Yoga Sastra by Guru Nitya Chaitanya Yati
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
GURUKULAM VOLUME XI • 1995 THIRD-FOURTH QUARTER GURUKULAM VOLUME XI • 1995 THIRD-FOURTH QUARTER 3 LIKE A LEAF IN THE WIND by Nancy Yeilding 5 EXPERIENTIAL AESTHETICS AND IMPERIENTIAL TRANSCENDENCE: Commentary on Narayana Guru's Svanubhavaglti Satakam by Guru Nitya Chaitanya Yati 11 THE KAJHA UPANISAD Translation and Commentary by Muni Narayana Prasad 15 THAT HOLY MOUNTAIN OF NILGIRIS by Peter Moras 17 THE SCIENCE OF HARMONIOUS UNION Commentary on Patanjali'sYoga Sastra by Guru Nitya Chaitanya Yati 22 PAPERCUTS by Karen Balos 24 BIOGRAPHY OF NARAYANA GURU by Nancy Yeilding 28 WHAT MAKES A BELIEF VALID? by Guru Nitya Chaitanya Yati 36 MUSIC RESEARCH REPORT by Ananda Nada Yogi 38 GURU'S WALKS by Deborah Buchanan 40 ESPECIALLY FOR CHILDREN Thank am Suresh 42 EAST-WEST UNIVERSITY REPORT AND NARAYANA GURUKULA NEWS 44 PHOTO AND ILLUSTRATION CREDITS GURUKULAM ENGLISH LANGUAGE EDITION GURUKULAM is published by Narayana Guru- kula and the East-West University of Unitive Sciences. Its policy is that enunciated by Naray ana Guru when he convened the Conference of World Religions at Alwaye, South India, in 1924: "Our purpose is not to argue and win, but to know and let know." NARAYANA GURUKULA is a non-profit or ganization and all contributions are tax- deductible. FOUNDER: Nataraja Guru GURU and HEAD: Guru Nitya Chaitanya Yati REGULATING SECRETARY: Muni Narayana Prasad PUBLICATIONS BOARD: Deborah Buchanan, Sraddha Durand, Scott Teitsworth, Robert Tyson, Nancy Yeilding. EDITOR: Nancy Yeilding PRODUCTION STAFF: Deborah Buchanan, Sraddha Durand, Tom Fowler, Desiree Hunter, Bill Hughes, Calder Hughes, Patrick Hughes, Andy Larkin, Suellen Larkin, Susan Plum, Nan cy Richmond, Emily Teitsworth, Harmony Teit sworth, Scott Teitsworth, Robert Tyson, Indra Vas, Nancy Yeilding. SUBSCRIPTION INFORMATION: Yearly: $20.00 for four issues. For outside USA add $4.50 for surface mail, $14.50 for air mail. Write to: GURUKULAM, 8311 Quail Hill Road, Bainbridge Island, WA, 98110, USA. In India write to: Narayana Gurukula, Srinivasapuram P.O., Varkala, Kerala, 695145, India. PRINTED at Island Gurukula Aranya, Bain bridge Island, Washington, USA. COVER: Drawing by Sebastian Varghese Printed on Recycled Paper With Soy Based Ink Like a Leaf in the Wind Love for Certain Work dried up, no longer a useful p tree, soon to become compost a Traveling is as refreshing for some The leaf becomes a symbol of ag as staying at home is for others. arating from vital connectednes: ing. At the same time, we envy Solitude in a mountain place and lightness with which the leal fills with companionship fate. for this one, If we watch with great atte and dead-weariness may be able to predict one or two of the for that one. next movements a falling leaf might make, This person loves but we can't map out with any accuracy the being in charge of the workings whole course of its progress from branch to of a community. ground, and it is utterly impossible to This one loves predict the movement of all the leaves of the ways that heated iron can be shaped even one tree. The frail leaves which the with a hammer. wind can whip up, set madly whirling, Each has been given and slap against rocks or buildings, can a strong desire for certain work. also be gently turned in graceful pirouettes and tenderly laid to rest upon the earth. At A love for those motions, times we feel no more in control than a leaf and all motion is love. in the wind; the world, like the wind, hav ing the power to randomly support us, give The way sticks and pieces of dead grass us a good ride, or crash us against the hard and leaves facts of life. shift about in the wind To insulate ourselves from such feel and with the directions of rain ings, we build up castles of possessions to and puddle-water on the ground, make life cozy, bulwarks of preferences those motions which we dedicate ourselves to satisfying, are all a following and bastions of attitudes to contend with of the love they 've been given. life's quirks. We act, and through our ac tions try to convince ourselves of our worth Rumi and power. From early childhood, chil dren are taught, sometimes by encourage ment and sometimes by adversity, to de In the Fall, brilliantly colored leaves of velop a sense of self and to impress the deciduous trees are loosened by the wind mark of that self upon the world through and sent floating to the ground in a seemtheir actions. Parents and teachers often ingly aimless way, now drifting to one side,attempt to convey to their children the then the other, sometimes being carried myth that life can be planned out and lived aloft again, only to plummet to earth. Now in an orderly step-by-step manner, even and then, we find ourselves standing forthough a their personal experience of it is moment in reverie, watching a single leafmore like that of a falling leaf. Modern fall slowly, and poets of many ages and educational systems are in the forefront of cultures have mused upon the fallinghuman attempts to control both human leaves of autumn. We watch wistfully,nature and the natural world. Time is di knowing that the leaf which was once pulvided into rigid segments marked off by sating with green energy has now becomebells and calendars. Children sit in rows 3 inside square buildings, following preas physics, astronomy, mathematics, earth scribed curricula, day after day and year sciences, meteorology and social sciences after year. The omni-directional interestshave become fascinated by the study of and energy of growing children arechaos. They are making some surprising blocked off and channeled into society'sdiscoveries and developing ways to see accepted molds. From an early age, young order and the operation of the laws of na people are asked what they are going to be ture even in random events such as the when they grow up. They soon learn thatmovements of a falling leaf. Chaos theory the appropriate answer to the question is is stretching the limits of scientific endeav one career or another. Though the scopeor to incorporate uncertainty. And what of human possibilities is vast, the range ofthey are finding is that beneath the surface acceptable answers is usually very small,of randomness there is order. In order to fenced in by the fear of a leaf-like existence.understand it, a whole field of new theory From the three year old who is interested in is being developed. The scientists at the everything, a person travels the narrowingforefront are so convinced that they have road to the thirty year old who is limited to actually redefined chaos from meaning the a given career, particular lifestyle and set absence of order to meaning that which of companions and possessions. only appears to proceed according to Both science and religion have sprungchance but is actually governed by precise from the principal human response to thislaws. fear: an attempt to control reality by un This is what the mystic Rumi saw cen derstanding it, figuring out the deepest seturies ago. The way of the mystic is differ crets of how the cosmos operates and how ent than that of either science or religion. it impacts us. Science has followed the Instead of trying to control reality and course of developing and following a sysbend things, persons or events to his or her tematic course of discovery and study to will, the mystic tries to come into intimate reveal the laws and resources of naturerelation with what is. That intimacy brings and how we can use them to our benefit,deepest insight and enables the mystic to while religion has attempted to control re guide us to see in a way that we can use to ality through faith in and supplication ofimprove the quality of life. Like the scien super-human beings and forces. tist, he asks us to look beneath the surface Science has been tremendously sucof events and different ways of being and cessful in its pursuit, having uncovereddoing. When the scientist speaks of law, many of the secrets of the cosmos and how the mystic speaks of love. It is the same to change its impact on human life. Butreality, seen differently. The mystic is tak human beings are as subject as ever to aning us by the hand, whispering gently in guish, guilt, suspicion, insecurity, hatredour ear, singing exuberantly in joy and and fear of themselves, each other and theasking us to surrender ourselves to the twists and turns of an uncertain fate. Thedance of life, so that we too may find the solace offered by religion has been paid for key to going beyond fear. in the blood of those who differ. Although the scientific method is known for its emphasis on logic and or Nancy Yeilding derly progression, science has traveled its long road of exploration and classification only to come face to face with uncertainty. Correspondingly, human beings have in creasingly come to despair, seeing life as having no meaning. But science has con tinued to push at the boundaries to look fearlessly at the chaotic nature of existence. Thinkers at the forefront of fields as varied 4 Svanubhavagiti Satakam: Experiential Aesthetics and Imperiential Transcendence by Narayana Guru Translation and Commentary by Guru Nitya Chaitanya Yati Verse 90 As the waves of high tide rise in the sea, when knowledge blasts ignorance with raging storms, it breaks away many an attachment made in the past. Many negligible fights arise from controversies concerning cause and effect of pot and cloth, etc.