Consciousness and Super-Consciousness:
In the preceding chapters I have tried to show, firstly, that
the number of the mystics that had the genuine experience, throughout the
course of history, has been extremely small, and that all those who claim
knowledge of the spirit are not really enlightened. Secondly, that the present
world is woefully deficient in the knowledge of the brain and that the learned,
in dealing with mind or the origin and nature of the universe, usually leave
the encephalon out of count, as if human intelligence exists incorporeally and
independently, and does not depend for its manifestation, quality and
performance on the activity of an organic instrument, beyond our scrutiny at
present. The result is that much of our knowledge, at the moment, is unilateral
and speculative, nescient of the nature of the 'Knower' itself. An intelligent
species with a brain that shows an altered perception of time, an easy
possibility, would frame an entirely different picture of the universe.
The aim of this writing is to draw attention to this serious
lacunae which keeps us in ignorance about our own selves. The position that I
am taking up is that the human mind, as we know it at present, is not a
constant, unalterable entity. It can change and with it the whole picture of
the universe, which we perceive with our senses. This is a bold statement to
make, and is not likely to be accepted for the simple reason that it undermines
the very foundation on which science is built, namely, the reality of the objective
world and the validity of the empirical observation conducted by the mind.
The issue boils down to this: if it is admitted that the human
mind is variable and that this variation can affect the very image of the
universe, and all the phenomena observed, it would clearly imply that the
cosmos is not, in reality, as we perceive, assess and measure it with our
intelligence, but only a creation of our mind liable to change in other
dimensions of the perceptive faculty. From this it would follow that the temporal
knowledge gathered by us is relative also and that what is accumulated in one
dimension of consciousness can prove incomplete, deceptive or erroneous in the
other.
"Our conception of the structure of the universe,"
says William de Sitter, "bears all the marks of a transitory structure.
Our theories are decidedly in a state of continuous, and just now very rapid
evolution. It is not possible to predict how long our present views and
interpretations will remain unaltered and how soon they will have to be
replaced by perhaps very different ones, based on new observational data and
new critical insight in their connection with other data."
Where from is this new critical insight to come except from a more evolved mind
and brain?
An affirmation of the same position comes from no less than an
authority than Max Planck. He says: "How do we discover the individual
laws of Physics, and what is their nature? It should be remarked, to begin
with, that we have no right to assume that any physical laws exist, or if they
have existed up to now, that they will continue to exist in a similar manner in
the future. It is perfectly conceivable that one fine day Nature should cause
an unexpected event to occur which would baffle us all; and if this were to
happen we would be powerless to make any objection, even if the result would be
that, in spite of our endeavors, we should fail to introduce order into the
resulting confusion. In such an event, the only course open to science would be
to declare itself bankrupt. For this reason, science is compelled to begin by
the general assumption that a general rule of law dominates throughout
Nature."
Once the position is accepted, the conclusion becomes
unavoidable that all the contexts of our day-to-day experience of the world--the
events which befall and the sights we see, the good and evil, noble and base,
beautiful and ugly we meet, or the ideas of God, Soul and the Hereafter we
entertain, all emerge from the unfathomable depths of our consciousness. This
means that all we come across during the pilgrimage of life is not an objective
reality, but a stupendous, realistic drama, presented by our own mind, and
another enigmatic stuff, we call material energy. The latter is becoming more
and more of a paradox and the more we try to reach its bottom the more
paradoxical and unpredictable it becomes. For all we know, it might be a twin
brother of our mind, both off-shoots of the same tree or a projected image of
mind itself. The corollary that follows this view of creation, forced on us by
the latest concepts in physics, is that since our brain is the junction-point,
where this incredible exchange between the mind and his brother takes place, it
is to the brain that we must look for a solution of the mystery.
The matter does not end there. What should now become obvious,
beyond doubt, is the fact that when contemplating a grand spectacle of nature,
during the day, or the shimmering firmament at night, the sense of admiration,
awe or wonder felt does not come from the magnificence, loveliness or the vast
extent of these external objects, inherent or dwelling in them, but from the
grandeur, beauty and the immensity residing in our own consciousness. In other
words, it is we who lend grandiosity, charm and vastness to an object, also horror,
cheerfulness, humor or sadness to what appears to us as a dreadful, merry,
ludicrous or tragic scene. What the world will look like to a mind, dead to
emotions and bereft of the sense of beauty and color, I leave it to the reader
to imagine.
This still does not complete the picture. The other conclusion
that follows is that all the over four billion human creatures on the earth,
the multi-millionaire and the pauper, the king and the beggar, the strongman
and the cripple, the philanthropist and the thief, the beauty-queen and the
leper, as long as they live, share the same incredible wonder in their
interior, as they share the sun, the moon, the stars, the air and water, the
precious bounties of nature that make life possible on earth.
It is a staggering position. But there is nothing incongruous in
what I say. The scriptures of all the current faiths point to the same
conclusion. Since the Soul is held to be immortal, incorporeal and divine, it
must always stay immaculate, above the corporeality and the blemishes of the
mortal frame. It would be blasphemous to say that there could be a sightless,
lecherous, leprous or penniless Soul. It is because of an impure frame of mind
that attaches more importance to the externals of religion than to its beatific
interior that we are denied access to the Glory that dwells in all of us,
irrespective of our station in life.
The main task of religion is to bring awareness of the divinity
within to every human being. In this unique treasure of heaven no one is
richer, stronger, superior or better than the other. This divine Splendor all
share alike, irrespective of their position, wealth, learning intelligence,
strength or looks. Like the brilliant orb of the day, it shines alike on the
rich and the poor, the wise and the fool. The glaring differences and
discrepancies, elegance and squalor, virtue and vice or excess and want we see
around, belong to the stage and the dress of clay and not to the divine actor,
ever undefiled, like a dancing beam of light. The aim of human life is to
explore this 'wonder' in every one of us whose pleasure-ground is the universe.
This is the Message which for the last over three thousand years
the exalted class of true mystics has brought to the world. This is the Message
which juvenile science, at first, cared not to heed like an impetuous youngster
refusing to listen to his more seasoned elders, ultimately in his declining age
to regret the rebellious thoughts of his early years. There are myriads who, in
their closing days, review with sorrow their reckless youth. Were there no
surprises and no innovations in the province of thought in store for the human
wit in the ages to come, she would die of boredom in a few centuries. It is
change that keeps her alive. The pendulum is now swinging in the other
direction to usher in a new era of thought in which the spirit and not matter,
the mystic and not the skeptic will dominate.
An indication of this change is provided by the thoughts
expressed by many eminent scientists of recent times. This is a sample of one
of them: "Yet I repeat once more," declares William James, "the
existence of mystical states absolutely overthrows the pretension of
non-mystical states to be the sole and ultimate dictators of what we may
believe. As a rule, mystical states merely add a super-sensuous meaning to the
ordinary outward data of consciousness. They are excitements, like the emotions
of love or ambition, gifts to our spirit by means of which facts, already
objectively before us fall into a new expressiveness and make a new connection
with our active life. They do not contradict these facts as such, or deny
anything that our senses have immediately seized. It is the rationalistic
critic rather who plays the part of denier in the controversy, and his denials
have no strength, for there can never be a state of facts to which new meaning
may not truthfully be added, provided the mind ascends to a more enveloping
point of view. It must always remain an open question whether mystical states
may not possibly be such superior points of view, windows through which the
mind looks out upon a more extensive and inclusive world.">
The present-day concepts of physics no longer contradict the
experience of the mystic but, on the other hand, find it more consistent with
the new insights into the nature of the physical world. This view has been
expressed by many of the leading physicists of our time. "A rainbow
described in the symbolism of physics," writes Eddington, "is a band
of ethereal vibrations arranged in systemic order to wave-lengths from about
.00004 centimeters to .000072 centimeters. From one point of view, we are
paltering with the truth whenever we admire the gorgeous bow of color, and
should strive to reduce our minds to such a state that we receive the same
impression from the rainbow as from a table of wave-lengths. But although that
is how the rainbow impresses itself on an impersonal spectroscope, we are not
giving the whole truth and significance of experience--if we suppress the
factors wherein we ourselves differ from the spectroscope. We cannot say that
the rainbow, as part of the world, was meant to convey the vivid effects of
color; but we can perhaps say that the human mind, as part of the world, was
meant to perceive it that way."
Another eminent physicist, James Jeans write, "In more
recent times, Bertrand Russell has expressed what is essentially the same
argument in the words: 'So long as we adhere to the conventional notions of
mind and matter, we are condemned to a view of perception which is miraculous.
We suppose that a physical process starts from a visible object, travels to the
eye, there changes into another physical process, causes yet another physical
process in the optic nerve, and finally produces some effect in the brain,
simultaneously with which we see the object from which the process started, the
seeing being something "mental," totally different in character from
the physical processes which precede and accompany it.' This view is so queer
that metaphysicians have invented all sorts of theories designed to substitute
something less incredible...
"Everything that we can directly observe from the physical
world happens inside our heads, and consists of mental events which form part
of the physical world. The development of this point of view will lead us to
the conclusion that the distinction between mind and matter is illusory. The
stuff of the world may be called physical or mental or both or neither as we
please; in fact the words serve no purpose."
"Even if the two entities which we have hitherto
described," continues Jeans, "as mind and matter are of the same
general nature, there remains the question as to which is the more fundamental
of the two. Is mind only a by-product of matter, as the materialists claimed?
Or is it, as Berkeley claimed, the creator and controller of matter?
"Before the latter alternative can be seriously considered,
some answer must be found to the problem of how objects can continue to exist
when they are not being perceived in any human mind. There must, as Berkeley
says, be 'some other mind in which they exist.' Some still wish to describe
this, with Berkeley, as the mind of God; others with Hegel as a universal or
Absolute mind in which all our individual minds are comprised. The new quantum
mechanics may perhaps give a hint, although nothing more than a hint, as to how
this can be."
"It seems, at least, conceivable," Jeans adds,
"That what is true of perceived objects may also be true of perceiving
minds; just as there are wave-pictures for light and electricity, so there may
be a corresponding picture for consciousness. When we view ourselves in space
and time, our consciousness is obviously the separate individuals of a
particle-picture, but when we pass beyond space and time, they may perhaps form
ingredients of a single continuous stream of life. As it is with light and
electricity, so it may be with life; the phenomena may be individuals carrying
on separate existences in space and time, while in the deeper reality beyond
space and time we may all be members of one body. In brief, modern physics is
not altogether antagonistic to an objective idealism like that of Hegel."
I know it will be hard for me to make myself understood, as I
tread on unmapped territory in the effort to bring into focus in the province of
religion and science both, a vital element that has been ignored so far,
namely, the center of life in the body, that is the brain. Since the organ is
indispensable for all our activity and even existence in the human form, it is
inconceivable that our consciousness can take a leap beyond its normal
periphery without affecting its substance in any way. There is no historical
precedent of a higher animal, say a horse, ever attaining the mental stature of
a human being, and co-mingling with other humans on a basis of equality. How
can it then be possible for a human being to consort with gods without some
kind of change in the brain? Those who long for self-awareness, clairvoyant
gifts, miraculous powers, communication with the spirit world, encounters with
masters, or adventures in the occult realm would do well to give second
thoughts to their cherished dream. The world did not produce another Christ or
Buddha, Vyasa or Socrates, Plato or Mohammed, Rumi or Shankaracharya, Francis
of Assisi or any other great mystic or master of the occult, because the
mystery of the part played by the brain in these accomplishments remains
unsolved so far. The aim of this writing is to make this hidden knowledge
accessible to humanity.
I am confident of my stand, as a psychological cathartic is
necessary to crown the revolution caused by science, and its off-spring,
technology, in human life and thought. Without this psychological climax,
mankind will continue to move in the accustomed groove and utilize the
resources of the earth and also of her fertile intellect only to enhance and
satisfy her physical needs as she is virtually doing now. Her most pressing
need at the moment is to become aware of the spiritual goal planned for her by
nature and the methods to attain it. Once this knowledge is gained and the
unmatched splendor of the crown destined for her realized, no efforts of
pharisees or saddusees, who thrive on the credulity and nativity of human
beings, can make the race deviate from the course.
A tidal wave of skepticism, doubt and disbelief, symbolized by
the materialist ideology, is sweeping over the earth, not because Satan and the
Anti-Christ have become dominant nor because it is Kali-Yuga of the Indian
mythology, but because the time for a further elaboration and enrichment of the
religious creeds and spiritual ideals of mankind has come. Like a cocoon, man
weaves a tough sheet of dogma around himself to lie inert and passive until
nature tears it open with a revolution to allow him freedom. But he soon starts
to weave it afresh in the newly introduced pattern of life or thought to entomb
himself once again. This is true not only of religion but also of political
orders, social customs, educational systems, even scientific institutions and
other long-standing ideas and beliefs. It is easier, sometimes, to bore a
tunnel through a mountain than to break open the shell which the conservative
element in human nature builds around itself.
To believe that the universe consists of only those elements and
forces that are perceptible to our senses or detected by our instruments is to
belie the latest assessments of science. The very size and the extent of the
Universe, the new formations discovered in the sky and the problems created by
them, the marvels of the ultra-microscopic world and the possibility of even
superior types of life in other parts of the Cosmos provide more than
sufficient material to make it clear that the creation round us is too complex,
too vast and too full of unsolved riddles to make us complacent about the fact
that what our senses perceive or minds apprehend is all that exists in it. Such
an attitude of mind at this stage of our knowledge can only emanate from one
not in touch with the progress of today.
Written by: Gopi Krishna
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