Jnana Yoga

God has three eyes. Their names are Bhakti, Karma and Jnana. Bhakti wants to live in its Father's most intimate Truth. Karma wants to live in its Father's all-pervading universal Truth. Jnana wants to live in its Father's transcendental Truth.

The man of devotion needs God's protection. The man of action needs God's guidance. The man of knowledge needs God's instruction.

The Bhakta's faith in God and the Karma yogin's love for humanity do not interest a Jnana yogin, much less inspire him. He wants nothing but the mind. With his mental power he strives for the personal experience of the highest Truth. He thinks of God as the Fount of Knowledge. He feels that it is through his mind that he will attain his Goal. At the beginning of his path, he feels that nothing is as important as the fulfilment of the mind. Eventually he comes to realise that he must transcend the mind if he wishes to live in the Supreme Knowledge.

Life is a mystery. So is death. A Jnana yogin wants to fathom these two apparently insoluble mysteries of God's creation. He also wants to transcend both life and death and abide in the Heart of the Supreme Reality.

Man lives in the sense world. He does not know whether this world is real or unreal. An ordinary man is satisfied with his own existence. He has neither the thinking capacity nor the sincere interest to enter into the deeper meaning of life. He wants to escape the problems of life and death. Unfortunately, there is no escape. He has to swim in the sea of ignorance. A Jnana yogin alone can teach him how to swim across the sea of ignorance and enter the Sea of Knowledge and Light.

A Jnana yogin declares: Neti, neti. "Not this, not this." What does he mean? He means that there is a higher world than this sense-world, a higher truth than this earthbound truth. He says, in a sense, that there are two opposing parties. One party consists of falsehood, ignorance and death. The other party consists of Truth, Knowledge and Immortality. While uttering "Neti, neti" he asks man to reject falsehood and accept Truth, reject ignorance and accept Knowledge, reject death and accept Immortality.