MIRZA GHALIB, THE VEIL ,AND THE REALITY

MIRZA  GHALIB, THE VEIL ,AND THE REALITY 

"Bekhudi besabab nahin Ghalib

Kuchh to hai jis ki parda-daari hai"

(O Ghalib, this self forgetfulness is not without cause,

There is surely something whose veiling is being kept.)

What Does Ghalib  Convey in the Light of Yog Vasishtha and Upanishads ?

This couplet of Mirza Ghalib holds within it the entire philosophy of veil and reality, of forgetting and remembering, which the sages of India have called Avidya and Maya, and which Ghalib calls parda daari. Bekhudi is not mere intoxication. In Ghalib's lexicon it is the state where the small self, the limited Ahamkara, becomes absent. The poet says this absence is not causeless. If the ego has slipped away, it is because something else has demanded its absence. Something so luminous, so intense, so total that the eye cannot bear to see it directly and so the mind arranges a veil. This is precisely the position of Vedanta. The Upanishads declare that the Self is ever present but is covered. The Katha Upanishad says:

"Na samparaye pratibhati balam pramadyantam vittamohena mudham"

This world and the next does not shine forth for the childish who are intoxicated and deluded by wealth.…... (Katha Upanishad 1.2.6 )

And then in the same Upanishad, the method of veiling is explained:

"Paranchi khani vyatrinat svayambhu tasmat paran pashyati nantaratman"

The self existent Lord pierced the senses outward, therefore one looks outward, not within....( Katha Upanishad 2.1.1).

Ghalib's parda daari is this outward piercing. The senses are made to look away because what is inside is too formidable to behold without preparation. Yog Vasishtha, which is the most poetic and most psychological of Vedantic texts, speaks again and again about this veil as Chitta or Sankalpa. Sage Vasishtha tells Sri Rama:

"Chittam eva hi samsaro raga adi klesha samyutam

Tad eva ashuddham samsarah shuddham moksha iti smritam." 

(The mind itself is samsara, together with attachment and affliction. That same mind, impure, is bondage, pure, it is called liberation.) .....(Yog Vasishtha 3.4.15)

Elsewhere Vasishtha is even closer to Ghalib:

"Drishtim jnanamayim kritva pashyed brahmamayam jagat"

Having made the vision full of knowledge, one should see the world as full of Brahman. .)....(Yog Vasishtha 3.4.19)

What Ghalib calls bekhudi, Vasishtha calls the moment when Drishti, ordinary perception, collapses. Why does it collapse without cause. Vasishtha answers, because the world you see is not the world that is. There is a parda.

"Mana eva manushyanam karanam bandha mokshayoh

Bandhaya vishayasaktam muktaye nirvishayam smritam"

(Mind alone is the cause of bondage and liberation for humans. Attached to objects it is bondage, free from objects it is liberation. )

Ghalib intuits this. His bekhudi is nirvishaya mind. It has become free from objects not by effort but because some greater attraction has pulled it. What is that something. Kuchh to hai. That indeterminate something is the central pointer of the Upanishads. They refuse to name it as a thing, for to name it would make it an object. The Brihadaranyaka Upanishad says:

"Yatra hi dvaitam iva bhavati tad itara itaram pashyati"

(Where there is duality as it were, there one sees another.).....( Brihadaranyaka Upanishad 4.3.31)

When that duality disappears, what remains cannot be called something in the ordinary sense. Yet Ghalib says kuchh to hai. The Upanishads say neti neti, not this, not this, and still affirm asti, it is.

"Tat tvam asi, " "That thou art. " .....(Chandogya Upanishad 6.8.7)

"Aham Brahmasmi," " I am Brahman.".... (Brihadaranyaka Upanishad 1.4.10)

"Prajnanam Brahma, " " Consciousness is Brahman." ...( Aitareya Upanishad 3.3)

"Satyam Jnanam Anantam Brahma," " Brahman is Truth, Knowledge, Infinite. " ...(Taittiriya Upanishad 2.1.1)

That kuchh is Sat, pure being, which veils itself by its own power. Yog Vasishtha explains this self veiling with extraordinary beauty:

"Yatha tarange kalalam yatha vahnau visphulingakah

Tatha aham ityadirupam chiti sphurati chitsvayam"

(As ripples in water, as sparks in fire, so the notion of I and so on flashes forth in consciousness by itself. )....(Yog Vasishtha 3.9.32)

And then:

"Jagat sarvam idam drishyam ajnanat svapnavat bhavet

Jnanat brahmamayam shantam iti prajna vidam matam" 

(All this visible world, through ignorance, becomes like a dream. Through knowledge, it is seen as tranquil and full of Brahman. This is the view of the wise. )...(Yog Vasishtha 3.11.7)

Parda daari therefore is not deception by another. It is self concealment. The Ishavasya Upanishad states it directly:

"Hiranmayena patrena satyasyapihitam mukham"

(The face of truth is covered by a golden vessel.) .....(Ishavasya Upanishad Verse 15)

Gold is luminous. The veil is not darkness but too much light. Bekhudi happens when the golden vessel shines so strongly that the eyes close.

Thus Ghalib's couplet becomes a perfect summary of Vedantic epistemology. The jiva experiences bekhudi, a loss of limited self awareness. Reason says this cannot be causeless. There must be a cause. The cause is not in the world of cause and effect. It is that which stands behind the veil and holds the veil in place, out of compassion, so that the unprepared mind is not burnt. That is bekhudi. And Ghalib, like a Rishi, does not claim to know what is behind the veil. He only affirms with utter certainty, "kuchh to hai" . Something is. That affirmation is "Shraddha" , which is the beginning of all inquiry in Vedanta.

( Avtar Mota )

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