Dr. Vijai S Shankar MD.PhD.
Published on www.academy-advaita.com
29 April 2018
The enlightened have declared that life is the timeless and thoughtless ‘Here and Now’. They have also said that life flows like a river. But to every man and woman, however, time and word is present in the here and now and life is full of interrupted words and is not a flow.
So what is the understanding of the enlightened, is the question?
A word is not present in every moment of daily life. If a word was indeed present in every moment of daily life, the mind wouldbe unable to recognise the word. It is also impossible for every moment to have a word within it.
It is impossible because in between a moment and the next is a moment as well. Therefore, if a word was present in every moment, the word would not be recognised by the human mind.
The reason why the mind would not be able to recognise the word, if every moment had a word, including the moment in between moments, is the fact of the moment in daily life.
The fact of the moment in daily life is that the moment in daily life is continuous, spontaneous, uncontrollable and unpredictable. A continuum does not have multiple moments in order to contain multiple words of a human language, but the continuous flow of life is a singular, moving moment. Also, the moment of numerical time present in any moment is not known by humans as yet.
To know the numerical time present in a moment is also impossible because a distinct, actual moment separate from the next cannot be determined, because there is no separation between moments.
What is present in life is a continuous, spontaneous uncontrollable and unpredictable sound of various intensities and qualities. In the human mind only particular sounds of varying intensity and quality appear as a word.
Now a word is made up of letters. The ‘here and now’ does not contain numerical time to be able to contain a letter for a word. This signifies that the ‘here and now’ is only sound with varying intensities and quality.
This implies that intermittently a word with a context, which does not actually exist as an actuality, is precisely manifested by the intelligence in life. This convinces man and woman that an actual word actually exists, while all that exists in any moment is only sound, which appears as illusory words with content and context.
This signifies that the waking state, with a word and without a word, is actually word-less, because the ‘Here and Now’ neither contains a letter nor a word with content and context.
This implies that a word is a spoken sound, because all that is present is a river of sound and also not even a part of a sound could be a word. A river is also a spontaneous, uncontrollable and unpredictable flow. There are no parts in a river and the continuous flow is also only sound, just as life is only a continuous flow of sound in light. This signifies that life is timeless and thoughtless and flows like a river with sound, just as the enlightened have rightly proclaimed.
Author: Dr. Vijai S. Shankar
©Copyright V. S. Shankar 2018
The transformation of a river of sound, which is revealed by enlightened beings to be all that is present in the here and now - where nothing else can be present - into letters and words, albeit illusory, is a wonder. Furthermore, this transformation into multiple letters and words by the intelligence of life is the totality of the illusory world that man inhabits. The proclamation of the wise, as gifted in this article, that life is a timeless and thoughtless flow, is the wonder of wonders.
Julian Capper, UK.
German Translator‘s Note:
Man wants positive words. Man wants to neither hear nor say negative words. Positive words make everyone happy. So when you say something negative about your situation, another or yourself, you are advised to say something positive instead. However, one should realize that the situation, the other, or oneself obviously has not changed the least while talking positively now. This finding shows that even negative words do not change the least of the situation, the other or oneself. It just feels better. Now you might think that a positive talk helps you to feel better. A deeper understanding, however, is the insight that man is totally dependent on positive and negative words from himself and others, although both obviously do not make up the situation. Life is the way it is, whether we talk positively or negatively. How real could words be? Man should think deeply about this in order to free himself from the dependence of words, regardless of whether they are positive or negative. Dr. Shankar in "Word 2" clearly shows the reader that every word, positive and negative, is not real in life. Anyone who understands this deeply, spontaneously stops being impressed by positive or negative words. The dependence of man on his illusionary world of words, which he considers to be reality, ends.
Marcus Stegmaier, Germany.