| Discourses On Gita By Acharya Vinoba Bhave |
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| Discourses On Gita |
| BHAKTI : SAGUNA AND NIRGUNA |
| Both are one - personal experience 28. Therefore, when we begin to describe the difference between the saguna and the nirguna worshipper, it becomes difficult. In the end, saguna and nirguna become one. Thourgh the stream of bhakti springs from the saguna, it reaches nirguna in the end. Here is an old story. I had gone to Vaikom to observe the Satyagraha there. I remembered the geographical fact that Shankaracharya's birth place was on the border of Malabar. I had a feeling that Shankara's village, Kaladi, was somewhere near. I asked the Malayali gentleman who accompanied me. He said, "It is some 10 or 12 miles from here. Do you want to go there?" I said I did not. I was going to see the Satyagraha in progress, and it did not seem proper to go elsewhere. So on that occasion I did not go to that village. Even now it seems to me that I was right in not going there then. But that night, when I went to bed, that village of Kaladi and the image of Shankaracharya stood before my eyes again and again. I could not sleep. That experience is still with me, as fresh today as it was then. Again and again that night, I thought of Shankaracharya - of power of his jnana, his divine certitude in advaita, the extraordinary glowing vairagya; non-attachment, which convinced him that samsara, this phenomenal life was all false, of the majesty of his language and the boundless help I have received from him. All night-long these images stood before me. Then I
realized how nirguna is filled to the brim with saguna. Even seeing him face to
face would not have evoked such love. Even nirguna is filled with saguna.
For the most part, I do not write letters to friends to inquire about
their welfare. But even when I do not write to a friend, the thought of him is ever present, it fills my
mind. Thus, saguna lies hidden in nirguna. Saguna and nirguna are indeed one. Placing an image
before us and worshipping it with visible outward service on one hand, and on the other, being constantly concerned inwardly |
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