Om bhaskaraya namaha, Salutations to the Sun who is the cause of brillance and makes things evident.
glossary
bhaskara – sun. Adi 4.171
bhaskaran – the sun. SB 3.29.5, SB 4.10.15, SB 6.1.15
bhaskaran – the sun-god. SB 9.24.35
bhaskaram – the sun. SB 3.11.29
Sun Gayatri Mantra lyrics in Sanskrit:
Om Bhaskaraya Vidhmahe,
Diva karaya Dheemahe,
Thanno Surya Prachodayath.
Surya Gayatri Mantra translation and meaning:
Let us meditate on the Sun that emanates light,
And is divine in its essence,
Let Sun enlighten my mind.
For a thing to be self-evident, it must become present in our consciousness. A people who live in darkness cannot see objects in the darkness. The darkness of ignorance has people believing they are the body, tanu bhava, and naught else exists within them. Their immediacy is experience and they do not draw wisdom from years of experience. They repeat the same event over and again, lifetime after lifetime.
The intellect is not based on satisfaction of desires. There are values inherent within the human which must be elicited through educare; that is the task of education, eliciting the knowledge and wisdom that is inherent within the human. This knowledge, this wisdom is the perennial philosophy, the knowledge that one is the atma, the spark of the divine contained within the body, and knowledge of this is attained via a clarified intellect, that which undertakes actions based not on the gunas but on the inherent values of truth, love, peace, right conduct and non-violence, which are within each and every human.
The intellect is nearest the atma and derives over 80% of its illumination from the atma. At that level of illumination, all is brilliance within. The knowledge inherent within has to be cultivated for it to shine with brilliance. One cannot see air, yet it is all around, and it gives life as one breathes air and transfers oxygen into the bloodstream. So also, buried within the human is the spark of divinity which manifests as the voice of conscience and guides the human toward true humanness and the goal of life. It is this which illumines a dulled intellect with the brilliance of the Sun.
There is no dearth of books today; nor is there lack of Gurus. Educational institutions spread knowledge all around. To all appearances, the Sun of Knowledge, the Jnana Bhaskara is showering His rays in plenty. But one can hardly notice those who have imbibed the nectarine wisdom thus offered and dwell in the ecstasy it can confer. The thick binding encasing the books seems to prevent wisdom from emerging. The mountain range with lust, anger, hatred, envy and pride as the peaks, shuts out the splendour of the Sun. Charity, compassion, fortitude, sympathy, sacrifice, these arise from the higher levels of consciousness while opposite tendencies breed in the lower levels. The latter cannot confer ananda; they can only plunge us in grief. – Abbostsbury, Madras, 22-1-1982.
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