Silence and Speech

Around five thousand years ago some enlightened Rishis (sages) realised Saakshatkara. In their inner mind they heard the mantras of the Vedas and the Upanishads. They were called ‘Mantra Drushtararu’ (the one who heard in their ears, the Upanishads and the Vedas). The one which is heard in the ears is called ‘Shruti’. Here lies the greatness of the ancient wisdom because the Vedas and the Upanishads were not written by any sages. The Hindu philosophy is very tough to comprehend.

The Upanishads say ‘Aatma’(self) is the ultimate reality. No word (speech) can describe Aatma. The intellectual mind cannot comprehend Aatma. It is ever spreading and omnipresent. Before words came into existence there was silence and the words were born out of silence and will die in silence. It is interesting to note that there was a friendly rivalry between speech and silence. Upanishads say words cannot describe Aatma and here words find their limitation and say it is beyond their capacity that they cannot grasp the unknown. Now the contradiction is that words have a limitation and it cannot know more. Thus words accept their failure but the awareness that there is more to know is the important factor. The word fails and wins simultaneously. This is the success of word in failure. Is this Aatma’s Leela? More importantly, words might try to describe Aatma, but silence prays.

It is strange that Aatma cannot be described by words takes the help of Aatma to succeed, this means Aatma indirectly helps the word to succeed. In the process it is more interesting to know that word becomes silent. Silence is always present whenever the word is in action, but it is not affected by word. This makes word to turn silent and get the satisfaction same as silence gets. The friendship of silence which contains no evil makes the word feel free.

This is our ancient wisdom.