40. ध्याननिर्धूतकल्मषः Dhyāna-nirdhūta-kalmaṣaḥ

One who, through meditation, was thoroughly cleansed of impurities

Kalmaṣa means mental impurity or sin. The Śruti explicitly talks about the nirdhūta, cleansing, of kalmaṣas through dhyāna, meditation. For instance, it is said, “The bliss that is had by a mind cleansed of impurities through samādhi (samādhi-nirdhūta-kalmaṣa) and absorbed in the Ātman, cannot be described in words. It is experienced by the mind itself at that time.”¹¹¹

About the consequences of getting rid of kalmaṣas, Lord Kṛṣṇa says, “Unsurpassed bliss indeed comes to this yogin who is of extremely tranquil mind, whose rajas (mental dirt consisting of delusion and other blemishes) has been destroyed, who has the certitude that all this is Brahman and who is free from kalmaṣas.”¹¹² Here, good and bad actions are both impurities because they lead to bondage, that is rebirth. Past actions are completely destroyed on the dawn of knowledge, and since the jīvanmukta has gone beyond actions, whatever actions he does in the world do not bind him. Only prārabdha or the actions that have started to fructify remain for the jīvanmukta. In this context the Lord says, “Always remaining reposed in this yoga (that is eschewing everything other than such yoga) the yogin who is free from kalmaṣas effortlessly attains the superlative bliss that is associated with Brahman.”¹¹³ Here kalmaṣas are the obstacles to experiencing samādhi, and it is in the sense of destroying these obstacles caused by prārabdha, that samādhi is said to ‘free’ even the jīvanmukta from kalmaṣas; sins or, for that matter virtues, in no way act as any bondage for the jīvanmukta.

His Holiness became a jīvanmukta through the royal path of yoga that culminates in the practice of dhyāna leading to nirvikalpa-samādhi (vide nāma 76). Even from the time when He started to meditate as a young saṁnyāsin in His teens, He was an adept at it, as described under nāmas 1, 27, 59, 67, 69 and 76. After jīvanmukti, He used to be able to go into and come out of even nirvikalpa-samādhi at will, for durations perfectly determined by Him. It is therefore apparent that none could be more suited than His Holiness to be described by this nāma.

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[The following account shows how His Holiness could regulate the duration of His meditation even at a stage when He had just started His meditative practices.]

In January-February 1934 (when His Holiness was sixteen years old), the senior Jagadguru taught His Holiness a method to start meditation (vide nāma 15). Initially, His Holiness meditated twice a day - in His room in the afternoon and at the Kālabhairava Temple in the evening. The idea of meditating just before or immediately after His morning āhnika and of going for His bath earlier than usual to facilitate this appealed to Him. However, He did not implement it for a couple of weeks. The reason was that He was not in a position then to predict or regulate the duration of His meditation. As He used to go after His morning āhnika to the senior Jagadguru’s presence to offer namaskāras, He did not want to take the risk of becoming delayed because of unintentionally meditating for too long.

With regard to the estimation and regulation of the duration of meditation, He reflected as follows: “Once I lose awareness of the body and the surroundings and my mind locks on to the divine form, I have no awareness of the passage of time. So I am not in a position then to decide how long more I am to continue meditating. Even during deep sleep, I am unaware of the passage of time and am in no position to determine how long more to remain in that state. Yet, it is not as though the duration of my sleep is quite unpredictable. Further, it is not that I cannot, on my own, alter the time for which I normally sleep.

“Habit influences how long a person sleeps at night. Other factors being the same, he is likely to sleep at night for as many hours as he usually does. Moreover, if he has the habit of sleeping for half an hour every afternoon, he is likely to awaken on his own after a half-an-hour siesta. Presumably, if I were to regularly meditate for fixed periods in the mornings, afternoons and evenings, my mind will spontaneously emerge from deep meditation at the end of these periods. Just as one can choose to go back to sleep, I should be able to revert to a state of deep concentration. By doing so for some days, I should be able to increase the time after which my meditation tends to lighten.

“When, on some night, I decide before sleeping that I must get up at a particular time, I awaken at that time on my own notwithstanding my having slept much less that night than usual. In like manner, I should be able to influence the duration of a session of meditation by making a resolve about the duration before beginning to meditate.” His experiences of the first two weeks accorded with this analysis. Confident that He could now estimate and regulate the duration of His meditation, He ceased to have any inhibition about having a session of meditation before going for His Guru’s darśana.

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[The sequel gives a glimpse of the level of mastery over meditation that His Holiness had even in the early stages of meditation.]

It was just a few months later the same year, that His Holiness gained proficiency in readily setting, at the time of beginning to visualise a form during meditation, the level of His concentration. For instance, He could adjust the intensity of His focus to block out the sound of a loud peal of thunder, or to allow a loud peal of thunder to be heard but not the sound of rain or a not-so-loud peal of thunder. If He felt like chanting a mantra throughout a session of meditation, He pegged the intensity of concentration on the form at a lower level than otherwise.

He had heard people say that their minds wander when they perform japa or when they try to meditate on a form. From the time He began meditating, He had not experienced this difficulty. To appreciate the problem of mental wandering, He experimented with progressively lowering the level of His concentration on the form. He found that when the concentration fell to a level far below that during His normal meditation, His mind started to wander a little to extraneous sounds. By deliberately keeping the intensity of focus low enough to allow some distractions, He determined, during a couple of sessions, over a dozen aids to deal with the disturbances. Chanting the mantra with greater vigour, temporarily holding the breath and stressing the importance of meditation were some of them.

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A disciple of His Holiness once had a strong desire to behold His Holiness in nirvikalpa-samādhi. The disciple did not express his wish to His Holiness but what can be hidden from the omniscient One? One day, He asked the disciple to accompany Him to the Kālabhairava temple (atop a hill in Narasimhavana) and there, He sat down for meditation. He asked the disciple to sit close to Him and then remarked, “We will meditate.”

The disciple saw His eyes close partially. Slowly, the heaving of His chest became slower and slower and soon, no trace of breathing was discoverable by the disciple, though he was seated very close to Him. He seemed to radiate peace. Suddenly, the disciple felt a force dragging him into meditation. He too closed his eyes and his mind soared to the heights of concentration.

The disciple opened his eyes after what seemed to him to be a moment, and observed His Holiness. Slowly, His breathing commenced and in a few moments He opened His eyes. Turning to the Kālabhairava idol, He called out the Lord’s name and after prostrating, came out of the temple. Actually, over half-an hour had elapsed. On coming out of the temple, He said, “Nirvikalpa-samādhi is very nice. Is it not?” His Holiness was such a master of nirvikalpa-samādhi, that He had perfectly regulated the duration of His own state of nirvikalpa-samādhi, to coincide with the disciple’s.

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A disciple once asked His Holiness whether the transition to nirvikalpa-samādhi during meditation could be effected by merely stilling the mind. His Holiness answered in the negative and then said, “Let us try it out. You try to go rapidly into nirvikalpa-samādhi by stilling your mind and I too shall do the same.” They sat face to face with one another. After about 45 minutes, the disciple gradually opened his eyes, only to find His Holiness doing the same. His Holiness had maintained perfect rapport with him and had duplicated his every move; this was unmistakable from the conversation that followed.

HH: Narrate one step of what you did and I shall state the next.

Disciple: I fixed my gaze between my eyebrows.

HH: Today, a light green hue manifested there.

D: Yes. I then started stilling my mind.

HH: The hue vanished and an expanse was perceived.

D: Yes. The mind then became progressively calm.

HH: Suddenly, you were transported into nirvikalpa-samādhi. It thus appears that no fixation of the mind on the Ātman was required. Is it not so?

D: Yes.

HH: Actually, just prior to the transition you had, by force of habit, you fixed your mind on the Ātman. Still your mind this evening as you did now but pull yourself out of meditation just before you plunge into nirvikalpa-samādhi. Tell me later what happened.

The next day, when the disciple went to prostrate before His Holiness, He asked, “Did you try it?” The disciple replied that he had and found that what His Holiness had said was perfectly valid. With a smile, His Holiness remarked, “For the sake of confirmation, I too tried out this morning what I had told you to do and noted exactly what I had observed yesterday.”

Such was His Holiness’s expertise in meditation, in the attainment at will of nirvikalpa-samādhi and in its regulation.

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