Theos-Talk Archives (March 1996 Message tl00068)

All you can do is to prepare the intellect: the impulse toward
"soul-culture" must be furnished by the individual. Thrice
fortunate they who can break through the vicious circle of modern
influence and come up above the vapours!... We have one word for
all aspirants: TRY.  [KH in ML #35]
________________
Vasistha continues:
O Raama, one should, with a body free from illness and mind free
from distress, pursue self-knowledge so that he is not born again
here. Such self-effort has a threefold root and therefore threefold
fruit -- an inner awakening in the intelligence, a decision in the
mind, and the physical action.

Self-effort is based on these three -- knowledge of scriptures,
instructions of the preceptor and one's own effort. Fate (or divine
dispensation) does not enter here. Hence, he who desires salvation
should divert impure mind to pure endeavor by persistent effort --
this is the very essence of all scriptures. The Holy ones
emphasise: persistently tread the path that leads to the eternal
good. And the wise seeker knows: the fruit of my endeavours will be
commensurate with the intensity of my self-effort and neither fate
nor a god can ordain it otherwise. Indeed, such self-effort alone
is responsible for whatever man gets here... No one has seen such
a fate or a god, but everyone has experienced how an action (good
or evil) leads to a result (good or evil). Hence, from one's
childhood, one should endeavour to promote one's true good by a
keen intelligent study of the scriptures and by having the company
of the Holy ones and by right self-effort.

Fate or divine dispensation is merely a convention which has come to be
regarded as truth by being repeatedly declared to be true. If this god or
fate is truly the ordainer of everything in this world, of what meaning is
any action?... No one has ever realised the existence of a fate or divine
dispensation... Raama, this sage Vishvamitra became a Brahma-Rishi by
self-effort; all of us have attained self-knowledge by self-effort alone.
Hence, renounce fatalism [and god] and apply yourself to self-effort.

(The word used in the text for fate is "daivam" which also means
"god".)
_________________

-- ~The Supreme Yoga~ (~The Yoga Vasistha~) translated by Swami
Venkatesananda.

--
Nicholas <> am455@lafn.org <> Los Angeles
 First of all, love truth for its own sake, for otherwise no recognition of
  it will follow.  HP Blavatsky