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YOUR QUESTIONS ANSWERED: F.A.Q. 17 |
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THE TRUTH ABOUT CREATION QUESTION: How was the World created according to
Yoga? ANSWER: One of the most important questions that
an intelligent person can ask is, How was the World created or, in different
terms, What is the World made from? The reason why this is so important is
because it influences the way in which the believer views the World and lives
his life. For example, if we get the wrong impression about a person
when we first meet him, it will affect the way we relate to him later on.
Similarly, if we get the wrong view about the World from the outset, we can
hardly get anything else right in life. This is why there is so much
confusion in the World today, in particular when it comes to religious
matters. Indeed, many religious teachings are just man-made inventions
that are conducive to irrational thinking and create much suffering in the
World. Irrational beliefs lead to irrational actions. It is our duty, therefore, to expose such errors of belief
in order that Mankind may return to the True Faith and Righteousness may be
re-established on Earth. Eastern Wisdom vs. Western Dogma There are two fundamentally opposed views on the subject of
Creation. The older, Eastern Traditions of Yoga, Hinduism and Buddhism
say that the World was made out of the Creator Himself. The World therefore
consists of the same substance as the Creator (that is, Intelligence or
Consciousness). By contrast, the newer, Western Traditions of Judaism,
Christianity and Islam maintain that the World is made out of nothing. How
can these two apparently contradictory views be reconciled? First, we must understand that there is a difference between
what people believe and what Scripture says. Second, a further distinction
must be made between what Scripture appears to be saying and what it really
says on closer examination. In the case of the Eastern view (Creation out of
the Creator), the situation is very clear. Eastern Scriptures say that
"All this was born of God", "God became all this",
"This whole World is pervaded with beings that are part of Him",
"He is hidden in all things" "All this is perceived (or
projected) by Shiva within Himself", "This World, which is a mass
of thought, is thought by Him, and in Him it disappears" (see Shvet.,
Maitri Upanishads, Shiva Purana, etc.), and this is also interpreted as such
by their followers. In the case of the Western view (Creation out of Nothing) the
situation is rather more obscure. The fact is that neither the Jewish, nor
the Christian, nor the Muslim Scriptures actually say that the World was
created from nothing. And yet, in the year 1215, the Christian Church declared
Nothing to be the substance out of which God created the World: "We
firmly believe and openly confess that there is only one true God, the one
principle of the Universe, Creator of all things visible and invisible,
spiritual and corporeal, Who from the beginning of time and by His omnipotent
power made from nothing creatures both spiritual and corporeal,
angelic and human" (Fourth Lateran Council, Canon 1). That this cannot be so, even a child can see. A Spiritual
creature such as an Angel, for example, is, by definition, made of Spirit and
not of Nothing. To maintain that Spirit can rise out of nothing is to divest
it of its true value and meaning. Moreover, since Angels are admitted to be
God's own Powers, how can anyone say that they were created from nothing?
Such a stance, therefore, is manifestly wrong because it is contrary to Truth
and because it creates confusion in the mind of sincere Seekers of Truth. Strictly speaking, Nothing means no-thing, that is to
say, an inconceivable "something" that is non-existent. And if it
doesn't exist, then it has no substance, no value, no meaning, and nothing
whatsoever can be said about it, let alone create things from it. If we were to accept - for the sake of argument - that God
created the World out of Nothing, this would mean that the Nothing existed
prior to the World. If that is so, then the question arises as to whether the
Nothing (a) has always existed or (b) was only created prior to the Creation
of the World. If (a), then it must be Eternal. But this cannot be since the
only Eternal Reality is God. If (b), then it must be explained how or from
what the Nothing was created. Was it created from another Nothing, perhaps?
If so, where did that other, earlier Nothing come from? Thus the proponent of Nothing drives himself into a corner
from where there is no escape. He must either openly admit defeat and accept
the fact that the World is God's Own Projection or Extension into manifest
existence, or he may attempt to avoid defeat by interpreting "from
Nothing" as intended to mean a stage at which nothing was yet created.
However, this interpretation would refer only to a state of being prior to
Creation without describing the substance from which the World was created.
Hence it does not constitute proof for the purposes of our investigation. In short, the Out-of-Nothing position is untenable and it must
be admitted that the World cannot have been created from Nothing but must
have been created from Something. All we need to establish is what
that Something is. There are two conditions that must be fulfilled in
this process. Firstly, the investigation must be conducted on the basis of
Scriptural evidence and secondly, the result must be acceptable to rational
people. Beginning with the first condition, we may observe that all
major religions or their Scriptures, admit that (1) in the beginning, God
alone existed and (2) everything comes from God. Now, if nothing else existed apart from God (not even
the Nothing discussed above) then He must have created the World out of
Himself. To say that the World was created from something other than
God, would give rise to a whole string of problems of which we may enumerate
a few: (1) it would demand an explanation as to what that Something is, where
it comes from, what are its attributes, etc.; (2) it would amount to denying
the Unity of Life; (3) it would force God to assume a limited position to
make place for a second Reality; (4) it would make God dependent on external
factors and undermine His Omnipotence; (5) it would make the Creation
fundamentally different from God and hence incapable of experiencing Unity
with the Creator. And last, but not least, such a position would contradict
the Scriptures and thereby disqualify itself as Scriptural teaching. On the other hand, if we admit that the World was indeed
created by God out of Himself, then the following will happen: (1) we will
remain true to the evidence of Scripture; (2) we will be true to the Unity of
Life; (3) we will be true to the Supremacy and Omnipotence of God; (4) we
will be true to Reason which was given to us by God for the purpose of
finding Truth; (5) we will rest assured that, being consubstantial with, or
essentially of the same substance as, God we are capable of experiencing
Unity with Him. Finally, we will establish harmony between all the various
religions of the World. All this would be a formidable accomplishment indeed,
and an unparalleled contribution to Unity and Peace on Earth! We have already observed that nowhere do the Scriptures state
that God created the World out of Nothing. So let us see what the Scriptures
really say. Says the Bible: "God is Light and in Him is no darkness at
all" (1 John, 1:5); "All things were made by Him; and there was
nothing without (outside of, beside) Him. In Him was Life and the Life was
the light of men" (John 1:3-4). The Essenes of Qumran, an important
faith originated in pre-Christian The Quran says: "All things in Heaven and on Earth are
from Him and to Him all things return" (3:109); "Whichever way you
turn there is the Face of God: He is Omnipresent and All-Knowing"
(2:115). And again the Bible: "There is but One God, the Father
(Creator), from Whom are all things and we in Him" (1 Cor. 8:6);
"In Him all things hold together" (Col. 1:16-17); "In Him we
live, and move, and have our being" (Acts. That God created the World out of Himself is even more clearly
expressed in the Scriptures of the Ancient Egyptians, where it is said:
"I am a Spirit who came into being and was created out of the Body of
God, I am one of the Gods who dwell in the sunshine, whom God created from
His Own Flesh (that is, out of Himself)", etc. (The Chapters of Coming-forth
by Day). Since the Egyptian is the oldest among Western traditions, it
is also the closest to the Original Revelation which today is most faithfully
represented by the Eastern (Indian) faiths, having only survived in a diluted
and often misinterpreted form in the West. This Original Revelation (Adi
Dharma) teaches that God created the World out of Himself, there being
nothing else beside Him. The fact is that God is Light: the Light of Knowledge,
of Consciousness, of Intelligence. And there is nothing else beside. Since we are
created out of that Light, this means that Man and the World are
consubstantial with God, that is, consisting of essentially the same
substance as God. Are we not intelligent beings and the Creation of the One
Supreme Intelligence? We are lights from the Light of God. Or, as Scripture
declares, we are "sparks from the Divine Light". The Scriptures of Ancient Egypt likewise say: "I am a
Great One, the son of a Great One, I am a Flame, the son of a Flame. I indeed
am the Great God, Lord of Eternity". Again, since nothing exists apart
from the Light of God, it follows that all created things come into being,
exist and pass away, within that Light. Is God not Omnipresent? Is He not
everywhere? Wherever we look, there is God, manifested as a multitude of
things. This position is in full agreement with Eastern, Dharmic
(Dharma-based) traditions such as Yoga, Hinduism and Buddhism which teach
the Unity and essential Identity of Man, World and God. As we have just
shown, it is also in agreement with the Scriptures of the Western faiths.
Those who claim that God created the World out of Nothing or from a substance
other than Himself or that we exist somewhere outside of God, contradict not
only reason but also their own Scriptures and create problems that are as
unnecessary as they are impossible to solve. Now the purpose of true religion is not to create
problems but to solve them. And this is exactly what Yoga with its insistence
on Absolute Unity does. Even modern Science is beginning to accept the
essential Unity of everything. Indeed, Reality can only be known from the
perspective of Unity. A divisive, fragmentary perspective can only result in
fragmentary knowledge of Reality. Therefore, the perspective of Unity alone
enables us to correctly understand all religious traditions of the World and
recognise the One Eternal Truth behind their superficial differences. The Unitive Perspective of Yoga even makes sense of the
Western Creation-out-of-Nothing view. From the perspective of Yoga, this view
simply represents a corruption of the Yogic teaching of Emptiness which says
that the state immediately preceding Creation was Emptiness (Shunyata):
in the same way as a lake without fish and other forms of visible life may be
said to be empty even though it is full of water, or as a hall may be said to
be empty (of people and objects) even though it is full of light and air, or
as the human mind may be said to be empty prior to the conception of a
thought even though it is full of intelligence, that is, the power to know
and to think, so also the Universe prior to Creation may be said to be empty
of created things even though it is full of the Light of God. In Yoga, Emptiness has another sense also, namely, that from
the perspective of God the World is empty of things other than Himself Who
experiences all things as One with Himself and hence "empty" or
devoid of separate existence. An admission to this fact is found even in the
Western Scriptures such as the Bible, where it is said that in the beginning,
"the Earth was without form and empty" (Genesis 1:1). Thus, far from being "Nothing", Spiritual Void or
Emptiness (Shunyata) is really Objectless Consciousness. It is a Higher Form
of Intelligence devoid of created or manifested things yet containing in
itself the potentiality of all conceivable and inconceivable things. It is
God's Own Undifferentiated, Formless Intelligence out of which anything and
everything may be born or produced according to His Own Free and Independent
Will. This apparent Emptiness when incorrectly understood can give
rise to the negative and erroneous notion of Nothing. In reality, however,
there is no such thing as a Nothing out of which the World could have been
Created. Finally, the expression Out of Nothing can also be taken
metaphorically as an illustration of God's Infinite Power and a reminder of
the creature's absolute dependence upon Him: Creation is Nothing without the
Creator. This is a fact which nobody can reasonably deny. Original Man was a Being Divine Concerning the creation of living things, the Holy Scriptures
of India such as Shiva Purana, clearly state that the Supreme Being (Parama
Shiva), having assumed the form of the Creator God (Brahma), produced out of
Himself the four classes of beings in the following order: Gods (or Angels),
Divine Ancestors, Humans and Subhuman Creatures. Man himself was created as a manifestation of the two
aspects of God's Own Inner Being: Consciousness (Shiva) and Energy (Shakti),
Spirit and Nature, Mind and Matter, Male and Female. Man was called Manu - from Manas, Mind - because he is
the product of God's Own Mind and because he thinks, that is, lives primarily
by mental thought-processes. This distinguishes man from the Gods and Divine
Ancestors who know directly by means of their higher intelligence, and from
Subhuman Creatures (animals, demons, etc.) who are guided by basic instincts.
Thus man is called Manu by virtue
of his occupying a position above animals and below Gods. Now as Original Man was known as Adi Manu and his
consort was known as Manavi, the First Couple came to be known in
later, Western Faiths as Adam and Eve. Although Western scholars have
attempted to construct different derivations for the names Adam and Eve, the
fact is that “Adam” comes from “Adi Manu”, “Original Man” and “Eve” comes
from “Manavi”, “Original Woman”. Thus “Adam” clearly represents a contraction
of “Adi” and “Manu”, while the Hebrew name “Ava” is nothing but “Avi” from
“Man-avi” which was given the feminine ending “a”. The above becomes even more clear if we analyse the
etymological derivation of the words “man” and “woman” in English which is an
Indo-European language related to or derived from Sanskrit. Originally, the
English word “man” meant “human being” and referred to both male and female,
just as Sanskrit “Man” or “Manu” simply meant “human”. This
reflects the fact that there was no need for the Original Couple to be
distinguished from one another: they were the first and only humans and lived
in a state of complete unity. At a later stage, the female of the species was
called “woman” from “wife-man” or “female man” just as, in Sanskrit, woman
was called “Manavi” which is the feminine form of “Manu”. Although the Divine nature of the first human beings has
fallen into oblivion in the West, its memory has remained alive in the East
down to this day. Says the Shiva Purana: "Original Man is Shiva and
Original Woman is His Beloved. All men
are identical with Shiva (God) and all women are identical with Maheshvari
(the Great Goddess). Therefore, all men and women are manifestations of
their (Shiva’s and Maheshvari's) Divine Powers." A faint echo of this Spiritual Fact is alsol found in the
Scriptures of the West. For example, in the older portion of the Bible (Old
Testament), God says: "We created them in Our Own Image, both male and
female". Indeed, God is both Male and Female, and at the same time He is
Neither, being above physical manifestation. He is the Potentiality of
everything that exists, the Storehouse of Infinite Possibilities, the
Boundless Ocean of Life out of which all the differentiated waves of limited
life arise. This is why, in the Yoga Tradition, God (Shiva) is called Lord
of All (Vishveshvara). The Wheel of Life A very important contribution Eastern Faiths have made to our
understanding of the Universe, is the concept of Cyclical Life (Samsara).
At a higher, transcendental level, Life is Eternal, without Beginning or End,
and Changeless. At a lower, manifestational level, on the other hand, Life is
a series of recurring phases or cycles. In the Rig Veda, man's life is described as going up and down,
like the rolling wheels of carts. In the Upanishads, life is compared to a
water-wheel (that revolves again and again to raise water for irrigation,
etc.). This cycle or wheel-like process of life becomes manifest from the
observation of everyday facts: day follows night, one season follows another,
plants blossom and bear fruit every year anew, animals give birth to new
offspring, etc. In terms of human life, man undergoes periodic changes in
energy levels, he experiences emotional highs and lows, he alternately sleeps
and wakes, while in the long run, he dies and is reborn again many times.
From a wider perspective, the World itself undergoes similar recurring patterns,
the main phases of which are known as Yugas or World Ages. Thus in the First or Golden (that is, Enlightened) Age, the
Earth is ruled by Divine Beings; in the Second or Silver (that is, less
Luminous) Age, it is ruled by Divine Ancestors; in the Third or Copper
(Darkening) Age, it is ruled by Man; and in the Fourth or Iron (Dark) Age
Earth is ruled by Subhuman creatures such as Spiritually undeveloped,
materialistic, animal-like humans, demons (Asuras), etc. A brief glance at
the quality of "leaders" in charge of the World today, will confirm
that Mankind has entered the Age of Darkness, which is the Fourth and Last
World Age. When the World has reached its lowest point of Spiritual
Degeneration, it is dissolved or withdrawn back into the Creator. Says Scripture:
"This World, which is a mass of thought, is thought by Him, and in Him
it disappears" (Maitri Upanishad We have thus demonstrated that all religious traditions
agree with the Teachings of Yoga or, if they disagree, then it is entirely
due to their own incomplete or incorrect understanding of the Original Truth
as revealed in the Holy Scriptures of Creation, Evolution and Intelligent Design A common misconception found in the West is that we must
choose between Creationism and Evolutionism. Creationism is a
Judaeo-Christian-Islamic belief according to which God created the World as
it is. Evolutionism is a materialist belief espoused by Communists,
Atheists and other non-believers, according to which the World evolved over
long periods of time from an undefinable substance called "matter"
and without the aid of a higher intelligence. The latter is also known as
Darwinism, after the British naturalist and evolution theorist, Charles
Darwin, who developed this thesis in the 19th century. By contrast, in the East, it is accepted that truth is not
always as white-and-black as simple-minded men imagine, but rather more
complex, requiring some reflection on the part of those who seek to properly
understand it. Eastern Faiths, in particular Yoga, therefore, offer an
alternative teaching which includes elements of both Creationism and
Evolutionism, blending them into a beautiful and correct description of
truth. Yoga admits that
the World was created by God but it rejects the view that the World was
created as it is and has not undergone any changes from the beginning of
time. EXPLANATION: We know from
experience that humans are born, grow old and die. So do animals and plants,
forests, mountains, lakes, rivers and seas. All created things undergo
certain changes over time. Indeed, the further back in time we go, the
greater the changes we find. In consequence, it is unreasonable to suppose
that the World was created as it is. Some kind of evolution must be admitted
to have taken place since Creation. What remains to be established is the nature of the power that
initiates, supports and directs this process of creation and evolution. In
answer to this, Yoga replies that creation and evolution are the work of the
Universal Intelligence. We know that objects which are endowed with a specific ordered
design, purpose and function, such as houses, tools, cars, nests, burrows,
etc., are created by intelligent beings. As similar design, purpose and
function may be found in naturally-occurring things, it is reasonable to conclude
that they, and by extension, the entire World, too, were created by some form
of intelligence. It is unreasonable and unscientific to assume the existence of
an exception to the above general rule unless it can be proved that a) such
an exception exists and b) it is true in the case of Creation. If
non-believing scientists wish to prove that the World was created by
accident, they will have to adduce the relevant evidence in support of their
position. So far they have failed to do so. The fact is that the Universe is not random and chaotic but is
constructed according to a certain order. It also performs the practical
function of supporting life. It is therefore logical to conclude that the
Universe is the work of an Intelligent Creator and that life evolves
according to an intelligent design. For this reason, Yoga firmly supports
what is called “Intelligent Design”. Another important thing is that the World is fundamentally
good. It is good that the Sun rises and it is good that the Sun sets. It is
good to have sunny weather and it is good to have rain. It is good to
breathe, to see, to hear, to eat, to work, to sleep, to communicate and
interact with others, etc., etc. Although bad things also exist, which
sometimes interrupt or disturb the general state of goodness, goodness
remains the unchallenged ruling principle. This fact is in perfect agreement
with the Holy Scriptures of India which state that Shiva (which means “good”,
“auspicious”), the Supreme Principle of Goodness, is the Ultimate Reality Who
creates and governs the World according to His intrinsic inner nature
manifested as the Supreme Eternal Law of Goodness (Sanatana Dharma). Although the teaching of Intelligent Design is relatively new
in the West, it has been taught by the Scriptures of the East and the
Enlightened Yogis of India from times immemorial. Thus Yoga, as an inclusive
and unitive faith, reconciles Creationism and Evolutionism, elegantly solving
one of mankind's oldest problems. Teaching people that they accidentally evolved from monkeys,
pigs and other animals, will only encourage them to think and behave like
their supposed ancestors as is evidenced by the inhuman behaviour of many
Communists, Capitalists and other non-believing Materialists. On the other
hand, telling them that they are intelligent Souls emanating from God even as
rays radiate from the Sun, will inspire them to elevate themselves through
pure and righteous behaviour and noble thoughts and aspire for higher planes
of existence, as demonstrated by Enlightened Yogis. In conclusion, Accidental Evolutionism must be strongly
rejected even if it were true. It must be even more strongly rejected since
it is patently untrue. |