Kashi Pancakam

July 07, 2021

Table of Contents

Class 1

Small prakarana by Shankaracarya
pravaha - flow, activity, current.
When it comes to knowledge, there no division between east and west.
Nature of work is grow, until it occupies all free time you have.
It is the means that shapes the end. You won’t get the end independent of the means
If bhakti is separates from philosophy, it becomes superstitious. Religion loses its transforming power. Society comes into focus, not individual liberation.
We rise above literality of the mythology and rise to the spirit. That’s why it is called spirituality. If you take them literally, you once again fall into the trap of establishing division.
The rishis love to cloud the truth in a symbolic language. Instead of telling that sun’s white light can be split into seven colours, the mantras say that “he travels by a chariot pulled by seven horses”. sa:sapti - horse, ray of light.
Serpent going and eating part of the sun - shadow. It covers up part of the sun or the moon.
In all this stories the literality has to be appreciated and spirit must be understood correctly. Then only there is beauty in those stories.
Kashi - atmajnanam in this context.
sa:nija - self
I’m is the most fundamental experience of every human being. It is prior to everything else, incl. god.
I’m is the primordial intelligence. “God is” is not, neither “you’re”.
What is the matrix of I’m? Conscious being. That conscious being is the Kashi - because it is self-shining. You validate the existence of all objects. “I’m-ness” is svayamprakasha - it is prior to perception and thinking.
Body makes you limited in space, mind in time.
If god is a limited guy, he can have only one center. If he’s spherical. If he’s elipsoid, he can have two. Whereas every human heart is the center of God. He’s infinite.
Most important, sacred spot in Kashi is the place where bodies are burned.
You will not be able to invite the truth. It will reveal itself. You only have to prepare yourself for the revelation. The preparation is negation of the identification with the body, which is threefold: me, mine, for me. aham mama mahyam. Mahyam gets neutralised by karma yoga. Mama, things related to me, are neutralised by bhakti yoga. Everything is of Ishvara, nothing is mine. In bhakti namah (na mama) is the most important thing. Aham karta is negated by sankhya yoga -> nirahamkara.
Without crucification there can be no resurrection. What resurrects is the Christ who is one with the God - myself and father in the heaven are one and the same. How to do? Begin with namahyam. Then namama.
Upashanti: shanti shanti shanti is 3x because there are three kinds of papas. Adhiatmika, adhibauthika, adhidaivika. Each papam is a fire, heat, pain, suffering. Shanti douses all three of them. The heart is at peace.
But Real shanti is not upashanti. It is parashanti, moksha. Permanent freedom from suffering - nirvana. It is a negative word. It is not a positive definition. I cannot say what it is itself.
Silence per se is not important. When the mind is moving, the flow of thoughts is harmless if you know that the content of the mind is unreal.
You psychologically depend on that content of waking consciousness for self-fulfillment and happiness and take it to be other. It is a very far and deep ignorance. It can give me sukha and dukha and therefore to have more sukha and less dukha I have to manipulate the content. The flow of mind throws a screen of thought over the truth which is then totally covered.
You have to discover the truth deep within so you can compare it to the mind created world. The mind creates a world for us and presents it to us every day morning. We’re accepting that world and take it to be real and ourselves to be a small part of the world.
Rather than taking up the struggle to discover the truth ourselves it is very convenient to handle the responsibility for the truth to the mahatma and start relaxing. How do you know that jagat is mithya? Sastra says that … c’mon! How long will you manage like this? Therefore gain the paramopashanti. That is the real kashi. You get by manonivrtti.
Suppose I see a pot. Now I pay attention to the pot. And now I’m interested in the pot. That makes the pot real. While paying attention and investing interest cannot say a thing is mithya. Stop paying attention and interest and see what happens. That is called manonivrtti. Just watch your mind in an uninvolved way. Be kind to it. Do it constantly.
De-automatize everything. Like stop talking when you are eating food. Because if you are talking, eating becomes automatic and the attention is on talking and there is identification. It is the mind that is functioning through the taste-buds. Just watch it.
Just watch the mind. Don’t ask how. Suppose you find an agitation in the mind. When the mind is agitated I’m agitated. That is called identification. There is no viveka (between I’m and the mind). I’m and I think are not the same. When you watch the mind it becomes pure. Slowly. Once the mind is pure you’ll know very spontaneously that you’re not the mind but the witness of the mind.
Transcending the mind means knowing that I’m not the mind, antahkarana. Antahkarana suddhi is the most important starting point.
That silence is conscious presence. It is not a gap, it is not void. It is the kashi. In Kashi there is a flow of ganga. Ganga is pure and also purifying. In the Kashi which is in my heart, the Ganga is jnanapravaha.
I’m the primordial light/intelligence. The moment body comes into the light the world also comes. They always come together and resolve together.
The light is the atmajnanu. The brilliantly shining awareness. The Kashi. And the playfulness (vilasa) of the mind is the film. Steven Spielberg knows it, that’s why he called his company Dreamworks.
The world you experience is entirely, not partly, a projection.
Whatever is the content of consciousness, whatever is known to you as part of that content, that is not I’m. I’m is unknown, unknowable, undefinable, undesignated, undifferentiated, primordial awareness of being.
You don’t want money, wife and children … what you’re seeking in life is happiness. You’ve a right to seek it. Seeking is right, but the method is wrong. You don’t seek happiness in the other. The other is maya and kalpita (imaginary). You see a movie and feel good. Where do you get that feeling of goodness? From the screen it flows to you? No, from you it flows onto the screen.
Discover it: be sat cit. Then discover the fullness of that. Then as you discover it, the screen of thought projected by the mind will slowly move away. And the inner silence starts flowing into the life and makes it sacred, joyful.
When you say I’m rich you’re deriving the sense of self from the riches. When you say I’m the husband you’re deriving the sense of self from your status. That’s wrong. Be the love of the husband. Don’t derive the sense of self from anything that you know. Don’t have any identification what so ever.
Mahatmas find it so hard to identify with anything. Samsaris people readily identify with anything what-so-ever. Be a true nobody, not somebody, then the real self shines in all its glory. It is called paramatmarupa.

Class 2, Shambhavi Mudra Meditation

soham - I’m that. That reality. You cannot describe it. The truth is so simple and so profound that language cannot reach it. Truth is not linguistic, truth is existential.
The word that can be used to indicate it - Om.
Atma, as it reflects in body/mind, the reflection appears as sakshi.
Manifestation is always the contact. Contact of the infinite (sakshi) with the finite (koshash). Electricity coming into contact with the filament of the bulb appears as the glow.
Suppose somebody speaks good or bad things about you. And you just smile and are ready to happily bless both. Then you’re free from the bondage - samsara bandha - ashiva - amangala. From the bondage of opposites: punya papa, shubaashuba… All dvandvas bind us.
Every identifications presents us as a victim to opposites.
Just be a sakshi. Uninvolved, uninterested, unperturbed witnessing awareness. Don’t get caught in opposites.
Job of the sword can’t be done as long as it is in the sheet. Its glory is covered as long as it is in the sheet.
There is bondage only when you make the fundamental, original mistake of identification. The mistake that amounts to a sin. The name for it is maya, avidiya in the context of individual.
Why are you living? I don’t know. Just because I’m living doesn’t mean I’m seeking to live. If Bhagavan decides to put an end to this live at this moment it is OK with me. With this attitude there is no boktrtva, no identification with the mental/intellectual sheath.
Annamaya is not the bondage. Identifying with it is the mistake. If you’re the body then you won’t know the body. But you know the body. Eyes can’t see themselves.
Pot thought is known to I. I’m aware of the pot-thought. I’m not the pot-thought. I’m a realm of intelligence behind the thought. There is no logic identifying with the thought.
Money lost, nothing is lost. Time is lost, something is lost. Character is lost, all is lost.
The mistake is cognitive, mental. It is the cognitive faculty called buddhi, that is underlying all this five-fold mistake.
Ignorant-mind is (called) avidya. Avidya is the buddhi. This avidya is none other than bhavani. Cosmic avidya is called maya, bhavani. In every body this mistake is repeating again and again. Every individual is doing this mistake of identifying.
You can turn the avidya to your advantage by identifying with the shiva. Shiva is the purusha. Prakuruti is the buddhi, maya, bhavani.
bhavasya (spirit) patni (wife) - bhavani. bhavam samsarinam karoti iti bhavani. She makes Ishvara, Shiva a samsari.
Be a witness to the vital force, mind, buddhi, to all enjoyment. Don’t become enjoyer. When you identify with the enjoyment, then you become an enjoyer. Be a witness to the ego, it won’t be able to survive. Every movement of ego you just watch. It becomes pure, right ego. Only the ego that has become strong because of identification hurts.
In kashi there is shiva (bhava) and bhavani. Shivasya patni - shivA. Bhavasya - patni bhavani. Rudrasya patni - rudrAni. Sakshi is shiva. Sakshya the five-fold upadhi is the bhavani. All bondage is placed the moment you identify.
Any-seeker who knows this kashi gains the kashi.
Shambavi mudra meditation: Keep eyes open. Stop blinking for a while. Understand I’m not seeking what is in-front of me. I’m aware of the inner only. I focus the entire eye-sight in the center of the eye-brows. I’m watchful of the center of the eye-brows. There is a watcher and the watched and eventually I become the watchfulness itself. That is called the kashi. Now the awareness instead of being focused on the things is focused on itself. That is the kashi. That is you. You are not what comes to light in that kashi. That is the ego.
The awareness is the Shiva and the center (between the eyebrows) is the kashi. Shivoham.
It is the movement of the mind that creates the entire content. Through ignorance the mind gives reality to its own creation. As long as you have interest in the content, attachment to the content, so long you won’t be able to discover the inner silence.
Kashi ksetram shariram - city of Kashi is entire body. In Kashi you have Ganga. Ganga flows in three lokas. In heavens, earth, netherworld. Tribhuvanam vyapini ganga. Here the ganga is jnanaganga - manifest conciousness. It also flows in three lokas - waking, dream, deep sleep state.
Three states (waking, dream, sleep) are called sthAna. The consciousness lights up all of them. Yet one doesn’t acquire sthAna dharma. One doesn’t get married/attached to them - identified with the sthAnas. Disassociate with it. Example: day, night, twilight do they happen to the sun? They just happen as the earth moves around the sun. Nothing ever happens to you. You’re the forth, the primordial intelligence. That turiya is the Shiva. That turIya is the Isha of vishva - entire universe (all what you see, smell, touch …).
Content of the waking consciousness is the vishva. You’re the master of it.
tIrtha - place that purifies you, road, ascetic, preceptor, channel.