ISVARA OR THE UNIVERSAL SOUL

[Ms Tercy Lonan]

ISVARA OR THE UNIVERSAL SOUL
Sri Swami Krishnananda
The Existence Of God
The transcendent Brahman does not bear any relation to the universe. The nature of its
existence is such that it cannot have distinctions within it or outside it. It is free from the threefold
differentiation: Sajatiya, Vijatiya and Svagata (homogeneous, hetrogeneous and internal
differences). It is beyond the world in every sense of the term, and cannot be discovered in anything
that we can hope to know. The perishable does not satisfy our quest for the eternal. Brahman is
Nishprapancha, Prapanchopasama, a being which is free from the universe, and in which the
universe ceases to be. But without holding allegiance to the existence of Brahman, the world cannot
be. The world is dependent on Brahman. In this respect, the names and forms and activities of the
world are directed by Brahman; the world automatically receives, in different degrees, inspiration
and reality from the existence, consciousness and bliss of Brahman. Brahman envisaged thus by the
individuals, as the supreme Cause and the Director of the universe, is Isvara, the Cosmic Being.
Isvara is omnipresent, for He supports and animates every speck of creation by His immanence. He
is omniscient, for He has a direct intuition of all things, manifest and unmanifest. He is also the
Divine Self and the Inner Ruler of the cosmos. The knowledge which Isvara has of the universe is
not relational, not brought about by a mental function, and does not labour under the limitations of
space and time, but immediate in its essence and spirit. It is not any outside knowledge of an object,
but knowledge as the being of the object itself. He is omnipotent, for He has the power to do, undo
or transform the universe as a whole, for the universe is His Body. He is called the Creator of the
universe, for it is He that initiates the appearance of all things by the activity of His consciousness.
This work of Isvara never comes to a cessation until the universe is withdrawn into Him, and this
process is felt and continues in different degrees, in every bit of His creation. He is the Preserver of
the universe, as the sustenance of all life requires the operation of His Spirit. His existence and
activity are felt by us wherever and whenever we think of Him intensely. He is the Destroyer or the
final transformer of the universe, into whom the universe is withdrawn in the end, to whom all
beings return on the completion of the working out of their deeds in the present cycle. Isvara is the
natural and necessary counter-correlative of the world taken as an object of individualistic
observation.
The characteristics of Isvara, as enumerated above, are the Tatasthalakshanas or the
accidental attributes of Brahman. The appearance of Brahman as Isvara continues as long as there is
the experience of the world and the individual. The fact that there is an observer implies that there is
an external world. And the fact of the existence of an objective world, again, entails the recognition
of a supreme Creator and Director of beings. If there is an individual, there ought to be a world, and
if there is a world, there ought to be God. Isvara, Jagat and Jiva-God, the world and the
individual-go together, one implying the others, and not being possible without the others. The
three principles are the basic contents of all relative experience.
The concept of God involves certain unavoidable presuppositions, if it is to stand the test of
reason. We are obliged to hold that God must be one, and not more than one. A perfect God ought to
be self-dependent, and a plurality or even a duality of gods would introduce a kind of limitation and
dependence. A universe with many gods cannot be governed harmoniously, for there would be
conflict of purpose among them. The system and order in Nature demand that the Sovereign of the
universe must be one. God ought to be an uncaused reality, and though everything of which God is
the cause has to be in space and time, God, who is the causeless Cause, is above space and time. The
sequence of effects which proceed from God is more logical than chronological. As the final goal of
all beings, God directs all movements towards Himself by an upward pull, as it were, by being the
determining destination of the entire creation. He is the fulfilment of all aspirations and needs, and
the realisation of Him is the great blessedness of any mortal. God has a direct knowledge of the
inner workings of Nature, in their completest detail. Though He transcends all individual values, He
is the conservation of all values, and constitutes their eternal home. In Him all values exist in their
truest essence. Not only this, God Himself is the highest value and end of universal existence. To
realise Him is to rise to the centre of the cosmos and to rule it with unlimited knowledge and
suzerainty. Man realises his ideals more and more as and when his consciousness approximates, in
greater and greater degree, the being of God. The deeper the realisation, the more inward is the
manner in which the values are enjoyed in a condition which tends to advance towards infinitude, in
which the remoteness of ideals gets expanded into a boundless Spirit, with neither inside nor
outside. God is the be-all and the end-all of creation.