Shri Yoga Vasishta Invocation,
The means of enlightenment Aum,
Hail to the eternal,
Salutation to that reality From whom all beings proceed,
By whom they are manifest,
Upon whom they depend,
And in whom they become extinct.
He is the knower,
The knowledge,
And all that is to be known.
He is the seer,
The act of seeing,
And all that is to be seen.
He is the actor,
The cause and the effect.
Therefore Salutation to he who is all knowledge himself.
Salutation to he who is supreme bliss itself,
From whom flow the dews of delight,
Both in heaven and earth,
And who is the life of all.
Namaste.
Welcome to this new series on Yoga Vasishta.
I'm very happy to be able to present this.
I'm so happy I can hardly speak.
Because this gives me great bliss and pleasure.
This Yoga Vasishta scripture is an extensive treasury of the entire teaching of Vedanta and especially Advaita.
Although it spans the range of Vedic knowledge,
Yet the conclusion keeps coming through and is repeated again and again so that anybody who hears it has to get it.
So on this auspicious occasion,
Beginning with the invocation,
We're going to go through chapter by chapter the significant lessons and themes of Yoga Vasishta.
So for this one,
For this episode,
I'm going to try to give some background and some general indication of the meaning and significance of the work.
It's really quite profound.
First of all,
Yoga Vasishta means Vasishta's yoga.
The name,
The yogi's name is Vasishta and the possessive case is made by lengthening the first vowel.
So Vasishta means Vasishta's yoga.
Just like Vasudev is Krishna's father.
So Krishna is known as Vasudev.
See lengthened the first vowel.
In the same way,
Vasishta's teaching is known as Vasishta,
Yoga Vasishta.
So now that we have that straight,
You're going to be hearing a lot of Sanskrit,
So get used to it.
This work is written as a supplement or actually as a crowning glory of the ancient Ramayana.
Ramayana,
Of course,
Is the history of Lord Rama and Rama in the story,
When he was just a young boy,
Went on a pilgrimage to all the holy places and when he returned,
The great sage Vishwamitra came and asked for his help to kill some Rakshasa demons who were spoiling his sacrifices.
Now at first,
Rama's father,
Dasaratha,
Was very,
Very reluctant to let him go.
But then there was a conversation involving the sage Vasishta.
And because of that conversation,
Dasaratha changed his mind.
But that conversation is only summarized in the original Ramayana.
So later on,
Valmiki,
The original author,
Expanded that conversation.
And the result of that is this Yoga Vasishta,
Which is also known as the Maha Ramayana.
So I hope that's all clear.
I'm just blissing out here because this is such a wonderful book.
I can't tell you,
For me,
It means a great deal because it has confirmed many of the realizations and insights I've had by means of sadhana and direct perception that were not covered in any other scripture.
I'll give you an example.
In the first part of Book Three,
There is a narration of what is called the Bhū-mandala.
The Bhū-mandala is basically the overall cosmology of our particular universe,
The Brahmāṇḍa.
So in another work,
Which I studied a long time ago,
The Bhagavat Purana or Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam,
This is explained as if it's reality,
Physical reality,
Without any qualification.
And of course,
It completely contradicts modern science.
So a lot of people,
I remember at the time when that book came out,
A lot of people left the temple.
A lot of disciples quit their guru because he was saying something that didn't make any sense to them.
And I thought,
Well,
This is strange.
Everything else that he's written has been in harmony with modern science.
So why this is suddenly so different?
And I said,
There must be a reason for it.
It must be the view of the universe seen from the subtle body,
Not the gross senses,
But the subtle senses of mind,
Intelligence,
And so on.
Pure consciousness.
So it turns out in the third book of Yoga-vāśiṣṭa,
There is a similar narration of the Bhū-mandala.
However,
In this narration,
The description is given,
It is a result of astral travel in the subtle body and the perception of subtle senses in what is seen is basically the fourth dimension.
So this totally vindicated my earlier insight,
Which was not supported in any scripture that I knew at the time.
And that's only one.
There are many,
Many,
Many things like this.
So one of the things I'd like to do in this video is to narrate some of the wonderful effects and qualifications of this scripture to motivate you to study it.
The effect of Yoga-vāśiṣṭa,
Bhīśvāmitra said,
Rāma,
Now it is appropriate that you have your mind properly purified from its doubts,
As it was done with Śukha,
The son of Vyāsā.
So the effect of this scripture,
Yoga-vāśiṣṭa,
Is to purify our minds from their doubts.
And the story is,
Śukha,
Śukhadeva,
Was the son of Vyāsā.
Vyāsā means divider.
And it was Vyāsā who divided the Vedas into four,
The Rīkṣāma,
Aṣṭarva,
And Yajurvedas.
So because of this,
He was in a position to have at his fingertips all Vedic knowledge,
And he passed that knowledge on to his son,
While his son was still very young.
So Śukhadeva attained enlightenment very early in life,
But on account of his tender age,
He had some doubts as to whether his insights were actually the ultimate.
First he went to his father,
Vyāsā,
And Vyāsā simply repeated the essence of what he had instructed him before.
So Śukhadeva was still doubtful in his mind whether this was really the ultimate knowledge.
So therefore,
Vyāsā said,
You go to Janaka.
Janaka,
King Janaka,
The father of Mother Sita,
Who later on became Rāma's wife.
Janaka had become enlightened in his harem.
It's described in the Kaivalya Navānīta scripture that he was in his harem enjoying with his beloveds,
And afterwards he heard the singing of the siddhas in the sky.
And because of the things that they sang,
He was thrown into a deep reverie,
And he went into isolation and simply thought about this,
Contemplated,
Meditated for weeks,
And as a result he attained complete enlightenment.
So Vyāsā told Śukhadeva,
You go to Janaka.
Janaka will set you straight.
So he did.
And after that,
Śukhadeva had no more doubts.
He went up on a high mountain and meditated for a long time,
And finally completely merged into the Supreme Brahman.
What else?
Vasishta says,
O sage,
I will perform what you have commanded me to do without fail.
For who,
Though mighty,
Can refuse to perform the requests of the good and wise?
I will destroy the mental darkness of Prince Rāma and others by the light of knowledge,
Just like we dispel the gloom of night by the light of a lamp.
So Rāma was feeling some doubts.
He was not sure at all about this world and his position in it.
He was not at all sure of the ultimate knowledge and deliverance from material existence.
He was having so much doubt that it was impossible for him to continue his normal duties.
So of course King Dasarāda was very concerned,
But Viswāmitra basically ordered Vasishta to give this knowledge to Rāma and to remove his doubts.
So it not only removes Rāma's doubts,
It removes our doubts as well.
And so you should really hear this scripture and read it for your own enlightenment.
So we have given,
And you can see down in the description of this video,
We have given this first book of the Yoga Vasishta for you to read.
This is like your homework,
Reading assignment,
Because otherwise it will be very hard for you to follow the discussion in this video and the subsequent episodes.
So please read that before you watch the next video.
And of course I'll remind you in the beginning of the next video,
Just in case you haven't.
So I want to leave you with one more śloka.
This scripture is easy to understand and ornamented with figures of speech.
It is a poem full of flavors and embellished with beautiful similes.
One who has slight knowledge of words and their meanings may be self-taught in it,
But he who does not understand the meanings well should learn from a pandit.
After hearing,
Thinking about,
And understanding this work,
One has no more need to practice austerities or meditation,
Repeating mantras or performing other rites.
A man requires nothing else for the attainment of his liberation.
By deep study of this work and its repeated perusal,
A man attains an uncommon scholarship and purification of his soul.
So this is the result of studying this great work,
And we invite you to continue with us in this great attempt to reach the essence of self-realization.
Aum tat sat,
Aum harihi Aum.
If you enjoy our work,
Please visit us at patreon.
Com slash esoteric teaching.
Thank you.
