflections of his earlier lives.

Another question that tortures the mind as who is telling Baba “Are you P.R. Sarkar? See what you are.”

Meaning thereby he is not actually P.R. Sarkar?

To my humble and imperfect intellect at seems that because of psychic association of a unit mind with that physical body, the vibrational imprint of the unit in a very subtle and almost theoretical form remains with the structure and therefore the call to shake off this imprint.

In the end I would like to emphasize that Lord’s Liila is inscrutable.*

The more we try to question and find out the answer, greater is the chance of being confused. Taraka Brahma is not a figure of philosophy, He is the creation of devotional sentiment.

Hence total surrender can alone satisfy the inner urge of a soul.

This is why when Amitanandaji requested Baba to untangle the riddle about strange factual events concerning Him, Baba’s reply was:

“Naham manye suvedeti no na vedeti veda ca. Yo nastadveda tadveda no na vedeti veda ca”.

That is, “Neither do I say that I know Him, nor do I say that I don’t know Him, because I know He is beyond my knowing and not knowing.”

More we make attempt to understand the mysteries of his Liila, the more we lose ourselves in Him. We can never completely grasp the depth and plurality of His sports, his manifestations, by sheer intellectual analysis, howsoever brilliant and exhaustive it might be, He alone knows the secret of his mysteries and those trying to unravel it merge in him in the process.

May the Great Kind and Sweet Lord pardon this humble child again for speaking about the unspeakable, for discussing the undebatable and for scrutinizing the inscrutable.

May the Compassionate One forgive this impertinence of this ignorant child.

Yours sincerely, Santosananda Avadhuta