I'm very happy to introduce Viprajana Rajaprana, born in California in 1952, did undergraduate and graduate studies at UC Santa Cruz and received her master's degree in literature there and began doctoral work in English literature. She joined the Sarada Convent of the Vedanta Society in Southern California in 1977 in Santa Barbara and took her first monastic vows in 1983 and the final vows, sannyasa, in 1988. She's the author of a number of books, the most recent is Vedanta A Simple Introduction. She enjoys gardening and singing with the Santa Barbara Choral Society. So another example of the interreligious dialogue, she's been singing Hamel's Messiah, Fahre's Requiem, and Beethoven's Mise en Scene. Her presentation today is Regaining the Lost Kingdom, Purity and Meditation in the Hindu

[01:09]

Spiritual Tradition. I know Father Joseph wants us to just get up here and talk, but some people are speakers and some people aren't. So, I'm going to leave. Sorry. First of all, I'd just like to say what an honor it is to be here and to be in the presence of so many people who are spiritual seekers. And I'd like to thank the monks here who have put in so much obvious work and who are feeling the results of that obvious work right now. Thank you. Once upon a time in India, long, long ago, there was a great king who lived in the magnificent city of Srinagar, which means the city of memory. Now this king was an avid and excellent hunter, and so one day he left the kingdom alone on a horseback to go hunting. So he got on his horse, he rode out of the city, and then he rode out of his kingdom and he went deep into the forest. And he'd been out there several hours, and suddenly a snake slithered across the path

[02:11]

of the horse. The horse bucked, and he was strung from the horse, his head hitting the ground. He was not completely unconscious. And when he awoke, he didn't know who he was or where he was. But he did notice, he looked down and he saw that he had this hunting outfit on, so he figured that he must be a hunter. So, he sort of, you know, made himself a rough dwelling and made his living as a hunter. And time passed. But, well, he just didn't feel happy being a hunter. He just didn't feel like he was a hunter. And what made things worse was he was troubled by a recurring dream. And in this dream, he'd be the king. And he lived in this magnificent palace, surrounded by riches and by courtiers and a loving queen and princes and princesses. But then when he'd wake up, he'd be lying on the floor in the dirt. And it was horrible. So, time passed. And one day, a merchant came into the forest. And he decided to tell the merchant about his dream. And the merchant said, I see, you want to be rich.

[03:14]

Well, you ought to be a merchant like me. Then you can make money and just buy yourself a kingdom. Well, the hunter thought that was a pretty good idea. So, he took his skins and went out to a neighboring city and tried to sell his skins. But he was just an abysmal merchant. And so, he went bankrupt and then went back into the forest and made his living as a hunter. And time passed. And eventually, a soldier came in. And the soldier, he told the soldier about this dream that he kept having. And the soldier said, Oh, you ought to be a soldier like me. Then with your martial skill, you could just take a kingdom by force. And the pirate thought that was a pretty good idea. So, he went and tried to enlist as a soldier. But the soldiers looked at him and they said, You know, you're really too old and flabby. You can't be a soldier. So, he had to return to the forest and made his living as a hunter. And time passed. But eventually, a sadhu, a Hindu wandering holy man, came into that forest. And he said, Your majesty, where have you been? We've been looking all over for you.

[04:15]

And the hunter said, I don't know what you're talking about, but I am having this recurring dream. So, after he told the sadhu of his recurring dream, the sadhu really understood what had happened. And he said, Have no fear, my child. Through my austerities, I can confer upon you the gift of hypnotic speech. Through my grace, whoever hears your words will believe you. So, he said, All you have to do is hire a white horse with a silver saddle, and then go into that neighbouring kingdom of Srinthi Nagar, and you just say, I'm the king of Srinthi Nagar. And through my grace, everyone who hears your words will believe you. Well, the king was doubtful, but still he was a pious man. So, he went out and got a white horse with a silver saddle, and he started riding towards that kingdom of Srinthi Nagar. Well, the first thing he runs into is a contingent of soldiers. And he says, I'm the king of Srinthi Nagar. And to his astonishment, the soldiers bow low, dismount, get off their horses,

[05:17]

and he has his faith in the sadhu's words considerably increased. And they followed him back towards that kingdom. Well, wherever he went, he kept saying, I'm the king of Srinthi Nagar. And people were cheering and clapping and celebrating. And this went on until the gates of the city actually opened up, and the palace loomed before him. And then his memory returned. He realized that he really was the king of Srinthi Nagar. And he ascended his throne, and he lived happily ever after. Well, every religious tradition has its teaching stories. And this one nicely illustrates two of Hinduism's primary tenets. First, that we are the heirs to a glorious kingdom. And second, that we're suffering from spiritual amnesia, which prevents us from coming into it. How was the kingdom lost and how can it be regained? Hinduism says that we can't really lose our kingdom just as the king never really lost his kingdom.

[06:17]

It was waiting for him the whole time. Our spiritual kingdom lies within the depths of our hearts and it awaits our arrival. Our kingdom appears to be lost because of Maya, ignorance of our real nature. Ignorance is removed through knowledge, and knowledge comes through meditation. But without purification of the heart, meditation is a lost cause, and spiritual attainment is impossible. This is Hinduism's basic equation for purity and meditation. I need to make a little truth-and-advertising statement here. Hinduism is a vast subject and I can't really cover the entire game of Hinduism. Since I'm a Vedanta nun, I'll be speaking from the Vedanta tradition. If God's kingdom lies within us, why are we unaware of it? Hinduism says that Maya causes a spiritual amnesia which clouds our understanding and prevents us from understanding who we really are. Well, who aren't we?

[07:18]

While we appear to be limited mortals, we live, move, and have our being in Brahman, the infinite, divine, transcendent reality. Furthermore, the very core of our being, the Atman, is divine and one with Brahman. The Atman isn't a little chunk of Brahman. The Atman is Brahman in all its infinite fullness. God within us is called Atman out of semantic necessity, but there's no essential difference between Atman and Brahman. What artificially separates the Atman from Brahman is the body-mind complex. Maya makes us identify with our psychophysical characteristics instead of our real nature, which is pure, perfect, eternal, ever free. Our true nature, the Atman, is untouched by birth and death, by sorrow and delusion, by hatred or fear or any other human limitation. Maya makes us forgetful

[08:19]

of that kingdom which we already possess. When a Hindu reads, the light shines from the darkness and the darkness comprehended it not, he or she will identify this as the veiling power of Maya obscuring the light of the Atman within us. The world that we see around us is nothing but Brahman, but we're seeing it through that prism of Maya. It's a distorted vision. It's like the image that we see in a funhouse mirror. The world that we see is circumscribed by time, by space, by causality, and by our mind's own limitations. As Meister Eckhart said, nothing hinders the soul's knowledge of God as much as time and space. For time and space are fragments whereas God is one. Well, this world of Maya may not be all-time real, but it's nevertheless real enough in our only daily experience. I can't pretend that if I stub my toe it doesn't hurt, and I can't pretend that if someone says

[09:21]

something nasty to me, I'm not going to react to it. In order to progress on our spiritual journey, we need to acknowledge our immediate reality with care and intelligence and the quality that Cassian provides so much discernment. Only then will we have access to higher levels of reality, and only then will we be able to escape us so we can regain our kingdom. And that's where the practices of purification and meditation come in. In Cassian's first conference, Abbot Moses says that while our ultimate goal is the kingdom of God, our attention must be placed on the immediate direction which takes us to our goal. He said, Our objective is purity of heart, for without this, the goal cannot be reached. You have purity of heart for an objective and eternal life as the goal. For serious Hindu practitioners, these words ring sound and true. Purity is an absolute

[10:23]

prerequisite in Hindu spirituality. It doesn't matter whether you're a dualist or a non-dualist, it doesn't matter to which particular tradition you belong. Purity is a basic requirement for an authentic spiritual life. Either they go together or they don't go at all. It's really a pity, whereas the West, meditation is known and strongly associated with Hinduism, whereas its necessary counterpart, purity, is given very, very little attention. How does Hinduism define purity? The Atman, the divine self within us, is pure, perfect, and free. It's unaffected by the desires of the body and the moods of the mind. The more we identify with the Atman, the purer we are. The more we identify with the urges of the body and the vagaries of the mind, the less pure we are. Our bondage to flesh and senses, accompanied by the mind's attachment to them and identification with them,

[11:24]

is how Hinduism defines impurity. And for this reason, Hinduism has always placed great importance on restraining sensual desire. The more we face down desire, the more control we have over the body-mind complex, and the more peaceful our minds become. As the Bhagavad Gita says, those whose senses are not restrained have neither spiritual understanding nor the capacity for meditation. There is no peace for those who cannot meditate, and without peace, where is happiness? Developing purity is one of the central objectives of Hindu spiritual practice, and every major yoga, that is, every spiritual path, puts great emphasis on its attainment. The word yoga comes from two different Sanskrit verb roots, and has two different but complementary meanings. The first one is actually concentration, and the second one is yoking, or joining. That is, we're yoking ourself to the divine.

[12:26]

Unfortunately, when Westerners say yoga, they're usually referring to hatha yoga, a technique of strengthening the body and increasing its longevity, which doesn't have that much to do with traditional meditation practices. Hinduism has historically recognized the need for providing various spiritual paths for differing psychological temperaments. Some people are emotional, and some people are intellectual. Some people are active, while others are naturally contemplative. Hinduism has therefore provided a spiritual path, or yoga, for each predominant temperament. Each yoga has a different approach for gaining purity, while consistently stressing its necessity in spiritual practice. Although each authentic spiritual path is a yoga in its own right, all such paths can be broadly classified into the four major yogas, which are raja yoga, bhakti yoga, karma yoga, jnana yoga. These yogas are like spiritual thoroughfares, each yoga

[13:28]

having its own purification technique, and each yoga having its own spiritual practices, or sadhanas, which join the limited individual to the limitless divine. Now, those who are predominantly emotional are suited for the path of devotion, or bhakti yoga. Those who are led by the head rather than the heart, and have a powerful, discriminating intellect, are qualified for the path of jnana yoga, the path of knowledge. Karma yoga, the path of selfless action, is for those with an active temperament, and those who are naturally contemplative are fit for the royal path of meditation, raja yoga. Every yoga results in regaining the divine kingdom, and each yoga complements every other yoga. These yogas are not airtight compartments. They're meant to be able to strengthen one another, and build upon one another, so that every aspect of the human personality can be pulled into spiritual life. Now, apart from purity

[14:30]

and meditation, every yoga follows two basic steps of withdrawing the mind from whatever is finite and relative, and then placing it on what is real, infinite, and absolute. These two steps call for two qualities which are indispensable in spiritual life. Detachment from the finite, and yearning for God, longing for either a personal form of God, or for the infinite. Now, detachment doesn't mean indifference, and it doesn't mean credulous. Real detachment is freedom. It's freedom from desires, freedom from our lower impulses, which take our minds away from God. Hand-in-hand with detachment comes attachment to God, or to the Atman. Unless we feel drawn towards something higher, we won't be able to push away lower impulses. And unless we make an attempt to subdue those lower impulses, we won't succeed in drawing closer to the Divine. Now, since every yoga uses

[15:32]

meditation to a greater or lesser degree, I'll give you Raja Yoga. Because it's also Raja Yoga, we can examine purity and its effect on meditation most clearly. For Hindus, meditation isn't a relaxation technique. It's an intense and concentrated search for the Divine reality within us. Patanjali, the ancient sage and the author of the Yoga Sutras, defined meditation, or dhyana, as an unbroken flow of thought toward the object of concentration. Now, the traditional metaphor for meditation is a steady stream of oil poured from one vessel into another. In Raja Yoga, the object of meditation can either be an impersonal, formless reality, or a personal form of God. But what happens when we sit to meditate? Once we sit down, the mind is quiet, and the externals are turned down, suddenly

[16:32]

these random messages start popping up from the subconscious. All of a sudden, we remember where we left the keys, or we create the perfect retort for that argument we had the day before. The brilliant response! And while we tend to take these shortcomings personally, it's really a universal, healing response, and it's one that Patanjali thoroughly investigated. Patanjali defined yoga as control of the vrittis, that is, the thought waves of the mind. Now, the goal of Raja Yoga is to control these vrittis, these thought waves, so that the Atman can be experienced without being affected by the mind's limitations. Now, Raja Yoga's classic metaphor is that of a lake. When the surface of the lake is calm and tranquil, the lake's bottom can be easily seen. Now, when the surface is lashed into waves, the water becomes muddy, and then you can't see the bottom of the lake. Now, the bottom of the lake represents the Atman, the water

[17:33]

is the mind, and the waves on the top are the vrittis, these thought waves. Now, if these vrittis are controlled, the water, the mind, will remain placid, so the Atman can shine forth in its own splendor. When these vrittis are under our control, we will be able to uncover the treasure within us, and we will regain our lost kingdom. But to control the vrittis, we must completely overhaul the constitution of the mind itself, and that means effecting a complete transformation of character. As St. Paul said, being transformed by the renewing of your mind. According to Hindu psychology, every thought and every action that we do creates a subtle impression in the mind, a little groove, called a samskara. Now, this impression remains embedded in the mind in either a deeper or fainter form. Now, the more the same thoughts and actions are repeated, the deeper that groove becomes. The aggregate

[18:35]

of these groups, these different things in our mind, forms our character. As water when directed into a narrow canal gains force, so our repeated thoughts and our repeated actions creates a groove that's so deep that it's almost impossible to resist that force. Now, samskaras, these latent impressions of our past experiences and thoughts, reside in that dark, unconscious part of the mind called the chitta. In this dark mental basement, innumerable samskaras, those impressions from this life and previous lives, are warehoused. But samskaras are like seeds, and they sprout when the environment around us becomes favorable. What we call desire is actually a sprouting of one of those samskaras, one of those previous impressions. Like Proust with his famous Madeleine, we've all had times when a sight, a smell, a musical phrase, will bring an avalanche of memories and a company wave of emotions. Now, much of the time, this

[19:37]

stimulus wasn't external, it wasn't the smell of a madeleine. It's internal. It's our thoughts, our memories, our imagination, which cause these samskaras to sprout into vrittis, these mental waves. When they sprout, these mental waves erupt, and they form a little whirlpool, and they muddy the waters of the mind, thus making real meditation impossible. Samskaras, those groups, create desires, and desires move us into action. When actions are repeated over and over again, the samskaras get stronger, and the desire for further repetition becomes even more intense. Now, we see this most obviously in addictions, but we can see it in our own habits and our own tendencies. And it's for this reason that desires are seen as spiritually treacherous, because they keep the mind in a perpetually turbulent state, so we can't even begin to try and meditate. So, in order to be free

[20:39]

from this group of desires, that whirlpool of vrittis has to be controlled into one calm, steady vritti, one unwavering thought wave going towards God. And that is what meditation is. Purity of heart is freedom from the slavery of desire. What the method of Raja Yoga provides for attaining this freedom is the practice of the moral virtues formulated by Patanjali in the Yoga Sutras. The aim of these virtues is to create chittashuti, purity of mind. Once the mind is purified, the divine will automatically shine forth in its own splendor. As we already heard from Fr. Thomas, Patanjali divides moral conduct into two categories, yama and niyama. Yama consists of nonviolence, truthfulness, non-stealing, chastity, and the non-receiving of gifts. Niyama consists of cleanliness, contentment,

[21:40]

austerity, study, freedom from these disciplines. Freedom from the impulses and the desires that pull our mind away from God. Now this doesn't mean that spiritual seekers won't have desires. We will. As long as we have bodies and minds, we're going to have desires. But when we have desires and choose not to act upon them, not even mentally dwell upon them, the more attenuated our desires become. It's only with the highest spiritual realization, nirvikalpa samadhi, that the samskaras are finally destroyed. Like seeds which have been burnt, those seeds, those samskaras are going to sprout again. But since this lofty state is extremely rare, the immediate goal of Vajrayogi is to control those samskaras, to weaken the samskaras so that meditation is even possible. In order to meditate, the mind must first be

[22:42]

withdrawn from external objects, pratyahara, then it has to be fixed on a center of spiritual consciousness within. This is called dharana. And once the mind stops reaching out for those external funsies, and once we sort of reject unrelated thoughts, thoughts that are unrelated to our meditation, the mind develops a natural inwardness, which is compared to a bird returning to the nest. Now, this inwardness allows meditation, or dhyana, when it's unwavering, prolonged, and concentrated, to deepen into complete absorption, which makes union with God, samadhi, possible. Before this exalted experience, we've only had a concept of God. With samadhi, the true nature of what we've meditated upon shines forth in its own light. This experience is more than perception. It's a direct and immediate knowledge, unimpeded

[23:44]

by the mind's limitations. We go over the mind. With this experience, we're eternally and perfectly free. We've touched the divine within our hearts, and we've regained our lost union. Bhakti yoga, the path of devotion, aims to develop such an intense love for God that no distance is left between the lover and the divine beloved. The beauty of bhakti yoga is that it utilizes the faculties and the desires that we already have. Everybody can love, and everybody has a deep need to be loved. Bhakti yoga harnesses the power of love, and it focuses that power into a path for God-realization. As our purity for God increases, our desire for sensual desire naturally decreases. As Ramakrishna said, the less you're attached to the world, the more you love God. Bhakti yoga implies a dualistic relationship between a devotee

[24:45]

and a personal relationship and a personal God. But, as we read in the Narada Bhakti Sutra, it's one of the classics of Hindu devotion. As our love for God grows, we become increasingly aware that the God that we're worshiping is really our own self. It's really our own nature. The personal aspect of God that the devotee chooses to worship is called the Ishta, the chosen ideal. Now, the Ishta that we worship may be a divine incarnation, such as Krishna, or Jesus, or Buddha. Or, the Ishta may be a god or a goddess, such as Shiva, or Vishnu, or Durga. Now, this doesn't mean polytheism, because just as there are many aspects and a limited human being, so there are infinite aspects in the all-pervading divine existence of Brahman. Hindu gods and goddesses are the infinite Brahman, but they're seen through different angles through varying human lenses. Hindus share with Christians their belief that

[25:46]

God incarnates for the sake of humanity. The Sanskrit word for incarnation is avatar, which literally means coming down. That is the descent of God into the world in tangible form. The Bhagavad Gita says, when goodness grows weak, when evil increases, I make myself a body. In every age, I come back to deliver the holy, to destroy the sin of the sinner, to establish righteousness. Now, proponents of Bhakti Yoga suggest adopting a relationship, or a bhava, towards God. Now, these bhavas are shanta, a peaceful, philosophical relationship with God, dasya, the attitude of the servant towards the master, apatya, the attitude of a child towards the father or the mother, sakhya, an easy relationship between friends, vatsanya, the attitude of a parent towards a child, and madhura, the relationship between the lover

[26:47]

and the beloved. Now, as we can see, these relationships cover the entire gamut of human experience, and they begin from the relationship that offers the least emotional involvement to a relationship that is the most absorbing and the most intimate. The aim of Bhakti Yoga is simple, to develop increasing love for God, as well as increasing awareness of God's love for us. Now, to do this, the devotee practices the constant recollectedness of God. And one of the easiest and most effective ways of doing this is through japa, the repetition of a mantra. Hindus delight when they discover the passion, as well as the offer of the cloud of unknowing, and many others came to the same conclusion. St. Paul's instruction to pray without ceasing finds particular resonance with Hindu practitioners. I suspect many Christians would be astonished if they realized how many Hindus have been profoundly inspired by the way of the pilgrim. To Hindus,

[27:49]

this pilgrim is a perfect example of one who is japa siddha, perfected through the practice of japa. Bhakti Yoga uses the purifying technique of japa to cleanse that cellar down line of its lower tendencies, by constantly infusing the divine name into that cellar. The mind, the dark cellar, eventually becomes cleansed, just the way you clean an inkwell by pouring fresh water continually into it. That's how we clean out the unconscious part of the mind. Prayer also has a significant role in the Hindu tradition. One ancient and beautiful prayer known as the Avyaroha mantra says, lead us from the unreal to the real, lead us from darkness to light, lead us from death to immortality. Hinduism's most celebrated prayer is perhaps the Gayatri mantra, a verse from the Rig Veda. We meditate on the glory of that being who has produced this universe. May he enlighten

[28:49]

our minds. Like the Lord's Prayer, the Avyaroha and Gayatri mantras have been a source of inspiration, meditation, and illumination for thousands of years. Spontaneous prayers are equal if not more efficacious. If God is our very own, nearer than the nearest, and dearer than the dearest, then we don't need any special formula to talk to him or to her. Just as we unburden our heart to our closest friend, or tell our mom our problem, knowing full well she's going to do something about it, so should be our prayers to God. Prayer is one of the most effective ways of concentrating the mind. There's no way the mind can wander if it's completely focused in a heartfelt prayer. There's no way that we can fall asleep, and there's no way that we can reenact yesterday's argument. The very act of prayer focuses the mind and gives it a Godward turn. Worship is another essential practice in bhakti yoga. While prayer involves, at least in the beginning, asking

[29:51]

of God, worship is giving to God. And for that reason, worship is often seen as a stage after prayer. Human nature being what it is, we generally put ourselves and our needs first. When real love arises, the heart expands, and then we find it more fulfilling to give than rather to receive. And that's what worship is. What we give doesn't matter. It's the attitude with which we give that's really critical. The Bhagavad Gita says whatever a person gives me in true devotion, fruit or water, a leaf, or flower, that I will accept the true gift of the pure light. Christ's praise for the widow in her offering of two lights resonates here. In worship, we neither want nor expect anything. We give just because we need to express our love. Included in worship is ritual, and that is the symbolic actions that express the mystic relationship between the devotee

[30:51]

and God. Now ritual isn't particularly effective because it includes the whole human being, the body, the emotions, and the intellect. Now ritual has often been dismissed as sort of a ritual road activity, but the purpose of ritual is to express through action what words fail to express. The real feeling that Hindu ritual evokes, however, is intimacy with God. The worshiper doesn't think of God's powers or glories. The worshiper only sees the sweet form of the Divine Beloved gazing at him or her before him. The goal of worship, as with meditation, is Divine Communion. Through the process of worship, the devotee feels increasingly closer to God until the point of Divine Communion is attained. All these methods, prayer, worship, japa, and other devotional practices such as sacred music, holy reading, pilgrimage,

[31:53]

lead the devotee to the constant recollectiveness of God's living presence within the heart. With this, the culmination of bhakti is attained. Then the lover and the beloved become one, and the lost kingdom is regained. And bhakti yoga assures us that the Lord lovingly accepts whatever we offer, but just as we can offer flowers and fruits, love and adoration, so we can also offer our actions and their fruits. The Bhagavad Gita says, whatever you do, whatever you eat, whatever you offer in sacrifice, whatever you give in charity, whatever austerity you perform, do that as an offering to me. Now the goal of karma yoga is to transform worship into a path for spiritual realization. And while karma yoga is specifically meant for those with an active temperament, all spiritual seekers are advised to use the methods of karma yoga, since all of us have to work all the time, because even

[32:55]

thinking is an action. Now the word karma comes from the Sanskrit verb to do, and refers to both action and the effects of action. Now when the word karma is used in the West, it generally refers to the law of karma, the law of cause and effect, which simply means that an individual's actions and thoughts produce both subtle impressions in the mind though some scars we talked about, and tangible effects, which will be experienced by that person sometime or other, in this life or another life. As ye sow, so shall ye reap. Now good actions and good thoughts reap pleasant results, bad thoughts and bad actions reap unpleasant results. Now according to the Hindu worldview, God doesn't arbitrarily hand out punishments or rewards. He dispenses whatever results people have earned through their own actions. Now karma is normally binding because it's coupled

[33:57]

to desire. We act to fulfill some desire, either conscious or unconscious. The desire is there. Karma yoga breaks that powerful link between desire and action. Now this is done in one of two ways. Either by working for work's sake alone, or by offering the results, the fruits of our action, to God. Either way, the mind is purified because we remove desire from the results of our actions. The Bhagavad Gita says to work alone you have the right and not to the fruits thereof. Do not allow longing for the results of your work to be the motivating force of your actions. And do not allow yourself to be attached to indolence. Now this teaching is the real anthem of karma yoga, both for those who follow the path of the impersonal, as well as for those who worship a personal form of God. Now the first method of karma yoga,

[34:57]

working for work's sake, is for those who relate to an impersonal reality or wrong. Now these karma yogas must train themselves to do good simply because it's good to do good. This must be their only motivation and they must seek no other reward. They must work with complete detachment. Putting every ounce of energy and concentration into the means will be completely indifferent to the end results. Such yogis must have tremendous yearning for liberation, mukti, that is freedom from the wheel of birth and death. And this freedom can come only when the bondage of karma is destroyed. As much as the devotee yearns for God, so the karma yogi must yearn for freedom from bondage. Now the second method of karma yoga is for those who feel drawn towards a personal aspect of God. And here the devotee offers the results of all actions and all thoughts to a personal form of God. For the karma yogi inspired by devotion, the goal

[35:59]

is to work with no personal motivations since every thought and every action is an offering on the altar of God. For all karma yogis though, all work is worship. Whether we're sitting in the shrine, whether we're working in the septic tank, it doesn't matter. The subjective feeling is the same. I spend a lot of time in the septic tank, I'm speaking from experience. It's all worship. No work by itself is either menial or lofty. When work becomes a prayer, every action becomes noble. Now what distinguishes karma yoga from the other yogas is its two-fold action. It goes first inward to the divine source, then outward to service and action. While other yogas take the mind and focus inward, karma yoga takes the mind inward only to go outward again, this time for worship in the form of work. Now this two-part movement distinguishes karma yoga from mere social work. Because unless the mind is

[37:01]

purified and drawn inward first, unless we sort of charge our spiritual battery, the outward activity can easily degenerate into ego-driven social activity. In order for the work to be transformed into worship rather than mere busyness, the inwardness and alertness produced by meditation has to be present at all times in our work. Now one of the great strengths of karma yoga is that it doesn't allow us to compartmentalize spirituality in a separate cubbyhole while allowing the rest of our life to go on as it will. Karma yoga insists that our active life be a natural extension of our contemplative life. Just as during meditation, the spiritual seeker tries to keep the mind from wandering, so that karma yoga has to keep that mind alert and engaged during every action, either directed towards the Atman or directed towards a personal form of God. And this creates a purified mind so that the divine will shine forth.

[38:02]

The karma yoga, the karma yogi aims to make the method so perfect that the means and the end become one. The result is complete communion and the regaining of the lost kingdom. Jnana yoga, the path of knowledge, is for spiritual seekers with intellects more powerful than their emotions. Jnana yoga asserts that ignorance of our divine nature is the only obstacle to spiritual realization. And just as Jnana yoga and knowledge alone can remove this obstacle. Knowledge here, when I say knowledge alone can remove that obstacle, knowledge doesn't refer to an intellectual understanding. It's referring to a direct experience of the Atman. Jnana yogis use the intellect or what they call the buddhi, that's our higher portion of the mind, to carve through maya through to freedom and perfection. Now while intellectual knowledge is not the goal,

[39:05]

the intellect can nevertheless be used as sort of an incisive instrument to cut the veil of maya so we can actually see the Atman. The Katha Upanishad says, The self, deep in the hearts of all beings, does not shine forth. It is realized only by the sharp, refined intellects of those who experience the subtle reality. Now this sharp, refined intellect necessary for Jnana yoga is a direct consequence of purity of heart. Purity of heart means being free from the pull of lower impulses. As long as impulses and desires pull the mind away from the Atman, the intellect isn't free to cut that cord of maya and there isn't much of an inclination to do so. The intellect cannot become sharp if it's being repeatedly pulled in different directions. As St. John of the Cross said, If you purify your soul of attachments and desires, you will understand things spiritually. If you deny

[40:06]

your appetite for them, you will enjoy their truth, understanding what is certain in them. Now there are four preliminary requirements for Jnana yoga, which are called the Sadhana Chaturthi. The first of these is the most essential, Viveka. Discrimination between the unreal and the real, the fleeting, the transitory. Shankara defined Viveka as the deep conviction that Brahman alone is real and the world is illusory. Now, this isn't to say that the world doesn't exist. It does exist, but its existence is dependent upon Brahman, and Brahman alone is the one unchanging reality. In Jnana yoga, discrimination is the foundation of every further spiritual practice. Before continuing with Jnana yoga's other disciplines, we must first be firmly convinced of the transitory nature of the world and its pleasures. Now the second requirement of Jnana yoga is detachment

[41:07]

or dispassion or vairagya, a turning of the mind away from sense pleasures. And as we've seen before, renouncing sense pleasures and our attachment to them is synonymous with purity. Discrimination produces, hopefully, detachment because discrimination makes us realize that worldly pleasures won't give us lasting fulfillment. As discrimination produces detachment, detachment empowers discrimination. It's no use discriminating from the real and the unreal unless we have a desire to shun the unreal. The Vedic Chinnamani, one of the classic texts of Jnana yoga, said that with detachment, the spiritual seeker shuns the illusory as from the problems of a crow. Jnana yoga's third requirement is a collection of six virtues which are tranquility, self-control, mental poise, forbearance, faith and concentration. And with these six virtues firmly locked

[42:09]

into place, we can reach the fourth and final prerequisite of Jnana yoga, which is longing for liberation. Now the bondage of ignorance is so powerful that only the most intense desire for freedom will sever its cords. Longing for liberation is a desire so intense that Vedanta literature has compared it to a man whose hair is on fire who's looking for water. The only thing he wants in his mind is that wherever that water is he has no other desire, no other thought in his mind, no other jet of just giving to that water. Our desire for liberation has to be that intense to sever the cord of mine. Now cultivating these four spiritual requirements makes a student fit for the basic tribe, the classic tribe of Jnana yoga, which are trodha-madhura-vindhyasana. Hearing the truth, reflecting on the truth and meditating on the truth of Brahman. First, we must

[43:10]

hear the truth of the scriptures from a qualified teacher. Second, we need to reflect, we need to think of Brahman constantly and through that thinking gain a deep conviction about the truth of Brahman. And finally, we must meditate, which means having a constant, unbroken stream of meditation upon Brahman. Unbroken meditation practiced for a long period of time brings samadhi, divine union. Now every yoga has samadhi as its ultimate goal. But is this experience? It's really impossible to say because Nipunisha has said that samadhi is that which words cannot express and the mind cannot reach. But what Shankara describes in the Viveka Chudamani is worth repeating here. The disciple having wholeheartedly followed the instructions of his teacher goes into deep samadhi. Now when he returns to a normal plane of consciousness,

[44:11]

he says out of the fullness of his joy, the ego has disappeared. I have realized my identity with Brahman and so all my desires have melted away. What is this joy that I feel? Who shall measure it? I know nothing but joy, limitless, unbounded. My mind fell like a hailstone into that vast expanse of Brahman's ocean. Touching one drop of it, I melted away and became one with Brahman. And now though I return to human consciousness, I abide in the joy of the Atman. Now finally and clearly I know that I am the Atman whose nature is eternal joy. This experience, Hinduism says, is the goal of human life, its highest attainment. Attaining that divine kingdom within our own hearts, we realize that we've been there waiting for us the whole time.

[45:12]

As Master Eckhart said, when the kingdom appears to a soul and it is recognized, there is no further need for preaching or expulsion. It is good enough and has a God-secured eternal life. To know and see how near God's kingdom is, is to say with Jacob, God is in this place and I did not know it. ...leadership to train Catholic diocesan staff. He has numerous articles and presentations including Vatican II, The Continuing Agenda, by Sacred Heart University Press, New Theological Review, Ecumenical Trends, Origins, and Faith Alive. With John Erickson, he co-edited The Quest for Unity, Orthodox and Catholics in Dialogue, and has edited the Handbook for Inter-Religious Dialogue. So, John,

[46:14]

Well, I think my great challenge this afternoon is not to respond to such a full and complete presentation of Hindu thought and Hindu ideas and practices, but to respond to such a full presentation of Hindu thought and Hindu practices at three in the afternoon. But Sister Vrachaprada has skillfully, if not ingeniously, begun her paper with an intriguing story of the forgotten kingdom. The symbol of the kingdom serves as an exceptionally rich beginning for our conference. Kings, kingdoms, rulers, are the context for the teachings

[47:17]

of Kung-Fu-Tzu and Meng-Tzu and Taoist teachers that we'll be hearing about later in the week. Kingdoms, kings, and wealthy folks are the context, too, for the teachings of the Buddha. And bejeweled and luxurious landscapes adorn the realms of the Buddhas. And certainly this symbol of kingdom has its appeal to Christians. The kingdom of God, the kingdom of Christ, the kingdom of Heaven appear more than 150 times in the New Testament. Jesus inaugurates His public life with reference to the kingdom of God at hand. And that's in Matthew and Mark. And for all practical purposes in Luke 2, there's a reference very early on to the kingdom of God when Jesus begins His public life. All four Gospels make reference to Jesus preaching a kingdom

[48:17]

during the trial of Jesus and the public accusations against Him in the Passion narratives. So not only does this story about a forgotten kingdom awaken us to the play of symbols among our traditions, but also challenges us to listen to one another very carefully. Challenges us lest we misapprehend the nuances each of us is bringing to this symposium on purity of heart and contemplation. Sister Vrajaprana tells us the story of the king of Smriti Nagar, the city of what is remembered. And curiously, this city's name is a double play on memory and on the body of literature, Smriti, that helps faithful Hindus recall

[49:18]

the hidden mysteries of the revelations that were once heard. Shruti. Through her lens of Vedanta, those truths in Shruti that were once heard are the Vedas. The king has a real problem with memory. But through the help of a sadhu, with Buddhist leanings, I think, who recognizes him and uses the skillful means of a tiny white lie, the king is shocked out of his memory loss. This leads our teacher of Vedanta to say that, like Christianity, the kingdom of God is within, and that each of us has the power to lay claim to it. Though the real culprit is ignorance, to begin, we must have purity of heart. And this

[50:20]

launches her into her lengthy presentation of the fundamentals of Hindu methods of purification. Through, again, the lens of Vedanta, and specifically the lens of Advaita Vedanta that has come down through the Vivekananda and the Vedanta society. And she does this. There's much more to her paper, the 35 pages of her paper. She's more blinded, than what she was able to read. She takes us through a discussion of Brahman and Atman, and how the theme of purity of heart plays out in this context. Not only through the methods, not only through the methods requiring Brahmacharya, that is, celibacy, or the indwelling of Brahman,

[51:20]

and that, she says, by the way, is sexual restraint, the most powerful of desires, but also through all the methods with different kinds of means of controlling the galloping horses of the senses, and harnessing the whole body-mind complex through yoga, and the various sadhanas, spiritual disciplines, required of each of the four yogas. She returns again and again, as I think you heard, as she presented her paper, to the image of regaining the lost kingdom. Now, she and I would disagree on which kind of Vedanta is closer to the expressions of the truth found in the sources of Vedanta. And consequently, we would disagree on how to read the Bhagavad Gita. We might even disagree on how many yogas there are in the Yoga Sutras, for my lens has been colored

[52:22]

by my studies years ago of Vijnana Bhikshu, and the particular lens that he offers. But as enticing as these discussions could be, we could have other discussions, in particular, a very rich one on reading one another's scriptures. And we were just beginning that at the end of the last presentation. Fr. Thomas made the remark about reading other scriptures and so forth, so we could have a very enticing discussion of that. But, it seems to me that I think is going to arise. But the more critical pieces that I was referring to earlier is not the purpose of our being here. We are here to aid a discussion of the meaning of purity of heart. In other words, we're talking about the methods that prepare us for the experience of intimacy. To say, as

[53:26]

a Vedanta would say, that the world around us and the core of our being are nothing but Brahman, can lead us to a discussion of intimacy with the Divine. She uses some Christian sources well, at least from what I understand, quoting Weiss-Dreckhardt, quoting Cashin and others. Another contribution of her paper is that she points out again that one method does not fit all. And one of the great gifts of the spiritualities emanating from the Indian subcontinent has been the institutionalization in written guides and in other forms, often resulting, always resulting, really, from a very wide oral tradition of addressing the particular needs of every individual. Every individual candidate seeking purity of heart. We're not all alike. We need different techniques.

[54:27]

For those, she goes on to say, who are predominantly emotional, then she mentions bhakti yoga and so forth. For the physically active, karma yoga. For the predominantly intellectual, jnana yoga. And for those few people, the contemplatives always oppressed by the actives, those contemplatives turn to kena yoga, raja yoga. It goes much deeper than this, of course. And her paper demonstrates this, that again, using even her approach to Advaita Vedanta, that this is nuanced in many ways by the particularities that each of us bring to this experience and the need for purity of heart. She says that they all have in common withdrawal from the finite and relative and focusing upon the infinite, the real, and the absolute. This is a view of detachment. Beneficial as it is, gives me pause.

[55:29]

As distracting as the work of the samskaras is, had Peter, the disciple of Jesus, the samskaras are these impressions that are built up in the mind, as distracting as these are, had Peter not been distracted by the crowing of a cock, a flood of memories would not have driven him to grief and the understanding that Jesus was to die even for his sins, Peter's sins. As interfering as the residue of memories can be with one's purity of heart, the disciples on the road to Emmaus would not have recognized that the man who had walked with them was indeed the resurrected Lord in the breaking of the bread. These are sensual experiences,

[56:32]

embodied sensual experiences in their own right. Among the rules, I call them rules, the yamas, of the five, ten, eight membered yoga, but the yamas, the rules, you know, are non-stealing, truthfulness, study, brahmacharya, chastity, and lack of greed. She writes of chastity, while chastity seems like a fairly straightforward, forward spiritual practice, we need to remember that chastity isn't merely abstaining from sex. It also means keeping the mind as restrained, keeping the mind as restrained as the body by refusing to allow the mind to dwell upon sexual desires and fantasies.

[57:33]

She then adds, and for those who are married, chastity entails being completely faithful to one's spouse in thought, word, and deed. Now, I've taught yoga in the past, taught about yoga years ago, and I would do the same thing, throw in one sentence. The majority of people in the world who have an embodied experience of intimacy, and this embodied experience of intimacy, an experience that brings a couple together in body, mind, and soul, gives me some pause about the importance of sensuality in its own right. Um, um, in the, in your rooms, um, on another point, you'll find this nice little booklet that explains the monastic life and the Commodities origins, and it talks about renewal of the Commodities in monasticism, actually the renewal of monasticism at the Second Vatican

[58:35]

Council. We as Catholics look to that council of the 1960s as the major event in recent times that the church and body of people that we are in the Catholic Church moving into this new millennium are a body renewed by that council. If we were to look for the image of the kingdom in that council, and what it was teaching, we would look to two documents. One of them was the document on the church, the doctrinal document on the church, and you find this passage very early in it. Hence the church endowed with the gifts of her founder, and faithfully observing his precepts of charity, humility, and self-denial, sounds familiar, receives the mission of proclaiming and establishing among all peoples the kingdom of Christ and of God. And she is, and she is

[59:35]

in each, and she is for each the seed and beginning of that kingdom. But we have another document. It's about the church in the modern world. And it begins with a very sensual image. The joy and hope, the grief and anguish of people of our time, especially those who are poor or afflicted in any way, are the joy and hope, the grief and anguish of the followers of Christ as well. Nothing that is genuinely human fails to find an echo in their hearts, for theirs is a community, a human community, a human community who, united in Christ and guided by the Holy Spirit, presses onwards towards the kingdom of the Father and are bearers of a message of salvation for all. To me, this is a very embodied experience that is spoken of here.

[60:36]

One, I guess, concluding thought then, in desperation to find something on spiritual amnesia, I turn to John Zizoulas. John Zizoulas is one of the greatest authors of our times on Eastern spirituality and Eastern Christian theology. And he is really the one who has moved forward this understanding of the kingdom as a communion of persons. It's not just the communion of divine persons, but the communion of all persons. And it's a very embodied reality of the Church's kingdom. He writes in this one piece on the spirituality of the very early centuries of the Church. He says, among the foundational principles bequeathed by the early patristic period was the demarcation of two basic mentalities or attitudes in spirituality. The type of spirituality

[61:41]

that was based on the Eucharistic community. The community gathered around the Feast of the Table. The Feast of the Table, the breaking of the bread. And involved the community and its eschatological towards the future, fulfillment in the future orientation as the decisive factors of spirituality. And the other, the type of spirituality that was based on the experience of the individual who struggles against passions and towards the achievement of moral perfection. A spirituality accompanied by a mystical union of the solar mind with the Logos of God. And he said, what kept that second type from spinning off into the universe of the Mediterranean world of the early centuries of Christianity when a lot of people were developing a lot of spiritualities of their own.

[62:41]

What kept it from spinning off into just another form of Platonism that could be bought on the streets was the work of Maximus the Confessor who reeled it in, who reeled it in and sacramentalized it and connected that kind of spirituality, the individualized, with the embodied spirituality of the living community. And this one final thought. And those of us who lived that spirituality and the intimacy of body, mind, and soul of the married life finally got a sacrament of our own about the 10th century. Thank you. We have about 15 minutes left. Just a couple of things I'll say right from here. I want to make sure everyone understands

[63:41]

that Hinduism does not denigrate central experience per se. In Hinduism there's four values of life. Artha, Dharma, Karma, Kama, Moksha. Artha, our livelihood, wealth. The second one, Dharma, righteousness. Third, Kama, desire. But it's legitimate desire. It's fulfilling our sensual desires in legitimate ways so that they don't get out of control. And for us it's a sacrament also. Marriage is a sacrament. It's a valid, holy experience. And it's also a discipline. Because you have to remain within the confines of that experience. In the Hindu tradition, the man and wife are seen as co-partners in their spiritual life. Even a Hindu priest has to have his wife help him do it. She's called the Sahadharmini. She helps him with that. They are together. And then the final one, Moksha, or liberation. So in the traditional Hindu experience,

[64:43]

every individual starts as a student. As a child, then it goes to the student life or Brahmacharya, then married life, which is a valid, accepted, revered stage of Hindu experience. Then towards the final renunciation. After those experiences are put in the proper perspective. For those on the fast track, however, they're allowed to sort of make a leap and leapfrog over that experience. But it isn't that Hinduism denigrates that. It's probably one of the most guilt-free of all the world's religions as far as essential experiences. Rather than... I could go on, but I'll just stop there. I'd like to thank you very much for a very intelligent, thoughtful, and kind reading. Okay, we've got about 12 minutes, so what questions do you have? Thomas? Thank you very much, Sister, and let me try to recall

[65:44]

a phrase that you said, which I appreciated very much, but I think it also connects with the John's response, and that is detachment is not... I want to say heartlessness. No, you were saying something else. You were saying coldness or indifference? Yes, coldness. That was the image that you used. I like that very much because I think that if we see something that is unapproachable or cannot be interiorized in what the Hindu traditions say about detachment, of course we have to realize that the same thing basically is being said by the great Christian ascetical tradition. You quote it, rightly so, St. John of the Cross, and no one is more radical than he about the necessity of detachment. But it's not deadness. It is not

[66:46]

deadening of the senses because the kind of detachment that, as I understand it, is taught in the yoga teachers and is taught in Shakaracharya, is that which truly refines the senses in order that they may go to the subtle beyond the gross and then go to the essence beyond the subtle. In other words, there's this progressive going beyond but it's also passing through because no one can go beyond the senses without passing through the senses. That, I think, is essential to keep that in mind. One thing, however, that I think is important and useful, and I think it's useful for us Christians to reflect upon the concern that is present in many of the highest expressions of Hinduism that religion itself be purified. And that the exercise of detachment

[67:47]

and the purification of our images and ideas and feelings be practiced with regard to our religious objects, as it were. In other words, it's fine to have an Ishtadeva. I need this desired divinity in order to revive. But I think it is true also for the believers in Jesus Christ as mediator of the divine nature that we are called indeed to become one with that nature and not to stop at any point on the path. So that all has been delivered into... Well, as Paul said, all things are yours, you are Christ's, and Christ is God's. So it's always this progressive thing. And I think this is something that we would know well to do. Also, St. John of the Cross, as I recall, did speak about how the vices... Now, the vices are not the avatars. The avatars are always good. The avatars are always

[68:49]

good because they are something that is part of our being human. But the vices are when they are turned away from that ultimate end. And so when our appetites... It's good to be hungry and go and eat and enjoy that food. And if you don't enjoy it, you're not being human. You're being kind of dead. It's not living. It's the amount of attachment that goes into it. Exactly. It depends on where your mind is. So if we have... Right. But the same thing works also for our religious practice. In other words, we can go to our prayer with the kind of greediness, with the kind of possessiveness, with the kind of oh, I've got to feel something, or I've got to do so much that really does turn our attention away from that ultimate end. That holy... Well, I'm sort of a little hesitant to dictate or suggest what other people need to do to continue on their spiritual path. I think it's a very, very subjective thing

[69:51]

and what we might interpret as another person being locked into something might be something very much that they need at that point in their spiritual life. So I think the only thing that we can do as serious spiritual practitioners is to really keep our own minds pure and also be aware of our own motives. And I think that's one thing that the Yoga Patanjali emphasizes very much. How are we aware of our own minds? What are our own motives? And I think as serious spiritual people we always have to be aware of checking on ourselves. What is my motivating force here? And I think if we're sincere, that's as much as we can do. Because I don't think we're in a position to be able to judge other people about where they are in their spiritual life. Chris, I was not saying this in a judgmental sense, and I think that it is beautiful in Hinduism that there is this openness to everyone's

[70:52]

spiritual needs and ways of fulfilling it. It is not judgmental, and I think that's very positive. But I think that also that each one of us in our own experience and going into it, can discover ways in which the practice of detachment, rightly understood, is a liberating force in our own religious practice. Absolutely, because detachment has really gotten a bad rap. You know what I'm saying? You think of detachment as the guy at the bank who won't give you the loan. But it's not being cold, it's not being indifferent. What it means is it's releasing your ego. Your ego involvement stops. You are more available for other human beings. You are more there for them. You are more loving. You are more giving. Because you lose that selfishness. When you lose that selfishness, you can be more for other people. Because what really prevents our growth, both spiritually and interiorly and exteriorly, is our own self-centeredness.

[71:52]

The more detached we are from our egotism, from our limited sense of who we are as a human being, the more detached we are from that. And that's what detachment is. The more available we can be for other people. I have a difficult task which the other coordinators are going to have to deal with too. I am not opposed to dictating spiritual practices. So I'm going to ask all of us in the course of this week to try and develop the capacity to be pithy. That is, tersely cogent. If we have a month, we'd be in great shape to get through 20 papers here. I mean, everything here is so exciting and we want to be talking about that. We've got a large group. We want to try and give everyone a chance to ask some questions. And then we do have the breaks in the evenings as well. So remember, pithy, tersely cogent. We have four minutes left. Okay, so very pithy. I think your third karma, I mean, yoga, karma, when you say detached,

[72:54]

you know, substance, but the karma still is karma. It still has an effect. So that effect may not be changed because you are detached from desire, for example. You're detached from doing something which still can be bad and so on. I think that's a problem. Karma by action means good action, good for doing good. Bad action is always going to have bad effects. It will always increase your ignorance. So it has to be a good action. But that's a necessity as our lock that we form is because of personal desire. So that what karma yoga does is remove that egotism which is attached to the desire for action and the results of action. But it has to be a good action. So that leads to a question which I don't want to explore. Your yoga has to be organized in some fashion, you know, in terms of some priority or something. Well, it's for removing your ignorance.

[73:56]

Now, that ignorance, it could be cleaning the septic tank might be that karma yoga for you. But you're doing it as an offering for God. Or you're doing it selflessly, just keeping your mind on the means without thinking, oh, and everyone's going to be so, they're going to say God brought you from, you're such a great organizer of that septic tank. Thank God you did it. You've got to remove that from your mind. Yes. Joseph? I think when you mentioned the karma yoga, you say what the chief means to acquire, to achieve purity of heart is through the way of mantra. Could you tell us some examples of what are the most common mantra, and do they practice it throughout the day, or also with some set time to say it, sitting by to say it? Two questions. The mantra will depend on who the Ishta is. And that is completely between you and your spiritual teacher. So your

[74:57]

spiritual teacher will give you that mantra, and that mantra you will never reveal to anyone. Even your wife, your husband, your children. That is your personal possession. It's very, very sacred. It's not even generally, it's not even written down. Except in very rare cases in jobs. So that is, and it depends on between you and your spiritual teacher about how often you're to repeat it. Now for many people in the bhakti yoga tradition, they try to repeat it continually. So that when you are deeply involved in that tradition, that mantra will repeat itself continually. They suggest that you use it when you walk, when you do anything, when you do physical labor. That's why physical labor is often encouraged because it gives you that freedom of mind to be able to do it. With people who are very advanced, it will even repeat itself during sleep. And so they go to sleep repeating the mantra, they wake up saying the mantra. And it becomes the rhythm, like the way the pilgrim, it becomes a method of

[75:57]

breathing. You can feel it in the heart for advanced practitioners. And the goal would be to attain that state. Very interesting. Norman, did you have a hand up? This is the last question. On that last point, previous to this one, the action has to be good for the karma yoga detachment to be effective. The famous example in the Bhagavad Gita, presumably, presumably that's not a good action. Well, it actually is, because he's a warrior. That's his dharma. But that's not a bad action that's being transcended because it's karma yoga. It's a good action for that person. It's a good action for that person. One of the values of Hinduism is that each person has their own dharma. As a Sannyasini, I've taken vows of non-violence. No matter what, I cannot inflict harm. For those who are in the military, that would be a very stupid idea. For those who

[76:58]

were in who were in Germany, there has to be resistance, but that wasn't those who were monastic have taken another path. So that's not a theological problem in the context of that. No. Okay, thanks. Alright, half hour break. The bell will ring in five minutes till three will begin counting three five. Thanks so much. Thanks so much.

[77:22]

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