Gita Rahasya -Tilak
|
CHAPTER X
THE EFFECT OF KARMA AND FREEDOM OF WILL
As the fruits of Action which are obtained by the orthodox ritualists and by the scients following the Karma-Yoga, are in this way different, those persons have to go to different spheres by different paths after their death; and these paths are respectively known as 'pitryaya ' and 'devayana' [1] ; and these two paths are described in the eighth chapter of the Gita on the basis of the Upanisads. The man who has acquired Knowledge— and he must have acquired this Know- ledge at least at the moment of death— [2] goes and reaches the sphere of the Brahman, after his body has fallen and has been burnt in fire, through that fire, passing through the flames, daylight, the bright half of the month and the six months of the ultarayana; and as he attains Release there, he does not take birth again and come back to this mortal world ; but, that man, who has been a mere orthodox performer of ritual and has not acquired Knowledge, reaches the sphere of the Moon, through the smoke of the same fire, and through night, and the dark half of the month, and the six months of the daksinayana ; and when he has enjoyed the reward of all the meritorious Actions, which he has performed, he again returns to this world. This is the difference between the two paths [3]. As the Upanisads use the word arcih (flame) instead of ' jyotih ' (flame), the first path is also called 'arciradi ', and the second path is called ' dhumradi '. When one hears in mind the terminology that our uttarayaya (period during which the Sun is seen moving towards the North) is the day of the deities living on the North Pole, and our daksinayana (when the Sun is seen moving towards the South) is their night, it becomes quite clear that the first out of these two paths, namely, 'arciradi' ( jyotiradi) is lighted from beginning to end, and that the other one or the dhumradi is one of darkness throughout. In as much as Jnana (Know- ledge) is an embodiment of light, and the Parabrahman is "jyotisam jyotih" [4], i. e., "the brilliance of all brilliance", it is only proper that the path taken by the scients (Jnanins) after death should be lighted; and the adjectives 'sukla ' (white) and 'krsna ' (black) used in the Gita with reference to these two paths, mean that they are respectively lighted and dark. The Gita. does not mention the stages sub- sequent to the uttarayana, but the Nirukta of Yaska contains a description of the spheres of the Gods, the Sun, the lightning, and the mental Purusa, which come after the uttarayana [5] ; and the descriptions of the devayana given in the various Upanisads are harmonised in the Vedanta- Siitras in which all the subsequent stages after the uttarayana, namely, the year (samvatsara), the spheres of the air, the Sun, the Moon, lightning, Varuna, Indra, Prajapati, and ultimately, the sphere of the Brahman are described [6]. |
|
