Question:
It is said that Consciousness/God is Everything- including war, cancer, victimization, etc. Why then do Enlightened beings also say Consciousness is pure ‘love’? Wouldn’t it be more accurate to say that God is love & hate?
Sri Prabhuji:
Absolute God is “nothing – Not a thing – not an object”. Absolute Reality God is transcendent – beyond sense organs. Hence any discussion about material nature does not apply in absolute God – transcendent reality.
However, the creative vibrational energy of absolute God manifests the world. This creative energy is called by various names – shakti (power of God), Omkara … etc. World is “appearance” of God because of vibrational energy. It is like saying water “appears as” big wave, small wave, bubble, foam etc. Even though water appears as “many” there is no change in water. Similarly Absolute Reality – Transcendent God “appears as world” because of vibrations.
Any appearance requires a contrast – requires two colours black and white. Without contrast and variety no appearance is possible. Light and dark, peak and valley etc. Variety “appears” as creation. Nothing wrong with variety. One Reality of God appears as multiplicity and variety. However, the problem of like and dislike – love and hate appears with the appearance of “ego” individualised consciousness. Ego identifies with a particular body, mind and views the world with an attitude of love and hate, like and dislike. Ego is unreal like a shadow. Ego identifies conscious SELF (God,) with matter with a thought ‘I am body’. Consciousness and matter can never mix like water and oil mixing. However ego mixes these two. Ego is illusory – not real at all. God is Real while ego is illusory. Real God is love while appearance of illusory ego causes love and hate.
Birth and death is also part of nature. The duality of heat and cold, birth and death etc are like two sides of coin – one cannot exist without other. These contrasts are created by vibrational energy.
Let us distinguish between pure love which is feeling and love for an object which is conditioned love- called attachment. It is the attachment for an object causes hate not the pure love. Same object can cause two different reactions in people – one person may “love” coffee while another person may “hate” coffee. This means hate and love are not part of the object. It is the view point of the person which creates love (attachment) and hate.
Why somebody has an “attachment (love)” for an object? The object gives him “happiness” by making him feel complete.
God is appearing as entire universe. Entire universe being God, there is nothing for God to gain to become “complete”. God being everything in the universe, God is nature of “pure love” not conditioned “love or attachment”. We do any work because of conditioned love – say mother taking care of the child. Similarly entire universe is maintained because of pure love of God.