The Brihadaranyaka Upanishad - 2.4.4. Swami Krishnananda.

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Friday, March 25, 2022. 19:00.

Chapter- II :

FOURTH BRAHMANA : 

THE CONVERSATION OF YAJNAVALKYA AND MAITREYI ON THE ABSOLUTE SELF :

 Mantram : 4. 

(Spoken on 8 February 1977)

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Mantram : 4. 

"Sa hovaca yajnavalkyah, priya bata are naa sati priyam bhasase; 

ehi, assva, vyakhyasyami te; vyacaksanasya tu me nididhyasasva iti."

"Sa hovaca yajnavalkyah, priya bata are naa sati priyam bhasase; ehi, assva," : 

"So, now I shall speak to you the secret of all these things." 

vyakhyasyami te; vyacaksanasya tu me nididhyasasva iti." :  

"Listen to me with rapt attention. I shall tell you the secret of this great problem that you have posed before me; the question that you have put; the difficulty in the ascent on the part of people to become permanently happy, which is not possible by possession of wealth."

Now, the whole subject is a discourse on the relationship that obtains between eternity and temporality. What you call immortality, is the life eternal; and that which is temporal, is what we see with our eyes. Wealth is a general term which signifies any kind of value, any possession. It may be a physical possession; it may be a psychological condition; or it may be a social status – all these come under wealth, because anything that gives you comfort, physical and social, can be regarded as a property. 

This is what is known as temporal value. It is temporal because it is in the context of the time process. That which is temporal is that which is conditioned by time. The time process is involved in the possession of values that are called temporal. So, time has a say in the matter of our possessions. We cannot completely defy the law of time and take hold of possessions that we regard as ours. Time is an inscrutable force which is a peculiar arrangement of things in the world. That arrangement is known as temporality.

The arrangement of things is such, in the temporal realm, that things cannot be possessed by anyone. The idea of possession is a peculiar notion in the mind. You know very well how false the idea of possession is. You cannot possess anything except in thought. So, what we call ownership of property, is a condition of the mind. 

I can give you a very small gross example : 

There is a large expanse of land, a vast field which is agricultural in itself. Today you say, it is owned by 'A', and tomorrow it is owned by 'B', by transfer of property. Now, what do you mean by this transfer of property? It has never been transferred. It is there in its own place. It has been transferred in the ideas of people. One person called 'A' imagined that it was his, yesterday, and today, another called 'B' thinks in his mind that it is his. Now both ideas, whether it is the idea of 'A' or the idea of 'B', are peculiar, inscrutable conditions which cannot be easily associated with the physical existence of the property known as land. 

There is no vital connection between the thought of the person and the landed property. There is only an imaginary connection. But, the social arrangement of the idea of ownership is such that it appears to be well-placed. There is an agreement among people that certain ideas should be accepted as logically valid. 

That is called temporal law. Man-made law is temporal law, and it is valid as long as people who are concerned with it agree that it is valid. But if it is not agreed upon, then the validity of that principle ceases. So, when the acceptance on the part of minds of people, in respect of a principle called ownership, ceases, then the ownership also ceases. For example, there is no ownership in a jungle. The beasts do not possess any property; animals have no idea of ownership; they go anywhere at any time – today the animal is in one place, tomorrow it is in another place. And we, too, live in a similar manner. We are in one place today, and tomorrow in another place. The difference is, we think in a particular manner, whereas animals think not in that manner.

The whole question of ownership, or psychologically put – like or dislike, is a condition of the mind which is an arrangement of psychological values, agreed upon by a group of people who have decided that this should be the state of affairs. So, you can imagine how artificial is the idea of ownership. Nobody can own anything unless it is agreed upon by the concerned people that this idea be accepted. If the idea is not accepted, then the ownership goes, because you cannot swallow the land, or eat the property. It is there physically existent, as something not mechanically related to you, but psychologically a phantom of your mind. This being the case, how can that bring you permanent satisfaction? If a thing can be permanently possessed, you cannot be dispossessed of it. The very fact that one can be dispossessed of a property shows that permanent acquisition is not possible. It is conditionally connected with you in a psychological manner, and it cannot be connected unconditionally. And, what you call permanent happiness is unconditional existence independent of temporal relationship. That unconditional existence is not possible, if it is an effect of a conditional arrangement.

So, eternity that is aspired after, which is what we know as immortality, is something transempirical, and not conditioned by the process of time, and it has nothing to do with the ownership of property. You may possess or you may not possess; it is absolutely immaterial as far as the question of immortality is concerned, because immortality is not dependent upon connection of values external. It is a state of being as such. In order to inculcate the meaning of this great passage, Yājñavalkya tells us:

To be continued ....

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