Tag: material world

Creation of the Material Dimension

All energies emanate from the Supreme Person and everything animate and inanimate is owned and controlled by Him. Three energies compose all that exists within the material and spiritual dimensions. Material scientists refer to two of these energies: matter (the material dimension or the inferior energy of the Lord) and anti-matter (the spiritual dimension or the superior energy of the Lord). The third energy is the eternal living being, referred to as marginal energy, because the living being can exist within the material dimension encased in a material body or in the spiritual dimension in his original eternal form composed completely of spiritual energy.

The building blocks of all gross material objects within the material dimension consist of singular or combinations of five elements: earth, water, fire, air, and ether or space. Mind, intelligence, and false ego are subtle material elements or energies that also cover the embodied living being. All animate material objects within the material dimension are animated by the eternal living being within.

Other examples of subtle material energies: the illusory energy, desire, attachment, lust, the four material defects (imperfect senses, propensity to cheat, propensity to be illusioned, making mistakes), etc., further cover the living being within the material dimension.

Maha Vishnu and the billions of massive universes coming from His body.

The material dimension of innumerable planets within innumerable universes regularly undergoes creation and then dissolution. At dissolution, the entire energy composing the material dimension is withdrawn within the Supreme Person, to be released when creation again takes place. The entire material dimension is an insignificant emanation of the Lord’s inferior energy and is controlled and destroyed by His energy called kala or time.

The purpose for creation of the material dimension is to allow freedom of choice to the eternal living being to live apart from God outside of His kingdom if he so desires. Each living being within the spiritual dimension experiences full happiness in his relationship with the Supreme Person and in his relationships with all other fellow living beings there. How is it possible that living beings in the perfection of existence could possibly desire something else?

Freedom to love and serve God is not forced upon the living being, nor is that freedom to choose an imperfection. Actual loving service and devotion for the Supreme Lord must be completely free from any doubt or tinge of indecision. If one feels the slightest desire to not serve, then immediately that desire is fulfilled by birth and incarceration in the prison of the material dimension. Now, I can falsely “do what I want.”

It is like a child playing nicely in a group of other kids who then wants to do something else and will disrupt the whole group to try to get his way. So, he leaves to go do his thing, and he realizes it is not so fun without everyone else. The material dimension is set up so that the living being realizes that he has left his actual happiness and then wants to return.

In this material dimension, the envious living being can attempt to be the controller, the owner, the enjoyer, competing with all other beings who want to take God’s position of being the Supreme Enjoyer, the Supreme Controller, the Supreme Protector, the Supreme Lover, the Supreme Master, etc.

The wayward and rebellious living beings have unlimited desires to try to fulfill and must struggle so hard just to maintain the material body, family, friends, occupation, security, and well-being. At the same time, weighed down by karmic reaction, suffering caused by other living beings, natural disturbances, mental dilemmas, and so many other problems, one’s body ages as one faces death on the horizon. Once again, eternal time exacts its toll.

I am an eternal living being who has freely made the sad decision to leave behind all that is good, all that is eternal, all that is fulfilling, and all that is perfect. My rehabilitation takes place in the dimension created for that purpose, the perfectly created illusory, temporary, dark dungeon of material existence with no escape possible until I turn to my Supreme Friend and ask for release.

Within the material dimension, I am covered by ignorance that blocks any recollection of my eternal existence, ignorance that makes me believe I can find happiness here, ignorance that masks the suffering of temporary life in a temporary body, ignorance that I am the cause of all my suffering, ignorance that cheats me from understanding why the material dimension exists, and ignorance that hides all other truth from me. I have amnesia caused by ignorance and I do not even know who I am or why I am here.

There are 14 Planets in each universe

I am perpetually trapped within this place of repeated birth and death and may believe I have a “good” life, but death is always lurking, waiting to take it all away. Anxiety shadows me throughout my travels, from the upper planetary systems to the lower, as I rotate on the wheel of birth and death, always interrupting my quest for pleasure and peace.

As I grow weary of repeated failures life after life, if I am fortunate, I come in contact with transcendental sound and knowledge which is the lifeline to pull me from the ocean of material suffering. My intelligence becomes purified, and I realize that I am an eternal person imprisoned in a temporary decaying dimension of time, of birth, disease, old age, and death.

The transcendental process of Sadhana Bhakti becomes my parole from this dark collection of material universes and my complete freedom comes with the perfection of Bhakti Yoga.


See more:

https://sif.yoga/yoga-wisdom

https://www.youtube.com/c/ScienceofIdentityFoundation

About Author:

Sahadeva Das is an initiated disciple of Jagad Guru Siddhaswarupananda Paramahamsa who comes in a long line of bona fide yoga spiritual masters. Sahadeva Das considers it his great fortune in life to have heard and learned from a self-realized soul and is humbly attempting to pass on what he has received.  

Living in the Material World  

I am a spiritual person living in this material universe on planet earth. Everything that I touch, see, hear, smell, think, and otherwise experience here is made of material energy. The Vedic yoga literature describes this material energy as consisting of five basic gross elements: earth, water, fire, air, and ether, or space, and three subtle elements: mind, intelligence, and false ego. I am not made of material energy, but my body is. It is a combination of the gross and subtle elements. 

Scientists have identified many different atomic elements and particles in their attempts to explain the universe, but they are still scratching the surface in developing a full understanding of material energy. The general view of the scientific community is that matter is the only energy that exists. However, the Vedic understanding is that there is another energy, the energy of life, and that is the life-force in all bodies that animates and brings life to matter. Beyond the universe of matter is the universe made of spiritual energy. I am a spiritual being who belongs in that spiritual universe. 

What do I experience here in the material world? I am an eternal spiritual being, but I experience death. I am full of knowledge, but I experience ignorance. I am joyful by nature, but I suffer misery. I crave loving relationships and friendship, but they always end in sadness. I am frustrated in so many ways. 

One major example of this frustration is time, which measures out my life in this body, and ultimately destroys it, along with everything in the material world. Even the most apparently strong constructions are broken down by time. An enormous ocean-going liner or a powerful locomotive last only thirty something years before they must be scrapped. Time is a mysterious thing. When I need more time, it seems to speed up, when I am bored or waiting in anticipation it seems to slow down. Time frustrates and then ends all my experiences. 

I remember sitting in a classroom when I was 10, just looking at my classmates and wondering what we all were. I was looking at their bodies but feeling that there was more to the person than that. Earlier in my life, my stepsister had drowned in the community pool, and we went to the funeral home to see her body in the casket. When I touched her body, it was cold. I knew she was gone, and that the body lying there was not her. When she was present in her body it was attractive, but her dead body was not. What had made it attractive in the past was her presence as a living being, animating her body.  It is the presence of a living being that animates the bodies of all creatures in this world. 

According to the Vedas this animating force, the living being, is eternal, never dying. 

Only the material body of the indestructible, immeasurable, and eternal living entity is subject to destruction; therefore, fight, O descendant of Bharata.  

Bhagavad-Gita 2:18  

For the soul there is never birth nor death. Nor, having once been, does he ever cease to be. He is unborn, eternal, ever-existing, undying, and primeval. He is not slain when the body is slain.  

Bhagavad-Gita 2:20

Know that which pervades the entire body is indestructible. No one is able to destroy the imperishable soul.  

Bhagavad-Gita 2:17

Although I am eternal, I am covered by illusion that blocks any recollection of my eternal existence. This illusion also makes me believe I am this body, and that I can find happiness by making my body happy. This illusion masks the suffering of life in a temporary body; it cheats me into imagining the material world exists for my pleasure. Like a master magician, an illusionist, it hides the truth from me. I have amnesia and do not even know who I am or why I am here. 

But I can come out from under the darkness of illusion. Enlightenment is attainable. I can come to know and experience my true, eternal nature, even while living within a material body in the material world. I can come to realize that the temporary pleasures of the body are not truly fulfilling. And I can begin to inquire about the higher purpose of my existence. 

If I understand that I am only temporarily in this body, then I will see that attaining wealth, fame, high position, friendships, and wonderful family do not give me any lasting happiness or fulfillment. When my time runs out, I must leave everything material behind. But there is a world beyond the decaying world of time, birth, disease, old age, and death. My essence is spiritual, and my ultimate eternal home is in the world of spiritual energy. 

How do I travel there? There is a process described in the Vedas as being both the easiest and the most sublime method to transcend this world of matter.  It is the process of meditation on transcendental sound, mantra, and this allows me to enter that spiritual world even while still in a physical body. 

 

Source: – 

www.facebook/TheScienceofIdentityFoundation 

www.youtube.com/c/ScienceofIdentityFoundation

www.soundcloud.com/scienceofidentityfoundation

About Author: 

Sahadeva das is an initiated disciple of Jagad Guru Siddhaswarupananda Paramahamsa who comes in a long line of bona fide yoga spiritual masters. Sahadeva das considers it his great fortune in life to have heard and learned from a self-realized soul and is humbly attempting to pass on what he has received.