Q: What is Hinduism?
A: Hinduism is a name given to what
Hindus call the ‘Vedic religion’ or Sanatan Dharma which
means ‘Eternal Law’, the law that governs man and the universe. It
is a modern name for that ancient religion. It is something very
scientific, very logical — not a dogma — and when we look at it,
we find that it has certain ingredients that psychologists are using
today. The word Hinduism came much later. Hinduism is not a historical
type of religion. As far back as we can go we find that Hinduism was
already existing. It is the original religion. The Hindus are not
converts; they were born into that religion, grow and live in it. Its
basis is Sathya — Truth — and as we all know, Sathya
is eternal. So when we talk about Sathya, we talk about wisdom and
knowledge as well, because Truth is the basis of knowledge, and in the
Hindu religion Truth plays a very important part. It is by Truth that
we can become free, that we can liberate ourselves from this world of
ignorance.
Its original scriptures are known as
the Vedas. Veda is the book of wisdom. Veda means
knowledge. In Hinduism, the emphasis is on seeking knowledge, because
only knowledge can destroy ignorance and ignorance is the cause of the
problems of the world. The more we can attain to that state of
understanding, the greater our vision becomes and, therefore, we will
be better able to handle the problems of the world.
Hinduism is not just a philosophy of
teachings about God; it is also a study of man and the world, and it
is this study that makes Hindus a very practical type of people.
Q: Can you please explain about
Hinduism as regards its being the ‘original religion’?
A: The Hindus believe that in very
ancient times — not in terms of civilization which started just
recently, as people in the West think — there were civilized people
many, many thousands of years ago and that, at that time, Hindu
teachers were travelling to different parts of the world, like Mexico
and South America, and influenced their thinking.
We may wonder how other religions came
into existence in this world. There has been a lot of research about
Jesus and there is a strong tendency to think that Jesus went to India
where He received His teachings, after which He returned to the
western world. Other researches show that, in ancient times, Israel
and India were connected. Even though Christianity has a Jewish
background, it has been very much influenced by Hindu thought, Hindu
religion, and some Hindu teachers are of the opinion that Jesus had
brought a teaching like ‘The Sermon on the Mount’ from India: So,
Hinduism is reflected through Christianity in the Western world.
Islam is a combination of Christianity
and Judaism — what we call the Semitic source. There is proof that
there were strong contacts between Indian teachers and the people of
countries like Arabia, Egypt and Greece, and much of Hindu wisdom came
to those countries. We also know that mathematics — for instance,
the Indian invention of one to nine and the zero — was brought by
the Arabs to the western world. Furthermore, medical science and
astrology, among other things, were invented in India and influenced
other parts of the world. A part can never give complete satisfaction.
This happens only when the whole is experienced.
Hinduism is the oldest religion in the
world. The Hindus believe that whatever one is following is part of
Hindu principles; they may not be fully grasped, but whatever one is
following has some truth in it; it may not be the full truth but even
a part is helpful to guide one on the path of God-realization. That is
why Hindus are very tolerant. Since they believe that every path leads
towards God, there is no need to convert anyone.
Hindus believe that God is One, but the
sages — the wise men of the world — call Him by different names.
Although the names may differ, in reality we are talking about the
same person, the One. Different people may call a man — because of
their relationship with him — father, brother or husband, yet he is
the same person. In that way God is also One, but people see Him
differently according to their ideas about Him, and it is these ideas
about God that matter. Some people think that their idea is more
perfect than other people’s ideas and some people even fight for
them, and so they create a lot of conflict in the world. The Hindus,
however, think that because God is One — though people call Him by
different names — there is no need for conflict. On the contrary
there should be tolerance about the different religions rather than
conflicts.
In Hinduism, experience is important,
not belief. Experience is more profound than belief because only
experience can transform us and make us into a different person. The
emphasis in Hinduism is on knowledge because, as we all know,
ignorance is the cause of our problems. Therefore religion should
emphasize knowledge. If we want to find out about knowledge we need
freedom, and unless there is individual freedom to seek God, the
Hindus think that the liberation we are aspiring to cannot be
realized. So religion according to Hinduism cannot take us to a very
high level. This is more a personal thing and means that we have to
search for a genuine spiritual teacher and when we find him he will
instruct us on that higher path towards the realization of God.
Q: What is your comment on the
expectation of the coming of a World Teacher?
A: Today most people are conscious of
the fact that there is a need for a Teacher and many people of
different religions have been expecting a World Teacher coming into
the world to change the world, to change man’s mind and to make him
a more divine being. In Hinduism, it is believed that a Divine
Incarnation comes from time to time to help the world. We, in our own
organization, recognize our Guru Maharaj — Acharya Pranavanandaji
Maharaj — as one of the teachers of modern times Who has done a
great deal to improve human conditions and understanding.
Suffering in the world is due to a lack
of proper understanding. This understanding we can get only through
meditation, through Self-culture. Religion without Self-culture cannot
bring about that refinement in men. To be able to maintain a balanced
mind is so important for us. And therefore, our Acharya emphasized
self-control very strongly, because only when we are able to overcome
our instincts, we can have that inner peace, and through that we can
have outer peace as well, like Shiva — meaning peace — sitting in
meditation. Likewise, our Acharya used to sit in meditation in the
early morning for three to six hours when He was a child and at a
later stage He would sit in meditation the whole day or night. In this
way we are taught how important meditation is to our spiritual
well-being, inner harmony and harmony of the whole world. So, this is
the role of the teacher. A teacher is one who is detached from worldly
temptations. Without a teacher, the followers are left in a state of
blindness and so teachers play a very important role to guide the
followers of religion. Hinduism, therefore, has never been without
teachers and that is why — in spite of being a very ancient religion
— it is still very dynamic, with a great sense of purpose.
Today, the different religions are
awaiting the coming of the Buddha, the Christ, Krishna, for example.
Everyone is expecting a teacher, because we think that we are at a
junction or crisis, and unless a teacher comes our world will be
destroyed. However, it is important to remember that while we are
waiting for this World Teacher, this Master, we have to take care ourselves
of whatever we have, and that is: to follow the teachings and to
try in our own way to help overcome the problems we are facing in our
present-day world — with the help of the teachers that are there to
help us to remain conscious of our pure Being.
When we are ready and prepared, the
World Teacher and the Masters will, no doubt, come. It is essential to
understand that contact with our spiritual Masters is very important
for us to be able to have that higher realization of the unity of life
and the unity of the world. The Masters have transcended the world of
diversity into a world of unity, harmony and oneness. Our spiritual
teachers told us that we are coming to an age of universal unification
and universal emancipation and that we should work towards that by
spreading the message, the words of wisdom, to elevate the mind of
people, to enlighten them, so that they can understand there is a
greater purpose in life than all the conflicts that are so obvious.
Life in this world should be lived in
such a way that there can be harmony, peace and progress in a
collective sense, not in an individual or personal sense. In this way
we will have a world that the Masters can be proud of when They come.
But if we still maintain a state of conflict, hoping that the Masters
are going to come, we might be disappointed because they will only
come when we are prepared for Them, when we are ready for Them. This
readiness calls for a lot of austerity, preparation and discipline,
and once these are there, there is no doubt whatsoever in my mind that
the Masters will appear.
Q: What is the relationship of Guru
Maharaj to Lord Shiva?
A: Shiva is not an Avatar. Shiva is one
of the Trinity in the Hindu religion. In the Trinity, Shiva is the
Lord of Regeneration and of Yoga: Acharya Pranavanandaji Maharaj is an
Avatar of Shiva: He was born in 1896. During that time the world was
[in] a warring mood — each nation trying to subjugate the other and
there were sectarian conflicts with creeds and beliefs; He came with a
message saying that this is an age of universal unification, of
universal harmony, of universal emancipation. He was not emphasizing
differences, but the need for harmony, unity and co-operation for the
salvation of humanity. That is why we feel that His message is so
relevant to our modern times.
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Sri
Krishna granting full vision of
His Divine Being to Arjuna |
Q: What is the difference between
Hinduism and Christianity?
A: All teachers, like Jesus and
Krishna, came for a particular reason with a message relevant to their
time, whereas other teachers came with messages relating God to Man.
Guru Maharaj emphasized the problems of mankind. He said that there
are enough teachings already, that each teacher had given something
that was relevant for the world at the time, to the people of that
time, and that in the present age we need something more practical,
something whereby man realizes that without harmony and peace our
existence is at stake.
Krishna is an Avatar of Vishnu, the
Preserver of the world, and Jesus — as Christians say — is an
Avatar of God. The Islamic religion has no teachers but — as
Mohammed is called — the Messenger or the Prophet. When we look at
our present day, we see the need to work for harmony and unity, which
is so much emphasized by all genuine seekers today and what Acharya
Pranavanandaji Maharaj declared, with foresight, in 1920. His
prophetic vision was that we ultimately will have to work, not for our
own salvation, but for the salvation of humanity. His main teaching is
that we must culture our life along the lines of renunciation,
celibacy, self-control and adherence to the path of Truth.
Without these disciplines religion cannot refine man. They are the
basic principles of religion, and following them can transform us from
human beings into Divine Beings. These principles elevate and refine
the human mind, make us more Self-conscious and create a sense of
harmony with other beings. His emphasis on seva — selfless
service — to the poor, the ignorant, the destitute, is still a
fundamental principle in the Sangha [Community]. We must look at human
suffering in all its forms and we must try to elevate people from a
low to a very high intellectual and spiritual standard. Only then —
by developing the common people who ordinarily cannot transform
themselves — can we have a world where everyone respects the other, one
world, a perfect world — and this is the main teaching of Guru
Maharaj.
When we look at it within the context
of our everyday life, we will find that unless we adhere to the path
of Truth our life cannot become sublimated, because falsehood is the
basic cause of the conflicts in the world. We all have something to
hide and that is why we have to speak the untruth. But Guru Maharaj
emphasized that following the path of Truth will help man to realize
that without Truth we cannot have harmony in the world.
Renunciation means giving up
selfishness and greed, for they are the causes of conflict. We have
many things in the world; when we develop contentment and
self-satisfaction we will not covet anyone’s wealth or anything of
this sort.
Guru Maharaj’s emphasis on celibacy
is very relevant to our modern time where people have become
promiscuous, having illicit sex, with AIDS — among other things —
as a result. Therefore, unless we refine ourselves, unless we live a
regulated and disciplined life, we cannot really have peace of mind,
neither can we have peace in the world.
Prophets came at different times to
emphasize a particular message, even though there were valuable
teachings already, but They emphasized something specific at a
particular age. Acharya Pranavanandaji Maharaj did not deny what the
Prophets and Divine Incarnations had taught — all being true — but
that we should practise the inner principles of these teachings
because we have forgotten the spirit of these teachings and as a
result of that we fight on a sectarian basis, on beliefs and concepts,
rather than trying to experience what They taught us. His main
emphasis is that we must strive for experiencing the teachings and not
just following them.
In Christianity, suffering is almost
the central teaching, being acceptable as a part of life, something we
must accept and take for granted. Jesus on the Cross is central to
Christianity. In Hinduism the basic principle is quite different, for
Hinduism emphasizes that happiness and joy are the fundamental values
of life and that we must strive for them. Hinduism is a meditative
culture and in meditation we cannot really contemplate suffering, but
happiness, joy and peace. If we contemplate suffering, it will affect
us psychologically and in such a way that we will become very
frustrated. When we meditate on joy, our mind gradually starts to
adjust itself from this world of suffering to the world of harmony, of
peace, and the experience of joy. To give that impression of
happiness, joy and peace, we find on the Hindu altar many beautiful
pictures of various characters — aspects of the Godhead —
decorated beautifully with lights and flowers. On the contrary, we
find in most Christian churches Jesus on the Cross, representing
suffering. So, this is the basic difference between Christianity and
Hinduism. No doubt this must have influenced the adherence to these
two different religions. The emphasis in Hindusim is to strive for
knowledge, liberation and happiness because the Hindus believe that
happiness is the Source of our Being and striving for happiness is,
therefore, very important. Suffering is not really a characteristic of
our Being. Suffering is the cause of ignorance and happiness comes
through knowledge. The Hindus know that knowledge will make them
happy, that it is going to break down all the barriers of life, all
the differences that exist in society, and that is why they strive for
it. And meditation is that part through which we can attain that
state.
Q: How do Hindus believe in God?
A: Hindus believe in the Blessings and
the Grace of God, and that they come through the Guru. The Guru plays
a very central part in the Hindu religion and the Blessing that we get
from God is the knowledge that we receive. That when we get this
knowledge, we can recognize a holy man, we can recognize Truth from
falsehood, and that recognition is very important for a Hindu because
when we mistake the untruth for Truth and the Truth for untruth, that
confusion leads to a lot of problems in life. As a result we find that
we do not progress in any real sense. It is very important to
recognize the good in people and even more important to recognize the
Spiritual Master or Teacher as God on earth, that he is the
representation of God’s Blessing on earth. That contact with Him is
very important, because the moment we get in touch with Him our lives
become different. He is an example of which the scriptures speak. He
is the wise man, the holy man, the free man, the happy man.
When we find these characteristics in
Him, the grace flows from God through Him to us and when we surrender
ourselves to the holy man, the Guru, we will find that we are
receiving God’s Grace, because that happiness and joy transmit from
God, from the Divine Being, through the guru to the disciples and
devotees. In the Guru we have faith and we approach Him with
reverence; we prostrate in front of Him and we serve Him. That close
connection with Him helps us to receive that Divine Vibration which
emanates from His very Being. It is something we cannot describe in
words, that kind of communication cannot be verbal — it is something
that is intuitive, that we experience within.
So when we speak about God’s Grace in
the Hindu religion, we find that God’s Grace comes to us through the
Guru, through the saints, through the spiritual Masters. It is through
this that we find satisfaction and fulfilment. It is a fact — even
in our secular life in the world — that the teacher plays a very
important part, for without a teacher it is very difficult to learn
anything. And it is more so in our spiritual life. When we come in
touch with a spiritual Master, He is like a mother: He will take care
of us, guide and protect us, and do whatever is necessary for us —
He will help us all the way. Contact with Him is like completing 90
per cent of the journey and we have to walk only 10 per cent
ourselves.
When we, as aspirants, are frustrated,
rejected, forlorn and feel that we cannot achieve our goal, the Guru
will urge us at that moment, encourage us and help us on our way, and
so, gradually we will get back on our feet and proceed on the journey.
The Guru is like a cat carrying its kitten. Likewise, the guru takes
the disciple to a certain distance and when he reaches there, he will
understand the greater values of the inner life. Then he himself will
walk the path towards Self-realization.
Detachment plays an important part in
Self-realization, knowledge and liberation, because when we are
attached to the world we become bound by the world of cause and
effect. The Guru — in His way — attracts the ‘child’, the
aspirant, to Him, away from the world, onto the spiritual path. As
soon as the aspirant comes near the Guru, he will sense the spiritual
value in the teacher’s life. The spiritual vibration that emanates
from the teacher attracts the disciple. This attraction is not a form
of attachment. Attachment refers only to the material world.
When we are away from the source of Our
Being, the attachment to the Guru or that Divine Source will bring us
back home from where we have come. In one we find our existence; in
the other we lose our existence. This is the difference between
attachment to the Guru or to the world. So, attachment to the world
and attachment to the Guru are quite opposite. When we get attached to
the world we lose our identity, we lose ourselves, we lose our being.
The Guru will bring us back on our path, till we find our way back
home: when we discover ourselves.
Om Tat Sat Hari Om.
hope for the return of Christ, Jews await the Messiah, Moslems look for
the Imam Mahdi or Messiah, and Buddhists anticipate the Fifth (Maitreya)
Buddha. According to esoteric teachings all of these are different names
for the same individual: the World Teacher, whose personal name is
Maitreya (My-TRAY-uh). He is the leader of the Spiritual Hierarchy of
Masters (also known as the Great White Brotherhood, the Church
Invisible, the Spiritual Hierarchy). It is a group of very advanced
beings with high degrees of ' Krishna/Christ Consciousness' who guide
our evolution from behind the scenes. He has led the Hierarchy for the
past 2,600 years. His energies work through men and women of goodwill
everywhere, regardless of religious, philosophical, or political
affiliations.