Knowledge through consciousness

This year we are celebrating 150th birth anniversary of Swami Vivekanand. Swamiji had very extraordinary sharp memory (The Life of Swami Vivekanand, Vol II, pp. 634, AdvaitvaAshrama, 1989). As per this Swamiji had such a sharp memory that he almost remembered 11 volumes of Encyclopedia Britannica, which he had just read once. A question is to be raised as, ?what is the mechanism of this sharp memory and how this state of orderliness is achieved and how is it related to his/her behaviour as a great Yogi

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Nov 17, 2012, 12:53 pm IST

Surendra Singh Pokharna

This year we are celebrating 150th birth anniversary of Swami Vivekanand. Swamiji had very extraordinary sharp memory (The Life of Swami Vivekanand, Vol II, pp. 634, AdvaitvaAshrama, 1989). As per this Swamiji had such a sharp memory that he almost remembered 11 volumes of Encyclopedia Britannica, which he had just read once. A question is to be raised as, “what is the mechanism of this sharp memory and how this state of orderliness is achieved and how is it related to his/her behaviour as a great Yogi following celibacy strictly and who had a highly enlightened consciousness ?”

To answer this question, we need to critically examine the concept of knowledge in science and that in Indian philosophy which asserts that knowledge is structured in the consciousness and several new faculties of knowledge may open up in higher stages of consciousness.

Science and technology and their use in economical developments and commercialisation have revolutionised the whole world in such a way that everything appears to have changed in last 100-200 years. Developments in the field of space technology, atomic energy, electronics, biotechnology, modern agriculture, telecommunication, and manufacturing systems are some of the examples of these changes. Also these changes have played a key role in making this world truly global. However, because of these changes and domination of science and technology in all walks of life, an impression has been created that scientific knowledge is the supreme and anything other, which does not fall into this domain is not much relevant. Not only this, it is also presumed that the knowledge which is experimentally verifiable and repeatable at any place and at any time alone, is the actual knowledge. This is far from the truth. The fact is that the so-called science is just around 200 years old and the concept of knowledge existed much before that for several centuries. Vedas, Upanishads, Puranas, Agamas, Mahabharata and Ramayana, Koran, Bible have lot of knowledge. Similarly technology of gold manufacturing in the ancient India, design of old temples, etc do involve knowledge, which need not be scientific.

(To be concluded)