What is Yoga Vasistha?
Who was Vasistha?
Yoga Vasistha in Brief
Chapter 1: Vairagya (Dispassion)
Chapter 2: Mumukshuvayah (Longing for Liberation)
Chapter 3: Utpatti (Creation)
Chapter 4: Sthiti (Existence)
Chapter 5: Upashama (Dissolution)
Chapter 6: Nirvana (Liberation)
The Concepts or Truths in Yoga Vasistha
1. The Universe is a mirage.
According to Yoga Vasistha, this world is not real, it does not exist, it is a mirage or an illusion.
Surprisingly, modern physics seems to agree with this truth. According to a recent study, there is a complete balance between matter and antimatter in the Universe. They should have cancelled out each other, which means the world should not exist.
So how do living beings function and breathe in this world?
In answer to Lord Rama’s question, “Where does the world go during dissolution?” Rishi Vasistha says, “Water in the mirage does not come into being and go out of existence, even so, this world does not come out of the absolute, nor does it go anywhere. The creation of the world had no cause and therefore it has no beginning. It does not exist even now, so how can it reach destruction?”
2. The world is the creation of the mind:
Yoga Vasistha elaborates on the power of one’s mind to create their world. He says, “The mind alone is the creator of the world, the mind alone is the supreme person. What is done by the mind is action, and what is done by the body is not action. Whatever appears in one’s consciousness, that seems to come into being, gets established and even bears fruit.”
Simply put, Karma is created through thoughts and not actions of the body.
The truth is, you create your life. Your life events like work, relationships, status, etc., have been created in your thoughts maybe as far back as 5 years ago or 5 days ago. Your life and your mind have a direct connection that is sometimes visible and sometimes vague.
You have been creating your life through your thoughts for several lifetimes, and each one impacts the other in different ways.
3. Time is Relative:
Remember Einstein’s theory of relativity? Yoga Vasistha talks about this concept since ancient times. It argues that time is relative to the person observing it. Events occurring at a particular time for one observer may appear as occurring at a different time for another observer.
Sage Vasistha explains this concept to Lord Rama in a beautiful way through a story.
In this story, a queen travels through her previous lifetimes with the help of the Goddess of knowledge, Saraswati.
The Goddess then tells the queen that her husband had died just eight days ago in his previous life. This puzzles the queen. She asks the Goddess as to how this is possible since they had been married for a long time.
Goddess Saraswati replies, “Just as the world and its creation are mere appearances, a moment, and an epoch are also not real. They are imaginary. For a lover, a single night without his beloved seems like an epoch. We, however, dream of birth, death and relationships happening in a very short time. The jiva or soul too, thinks of experienced and non-experienced objects in the twinkling of the eye. So we can say that the truth about time is that it is relative.
4. There is life outside of Earth:
How did the great sage know that extraterrestrial life exists? This is something that puzzles scientists even now!
In Yoga Vasistha, Sage Vasistha tells Lord Rama, “Rama, just as in this universe there are countless beings of different species, in other universes, too, there are various beings with bodies suitable for those universes.”
Rishi Vasistha knew that alien life existed on different celestial bodies. Life forms that were vastly different from life on Earth.
5. The mind is a dead entity:
The mind is referred to by Rishi Vasistha, as an entity that is forever dead. He says, “The mind has no self, no body, no support and no form. Yet, by it, everything in the world is consumed. This is the greatest mystery of life. To say that one can be hurt by the mind which is dumb, blind, and inert is like saying one can be roasted by the light of a full moon.”
Only with the power of the life force within the body can the mind function. Once the body is dead the mind stops functioning. With no form, the mind has no support or existence and is as good as dead.
6. Knowledge of the mind makes you fearless:
7. Nothing happens because of fate:
Rishi Vasistha was against the concept of fatalism. One should not say that anything in life happens because of fate. To quote Sage Vasistha, “Fate has come to be regarded as the truth by merely repeatedly regarding it as true. In this world, except for a corpse, everything else is active. Thus an action results in an appropriate result. If god is the ordainer of everything in this world then what is the meaning of any action?”
He further says, “If someone says that fate is the cause of his action, then he is brainless, and the goddess of fortune abandons him.”
Conclusion:
Lord Rama met Rishi Vasistha when he was in great misery. Together, they have created a treasure that can guide anyone dealing with big questions like why we exist and why we suffer. We all think about these questions sometimes but often avoid them because we worry we’ll never get answers. In Yoga Vasistha, you can find those answers, although they might challenge what you believe and leave you feeling confused, as you realise what you thought was true, isn’t so.
Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar on Yoga Vasistha
“Yoga Vasistha is a very big thing. Yoga Vasistha needs to be read again and again, reading it once won’t work. If you read it every two to three years, something altogether different will come up. Read and ponder on it. You will gain new understandings.”
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