Veda and Deva

Devas the creating creatures (The words in italics are the Sanskrit words. These words can be read in the Sanskrit English dictionary by Sir Monier Williams, available in Internet at <http://www.sanskrit-lexicon.unikoeln.de/monier/> The Sanskrit words in italics are in Itrans version.)
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We on this earth live on things which are different from us. We live in a world where every thing we know is different from us. Still we have to dwell on them. The sun, the water, the earth, the air, the food, every thing is a different entity, different from us, though we get life from all of them. We are at the receiving end. We get what is already there in the creation and achieve the satisfaction. We run after things because we do not have it in us. What we know is that somehow, by some means every thing has been created here for our survival. We are slightly better than what we were on the first day of our life lying in mother's arms. We still have continued to live at the mercy of the mother nature without knowing why she is so bountiful. We do not care to know, thinking the world as inert and inanimate. We are half awake, dreaming creatures, and extremely limited. Since we are unaware of our origin and conscious aspect, naturally, we fail to recognize that the world we live is full of consciousness. Rishis (seers) have taught us that as we learn to know our own conscious state we also start realizing that every thing inside and outside is also conscious. Inertness is a form of consciousness. If you get fixed in a thought or a state for a

longer while, you become as if inert or frozen with that thought or state. Inert or inanimate object is something like that. But actually you are always changing, dynamic and lively. Similarly every inert entity is a part of dynamic, live consciousness. Similarly, you, we and everything all are part of Great Consciousness, unbound, unhindered, self-revealing, allaccomplished. The water which you see outside is existing in you as coolness, as sense of satisfaction, as fulfillment. It just not quenches your thirst, it is the basic seat of accomplishment in you! In your inside, you feel the coolness, cleanliness of water, feel the satisfaction to your thirst. These are all forms of your consciousness in you when you get associated with water. Similarly in other human being also the feelings of water are similar. Again the feelings of water in an aquatic animal could be somewhat different. It is the same consciousness/universal personality "Water" who is there everywhere, in our inside, and outside. This is the Water Goddess, a conscious universal personality. She not only quenches your thirst when you drink water, she is in you as the sense of your "satisfaction", "accomplishment", as feeling of "serenity". Whenever any of your desire is fulfilled, quenched, whenever you get satisfied, it is because of HER presence in you. In Sanskrit water is termed as "ap". The Sanskrit word aap "aapti" meaning, "achievement", "fulfillment", is derived from the word "ap". Thus this is how the water is in the divine plane. Beyond every entity in the physical plane there is a plane of divinity, there are deities. Similar is the "Air" the deity of "Touch"("sparsha" in Sanskrit). Air in the Vedas is also known as "sUtratmaa", (sUtra=Thread) + (atmaa=Soul). He is the god who links every one, every body. In you, this inner air, your feelings, are linked. Your whole body is

linked by the network of nerves, through which the life /air flows as feelings. You get linked by the phenomenon called "touch". You get in "touch" with some thing, some one, you get connected. The Air, the God of touch is always touching all of us! In you "he" is as touch in your skin, in your lips! In you He is your "air", your "traits", your "sensitivity". The air connects the sky (heaven) with the earth. Air called "vaayu" in Sanskrit, is the god of yajur Veda. yajur means join. The root word yaj means to sacrifice and also to join. We sacrifice something to join with another thing. We sacrifice mortality to join with the eternity. The word "vaayu" is connected with the word "vaya" meaning "weaver". Air, or any substance in gaseous phase, immediately spreads every where if it gets into a container, as if it immediately establishes a network of connection inside the container. Its because of the inner air, our limbs are taut, not slacked and the whole body is in unison and synchronized. If the air/life leaves the body, it remains no longer taut. The process of breathing in and breathing out is actually the continuous communication or touching happening between inside and the outside, which is the process of living. This is why in Sanskrit, life or life span is called "aayu" which is the inner air. Out side air is called "vaayu". Thus, every entity can be identified with the gods, deities, the universal personality, from whom we are deriving our entity, life, existence. It is a conscious, living and loving system to which we all belong. The manifestation of absolute One, from which every thing is created, shows certain structured steps, strata. We are also from the absolute "One". The deities, the gods are in the higher plane, higher strata of this revelation. There is no "want" in the plane of deities or in divinity. There the revelation,

manifestation happens spontaneously out of joy. As the sun radiates spontaneously and the life is sprouting in the earth, so is the plane of divinity through whose revelation, radiation, the life is churning out every where in innumerable, unimaginable forms. We are getting the world, getting the sound, touch, taste, the air, the earth, the smell....., all the varieties through the plane of divinity. This plane radiates, donates. So the world of deities, called, "div", as well as "dyu", meaning 'radiating", "secreting", "divine", heaven etc. There nothing ends, gets exhausted. In our plane things terminate. We are at the receiving end; we live in planets called "graha" in Sanskrit. The word "graha" is connected with the word "grahaNa" means act of receiving. If you are looking for unending joy, unending life, unending vision, unending vitality and thus everything unending, then it is here. The road to it is inside, where the God of all the Gods is in you as your own "inner self"(aatman) and is active in you as your Consciousness, life, praaNa. You, the whole world, all the deities are in Consciousness, are forms of Consciousness. Any thing you know is a form of your "knowledge", "feeling", form of the "universal consciousness". This act of reading this article is also like that. It is happening there inside you, which is also the core of the universe. {This is written from the teachings received from the seers Shri. Bijoykrishna Chattopadhaya (1875-1945), and his principle disciple Shri Tridibnath Bandopadhaya(1923-1994). ------Debkumar Lahiri (you may write to the author at dkldk@rediffmail.com or debkumar.lahiri@gmail.com for any comments or query)