There is no view or means of knowledge where the concept of ‘god’ is described so precisely and nuanced as in Vedānta. This has a salutary reason. Like all teachings in Vedānta, this requires a supple, dynamic, flexible mind.
The practitioner of self-knowledge uses īśvara to free himself from īśvara. This use is something very beautiful. But also difficult to understand. There is something paradoxical in it. In order to understand myself better as the full, attributeless reality itself, I have to surrender the wrong self-image of myself in love and devotion to īśvara.
What is the wrong self-image? That I am a living being with a mind and body. What is that mind and body? A piece of īśvara. Why? Because īśvara is consciousness plus all properties (saguṇa brahma). All means including all properties of the person I think I am. So I have to give it back in thought.
If I don’t do this, I can’t become free as pure consciousness. In that case I remain cognitively connected to everything that happens to the jīva. In theat case I remain attached to the fears, desires, aversions, preferences, judgments, projections etc. etc.
How do I give the properties of the person back to īśvara? By means of karma yoga and upāsana yoga (more on that soon).
But for that I need knowledge. For example, I have to know that consciousness is infinite (ananta). It is so infinite that it has the possibility of māyā. Māyā is the unmanifested power in consciousness that can manifest into a world. Īśvara is consciousness plus māyā. Māyā is nothing without consciousness. After all, reality is non-dual. Māyā is therefore apparent, and nothing other than consciousness itself.
I must also know that the living being (jīva) that I think I am is only a mini-radar in the whole of īśvara, totally dependent on the whole. The only thing that can make me independent is knowledge. Because the properties of my person belong to īśvara, I place them where they belong in my thoughts. That sets me free, as pure consciousness. So now I can say that as pure consciousness I am equal to god. As apparent properties I surrender to god.
This has the immense advantage that I become free and full as consciousness. Freedom means not having to bear anything, having no responsibilities, no fears, no binding desires. Can I then just do what I want? No, reality is so cleverly constructed that if I act adharmically, I will get confused, and my pure self-knowledge will not hold. Moreover, the one who sees himself as the pure reality itself, will see everything as such, and therefore love everything as himself.
Seen in this way, īśvara is a concept for initiates and devotees, to understand, so that we can stand in freedom. From the perspective of a living individual, īśvara is consciousness plus a world with beings in it.
Since everything is pure consciousness, there must be an apparent force in (brahman) consciousness. That is what we call, as said, māyā. In itself, māyā is nothing. I, consciousness, must be present to ‘activate’ māyā, so to speak.
When māyā is recognized as something to be worshipped, we call that īśvara. Manifestation is therefore māyā associated with the consciousness that I am. Another way of saying this is māyā is in me, and in reality I am equal to īśvara (essentially one and the same as consciousness).
Where māyā is only the mysterious, apparent power, īśvara is equal to brahman, the truth, pure consciousness, which seems to have taken on the qualities of māyā, causing a world to appear. That is why īśvara is also defined as saguṇa (with guṇas, qualities) brahman.
Formulated in this way, it is all seen from the individual perspective. For a jñānī (knower) who sees as non-dual consciousness, there is only īśvara, consciousness plus false appearance. Then there is no point in calling it īśvara. Seen in this way, īśvara is a celebration of being infinite love. An apparent bhakti play, in which things are just what they are.
Īśvara is therefore consciousness plus the potency of māyā, which consists of all knowledge (sarvajña), all power (sarva śakti). This can be both manifested and unmanifested māyā.
Brahman manifests as apparent (vivarta) as the entire universe (creation, sṛṣṭi), in all its causal, subtle and gross aspects. This is possible only because brahman is pure intelligence. In reality, nothing happens because brahman is unchanging, silent and full.
A formal definition for īśvara is: māyā upahita caitanya brahma. Pure brahman-consciousness (caitanya) as free uncoloured, attribute-less carrier, as underlying substrate (upahita), when recognised and acknowledged (and thus manifested) that it has the inherent, unmanifested creative power māyā.
For the devotional person in us, īśvara then takes on the role of lord of all, and is then also called Bhagavān: That which possesses the highest values (bhagas). As an object of devotion (bhakti) and meditation (dhyāna or upāsana), Bhagavān is then saguṇa brahma, brahman with the highest qualities.
For the Vedāntin, devotion is an intermediate stage, because it is dual. The pitfall of devotion is that it usually involves the personification of īśvara. There is nothing wrong with that in itself, because it brings feelings of happiness. Religious people are often relatively happy. But personification can get in the way of an assessment of īśvara as 100% neutral. This objective view is necessary for a mind that wants mokṣa.
This step from an informal, personal idol (iṣṭa devatā), who always listens, to a mature image of god as a neutral order, who does not conform to my personal preferences is essential. We do this with formal karma yoga (in action) or upāsana yoga (in meditation).
So I am going to write īśvara with a capital letter as Bhagavān, as something to which my love continuously flows. Then I can see God as my ever-present, greatest friend, I care for Bhagavān like a baby (Bālakṛṣṇa) or throw my body under his crushing wheels (Jagannātha, source of the word juggernaut). Or I give my individual being to his destructive force (rudra, śiva in the narrow sense).
Bhagavān is that which takes me up into his hells or heavens (also the hells and heavens in the here and now in my mind), which takes care of me, and to which my love can always flow. The disadvantage is that I remain the little one, who relates to a Great Personal God. This only becomes non-dual devotion, when I worship everything as myself. The free knower of himself (the jñānī) fully engages in this devotion, but sees it as forms of a love game that apparently takes place within him or her.
Īśvara is in reality completely neutral and objective. So nothing personal, and so we write īśvara with a small ī. It is just one big, consistent machine that lets a world shine within itself according to consistent laws. Why is this important?
Since my mind-body is a puzzle piece īśvara in the whole, I want to let ‘its’ neutrality reflect in my mind. The little person is also 100% neutrality. Even a physical feeling of fear is just a neutral sensation. Why? Because īśvara is 100% neutral and I am part of it. And because my consciousness and īśvara’s consciousness are the same truth! Advaita, non-dual. Is neutrality boring? No, īśvara consciousness is -vara, grace in itself, totally blissful.
That there is a difference between nirguṇa brahman (consciousness without qualities) and saguṇa brahma is an illusion. It is the difference between the happiness of the small bhakta and the free bliss of the complete jñānī, who enjoys the apparent life, from a free, objective standpoint.
The duality of religion raises even more problems. The individual who completely surrenders will live in a state of happiness. But the dual mind of the faithful devotee, when things go wrong in life, may start doubting (vikalpa) his faith. There are many testimonies of this in all religions. Hence the importance of doubtless knowledge (saṅkalpa).
In case of adversity, there is complaining about an unjust, merciless (nairghṛṇya), partial (vaiṣamya) God. But I would do well to inquire carefully why I get bad results. Learning, evaluating ability is essential for growth towards emotional maturity. That I can learn something from it is a blessing in itself. For those who are open to it, adversity can be used as an invitation for a wake-up call.
Generally speaking, it comes down to the fact that I lived too extroverted a life. Illness or loss are such an invitation to introspection. Those are the moments to be honest and courageous in my life. There are legions of testimonies from people who said, that burnout changed my view of existence. That things initially went downhill, and everything collapsed in my life, ultimately turned out to be my greatest blessing. Once we understand how this works, we don’t have to be afraid of anything. Where does all that blessing come from? Īśvara as the distributor of the results of action (karma phala dātā).
That is the beauty of Vedānta. It defines God, by giving Him a place in the panorama of reality. Can we define God exactly? Well, in reality God and consciousness are the same. Just as I am simply (sādhāraṇa) brahman, just like everybody else. God becomes mysterious when māyā is brought into action by the grace of the light of consciousness. Then māyā comes into action, and that is īśvara. And īśvara is just a working title that we use to understand all this.
Then everything becomes unusual (asādhāraṇa), and a wonderful moving world (jagat) appears. So we can roughly see god as consciousness plus all possible objects (manifested, vyakta and unmanifested, avyakta, perceptible, gocaram, and unperceptible, agocaram), including the personal subconscious or causal body, subtle body and gross body.
On our mental journey to freedom, we can make good use of īśvara. First, to dismantle the authenticity of my person by dedicating everything to īśvara (īśvara arpana buddhi). This is called karma yoga. I constantly remember the divine (īśvara smaranam) in everything I do. I think and do everything discreetly, according to the dharma of īśvara and receive all results of action in a spirit of gratitude (īśvara prasāda buddhi).
By realizing that I am acting discreetly in alignment (yogaḥ karmasu kauśalam) with īśvara, I join the divine. When I thus remove the tension from my life, because I know that I am always cradled in Bhagavān’s long arms, and I in turn love everything as Bhagavān, and I tenderly care for the ignorant around me, my mind is ready to understand my nature as consciousness, just as īśvara’s nature as consciousness.
So we cannot avoid īśvara’s dharma. Because I begin my spiritual quest as a supposedly small person, I must first join the manifested whole, otherwise I only see through the small, while I must see through the all, to become one with it. In this way I come to understand that everything is the altar of that which is always good. Thus we can conclude that karma yoga is already bhakti yoga, in honor of and equal to īśvara.
Karma yoga and upāsana yoga (meditation) can thus just as well be called īśvara yoga. We tend to call this ‘connecting with God’, but a better description of īśvara yoga is: How does the person fit seamlessly into God? How do I walk in line with God? It is nonsense to ‘connect’ myself as a conscious being with consciousness. I am that already infinitely and eternally. It is also nonsense if jīva wants to connect with īśvara, I have (apparently) been part of it for a lifetime or over many lifetimes, if you like. Just as I cannot jump out of my skin, I cannot jump out of my consciousness and I cannot escape God. I can only contribute to God by dancing the dharma.
I only have to investigate how I fit best into the whole. You have those halls of mirrors or moving houses at the fair. Both represent the learning process in this life. Īśvara (māyā) can be compared to that. If I don’t get confused by the mirrors, I come out of the hall of mirrors well, and I have had a nice time. And if I bump my head, I adjust immediately. Then I learn and grow. The moving house is next level. The devices with their movements are Īśvara. If I move exactly along with all those strange devices, I have had an entertaining journey, and I come out of it unscathed. But if I can’t estimate exactly how I let the body move rhythmically, I am covered in (karmic) bruises.
For example, if I could have known in advance that it would not work out, because I am too old, have an injury, or a balance disorder, then I should have estimated that I should not have started it. Then it does not suit me (not my svabhāva, calling, destiny and disposition).
Nobody says it is easy to estimate ‘what the purpose and the destiny is’ and how to let my svabhāva flourish in it. Even more subtle and difficult is to see īśvara as a blueprint of my own mind. Action starts with thoughts. Do my thoughts go against īśvara’s flow? What is natural, what is appropriate? The inquiry goes deep. Which thoughts create inner friction? People pay a lot of attention to physical health, but a healthy mind is more essential for balance and happiness.
He or she who walks aligned with īśvara has a wonderful life, and is also ready for truth.
When Vedānta then explains how you relate to īśvara, so how you are equal to īśvara and how you are different, you can meditate on īśvara, and contemplate yourself (nididhyāsana) on your identity with īśvara as the substrate of the appearances, the circle of reality is complete.
How do I do this practically? I see īśvara as a factor in me and of me. As the appearing superposition of a person and a world in me. I then stand free as the bearer and silent witness of all that, free from any thought about it, as it were embracing and enclosing everything. And I know that all objects are mithyā.
Seers (ṛṣi’s) have an incredibly nuanced view of reality. It is being beyond god with attributes, it is being equal to god as consciousness, but then with the full self-awareness, something that consciousness itself does not have, since it is attributeless and thoughtless. That is what makes being apparently human so special, especially the researchers of themselves.
So it is important to start with: The person, the thinking appearance of the seer, is a tiny part of īśvara. The attributes of the person and the attributes of īśvara are not real. What remains is my equality with god as the ocean of consciousness. Meditation on god and contemplation on myself are also actions. They are mental actions. In order to realize all this I have to go through and complete all these stages of the pathless path. So karma yoga, upāsana yoga, śravaṇa, manana and nididhyāsana. These five stages are the path of vedānta (knowledge yoga).
In other words: Īśvara is generally defined as saguṇa brahma. Saguṇa brahma is nirguṇa brahma (consciousness without qualities), once it assumes the temporary status of creator (brahmā), the pervading, sustainer (viṣṇu) and dissolver (śiva) of the universe.
When consciousness māyā, the upādhi (something that apparently, not really give qualities to its medium/carrier, the upahita) of brahman, is illuminated by consciousness, this potentiality can manifest into a world of beings. Īśvara is therefore consciousness plus illusory qualities, māyā only the illusory potentiality for qualities.
But what I see is not illusion, it is just pure consciousness, just like the sense that sees it. Also the idea that there would be such a thing as separate objects is in itself an illusion, but in reality it is just consciousness.
Vedānta dares to define God. Because to be the non-dual God, you must first understand God. So I am not the concept of God, but I am God as pure consciousness. Why? There is nothing other than God. And to state all this in this way, I must exist, so…
The jīva (consciousness plus a small piece of īśvara) does not exist outside of īśvara! Yet, and this is what makes the truth as expressed by Vedānta so difficult, saguṇa brahman is actually no different from nirguṇa brahman, because it is dependent, or better yet, because it is an apparent expression of its substratum. ‘Where mithyā (dependent, impermanent, changeable objects) is, there is satya (the independent existence-consciousness), itself’.
Everything, even this language, these definitions, are an expression of that, which only I myself can be, because I know that I am. Pure consciousness is therefore also called īśvara. Not everything is god, but god alone is, said Svāmī Vivekānānda.