Topic: The Honey Doctrine (Madhu Vidya)

[Nichi]

I've had to draw from pre-written sources because I am walking on shaky ground as to my knowledge of it. This principle is supposed to be strictly Brahmanic - that is, available and discussed only among the Brahman caste. But I have no way of knowing if that is really true - or even what it means. (If it's online, one concludes that it is not all that secret or obscure.)   My interest in it comes as part and parcel to some other research I was doing, which makes it relevant to me personally, but rather than streamline it into the other items, I thought it needs to stand alone, in the Hinduism folder, for now.

This will be presented in several installations. The Sanskrit passages have not been included because no one here (to my knowledge) reads it.

[Nichi]

The Brihadaranyaka Upanishad

by Swami Krishnananda
CHAPTER II
Fifth Brahmana: Madhu-Vidya – The Honey Doctrine

There is an interesting story behind this knowledge. It is a very secret knowledge which cannot be imparted to all people. And Indra got this knowledge from Sage Dadhyaṅṅ. Greedy that he was, he did not want others to know this. He wanted to have this knowledge only for himself. He had told his Guru, "If you tell this to anybody else, I will cut off your head." He was a very strange disciple, and the Guru said nothing. He kept quiet. Indra desired to be the only knower of it. Such a great secret it is! Then two other gods known as the Aśvinis – they are the twin celestial physicians – wanted to have this knowledge. They knew that this Guru knows this – the Madhu-Vidyā. So they came and said: "Will you teach us Madhu-Vidyā?" The Guru Dadhyaṅṅ Ātharvaṇa Rishi said: "You know the danger behind my telling what I know? I will lose my head." "Why?" they asked. He told them: "This is what happened. That foolish Indra, I taught him something, and this threat is the gratitude he gave me. He says, if I tell this to anybody else, he will sever my head. So, if I tell you, my head will go." "Oh, you do not bother about it," the twins said, "We shall look to it. We shall take care of this matter. You do not be afraid of losing your head." "How are you going to save me?" "You start teaching. Then, we cut off your head. Then, we will bring the head of a horse and place it on the trunk of your body, and you speak through the horse's mouth. Then Indra will get angry and cut off your head. But what he will cut off is the horse's head only. Afterwards he will go away and we will replace your real head and join it so that you become all right. Thereby you will not have lost anything." That was a very good idea. Then Sage Dadhyaṅṅ began to speak and the Aśvinis cut off his head and kept it safe somewhere, in secret. They brought the head of a horse from somewhere, fixed it on the sage's trunk and gave it life. Immediately the horse started speaking the Madhu-Vidyā, and through the mouth of the horse it is that this wisdom has come. Indra got enraged on seeing that the sage had started imparting the Madhu-Vidyā. He went and cut off that head he found on the sage's neck – the horse's head. Then the Aśvinis came and put back the original head on the sage and made him whole again.

So, this is the interesting story behind the Vidyā called Madhu-Vidyā. But whatever the story is behind this enunciation of the Vidyā, it is a magnificent statement of the Upaniṣhad, where it tells us that everything is organically related to everything. When you touch anything, you are touching everything. If I touch a table, I am touching the sun at once. Nobody can understand the mystery behind this thing. Everything is vitally connected, not merely artificially related, so that when I see anything, I am seeing everything. When I speak to anyone, I am speaking to everybody. When I touch anything, I touch all things, and when I know one thing, I know everything. This point is really a magnificent theme in the Bṛhadāraṇyaka Upaniṣhad. No wonder Indra was very fond of it and did not want others to know it.

So, do not cut off my head because I am telling it to you. This earth is the honey of all beings. It is the essence and milk of all beings. People suck this earth as if they suck honey which has such a beautiful taste; and earth sucks everybody and everything as if they are honey to it. The earth is the honey of all, and everyone is the honey of the earth. The earth is absorbed into the 'being' of everything, and everything is absorbed into the 'being' of the earth. That is the meaning of saying that earth is the honey of all beings, and all beings are the honey of the earth. It is the honey that you absorb into your being by sucking, by licking, by enjoying, by making it a part of your own 'being'. So does the earth make everything a part of its own 'being' by absorbing everything into itself. And so does every 'being' in the world suck the earth into itself and make it a part of its own 'being'.

Apart from the earth and the beings who are correlated in this manner, there is another superior principle present in the earth and in all beings. That superior principle is the luminous consciousness. There is an animating being behind this physical entity that you call the earth, and an animating principle behind what you call all the beings, creatures, individuals, in the world. That which is cosmically animating all creation and that which is individually animating every little creature, that also has to be taken into consideration in the correlationship of the objective and the subjective aspect of creation. The earth that is mentioned here is not merely this little ball of mud on which we are sitting. It is the entire physical creation. The whole physical creation is what is designated as 'earth'. And here there is a description of the correlativity and correlationship which are animated by the same consciousness. There is an immanence of consciousness in the objective universe and an immanence of consciousness in the individual beings, manifesting in some degree, not always in the same degree. Now, these two are correlated. Just as the objective world and the subjective individual are organically connected, so is this animating consciousness in the objective world correlated with the individual consciousness. One is hanging on the other, one is connected with the other, one is dependent on the other, one is incapable of being without the other. That Being which animates the cosmic and the individual aspects of creation is called the Luminous Immortal Being – tejomayo' mritamayah purusah. He is called the Puruṣha because the Puruṣha is etymologically that which exists in anybody, or that which animates anybody. It may be an individual body or a Universal Body. In either case it is known as the Puruṣha. It may be the Puruṣha that is individual when we merely call it the Puruṣha, otherwise we call it Puruṣhottama – yaś cāyam āsv apsu tejomayo'mṛtamayaḥ puruṣaḥ.

That is this; this is that; there is no distinction between the two. The individual is not constitutionally separate from the substance of the whole, and the whole is not in any way different from the structure of the part. They are essentially the same. That which connects the part with the whole and the whole with the part is what is called Puruṣha. The Being that is between the two as a need, as it were, is the immortal essence of the cosmos as well as the individual – sa yo'yam ātmā. This is the Ātman that we speak of. This is the Self of the Universal Being; this is the Self of the individual being; this is the Self of what is outside; this is the Self of what is inside. This is all – idaṁ sarvam. This is called Brahman, the Absolute. It is filling all space, existing everywhere, filling all things. It is a plenum; it is fullness; and therefore it is called Brahma. The word Brahma comes from the root Brahm, to fill everything, complete everything, and to be self-sufficient in every respect. That which is overwhelming and complete in itself is Brahma, and that is the Ātman or the Self of all beings – idam brahma, idaṁ sarvam.

This earth element is of this nature. So are all other elements capable of being correlated in this manner. The objective principles are present in the individual bodies in some form. The physical body is an individual projection of the cosmic physical substance. The physical solidity that we feel in the body of ours, actually and substantially, is the earth element. It is the earth that appears solid, and there is nothing in this body of ours which is not of the earth. Likewise, the water principle is present in us; fire principle is present in us; the air principle and all other principles are present which are mentioned one by one, gradually.

The water principle is the honey of all beings, and all beings are the honey of the water principle as the cause thereof, and the cause which is the water principle is not independent of the part which proceeds from the whole. Up to that which is animating the water principle and that which is animating the parts thereof, that is the immortal Being. The seed in the individual, the vital force in the individual is the representation of the water principle in the cosmos. Both these are correlated to each other, and they are animated by a single Being, the Immortal Ātman, the Self of all which is, veritably, everything, the Absolute Brahman.

This fire principle is the honey of all beings, and everything that is a part thereof is naturally included in the whole. I need not mention it once again. This fire principle is manifest in the speech of the individual. The speech is an action, an activity which is superintended by the fire principle. If there is no fire in the system, you cannot speak. So, these are correlated with each other as part and whole, cause and effect. But this causal relationship between fire and the speech principle is made possible by the presence of the immanence of the Cosmic Being who is the Puruṣha Supreme – tejomayo'mṛtamayaḥ puruṣaḥ.

This air is of the same nature. The breath that you breathe, the vital energy in us, that is the correlate in the individual aspects of the cosmic Hiraṇyagarbha, Prāṇa and Vāyu, and they are correlated, so that when the part is conceived, the whole is automatically conceived. The Upaniṣhad will take pains to make clear the point that this co-relationship is not mechanical or artificial, but vital, living and organic. To bring out this point it is that the Puruṣha is brought in as the connecting principle. Consciousness is equally present in the cause as well as the effect. It is in the outside world and also in the inner individual. So, when any particular function of the individual is taken into consideration for the purpose of effecting or producing anything, the cause has to be taken into consideration at the same time. If the cause is forgotten and the individual alone is emphasised in a particular action, it would be the source of bondage. The bondage of the individual is due to the emphasis of the individual independently of the cause which is organically connected by the very same Ātman that is present in both. So, the essence of the Madhu-Vidyā is the cosmic contemplation of Reality. Prāṇa within and Vāyu outside, they are both correlated and connected by a single immortal essence.

Now, the sun is connected with the eye. We are able to see things on account of the principle of the sun that is present in our eyes and the connecting link between the sun and the eyes in again the same Puruṣha. Wherever you see the connecting link between the macrocosmic and the microcosmic you find the same Puruṣha. So, the one Being is the active, energising Reality of any aspect of the cosmos as well as the corresponding aspect of the individual. So, here the sun and the eye are correlated.

Likewise, the quarters of the heavens and the ears are correlated. The mind and the moon are correlated, and the Upaniṣhad goes on to correlate the light that is flashed forth by the lightning above and the light that is projected by the body by its own energy. The sounds that are made outside in the world are also causally connected with the effect as the sounds made in our own bodies by various functions. The space that is outside is not independent of the space in our own bodies. It is the same space that is operating inside also. The space in the heart within is the space that is outside. Both are internally connected.



(to be continued)

[Nichi]

(The above, continued.)

The law that operates outside is the law of the cosmos. There are no two laws – God's law and man's law; universal law and individual law. No such thing is there. Such thing as 'my law' or 'your law' does not exist. There is only one law operating everywhere, in all creation, visible or invisible, in all realms of being. The same law is there for the celestials, the humans and the subhuman creatures. Everyone is controlled by a single principle of ordinance. That is called Dharma. It operates as gravitation in the physical level; it operates as love in the psychological level; it operates as chemicals in the chemical level and it operates as integration of thought in our mental level, the level of cognition and thinking. It ultimately operates as the connecting link between the subject and the object, on account of which there is knowledge of anything at all. That is called Dharma. Dharma is an integrating force of anything that is even apparently in disparity. Anything that is disconnected, apparently isolated, not visibly connected, is actually connected, and that connecting principle is called Dharma. And Dharma becomes an integrating principle because of the presence of the Ātman that is behind it. There is no such thing as Dharma independent of the operation of the Ātman. What you call Dharma or law is the Ātman working. Its own law is its Being; its Being is its law; they are not two different things.

What you call truth is one. There cannot be two truths, three truths, four truths, five truths, etc. There is only one truth – satyameva jayate. The truth that succeeds is that correlative, integrating principle, Satya, which is, again, a manifestation of the Ātman. Ātman is truth, and Ātman is Dharma. So, Satya and Dharma are identified as it was mentioned earlier in a preceding passage.

The humanity that you speak of is also of the same nature. There are two types of humanity which we study in psychology. We find mankind as it is totally construed, and mankind as it is in itself. It is a subject of psychology. Mankind, as it is in itself, is connected with the spatially construed humanity. The psychological mankind and the real mankind – the Jīva-Sriṣti and the Īshvara Sriṣti -are also interconnected, correlated vitally, and this correlation is possible on account of the Self, the Ātman.

The Cosmic Being is feeding upon the individual and the individual is feeding upon the Cosmic. They are interrelated like the mother and the child and much more correlated with each other in an organic unity which is incapable of understanding. This Ātman is not your Ātman or my Ātman. The Ātman that we are speaking of is the Ātman of all beings. Rather it is not the Ātman of all beings; but it is the Ātman, which is all beings, ultimately. It is the Lord of all beings.

Everything is controlled by the very existence and presence of the Ātman, without any movement on Its part. It is the Emperor of all. As the spokes are connected to the hub of a wheel, everything visible or invisible is connected to this Ātman. All beings, whatever can be conceived of or not conceived of – all celestials, gods – all the worlds that can be conceived of in any level of manifestation – everything that is vital and real – everything, all beings, whatever is, in any form, are located in this Ātman, in the same way as every spoke is located in the hub of the wheel.

This is the Madhu-Vidyā in quintessence – the contemplation of all things by the contemplation of anything. And, one need not be surprised that this is the secret of success, because success is the materialisation of a cause in a given direction, and the materialisation is possible only if the part moves in the direction of the cause which is not yet manifest as effect. If the object is outside the thought, how can it materialise? So, whatever you think, if the object is thought to be 'outside' your mind, it will not materialise. The contemplation by the mind, of the internal organic connection of the object with its own being, is the way to the success of any thought. Any thought can materialise; anything can become true, provided that which is affirmed or asserted in the mind is contemplated upon as a vital reality, inescapable from the 'being' of the mind; inseparable from the mind.

This is the Madhu-Vidyā which Dadhyaṅṅ Rishi, the Sage Ātharvaṇa taught to the Aśvins, the two celestials, who wanted to learn this Vidyā, by placing a horse's head on his trunk. The Sage says: "My dear children, you have performed a terrific feat in wanting to know this wisdom from me. Verily, you are really very virile. You have performed a terrific act in severing my head and replacing it by a horse's head temporarily. You worked this miracle for the sake of this knowledge that you wanted to gain from me. All right, here is this knowledge for you." "Like clouds rain water, I shall rain prosperity upon you by this knowledge that I impart to you."  By the head of the horse was this knowledge spoken by Dadhyaṅṅ, the Sage Ātharvaṇa.

This, therefore, is known as the Madhu-Vidyā, the sense of the 'honey' of all beings, the knowledge of the interdependence of things and the vital connection of everything, under every condition, at every time, everywhere. This is what the great Rishi Dadhyaṅṅ Ātharvaṇa communicated to the celestials known as the Aśvins.

Through the mouth of the horse, the great Master spoke.

This, the Ātharvaṇa Rishi spoke, and in conclusion, he said: "This Being which is responsible for the interconnectedness of things has become, what you call, the living and the non-living; the visible and the invisible; the creatures which are two-footed and those that are four-footed. He became the subtle body and then the gross body by means of a subtle instrument known as the Linga Śarīra or Sukshma Śarīra. The very Being became the vital consciousness of all physical bodies, and He is present in everybody. The Body that is Universal and the body that is particularised – there is nothing that it is not enveloping.  Everything is covered up by That – idaṁ sarvam." 

This again is the knowledge which Dadhyaṅṅ Ātharvaṇa taught to the Aśvins. He said this: "In every form He appears in a corresponding form." This is a very important passage in the Upaniṣhad. He casts Himself into the mould of every creature and becomes formulated into the structure of that particular creature. He can be conveniently made to assume any shape under any condition. When He casts Himself into the mould of a bird's body, it looks as if He is a bird. When He casts Himself into the mould of a human body, it looks as if He is a human being. When He shines as a celestial, it looks as if He is an angel. He is, then, that which you visualise with your eyes.

These forms, these bodies, these visible individualities of things, are really intended for the recognition of His presence in all things. He has not created this world merely for nothing, as if He has no other work to do. It is intended to give an indication of His presence; an indication of the variety which He can comprise within Himself; an indication of the contradictions that can be reconciled in His Being; an indication of the Majesty which is in His own stature, and an indication of the inscrutability of His nature. All these forms are visualised by us directly with our own eyes, a contradictory world where nothing is clear; everything is enigmatic, if considered in isolation. However, everything is reconcilable if it is connected in its proper context in the manner which we have just described in the Madhu-Vidyā. So, there is no contradiction in the world; everything is harmonious. We, unfortunately, find it impossible to see the harmony as we are not in a position to harmonise ourselves with the harmony that is His. But His intention is something different. His intention is to make it possible for us to visualise the harmony and the interconnectedness through every finite form.

Due to the magnificence of His nature and the variety of His manifestation we are unable to see the truth of things. We visualise only one particular form and are not able to connect this form with other forms. So we are not able to see things as they ought to be seen. We are not supposed to see one thing only, or a few things only, or a hundred things only. We are supposed to see anything in its connection with other things. If this connection is lost, it is as if we see nothing and know nothing, and one day we will be full of sorrow. "So, let it be understood," says the great Rishi, "that the Master magician who can be called great Mayavi, the Supreme Being who is designated here as Indra, the Lord of all beings, appears in such manifold forms that it is impossible for the physical eyes to connect the forms with the circumstances in which they are really placed."

All the sense-organs are He only. They are not outside Him. It is He that appears as the senses; He appears as the forms and He appears as the perception of the objects, and in His Masterly variety, He has cast Himself into the mould of even the senses. He is Hari. Hari means the Lord Supreme, or it may mean the senses which drag you away to the objects. Harayah Hari: He may take away the ignorance of a person, and then He will be called Hari; or He may take away your consciousness towards the objects outside; that is also another function of His, and so He is called Hari. He is tens and hundreds and thousands; not one, two, three, four, merely. Any number is He, and all these numbers are capable of reconciliation in the One that He really is.

This Supreme is tens and hundreds and thousands and manifold and variety and what not. Everything is that glorious resplendence which appears as these colours and forms that move in various directions, in many ways. It is manifold and it is infinite in Its variety; It is the Supreme Brahman, the Absolute. He has neither a beginning nor an end.  You do not know what is before It; you do not know what is after It; you do not know what is inside It. It is all things. This is, verily, your own Self. This manifold Majesty, which is regarded as inscrutable, is seated in your own heart, not outside you. It is the experiencer of everything. Sorrows and joys, varieties, differences, apparent irreconcilabilities confusions – everything is Its experience. It is experiencing everything in Its own totality, and if you could experience through Its eyes and through Its forms, through Its Being, then you would not see the variety in the world. You would not see any contradiction nor any irreconcilability It is a One single interconnectedness that is Cosmic Being.

This is the subject of the great Madhu-Vidyā instructed by Dadhyaṅṅ Ātharvaṇa to the gods, Aśvins, through the mouth of the horse.

http://swami-krishnananda.org/brdup/brhad_II-05.html

[Michael]

I cracked the champagne!

[Nichi]

 

[Nichi]

"This earth is the honey (madhu, the effect) of all beings, and all beings are the honey (madhu, the effect) of this earth."

Brihadaranyaka Upanishad, 2.5.1.