Light From Eternal Lamps–Essays On Practical Spiritual Life–by Swami Nirmalananda Giri
The Truth About Us and the World
At the end of Saint John’s first epistle, when he says: “We know that we are of God, and the whole world lieth in wickedness,” he is speaking metaphysically. He does not say the whole world is wicked; he says it “lieth in wickedness.” That is, it is prostrate, helpless under the power of evil. And if we submerge ourselves in the world–that is, the consciousness of the world–we, too, will be crushed and paralyzed, lying in wickedness.
Now, what is “wickedness”? Even though we reject the foolishness and outright evil of ignorant, exoteric religion, we are conditioned to believe it anyway. So whenever we come across a Biblical passage like this we think it is negative and wrong. But it is we who are negative and wrong for not looking beneath the surface and seeing the spiritual meaning–which we all can do. It is really worthwhile to obtain a copy of Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance and check the meanings of the Hebrew and Greek words as we read the Bible. Even better is to get a computer program such as Online Bible (which I am using as I write this) which makes it very easy to do.
The word translated “wickedness” is poneros. It does not mean evil at all, but hurtful–that which causes anguish or pain. In other words, wickedness is that which causes suffering. This is the meaning of the root word ponos, which is derived from two other words (penes and ptochos), both of which mean to be starvingly poor, reduced to beggary. This is what Buddha perceived when He formulated the Four Noble Truths, the first of which is simply: There Is Suffering. Suffering is a corollary of being in the world–of our consciousness being centered in the world. It goes with the territory, as we say. The world strips us of more than external good, it tears us away from our very being which is spirit-consciousness, and renders us (at least to our perceptions) an illusion, a wraith pitifully scrambling to grab on to the non-existent “life” of the world. Only pain can be the legacy of us all. The world has nothing else to offer, just as the cobra has nothing but venom in its fangs.
We are of God: each one a spark of light within the Infinite Light of God, a point of consciousness within the Ocean of Consciousness that is God, a god within God–many gods within the one and only God. Nothing can change this. But the world makes us forget the truth of ourselves and we believe that we are suffering mortals, helpless under the “laws” of relative existence. Having wrapped ourselves in matter, we think we are material. Identifying with constant change, we believe that we have no permanence or stability. We have forgotten are real nature and are busily trying to be what we are not and never will be. What could be the result except suffering? Yes, we are indeed “lying in pain.” And we beg God to forgive our sins, take away our suffering, make us “good,” and all such silly things–silly, because God did not do this to us: WE did. Consequently we can rid ourselves of sin, suffering, and evil by turning our consciousness around fully. That is why Jesus continually said: “Turn fully around: the kingdom of heaven is right at hand.” That is the accurate translation of the words commonly rendered: “Repent ye: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.” All we need to is change our focus of consciousness from the unreal to the Real, from darkness to the Light, from death to Immortality–all of which we are! We need to realize that, and that is the purpose of meditation.
Everyone is of God at all times, but we fell asleep and forgot. Now we are beginning to awaken (otherwise I would not be writing these words and you would not be reading them). So it is time to take hold of the situation and make sure that we awaken fully and never fall back into the “wicked world” dream again. It is a matter of centering our consciousness in our own spirit-selves. When that process begins then the next verse from Saint John begins to have meaning: “And we know that the Son of God is come and hath given us an understanding.” This is not referring to an external avatar, but rather to the advent of our own Son of God consciousness. When that dawns, then understanding arises and ignorance vanishes.
The understanding that results from our awakening into spirit consciousness is not some intellectual “teaching” however. Saint John explains its character, telling us that it is “an understanding that we may know him that is true.” We are not interesting in knowing about karma, reincarnation, creation cycles, astral worlds, causal worlds, and such stuff. No; this is something far greater: the knowing of God, the True. How is such a wonderful thing possible? It is a matter of nature. Saint John further says: “And we are in him that is true.” So we, too, are “true god within the True God.” Without knowing the truth of our own selves we cannot know the truth–God.
Then Saint John says something interesting to sum all this up: “This is the true God, and eternal life.” In other words, the advent of spirit consciousness, of self-knowledge, and of God-knowledge are all God Himself, the Eternal Life. This is all done by God and in a mysterious way IS God. Saint John had learned this from Jesus, for he had heard Him say in prayer: “This is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God.” We are already one with God; we need only regain that consciousness, which is far more than a metaphysical principle. Instead it is the living experience implied by the statement: “I take refuge in the Buddha.”
“When I awake, I am still with thee.”
1) I John 5:19
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2) Matthew 3:2 [Go back]
3) I John 15:20 [Go back]
4) John 17:3 [Go back]
5) Psalms 139:18 [Go back]
