Sunday Service Reading #34
From Rays of the One Light
How Should We Meet Our Tests?
(to long readings) (link to longest reading)
Last week we considered Satan's temptation of Jesus in the wilderness, after his baptism by John. We discussed the question, Does Satan exist?
All of us experience temptation of one kind or another in our lives—some of us, frequently; others, only occasionally. Whether temptation comes to us from our own subconscious, or from outside ourselves, is secondary to the fact that it does come, and that we must deal with it. More important, then, is the question, How to deal with it—in fact, how to deal with tests of any kind?
Martin Luther flung an ink pot at the devil, who had appeared to test him. A dark stain on the wall of Luther's cell is pointed out to tourists in support of this story. Unfortunately, our trials are not often so summarily dismissed. As a fellow monk once said to Swami Kriyananda, speaking of Satan, “If only I could get my hands on him!”
Jesus during his temptations in the wilderness overcame them, and thereby set an example for all time, by clinging the more determinedly to God. As Paramhansa Yogananda used to say, “Darkness cannot be driven out of a room with a stick. Once you turn on the light, however, the darkness will vanish as though it had never been.” Jesus manifested this principle. The Bible tells us therefore that at last, “The devil leaveth him, and, behold, angels came and ministered unto him.”
In the Bhagavad Gita the point is clarified further by the added explanation that there are three qualities in human nature: sattvic, or spiritually elevating; rajasic, or ego-activating; and tamasic, or spiritually darkening. It is this triune aspect of human nature that the third Chapter refers to with the words:
As fire is hidden by smoke, as a mirror is dulled by rust, and as an embryo is enclosed in the womb, so is the indwelling Self enveloped by desire.
Yogananda explained that each of these examples describes one of the qualities, or gunas. Sattva guna, that which elevates our consciousness, can be freed of any identity with ego by a little puff of meditation and right affirmation. Rajo guna, which embroils the ego in restless activity, can be worked off with a little more, and a little longer, effort. Tamo guna, embracing as it does such mental states as laziness and stupidity, can only be outgrown in time, since it inhibits even the desire for self-improvement.
The example Jesus gave us was intended more for those in whom sattva guna is predominant. But if you yourself find elements in your consciousness that resist even the effort to cling to God in prayer and meditation, don't despair. Patience, as it has been well said, is the fastest path to God. As long as your efforts take you steadfastly in the right direction, you will come out right in time. Remember Yogananda's words: “A saint is a sinner who never gave up.”
If, however, your nature impels you, even against your will, to move in the wrong direction—toward egoic desires, and away from God—strive at least to detach yourself mentally from your wrong actions, which are induced by habit. The time will come when their own stored-up energy will tire and diminish. At that time, if you have not contributed to that energy by your consenting will, you will find it possible at last to redirect your energies more constructively.
Thus, through holy Scripture, God has spoken to mankind.
VIDEO of Pranaba's Service on this Subject from 8-24-08
MP3 for Download (or online listening) of Pranaba's Service on this Subject from 8-24-08
VIDEO of Asha's Service on this Subject from 8-24-08
MP3 for Download (or online listening) of Asha's Service on this Subject from 8-24-08
VIDEO of Ananta's Service on this Subject from 8-22-10
MP3 for Download (or online listening) of Ananta's Service on this Subject from 8-22-10
MP3 for Download (or online listening) of Jaya's Service on this Subject from 8-24-08 (in Michigan)
MP3 for Download (or online listening) of Chaitanya's Service on this Subject from 8-22-10 (includes songs)
MP3 for Download (or online listening) of Bharat's Service on this Subject from 8-26-07
MP3 for Download (or online listening) of Asha's Service on this Subject from 8-26-07
MP3 for Download (or online listening) of Devi's Service on this Subject from 8-20-06
Long Readings from the 3 Volume Set:
Rays of the Same Light
#34 Does Satan Exist?
Bible
"How To Meet Spiritual Tests"
This passage is from the Gospel of St. Matthew, Chapter 4, Verses 1-11:
"Then was Jesus led up of the spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil.
"And when he had fasted forty days and forty nights, he was afterward an hungred.
"And when the tempter came to him, he said, If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread.
"But he answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.
"Then the devil taketh him up into the holy city, and setteth him on a pinnacle of the temple,
"And saith unto him, If thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down: for it is written, He shall give his angels charge concerning thee: and in their hands they shall bear thee up, lest at any time thou dash thy foot against a stone.
"Jesus said unto him, It is written again, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God.
"Again, the devil taketh him up into an exceeding high mountain, and sheweth him all the kingdoms of the world, and the glory of them;
"And saith unto him, All these things will I give thee, if thou wilt fall down and worship me.
"Then saith Jesus unto him, Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve.
"Then the devil leaveth him, and, behold, angels came and ministered unto him."
Commentary
We find in this account three major tests that face every soul before it is granted final union with God. This passage suggests also the basic attitudes necessary for passing those tests.
At whatever point one finds himself on his spiritual journey, a forewarning of the tests ahead, and of the attitudes necessary for overcoming them, will help him in his further development. "As the twig inclineth," goes the saying, "so doth the tree grow."
Many people ask, "Why should we be tested at all? Doesn't God already know our strengths and weaknesses?"
Indeed He does. He is omniscient! God's knowledge of us is far greater than our own. It is we, rather, who need to be convinced to our own depths of where our loyalty lies. For the heart's feeling must reach a point where its flow toward Infinity is free, and not trapped in countless eddies of desires. Only then can the soul merge at last in the cosmic sea.
The first test Jesus faced was of his realization of God as the only Reality. His body, after forty days of fasting in the wilderness, wanted to reassert its dependency on food for its existence. The test here was to see whether physical imperatives of any kind could draw Jesus back from his perception of himself as the eternal Spirit.
Everyone who would be deemed worthy of freedom in God must reach the point in his unfoldment where no material demand of any kind can affect his sense of inner completeness.
The second test Jesus faced was the temptation to focus back upon himself the vast realizations he had achieved. The temptation was to get him to say, in effect, not, "How wonderful is God!" but, "How wonderful it is that God has blessed me!"
Jesus, having realized God as the sole Reality, had reached the next cosmic imperative: to abandon himself totally to that Reality. It would have been a step down the mountain of Truth for him to call upon God's Power to sustain and protect his mere humanity. Who was there, indeed, in that state of Absolute Being, to demand favors of whom?
The perfect faith of an enlightened sage asks nothing for itself. For a master of Jesus' vast consciousness to demand anything, personally, would have been to reaffirm ego-consciousness. It would have meant denying his realization that man's ego is a delusion.
There is the story of a certain saint in India whose prayers had brought healing to many people. One day this saint himself fell ill. His disciples urged him, "Master, through prayer hundreds have been healed by you. Why not pray to God that He heal you, also?"
The suggestion seemed a good one to the saint. He prayed, therefore, for help. After some time, the Lord appeared in a vision. But it was not to heal him.
"Of all things!" He scolded. "Your consciousness is so vast, yet you ask help for your insignificant little body? Shame on you!" Instantly the saint, overwhelmed with remorse, cried, "Lord, do with this body only as Thou willst."
The third test Jesus faced was when Satan, finding him immune to the lures of matter and ego, sought to tempt him with the vastness of his divine realization. Jesus' consciousness, by deep inner communion, had expanded out into the whole universe. Delusion's suggestion was, "Why not worship creation and all it holds as your own vast reality, apart from God? See: Already you are the lord of all that is!"
That was Satan's last test. He had no greater temptation to offer.
Thus also, on much lower levels of consciousness, are we all tested to see if we will put the things of this world before our love for God. Jesus' answer was the right answer for all of us: Man must worship God alone, and serve only Him.
The divinely inspired answers which Jesus gave Satan offer deep lessons for all of us on how to meet the unceasing tests of delusion.
We should live always in the thought of God as our one reality. By abandoning ourselves to Him with deep faith, we soon find that unflinching faith is the only practical "insurance." By living ever more fully in the thought of God, we find ourselves increasingly sustained by Him. The more we are able to die to our little selves, the more we find ourselves alive at last, in Him!
Thus, through the Holy Bible, God has spoken to mankind.
Bhagavad Gita
"If God Exists, Why Can We Not See Him?"
This passage is from the Bhagavad Gita, the 3rd Chapter, the 38th Stanza:
"As fire is hidden by smoke, as a mirror is dulled by rust, and as an embryo is enclosed in the womb, so is the indwelling Self enveloped by desire."
Commentary
The soul, in itself, is ever perfect. Jesus had realized that perfection. Satanic delusion could not shake him from it — though it tried to do so, by stimulating his memories of past ego-limitation.
It would be interesting to ponder the question: What would have happened, had Jesus succumbed to the temptations of Satan in the wilderness?
He would not have fallen very far. No great sin — not, at least from a human point of view — would have been attached to his appeasing the body's hunger by turning stones into bread. Many would consider such a miracle not only justified, but — given the circumstances — mandatory.
After all, didn't he turn water into wine soon afterward, at a wedding? And wasn't that miracle performed in a much less justifiable cause? Surely it was his duty to adopt every reasonable measure to keep his body and soul together. Wouldn't the alternative have been the same as committing that greatest of all sins — suicide?
To many people, again, it would have seemed praiseworthy for Jesus to cast himself from the pinnacle of the temple. After all, it would have been a demonstration, once and for all, of the power and glory of the Lord. What more inspiring way to convince the whole world that God is supreme?
And while most believers would no doubt balk at the idea of Jesus accepting universal dominion as his reward for worshiping Satan, what if those conditions had been stated differently? Fewer might be shocked had the price been explained, for example, as joy in the created universe, rather than in the Creator. This, essentially, is all that Satan was suggesting.
Supposing Jesus had succumbed to any one of these temptations, or even to all of them. He would still have been a great soul, not a fallen angel — not yet fallen, at any rate.
The thought of ego would, nevertheless, have reentered his mind. Had he pursued that thought further still, it would by degrees have gained a firm hold on him.
Oh, he would no doubt still have been virtuous. His virtue, however, would have been human, not divine. It would not have consciously expressed God's infinite goodness. Jesus would no longer have been in a position to reply, when someone called him good, "There is none good but one, that is, God." (Matthew 19:17)
From human virtue to divine perfection: The step is not all that obvious, outwardly. It is on a soul level that the step is recognized as infinite. Human virtue is confining to the soul. At the same time, at least it uplifts one's consciousness in aspiration toward higher states.
This is why Krishna in this week's passage compares virtue to smoke which obscures a fire. A little puff from the breeze of divine awareness, fanned by deep concentration, is all it takes to banish its egoic aspects and to reveal behind it the blazing fire of divine consciousness.
Last week we discussed the three gunas, as they are called in Sanskrit — the universal qualities of Nature. In the present Gita passage we find these gunas described from the point of view of their power to obscure one's awareness of the indwelling Self.
Of the three gunas, Sattwa guna, the elevating, or clarifying, quality, offers the fewest impediments. Only if a devotee emphasizes the ego-basis of his virtues can they actually obstruct his development.
Should the smoke of delusion gather more thickly before the fire of his inner awareness, a more apt metaphor would become that of rust on a metal mirror, which prevents the mirror from reflecting images clearly. Such is the quality of raja guna, the ego-active principle.
Even in the case of raja guna, if a person sincerely wants to grow in wisdom he has only to apply himself diligently to spiritual practices, and gradually the rust of delusion will be rubbed away.
A person in whom raja guna is predominant must work at overcoming restlessness and developing calmness. He must redirect his energies from meaningless activities to worthwhile, serviceful actions; and from desire-inspired acquisition toward working for the welfare of all.
Much more difficult is the case of one in whom tama guna is predominant. Such a person is apathetic, lazy, and dull minded. He is perennially an effect of whatever happens to him in life; never a cause. The creative impulse in him lies dormant. Not much can be done to transform this quality.
The best hope for the tamasic person may lie in activating his desires. Prodded by desire, he may at least bestir himself to act with a measure of creativity.
Time is what dull natures mostly require, in order to change — the time to struggle out of the mental and spiritual mud through which nature, at present, obliges them to plod. Hence the Gita's comparison of tama guna to the embryo, which emerges from the darkness of the womb only after nine months are up.
Gradually, by the increased pain such a person experiences each time he slips back into the ooze of delusion, his energies become redirected, however sluggishly, toward raja guna, the next higher of the three qualities.
Although one guna or another tends to predominate in a person's nature, all men represent a mixture of the three. The dull person, for example, may show courage. The idealistic person may be hampered by laziness, restlessness, or fear. We must use our virtues to help us overcome our defects.
The Bhagavad Gita describes the war between the forces of light and darkness in human consciousness. The good "soldiers" are our soul-qualities. The bad "soldiers" are the qualities born of ego-consciousness and material desire. The forces for good are urged to gain entry through any gap that presents itself in the ego's defenses. If a person finds himself blessed with any sattwic tendencies at all, he should give them every encouragement.
It is with the subtler obstructions imposed by sattwa guna that the devotee is most likely to have to contend. The way to disperse the smoke of sattwic limitations from before the clear light of Spirit is to meditate ever more deeply, and to offer every thought, desire, and action up in loving service to the Lord.
The Lord's presence is hidden from human gaze by the power of delusion. In the lives of the great masters, however, it becomes translated, so to speak, into terms which the discriminating human being can understand, and emulate. This is why the Scriptures tell us to meditate also on the lives of great masters, and to draw God's grace, through them, into ourselves.
Thus, through the Bhagavad Gita, God has spoken to mankind.