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In the Taittiriya Upanishad I.3.1- 4,
the rishi, one who has realized God or
Brahman, teaches five kinds of worships or
meditations to his students: adhi-lokam,
adhi-jyotisham, adhi-vidyam, adhi-prajam,
and adhi-atmam. In Sanskrit these are called
“samhita” or “sandhi,” which roughly means
“meeting of two things.” For example, dawn
is a “sandhi” or meeting of night and day
and dusk is the meeting of day and night.
The five “samhita” or “meetings”mentioned
above are five wonderful subjects for
meditation. Through these meditations, one
acquires a deeper insight into the meaning
of life and the world, and ultimately
attains knowledge of Brahman. Let us look at
these five meditations in detail.
The first meditation is “adhi-lokam;”
which means “regarding the various parts of
the universe.” “The earth is on one end.
The space beyond our perception is on the
other end. The sky is between the two and
the wind is the connecting link.” We live on
the earth; therefore let us start with
ourselves. We are sitting in a room. The
room is a part of a house, which is in a
town. The town is in a state, which is in a
country. The country is on earth. If we can
imagine this picture in our mind, it
immediately brings the awareness that we are
but a tiny speck on the surface of this
earth. Now the earth exists in space, which
is infinite. That infinite space extends
much beyond what our Hubble telescope can
see. The visible sky is in between the earth
and the space, and wind is the connecting
link between us and the infinite. Let us
meditate on this vastness. Thinking about
the vastness of this infinite universe will,
without a doubt, humble us. How absurd and
embarrassing therefore it is for us to be
egotistic knowing what a small and
insignificant creature we are on this little
earth!
The second meditation is “adhi-jyotisham.”
It deals with effulgent entities in the
universe. Let us think of the objects that
emanate energy. “The fire is on one end.
The sun is on the other end. The water or
moisture is in between and the connecting
link is the lightning.” This is another
subject for meditation. Early man must have
realized fire to be the closest form of
energy. The sun is the ultimate source of
energy. Because of the sun, clouds form and
we get rain, without which, life on earth is
impossible. Lightning is a tremendous source
of energy which is here considered as a
connecting link between the earth and the
sun. Let us meditate upon how much we depend
on the sun and its energy for our very
existence. If the sun decides to come closer
to the earth, we will burn to death, and if
it moves away, we will freeze to death. In
the absence of the sun, there is no life at
all.
The third meditation is “adhi-vidyam.”
It is regarding knowledge. “The teacher is
on one end. The student is on the other
end. Knowledge is in between and the
instruction is the connecting link.” Let us
meditate on the secular and spiritual
knowledge we have and contemplate on the
benefits we derive from both. We live
civilized lives as a result of the
innumerable inventions and discoveries that
great researchers and teachers have made in
the past and continue to make in the
present. They pass their knowledge to others
through instructions. The house we live in,
the heating and cooling systems, the
electricity, the computers, the food items
on our dinner table, the vehicles we drive,
the language we speak to communicate with
others, and many such things are nothing but
the result of knowledge passed on from
generation to generation and from teachers
to students. How indebted we are to those
teachers! It is the same with the prayers
we offer and the spiritual knowledge we
gain, both of which give us true peace and
understanding of the universe and ourselves.
Without the awareness of this divinity
within, people become utterly selfish and
destructive. They do not hesitate to kill
each other for selfish reasons.
The fourth meditation is “adhi-prajam.”
It deals with progeny. “The mother is on
one end. The father is on the other end. The
Children are in between and the meeting of
the parents is the connecting link.” Let us
meditate on our births. In order for us to
be born, our parents met each other, their
parents met each other, their parents met
each other, and so on. If one link of this
chain was broken, we would not have been
born. Millions of combinations took place
in order for us to come into existence. In
the mad rush of our day-to-day pursuits we
forget to remember these wonderful
combinations, taking many such things for
granted. Let us take a break from these
maddening activities and meditate on the
sacrifice made by our parents, grandparents,
and great-grandparents for our existence.
The fifth and final meditation
is “adhi-atmam,” which deals with our body.
“The lower jaw is on one end. The upper jaw
is on the other end. Speech is in between
and the connecting link is the tongue.” Our
body came from our parents, but the senses
of the body must function independent of
them. Let us meditate on the senses and
their functions. Every sense organ is an
intricate instrument; its function is
beyond anyone’s imagination. Science has
been able to explain just a fraction of the
whole mechanism of our bodies. Is it not a
wonderful thing that we speak? A thought
comes in the mind. Thought is an abstract
thing that grows in our minds. The mind
encodes our thoughts as waves and sends
these waves to our jaws and our tongue.
According to the encoding and the language
we know, the mind moves the jaws and tongue
to create sounds, which express our abstract
thoughts. This is just one system of our
body. Think then how our eyes, ears, heart,
digestive system, and other organs
function! Without the proper functioning of
these organs, we cannot live. Conversly, all
these senses functions only so long as there
is life in the body. When life is gone, the
senses, being mere instruments, become
totally non-functional. Rishis realized
that the life is due to the Soul or Self or
Atman residing in the body. It is the
ultimate source of life because of which our
minds and senses work. Let us meditate upon
the Self, the ultimate controller of our
existence and our activities.
(Edited by Uma Ramakrishnan &
Nisha Parikh).
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