Why are we used to thinking in terms of finite space and time or in terms of everything having a cause behind its existence? For the Vedas tell us of a Brahman that is “uncaused” and “uncreated” and so forth. This conception is truly hard to believe and hence the struggle to keep searching for the Truth till we understand it fully. We think the Brahman too, like everything known to us, ought necessarily to have a beginning. For, we are used to seeing everything around us caused or created out of something. Anything that’s caused or created must necessarily have a beginning. And everything that exists must necessarily be caused or created otherwise there’s no way for us to fathom how its existence came about. However, if we keep following this logic – viz. that everything is caused by or created from something, then it will lead us to an infinite regress. Because it will lead us to ponder indefinitely over a series of sources each having a source that caused it. Thus, a caused b, which caused c, which caused d, which caused e, and so on till we reach the end of alphabet z caused by y. But, the question would still persist…what caused a? Are we even allowed to ask this question? And why shouldn’t we be allowed? If we can question what caused b and so on till z, why can’t we question what caused A? Pondering on these lines, an interesting situation occurs if we think that A in its own turn was caused by Z itself… thereby repeating the progression cyclically. Thus the whole creation (assuming the whole creation were just a sequence of letters) would turn out to be cyclic in nature – much like a circle – with no beginning or end. It could be true. Because that’s what the universe seems to be – a succession that gets created and destroyed.
It does seem never-ending - without a beginning or an end. It seems crazy. Our minds are not attuned to understand such a thing. How can a thing NOT have a beginning? We are used to seeing things not having an end because our own lives aren’t long enough. But with the aid of logic we know that all things created must definitely have an end. They cannot be without an end. But we are not used to seeing things without a beginning. Even logic doesn’t help us here. How can a thing not have a beginning? Look at a circle. Does it have a beginning or an end? It just appears to be a smooth structure without any edges. But when we drew the circle – we did begin from somewhere, right? We touched the paper with the pencil and started drawing from a point. Perhaps then a Point marked the beginning of the circle. So a circle can be thought of as being composed of a virtually infinite number of points all side by side and touching each other such that one after the other they keep appearing until the last point falls adjacent to the point from where it all began, only however, it’s on the other side. Thus, we come back to the starting point and close the loop. But, now we have seen that a circle is perhaps nothing more than a sequence of infinitesimally small points all arranged in a circular manner. It’s hard to distinguish one point from the other. They are so close to each other as to appear perfectly smooth and continuous. In this arrangement it’s hard to find the beginning or end.
However, it does seem to suggest a more generic principle - when what starts goes back to where it started from – the whole structure seems devoid of a definite beginning or an end. But isn’t it right to say that its creation did involve a certain beginning? The pencil did start from somewhere. So how can we say the circle doesn’t have a beginning? Sounds strange! And yet, when we look at the circle – there’s no way of telling where it starts and where it ends. Thus in a way, it does seem to have had a beginning – but that no longer seems to be true when you look at it AFTER it has been created. Thus in a way it has a beginning or does it? Hmm… sounds familiar! Uncertainty principle? Does it exist or it does not?
Similarly – Brahman does not have a beginning or an end. But the question still remains. What caused the Brahman itself? Did it appear out of nowhere? Then what caused the NOWHERE? What IS NOWHERE? Who created it? Again it goes in an infinite regress. Thus, we see that per-force we need to accept a conception of a Brahman that has no beginning or end. It seems to be an unending progression of cycles – emanating and dissolving in an infinite cycle. No one knows what causes it. No one knows what sustains it. If we now create the conception of a God as separate from this Brahman then the same question will plague us again. How did God come about? Is he uncreated, uncaused etc? Then how is He different from Brahman, which we have seen (from logic of course), is also uncaused and uncreated etc.
There are no definite answers. Perhaps there will be no definite answers. The Brahman is indeed everything and there’s nothing apart from it. It is the only reality there is. Who caused the Brahman itself – no one knows, for it is the cause of everything. We who question the Brahman are nothing but Brahman. We caused everything else. We are everything else. There’s nothing apart from us. So how can we be caused because if we were caused then the question would go into an infinite regress… who caused that which caused us? And then who caused that which caused that which caused us and so on. It will lead to a logical absurdity. Thus in order to prevent that logical absurdity, we are forced to adopt the truth of the statement that Brahman is the uncaused, uncreated truth of everything that we see and do not see, feel and do not feel, hear and do not hear, see and do not see and so on. Brahman is both the intelligent and the material cause of all there is. From Brahman it all comes and into Brahman it all goes. Brahman is the only constant in the variable of the cosmos. And there is no answer to the question of who created the Brahman. I think this eternal restlessness to answer Brahman’s origin belies the limited nature of our consciousness that’s given to perceiving things as being caused or created. An uncreated, uncaused thing is simply beyond all our mortal conceptions. And hence we keep wondering where the source of it all came from.
We take the example of a pot – a pot made of clay. We know perfectly well that a Pot has nothing partaking of anything that might be known with the upadhi of a pot. What is a pot? It is after all made of clay. So, when we touch a pot, we are touching clay. Analyzing one step further – we question what is clay then? Clay as we understand is made up of a bunch of elements – Selenium etc. All these elements are present in a certain proportion and when conditions are appropriate they combine to form what is known as clay. When clay is treated appropriately and molded by an appropriately skilled person – it becomes what we know as a pot. So, continuing the inquiry further – we get to know that clay is formed from certain basic materials. If we analyze those basic materials further we get to know that these materials are actually a mass of Molecules held in a particular orientation. For example when carbon atoms combine in a certain manner – they form the shining diamond. Thus a diamond is nothing but a particular fixed orientation of the carbon atoms forming the diamond molecule. Analyzing atoms further we come to know of the electrons and the nucleus comprising of neutrons and protons. The story goes deeper from here onwards – eventually it can be shown that electrons etc behave both as a particle and as a wave and in fact they don’t appear to be anywhere near what they eventually appear as in the solid, macro form that we are used to looking at them in – viz. they are in reality far away from their appearance as a pot or the diamond we see in our daily lives. In fact, Science has proved that we cannot truly even locate the electrons completely. We can only locate them within the limits set by the uncertainty principle. In fact we also know from quantum physics that even the electrons, protons and neutrons are not the end of the road for us – meaning they are not the ULTIMATE basic particle that comprises matter. The story goes deeper than that and only recently it has been proved that given a sufficiently powered equipment that can produce a wave of a sufficiently small wavelength (which in turn means of a sufficiently large frequency because wavelength is inversely proportional to frequency which is directly proportional to energy) we can keep finding smaller and smaller constituents – almost indefinitely. Thus, we don’t even know what comprises the things that we see in our daily lives at the very basic level. We can only know approximately within the limits set by the uncertainty principle. But that’s about it. So what’s the harm in accepting what the Vedas say – that it’s all unreal? There is no reality to what we see except the reality that we accord to it from our own conception. Our own conception is but a product of ignorance. The ignorance itself arises from the interplay of what we call as Maya. But that could well be any force that misleads us into seeing things that are not real. Just like we can sometimes mistake a rope for a snake and be filled with fear. Till such time as the real nature of the rope is known – the conception of the rope being a snake seems perfectly real to us – as real as feeling the burning sensation upon accidentally touching a hot surface.
So, when we aren’t even sure of what the pot is made up of – how can we define what it is? We just saw we don’t completely know what the pot is – except that its form and appearance both seem real to us – except that it does seem to hold water in it and except that we can pour an equally unknown substance – water for example – into an equally unknown glass by an equally unknown hand employing the faculties of an equally unknown mind etc. This is as complex as it can get. The entire interplay of things can be proved to be but a myth. Behind it all, the only unchanging reality is the reality of THAT which perceives it all as happening. That which perceives it all is the Brahman. Rest all is maya or mithya or unreal. Whatever name you give it, the fact is you don’t know what it really is despite the fact that it appears to you to be the only reality there is. What grief!!!
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