DUAL & NON-DUAL DEVOTION
Extract from the book ''Sri Ramana Paravidyopanishad''
''The Supreme Science as of the Self as Taught by Sri Ramana ''
THE TWO PATHS
210 Such a one who knows the truth of non-difference by the intellect alone, but is unable to achieve experience of the true nature of the real Self, must strive to attain deliverance by devotion and self-surrender to God.
211 Only two paths are laid down for the aspirant to deliverance:
a. SELF-ENQUIRY. For the valiant, the quest of one’s own Self, (He must strive to attain deliverance by Self –enquiry)
b. DEVOTION AND SELF-SURRENDER TO GOD. For the fearful, self-surrender to God (He must strive to attain deliverance by devotion and self-surrender to God. What is called surrender of oneself to God is the final consummation of the practice of devotion)
In these two all the paths are included.
212 This two-fold path has been taught by the most holy one, Ramana, thus: ‘Either seek the root of the ego-sense [the ‘I’ that rises within the body] or surrender that ego-sense to God to have it destroyed [by His grace].’
213 That foolish man, who, considering himself as an advaitin, but not being valiant enough [to take to the quest as taught by Bhagavan] and who looks down upon devotion as inferior, lives in vain, without devotion to God. He is a man with a tainted mind.
214 In this samsara the devotee is like a pot let down into a well with a rope tied to it. The man without devotion is like a pot fallen into the well, without a rope being tied to it.
215 Those who are endowed with the diabolic temperament cannot have the right kind of devotion. Hence the good one should take hold of the divine temperament for practicing devotion to God.
DEVOTION DUAL AND NON-DUAL
229 Devotion is also of two kinds:
a. One with a sense of separateness(DUAL)
b. and the other with a sense of non-difference (NONDUAL).
The former is prescribed for the unrefined; the latter is excellent for the well-refined ones.
Dual devotion
230 If one, considering Him, who is only the Self, as other than oneself, worships Him in a form and by a name, then in course of time, through the clarification of his intellect, he surely reaches the supreme state. There is no doubt about this.
231 ‘If a man adores God, who is nameless and formless, he will be liberated from the bondage due to names and forms.’ Such is the teaching of Sri Ramana.
232 The man who, being endowed with the divine temperament, meditates with devotion on God with a form, will attain that same State [of deliverance] that one attains by meditating on Him as formless.
233 One may adore that one Being by name and in any form, as one likes. Among the forms of the supreme one, the wise one, whose mind is pure, will not see any superiority or inferiority..
The non-dual devotion
252 Since the better devotee approaches God as the Self, knowing that the notion of difference, due to the ego, is false, for this aspirant for deliverance, the annihilation of the ego will be accomplished quickly.