Equanimity~Samatvam


Emerson and Chapter 10 of Gita – Vibhuti Yoga
January 23, 2009, 4:36 pm
Filed under: Adult Scripture Class, Arsha Vedanta Center | Tags: , , ,

As I slowly pierce through Emerson’s seminal piece called ‘Nature’, a pattern emerges. A grand scheme of Dharma and Isvara as non separate from each other – interpenetrating and inseparable. The vision of Chapter 10 of the Gita, which outlines the Vibhutis (Glories ) of the Lord, is equally charged with the grandeur of nature as presented to us. Wherever you see Nature in her resplendent form,  the patient, glorious  Ganga, the soaring peaks of the Himalayas, the sounds of saints chanting, the ever guiding Polestar, Dhruva, you can capture that Unity, that Brahman as the substratum of all.

Bhagavad Gita – Chapter 10 -Verse 8:

ahaḿ sarvasya prabhavo;  mattaḥ sarvaḿ pravartate;   iti matvā bhajante māḿ; budhā bhāva-samanvitāḥ

TRANSLATION: I am the source of all spiritual and material worlds. Everything emanates from Me. The wise who perfectly know this engage in My devotional service and worship Me with all their hearts.

In Emerson’s words:

“All things are moral; and in their boundless changes have an unceasing reference to spiritual nature. …This ethical character so penetrates the bone and marrow of nature, as to seem the end for which it was made. Nothing in Nature is exhausted in its first use….. In God every end is converted into a new means. … Every natural process is a version of a moral sentence.”

“All the endless variety of things make an identical impression…..A leaf, a drop, a crystal, a moment of time, is related to the whole, and partakes of the perfection of the whole. Each particle is a microcosm, and faithfully renders the likeness of the world……. Thus architecture is ‘frozen music’….A church ‘petrified religion’…..The law of harmonic sounds reappears in the harmonic colors… So intimate is this Unity, that, it is easily seen, it lies under the undermost garment of Nature, and betrays its source in Universal Spirit.

“The central Unity is still more conspicuous in actions….A right action seems to fill the eye, and to be related to all nature. The wise man, in doing one thing he does rightly, he sees the likeness of all which is done rightly.”

Love

Rathi


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