We progressed to this point in the discussion that if we can get knowledge
of God, where is He, who is He, what is He, what is our relationship with Him? Then
on the basis of that we will develop faith, and through faith we will get love.
How then do we get knowledge of God? Whom should we ask, who is God what does He do?
Who will answer these questions for us? If we ask worldly people, they don't know
for themselves. How will they tell us? That will be like (Sanskrit)
the blind leading the blind. Let's say that in some place a lot of blind
people gathered. One blind person said sir, I wish to go to the Radha Krishna
temple but I am blind. Can you please take me someone? The other blind person
thought I am blind but the blind man doesn't know I am blind. He said, "oh blind man,
hold my hand I will take you. Now the two blind people, they started off. They did
not reach the Radha Krishna temple. They fell into a ditch on the way. Similarly
if we ask worldly people in the office, over a cup of tea, "my dear friends what
do you think is God? What do you believe in and what is your opinion on life
after death?" That will only be intellectual entertainment. It will have
no pure spiritual value. So you can't get
knowledge of God from worldly people. What about the great God-realized Souls, the Saints?
The Saints know God. From the Saints, we should be able to
find out about God. But the problem here is how to find a Saint?
Supposing 25 Swamis come from India to DFW area every year. How to find out
Which of them is a God realized Saint? And these Saints will not put any board like
in India if you wish to find a doctor, you just go around MG road seeing the
board; every town has an MG road, right? so you check the market and see okay
doctor Mukharjee, MBBS, MD, FRCS, London, heart specialist. Hmmm looks good. let me go and show him.
So a Saint will not put up a board, "God realized,
Attained God." Somebody may be a Saint. But we will never know. So
initially knowledge of God will not be from the Saints because you can't find
a Saint, you can't recognize a Saint. Then what to do? Why not ask God Himself? if
you want knowledge of somebody instead of going to a third party you go to that
person, "sir, you please tell me about yourself."
So in the same way if you want knowledge of God, rather than ask anybody else you
ask God Himself. But how will God answer? God has answered. Where? In His Vedas.
These Vedas are not a human creation. They are
directly the Word of God. (Sanskrit verse) Whenever God creates the world, He
manifests the Vedas. Just like you purchase a machine, and you get the
manual along with it. So the Vedas are the manual. God has manifested His
knowledge there and when He dissolves the world, He assimilates the Vedas back
into himself. Historians say, the Rig Veda is one of the oldest books in the world.
But in my opinion this word oldest is a misnomer.
Don't say oldest. The RigVeda is eternal. It has always existed. Just like God is
eternal His knowledge is also eternal. It doesn't have to be newly created in
Stanford and MIT. Knowledge of God is His Shakti, His energy. Ever since a fire
has existed, its heat and light have existed. Ever since God has existed, His
Bliss has existed, His knowledge has existed. So God's knowledge is eternal.
When He created our world, He first manifested the Vedas in the
heart of the first born Brahma. Brahma passed the Vedic knowledge to his
disciple, he passed it on to his disciple, he passed it on to his disciple. In this
way the Vedic knowledge came through the parampaara, hearing it through the ear
That is why another name for the Vedas is Shruti. Shruti means that knowledge,
which is received through the ear. However, 5,000 years ago,
when the lord Himself took avatar as VedaVyas,
he looked into the coming age of kali and he thought the people of Kalyug,
which means us folks, we will not be Shrutidhari. We will not
have the capacity to hear and remember. In fact we will forget in three hours
flat. Do this. "All right Swamiji." After three hours, "did you do it?" "I forgot Swamiji."
What a fantastic memory you have, you forget in three hours. So VedaVyas
could see all this. He decided now a book will be needed. He put that knowledge in
writing and he divided the one body of knowledge into four parts, the RigVeda, YajurVeda,
SamVeda, AtharvaVeda. So he is called Veda Vyasa, the divider
of the Vedas but nobody calls him Veda Rachayita or Vead Pranita, the writer. He is
the divider. The writer is God Himself. So the Vedas are Sanatan (eternal) and the
path, the science that the Vedas are teaching, the science of God realization
is an eternal science. It is non-sectarian. That is why they call it
sanatana dharma, the eternal path. The word 'hindu' doesn't come in the Vedas.
That word developed historically. The mongals on the other side of the hindu
kush, they said the people living on this side are the hindus. But the vedas are
not teaching us hindu dharma, they are teaching us Sanatan Dharma, the eternal
religion. Actually all religions are eternal, because they are talking about
the eternal God and the eternal soul. But they are giving
limited knowledge, like the pocket dictionary and the complete unabridged
oxford dictionary. It is like ten blind man went to see an elephant; one grabbed the
tail. Because he was blind, he gave his decision, "my dear friends this elephant
is like a rope." The 2nd grabbed the leg. Again because of lack of vision, he decided the
elephant is like a tree trunk. The third put his hand on the stomach. He said the
elephant is flat like a wall. The fourth got the Tusk. he said the elephaant
is pointed like a spear. The fifth got the ear. He said, the elephant is like
a fan. Now they all started fighting. Somebody with eyes came. He said, look
there is no reason to fight. You are all describing the elephant, but you are
describing a section/portion of the elephant. All this together is that
elephant. In the same way, sometimes Dharma's start fighting. My religion is
right, yours is wrong . Mine is right and yours is wrong, and yours is so wrong that I need
to kill you. But the Vedas say, look you are all right; please don't fight! But
you are describing a section of the knowledge and the entire spectrum of
knowledge from ABCD of spiritual knowledge till where it goes, it is all
there in the Vedas. Those Vedas then are the authority. (Sanskrit verse)
Any spiritual principle must be validated on the
authority of the Vedas. See, if we do that we'll never make a mistake.
otherwise everybody comes up with a new theory. And you say, where did you get this
theory from? "This was told by God to my guru in a private room." God told
your guru in a private room? And the Vedas are telling us something, and the
same Vedic knowledge is given by Sur das, Tulsi das, Meera bai, Tukaram, Narshi Mehta
Namdev, Shankar Acharya, Madhavacharya. "They are all wrong, and what my guru was told in a
private room is right." So - beware of such things. Any spiritual principle must
be on the authority of Vedic knowledge. That Vedic knowledge was elaborated in
the 2 Etihas, the Ramayana and the Mahabharata including the Bhagavad Gita,
the 18 puranas, like the Bhagavad purana, the Shad Darshan like Mimansa, Vedant
Nyaya, Vaishesik, Sankhya, Yog, and the hundred Smriti texts, the thousands of Nivandh.
These are elaborating the Vedic knowledge. Hence they are called Vedic
literature. So this entire body of Vedic literature. Just like there is the
constitution of America, and commentaries written by lawyers. All these can
be used to understand the Constitution. Similarly we use all the Vedic knowledge.
So let's find out from the Vedas about God.