At the Purnakumbh at Prayag, with its millions of pilgrims, Adi Sankara’s Bhaja Govindam verse 17 suddenly comes to mind: “One may go to the Ganga Sagar on pilgrimage or undertake severe fasts or perform charity. (However) all schools of thought hold that, without wisdom, such a person will not find liberation in a hundred births.”
What is the jnana which Sankara deems essential for liberation?
It is the discrimination that eventually leads one to the direct knowledge of Self, without identification with body. It is the growing awareness that one may really not be the body or mind, that one might be the spirit, an integral part of the universe, the atma in param-atma.
Without this seed of awareness all pilgrimages are merely religious tourism, all charity just a balm for the heart. Often by strengthening the ego, these have an effect that is just the reverse of what is intended. What should be a matter of piety becomes a matter of pride.
Om Namah Shivay.
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