Spiritual

Knowledge

2013 Swami Abhayananda

SPIRITUAL KNOWLEDGE
Swami Abhayananda
Anyone who has read widely, who is familiar with the writings of men living in
past centuries as well as contemporaries, knows that accurate knowledge regarding
the workings of both physical and psychological nature has increased rather than
declined over the centuries, and many an assumption from centuries ago is now
regarded as obsolete and inapplicable to our present understanding of things.
Indeed, much of what was once common opinion among philosophers and holy
men of an earlier period, is now viewed as archaic.
How unfortunate, therefore, that intelligent men who ponder the things of the Spirit
tend to place such unquestioning faith in the authoritarian utterings of those seers
who lived in very ancient times, or in a permanent literary legacy containing the
purported utterances of such men! In every lasting religious tradition, there is a
faithful reliance on the absolute verity of writings that originated in the minds of
men whose experience and learning was excellent in the time that they wrote
several millennia ago, but who can no longer be regarded as well-informed by our
present standards.
Spiritual understanding is frequently exempted from this kind of critical thinking
because, it is argued, spiritual realities, being eternal, are not affected by changing
views concerning the psychological or physical world. Yet we must recognize that
the written texts handed down as religious documents contain not only the personal
perspectives of their authors, but also reference events that modern empirical
scrutiny shows to have been sorely misapprehended, or simply erroneously
reported.
It would be appropriate therefore for sincere researchers in each of the religious
traditions to carefully re-examine even their most revered ancient books, with the
understanding and realization that these holy books were written in a time when
the world, let alone the distant galaxies, was little understood, when the notions
firmly held regarding creation, cosmology, human history, and the laws of nature
were yet simplistic, primitive, and often false. I am not suggesting, as extreme
elements among the secular materialists of today do, that we should throw out all
of what is good and true along with the bad and false in the various religious texts;
I am only suggesting that we re-evaluate our spiritual teachings in a way that better
satisfies our modern intellectual integrity, and better represents our present
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understandings. Much of our religious past is profoundly valuable; and sadly, much
of it is valuable only as an historical record chronicling the many speculative and
imaginative accounts left by men of past ages.
Real spiritual experience can profoundly challenge ones earlier perspective, and in
the search for a perspective that makes rational sense of our experience, we may be
introduced to various spiritual traditions whose roots date from a distant and
obscure past, and whose tenets, though absurd on their face, are well fortified by
the ardor and certainty of generations of the faithful. But antiquity doesnt
guarantee accuracy. And doctrines long reverenced are not necessarily true. In the
final analysis, it is not scripture that forms the foundation of our spiritual
knowledge, but the experience of our own direct inner vision. And it is upon that
spiritual vision we must rely. Every one of us is capable, with the right amount of
deliberate effort, study, and contemplation, of experiencing the wisdom, love, and
joy of the one divine Spirit, and of knowing it as the sole foundation of our being.
Spiritual vision is not obtained by means of the physical eyes, or any of the other
senses, nor through the imaginative or psychic faculty referred to as the minds
eye; but rather through a yet subtler faculty arising only in the higher reaches of
contemplative concentration, which is usually referred to as the spiritual eye or
the eye of contemplation. The spiritual eye sees, but without the physical sense
of eyesight or the deliberate projection of mindsight. The individuals interior
awareness is lifted beyond his/her mental field of awareness, as well as beyond the
awareness of worldly perceptions, as that awareness is transformed into a timeless,
spaceless awareness of identity with the limitless and eternal Consciousness from
which the universe emanates. That awareness transcends, not only the senses and
the imaginative faculty, but the sense of self, or egocentric identity, as well,
relieving the individual of the sense of a separate identity, so that his awareness is
of the all-inclusive One. The individual knows this eternal Consciousness as his
own, since there is no separate perceiver by which to see this Consciousness as
other.
It is this unitive experience that we must consider the only valid knowledge, proof
and confirmation of the divine Self, God, or Spirit. No other kind of vision is
appropriate to this kind of knowledge. It has long been accepted as axiomatic that
reason, in the form of philosophy or metaphysics, is powerless to provide a
credible proof (knowledge) of the existence of God, or the divine Self, since it is
limited to mental conceptions only; but God has been seen by many in the
unitive vision by the eye of Spirit.

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This unitive vision bears with it a unique kind of clarity, possessing an
unmistakable and indelible stamp of truth, that does not accompany the mere
physical or psychic kinds of vision. If it fails of the established standard for
knowing, then it must itself replace that standard, for it is the very essence of
knowing. However, insofar as I know, it is a knowledge that is non-transmittable,
and therefore undemonstrable. It may be verbally described, but that scarcely
constitutes the actual knowledge itself. It is a knowledge obtainable only via the
eye of Spirit. It should be added that the unitive vision must never be regarded by
its recipient as a matter of pride, for it is not a deed to which the individual may lay
claim. Such experience is brought about entirely by the One and only in the
absence of the individual ego.
The individual person is not meritorious in experiencing the unitive vision; rather,
it is only when he disappears that illumination occurs. Just as a dream-character in
a dream is dissolved in the waking consciousness of the dreamer, the sense of
separate selfhood (ego) is likewise dissolved in the wakeful Consciousness of the
One in whom that illusory ego arises. The One alone has absolute being, and alone
has the power of self-revelation. It is that One who is seen, and it is that One who
sees Himself in that unitive vision. Ultimately, no other may truly be said to exist
but that One who exists absolutely and forever.
Many have experienced that unitive vision who never sought it. It comes, at times,
when least expected, during moments of introspective reflection, or when viewing
a restful scene, or while feeling especially content or joyful. If the individual so
illumined is fortunate, that unitive vision will take up perhaps twenty minutes of
his life. But, for the rest of his life, his mind will hover about that vision, as a moth
about a flame, in search of a continual clarification of the illuminative
understanding obtained in that fleeting vision. It is in this way that he revisits the
unitive vision, basking in the contemplation of the One who illumined his heart.
It is there he finds the adoration, the bliss, and the sweet wisdom which that Self
revealed to him, ever living and ever new. It is not just a memory, but it is a lasting
presence in his life, benefiting him every moment, and shedding as well some little
benefit to others whom he touches with his words. That vision is a lifelong
treasure, filling his mind with a never-failing fountain of love and happiness and
the brightest consolations of wisdom. Though to the world he appears empty and
alone, he possesses within himself the fullness of the universe, and his solitude is
the blissful aloneness of the only One.
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