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Pujya Dr. K.C. Varadachari Complete Works Vol -1

Sri Ramchandra's Rajayoga: New Darsana : Part-2 :Psychology

Rings

  
It is an original discovery of Sri Ram Chandra that there are rings, which bind the individual. These rings seem to rise from about the Centre of God, and move towards the farthest limit of grossness in concentric spirals. The number of rings is said to be seven, and colourless at the beginning. They are said to be rings of splendour, which are certainly beyond the region of egoism, which arise later, after the splendour fades away. Then arise eleven circles of egoism, which are, as they move outward, more and more gross. They are also luminous, but as they move outward and away from the centre, they get individualized more and more from other similar movements from the Centre. The eighteen spiral rings now move towards the enfoldment of the outermost five circles or Rings. All these are of Nature, and reveal the structure and the process of organism-making.

This description of the individual's personality as comprising the five gross circles, eleven subtle circles, and finally the seven inmost circles around the central nucleus, or Centre, is not indicated in any earlier literature. Sri Ram Chandra holds that the form taken, as for instance, the human body, is due to the flattering and rounding of the spiral rings, so to speak, into this pattern of human form. By restoring them to their real condition or form, the continuous and uniform flow of energy is restored and the tensions of the organism are removed or destroyed. In other words, the rings are now in very bad shape, thanks to all sorts of activity, which are mutually restraining and effectively grossening one's nature. If we could but restore the rings to their real shape, or connect them with the central spiral continuum, then the sense of bondage can be lost; One is at peace.

Usually what is sought after is the complete removal of these rings so that one is finally freed from all process and movement. This may be called extinguishment of personality, called nirvana or emancipation. Sri Ram Chandra holds that this final extinguishment of personality does not take place except during the final pralaya or withdrawal of all souls into the Centre.

The individual pralaya proceeds only up to the point of dropping the rings completely. One continues to remain individuated and nearmost the Centre or God, getting directions from it for its own being or bliss or what ever that condition may be, since it is indescribable. How the souls which are free get their directions from the Centre is transcendental to man's ways of communication. It can be communicated only to those who reach such a high condition of crossing all the rings, and who are swimming in the Centre, after going beyond the central region. The picture of the individual thus can be visualized as in the diagram given in the book "Reality at Dawn" (p.25 first edition) reproduced here on page 294.

The description of each one of the rings is not given. Sri Ram Chandra says that most saints consider themselves to have been emancipated if they travel or cross over 1 1/2 Circles (the state of liberation lies between the second and third circle ibid., p.24). These five circles are the circles of Maya. Thus it is clear that most persons are even outside the circles of maya, and the travel in abhyasa takes its rise from the outermost of mayaic circles, and as one travels backwards and upwards one feels the sense of liberation increasing, so much so when one passes the second circle one feels almost liberated and beings to proclaim his liberated state. But this liberation itself is Maya for one senses power (another meaning of Maya), and liberation is a sense of power over lower forms of existence. But this is illusory power because it is not the ultimate goal, and one must discard power in order to be really free. The rings, thus, are finally to be crossed, and one should attain the state of Nothingness in order to be called truly a realized soul.

The categories of the several schools or darsanas do not fall into this kind of description. These twenty three circles or rings cannot be equated with the 23 tattvas of the Samkhya or Yoga schools. They seem to be the results of a New Vision.

The Rings themselves cannot even be considered to be like the concentric circles developing out from the Centre owing to the initial latent motion, or vibration called Thought or Manas, through this may be somewhat nearer the truth. Ksobh, or Vibration of Thought or First Mind, does in fact take this route towards the grossest manifestation of the more distant circles. The more distant from the Centre, the more gross is the element, and the nearer to the Centre, the more subtle. The vibrations are sensed more easily by the subtle than by the gross. Thus, as one advances towards the Centre, one becomes more and more sensitive to the Centre's existence. The gross manas becomes more and more subtle, and the manas becomes more and more subtle, and the manas becomes clearly the most important intermediate category, ranging from the most gross to the most superfine subtleness. Manas, therefore, is an indispensable category which is used to clear up the path towards the Centre.

Sri Ram Chandra, in meditation, takes up the Manas in the Heart and links it up with the Manas-lake or cit-lake, which has a subtler consciousness. This, in turn, is linked up with the higher centres or the Highest centre. This leads to the condition of Thoughtlessness, or the Void, but the experienced Voids of the lower centres are different from the Ultimate Nothingness.

When one crosses all these rings one is beyond all bonds and chains of evolution and involution.