What is knowledge? Knowledge is information. What is information? Information is man’s greedy interest in the world-sound.
What is knowledge? Knowledge is the discoveries of the mind. These discoveries can be in the mind proper, in the vital and in the body. To the mind, knowledge in the mind is something rigid, fixed and complicated. Knowledge in the vital is something dynamic or aggressive and destructive. Knowledge in the body, in the gross physical, is something obscure and uninspiring.
What is knowledge? Knowledge is man’s outer desire to help humanity, but his secret desire to please himself in every possible way.
Knowledge is something that keeps the knower and the known at two different places. The knower plays the role of the master; the known plays the role of the slave.
Knowledge is the little brother of wisdom. The big brother, wisdom, teaches us how to be inseparably and eternally one with the supreme Reality, the transcendental Reality. The little brother, knowledge, feels that the supreme Reality will eternally remain a far cry; therefore, he wants to be satisfied with the lesser reality. Knowledge wants to measure the lesser reality, and finally it wants to distribute the lesser reality to the world at large in infinitesimal portions.
What is the lesser knowledge? The lesser knowledge is the earth-bound knowledge. The lesser knowledge is the knowledge which tells us that we are of ignorance-night and we are for ignorance-night. It is the knowledge that tells us that all is matter, within and without us. When we embrace the knowledge of matter, we try and cry, cry and try to satisfy ourselves in the pleasure-seeking world. We consciously or unconsciously wallow in the pleasures of ignorance-mire.
As there is earth-bound knowledge, even so there is Heaven-free knowledge. When Heaven-free knowledge dawns on our devoted heads and surrendered hearts, at that time we can proclaim like the Saviour, “I and my Father are one.”
With knowledge how far? Not very far. When we start with earth-knowledge, we do not and cannot look forward; we are always stuck at the starting point. We cannot walk along the road of Infinity and Eternity; we cannot walk in the realm of the transcendental Spirit. But when we start with divine wisdom and try to walk along the road of Eternity, we see that the Golden Shore is ever beckoning us and that the distance is growing always shorter.
With knowledge how far? When we start with human knowledge, we enter into the world of nowhere. When we start with divine wisdom, we enter into the world of all-where. Human knowledge is the wild laughter of possession. Divine knowledge is the sweet, illumining and fulfilling song of liberation and perfection.
Human knowledge is our common sense. Divine knowledge is our God-sense. With our human knowledge we declare that our body is all, that the physical in us is all. With our divine knowledge we proclaim God as our Eternity's All; we proclaim His constant Self-transcendence as our All.
Human knowledge is the education of the unconscious or conscious ego-self in the finite. Divine wisdom is the education of the God-Self in the Infinite. Human knowledge belongs to the desire-world. And desire-world is nothing short of frustration-world.
Human knowledge leads us to cry,
> Asato ma sad gamaya.
> Tamaso ma jyotir gamaya.> Mrityor ma amritam gamaya.
> Lead me from the unreal to the Real.
> Lead me from darkness to Light.> Lead me from death to Immortality.
Divine knowledge inspires us to voice forth,
> Anandadd hy eva khalv imani bhutani jayante.
> Anandena jatani jivanti.> Anandam prayantyabhisam visanti.
"From Delight we came into existence. In Delight we grow. At the end of our journey's close into Delight we shall retire.”
God-knowledge tells us that each seeker must feel his inseparable oneness with his Inner Pilot. On the strength of his inner oneness, he proclaims to the world at large that he is Eternity’s divine lover and that God, his Inner Pilot, is Eternity’s Beloved Supreme.
AUM 1458, Wednesday, 23 April, Andover Hall, Harvard Divinity School↩
From:Sri Chinmoy,AUM — Vol.II-2, No. 5, 27 May 1975, Vishma Press, 1975
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