434
Aptavani-2
Sthita Pragnya
One day a great pundit (a religious scholar) came to test
me. He asked me, “What is a state of sthita-pragnya?” I
explained to him, “You are in a state of sthita-agna. You are
standing on this side of the bank so make the assessment
yourself what the other bank of sthita-pragnya must be like.”
I further said to him, “Do you want me to tell you what appeals
to you or what offends you? You are in a state of nothing but
sthita-agna; you go around in a state of intoxication from your
scholarship. The intoxication of alcohol is better than your
intoxication; at least with the former it goes down when you
pour water over a drunk. Whereas you have made your
intoxication permanent; it does not go down even during sleep.
It is possible for you to attain salvation, having wandered
endless lives, by doing ‘our’ darshan for only five minutes. Here,
with ‘us’ (in us) it is possible to do darshan of any God you
wish. Do darshan of anyone you wish.”
Sthita-pragnya is not a state of experience. Sthita-pragnya
begins from the moment you begin to make a differentiation
through words when you say, “This is the Atma and it is
separate from everything else.” The state of sthita-pragnya
begins from the moment you utter the difference till the moment
you attain the experience of the Soul (the Self). That is the state
of sthita-pragnya. The path that Lord Krishna has shown comes
all the way to sthita-pragnya, however there is a lot more
beyond that. When ‘we’ give you the knowledge of the Self,
you experience a state much higher than the state of sthita-
pragnya. There is tremendous difference between the state of
sthita-pragnya and attaining the Self. Sthita-pragnya means to be