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CHAPTER 4
Elucidation of The Deed of Yagya
My noble teacher, the revered Maharaj Ji, used to say, “To trim the mind along with the body and senses in keeping with the goal, is penance. They tend to digress from the goal but have to be pulled back and applied to it.” There are many who practise the yagya of yog. Yog is the joining of the Soul, wandering amidst nature, with God who is beyond nature. A clear definition of yog is found in the twenty-third verse of Chapter 6. Usually, the meeting of two objects is yog. But is it yog if a pen meets paper or a dish meets a table. Of course not, because both are made of the same five elements: they are one, not two. Nature and the Self are two entities, distinct from each other.
There is yog when the naturebased Soul meets the identical God, and when nature is dissolved in the Soul. This is the true yog. So there are many who resort to a strict practice of restraint because it is conducive to this union. The practicers of the yog of sacrifice (yagya) and they who are given to severe austerities keep in view their own Self and perform the yagya of knowledge. Here, nonviolent but severe austerities such as restraint, religious observance, the appropriate posture of sitting, serenity of breath, withholding of the mind along with the physical organs, retention, meditation and perfect absorption of thought in the Supreme Spirit, are indicated as the eightfold features of yog. There are many who undertake Self-study because they aim at Self-knowledge. Reading books is but the first step to Self-knowledge, for in the true sense it is derived only from contemplation of the Self which brings about attainment of God, and the final outcome of which is knowledge or intuitive perception. Krishn now points out what is done for this yagya of knowledge or contemplation of the Self.
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