M asks Sri Ramakrishna, " Is the world unreal?" Sri Ramakrishna answers, "Why should it be unreal? That's a speculation of the philosophers." Sri Ramakrishna loves a song that begins, "O Ma, make me drunk with Thy love. What need have I of knowledge or reason? Make me drunk with Thy love's wine." Being told about an atrocity, he said, " Who can understand why God destroys? I don't have to understand. The goal of life is to develop bhakti. I want to eat the mangoes, not count leaves.”
If one has been persuaded by Shankara that the world is unreal, certainly one will seek to find the Real. However, there are still plenty of reasons to seek God (the Real) even if the world is not unreal. First of all, it's temporary. Everything will pass: your loved ones, your wealth, your fame, your very life. Everything will decay. Your wife, so beautiful when you married, eventually is covered in wrinkles if she lives long enough. Most important: everything is a disappointment. As the Isha Upanishad says: “What seemed so bright, at last grows dim.” Addressing his male disciples, Sri Ramakrishna said, "Sex life with a woman, what happiness is there in that? There is a crore times more joy in realizing God." That's quite a ratio. A crore is 10 million.
Last, but not least, all the joys of the world are mixed with pain. Something negative raises its head. For many, life is mostly pain and just a little drop of joy.
So real or unreal, there is sufficient reason to strive for God. The clincher is, beginning with the Rishis (probably before even them), there have been people who have experienced the realm beyond the senses. What an incredibly blissful realm they discovered, all described in the Upanishads. ALL other discoveries pale by comparison. These other discoveries are trivial in terms of our ultimate happiness.
And now in our age, Sri Ramakrishna has come to remind us vividly of that realm. Once we have heard of it, how can we rest content without seeking it?
Well, in truth, plenty are not interested in it. They are not through, as Sri Ramakrishna says, with the enjoyment of worldly things such as love relationships, wealth, and fame. They must, life after life, taste how insipid all these are until they’ve had enough – until they realize they are “dim” and will never be anything else.
For earlier posts go to bill davis of ramakrishna.