Basingstoke : An unexplored side of Netaji on his 123rd Birthday that of a great philosopher. Some excerpts from from the final chapter of Netaji’s unfinished autobiography – “My faith”.
“….There was a time when I believed that Absolute Truth was within the reach of human mind and that the Doctrine of Maya represented the quintessence of
knowledge. What I cannot live up to — what is not. There is some analogy to the triple prayer of the Buddhists which has to be repeated daily — “I take refuge in Buddha; I take refuge in Dharma (Truth); I take refuge in the Sangha (Order).
In brief, this implies that the world as we perceive it through our senses is an illusion. It is a case of the rope being mistaken for a snake, the snake being the world of the senses. According to some the universe is the manifestation of Ananda or Divine Bliss. Others hold that it is the manifestation of Divine Play or ‘Leela’.
It is impossible to comprehend the Absolute through our human intellect with all its limitations……”
He concludes the chapter by saying
“…Nevertheless, we have to build our life on the theory which contains the maximum truth. We cannot sit still because we cannot, or do not, know the Absolute Truth.
Reality, therefore, is Spirit, the essence of which is Love, gradually unfolding itself in an eternal play of conflicting forces and their solutions….”
The book was published as “The Indian Pilgrim”.
Image Curtsey : NRB
