Education is a Process of Enlightenment - 5. Swami Krishnananda.

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Students of 18th batch Vedanta course of Sandeepany Sandhanalaya Mumbai along with their Acharya Swami Tejomayananda and ashram residents installed Lord Ganesha with lots of fervour and fanfare.

9.10.2021

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Friday, September 10, 2021. 6:48. AM.
(Spoken on July 26, 1976.)
Post-5.
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Students of 18th batch Vedanta course of Sandeepany Sandhanalaya Mumbai along with their Acharya Swami Tejomayananda and ashram residents installed Lord Ganesha with lots of fervour and fanfare.

9.10.2021

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Today-Vinayaka Chathurthy.

Indian metaphysics makes out that what we call matter is an expression of the Universal Spirit, and so matter is an external object only to the individual mind and not really from its own point of view. From the point of view of Indian culture we are told that what we call matter and mind are like two arms of the Universal Absolute. They are projections of the same Universal Substance from two different angles of vision, and this is the ultimate reality of things. The ultimate reality is neither the individual mind nor the material object. Both these are expressions of something altogether transcendent. The transcendent being, which is the reality, manifests itself partially as matter outside and partially as mind inside, and it is very clear from this analysis that everything should be integral to and a part and parcel of this Universal Being.

Education is, again to come to the point, a gradual process of approximation of oneself to the reality of the spirit. The more we come near to this ultimate reality, the more are we educated. Now, coming near to it does not mean coming physically near it as we come near a physical object. The very fact that it is universal shows that it is not in space and not in time, and therefore, it is not physical proximity that we are speaking of but an internal enlightenment. Education is, therefore, a process of enlightenment, and not contact with things.

Now I revert to the point that in the state of deep sleep we existed as an essence of spirit or consciousness. This Universal Being was peeping through our personality in the state of deep sleep. Just as the vast ocean may appear as a small wave on its surface, our personality rises in the waking state as a wave from this Universal Being, and when we awaken into physical consciousness, we forget the ocean that we were in sleep. When we come up to the body level in waking consciousness, we are tied to an ego personality which makes us forget the oceanic background behind us.

So education, to again come to the point, is a process of becoming more and more universal in comprehension. Thus, education includes every level of knowledge and every branch of learning. We cannot be merely physicists, chemists, biologists or mathematicians and call ourselves educated. These are only informative methods of educating oneself without gaining insight into the nature of things. True education is communion with reality by degrees, so if we are to be really called cultured and educated, even in the minutest degree, there must be a communion with reality.

To be continued .....

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