Kriya Yoga

Today we are going to discuss the direction of yoga called kriya yoga.

The word Yoga (starting with a capital letter) is identical to the word Religion; it means Mergence of an individual consciousness with the Primordial Consciousness (that is with the Creator, God-the-Father, Allah, Tao). The same word starting with a small letter means Path to such Mergence.

The word kriya means purification.

That is, the term kriya yoga should be interpreted as the path of purification of oneself (as a consciousness) to the Highest Subtlety of the Creator. Only if we have achieved such subtlety, can we come to Mergence with the Creator.

The Teachings of kriya yoga originate from great Babaji. His two Divine Incarnations took place in the near past. The first one of them was described by Yogananda in His books* published in the first half of the twentieth century. The second Incarnation happened from 1970 to 1984 in Indian Haidakhan, where Babaji materialized for Himself an adult body and lived in it fourteen years.

Let me note that the second Advent of Babaji was prophesized by Jesus Christ more than 2000 years ago. Jesus said: “When you see One Who was not born of a woman, fall on your faces and worship Him, for He is your Father”. These words are recorded in the apocryphal Gospel of Thomas.*

We know also the names of Lahiri Mahasai, Yukteshvar, and Yogananda, Who were Disciples of Babaji in His first (from two mentioned) Incarnation and attained Divinity.

In His second Incarnation, Babaji helped to achieve Divinity His Disciple Shastriji.

The same happened to Pavel Nahimov — who was an admiral of Russian fleet in the past. Later He was a personal Disciple of Babaji in both of His Incarnations and achieved Divinity too.

We were lucky to converse with all of these Divine Teachers.

But Babaji taught people not only during His Incarnations. He also provided spiritual help from the non-incarnate state to those deserving people who addressed Babaji for help. We were among them.

Babaji left to people of the Earth concise and profound spiritual Teachings; you can read about them in our book Classics of Spiritual Philosophy and the Present.

Now let us talk in more detail about kriya yoga.

So, kriya means purification. But what should we purify? And for what purpose? And, in general, what is the meaning of our existence on this planet?

From the Divine Teachings gifted to people by God, it follows that the meaning of our lives on the Earth consists in our development (as souls, consciousnesses) — with the purpose of achieving Divine Perfection in order to merge into the Creator and enrich Him in this way.

Jesus Christ expressed this idea very concisely: “Be perfect as your Heavenly Father is perfect!” This statement of Jesus is recorded in the New Testament.*

Apostle Matthew, telling about the Teachings of Jesus, said that the purpose of our spiritual efforts is attainment of Unity with the Heavenly King.*

Moreover, Apostle Philip wrote in His Gospel how Jesus taught to His closest disciples the meditative methods of cognizing such Unity.

(You may read about this in more detail in the book Classics of Spiritual Philosophy and the Present).

This is the essence of the Evolution of the Universal Primordial Consciousness: It creates and sends small particles of purusha, which are germs of human souls, to grow and develop on planets suitable for this. The formation of these germs happens on crystalline lattice of minerals; then they incarnate in bodies of plants, then — animals, and then — people.

So every one of us has gone through a long personal evolution on the Earth.

And all those plants and animals that we can observe now are people to be! Therefore, we have to treat them as our little brothers and sisters — that is carefully, tenderly, viewing them as not just bodies but also as evolving souls. And we have to help them in their evolution!

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What are the features of Divine Perfection? What qualities should we develop in ourselves on this Path?

The main qualities of God are Love, Wisdom, and Power. Also it should be noted that the Primordial Consciousness is the most subtle Manifestation in the multidimensional Universe (which is called also the Absolute).

It is in these directions that we have to develop ourselves.

Let me note that the power aspect of the consciousness is directly related to the size of the consciousness. Yet, on the spiritual Path it makes sense to grow the consciousness only if it has been refined already.

As for those who developed in themselves emotional coarseness, their destiny is hell: the “cesspool” of the evolving Absolute.

This allows one to create an image of a vector of multidimensionality, which goes through all the strata of the multidimensional Universe: from the Primordial Consciousness — to hell.

And every one of us has the possibility to use the freedom of will given to us by God and to walk in one or another direction along this vector of multidimensionality.

Approaching by the state of the soul the Divine end of this vector gives one the feeling of increasing bliss.

Approaching the hell gives one the nightmare of destructive emotional states, pain, life among similar beings, and eventually destruction of the soul… This is where the image of blazing inferno comes from…

(One can read about the evolutionary processes taking place in the Absolute in our book Ecopsychology).

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The information I am telling you now is not fantasy but knowledge imparted to people by God. This knowledge, according to the intent of God, has to unite all people in the common process of positive Evolution of consciousnesses. Babaji and all other Divine Teachers are willing to provide all Their Divine Powers to help people who walk this Path.

But how should one begin walking it?

Babaji suggested a very simple scheme consisting of five points; by mastering it, we can come to the higher stages of the spiritual Path. These points-principles are the following: Truth — Simplicity — Love — Karma yoga (that is service) — Abandonment of the lower self for the sake of Mergence with the Higher Self.

We described all these points in our books that I mentioned already. And now I am going just to explain them briefly.

The first point, Truth, implies a deep understanding of everything that we are discussing now.

Simplicity means an absence of haughtiness, arrogance, self-praise, self-admiration, contemptuous attitude toward others; it also implies lowliness in self-perception and in the way of life, absence of striving for luxury and for petty embellishment of the physical body.

Love means development of the whole spectrum of the emotions of love in oneself, refusal of all coarse and selfish emotional states. This can be mastered easily with the help of the art of psychic self-regulation and through the development of the spiritual heart.

Yet, love must be manifested not only in inner states but also in giving oneself to others for their sake.

Karma yoga is service to God through service to people in their evolutionary development. The personal selfish interest in the results of such work must be excluded.

The next point, Abandonment of the lower self for the sake of Mergence with the Higher Self, means refusal of egocentrism in behavior and in self-perception, and substituting it with God-centeredness. On the final stages of personal evolution, there must remain only one Self — the Self of the Creator, which is called the Higher Self. The inflated personal human self cannot allow this to happen; Mergence cannot take place in this case.

Let me explain that in the Abode of the Creator all Those dwelling in it exist in the state of mutual mergence, and therefore there is indeed only one United Self of the Primordial Consciousness.

It is only when someone of these perfect Souls comes to the Creation with the purpose of helping incarnated people — only then His or Her individuality is partly reconstructed.

I want to emphasize also that one’s full ethical transformation cannot happen instantly, for example just from listening to this conversation. No, it takes quite a long period of time. It also requires repenting one’s own ethical mistakes: in order not to repeat them again.

It is very useful to study in detail how Jesus Christ, Krishna, Sathya Sai Baba and other Divine Teachers discussed with Their disciples these problems of ethical self-transformation. (It is described in the books mentioned above and in other books).

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All that we have discussed here concerns the intellectual and ethical aspects of spiritual work, of spiritual purification. And now let us turn to some psycho-energetical methods.

I should note that there is no sense in trying to purify the organism of energetical contamination if one continues to contaminate it.

The main sources of such contamination are the following:

— using bodies of animals for food;

— one’s own coarse emotional states;

— emotional contacts with energetically coarse people; this is most important in the sphere of sexual contacts;

— influence of coarse, contaminating negative places of power.

Concerning purification, its methods can be the following:

— winter swimming, that is swimming in ice-cold water;

— various methods of physiotherapy that treat the body with electric currents of high frequencies, with magnetic fields, and so on;

— bioenergetical therapy, that is the methods used by healers;

— cleansing of the chakras and meridians with the help of the methods of raja yoga;

— receiving help from Divine Teachers — Holy Spirits — in special meditations, such as latihan or pranava;

— transformation of the energies of the body with one’s own hands of the consciousness developed through the methods of buddhi yoga.

What is the most efficient way of winter swimming, how to work with the chakras and main meridians — we are not going to discuss this now, because it was described in our book Ecopsychology and in our films; it hardly makes sense to talk about it again. Now let us talk about the methods that we received from Babaji and His Divine Disciples Yogananda and Yukteshvar.

Let us begin with the pranayama of Yogananda’s kriya. I should note that it can be done successfully only after cleansing the chakras — when the chakras become filled with pure goldish-white light.

(See demonstration of the exercises in the film).

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One of the laws of spiritual development is that one can enter subtle strata of the multidimensional universe only if the body has been brought to the corresponding level of purity and subtlety. Such purity and subtlety can be achieved, in particular, with the help of such methods provided that there was also a corresponding change in one’s way of life, which we discussed in this lecture and in our other conversations.

Only when we have become pure and subtle consciousnesses — we receive the possibility to see our Divine Teachers, to enter Their giant anthropomorphic Forms — Mahadoubles, to merge with Them, to learn to be Them.

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And when we have accumulated enough experience in this work — They will guide us further: to Their common Abode, the Abode of the Creator , where all They are One.

Divine Teachers let us into Themselves only if we have become giant spiritual hearts. How can one turn into such a heart is described in our other conversations and books.

Vladimir Antonov, Ph.D. (in biology)
(chapter from the book
Forest Lectures on the Highest Yoga)

Translated from Russian
by Mikhail Nikolenko