The Purpose of Human Life

II

How various Saints have solved the mystery of life is the subject for today. The fact is that Truth is one, but the ways of expression may be different. Our ideal is Truth. Let us see what Swami Ji has to say on the subject:

Link your soul with Naam.

We are advised to connect our soul with the Word. It implies that our attention is presently linked with something other than the Word. What is meant by attention? It is consciousness, a state of awakening or awareness. We may call it attention, spirit, or soul. It is this Life-Current emanating from our self, soul, which acts as a driving force within us. Swami Ji asks us to link this current with the Word. Now, where is the source of these currents? It is at the seat of the soul between the two eyebrows. What happens at the time of death? Life withdraws from the feet and rises to the back of the eyes. The Power which is concentrated behind the eyes is our Real Self. After that power is withdrawn, the body is of no significance. This is the most important and mostly ignored subject.

In order to probe further into this subject, one has to realise that soul is an entity distinct from the body.

We have to learn and practise to withdraw the soul currents from lower centres of the body to the eye focus. This process is similar to the one undergone by the soul at the time of one’s physical death. We have to rise above body consciousness. The theoretical knowledge of this process is not enough. Practice is far more important. An ounce of practice is more than tons of theory.

So we have to link our soul with the Word. Let us now consider what the Word – Naam – signifies. The Word has two aspects. One is an epithet and the other is that Ultimate Power to which the epithet refers.

For example, water itself is one thing, but it is referred to by many names; e.g., water, aqua, H₂O , etc. Similarly, Truth is One; but sages have described it in various ways.

Guru Nanak says:

I want to sacrifice myself on all Thy names, oh Lord.

Guru Gobind Singh, the tenth Sikh Guru, compiled hundreds of Names of God in His work Jaap Sahib. These Names are in addition to those already mentioned in the various scriptures. Despite hundreds of Names, God is One.

Similarly, there are many religions; but their goal is One.

We have to understand the God-Power with the help of spoken Names. This is our first step. Though the name is not different from the Named, yet it seems so until the Named is actually contacted. A person tastes a mango and declares that it is sweet. But one who has neither seen a mango nor tasted sugar, cannot know how sweet it is.

Thus, to realise God is of utmost importance. We have to make a beginning with spoken names. It is unfortunate that people quarrel over the different Names of God as given by the founders of the various religions. All the Names refer to the supreme Lord; and, as such, they all deserve our respect. The real thing is the Power of God to which these Names refer. That Power is Eternal Truth. It is One, will ever remain One, and is called Naam or the Word.

The Word is the source of the entire creation and can be experienced only with the help of a Satguru – True Master.

Guru Nanak has explained this point lucidly in the Jap Ji:

Whatever has come into being is the creation of the Word.

The Word is the Power that exists in the minutest speck in the universe. That is the Divine Link that connects the body with the soul. When this Link breaks, it brings about physical death. It is the same Link which sustains the universe and higher Spiritual Planes. When this Divine Link is withdrawn, there is total dissolution.

Now, the question arises, if we are connected with the Divine Link, which is the point in the body at which the two meet?

Guru Nanak tells us that the Word can be contacted after one transcends the six chakras – ganglionic centres – and has reached the aggya chakra – behind and between the two eyebrows. The Divine Link can be established only there and not anywhere else in the body.

Rishi Patanjali as also other past Saints have explained this process. When one reaches the aggya chakra after rising above the six lower chakras, one is connected with the Celestial Sound Current, the Anhat sound, and merges into Sahasrar, the first Spiritual Plane.

The Anhat sound is the Divine Link; It is the Word, or the Divine Power, which is manifested in every human being. This is the primary source of all existence.

Naam, the Word, says Gurbani, is invisible, unfathomable, limitless, and sweet beyond description. It has an Everlasting Divine Intoxication and Bliss. Whosoever experiences It forgets all worldly pleasures.

The soul is a drop of the Ocean of All-Consciousness, but is covered by numerous sheaths of body, mind, and senses. So long as a man is engrossed in the material world, he remains unaware of the Divine Naam within him.

According to Gurbani, communion with Naam opens within a grand vista of Divine Light – the Light of God. Naam also refers to the Sound Principle – the Sound of unabounding joy.

Thus, there are two expressions of Naam – the God-Power – Light and Sound.

In the Vedas, Naam has been described as Udgit or Nad – Music of the Beyond. According to the Vedas, Nad has created fourteen spheres. Muslim sages call It the Kalma. They also believe that the Kalma has created fourteen tabaks, spheres.

Maulana Rumi once prayed:

Oh God, lead me to the place where conversation goes on without words.

Christ says:

In the beginning was the Word, Word was with God and Word was God.

The Gurbani says:

Naam has created the earth and the heaven. All Light has emanated from Naam. All creation has come into being from Naam which is resounding in all human beings.

The Word was there even before the universe came into being. The Word is thus the source of all creation.

Saints of all the religions have expressed parallel thoughts on the subject:

The Word has been the source of salvation to human beings during all the four Yugas.

Gurbani

God is Wordless, Nameless, and beyond description. When He came into being, It was called Naam, the Word, the Light-Sound Principle. One who communes with Naam is able to establish a contact with God.

Hafiz Sahib, a Great Persian Mystic Poet, says:

No one knows the abode of the Beloved, but it is certain that sound of bells comes from there.

If you follow the strain of sound, you will reach its source. Thus, the Word – Light and Sound – is the safest means to the end – the Way back to God.

To get in contact with the Divine Light, one has to rise above body consciousness by self-analysis. Only then a contact with the Divine Sound is possible. By contacting Naam one gets peace and Eternal Bliss.

Blessed are they who are linked with the Word, oh Nanak! Whosoever listens to the Eternal Music attains salvation.

Gurbani