Did you listen to the silences?

"These oblations turn into the rays of the sun and taking him up they lead him, who performs the rites in these shining flames at the proper time, to where the single lord of the gods presides over all."

- from First Mundaka Upanisad, Canto II, verse 5. From Eight Upanisads, Vol. Two, trans. Swami Gambhirananda, Advaita Ashrama, Kolkata 700 014

In what the verse above presents, we find a sight of the meaning of silences in nature. Of the many, this too is a meaning. It refers to the realization that "Beyond all sound, all sight, beyond form, absolute, beyond all taste and touch, infinite, without beginning and without end, even beyond nature, the Unchangeable - he who realizes Him, frees himself from the jaws of death. It is, as it were, walking on the edge of a razor, the way is long and perilous, but struggle on, do not despair. Awake, arise, and stop not till the goal is reached. The one central idea throughout all the Upanishads is that of (self-) realization." - Swami Vivekananda, inside cover jacket flap, Eight Upanidads, trans. Swami Gambhirananda.

Something one would find similar in John Bunyan's The Pilgrim's Progress. Something that describe in part the nature of silence, amidst its many meanings - the meanings that get shared across cultures & time. The pious walks on a path that turns one pious; the criminal along another -seeking to mimic in mannerisms what fails he/she in substance. Thus marking and pushing the criminal faster along his/her path of destructive morbidities - upon envy. A good reason that the pious consider envy as one of the seven deadly sins. 

The pious seeks through his/her (self-) realization this verse in effect:

"And this one is the seer, feeler, hearer, smeller, taster, thinker, ascertainer, doer - the Purusa (pervading the body and organs), who is a knower by nature. He becomes wholly established in the supreme, immutable Self."

- from Praśna Upanisad, Fourth Question, verse 9. Eight Upanisads, trans. Swami Gambhirananda.

Thus the meanings change. The differences begin to reveal themselves in their qualitative differences that mimicry does not bridge. Or failing even the knowledge of what to mimic, the great impotent rage of the criminal - at the sage that does - threatening one with physical violence & disruptions. An old story that replays itself in human history. Over meanings, silences and where one reaches (and as what).

Given the thoroughly personal nature of any such journey, it is the criminal that makes penal authority a necessity. To save the sage, from the rage of the criminal, & the inept. 

When we do look around ourselves and, more importantly, 'within' we find ourselves. And what the cumulatives of each kinds that present us with their particular realities.

We begin to discover the meaning of the word refuge, from the refuse. We also then learn about the function of language & grammar. Or how else would one communicate what one is escaping from? It never is from a Sage, for the Sage is self-immersed and in speech or statements can only help one find and develop environments that help the pious. The Sage can only list, for posterity the travails of his/her own journey. Like John Bunyan does in his classic The Pilgrim's Progress,  and what one finds in works like The Seven Deadly Sins. 

The realm of the political is no different. Nor the realm of the modern which has been in defense of the personal nature of any quest, and thus guaranteeing the individual his/her every freedom from tyranny, and the criminal. 

The order of the pious help worlds of the poet & poetry. The one of tyrants and the criminals thus order themselves around violations - of the order of the sages. Thus marking for plaints as poetry even - in its plaintive cry for help, and of anguish! The self-immersed natures & necessities of the Sage result in the cumulative emergence of civilized anarchy. Of the criminal, in their cumulative emergence, results the  barbaric chaos.

So when we do find silences, is it not often useful to know of their various meanings too? Useful isn't it even when you & I would prefer the romantic silences that the Sages help create, as the fruits of their opulent orchards of emergence. The planet earth, for example? As one?!