The Process of Yoga : 1.3. Swami Krishnananda

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Tuesday, August 25, 2020. 2:20.. AM.
Chapter 1: The Spirit of Life -3.
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1.
But, we are not enquiring into the nature of the form of life led or being lived by the beings in this world. We are questioning into the nature of life as such, and not into the nature of the way in which the life is lived. For example, we may put a question in regard to the nature of diet. The diet of one person need not be the same as the diet of another person. Perhaps we have as many kinds of diet as there are people in this world.

But the question of diet is a scientific one. It is a philosophical question in the sense that it goes to the depth of the very nature of the question of diet itself. While the form of the diet or the food that we take may differ in different cases or instances, the purpose of the intake of diet, the scientific basis of the intake of diet, and the principle involved in dietetic discipline may not vary from person to person.

The purpose of the intake of diet seems to be the same everywhere in creation. Whether it is the diet taken by a plant or the grub swallowed by a bird, the food taken by an animal or the lunch enjoyed by a human being – whatever be the form of the diet, the purpose behind it does not seem to be essentially different. There appears to be a basic common factor as a scientific principle underlying the intake of diet. Likewise, we may say that there appears to be a scientific, logical grounding of process behind the manner in which we live in the world, though we all live differently from the point of view of our variegated individuality.

2.
How we live is one question, but why we live is another question. Why we should live at all seems to be behind the question of how we live in this world. Just as there is a difference between civilization and culture, there is a difference between the how and the why of life. It is easy to know how we live because that is our civilization in conformity with our national tradition, etc. We live in different ways according to our culture, tradition, religious background, and the faiths that we entertain in our minds in accordance with the social setup of our circumstance.

In this manner we live – economically, politically, socially, individually, communally, etc. But why do we live? What is the purpose of our living? What does it matter to us if we do not live at all? Who is going to be the loser if we do not exist? These are more difficult questions to answer. It is the spirit of life into which we enter when we put the question: “Why are we living at all?”

3.
While the form of life is given to us by the answer to the question of how we live, the spirit of life comes out when we try to answer the question of why we live at all.

We cannot easily answer this question: “Why do we live?” We will close our eyes and scratch our heads, but an answer will not come. “I will live. I want to live.” That is all. Everything enters into this quintessence of our need for living, the necessity of life. When everything is taken away from us, we ask for life. “Save my life. You can take away everything else.”

When political catastrophes and confusion take place in a rebellious atmosphere, people lose all their property. Sometimes they even lose their spouse and children, but they would not mind if all is lost, if only life is saved. They flee from country to country, from hot atmospheres to cooler ones, from difficult conditions to easier ones because, finally, life is a satisfactory answer to its own question. Life’s question is answered by life itself. It cannot be answered by anyone else. We cannot answer the question of life through instruments, through association with properties, possessions, etc. The value of our life is that life itself.

The value of our existence in this world does not depend upon the wealth that we possess, the associations that we have in society, the status that we occupy, or any such thing whatsoever. We have a value to ourselves. That is why we want to be saved, finally. Capital punishment is supposed to be the highest of punishments because it is the wiping of that which we regard as the dearest and the nearest to us. Even lifelong imprisonment is not regarded as so bad as capital punishment, because it is the wiping out of our existence. Our life itself is cut off; and what could be worse than that? Nothing is dearer than life.

To be continued ...

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