Passage 8

Tap any word for its meaning.

In plain words

That is mere delusion. People say, 'You are puffed up with Ahaṅkāra at your wealth!' That is not Ahaṅkāra at the sight of the wealth. That is mere delusion. Seeing your learning you think, 'I am a man of great learning, am I not?' That remains mere delusion. None of these should be called Ahaṅkāra. One may have learning and still be without this kind of delusion. One may have wealth and still be without such delusion. But this Ahaṅkāra is there in all alike. That is, because there is the feeling 'the body is I', the form of Ahaṅkāra has taken hold of him. So because this Ahaṅkāra covers the Buddhi, it keeps driving the body onto many kinds of wrong roads. So if this Buddhi is to cultivate what is called śraddhā, first of all we must put Ahaṅkāra far away.

Next, the second: the right wing this bird has is Ṛta. In the Veda, Ṛta has commonly been called Satya. That which shows the straight path is Ṛta. But there is a difference between Satya and Ṛta. You cannot say that Satya is Ṛta and Ṛta is Satya. To do with the hand what you have said in word, and to say in word what you have done with the hand, is Satya. But Ṛta does not mean that. To say in word what has arisen in the mind, and to do with the hand what has been said in word: this has the nature of the three guṇas, so it is called Ṛta. We may conclude that Ṛta belongs to the mind and Satya belongs to the world. This itself is what people call 'Satyaṃ, satyaṃ, trikāla-bādhyam.' That may be trikāla-bādhyam; Ṛta is triloka-bādhyam. That is, Ṛta is that which attains oneness in mind, in speech and in action. That is why Buddhi is right only when the two wings, Ṛta and Satya, come together. There is no use in having śraddhā alone. With this śraddhā, Ṛta and Satya too must become one. So we must not think of Buddhi as an ordinary intelligence. This Buddhi is made of śraddhā, Ṛta and Satya. But it has a tail besides. What is this tail for? To bring the wings into harmony. This tail is most necessary to set the balance right. To make Ṛta and Satya flow out in this world in the form of action, the tail called yoga is needed. In the everyday world we see the aeroplane.