The Crossroad of the Divine

A prospectus of spiritual thought or Veda such as this “Crossroad of the Divine” is a “compilation of knowledge”. Vedas are collections of poems, ritual instructions, monographs and spiritual teachings called Upanishads. 

The Upanishads, numbering 108, are instruments of learning that originated in the Indus Valley of India around 3000 BCE. The word Upanishad refers to a text and also a practice that “binds truth to the mind”. The technique and the Upanishads themselves are still taught around the world today. 

Vedas and Upanishads serve one purpose: the advancement of Learned Society. From Learned Society comes civility and from thence, Civil Society. The role of the Upanishads is to ensure these take place upon the firm foundation of the Spiritual Sciences. To this end, they instruct in prayer, meditation, and methods for inquiring into God’s Plans. 

The sages and gurus of ancient India and today are not alone in their hopes for accomplishing this most laudable of goals. Scientists, spiritualists and philosophers from every religion and culture and era of human civilization have searched the infinite heavens above and tried to peer between the most infinitesimally smallest of spaces in search of how we can think, feel, live at our best, create communities that facilitate the process, and maintain God’s Favor.

Unfortunately, we tend to think of them exclusively, off limits from one another. Our opportunities to learn about them and draw salient conclusions are rare. We are either subjected to slanderous comments from oppositional radicals and fanatics or content of dubious accuracy in Comparative Religion classes.

My Teacher, Swami Chinmayananda proposed a different approach: the comprehensive study of the world’s scriptures, a collection he called a Sastra, a Sanskrit term for “Jewel Box.” Within the Sastras are the Words God spoke to His Prophets and Messengers in order to redirect societies that lost their ways.

Each one has something critical to teach as to why Society must stand, how its problems can be identified and solved, and why our commitment to its success is a commitment to Godliness. Societies consisting of Godly persons are the culmination of all that is sophisticated and sublime about human nature.

In contrast, as long as a society doesn't believe its role is to work for the happiness of the citizen and citizens harbor suspicion of their government, the future of the human condition is at risk.

The difference is but, an attitude change. Attitude adjustment is why we pray, attend religious services, and study scriptures. With them, we have all that we need to transform this troubled world into a place where all the living things that love and depend upon it can survive and thrive.

To this end I have prepared this Veda, this Crossroad of the Divine, a study guide to the World’s Great Spiritual Masterworks in hopes the combined voices of all the Prophets, Gurus, demigods, Sages, Mystics and Messengers might soften our hard hearts towards ourselves and lead us to the discovery of Grace of God, the root cause for peace on earth and goodwill towards man.

God’s Grace is the Foundation of our embodied souls, it is how we find our way into a living body and into the world. Civil Society embodies our Grace. It is how the world comes together and gives meaning and purpose to all who dwell upon it.

Here begins the Crossroad of the Divine, dedicated to my Teacher, His Holiness Pujya Gurudev Swami Chinmayanandaji Saraswati.

A despairing world laments the loss of your P presence. May we work together to fulfill your vision of a world without violence, poverty, and cruelty, may we not quarrel with each other along the way.