Re: Sanatana Dharma questions
Originally Posted by
follower12
knowThyEnemy wrote:
I was reading this and got a little bit confused as the final outcome of your reflection in the statement also says that Moksha is the highest goal. When ego is destroyed or get purified, it attains liberation. Please correct me if I misunderstood it.
Pranam
Namaste follower12,
The statement is indeed confusing and the fault is mine, as I did not state it correctly. I have come across two primary definitions of Moksh. The popular one is that when a person gets out of the cycle of birth-death-rebirth, s/he has attained Moksh. The other is that when the veil of ignorance is removed and the person realizes that s/he is none else but Sat-Chit-Anand Brahman, s/he has attained Moksh. I prefer the latter one, and it appears that you do too. ("When ego is destroyed or get purified, it attains liberation.") Hence we shall use this definition of Moksh in our discussions.
Let's take a hypthetical situation where a person achieves Moksh at the age of 50, but he stays alive till 85. What should that person do for the 35 years after liberation? He already achieved the goal that everyone told him is "the highest goal"! Should he visit temples on a weekly basis and worship there? What for? He already got the highest reward that God can give someone! Should he read religious scriptures? What for? He already got the highest knowledge! Should he start a business and make money? What for? Money and wealth try to fulfill the ego's hungers. But his ego has no hunger left! That person would be reduced to being an aimless wanderer and would spend his 35 years doing nothing but waiting for death!
IMO Moksh should not be a person's 'goal'. Bhagavad Gita strongly emphasize the importance of dharma and Nishkam Karma. Moksh is a reward that is only for God to give to people. God controls Moksh, whereas we control dharma. However God clearly says in Gita that 1) whoever ignores dharma is a sinner, and 2) people shoud not expect any rewards when they live by dharma or do Nishkam karma.
What this means is that we should have total trust in God and realize that we will get Moksh only when God decides it is time for us to have Moksh. Once we have such understanding, this idea called Moksh becomes nothing but a theory about which there is nothing for us to do. We should stick only to what is in our hands- dharma, and should work towards living by dharma. When the time is right, God will give Moksh even to those who have never even heard of this term!
More: Mahabharat has a story of Abhimanyu (Arjun's son) who died fighting in the war. Sri Krishn told Pandavs not to mourn since he had died in the process of performing his dharma. However, this does not automatically mean that Abhimanyu got Moksh. He may have though, even though at his age he most likely did not even know what Moksh even was! At his age, he probably only knew that it was his dharma to fight hard to win and not be afraid of death. That is exactly the attitude that we need to have.
Hence the bottomline of my reflection is that Moksh should not be our goal nor should we think much about it! We will get our Moksh whenever it is in our destiny. We should concentrate only on dharma.
Now let's come back to that hypothetical situation that I mentioned above with the only difference that the person has led his life living by dharma. At 50, when he gets Moksh, he will continue to live by dharma for the rest of his life. The only difference now would be that living by dharma for 35 years would be an automatic Nishkam Karma on his part for which no one would get credit. This person would not be "waiting for death". He will stay busy doing Nishkam Karma and he would not even realize when his 85 years are over.
What is the one thing that no beings can do, except humans? Answer: Arts!
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