Chapter 14: God And The Universe
Question: You Have Written An Aphorism Which...
Question: You have written an aphorism which says: "God is at once finite and infinite. He is space. He is beyond space. He is measured. He can be measured. He must needs be measured. He is measureless. He is boundless. He is infinite." Could you please explain this, particularly how God can be called finite?
Sri Chinmoy: God is finite and God is infinite. You have stressed the word 'finite.' It means that you find it difficult to see how God can be finite. We normally feel that God is omnipotent, omniscient and omnipresent. Let us take this divine quality that we call omnipotence. If God can be as vast as the universe but not as tiny as the tiniest atom, then where is His Omnipotence? When we think of omnipotence, our human mind has the idea of vast and measureless power. But real omnipotence means that the Supreme has the power to be immeasurably vast or inconceivably small, according to His sweet Will. It means the power to be finite or infinite, limited or unlimited.
God is infinite, but He has entered into this finite body of ours which lasts for fifty, sixty or seventy years. God is infinite, but He houses Himself in each tiny child. Here in the finite, He wants to enjoy Himself and play the tune of the Infinite; it gives Him the greatest joy. It is in the finite that the Supreme in us is aspiring towards the Infinite. Finite and infinite: to our outer eyes they seem to be opposites, but in God's Eyes they are one. The finite and the Infinite always want to go together; the one complements the other. The finite wants to reach the absolute Highest, which is the Infinite. The Infinite wants to manifest itself in and through the finite. Then only is the divine Game complete. Otherwise, it will be only a one-sided game. There will be no joy, no achievement, no fulfilment. In and through the Infinite, the finite is singing its song of realisation. In and through the finite, the Infinite is singing its song of manifestation.
-1970
Question: Can God And The Universe Be...
Question: Can God and the universe be separated?
Sri Chinmoy: God is the Owner and Creator of the universe, and the Creator and His creation are inseparable. In the ordinary world, the creator or owner of a thing can pick it up or put it down; he can keep it or give it away. But, in the case of God and the universe, it is not like that. If you look at God, you will see the universe inside Him. And, if you look at the universe with your spiritual eye, your third eye, immediately you will see God inside it. Human possession comes and goes. Today you have millions of dollars; tomorrow you may be an absolute beggar. But in God's case, the Possessor and the possession can never be separated.
-1970
Question: All Around Us We Hear Of...
Question: All around us we hear of wars and conflicts. I want to know if these conflicts are all part of the divine order?
Sri Chinmoy: It is true that sometimes life is a divine Game; the good and bad in everybody comes to the fore and finally the good is victorious. Again, there is something called an attack by the undivine forces within or around us. After you leave here, somebody may come and snatch away your wallet. Is it karma or some wrong action on your part that caused you to be robbed? Far from it! You have prayed, you have meditated, you have done everything right. But there are many undivine forces around us, and no matter how spiritual or divine we are, they attack us. So we have to pray to God for constant protection.
With regard to the present-day political situation, it is not the intention of the Divine to let the forces fight it out so that out of evil good will come. At times we say that the divine Game is being played; that the Divine and undivine play and finally the Divine wins. But right now, it is not like that. The present-day wars are not God's intention; they are the product of human weaknesses.
-26 October 1973
Question: What Is God?...
Question: What is God? Where is He?
Sri Chinmoy: God is everywhere. But if we do not see Him or feel Him inside our heart, then we will not be able to see Him anywhere. First we have to see Him within us and talk to Him inside our heart. If we can do this, then only will we be able to see God elsewhere. If inside our heart God is missing, then we shall not be able to speak to God or mix with God anywhere.
What is God? God is both formless and with form. He is pure energy without beginning or end; at the same time, He is the most luminous form. It depends on how the seeker wants to see God. One person may want to see God in a human form, but as absolutely divine, supreme, perfect. He feels that if God appears to him with form, then it will be easier for him to recognise God or realise God. So he likes to see the personal God. But again, if someone says that he wants to go beyond the personal God, beyond form, beyond duality, and remain always in the infinite peace, light and bliss, that also can be done. And the same seeker who cries in the morning to see God with form can, in the evening, cry for God as formless, boundless energy.
-3 October 1975
Question: Why Should One Give His Time...
Question: Why should one give his time to God?
Sri Chinmoy: One gives his time to God because he sees that, unlike him and unlike others, God is the Alpha and the Omega. He is the beginning; He is the end. He is this; He is that. And, at the same time, He transcends what He eternally is.
God is all-pervading; He is everywhere. Whatever we do, whatever we say, whatever we grow into is nothing short of an expansion of His own Reality-Existence. Right at the outset we have to know that He alone exists. Just because He alone exists, no matter what we do, we know that our action is motivated by Him and also finds its result in Him. Not only that, but He is the One acting in and through us. Our action fulfils itself, our capacity is increased and our realisation is strengthened only because He exists and He is. Therefore, either consciously or unconsciously, either cheerfully or dolefully, God has to come into the picture.
-31 October 1975
Question: What Do You Think Of A...
Question: What do you think of a person who is an atheist?
Sri Chinmoy: We say that someone is an atheist because he says that there is no God. I say there is a God, but he says, "No God, no God, no God!" When he goes to that extreme, he will see that his negative feeling itself is a form of positive feeling. At the extreme, he says that there is nothing. But what he calls nothing is, for us, something; and that very thing we call God.
Sometimes the sky is overcast with clouds and no moon or stars are visible. We know that when these clouds are dispersed, we will immediately be able to see the moon and the stars. But an atheist cannot see beyond the clouds.
-18 July 1978
Question: Why Did God Create Evil?...
Question: Why did God create evil?
Sri Chinmoy: What you call evil, that very thing I call ignorance. There is a great difference between ignorance and evil. Ignorance is an experience that ultimately will lead us to a higher truth. We go from lesser light, to greater light, to greatest light. What you call evil and sin are actually experiences of bondage and imperfection. Evil is in our mind. In our aspiring heart there is no such thing as evil. What the mind sees as evil, the heart sees as imperfection. And this imperfection can easily be perfected when we pray to God for light, peace and bliss.
-13 June 1975
Question: What Is The Sound 'aum'?...
Question: What is the sound 'AUM'?
Sri Chinmoy: 'AUM' represents God in His three aspects: God the Creator, God the Preserver and God the Destroyer or Transformer. God the Creator has created us. God the Preserver preserves us. But while preserving us He notices some imperfection in us, which He tries to perfect. When He is perfecting us, He becomes God the Destroyer. But 'Destroyer' is the wrong term; God is not destroying anything; only He is transforming us. Anything that is undivine in us God transforms and illumines. 'A' represents God the Creator, 'U' represents God the Preserver and 'M' represents God the Transformer. So when we chant 'AUM', we invoke God in His three aspects.
-13 June 1975
Question: When Does God Want His Name...
Question: When does God want His Name spoken?
Sri Chinmoy: God wants His Name to be spoken by every human being at every moment and at every place. If each of us can be aware of our Source, we will become more illumined seekers, better instruments and more fulfilling hero-warriors of God for God's manifestation on earth.
-26 November 1976
Question: What Is Your Basic Philosophy?...
Question: What is your basic philosophy?
Sri Chinmoy: Our basic philosophy is love, devotion and surrender. We love God not in a human way but in a divine way. In human love there is constant demand. If I give you something, then I expect you to give me something; it is always give and take. But in divine love we give unconditionally. Human love ends in frustration and frustration ultimately is destruction. But divine love is constant illumination. In divine love, we love God unconditionally; then it is up to God to give us what He wants to give us. And when we love the world in a divine way, at that time we see the world as only an expansion of our own selves and our heart becomes universal.
Human devotion is attachment; divine devotion is dedication to a higher purpose or ideal, to a higher way of life. Divine devotion grows out of our soul's promise to manifest our inner divinity here on earth.
Human surrender is the surrender of a slave to his master. It is done out of fear. But divine surrender is the surrender of our less illumined part to our higher part. Right now we are not fully aware of our highest Height. But once we become aware of who we are, we try to surrender our lower self to our higher Self. The tiny drop is not aware of the ocean. But when it merges with the ocean, it becomes the ocean itself. In divine surrender, the finite in us surrenders to the Infinite in us and becomes inseparably one with it.
-11 March 1977
Question: Why Is Darkness Impermanent And Light...
Question: Why is darkness impermanent and light permanent?
Sri Chinmoy: Light is permanent precisely because our Source is all Light. Since our Source is Light, we also have to grow into Light. We come from Light, in Light we grow and through Light we fulfil ourselves. God is the eternal Source and we are His children; eventually, we have to grow into His very Image. God-realisation, the flood of infinite Light, is our birthright.
Right now we are enveloped by darkness because we have been sleeping for a few years or a few incarnations. But a day will come when the infinite Light will dawn inside us and make us feel what we truly are. At that time our inner sun, which is infinitely brighter than the physical sun, will dispel our ignorance-night of millennia.
The more we go deep within, the easier it becomes for us to realise that there is something within us that is everlasting. If we can live in our inner existence, even for one minute a day, we will see and feel Light in abundant measure and feel the possibility of growing into the effulgence of Light. So let us try to go deep within and enter into this inner cosmic sun. There we shall see the infinite, permanent Light waiting for us and crying for us. It needs only our conscious approval and cooperation to come to the fore.
What is Light? Light is Delight and Delight means Nectar, the immortal Nectar. In one of our Upanishads it is said that all human beings come into the world from Delight. Again, Delight is Light, God the Light. Although at every moment we are growing in Delight, we do not see or feel Delight right now because we are living the surface life in the meshes of ignorance. But we shall continue to grow and, at the end of our journey's close, we shall again enter into the effulgence of Delight. "We came from Delight, we grow in Delight and, at the end of our journey's close, we shall retire into Delight."
This experience of Delight we get only when we meditate, for only then do we get inner peace or peace of mind. Delight is visible, palpable and tangible only when we have peace of mind. Unfortunately, the modern, intellectual, doubting and sophisticated mind does not care for Light and Delight. It cries for outer information or it cries to achieve the Truth in its own way. But even while achieving the Truth, it negates the Truth. The mind sees the Truth for five seconds and then, when it is about to achieve the Truth, it doubts the possibility and potentiality of Truth. Then who is the loser? It is the mind. But if we live in the heart or in the soul, which is within the heart, then we identify ourselves with the Truth and immediately become the Truth. At that time there is no doubt; there is only a flood of certainty.
-June 1978
Question: I Was Wondering If There Is...
Question: I was wondering if there is a spiritual reason why earth is suffering from so many disasters at this time.
Sri Chinmoy: Disasters do take place occasionally. From the spiritual point of view, we have to take everything as an experience. In God's ultimate Vision, each human being will eventually have boundless perfection and infinite satisfaction. But God works in ways beyond our comprehension. Human beings do not know what God's ultimate Vision is. Here on the physical plane somebody will die and we will be sad; but on the inner plane perhaps God sees that dying at this time will expedite that soul's progress. So the best way is to take so-called disasters as an experience that God is giving to the individuals who are immediately involved and to those who are observing the situation.
Again, we have to know that wrong forces can operate in and through the earth planet because earth is not perfect. Some things God initiates and inspires, some things He approves of and some things He just accepts or tolerates. When we see earthquakes, floods or famine, we have to know that these are things God is just tolerating. If some wrong forces destroy a group of people or destroy some places, God is just tolerating it. Again, there is a higher purpose to these things. Today God tolerates this suffering, but tomorrow, inside the persons who have suffered, God's deep Compassion will flow, and in some way He will compensate. But that compensation we will not see with our human eyes; it has to be seen with our aspiring consciousness.
We have to know that the catastrophes and disasters which make us feel that the downfall of the human race is approaching are only what we are seeing in the outer world. Because we live on the physical plane, we notice whatever is happening there. But catastrophes can take place on the inner plane also. The undivine forces, the hostile forces, can also operate on the inner plane.Look at the conflict between faith and doubt. If doubt destroys our faith, then on the inner plane it is like the explosion of an atom bomb.
-6 August 1976
Question: Where Did God Originate?...
Question: Where did God originate?
Sri Chinmoy: God originated Himself out of His own Silence. He was One, but He wanted to become many in order to divinely enjoy the cosmic Game. You cannot enjoy a game with only one person. If you want to play a game, you need more players. So the Creator multiplied Himself and became the creation.
-May 1978
Question: How Did We Ever Lose God?...
Question: How did we ever lose God?
Sri Chinmoy: God is within and without. We have not lost God; it is only that we do not care for Him. If we do not want to eat a particular food, if we feel that it is not meant for us, then how can we go and blame others when we do not eat it? It is up to us to decide what to eat. Food, in this case, is God-realisation. It is there for us, but we do not want it. Right in front of us are both ignorance and knowledge. Unfortunately, we make friends with ignorance; that is why we live in constant doubt. Instead of remaining in the soul, we stay in the unlit physical mind, which does not know anything. Because the mind is all ignorance, what we say one minute the mind will doubt or forget the next minute. But if we remain in the soul, we will see and feel our constant oneness with God.
He who lives in the soul, he who cares for God and cries for God, will never say that he has lost God. The moment a child cries for something, he gets it from his father. If we cry for peace, light and bliss from our Eternal Father, then He will give them to us. If we cry for God, then He will come before us. So nothing is denied us; only we do not care for it. If we do not feel a sincere need for God, then we say that there is no God. But if we cry for God and feel our need for God, then we will see that we have never lost God at all.
-18 July 1978
Question: How Can We See Through God's...
Question: How can we see through God's Eyes?
Sri Chinmoy: We can see through God's Eyes only when we feel our conscious, constant and all-loving oneness with our Inner Pilot, the Lord Supreme. First of all, if we live in the mind or in the vital, we have to establish a free access to the inmost recesses of our heart. But if we already live in the heart, then we have to feel the Presence of the One who lives in the inmost recesses of our heart, our Lord Supreme. When we feel His Presence, at that time we have to go one step farther and feel our inseparable and eternal oneness with Him. Once we feel our inseparable, eternal one-ness with Him, then no matter what we do, we will feel that He is doing it in us, with us and through us and we are doing it in Him, with Him and through Him.
-26 November 1976
The following questions from delegates and staff members were answered on 20 May 1977.
The following five questions were answered by Sri Chinmoy on 20 May 1977.
The following group of questions was answered on 26 November 1976.
The following questions were answered in May 1978.
