The Master deals with nature of knowledge and ignorance in this Chapter and His revelations in this regard are indeed thought -provoking. The word knowledge, in common parlance, means awareness of facts relating to the environment in which one is placed and the objects and persons one comes across, the theoretical and practical understanding one has acquired of various subjects and the skills developed in handling things and situations as they arise in daily life. The philosopher would like to term it 'justified belief' to distinguish it from mere opinion. Philosophers have spent a few thousand years to find fool -proof methods of arriving at certain knowledge and its limits. Epistemology is the key word used by the philosopher for this field of endeavor. It is a firm belief amongst philosophers from ancient times that it is possible to apprehend the Real through pure reason.

By its stipulated nature, knowledge removes ignorance. Though a person may be possessed of verbal knowledge through study of a particular subject, say about the laws relating to buoyancy, he will be considered ignorant if he cannot swim in a river when the occasion demands. The nature of knowledge depends on the means or instrument through which it is gathered. The Master distinguishes between different kinds of knowledge, namely, physical, mental, material or spiritual.

Physical knowledge is the knowledge about the physical world gathered through the senses when they interact with the physical environment. Mental knowledge refers to the knowledge gained by the exercise of the mental faculties such as thinking, reasoning, imagination, memory and inference. Material knowledge relates to the knowledge of the properties of matter, as for instance, physical, mechanical, chemical, electrical, magnetic and so on obtained by carrying out investigations in the appropriate domain using suitable instrumentation. For proper ascertaining of the properties one needs to utilize mental faculties honed by education, training and exposure to the relevant field of specialization. It is not possible for a single individual to acquire complete and exhaustive knowledge of even one piece of matter in all its states of existence inclusive of its constituent parts even if he were to spend a lifetime of investigative effort. So varied and highly specialized have the various fields of investigation become that no single mind can dream of knowing all about a particle of sand not to talk about the infinitely vast material universe. Innumerable minds of calibre have been investigating the nature of matter and its basic constituents for more than two thousand years and still we are no- where near achieving the objective, though we have gained considerably by the partial knowledge obtained in the process.

To start with it was thought that matter was composed of indivisible atoms. Later it was found that matter is made up of at least three types of particles, i.e., proton, electron and the neutron. Today it is believed that there are more than one hundred and fifty fundamental particles, most of them extremely short-lived and are inferred to exist by indirect evidence such as through the traces left by them in the cloud -chamber- photographs of collision events in high speed particle accelerators. In the early part of the last century, it was discovered that matter exhibits a dual nature viz., of being a particle and as well as of a wave. Another important discovery has been that of the principle of uncertainty, namely, that it is not possible, for instance, to determine with equal accuracy the position of a particle and its momentum. The very process of determining one variable affects the accuracy of determination of the other. At the microscopic level, reality of the material universe seems to be explained by Quantum mechanics much better. According to this theory, fundamental units of matter, the atoms and their constituent particles can exist only in certain allowed states of energy; exchange of energy takes place in discrete quanta of light whose rate of vibration depends on the quantum transitions between the allowed states of energy. The understanding of these phenomena has been so good qualitatively and quantitatively that today's communication and computer revolution has been made possible through the design and construction of a myriad components utilizing the principles discovered as noted above.

Let us see briefly the means by which knowledge is gathered and ascertained at the mundane level. The physical and material knowledge is acquired through experience of and contact with the physical world. In its acquisition, living nature uses the sense organs, such as, organs of perception as those of sight, hearing, smell, touch and taste. In human beings the faculties of consciousness, reason, memory, language and writing skills have played a tremendous role in the explosive growth of knowledge about the world. The fact that fire is hot and it burns anything which comes in contact with it is not known till the observer happens to get close to it and hazards a contact with it. That will be a matter of direct experience or pratyaksha anubhava. If we developed faith in the words of our friend and he were to tell about the properties of fire, we take him at his words and say that we know all about fire or all that is needed to be known about it. This is called apta vachana.

Let us say we saw smoke emanating from a distance and we have seen earlier that smoke normally accompanies fire, we infer that there could be fire behind the smoke. This is called anumana or measure according to the dimensions of a known fact or phenomenon. Inference is not possible unless we can become aware of an experience, be in a position to summarize that in a capsule form into the words of a language we are familiar with, store it in a retrievable form, be able to find associations between constituents of a phenomenon and deduce presence of a part or a whole given the occurrence of one or more of the said constituents using our ability to recall the source experience. However, there is no foolproof inference as there is every possibility of correct premises but wrong conclusions due to faulty reasoning or the other way round, starting from false premises one may be led by a quirk of logic to the right conclusion. The subject of logic is a mine- field and even the most capable logicians fail to see light after marathon debates and profound reasoning and rarely reach the same conclusions from the same starting point.

We can see that in all the above- mentioned methods for obtaining knowledge, errors of judgement can creep in through omission or commission. It is known that any type of knowledge is a result of interpretation by the cognitive faculties brought into play by the instrumentality of the brain in man. Judgment as to the real state of affairs brought to one's attention is a very high order development seen in the sentient beings alone involving an intelligent synthesis of the outputs of the senses, a due processing of these with reference to prior experience while taking into account the relevance of the field of perception to the individual's current goals. It is at the bottom of all manners of knowing. At any point in this chain of processing we can have an incursion of untruth with or without our awareness, leading to the falsification of the finished item of knowledge obtained at the end.

Knowledge as discussed above is gathered or obtained through sensory means and the faculty of buddhi used in arriving at this kind of knowledge is the discursive type and rather mechanical in nature. The advanced computing machines of the day, which are also called the inference engines, function exactly in the same way. That is no wonder because it is the self- same intellect of like order is used in their design. This is the typical step by step counting and calculating approach using simple linear reasoning methods. Only a very limited range of natural phenomena can be comprehended by such methods and the disproportionate attention paid by human beings to these categories in nature is due to their immediate applications in successful conduct of mundane life of the physical nature. The knowing in the higher planes transcends ordinary logic or is supra rational and is made possible through our unique ability as humans to feel. It has been said that feeling is the language of God. For instance, though every one knows through hearing the scriptures that God is all pervading and would like to believe it, he is unable to do so and not only that, would cite the reason for such inability, his incapacity to feel that omni -pervasiveness. As Sri K. C. Narayana puts it in his commentary on the 'Efficacy of Sri Ramchandra's Rajayoga', we might say that knowledge, which is mental, has to percolate into the heart so that we can feel the content of that knowledge and behave accordingly.

In addition to the above, we use analogy (upamana), anubhava (imperience) and sruti (scriptural revelation) as means for gaining and validating knowledge.

Spiritual knowledge is direct immediate knowledge gained through divine intuitional insight and is regarded as the most superior form of knowledge. The Vedas or the sruti stand as the grand example of this type of knowledge. The word Veda itself comes from the root vid to know and it is a body of knowledge acquired through super-conscious perception. The Master is concerned chiefly with the manner in which the term, 'knowledge' is used with reference to spiritual knowledge. The way it is used leads to lot of misunderstanding and confusion. The range it covers as to the implied meaning extends from the baser level of common understanding to the higher reaches of inner enlightenment. For instance, a man who has learnt a few scriptures or recites choice Vedantic phrases such as, 'I am Brahman (Aham Brahmasmi)' claims to be enlightened. The masses also are prepared to accept him as such and hold such avowed Jnanis in high esteem and if he were to wear the ochre clothes in addition, he is elevated to the status of Jagat guru. According to the Master, Jnana in its real sense refers to the inner state acquired by a person by following a proper spiritual discipline. During the course of one's spiritual journey he passes through several knots or granthis, which are loosened and made to open by the application of the inner powers of his master. This enables the abhyasi to apprehend the various states of progressively refined consciousness or degrees of enlightenment corresponding to the knots. The real understanding starts developing as the knots start opening one by one. If one were to gain such knowledge through application of thought it will be artificial and of no avail.

In the book 'Path of Grace', a commentary on the Great Master's work 'Towards Infinity' brought out by the Sri Ramchandra Publishers, we find the description given by the Master of the key stages an abhyasi experiences while traversing any particular knot. These are really more and more refined states of the laya avastha in the knot in question. The first is characterized by free movement, saralata in the knot, followed by the state of mergence wherein he is saturated with the condition. But still awareness remains and when that too is gone he arrives at a state of settledness called sarupyata or identicality, a fully matured state of mergence. There is still a further refined state of identicality termed sayujyata where the impression of the state of merging and identicality also becomes extinct. The Master states categorically that only after one secures this state of sayujyata in a particular knot it can be said that he has secured complete knowledge of the knot. It can be also said that he has become Jnani up to that stage. In the words of Sri K. C. Narayana, the commentator of the work 'Towards Infinity', each knot in its real nature is an expression of divinity or rather divinity has expressed itself like that knot. There is an original divine purpose behind the expression of each knot and thus one has to ponder over the causal centre of every knot and merge in that realm to have full knowledge of that knot. This will facilitate his expressing himself as an offshoot of the divine in so far as that knot is concerned. The Master makes an interesting point here when He says that the knowledge thus gained at the different states helps by infusing the aspirant with a longing for the search for the Ultimate.

The interested reader is invited to read the book, 'Path of Grace' referred to earlier for further illumination on the subject of the various states of super-consciousness which open to the sincere, devotee who has surrendered totally to the Great Master. The Great Master Himself, having been structured by Samartha Guru, Lalaji Maharaj and chosen by Nature for her urgent task of spiritual regeneration, showed the practical possibility of living in the highest possible state of complete ignorance or total negation open to the human being. His life was an open book and showed that a God-realized person does not sit in a corner enjoying his own state of beatitude but comes out into the wide world and unceasingly works for the spiritual elevation of his fellow beings in the true spirit of service and sacrifice. He prepared during His sojourn on this earth and is preparing through His chosen instruments, so that they can abide in higher realms of super consciousness and thereby serve their fellow beings in the real sense. It has been adequately demonstrated by the Master and some of His capable disciples that Sri Ramchandra's Rajayoga is a science of practical spirituality and its practicants do not content themselves with mere preaching but are in a position to lead a life in the divine enabled as they are to do so by the transmitted divine consciousness of the Great Master.

There is an interesting observation of the Master that knowledge and ignorance are extremities of the same thing. They are not irreconcilable opposites. Ignorance graduates into knowledge almost imperceptibly even as knowledge greys into ignorance. The best analogy that comes to mind is the rise of dawn from the darkness of night and the shadows of the evening deepening into the darkness of night. It is all relative what one terms as knowledge or ignorance. As beautifully put by Rev. Dr.K.C.Varadachari in his talks on the subject, there is knowledge behind every ignorance and vice-versa. Every known law has its limits of applicability, indicating the grey areas which may be illumined by further research work unfolding a new order which subsumes the older law. The examples of Einstein's theory of gravitation versus Newton's theory and the Quantum mechanics versus Classical mechanics readily come to mind in this context in the domain of matter. But it is true that all of us are indeed obsessed with knowledge and it has been said that 'Jnanadeva kaivalyam', meaning thereby we can overcome bondage only through knowledge. It is also said equally emphatically that only through exclusive and uncompromising devotion the goal of life can be attained as uttered in the Gita (Bakthya tu ananyaya sakyam). And the Jnani learns after many a lives that unless he effects unconditional surrender he cannot reach the final state of release.

The Master as described in the foregoing has already declared what should be the criterion of real knowledge. All the same He discusses the traditional use of the terms of Vidya and Avidya. Normally we associate light with Vidya and darkness with Avidya. But our goal is not Light which is gone through in the intermediate stage; we have to move on to the state which is beyond Light and darkness. In the words of the Upanishadic prayer, 'Lead us from Unreality to Reality, Lead us from darkness to Light'. In Sri Ramchandra's Rajayoga we say,' Lead us from darkness to Grey', the grey of the Dawn. The Master says that we cannot have Vidya to the exclusion of Avidya; one implies the existence of the other. They are like the two poles of a magnet. We may say then that the veil of ignorance is torn when both of them are removed. According to the Master Avidya includes both Avidya and Vidya and terms this state as Tam, which is beyond both.

The state of Tam is the state of realization or the state of mergence in the Absolute or oneness with it. We move on from the crude level of ignorance, pass through knowledge, which is but an intermediary phase and move on finally to the state beyond knowledge. This state is termed by the Master as Complete Ignorance for lack of a proper word to describe this unique and highest condition. Normally to know anything we stand apart from it and gather information about it from various perspectives through appropriate instruments of knowing. This is really driven by our desire to be as objective about it as possible so that there will be as much agreement about the final conclusions amongst the community of observers. This is the essence of the scientific approach, which has caught the imagination of all inquirers of truth. The method has justified itself in terms of the results it has yielded in various spheres of knowledge. But the mystics have taught us that unless one merges himself or dissolves himself in the supreme object, it is not possible for him to realize it. This brings about a curious situation wherein the individuality of the inquirer has to be foregone for the realization of the objective. In this state of mergence we cannot determine whether we are in a state of knowledge (awareness of the state of knowing involving the separate existence of the knower, the known, and knowledge) or ignorance. It can be seen that this state transcends the two. As Master puts it, it is a state of not-knowingness, a state of latency or Tam. This state of not-knowingness is quite similar to the state of infancy, the state of unalloyed, unassuming and unsuspecting innocence filled with pure wonder and an infinite curiosity to know. It is to know for the sake of knowing with that feeling of awe and wonder forming the background, not with the idea to dominate or to exploit, to acquire and hide, be the first to know so that the late comer will put to disadvantage or sue for Intellectual Property Rights as the modern day gatherers of knowledge would like to do. The child filled with a piece of knowledge is brimming with innocent pride for having been the first to know but also cannot wait before it can be shared with the first human it comes into contact. The child who has become knowledgeable in some way is not conscious that it is a knower; the disease of the knower's egotism is a contagion it picks up or is forced to pick up much later as it comes into contact with the adult world, driven by fear, insecurity, greed and jealousy.

The Master digresses a little here to pass a comment on the worlds attained by souls of different kinds and calibre. The scriptures mention that the men of sinful deeds go to Hell and the ignorant reach Paradise perhaps through good deeds and the Brahma loka is reserved for the innocent. It is Jesus who said, 'Not until you become a child shall you enter the Kingdom of Heaven' and Dr.K.C.Varadachari puts it very aptly when he concludes, 'Not until you enter into the kingdom of God will you become a child'.

MEANS: TARKA, SHRUTI AND ANUBHAVA

The Master discusses next the means of arriving at knowledge. Philosophers have generally attempted to arrive at the inner core of things through reason (Tarka) instead of vision. We are all conscious that reason as popularly understood can fail us. Paraphrasing Rev Dr.K.C.Varadachari, we may say that it is only the yogi who has yoked himself to the Reality in its vastest and minutest forms in a spirit of supreme dedication can rise to the level of intuitional insight or the state of Darshana and see the things as they are without error or defect.

The Master discourages taking guidance from books as many times it can be misleading and be dangerous too. He emphasizes the need for practical experience or anubhava in the field, citing the instance that one cannot become a physician by mere reading of the names of medicines. He makes it clear that by reading books alone he would never have come up to the level of Ignorance which is the basic property of the Divine. A life of practicality is what is worth having. We should not be content with the curiosity about what is Realization but also strive to attain it.

The apparent contradiction in the Vedas has resulted in the emergence of the six schools of philosophy. But Reality or the unchangeable cannot be realized neither by reading, by reasoning nor by believing but only through super conscious perception. He Himself did not read the books as in the words of Viveka Chudamani,' Books are of no avail for Realization and they are not necessary after one has realized'. Whatever He has said or written is exclusively based on His anubhava, whatever might have been said on the subject by Sankara or Ramanuja. According to the Master, the merits in the Shastras can be said to be that they make one think by virtue of the inbuilt contradictions in them and offer methods and techniques for spiritual advancement to suit different levels of attainment, taste and mentality of the people in general.

We may thus see that the Master gives considerable importance to anubhava as a valid means of knowledge. But caution has to be exercised by the aspirant, who has to ensure that his chitta, buddhi, ahankar and manas are always in a state of purity through contemplation of the Holy Divine in a spirit of devotion and surrender. There are very efficacious techniques such as meditation on the points 'A' and 'B' in addition to the other daily practices suggested in the Sri Ramchandra's Rajayoga for maintaining the necessary purity so that the aspirant can rely on his anubhava. Further the practice of maintaining the spiritual diary and its periodic evaluation by his trainer brings a strong element of objectivity to the whole matter. In addition the reading of the condition of the aspirant by his trainer during the regular training sessions goes a long way in corroborating the evidence produced by the anubhava of the aspirant. A great example in this regard is the spiritual diary maintained by the Rev. Sri Ramchandraji Himself during His period of abhyas which was regularly evaluated by His Master and commented upon. This is indeed an invaluable contribution to the field of practical spirituality, something, which has never happened so far in the history of spiritual experience. It gives a lot of confidence to the novice practicant that if the Master could achieve the Goal in a lifetime he too can provided he brings the same sincerity, perseverance, faith in the Divine Master and a firm will to succeed. The Master's very transparent and sincere recordings in His diary show the pulls and pressures exerted by passion, anger, irritation and moods on Him and how He overcame all these obstacles by devotion, firm determination, constant remembrance and one pointed orientation to His Master. This spiritual auto-biography of the Great Master will serve as a beacon now and for ever to all the seekers on the very difficult path to perfection filled as it is with too many a trap and temptation.