The Nine Forms of God To Worship

Barring the die-hard atheist, all of us do some form of worship to a superior power which we call as Bhagwaan, God, Allah etc. Even among genuine believers, there can be conflicts. Is Bhagwaan superior to Jesus or is Allah the ultimate, is Vishnu the ultimate God or is it Shiva? I hope to present my understanding of the real God.

1. I have covered in my earlier blogs about the one supreme consciousness that exists everywhere. This is the supreme reality that provides a basis for everything else. However, this is subtler than the subtlest and more massive than the most massive thing that the mind/intellect can comprehend. Hence there is no way that with the gross body/mind/intellect complex, this supreme consciousness can even be comprehended. This supreme consciousness in spiritual technical terms is Brahman. Please note that this has nothing to do with the Brahmin or the Brahma. Brahman is just a technical term to denote the supreme consciousness.

2. Now if Brahman is supreme consciousness what is this world. I have described in an earlier post that this phenomenon called the world is an illusion created due to the innate power of consciousness. Just as a mirage is created due to the innate power of the desert/environment combination, this world is due to the innate power of consciousness. Now, the world though illusory has as its base the same consciousness without which it cannot be revealed. Just as the desert sand provides a sustenance for creating the mirage, the consciousness provides a base for this world. This reflected consciousness in the revealed world is technically called Kutasta Chaitanya.

3. The cosmic intelligence of consciousness to create the manifested world  is what is called as Maya or Mahaprakriti or Nature. Just as an artist wanting to create a painting, needs a basis intelligence to create a painting, Maya or Mahaprakriti is the equivalent cosmic intelligence needed to create the universe.

4. Based on the intelligence of an artist, he conceives an idea of a painting. At this point, it is just a thought in the mind of the artist. Similarly for creating the universe, there is an ideation stage. This ideation stage is called Iswara.

5. A painter draws the broad outlines of his painting before getting into the details. This outline or blueprint has all the necessary ingredients to develop into a full blown picture. Similarly in creating the universe, there is a stage where there is a blue print of the universe. This blue print has all the necessary ingredients for the full blown universe. This stage of creation of the universe is called Hiranyagarbha.

6. A painter using the blue print now fills in the details and creates a full fledged painting. Similarly from Hiranyagarbha, the full fledged universe emerges and this is called as Virata. We have seen so far the macro cosmic evolution of the universe. Let us now look at the microcosmic evolution of life/man. The equivalent of Kutasta Chaitanya or reflected consciousness for man is the Atman. To ensure there is no confusion, please note that consciousness is the same. Just as a ray of sunlight reflected from a mirror is still sunlight, Atman which is reflected consciousness at the microcosmic level is still Brahman.

7. The Atman provides the necessary base for the microcosmic intelligence for manifestation of life. I have covered in earlier blogs that the only reason we take birth in  a particular form is to fulfil our desires which are accumulated as vasanas. Thus the vasana is not only a storehouse of all our unfulfilled desires, but is also a repository of microcosmic intelligence needed to bring out life in a particular form. Hence this stage which is equivalent to Iswara at the macro cosmic level is called as Pragya at the microcosmic level.

8. The microcosmic idea stage which is Pragya has to now move to the next stage. Just as Iswara's next stage at macro cosmic level was Hiranyagarbha, the logical next stage in evolution of life at microcosmic level is called as Taijas. Readers may please note that this Taijas is nothing but the mind/intellect/memory/ego complex. At this stage, the necessary emotions/intellect/memory capability along with an "i am" which is the ego is available to life and is just waiting to reveal itself.

9. Just as Hiranyagarbha at macro cosmic level blossomed into Virata, the cosmic universe, at the microcosmic level, Taijas manifests as the individual and his world which is called as Viswa

Let me now list out the 9 forms of consciousness.

1. Brahman

2. Kutasta Chaitanya

3. Mahaprakriti

4. Iswara

5. Hiranyagarbha

6. Virata

7. Pragya

8. Taijas

9. Viswa

So depending on the individual propensity, one may take to worship any or all of the forms of consciousness. For a worldly person like most of us, we can worship Viswa and request it to manifest in our physical lives to make it better, like good health, good looks etc. For those of us who feel a lack of inner energy, a lack of enthusiasm, we can worship Taijas to give us the necessary inner strength to charge ourselves to face the world. For those of us who want to go beyond the mundane life and wish to know how to escape the birth/death cycle, we can worship Pradnya. For those of us, who see the whole universe as one, we can worship Virata. For those of us looking for the nascent state of the whole universe, we can worship, Hiranyagarbha. If we want to worship the root cause of the whole universe, we can worship Iswara. If we wish to worship the cosmic intelligence at the macro level, we can worship Maha prakriti.  If we wish to worship the consciousness reflected in the universe, we can worship Kutastha Chaitanya. Finally for the ultimate seeker, who is looking for nothing but bliss, the focus is the Brahman.