Himalayas – Rishikesh India www.yogadaindia.com
Nirvana
Nirvana: Gautam Buddha used the word for the ultimate state of consciousness. He could have chosen a positive word, and in India, there were many positive words for it: moksha, freedom, liberation; kaivalya, aloneness, absolute aloneness; brahmanubava, the experience of the ultimate. But he chose a strange word, which has never been used in spiritual contexts: blowing out the candle. How can you relate it with a spiritual experience?
Buddha says your so-called self is nothing but a flame, and it is being kept burning through your desires. When all desires disappear the candle has disappeared. Now the flame cannot exist anymore. The flame also disappears – disappears into the vast universe, leaving no trace behind it; you cannot find it again. It is there but it has gone forever from any identity, from any limitation.
Hence Buddha chose the word nirvana rather than realization, because realization can still give you some egoistic superiority – that you are a realized person, that you are a liberated being, that you are enlightened, that you are illuminated, that you have found it. But you remain. And Buddha is saying you are lost – who is going to find it? You disperse, you were only a combination. Now each element goes to its original source. The identity of the individual is no more. Yes, you will exist as the universe…
So Buddha avoided any positive word, knowing the human tendency, because each positive word can give you a feeling of ego. No negative word can do that; that’s why it remains unpolluted. You cannot pollute something which is not. And people were very much afraid to use the word – with a deep inner trembling – nirvana.
Thousands of times Buddha was asked, “Your word nirvana does not create in us an excitement, does not create in us a desire to achieve it. The ultimate truth, self-realization, the realization of God – all those create a desire, a great desire. Your word creates no desire.”
Unless you have come to a deep understanding of yourself and existence, the word nirvana will create fear in you. It is a negative word.
Literally it means blowing out the candle.
The above thoughts are in line with OSHO.
Nirvana
Nirvana: Gautam Buddha used the word for the ultimate state of consciousness. He could have chosen a positive word, and in India, there were many positive words for it: moksha, freedom, liberation; kaivalya, aloneness, absolute aloneness; brahmanubava, the experience of the ultimate. But he chose a strange word, which has never been used in spiritual contexts: blowing out the candle. How can you relate it with a spiritual experience?
Buddha says your so-called self is nothing but a flame, and it is being kept burning through your desires. When all desires disappear the candle has disappeared. Now the flame cannot exist anymore. The flame also disappears – disappears into the vast universe, leaving no trace behind it; you cannot find it again. It is there but it has gone forever from any identity, from any limitation.
Hence Buddha chose the word nirvana rather than realization, because realization can still give you some egoistic superiority – that you are a realized person, that you are a liberated being, that you are enlightened, that you are illuminated, that you have found it. But you remain. And Buddha is saying you are lost – who is going to find it? You disperse, you were only a combination. Now each element goes to its original source. The identity of the individual is no more. Yes, you will exist as the universe…
So Buddha avoided any positive word, knowing the human tendency, because each positive word can give you a feeling of ego. No negative word can do that; that’s why it remains unpolluted. You cannot pollute something which is not. And people were very much afraid to use the word – with a deep inner trembling – nirvana.
Thousands of times Buddha was asked, “Your word nirvana does not create in us an excitement, does not create in us a desire to achieve it. The ultimate truth, self-realization, the realization of God – all those create a desire, a great desire. Your word creates no desire.”
Unless you have come to a deep understanding of yourself and existence, the word nirvana will create fear in you. It is a negative word.
Literally it means blowing out the candle.
The above thoughts are in line with OSHO.
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