Maya—The Nature Of Illusion

Maya has three attributes: Satwa, Rajas and Tamas [goodness, passion and ignorance]. These attributes are just like chains used to tie up the ungrateful souls. Maya then applies a double case on the spiritual form of the soul. The double case is described by the words Linga and Sthul. The Mayik existence has twenty-four substances: the five elements (earth, water, fire, air and firmament); the five properties (sound, touch, sight, taste and smell); and the ten "Indrias," i.e. the five receiving senses (the eye, ear, nose, tongue and touch) and the five working organs such as hands, legs, etc. These twenty form the Sthul, or outer case.

The Mana, the Buddhi, the Chitta and the Ahankar, i.e. the mind, the understanding, the attention and the perverted ego, compose the Linga-deha, or inner case.

After encasing the spiritual form of the soul, Maya employs the fallen souls to work. Mayik work is composed of Karma, Akarma and Vikarma. Karma is conventionally good action done to obtain virtue, such as the performance of duties enjoyed by the Varnashram Dharma [the Vedic system of civilization]. Akarma is the omission to do duty. Vikarma is sin or crime.

Karma procures heavenly elevations up to the Brahma Loka planet. Akarma gives an unpleasant state on earth. Vikarma hurls down souls to hell. The fallen souls travel from body to body with their Linga-deha doing Karma or Vikarma, rising up to the heavens, and again coming down at the exhaustion of their virtues, going down to hell, and after suffering punishment, again rising up to the platform of work. Thus the state of the fallen souls is deplorable in the extreme. They enjoy and suffer massacre and murder, and go on in this state, sometimes smiling as the princess and sometimes suffering in ruin. The world is, therefore, a prison or a house of correction, and not a place for enjoyment as some people assert.

6. Certain souls are released from the grasp of Prakriti. Jivas are traveling in the path of Mayik existence from time out of mind, experiencing all sorts of pleasure and pain. How to get rid of this unpleasant state of existence? No, Dharma (performance of duty), yoga (development of powers of the Sthul and the Linga), Sankhya (the division of substances under the categories and simple knowledge that one is a spiritual being) and Vairagya (abnegation giving up all enjoyments of the world) are not the proper means by which one can actually get what he wants.

When a man comes in contact with a Vaishnava, whose heart has been melted by "Haribhaktirasa," it is then that he loves to imbibe the sweet principle of Bhakti, devotion, by following his holy foot-steps. By constant study of Krishna-Bhakti he slowly washes off his Mayik condition, and in the end obtaining his true nature, he enjoys the sweetest unalloyed Rasa, which is the ultimate status of the soul.

Satsanga, or the company of spiritual people is the only means to obtain the ultimate object of man. Bhakti is a principle which comes from soul to soul, and like electricity or magnetism in gross matter, it conducts itself from one congenial soul to another. The principle of Bhakti is sincere and entire dependence on the Deity in every act of life. The principle of duty is no part of Bhakti, as it acts as gratitude for favor obtained and it works like an obligation which is contrary to natural love. The principle of morality in the mortal world, though good in its own way, does scarcely give spiritual consequence in the end. Faith in the supreme beauty of the Deity, a desire for the eternal unselfish service of that Being and a consequent repulsion of every other thought of pleasure or self-aggrandizement are the three principles which constitute Shraddha, or actual hankering after Bhakti. Bhakti by nature is Ananya, exclusive.

Is it chance, then, which brings Bhakti? No, Sukriti, or good work, is the prime moving principle. Good work is of two classes. One class, passing as morals, includes those works which bring virtue and aggrandizement. The other class of good work includes all acts which have a tendency to bring spiritual culture. This latter class of good work brings one in contact with a sincere Vaishnava, from whom one at the first imbibes Shraddha, or faith in spirit, and being then capable of receiving Bhakti, one obtains a flash of that principle from the Vaishnava who is the actual Guru of the man.