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Upadesa Sara

Sloka 25

Vision of the Lord

 The conditionings are a result of ignorance and therefore, illusory. The qualities of limited knowledge of the jiva and omniscience of Isvara are only relative but their oneness is absolute. The true vision of the Lord is not different from Self-realization – the realization of one’s own nature. The following verse elaborates on this.

vesa-hanatah svatma-darsanam,
Isa-darsanam svatma-rupatah.

vesa-hanatah – to one who gives up (the gross and subtle conditionings); svatma-darsanam – vision of the Self (Self-realization); Isa-darsanam – vision of the Lord (God-realization); svatma-rupatah – as the Self;

One who gives up the conditionings gains Self-realization. The vision of the Lord as the Self is true God-realization.

 The idea of giving up the conditionings appears suicidal. The path of Self-enquiry does not advise us to literally give up the body, senses, and mind or to destroy them. What is to be given up is the ignorance-born false notion that ‘I am the body’. When the ‘I’-notion in the body is given up, the pure Self which is of the nature of Existence-Consciousness is realized. The nature of the Lord too is Existence-Consciousness. Therefore, Self-realization is God-realization.

Can we not gain the vision of the Lord as a particular form, say, Bala Gopala or Sri Rama through meditation? It may be possible to gain such a vision by the grace of the Lord and the intensity and fervor of our practice, faith, and devotion. But such a vision of the form should not be mistaken for the vision of His true nature. A form, since it is seen, is inert, finite, and perishable. The Lord is sentient, infinite, and imperishable in nature. Therefore, we should strive to gain the vision of the Lord as one’s own true nature.

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