Achariya George Adams
Speaks on "Truth, Love and Non-violence"
Sunday, October 9, 2016 at 11:00am
This Sunday we have chosen for our meditation the subject, “Truth, Love and Non-violence.” Our goal will be to awaken, inspire and affirm the spiritual evolution of our soul and that of humanity by the power of what Mahatma Gandhi referred to as “Satyagraha” (soul force). We will see that Satyagraha comports with the teachings of the Sermon on the Mount as well as the Shrimad Bhagavad Gita and that the law of love is the path to universal peace and understanding.
We will also come to the understanding that our soul, our divine essence, is a gift of God to each of us and that our spiritual destiny is to realize and manifest the qualities of Truth, Love and Non-violence in our daily life.
In preparation for this Sunday’s meditation, I invite you to reflect upon the following words from the teaching of The Mahatma:
“I have found that life persists in the midst of destruction. Therefore there must be a higher law than that of destruction. Only under that law would well-ordered society be intelligible and life worth living. If that is the law of life we must work it out in daily existence. Wherever there are wars, wherever we are confronted with an opponent, conquer by love. I have found that the certain law of love has answered in my own life as the law of destruction has never done. It takes a fairly strenuous course of training to attain a mental state of nonviolence. It is a disciplined life, like the life of a soldier. The perfect state is reached only when the mind, body, and speech are in proper coordination. Every problem would lend itself to solution if we are determined to make the law of truth and nonviolence the law of life. Just as a scientist will work wonders out of various applications of the laws of nature, a man who applies the laws of love with scientific precision can work greater wonders. Nonviolence is infinitely more wonderful and subtle than forces of nature like, for instance, electricity. The law of love is a far greater science than any modern science.”
— Achariya George
From Gurus and Swamis: AUM
“Thus, the whole life of the devotee and the universe around him are spiritualized in the twinkling of an eye. The state which the Raja Yogi realizes only by years of rigid practice, the Jnana Yogi after lives of discrimination, and the Karma Yogi, after many years of service, the Bhakti Yogi attains in an instant”.
— The Magnetic Power of Love, by Swami Premananda
“Religion deals with the truths of the metaphysical world just as chemistry and the other natural sciences deal with the truths of the physical world. The book one must read to learn chemistry is the book of nature. The book from which to learn religion is your own mind and heart. The sage is often ignorant of physical science, because he reads the wrong book—the book within; and the scientist is too often ignorant of religion, because he too reads the wrong book—the book without.”
— Swami Vivekananda, Notes on Science and Religion
“In its positive form, Ahimsa means the largest love, the greatest charity. If I am a follower of Ahimsa, I MUST LOVE my enemy. I must apply the same rules to the wrongdoer who is my enemy or a stranger to me as I would to my wrong-doing father or son. This active Ahimsa necessarily includes truth and fearlessness.
“Ahimsa is not the crude thing it has been made to appear. Not to hurt any living thing is no doubt a part of Ahimsa. But it is its least expression. The principle of Ahimsa is hurt by every evil thought, by undue haste, by lying, by hatred, by wishing ill to anybody. It is also violated by our holding on to what the world needs.”
— Mahatama Gandhi, An American Profile by Swami Kamalananda
“Realization of the Self reveals the harmony of existence and the correlation of the manifested universe, unfolds innate love and inner joy, unveils the beauty of creation, and in the limitless effulgence of self-consciousness brings the revelation of the all-pervasiveness of the eternal reality.
“Passing through the stages of duality, the Yogi realizes himself as above all dualities and free from their effects. He realizes himself as birthless, deathless, all-pervading, and free from the chain of cause and effect. He realizes that he is eternal. Yet he finds himself unable to express this realization in words. Here all suffering ceases, and the Yogi attains the state of eternal, conscious bliss.”
— Srimad-Bhagavad Gita, Spiritual Interpretation by Swami Premananda
Noble Thoughts
"Let Noble Thoughts come to us from every side."
—Rig Veda
“I am being led to my religion through Truth and Non-violence, i.e. love in the broadest sense. I often describe my religion as the Religion of Truth. Of late, instead of saying God is Truth, I have been saying Truth is God, in order to more fully define my Religion.…the most ignorant among mankind have some truth in them. We are all sparks of Truth. The sum total of these sparks is indescribable, as-yet-Unknown-Truth, which is God.”
— Mahatma Gandhi, Contemporary Indian Philosophy (p 23)
"What I want to achieve, what I have been striving and pining to achieve these thirty years is self-realization, to see God face to face. I live and move and have my being in pursuit of this goal. All that I do by way of speaking and writing, and all my ventures in the political field, are directed to this same end."
— Mahatma Gandhi, My Experiments in Truth
"You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy; But I say unto you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous. For if you love only those who love you, what reward do you have?”
— Jesus of Christ Consciousness, New Testament, Matthew, Chapter 5 (pp 43-46)