September 2019
What is Religion?
The Vedanta Kesari
48
R
Realising Spirit as Spirit eligion is the realisation of Spirit as Spirit; not Spirit as matter.1
We already saw in the Jan 2019 issue how Swamiji describes religion as realization. This month, he is specifying it by saying that religion is the ‘realization of Spirit as Spirit’, and not the realization of Spirit as matter. Why would anyone attempt to realize Spirit as matter? Is it even possible? Ah, but it is! This is a recurrent theme in Swamiji’s lectures – this tendency in man to idealize the real. We saw last month Swamiji saying: ‘There are two tendencies in human nature: one to harmonize the ideal with the life, and the other to elevate the life to the ideal. It is a great thing to understand this, for the former tendency is the temptation of our lives’.2 So, now the idea is clear: We all have the powerful tendency in us to realize the Spirit as matter. We shall overcome this tendency. Then what? Swamiji explains: ‘Religion is a growth. Each one must experience it himself. The Christians believe that Jesus Christ died to save man. With the Christians, it is belief in a doctrine, and this belief constitutes their salvation. With the Hindus, doctrine has nothing whatever to do with salvation. Each one may believe in whatever doctrine he likes; or in no doctrine. What difference does it make to you whether Jesus Christ lived at a certain time or not?
What has it to do with you that Moses saw God in the burning bush? The fact that Moses saw God in the burning bush does not constitute your seeing Him, does it? If it does, then the fact that Moses ate is enough for you; you ought to stop eating. One is just as sensible as the other. Records of great spiritual men of the past do us no good whatever except that they urge us onward to do the same, to experience religion ourselves. Whatever Christ or Moses or anybody else did does not help us in the least, except to urge us on. ‘The truly spiritual see Spirit as Spirit, not as matter. Spirit as such can never become matter. Spirit is always the same, changeless, eternal.3 ‘Have you realized that you are spirit? When you say, ‘I do,’ what is meant by that – this lump of flesh called the body or the spirit, the infinite, ever blessed, effulgent, immortal? You may be the greatest philosopher, but as long as you have the idea that you are the body, you are no better than the little worm crawling under your foot! No excuse for you! So much the worse for you that you know all the philosophies and at the same time think you are the body! Body-gods; that is what you are! Is that religion? ‘Religion is the realization of spirit as spirit. What are we doing now? Just the opposite, realizing spirit as matter. Out of the immortal God
