Baba Somanath Commenting on a Mystic Hymn (Bhajan) of Sant Ravidas
Ravidas: “I have sung the Lord’s praises over and over, but now of whom should I sing?
The One who is singing resides within me.
As long as you are aware of the body and its desires, you will go on crying out for help.”
Baba Somanath on Surat Shabd Yoga, Inner Light and Sound Meditation practice making it possible in meditation to transcend the realm of the five senses and begin the exploration of the inner regions beyond coming to know yourself as a ray or spark of the Divine, a soul-drop from the Divine Ocean of Love:
“As long as you are aware of the body and its desires, you go on crying out to the Lord for help. As long as you think that God Almighty is something separate from you, then, in order to reunite with Him, you go on praising and glorifying Him; you sing of His qualities and describe His greatness. But when you rise above all thoughts of the body, when every desire is removed, then you are all alone. You are soul — untrammeled by the body, free of birth and death, detached from mother, father, and all the worldly relations. As long as you remain attached to the body and dominated by pride, you will continue to be bound to mother and father, friends and relations; you will be caught in the love for spouse and children; you will go on thinking of yourself as a man or a woman. But as soon as you cast aside the love for the body and the selfish desires of this world, then you will be freed from the fetters of this material realm — now and forever. Ravidas Ji is revealing a profound truth to us.
Sant Ravidas: “When the mind loses itself in the Shabd [the sound current] and all the desires of the body disappear, who remains to sing the Lord’s praise?”
Baba Somanath on merging into the Divine Light, and the Sound, how the true bhajan — listening to the Sound Current — is the hymn of the Divine singing within you, reverberating within you:
“When the mind becomes absorbed in the One Primal Lord, when it contacts the Shabd and becomes united with it; when it merges into the Light and becomes the form of the Light, then who remains to sing the Lord’s praise? There is no more “you”. When you have united with the Lord, you have no existence separate from Him. So, who is singing praises and whose praises are they singing? As long as you think you are separate from the Lord, then you yourself sing His praise and glory, and you yourself hear that praise. You are the singer, and you are the listener. But when you have merged your individual identity into the One who is the All-Doer, when you have become His very form, then who remains to sing His praises?”
Sant Ravidas: “When you rise above desire, you reach the Highest Realm; then you attain the true happiness.”
Commentary by Baba Somanath: “When you remove desire from your within, then you become the form of tranquility. No cravings remain within you. When water becomes still, then no waves can arise. But when the water becomes agitated by the wind or by any other currents that would disturb its equanimity [equa-nimity], then waves and ripples form. We chase after those waves, and following wave after wave, we continue to take birth. Friend, think about it; what is the nature of a wave? It is made up of water. And what is the nature of water? It is mercurial — ever-changing.
“So, as long as the waves of desire keep arising in our mind, they will shape our understanding and our intellect. All our actions will be driven by those waves. We will create karmas to fulfill our desires, and then we will become bound fast by those very karmas.
“But when we reverse the trend of our thoughts, from where can those waves arise? Then we enter the field of Truth. When we absorb our thoughts in Truth then no desires can come up, and when desire is removed, we cease creating karmas to achieve those desires. When desire controls us, then we create more karmas to gain the object of our desire, and our karmas keep us bound. When desire is removed, we become free of karma. Then we gain true happiness.”
— Baba Somanath
