Bhagavagd Gita - Session 3- Track 308

By what power that action becomes steady? ─ By the power of Buddhiyoga. If intelligence does not become steady, Karma will not become steady. This is the relationship between the two. If you want to make your action steady, the condition will be that your intelligence must be steady. That is why He says that Karma is inferior to the yoga of intelligence: that is the condition. Mere action by itself will never lead you to liberation from action, ‘mere action’. We are all doing action all the time; it does not mean that we are all the time getting liberated. You can become liberated while doing action, only when first you become steady in your intelligence. This is the relationship between intelligence and action.

Why is this relationship? Basically if you go still beyond all this propositions, you realise that ultimate Reality is Satchitananda. We have taken this subject at length; ultimate Reality is Satchitananda. If you examine the whole world, which is in movement, you see behind it, a pure Stable. The pure Stable is the pure Existent. The pure Existent is Immutable, but He is not only immutable. He is not only Sat; He is also Chit; and Chit has two aspects: Consciousness and Force. The logic is: Sat first, Chit second, Force third. Action is Force. Force depends upon Chit; Chit is Consciousness of which Buddhi is a fundamental characteristic power at a certain level. Buddhi is not the highest power from the point of view of Consciousness. Beyond Buddhi also there are many other powers, but in our complex Buddhi is the highest power, nearest to Consciousness. Buddhi, which represents Chit, is higher than Action or Force; and higher than Chit, is Sat, is the Immutable.

‘This’ being the ultimate structure of the world, the powers also have got their interrelationship accordingly. If you are already stabilised, absolutely stable, then you do not even need Chit and Force; because that is the most primary thing, basic thing. But, being settled in the pure state of ‘Being’, you are capable of ‘Conscious-Force’: so, you might say that Conscious-Force is your instrument, you are the master. The Sat, wherever there is Sat, it is the master; that is the relationship; the relationship between Sat and Chit is, that Chit is one with Sat; Sat is one with Chit, and yet Sat is more than the Chit. This is the special kind of relationship that exists between Sat and Chit. Sat is the most fundamental; essence is most fundamental. Whatever manifests the essence is subordinate; it comes out of the Sat, ─ of the essence. Therefore, manifestation is always subordinate to the Stable. If the Stability goes away even the movement will ultimately fritter away. It is only on the basis of inexhaustible, unmovable, absolute self-existence that all movement can have as basis. Movement is always dependent upon the Sat; Sat does not depend upon the movement.

Similarly, Chit has two aspects: Consciousness and Force. Consciousness is more primary, in relation to the Force: Shakti; that is why we use the word Chit-Shakti. Chit is primary; Shakti is secondary. Chit can exist without Force; but Force can never exist without the Chit. Therefore Action is always inferior to Chit. And this is what Sri Krishna says that, “Action is inferior to Knowledge”. But therefore, it does not follow therefore, that Action is nothing: although it is inferior it does not mean that it is nothing and therefore to be thrown away. In the totality of Reality, all elements are needed: Sat is needed, Chit is needed, Action is needed, Ananda is needed. When you combine Sat and Chit, the union of the two is Ananda. Therefore all movement, all creativity arises out of Ananda.

You find therefore, the Reality is one, but it is triple; the Reality is one, but it is Sat, Chit, and Ananda. It is because of this, that we have got so many faculties, and these faculties relate themselves primarily to Sat, or to Chit, or to Ananda. And then, their inter-relationships are established on the basis of the original, the primary Sat, Chit and Ananda. The powers of Ananda are all subordinate to the powers of Chit and Sat. But also, Ananda is always a culmination; it is dependent, but ultimately all of them culminate in Ananda. This is the special privilege of Ananda. Ananda is always a culmination, is a crown. When you do all your actions perfectly, when you really become “be”, then there is prasāda, there is a complete happiness and complete deliverance, śāntiṁ, sukham, prasādam. This is the condition that you arrive at, when you completely “be” and completely “act”, when you are completely steadied, when you are yoga yukta, when you become completely engaged in Yoga, then this is the result, Ananda is the culmination.