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<p align="right" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align:center;line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0">&nbsp;</p>
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<b
style='mso-bidi-font-weight:normal'><font size="4">Buddha and Shankara</font><o:p></o:p></b></p>
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16.3pt;mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'><i>
<span
style='font-size:18.0pt;'><o:p>&nbsp;</o:p></span></i></p>

<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center;line-height:150%;
mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>(1)</p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;line-height:150%;mso-pagination:
none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'><o:p>&nbsp;</o:p></p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:.25in;mso-line-height-alt:
11.75pt;mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>To
escape from life is a teaching based on the view that life is an illusion. The
teaching began with Buddha. Buddha said that life or existence is the fruit of
desire and that there was only one way of getting out of the misery, namely, to
go out of existence. Shankara continued in that line. He added, however, that
existence was not merely the fruit of desire, but that it was altogether an
illusion and that so long as one lives in that illusion, one cannot realise the
Divine. For him the Divine – the Supreme Divine – did not exist. I believe his
view was something to that effect. In any case, for the Buddha there was no
God.</p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:11.5pt;mso-line-height-alt:
11.75pt;mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>Both
of them came in contact with something true and real. Buddha had surely an
inner contact with something which, in relation to the outer life, appeared to
him as non-existence and in this non-existence all the consequences of
existence disappeared. There is indeed such a state. And it is said that if
you remain in that state for more than twenty days, you are sure to lose your
body. I believe it is so, if the condition becomes exclusive. But also it can
be an experience that remains behind, exists in a conscious way and yet not
exclusively. In other words, the contact with the world and the outer
consciousness is maintained and supported by something which is independent of
them and free. It is a state in which you can make truly a great progress in
your external consciousness; for then you can detach yourself from everything
and act without attachment, without preference, in an inner freedom that
expresses itself in the outer life. Once you have attained the inner freedom,
this conscious contact with the eternal and the infinite, you must return to
<o:p>&nbsp;</o:p></p>

<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center;text-indent:11.5pt;
line-height:150%;mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:
none; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>
<span style='font-size:10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:12.0pt;'>Page –
104<o:p></o:p></span></p>

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<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;mso-line-height-alt:11.75pt;
mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>action
without losing that consciousness and allow it to influence the whole of the
consciousness turned to action.</p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:10.05pt;mso-line-height-alt:
11.75pt;mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>That
is what Sri Aurobindo calls bringing down the Force from above. That way lies
the only chance of changing the world; for you seek there a new Force, a new
domain, a new consciousness and you put that in contact with the external
world. Its presence and its action will bring changes inevitably, a total
transformation, we hope, in the external world.</p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:10.05pt;mso-line-height-alt:
11.75pt;mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'><o:p>&nbsp;</o:p></p>

<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center;line-height:150%;
mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>(2)</p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;line-height:150%;mso-pagination:
none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'><o:p>&nbsp;</o:p></p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:10.55pt;mso-line-height-alt:
11.75pt;mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>There
is no doubt that Buddha had the first part of the experience; but he never
thought of the second part, for it was contrary to his own theory. That theory
was that one must escape. And it is obvious that there is only one way of
escaping and that is to die. And yet, as he had said it himself very well, one
may die and yet remain attached to life and continue to be in the cycle of
rebirths without having the liberation. As a matter of fact, it is through the
successive sojourns upon earth that one grows till one arrives at this liberation.
For him the ideal is that where the world exists no longer. It is as if he
accused God of having committed an error by creating a world and the only thing
to be done is to repair the error by annulling it. Naturally, being thoroughly
reasonable and logical, he did not admit the existence of God. But then by whom
was the error committed? When and how did it come about? He never answered
these questionings. He simply said that the world began with desire and with
the end of desire it must end.</p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:12.0pt;mso-line-height-alt:
11.75pt;mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>He
was on the verge of saying that the world was purely subjective, that is to
say, a collective illusion, and if the illusion ceased the world would also
cease. But he did not go so far. It was Shankara who took up the line and
completed the teaching.</p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:.15in;mso-line-height-alt:
11.75pt;mso-pagination:none;tab-stops:106.05pt;mso-layout-grid-align:none;
text-autospace:none; line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>In the more ancient wisdom, however, if one goes back to
the teaching of the Vedic Rishis, for example, one finds no idea of escape from
the world; they sought a realisation upon earth and they even conceived of a
golden age when this realisation would be achieved.<span style='mso-tab-count:
1'>&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; </span>.</p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:.15in;mso-line-height-alt:
11.75pt;mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>
It is without doubt since the teaching of Buddha that the idea of escape came 
in; and that has gradually undermined the vitality
<o:p>&nbsp;</o:p></p>

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mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>
<span
style='font-size:10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:12.0pt;'>Page – 105<o:p></o:p></span></p>

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<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;line-height:150%;mso-pagination:
none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>of the country for it
meant an endeavour to cut oneself away from life. The outward reality became a
false illusion and one should have nothing to do with it. The natural result
was that one cut oneself away from the universal energy and so vitality went on
diminishing, and with diminishing vitality, all possibility of terrestrial realisation also diminished.</p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;line-height:150%;mso-pagination:
none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'><o:p>&nbsp;</o:p></p>

<p class=MsoNormal align=center style='text-align:center;line-height:150%;
mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>(3)</p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;line-height:150%;mso-pagination:
none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'><o:p>&nbsp;</o:p></p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:.15in;mso-line-height-alt:
11.75pt;mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>Some
say that the Buddha was an Avatar, others say he was not.</p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:12.7pt;mso-line-height-alt:
11.75pt;mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>To
use the names as known in India, I think it is the Avataras of Vishnu (the
aspect of the Divine that builds and preserves), who come to prove that the
Divine can live upon earth; whereas, each time that Shiva has manifested (the
aspect that works to transform and destroy), it was in persons who have tried
to fight against illusion and demolish what existed.</p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:12.45pt;mso-line-height-alt:
11.75pt;mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>I
have reasons to think that 'the Buddha manifested something of the Shiva
power. It was the same compassion and comprehension of all misery and it was
the same force that destroys, evidently with the intention of transforming, but
destroying more than constructing.</p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:12.0pt;mso-line-height-alt:
11.75pt;mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>His
work does not seem to have been very constructive indeed. It was necessary to
give a practical training to man not to be egoistic. In that way it proved to
be useful.</p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:11.5pt;mso-line-height-alt:
11.75pt;mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>But
taken in its fundamental principle it has not helped much in the transformation
of earth and earthly life. It has not encouraged the descent of a higher
Consciousness into earthly life; instead it has very strongly encouraged the
separation of the Consciousness, which he said was the only truth, from all
external expression.</p>

<p class=MsoNormal style='text-align:justify;text-indent:11.0pt;mso-line-height-alt:
11.75pt;mso-pagination:none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none; line-height:150%; margin-top:0; margin-bottom:0'>And
as to the existence or manifestation of the Divine upon earth, they who
believed in Buddha have now made him a God. You have only to look at the
Buddhist temples and all their divinities to know that human nature has always
the tendency to deify what it admires.<o:p>&nbsp;</o:p></p>

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<span
style='font-size:10.0pt;mso-bidi-font-size:12.0pt;'>Page – 106<o:p></o:p></span></p>

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