July 17, 2023
yo mām ajam anādiṁ ca vetti lokamaheśvaraṁ
asaṁmūḍhaḥ sa martyeṣu sarvapāpaiḥ pramucyate (X-3)
X/3/. He who knows me as unborn and beginningless, as the great Lord of the worlds, he, among mortals, is undeluded and
liberated from all sins.
Swamiji's Commentary
What is God’s own knowledge of himself*? What is God’s wisdom concerning himself? First, he is unborn and, therefore, beginning-less; and second, he is the great Lord of the worlds, or planes of consciousness or viewpoints. Here is an interesting thesis, antithesis, synthesis and transcendence. God is unborn and is not involved in all these passing appearances or phenomena. Who, then, is the controller of these phenomena which, by their orderliness and purposefulness, suggest such a governor? It is God. He is not involved in them, yet they do not function independently of him! Shall we, then, compare God to a despotic ruler who whimsically controls the destinies of peoplewithout getting involved in their miseries in any way? Oh, no! That would leave no room for his great compassion and love, which virtually ‘compel’ him to serve those who are devoted to him. He is very intimately conscious of the problems and strivings of mankind and, therefore, whenever the balance of right-and-wrong is greatly upset, he incarnates himself.
God’s own nature keeps the entire universe vibrating and scintillating, but in that there is neither an action nor an actor. In other words he is not limited to unity, mere infinity (as opposed to finitude), or transcendental (as opposed to sensible) nature. He is one; he is many; he is one in many; he is many in one; and he is that inexpressible ‘something’ which we all try to express in various ways.
Hence one who realizes God as this, that, both, neither, and that which remains when all pairs of opposites have been affirmed, denied and transcended (by fusion), is never deluded. He is free from sin, for if sin is forgetfulness of God, he never forgets God!
* ("himself") It is worth noting that Swami Venkatesananda also was fervently into celebrating "Durga" (the "Mother" or feminine aspect of the Divine), and earnestly worhipped the femine aspect as divine. We make mention of this to point out that it would be inaccurate to attribute any notion that God is masculine or feminine when reading the above passage. Those that knew Swami Venkatesanand came to know that there was no such tendency in Swami Venkatesananda to view God as specifically masculine. Please keep that in mind in other readings where the masculine pronoun pops up. That fact that it used above bears no relivance, and has no relivance attached to its use.