法则与自由
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中文
法则与自由
对于自由之人而言，斗争从来没有意义。但对我们而言，斗争是有意义的，因为正是名与色创造了这个世界。
在吠檀多（Vedanta）中，我们为斗争留有一席之地，但不为恐惧留有余地。当你开始彰显自己的本性时，一切恐惧都将消散。如果你认为自己被束缚，你就会继续被束缚。如果你认为自己是自由的，你就会是自由的。
那种我们在现象界中尚能感受到的自由，是对真实的一瞥，但尚非真实本身。
我不同意"自由即服从自然法则"这一观点。我不明白这是什么意思。纵观人类进步的历史，正是对自然的违抗构成了进步。或许有人会说，对低层法则的征服是通过更高的法则实现的。但即便如此，那征服的心智也不过是在追求自由；一旦它发现这种斗争同样受制于法则，它便想要征服那法则。因此，在每一种情况下，理想都是自由。树木从不违抗法则，我从未见过牛偷东西，牡蛎从未说过谎话，然而它们并不比人伟大。这个生命是对自由的巨大宣言；而对法则的服从，若推到极致，将使我们沦为纯粹的物质——无论在社会中、政治中，还是宗教中。过多的法则是死亡的确切征兆。无论在哪个社会中，若法则过多，那就是该社会即将衰亡的确切信号。如果你研究印度的特征，你会发现没有哪个民族拥有比印度教徒更多的法律，而民族的衰亡便是其结果。但印度教徒有一个独特的观念——他们从未在宗教中设立任何教条或信条；而宗教因此获得了最大的发展。永恒的法则不可能是自由，因为说永恒者处于法则之内，就是对它的限制。
在上帝那里不存在目的，因为如果有什么目的，祂就不会比人更高明。祂为什么需要任何目的？如果祂有目的，祂就会被目的所束缚。就会有某种在祂之外的、比祂更伟大的东西。例如，织毯工织了一块地毯，那构思存在于他之外，是某种更伟大的东西。那么，上帝要依照哪个构思来调整自己呢？正如最伟大的帝王有时也会玩弄玩偶，祂也在玩弄这个自然；而我们所称的法则就是如此。我们称之为法则，是因为我们只能看到运行顺畅的小小片段。我们关于法则的一切观念都在这小小片段之内。说法则是无限的，说石头在所有时间里都会下落，这是荒谬的。如果一切理性都建立在经验之上，五百万年前谁在那里见证石头是否下落？所以法则并非人的本质构成。科学对人的论断是：我们从哪里开始，就在哪里结束。事实上，我们逐渐超越法则，直到完全超脱，但带着整个生命的经验。我们在上帝和自由中开始，自由和上帝将是终点。这些法则处于我们必须经过的中间状态。我们的吠檀多始终是对自由的宣言。法则的观念本身就会令吠檀多学者恐惧；而永恒的法则对他来说是极其可怕的，因为那将意味着没有出路。如果有一条永恒的法则一直束缚着他，他和一片草叶有什么区别？我们不相信那种抽象的法则观念。
我们说，我们所要追寻的是自由，而那自由就是上帝。它与万事万物中的幸福是同一种幸福；但当人在有限之物中追寻它时，他只能得到一点火花。小偷偷窃时获得的幸福与在上帝中找到幸福的人所获得的是同一种幸福；但小偷只得到一点火花，却附带大量的痛苦。真正的幸福就是上帝。爱就是上帝，自由就是上帝；凡是束缚的，都不是上帝。
人已经拥有自由，但他必须去发现它。他拥有它，但每时每刻都在遗忘它。这种发现，无论是有意识的还是无意识的，就是每个人的全部生命。但圣贤与愚人的区别在于，一个是有意识地做这件事，另一个是无意识地做。每个存在都在争取自由——从原子到星辰。愚人满足于在某个限度内获得自由——如果他能摆脱饥饿或口渴的束缚。但圣贤感到还有更强的束缚必须被挣脱。他根本不会把红种人的自由视为自由。
按照我们哲学家的说法，自由是目标。知识不可能是目标，因为知识是一个复合体。它是力量与自由的复合体，而唯有自由是值得追求的。那就是人们所奋斗的。仅仅拥有力量并不等于知识。例如，一个科学家能将电击传送到数英里之外；但自然能将它传送到无限远。那我们为什么不为自然立像呢？我们想要的不是法则，而是打破法则的能力。我们想要成为超越法则之人。如果你被法则束缚，你将不过是一团泥土。你是否超越了法则并不是问题；但"我们超越了法则"这个信念——整个人类的历史就建立在它之上。例如，一个人生活在森林中，从未受过任何教育或获得任何知识。他看到一块石头落下——一个自然现象发生了——他认为那是自由的。他认为石头有灵魂，而其中的核心观念就是自由。但一旦他知道石头必然下落，他就称之为自然——死的、机械的运动。我可以上街也可以不上街。这就是我作为人的荣耀。如果我确定自己必须去那里，我就放弃了自己，沦为一台机器。自然以其无限的力量也不过是一台机器；唯有自由才构成有情的生命。
吠檀多说，森林中那个人的想法是对的；他的直觉是对的，但解释是错的。他把自然把握为自由而非受法则支配的东西。只有在经历了所有这些人类经验之后，我们才会回到相同的想法，但会以更具哲学性的方式来思考。例如，我想走到街上去。我获得意志的冲动，然后我停下；在意志与走上街头之间的那段时间里，我在均匀地运作。行为的均匀性就是我们所称的法则。我发现，我行为的这种均匀性被切割成非常短的片段，因此我不把自己的行为称为受法则支配的。我通过自由来运作。我走了五分钟；但在那五分钟均匀的行走之前，有意志的行动给出了行走的冲动。因此人说他是自由的，因为他所有的行为都可以被切割成小片段；虽然在小片段内存在着相同性，但超出这个片段就不存在同样的相同性了。在这种对非均匀性的感知中，就包含着自由的观念。在自然中，我们只看到非常大的均匀性片段；但开端和终结必然是自由的冲动。自由的冲动恰恰在起始处被给予，然后它持续运转；但这与我们的片段相比，要长得多。我们通过哲学分析发现我们并不自由。但有一个因素将始终存在，那就是"我是自由的"这个意识。我们必须解释的是，这种意识是如何产生的。我们会发现，在我们内心存在着两种冲动。我们的理性告诉我们，所有行为都是有原因的，但与此同时，伴随每一次冲动，我们都在宣称自己的自由。吠檀多的解答是：自由存在于内在——灵魂确实是自由的——但灵魂的行为渗透过身体和心智，而身体和心智是不自由的。
一旦我们作出反应，我们就成了奴隶。一个人责骂我，我立刻以愤怒的形式作出反应。他制造的一点振动使我成了奴隶。因此我们必须证明我们的自由。唯有那些圣者，在最高尚、最博学的人身上，在最低等的动物身上，在最卑劣、最邪恶的人身上，既不见人，也不见圣者，也不见动物，而在他们所有人身上见到同一个上帝——唯有他们才是圣者。即使在此生中，他们已经征服了相对性，坚定地立足于这种平等之上。上帝是纯净的，对一切众生都是相同的。因此这样的圣者就是活的上帝。这就是我们所趋向的目标；每一种崇拜形式，人类的每一个行为，都是达到这一目标的方法。想要金钱的人也在追求自由——摆脱贫穷的束缚。人的每一个行为都是崇拜，因为其理念就是达到自由，而一切行为，直接或间接地，都趋向于此。只不过，那些阻碍自由的行为应当被避免。整个宇宙都在崇拜，有意识地或无意识地；只是它不知道，即使在它咒骂的时候，它也以另一种形式在崇拜着它所咒骂的那同一个上帝，因为那些咒骂的人也在为自由而挣扎。他们从未想到，在对一件事物作出反应时，他们正在使自己成为它的奴隶。逆势而动是艰难的。
如果我们能够摆脱对自身局限的信念，我们此刻就有可能做任何事情。这只是时间的问题。如果确实如此，就增加力量，从而缩短时间。请记住那位教授的案例，他学会了大理石形成的秘密，用十二年制造出了大理石，而自然花了数个世纪才做到。
English
LAW AND FREEDOM
The struggle never had meaning for the man who is free. But for us it has a meaning, because it is name-and-form that creates the world.
We have a place for struggle in the Vedanta, but not for fear. All fears will vanish when you begin to assert your own nature. If you think that you are bound, bound you will remain. If you think you are free, free you will be.
That sort of freedom which we can feel when we are yet in the phenomenal is a glimpse of the real but not yet the real.
I disagree with the idea that freedom is obedience to the laws of nature. I do not understand what it means. According to the history of human progress, it is disobedience to nature that has constituted that progress. It may be said that the conquest of lower laws was through the higher. But even there, the conquering mind was only trying to be free; and as soon as it found that the struggle was also through law, it wanted to conquer that also. So the ideal was freedom in every case. The trees never disobey law. I never saw a cow steal. An oyster never told a lie. Yet they are not greater than man. This life is a tremendous assertion of freedom; and this obedience to law, carried far enough, would make us simply matter—either in society, or in politics, or in religion. Too many laws are a sure sign of death. Wherever in any society there are too many laws, it is a sure sign that that society will soon die. If you study the characteristics of India, you will find that no nation possesses so many laws as the Hindus, and national death is the result. But the Hindus had one peculiar idea—they never made any doctrines or dogmas in religion; and the latter has had the greatest growth. Eternal law cannot be freedom, because to say that the eternal is inside law is to limit it.
There is no purpose in view with God, because if there were some purpose, He would be nothing better than a man. Why should He need any purpose? If He had any, He would be bound by it. There would be something besides Him which was greater. For instance, the carpet-weaver makes a piece of carpet. The idea was outside of him, something greater. Now where is the idea to which God would adjust Himself? Just as the greatest emperors sometimes play with dolls, so He is playing with this nature; and what we call law is this. We call it law, because we can see only little bits which run smoothly. All our ideas of law are within the little bit. It is nonsense to say that law is infinite, that throughout all time stones will fall. If all reason be based upon experience, who was there to see if stones fell five millions of years ago? So law is not constitutional in man. It is a scientific assertion as to man that where we begin, there we end. As a matter of fact, we get gradually outside of law, until we get out altogether, but with the added experience of a whole life. In God and freedom we began, and freedom and God will be the end. These laws are in the middle state through which we have to pass. Our Vedanta is the assertion of freedom always. The very idea of law will frighten the Vedantist; and eternal law is a very dreadful thing for him, because there would be no escape. If there is to be an eternal law binding him all the time, where is the difference between him and a blade of grass? We do not believe in that abstract idea of law.
We say that it is freedom that we are to seek, and that that freedom is God. It is the same happiness as in everything else; but when man seeks it in something which is finite, he gets only a spark of it. The thief when he steals gets the same happiness as the man who finds it in God; but the thief gets only a little spark with a mass of misery. The real happiness is God. Love is God, freedom is God; and everything that is bondage is not God.
Man has freedom already, but he will have to discover it. He has it, but every moment forgets it. That discovering, consciously or unconsciously, is the whole life of every one. But the difference between the sage and the ignorant man is that one does it consciously and the other unconsciously. Every one is struggling for freedom—from the atom to the star. The ignorant man is satisfied if he can get freedom within a certain limit—if he can get rid of the bondage of hunger or of being thirsty. But that sage feels that there is a stronger bondage which has to be thrown off. He would not consider the freedom of the Red Indian as freedom at all.
According to our philosophers, freedom is the goal. Knowledge cannot be the goal, because knowledge is a compound. It is a compound of power and freedom, and it is freedom alone that is desirable. That is what men struggle after. Simply the possession of power would not be knowledge. For instance, a scientist can send an electric shock to a distance of some miles; but nature can send it to an unlimited distance. Why do we not build statues to nature then? It is not law that we want but ability to break law. We want to be outlaws. If you are bound by laws, you will be a lump of clay. Whether you are beyond law or not is not the question; but the thought that we are beyond law—upon that is based the whole history of humanity. For instance, a man lives in a forest, and never has had any education or knowledge. He sees a stone falling down—a natural phenomenon happening— and he thinks it is freedom. He thinks it has a soul, and the central idea in that is freedom. But as soon as he knows that it must fall, he calls it nature—dead, mechanical action. I may or may not go into the street. In that is my glory as a man. If I am sure that I must go there, I give myself up and become a machine. Nature with its infinite power is only a machine; freedom alone constitutes sentient life.
The Vedanta says that the idea of the man in the forest is the right one; his glimpse is right, but the explanation is wrong. He holds to this nature as freedom and not as governed by law. Only after all this human experience we will come back to think the same, but in a more philosophical sense. For instance, I want to go out into the street. I get the impulse of my will, and then I stop; and in the time that intervenes between the will and going into the street, I am working uniformly. Uniformity of action is what we call law. This uniformity of my actions, I find, is broken into very short periods, and so I do not call my actions under law. I work through freedom. I walk for five minutes; but before those five minutes of walking, which are uniform, there was the action of the will, which gave the impulse to walk. Therefore man says he is free, because all his actions can be cut up into small periods; and although there is sameness in the small periods, beyond the period there is not the same sameness. In this perception of non-uniformity is the idea of freedom. In nature we see only very large periods of uniformity; but the beginning and end must be free impulses. The impulse of freedom was given just at the beginning, and that has rolled on; but this, compared with our periods, is much longer. We find by analysis on philosophic grounds that we are not free. But there will remain this factor, this consciousness that I am free. What we have to explain is, how that comes. We will find that we have these two impulsions in us. Our reason tells us that all our actions are caused, and at the same time, with every impulse we are asserting our freedom. The solution of the Vedanta is that there is freedom inside—that the soul is really free—but that that soul's actions are percolating through body and mind, which are not free.
As soon as we react, we become slaves. A man blames me, and I immediately react in the form of anger. A little vibration which he created made me a slave. So we have to demonstrate our freedom. They alone are the sages who see in the highest, most learned man, or the lowest animal, or the worst and most wicked of mankind, neither a man nor a sage nor an animal, but the same God in all of them. Even in this life they have conquered relativity, and have taken a firm stand upon this equality. God is pure, the same to all. Therefore such a sage would be a living God. This is the goal towards which we are going; and every form of worship, every action of mankind, is a method of attaining to it. The man who wants money is striving for freedom —to get rid of the bondage of poverty. Every action of man is worship, because the idea is to attain to freedom, and all action, directly or indirectly, tends to that. Only, those actions that deter are to be avoided. The whole universe is worshipping, consciously or unconsciously; only it does not know that even while it is cursing, it is in another form worshipping the same God it is cursing, because those who are cursing are also struggling for freedom. They never think that in reacting from a thing they are making themselves slaves to it. It is hard to kick against the pricks.
If we could get rid of the belief in our limitations, it would be possible for us to do everything just now. It is only a question of time. If that is so, add power, and so diminish time. Remember the case of the professor who learnt the secret of the development of marble and who made marble in twelve years, while it took nature centuries.
文本来自Wikisource公共领域。原版由阿德瓦伊塔修道院出版。