The Primary Principle

All living beings emanated originally from water; humans have bodies built out of food based ultimately on plants sustained by water. Speech is the special acquisition of human beings and the earliest use man made of this talent to utter the glory of God and pray for His grace is the RK of the Rig Veda. The RK was rendered enchanting because it attributed Names to God while paying homage to the Supreme. All such names are subsumed and treasured in the sound OM the audible but not visible sign and symbol.

OM indicates the Omniself, the Param Atman, the Cosmic and Trans-Cosmic Consciousness. Every moment, in every cell, in every atom, the OM resounds, reverberates and activates. OM energises, sustains and fills the Universe. "OM ithi ekaaksharam Brahma" (The one letter OM, the indestructible is Brahma) assert the Upanishads. The Vedas assure us "Ayam Atma Brahma" (This Atma--Soul--is Brahma). The sages were aware that the Atma is OM, even when they defined OM as Brahma. In fact all the three expressions indicate the one and only Entity.

Every one has to achieve the awareness of this Atma in him. Man passes through four phases of life, each single day. He is awake (jagrath), he dreams (svapna), he sleeps (sushupthi) and he reaches the phase beyond the three (thuriya). When awake, the person is involved incessantly with the objective world, through the senses. The eyes are able to distinguish colors; the ears welcome good and bad sounds; the tongue tastes and rejects; the nose gathers information about fragrant and forbidding smells. The basic attributes of the five fundamental elements-ether, wind, fire, water and earth--are apprehended by the five senses as sound, touch, form, taste and smell in that order. So the individual is concerned not only with itself but with all the Cosmos around. Therefore the waking stage is named Viswa (global). The soul of man then assumes an omnipresent form, reminiscent of Vishnu, of the Director of sensual activities, the Hrishikesa.

During the phase of dreams, man turns into himself. The senses of perception and action lie dormant. The individual is busy with his memory and the plans and projects the mind has played with. People sleeping adjacent to one another dream differently according to each one's urges and mental mysteries. The dream has validity for the dreamer; it absorbs light from the deeper levels of consciousness; it reveals the latent through inner luminosity. So, the stage is named thaijasa, partaking the nature of Thejas (shining).

During the phase of Sushupthi (deep sleep), the senses, the faculty of reason and the mind are all out of action, and are subsumed in the Self. The person is unaware during sleep of himself or others but he is able to recall every detail as soon as he wakes. He is, during sleep, merged in consciousness, pure and simple. So the phase is named Prajna.

The fourth stage is thuriya, where the person is aware of the Divinity that is his nature. He attains merger with the Absolute or Samadhi.

The sound, OM, known as pranava has also four parts or stages. The sound 'A' (as in 'manna') is a basic sound in speech and is universally utilized. It is parallel to the Viswa or Wakeful phase of man's daily life. The sound 'U' (as in 'input') is indicative of the breathing process (inhaling and exhaling), which ensures thejas (the glow of Vitality). The breath persists in the dream stage and so it corresponds to the dreaming phase. Then we have in OM the 'M' sound (as in 'am'), which closes all externalizing and internalizing outlets and inlets of consciousness and enables man to be alone with his Reality, prajna or Brahma. So it symbolizes the condition during sushupthi and can be defined as the prajna phase. The silence into which the OM tapers is the consummation, the thuriya phase, when the veil of ignorance, that has prevented the ecstasy of Brahman from illumining the awareness, is removed and one is conscious of the mergence.

The Atma is associated with speech, breath and mind in the body, though it remains unaffected. It is a spark of the all-comprehensive Brahman, the all-pervasive OM, the ever-present 'is' (Asthi). Brahman is defined as Sath (Being), Chith (Awareness) and Ananda (Bliss). When it is said that education must result in the manifestation of the Divinity already in man, it is the awareness of the Atma that is indicated as the goal.

When the sage Narada approached Sanatkumara for spiritual guidance, he was asked by the Guru to relate what he had learnt up to that moment. The credentials had to be laid bare. Narada reeled off a long list of subjects and texts that he had mastered. He was happy that Sanatkumara was listening to him with attentions. When he finished, Sanatkumara described the entire list as mere 'names' of things and ideas, names devoid of substance.

He told Narada, "Speech is more meaningful and weighty than name, the Mind from which speech springs is more significant than Speech; the Will is more fundamental than the mind; Consciousness is the prompter of the Will; both these depend on Vital Energy which is derived from Food. Food is grown on earth with the help of water; the element Water is a derivative of Fire which itself is a byproduct of Air. And Air is a manifestation of Space, the first projection of the Will latent in Brahman. Therefore, unless you know Brahman, your knowledge cannot be total and completely satisfying." This teaching of Sanatkumara reveals that the Cosmos is Brahman, in and through and that OM is activating as the Cosmic Sound. Matter is saturated with the Divine, every molecule of it. Though Matter is the product of Becoming, it is still a genuine fragment of the Being that has become matter. Hence, it is that we are able to see it, deal with it and recognize it as a whirl of energy. Energy, latent or patent, greater or less, exists in all things. It is the Divine characteristic in them.

Contemplation on the One and on its symbol OM resounding in us with every breath and reminding us of the One which persists in us during daily wakefulness, dream and sleep, can ensure the awareness of the Sath-Chith-Ananda we really are.