hurdles we have to pass through in the practice of yoga. They are all epic descriptions
of these obstacles we have to face and the difficulties we have to overcome.
When everything is done, and we are in the hall of the divine Absolute, then the glory
dawns, which is the experience designated in the sutra of Patanjali as dharma-
megha samadhi. This is a grand experience, very majestic. Once we reach that state,
there is no fear. We are real masters. Prasaṁkhyāne api akusīdasya sarvathā
vivekakhyāteḥ dharmameghaḥ samādhiḥ (IV.29). We do not know why he has given this
name to it. It is a peculiar novelty of Patanjali. Many people interpret it in many
ways. What is ‘dharma’, and what is ‘megha’? If we look at the dictionary, we will see
that a very simple meaning is given. Dharma is virtue, righteousness; megha is
cloud. So what does dharma-megha—the cloud of righteousness, the cloud of
virtue—mean?
The meaning of this epithet in respect of this spiritual experience seems to be that
there will be a shower of virtue—not a virtue that we deliberately practise as a
sadhana, but a spontaneous rain of divine grace which will come like a flood of
showers from all sides. The virtues which we practise as a sadhana are different from
the virtues which automatically proceed as a spontaneous character of one’s
enlightened being. In the beginning they are efforts, but in the later stages they
become our own nature. We need not put on a switch to have the light; the light is
there, as is the case with the self-luminous sun. The dharma-megha is, therefore, an
indication that we are in the vicinity of the great goal. Though it has not been reached
yet, we have inklings of its presence. There are indications that we are approaching it.
Prasaṁkhyāne api akusīdasya sarvathā vivekakhyāteḥ dharmameghaḥ samādhiḥ (IV.29) is
the condition that precedes this experience of dharma-megha.
We should not have a desire even for such enlightenments as all-knowingness. “Let
me be all-knowing, all-powerful”—even such desires should not be there. Only then,
this dharma-megha comes. We are asked not to allow even the finest and subtlest
form of the ego to work even in this high or lofty plane because the ego, when it starts
working, can take a very fine ethereal shape. The desire to know all things has a
subtle background of the presence of one’s individuality, though it is a far, far
advanced form of individuality. And the power which follows, which is called
omnipotence, is also of a similar character. Of course, we do not know what actually
happens when there is omniscience or omnipotence. We have to have it, and only
then can we know what it is. But before it comes, it looks like a possession or an
endowment which would exalt a person to a lofty degree of status in the universe;
and all ideas of status must be shut down.
Even the enlightenment in respect of objects such as insight—the siddhis mentioned
in the Vibhuti Pada, the powers of different types, and the insights and intuitions
which may flash forth in respect of the different things of the universe—should not
enchant the mind even in the least, even in the minimum, because as we go higher
and higher, the delights are also subtler and subtler. The joys that we have in this
world are gross and crude, but even they are enough to catch us and entangle us. But
when we go higher, the joys are subtler. They can catch us more powerfully than the
joys of this earth, which are crude and impeded by the physical tabernacle.
There are no physical obstacles in the higher realms. The obstacle in the physical
world is the physical body. That is the object and, therefore, we cannot enjoy it