.
.
...rituals are unsafe rafts for crossing
the sea of samsara, of birth and death.
Doomed to shipwreck are those who try to cross
the sea of samsara on these poor rafts.
Ignorant of their ignorance, yet wise
in their own esteem, these deluded ones
proud of their learning go round and round
like the blind led by the blind.
.
Living in darkness, immature, unaware
of any higher good or goal, they fall
again and again into the sea.
...
...
The eye cannot see it; mind cannot grasp it.
The deathless Self has neither caste nor race,
neither eyes nor ears nor hands nor feet.
...
As the web issues out of the spider
and is withdrawn, as plants sprout from the earth.
as hair grows from the body, even so,
the sages say, this universe springs from
the deathless Self, the source of life.
.
The deathless Self meditated upon
Himself and projected the universe
As evolutionary energy.
From this energy developed life, mind,
the elements, and the world of karma,
which is enchained by cause and effect.
.
The lord of Love is the one Self of all.
He is detached work, spiritual wisdom,
and immortality. Realize the Self
hidden in the heart, and cut asunder
the knot of ignorance here and now.
.
~ the Mundaka Upanishad
translated by Eknath Easwaran
.
