Commentary on Paramahansa Nityananda's Chidakasha Gita–Number 14
by Swami Nirmalananda Giri

Chidakasha Gita:
Verses 52-55

52. It is not the body that exists or disappears. He is the One who is the supreme doer. It is the breath that man brings here at birth and it is the breath that man takes with him when he leaves this world. Property and fame are here only. There, everything is one. Duality exists here only. On the other side, there is no duality. An avadhuta is the greatest of men. Yogis and sannyasis want some siddhi, i.e., power acquired through yoga or tapas. An avadhuta does not want anything.

• It is not the body that exists nor disappears.

Considering what follows this sentence, it seems reasonable that this is a statement about Brahman–and therefore the Self as well. The Self is not the body that temporarily appears at birth and and then disappears at death. Nor is Brahman the relative levels of existence that emerge the onset of the Day of Brahma and dissolve at the onset of the Night of Brahma.

“There is day, also, and night in the universe: the wise know this, declaring the day of Brahma a thousand ages in span and the night a thousand ages.

“Day dawns, and all those lives that lay hidden asleep come forth and show themselves, mortally manifest: night falls, and all are dissolved into the sleeping germ of life.

“Thus they are seen, O Prince, and appear unceasingly, dissolving with the dark, and with day returning back to the new birth, new death: all helpless. They do what they must.

“But behind the manifest and the unmanifest, there is another Existence, which is eternal and changeless. This is not dissolved in the general cosmic dissolution. It has been called the unmanifest, the imperishable.

“To reach It is said to be the greatest of all achievements. It is my highest state of being. Those who reach It are not reborn” (Bhagavad Gita 8:17-21).

• He is the One who is the supreme doer.

In the universe it is Brahman That is the Supreme Doer; on the level of the individual life it is the Self that is the sole doer. But we must understand that we are only speaking in a relative manner. Since all relative existence is an illusion, how can Brahman or the Self act? They do not ACT–they DREAM. So it can also be said that Brahman and the Self absolutely “do” nothing–ever. And at the same time they are the “supreme doers.” Here is teaching of the Gita on this:

“Knowing It [the Self] birthless, knowing It deathless, knowing It endless, for ever unchanging, dream not you do the deed of the killer, dream not the power is yours to command it” (Bhagavad Gita 2:21),

“Do not say: ‘God gave us this delusion.’ You dream you are the doer, you dream that action is done, you dream that action bears fruit. It is your ignorance, it is the world’s delusion that gives you these dreams.

“The Lord is everywhere and always perfect: what does He care for man’s sin or the righteousness of man? The Atman is the light: the light is covered by darkness: this darkness is delusion: that is why we dream”(Bhagavad Gita 5:14, 15).

• It is the breath that man brings here at birth and it is the breath that man takes with him when he leaves this world.

In the Chidakasha Gita Nityananda has a great deal to say about the breath as the very basis for our existence–and even more, as the basis for our sadhana. Since the time for commentary will be when we come to them (except for aphorism 45–already commented on), I will only quote them to give you an idea.

“Without the control of breath (pranayama), a man cannot be a yogi” (45).

“The seat of breath is the truth. It is the internal space (chidakasha). In the eternal space is the tower of eternal bliss. This tower is the seat of eternal peace” (120).

“Prana [breath] is the ONE. Prana is the ONE in all. Prana is existence. This is known only to those who have practiced yoga” (121).

“When you were born, you were born with breath. When you leave this world, you leave breath only” (163).

“By breath everything is accomplished” (210).

“The origin of breath is true ananda.…The house of breath is the dwelling of kundalini. This is the house of Shiva. This is our real happy home of peace. This is the home of sattwa guna. One who lives in this house does not care for honor and dishonor. This is the home of a yogi who has renounced everything. This is the home of those who have the power of subtle discrimination. This is the home of kundalini. This home is the heart home” (231)

“Those who do not concentrate on breath have no aim, no state, no intelligence and no fulfillment. So concentrate and think. Concentrate on the indrawing and outgoing breath” (232).

The idea of this aphorism is that breath is the power of birth and death, the determiner of all that occurs to us in this world.

• Property and fame are here only.

Possessions and notoriety exist only in this world–and are tenuous even here. Those who are wealthy in this life may be impoverished in the next life, and those who are famous and influential may in the next life may be of no consequence whatsoever and even despised. It is all as unreal as the rest of the dream.

• There, everything is one. Duality exists here only. On the other side, there is no duality.

This being so, there is no chance of either heaven or houris for the Mediterranean religions! It is God or nothing. That is why nearly everyone chooses to keep coming back and suffering here–they have an allergy to God.

• An avadhuta is the greatest of men. Yogis and sannyasis want some siddhi, i.e., power acquired through yoga or tapas. An avadhuta does not want anything.

There are many ideas about what makes someone an avadhuta. Some think Nityananda was an avadhuta just because he did not wear clothes. All kinds of eccentricities are listed as the traits of the avadhutas, but Nityananda–a real avadhuta–give us a single trait: total desirelessness. That is because desire carries a great deal of baggage along with it, not the least being the ego and an entrenched sense of duality. If you have a text of the Bhagavad Gita in your computer, do a search for the words “desire,” “desires,” and “desireless”–you will be amazed at the number of times they occur. Desire and its adjuncts are the major subject of the Gita–and the authentic upanishads, too.

“The knowledge even of the wise ones is obscured by this eternal enemy, having the form of desire, which is insatiable fire.

“The senses, the mind and the intellect are said to be its abode; with these it confuses [deludes] the embodied one, obscuring [or covering] his knowledge.

“Therefore, restraining the senses first, kill this evil thing which destroys knowledge and discrimination [intelligent understanding]” (Bhagavad Gita 3:39-41).

That is how to become an avadhuta.

53. When Sat unites with Chit, Ananda is the result. This Ananda is Paramananda, Sri Satchidananda. Paramananda is experienced in the head. In the head is the brahmanadi. Brahmananda is Paramananda. The jiva enjoys this bliss when he is one with Paramatman. This bliss is also called Shivananda. Paramananda is experienced in the head. This state is eternal joy. This state is jivanmukti.

• When Sat unites with Chit, Ananda is the result. This Ananda is Paramananda, Sri Satchidananda.

Satchidananda–Existence-Knowledge-Bliss Absolute–is the fundamental term for Brahman, as it defines Brahman as nearly as is possible for human language. Sat is the Real (or Reality); Chit is Consciousness; and Ananda is Bliss. The totality of Reality, Consciousness, and Bliss is Brahman, and since Brahman is the essence of our being, those three aspects also comprise our true Self.

Nityananda is speaking of how the individual spirit enters into the direct knowing of itself and Brahman: our consciousness (chit) must unite with our own reality–the Self–and ananda will be the result. Only through meditation does this come about. There are many degrees of ananda, but Nityananda assures us that the ananda experienced when we are united with the Self–and Brahman–is the supreme (para) ananda, and is Satchidananda Itself. Satchidananda is both an experience and Being Itself.

• Paramananda is experienced in the head. In the head is the brahmanadi.

The supreme center of conscious in the individual is the Sahasrara–the thousand-petalled lotus–located in the head, corresponding to the brain, for it is the astral and causal “brain.” As a consequence, meditation should take place in the head. Nityananda has a great deal to say about the head as the place where Self-realization takes place, and where we should keep our awareness centered. For in the head we find the Brahmanadi–the channel in which the consciousness rises upward from the body into the head, through which it moves as liberation is attained, and through which we ascend beyond the bodies into Spirit Itself at the time of death.

• Brahmananda is Paramananda. The jiva enjoys this bliss when he is one with the Paramatman.

The bliss of Brahman is the highest (para) bliss which is attained upon our becoming one with the Paramatman–Brahmnan.

• This bliss is also called Shivananda.

It is often said: “The jiva”–the individual spirit-consciousness–“is Shiva”–the Absolute Consciousness. So Shivananda is the Bliss of the Self. Although later writings such as the Puranas present Shiva as a matted-haired ascetic riding around the Himalayas on a bull, in the ancient texts Shiva is always a title of Brahman the Absolute, and refers to the non-dual Reality. This is especially true in the spiritual writings of south India, including the teachings of Sri Ramana Maharshi. It those who are established in the Advaitic Bliss that are true Shaivites.

• Paramananda is experienced in the head.

Again we return to the subject of the head (sahasrara) as the place of enlightenment in the embodied individual that is yet in the body.

• This state is eternal joy. This state is jivanmukti.

Paramananda is inseparable from liberation, and when it is attained while still embodied, it is called jivanmukti.

54. He is a jnani who has given up worldly pleasures and by practicing yoga seen God. Ananda is not in what you hear. Bliss is a matter of experience. Such a man is called a mahatma. Those who have seen earthen and stone images do not become Mahatmas. He is a mahatma who knows himself.

• He is a jnani who has given up worldly pleasures and by practicing yoga seen God.

Here we have it said to perfection: jnana is renunciation of worldly things (vairagya), and the practice of yoga which has resulted in the realization of God. Everything else is elementary and only a reflection of jnana–steps to jnana, but not jnana itself. Only the dispassionate yogi has a hope of gaining Self-realization.

• Ananda is not in what you hear. Bliss is a matter of experience.

There are a lot of people that get the tremors and the chills listening to inspirational talks–some even shed tears–but Nityananda wants us to know that this is far beneath the ananda that is the goal of the yogi. That ananda is the experience of the Self–nothing less.

• Such a man is called a mahatma.

One who has become established (sthira) in the Self is a genuine “great soul” (mahatma), and only such a one merits that title.

Those who have seen earthen and stone images do not become Mahatmas. There is a strain of sociopathy in every religion, and it usually takes the form of a zillion rules and principles of do and don’t, none of which have any effect on the consciousness of the individual, but are just frantic busywork and superstition. Modern India abounds in this labyrinth that leads nowhere. One of the more tiresome–and tiring–is the insistence on a multitude of pilgrimage spots that a sadhu–a mahatma–must visit to really “be” a sadhu. One such is the chain of “jyotir lingas”–shrines to Shiva–scattered throughout India. There are trusting souls that believe they really have not come up to the mark until they have visited each one, and I have known those that kept mulling over how they were going to eventually get to all of them. It is this nonsense that Nityananda is specifically referring to. No one becomes a sadhu by looking at earth and stone symbols. Only experience of the reality indicated by those symbols has any meaning whatsoever for the yogi.

• He is a mahatma who knows himself.

Well, there you have it!

55. An avadhuta has conquered death and birth. He has no consciousness of the body, an avadhuta has gone beyond all gunas (qualities). He is the knower of the Omniscient Light. He has no consciousness of the “I.” Such is a Raja Yogi, not a Hatha Yogi. When he comes to a village he feels glad, whomsoever he may see. He has no consciousness of duality though he moves here and there. He has no hunger. He eats plentifully if he gets plenty of eatables. If he does not get, he will not ask anybody. Those who give to him poison and those who give to him milk are the same to him. Those who beat him and those who love him are the same to him. To an avadhuta, the universe is the father, the mother, and the relation. He becomes the universe and the universe becomes him. The universe is merged in him.

• An avadhuta has conquered death and birth.

Sutra 52 has told us that an avadhuta is one that lives in absolute desirelessness. Since it is desire that draws us into birth and expels us through death, this is a natural consequence. Proof that this is so is given in the life of Sri Brahma Chaitanya. In chapter six of The Saint of Gondawali we find the following:

“Shantabai, the Master’s daughter, was two years old. The girl was extremely handsome as well as silently playful. The Master, therefore, called her Shanti, which means Peace. She could not yet speak, and so used the language of signs. She showed great inclination towards devotion to God.…She would sit undisturbed for an hour to listen to the Master’s discourse on God and His devotion. When the Master asked her, ‘Shantabai! Do you follow me?’ She replied a ‘yes’ by her sweet, innocent smile. One day her aunt was worshipping the tulsi plant. The girl was in her arms. Just then the Master happened to come there. He asked the child, ‘Would you give me your necklace?’ The girl removed the necklace and put it into the Master’s hand. He again asked her, ‘Don’t you like to have the necklace? Shall I have it for me?’ The child cut a leaf from the tulsi plant and placed it on the necklace, thereby implying that she had no attachment to it. The Master happily remarked, ‘Well, child! God will surely give a lift to you.’ Six months later the child died. Her mother and the other ladies felt very sorry to lose her. The cremation took place in the evening. When the Master came back a disciple asked him, ‘Master, why do children, particularly gifted children, die so young’” The Master answered, ‘Desire is the cause of birth. Desire again becomes the cause of death. When a child is born, it comes to satisfy some desire. The common man does not know who comes to him as a son or a daughter. The saints know it. Sometimes it happens that some spiritually advanced souls fall a prey to some petty desire. This desire dominates at the time of death during the previous birth. Then it forces them to be born again, preferably in the family of a seeker or a saint. They satisfy the desire and soon depart from this world. That is why many gifted children die young. This girl was such an advanced soul. Hence we should not mourn her death.’”

The single desire–for a necklace–had brought the girl into birth, and her cutting off of that desire by offering it as a gift to her father (the putting of a tulsi leaf on the necklace indicated that it was being given to God, actually) freed her through the gate of death.

By conquering desire we conquer birth and death.

• He has no consciousness of the body.

This is almost always understood simplistically–and therefore erroneously. One of the problems is that non-yogis are trying to figure out or imagine the state of consciousness of a liberated person–something that is as absurd as a child attempting to understand the full mind of an adult. These people usually write the books on the great masters and thereby give a completely mistaken–even distorted–impression of them. Their sincerity of intention matters not a whit.

Avadhutas eat, sleep, walk around, and speak to others. How could they do that without some kind of bodily sense? What Nityananda means is that the avadhut perceives himself, including his body, as pure consciousness–as the Self. His body is not a cover of the Self, but a revelation of the Self. He is at all time aware of the Self in all things: “[The yogi’s] heart is with Brahman, his eye in all things sees only Brahman equally present, knows his own Atman in every creature, and all creation within that Atman. That yogi sees me in all things, and all things within me. He never loses sight of me, nor I of him. He is established in union with me, and worships me devoutly in all beings” (Bhagavad Gita 6:29-31).

• An avadhuta has gone beyond all gunas.

Sattwa, rajas, and tamas do not exist for the avadhuta, because they are simply three modes of energy behavior in Prakriti. But for the avadhuta there is only Purusha, which transcends Prakriti.

He is the knower of the Omniscient Light. The Omniscient Light is Ishwara, the infinite Lord–Bhagavan. This, too, is made clear in the life of another great master: Paramhansa Yogananda. In the first chapter of his autobiography, this appears:

“Sitting on my bed one morning, I fell into a deep reverie.

“‘What is behind the darkness of closed eyes?’ This probing thought came powerfully into my mind. An immense flash of light at once manifested to my inward gaze. Divine shapes of saints, sitting in meditation posture in mountain caves, formed like miniature cinema pictures on the large screen of radiance within my forehead.

“‘Who are you?‘ I spoke aloud.

“‘We are the Himalayan yogis.’ The celestial response is difficult to describe; my heart was thrilled.

“‘Ah, I long to go to the Himalayas and become like you!’ The vision vanished, but the silvery beams expanded in ever-widening circles to infinity.

“‘What is this wondrous glow?’

“‘I am Iswara. I am Light.’ The voice was as murmuring clouds.

“‘I want to be one with Thee!’

“Out of the slow dwindling of my divine ecstasy, I salvaged a permanent legacy of inspiration to seek God.”

In sutra 163 Nityananda says about Om: “It is the light of divine wisdom.

In the Prashna Upanishad we are told: “Then Satyakama, son of Shibi, asked him [the Rishi Pippalada]: ‘Venerable Sir, what world does he who meditates on Om until the end of his life, win by That?’ To him, he said: ‘If he meditates on the Supreme Being [Parampurusha] with the Syllable Om, he becomes one with the Light” (Prashna Upanishad 5:1, 5),

• He has no consciousness of the “I.”

The principle of ego, the ahankara, has vanished from his consciousness totally.

• Such is a Raja Yogi, not a Hatha Yogi.

Several times in these sutras Nityananda will mention Raja and Hatha Yoga. As we will see when we come to them, he had a definite conception and attitude regarding them. In sutra thirty-three he has already said that Raja Yoga is the seat of non-dual consciousness–of liberation. In all the sutras he speaks of Raja Yoga as spiritual consciousness and Hatha Yoga as material and egoic consciousness. He considers that Raja Yogis are following the path of Spirit, of moksha, but Hatha Yogis are following the path of material consciousness and ignorance. He is not subtle in his distinction.

Naturally, he is not disapproving of those who engage in Hatha Yoga with the understanding that it is a system of physical culture, but those that pretend it is a system of spiritual culture. This difference between the two may seen obvious to us here in the West–perhaps even an unnecessary distinction–but I have encountered “yogis” in India who knew nothing of even the simplest spiritual principles, but who because of their expert knowledge of Hatha Yoga passed themselves off as great Himalayan yogis. At the Kumbha Mela these types gain a great deal of notoriety and money. (One yogi boasted to me of making nearly one hundred and fifty thousand rupees at one Mela–and that was in the days when the rupee was worth over five times more than it is now.) This is because they can impress people by their physical demonstrations–the yogi I just mentioned could float, sitting, on water and play the harmonium! But what “show” will an enlightened Master give? He can only sit there and be what he is–and how many people can perceive his inward state? The blowhards have LOTS of loudspeakers and give hours of discourses interspersed with scriptural recitations and singing by their groupies. Some of them bring acting troupes along to literally give a show. The man of wisdom just cannot compete–and does not want to. This is why the intelligent completely bypass the tents and sideshows and wander through the areas of the unmoneyed (and therefore “unimportant”) who have no assigned “camps” but are on the outer areas of the mela grounds. There they may find a real treasure sitting at peace. One of my friends only goes to the other side of the Ganges, where he has met many great souls over the years.

• When he comes to a village he feels glad, whomsoever he may see.

Friends and strangers–and even those that may have been unfriendly when he was there before–are equally dear to him, because he sees them all as dwelling-place of the Spirit. Notice that the avadhuta is not indifferent or non-reactive. He is glad to see them, for he loves all, being one with “the Friend of all men” (Bhagavad Gita 5:29).

“He who regards with an eye that is equal friends and comrades, the foe and the kinsman, the vile, the wicked, the men who judge him, and those who belong to neither faction: he is the greatest” (Bhagavad Gita 6:9).

“His attitude is the same toward friend and foe. He is indifferent to honor and insult, heat and cold, pleasure and pain. He is free from attachment” (Bhagavad Gita 12:18).

Thus is the avadhuta.

• He has no consciousness of duality though he moves here and there.

Being always centered in the Self and absolutely stabilized in consciousness he already lives outside of time and perceives that he really goes nowhere–not “here” or “there.”

• He has no hunger.

The avadhuta does not experience hunger as a compulsion, but is simply aware if his body needs food.

• He eats plentifully if he gets plenty of eatables. If he does not get, he will not ask anybody.

He merely responds to the external conditions, but has no inward preference at all.

• Those who give to him poison and those who give to him milk are the same to him. Those who beat him and those who love him are the same to him.

This has already been covered.

• To an avadhuta, the universe is the father, the mother, and the relation.

That is because he sees the universe and all in it as Brahman–his own Self. Brahman is the only one with which we can have any real relationship, for Brahman alone IS.

• He becomes the universe and the universe becomes him.

The universe is merged in him. Unity alone occupies his awareness.